Jazz Hands, Sparkle Crotch: Erika Schupe Pt. 9

[MakeitSew]

Really stunned by this news but have no snark for Erika. Good for her! She swallowed her pride and did what was the best for the kids. No snark here. Way to go! Now if only the Nauglers and Rods would follow suit. . .

[pancakes]

I wonder if it's a combination of factors rather than just one reason. Although I have one less child than she does and mine are, on average, younger I don't think it would be worthwhile for me to have an out of the house job. What happens when those otherwise sheltered kids are sick with every bug they encounter for the first six months? With my kids we've had months where one child or another was home sick or had a doctors appointment nearly every school day. Couple that with the need for after school care for the little kids and the sheer volume of housework with a family that size and I really doubt she has a job although she very well could be using this time as a way to try and make more off her blog or delve into some other money making venture at home.

I think finances could be playing a part in it but not in a she needs a job sort of a way. We homeschooled for years and it's expensive to do it well. What worked for one child might not work for the others so curriculum has to be replaced. There's ways to do it for next to nothing but those options are too time consuming for someone needing to plan lessons for a half dozen or more different grade levels. Outside activities, lessons, etc get expensive and the kids are old enough to know they're missing out if they don't get to do those things. Even with just three kids homeschooling we were easily spending $6-7k per year on materials, supplies, field trips, classes, sports, and lessons. That sort of money might be more than they can budget for.

[princessmahina]

1 hour ago, pancakes said:

I wonder if it's a combination of factors rather than just one reason. Although I have one less child than she does and mine are, on average, younger I don't think it would be worthwhile for me to have an out of the house job. What happens when those otherwise sheltered kids are sick with every bug they encounter for the first six months? With my kids we've had months where one child or another was home sick or had a doctors appointment nearly every school day. Couple that with the need for after school care for the little kids and the sheer volume of housework with a family that size and I really doubt she has a job although she very well could be using this time as a way to try and make more off her blog or delve into some other money making venture at home.

I think finances could be playing a part in it but not in a she needs a job sort of a way. We homeschooled for years and it's expensive to do it well. What worked for one child might not work for the others so curriculum has to be replaced. There's ways to do it for next to nothing but those options are too time consuming for someone needing to plan lessons for a half dozen or more different grade levels. Outside activities, lessons, etc get expensive and the kids are old enough to know they're missing out if they don't get to do those things. Even with just three kids homeschooling we were easily spending $6-7k per year on materials, supplies, field trips, classes, sports, and lessons. That sort of money might be more than they can budget for.

Homeschooling Shupe-style isn't all that expensive. They have a set of workbooks than they don't consume (just answered on lined paper), they don't do experiments or outside activities (or if they do, she doesn't talk about it), and she doesn't really care if something doesn't work for a child. It was all very Maxwellian. 

Somehow, I don't think it's finances. If they weren't going to change things up when he was literally jobless and they had no income coming in, I don't think they'd change for that reason now. I think it's Bob, getting tired of their weird lifestyle. 

[Coy Koi]

19 minutes ago, princessmahina said:

I think it's Bob, getting tired of their weird lifestyle. 

That's my best guess too. It would also explain why Erika has nothing to say about the changes, if it wasn't her choice and she's not happy about it. If she really thought it was for the best, I think she'd want to explain why. So if we're right and it was Bob's doing, this must be killing Erika, the biggest control freak on the planet!

[elliha]

Go Erika and Bob! The kids are even going to school, that is great. I think Bob is the main reason for this, but another theory might have been that one or several of the kids have special needs and the CPS visit they had might have led to the children being tested and they might have been strongly encouraged to put them in school and then the family decided to do this for all of them?

[Hane]

I'm with @princessmahina: I think Bob got fed up. It may have started a year or more ago when he put Halloween stuff on his FB, while her blog was full of anti-Halloween "Christian" blather. I think it went like this: "Geez, Erika--that stuff on your blog is making my customers make fun of me! I have a business to run, and if I lose customers, we lose this house and nobody gets to eat. So dial it the f*ck back."

[lauraloralara]

I really hope Erika got a job. I could see her being the receptionist or something similar at a Christian school in her area.

