Parenting Through the Unexpected: Type 1 Diabetes, Homeschooling, and Finding Our Way

Our journey to homeschooling did not come in the typical way. I hadn’t researched for years like some parents do; I hadn’t dreamed about unhurried nature walks, teaching my children how to read, and learning fractions while baking our favorite cookies. We came to homeschooling by way of fear and uncertainty that only comes with an unexpected medical diagnosis. 

The irony is that I, myself, had been homeschooled from middle school through high school. I had loved it as a teenager and was proud to have it as part of my history and heritage. However, when my husband and I started having children, the conversation about educational choices never came up, and it never occurred to me that we would choose it as an option.

Which is why, when my two younger children started begging me to be homeschooled in the fall of 2024, I literally found myself laughing out loud and saying things like “Nope… nope on a rope. Not unless there is a significant medical issue….” My children persisted; so did I.  I do remember asking my husband privately if I was crazy for not considering it, but even he thought the idea was ridiculous. 

And then, just a few weeks later, my son was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes the same week he turned 8 years old. Our entire world was turned upside down with fear and grief. And, I remember knowing in my gut almost immediately that we needed to pull my son and my middle daughter out of school for a bit to take a beat, to allow space to process our grief, and to find our new normal. My oldest, who was a sophomore at the time, was also given the same choice; however, she preferred to stay at her charter school, and we were more than supportive of this. 

The initial plan was to take the rest of the school year off and regroup, with the hope of going back the following year. I remember passing by their old school on the way to or from somewhere, and feeling like I was being gut-punched every time. I remember feeling haunted by it, like my kids should still be there running around on the playground at recess with the rest of their friends, even though I never felt like we had made the wrong decision to pull them out. I think that is how grief sometimes shows up, as glimpses of the life you once had that is no more. I imagine others may resonate with this. 

It is now 2026 and we are in our third year of homeschooling. I would be lying if I said I had everything figured out, because I definitely do not. I don’t know how long we will continue to do this. There are some days I feel empowered to homeschool all the way through high school graduation. Truthfully, there are also days I don’t know if I can do this another minute. But I do know that this process has been incredibly sanctifying and beautiful. And we are taking it one year at a time. 

I would love to hear from you, too. Whether you homeschool, send your children to traditional school, or have found yourself navigating a path somewhere in between, I’m curious whether your family’s unique circumstances, whether a medical diagnosis, learning difference, or unexpected season of life, led you to make choices you never imagined making? What has that journey looked like for your family? There is no one-size-fits-all approach to raising a family, and I look forward to learning from one another’s stories.