Tough Decisions Ahead - advice please

[cariad]

I am battling two crucial but unrelated dilemmas for my kids.

I'll go with the more straightforward one first: Aidan is ill. Very, very ill. I've taken him to the doctor - viral cough, not much to be done, and so on. In sorting through everything we have in our possession I found a stash of TamiFlu that expired in 2006. When my baby was deathly ill one Halloween, we called our GP at home and asked if we could dissolve a capsule in some juice and give him about half and he said yes. We did this and it was like a miracle cure. Dyl was 3 at the time and the capsules were expired. The GP here does not know us well yet, and I will try to get him over the road to the office, but I guess I want to know if I should try this for Aidan. He is 10 and weighs around 34 kilos. I would probably give him a full capsule.

Second question is about Dyl and "may be offensive to some viewers". Seriously, this is about Christianity and if you do not want to know my true feelings about your religion and its institutions, especially Catholicism, please stop right here.

I had my hair done yesterday and mentioned to the stylist that we are going to move to (hopefully) get my son into a great school in the centre of town. She and I live in the same area it turns out, and she said she knew of an opening at a "wonderful" school where she sends her daughters, and the opening was in Dyl's year. It is a Catholic school. I read the Ofsted report on the school and I have never read one more glowing - there was not one criticism of this school, the kids find the classes fun, they learn a lot, they feel supported by teachers and parents. If we got him in there we would not need to move.

On this news, Gwyn and I went out to look at the school last night, literally prowling around their grounds peering in windows because they cannot show us the school until after the holidays but we have to make housing decisions as soon as we can. I rang up the school and told the woman outright we are not Catholic and she said "oh, we have children of all faiths here". OK, but I suppose I should have asked "What about children of no faith?" I called the council and they said that spaces are allocated to baptized Catholic children first, then children within a certain boundary (which I do not believe we live in) and then to whomever is closest to the school after that. There is one child on the wait list but this parent said there were two spaces in Dyl's year and the school seemed to corroborate.

I called my father I was so distressed about this. I said from the Ofsted report it looked like it would be a fantastic school, but could I hand my child and his trust and his mind over to this organization that I find quite reprehensible. My father is all about education, so he basically said "Oh, they made me pray every morning when I was in school, it didn't do me any harm." I said "Well, you were practicing Jewish, right? Didn't that help?" to which he sort of gave a very, very hesitant "maybe". I know he encountered anti-semitism as a child, so perhaps it actually made it worse. We have friends in America who send their kids to Catholic school - God alone knows why since the mother is constantly on high-alert for sexual abuse. And she pays tuition for that! She is Catholic I assume (Irish) but she has said things about "pretending to be into it". I won't pretend anything. (In this country, parents have been known to baptize their kids just to get them into a better school!)

My son is very interested in religious beliefs, and when I told the stylist this she said lightly "well, they'll cram it down his throat there!" She said they hold mass every Monday and she found that "a bit much" but she could not say enough good things about the school. I have a friend in Detroit who sent her kids to Catholic school to get them a better education, but then she would complain about all the mentions of Jesus and the emails requesting prayers. Could never think of a nice way to say "Erm, what did you expect?"

The stylist seemed to indicate that the preaching is about being a good person, but I suppose being American, I am worried they will use the access to impressionable children to preach about abortion or homosexuality or any of the other issues that I do not want anyone but Gwyn and I talking to Dyl about. I think we are going to risk losing out on renting a property before the holidays to give ourselves a bit more time to decide what to do. I am worried that if we do send Dyl there, we will just never fit in since we are not Catholic and don't live in their community. I am so reluctant to give up on the other school, because I felt really at home there. If I move Dyl mid-year and a place opens up at the town centre school, do I move him twice in one year? Would you send your child to a school that promotes a different religion/ideology to your own?

Thoughts on one or both questions welcome.

[cassandra]

Hi Cariad, well on question one, concerning the antibiotics, I would not give the Tamiflu, for probably a viral cough.
I would give him a good coughmixture, and keep him warm, and make him rest 
(that's what I give hubby when he thinks he's about to leave this planet)

And concerning your second question, I don't actually know.
On the one hand, children are very impressionable, so you mind find 'difficult discussions' with Dyl, later on. But he might get a good education, and it means you don't have to move (again)

I might add, I've never been to school in this country. Went to a protestant school in the Netherlands, (protestant parents) and grew up to be an atheist with quite a bit of knowledge about the bible, and its followers, which I do not consider to be a bad thing.