[alba]

11 hours ago, lauraloralara said:

I really hope Erika got a job. I could see her being the receptionist or something similar at a Christian school in her area.

The idea of calling up my children's school and being greeted by Erika's perkiness makes me shudder.

[DarkAnts]

On 10/13/2016 at 0:28 PM, alba said:

Didn't the babies sleep in Erika's closet? Why would Karen be getting up to feed them when she's in another room?

Because Erika could not feed both of them at the same time. Her schedule would have been off if she feed them one at a time.

[princessmahina]

2 minutes ago, DarkAnts said:

Because Erika could not feed both of them at the same time. Her schedule would have been off if she feed them one at a time.

So the best solution was clearly to wake up her teenage daughter to feed the baby instead of...the husband who helped create them. 

Ugh, that woman.

[mango_fandango]

3 hours ago, princessmahina said:

So the best solution was clearly to wake up her teenage daughter to feed the baby instead of...the husband who helped create them. 

Ugh, that woman.

Apparently Bob "needed" a full night's sleep to be able to function properly at work. Erika then went on to say that it was only half an hour so Karen wasn't that tired during the day. 

Karen was 12 when the twins were babies. A 12 year old getting a proper nights' sleep is more important than a grown man getting a proper night's sleep. 

If I were 12 and had baby twin siblings, sure I'd love to help my mom feed them... during the day. I would not have wanted to be woken up in the middle of the night. 

[ILoveJellybeans]

Needed a full nights sleep to function properly at work?? That is not more important than a teenager getting a good night's sleep. In fact, its something that happens very frequently, some people go back to work before their baby has started sleeping through the night yet. Doesn't mean they have to make their oldest child get up.

[atlantagirl30084]

6 hours ago, ILoveJellybeans said:

Needed a full nights sleep to function properly at work?? That is not more important than a teenager getting a good night's sleep. In fact, its something that happens very frequently, some people go back to work before their baby has started sleeping through the night yet. Doesn't mean they have to make their oldest child get up.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't Bob out of work during the time of the twins' birth?  Meaning he didn't even have to get up to go to work?  I mean, obviously, he would be looking for a job, but he wouldn't have had a strict 9-5 schedule for that.  So a 12-year-old had to sacrifice her sleep so her unemployed father could get his full 8 hours.  Great priorities. /s

[EmiGirl]

My cousins had to feed, diaper, etc their baby sister when they were 9 and 11 day and night.

[Anonymousguest]

17 minutes ago, atlantagirl30084 said:

Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't Bob out of work during the time of the twins' birth?  Meaning he didn't even have to get up to go to work?  I mean, obviously, he would be looking for a job, but he wouldn't have had a strict 9-5 schedule for that.  So a 12-year-old had to sacrifice her sleep so her unemployed father could get his full 8 hours.  Great priorities. /s

That's what I remember too. I have one daughter who loved her baby sibling so much, she voluntarily did do much mothering. But only during the day. It would never cross my mind to have a pre-teen get up in the night, every night, to care for my other children. Maybe in extreme circumstances, illness or whatever, but not as a solution to my scheduling problems. I wonder how Karen feels about having her own extra sized family. I know a couple girls who are the oldest in families of ten and eleven, and one does not plan to have any at all, and the other says no more than 4 well spaced. 

[ViolaSebastian]

I'd also say there's a big difference between allowing a sibling to contribute to the care of an infant and expecting them to do so. Diapering and feeding can be a healthy way to encourage bonding between older and younger siblings, but waking them up in the middle of the night and expecting them to do so? No bueno. 

[atlantagirl30084]

2 minutes ago, ViolaSebastian said:

I'd also say there's a big difference between allowing a sibling to contribute to the care of an infant and expecting them to do so. Diapering and feeding can be a healthy way to encourage bonding between older and younger siblings, but waking them up in the middle of the night and expecting them to do so? No bueno. 

I agree.  A sibling's chores should never include being the primary nighttime caretaker of their infant sisters.  A good parent who brings a child into this world will not demand that of an older child.  That is not their responsibility, especially if both parents are able to do so.  That Bob allowed, or told Karen that she needed to do that, tells me just how much of a man he really is.  I hope that these recent changes mean he found his spine (or another two things) and stood up to Ericka.  Or maybe Karen got sick of all that crap and took the first step outside the baby gates of that family. 

[mango_fandango]

I totally understand someone needing a proper nights' sleep. But what I don't quite get is that it was half an hour in the schedule, and that apparently Karen functioned fine during the day. IDK. Maybe Bob is one of those people who really needs uninterrupted sleep. Not sure, but at the time I don't think Karen got up as early as her parents. So maybe she got more sleep at night overall.

But then, of course, he was unemployed for five months following the twins' birth. Erika's "sleep training" techniques mean that she dropped the night feedings after three months IIRC. So, really, IDK.

 

[QuiverFullOfTacos]

I'm glad the kids are in school, and I really hope Erika is working outside the home, even just part-time. I realize there are some situations (such as having a large number of young children who would need day care) where it makes more sense to have one parent at home, but I really, truly think it's a good thing for women to be in the work force if at all possible, in any capacity. Children grow up, but the opportunities one can get from a job can last for years.

[THERetroGamerNY]

Well, I'll ve damned... All these changes. I'm going with the finances forced it theory, which makes sense... 

[alba]

I know a woman who was, last I saw her, the oldest of twelve siblings (we were both around 20 at the time). When her youngest sister was born, for some reason rather than sleeping in the parents' bedroom upstairs she slept in this woman's bedroom downstairs, and every time she woke to be fed in the night her older sister had to take her upstairs to their mum to be fed (presumably breastfed). Yes, she was an adult, rather than a preteen, but I remember being horrified that her parents would allow such a thing to happen.

Her family are farmers, so I'm sure her father needed to be up early and needed his sleep, but even so I was aghast that this was, apparently, not a big deal for her. Even assuming her father really needed uninterrupted sleep (which, honestly, I can appreciate, if he's operating tractors and other machinery on the farm) and her mother was on bedrest after a difficult birth, why on earth have the baby and the woman who has to pick her up sleeping in a separate room from the woman who actually feeds the child?

[formergothardite]

Wow! I bet those kids are loving school. No way Erika actually wanted to do this, something(or someone) forced her to change. She is probably going to try to hide it as long as possible while she tries to write a blog post explaining the change all while still maintaining the "I'm better than the rest of you" line. 

[sta_sha]

Holy cow, Erika! I'm away for away few days and you let slip that the kids are in school?!?

 

I never thought I'd see it.  Hopefully that the kids are enjoying themselves and are making friends that aren't siblings. It's too bad Karen (and possibly Melanie?) didn't have the opportunity as well. 

 

[elliha]

I am in agreement that Karen shouldn't have had to get up in the middle of the night to feed the twins, I am sure Erika could have handled herself even for example by placing them in front of her and feeding one with each hand. My sister's sister in law (that is not a relation you talk about that often) had twins and would bottlefeed both of them like that when she was home alone. It is of course better to feed a child while holding it in your arms but once a night is not likely to cause any problems at all. 

On the other hand, one has to remember that Karen is the oldest of a big family and likely 1. Was bored out of her mind doing everything according to schedule and being treated like a toddler so getting to do something different might have been fun even if she had to get up at night 2. Was likely also starved of attention and appreciation from her mother and having half an hour with her with only the babies who don't really say or do much might have been nice. I don't think Erika made the right choice in this but I am not sure it is something Karen necessarily thought was bad at the time or even now. 

[CTRLZero]

3 hours ago, formergothardite said:

Wow! I bet those kids are loving school. No way Erika actually wanted to do this, something(or someone) forced her to change. She is probably going to try to hide it as long as possible while she tries to write a blog post explaining the change all while still maintaining the "I'm better than the rest of you" line. 

(@formergothardite - it's nice to see you again!)

Erika seems so similar to my former neighbors, who took every opportunity to slight those of us whose children were not 100% religiously homeschooled (even giving interviews for papers, etc.).  They finally moved away from us reproduction-controlling heathens, but it turns out that they put their children into high school.  The older kids are now grown-ups with good jobs, which required some community college courses after graduation.

Whether Erika's reasons are financial, teacher burnout, and/or realization that her kids need more educational options to succeed, I wish the best for her family.