What does Dyl want?

take care, Cas

[MaryD]

And perhaps paracetamol to help bring his temperature down if he has one.

[KarenInWA]

Just wanted to chime in here...

Tamiflu is not an antibiotic, it is an anti-viral. The drug companies would never make an antibiotic with the word "flu"in it, knowing full well that the flu is a virus, and not bacteria.

The generic name for Tamiflu is oseltamivir. The suffix "vir" indicates it's an anti-viral. Many IHD patients have been on various "vir" drugs for things like the CMV virus and the BK virus.

Here is an interesting article about using expired Tamiflu that I found online:

http://www.ukmedix.com/tamiflu/tamiflu_may_be_used_after_expiry_date_in_a_pandemic_situation4650.cfm

KarenInWA

[MooseMom]

Is the Catholic school that much better than the town centre school?

[jbeany]

No experience with Tamiflu at all, so no opinion to offer there.

My thoughts on Catholic school as another non-believer (or whatever you want to refer to a Humanist as) - no.  Just no.   

"The preaching is about being a good person."  Except this is an organization that doesn't think you are a good person if you are gay, or have premarital sex, or even consider having an abortion, or get depressed enough to commit suicide.  Heck, babies who haven't had water splashed on their heads are punished if they die.  Add in the whole crackers and wine really and truly become the blood and body of a dead guy, and then think again about what you are asking your child to ignore for 8 hours a day, 180 days of the year.

And think about whether he's going to have to pretend to believe to get along with his classmates.  Children can be far crueler than adults.  I have friends whose parents were raised Catholic but no longer practice.  My friends were sent to Catholic school for the education, too.  They were miserable - and it didn't take them long to demand to go back to public school where they wouldn't get shunned for being "sinners"  - and some of the teachers were just as bad as the kids.

Here's hoping the Catholics stopped reading this when you suggested they stop. 

[MaryJoe]

Gosh jbeany, you forgot to throw in the virgin birth.

[MooseMom]

Cariad, I don't think you'd ever be really comfortable with having either of your boys at a Catholic school.  There are more elements that go into making such a decision than a glowing Ofstead report.  If the school in your town is "really great", then I'm sure your boys will do just fine there, and you will be saved the angst of having them in a religious school.  I think you already have your answer.

[jbeany]

Gosh jbeany, you forgot to throw in the virgin birth.

LOL!  See, and that's the only part that ever made sense to me.  Plenty of girls get pregnant before they get married and claim they are still virgins....

[Poppylicious]

I can't help with Aidan (hope he's better soon) but regarding the Dyl dilemma ... I went to a C of E (Church of England) school.  This was purely because it was my local catchment primary school in my village and back then you went to the local school; there was none of this fannying about, choosing which school to send your children to.  We sang hymns in assembly, all went up to the parish church for religious occasions and had the vicar pop in to see us regularly. As far as I know the school is still a C of E one, but families have been known to move to the area to get their children in because it IS a good school.  My nephews go to a Church of Wales primary school, again purely because it's their local catchment area one and is a good school; neither my brother nor my SiL are religious and the boys haven't been Christened or regularly taken to church. They always have lots of funny stories about the parish vicar though!

Obviously these are different to catholic schools (I'm sure that when I was a nipper you only went to a catholic primary/high school if you were a practising catholic) but I suppose what I'm trying to say is that I don't see a problem with it, as long as you and Dyl are happy with it.  I have absolutely no experience of catholic schools (I wouldn't be able to use my teaching qualification to teach in one because my specialism is RE and I'd HAVE to be a practising catholic to teach that!) and I don't know if the 'you're allowed to withdraw your child from RE lessons and assemblies' applies at catholic schools (which would be where you'd mostly get the fixed religious views from). In science lessons they will still have to teach about evolution and I'm sure they're not supposed to indoctrinate even in religious faith settings. I can't say if you can compare Amercian catholic schools to British ones (if you have to pay to go to a catholic school in America this would make them very different to ours).  I assume the one you are thinking about is not a fee-paying independent school!

Having said all that though, I think if it is such a dilemma for you it's one you shouldn't even be considering, and certainly not one you need to consider with so little time to completely weigh up the options.

Also, it is okay to sometimes ignore Ofsted reports; they're not all they're cracked up to be and often don't give a wholly accurate representation of the school. 

 

[willowtreewren]

I think I'm going to chime in with a firm agreement with Jbeany.

Yes, most of us who are now "practicing" atheists had some kind of religious upbringing BUT, not on a daily basis as a captive audience. Knowing that Dylan is still at a VERY impressionable age doesn't help. You would be putting him in a compromising position where you would have to debrief him on SOME of what he learned at school without undermining his general education. I just don't think this is emotionally sound practice.

If he were older, maybe. You could give him lessons on discerning mumbo-jumbo from verifiable information.

And then, too, think about how much anxiety you might feel while he is at school without knowing how subtly (or overtly) the indoctrination was commencing. You would be unable to second guess everything that might be presented.

I would advise going with a (mostly) secular school if you can.

Aleta

[SooMK]

I wouldn't send my child to a parochial school even if it was a better school. My kids had a hard enough time being raised as non believers in the public schools since so many of their friends went to CCD and so on. I always joked about being a heathen and my kids never complained about  it but I know at least one adult actually made some negative comment to my child. Some people may not feel like believers particularly but that's how they were raised and are fine going along with whatever in order to get a good education for their kids. But you have pretty strong objections to religious teachings so I don't think it would be worth it. Seems like Dyl would be getting caught between what he's learning at school and what he's learning at home and that would get old quick and might lead to some unpleasantness.  Most kids want to fit in and I think school is tough enough without stacking the deck. Good luck on both your decisions.

[Sydnee]

This is coming from a Christian, home schooling, mother so take it with a gain of salt.

I would not put my child in a school that I don't agree with what they are teaching. The catholic school in our community is good academically but squelches independent thought and creativity. Along with teaching catholic beliefs, I wouldn't be able to handle any of it.

[Rain]

This is my opinion being a praticing catholic.  Growing up my parents took me to church but explained to me that you don't have to believe everything the church was preaching.  just have an open dialogue with your son. 

[galvo]

As a practicing Muslim, I find this anti-Catholic bias from other so called Christians and non-believers, as both amusing and sad.

[YLGuy]

Okay, I am Catholic and I kept on reading. lol.  It really is different from school to school.  My ex went to Catholic school in Connecticut growing up and it was very much about indoctrination.  We got married in the same church that she graduated high school in.  They had Mass in Italian.  There is a Catholic High School out here in California.  I know a number of people who send their children there.  It is a very good school and is very open to students not of the Catholic faith.  So, I would have a VERY open and honest conversation with the school about your concerns. 

I hope all works out with the school.  Of course I hope your little guy gets better fast.  You and your family are in my thoughts prayers (couldn't hurt).
With all my love,
Marc

[justjen321]

As someone who is not really 'Athiest', (I think of myself as a humanist) who used to teach Sunday School and run the teen groups for a Christian church, leaving when I finally had had enough of the hypocrisy of 'organized religion':

I can speak only for me, and how I chose to handle that with my children. I would never, ever have allowed them into a parochial school of any faith, because it was important to me that they explore any and all faiths THEY chose to explore, should they choose to explore them. Parochial schools present their faith because well, that's why they are there.

You've visited a school you felt at home in. For me, if I were in your shoes, and felt the way you wrote about feeling, it's a non starter. Not even an issue. I'd go where I felt at home, and comfortable that my child was getting his book learning, and that his spirituality would be left to his parents, and more importantly for me, to HIM to decide.

[galvo]

Do you think it appropriate to accept a "catholic" kidney?

[cariad]

I really want to respond in detail to these posts - the points are wonderful and many are issues that I had not even thought about - but I am pressed for time as we are due at my brother-in-law's down south in a few hours. I do need to address these posts:

As a practicing Muslim, I find this anti-Catholic bias from other so called Christians and non-believers, as both amusing and sad.

Do you think it appropriate to accept a "catholic" kidney?

Galvo, darling, have I inadvertently offended you? I don't know if I just did not make myself clear or if you understood me perfectly and are still "saddened" but when, for example, I say that I find the Catholic church reprehensible, I refer to the worst of their actions, their cover-up of the sexual abuse of children and the refusal of any acting pontiff to address it and intervene. Milwaukee's own former Archbishop Timothy Dolan is known to have done his part to attempt to deny justice to victims, and then he was promoted up the religion's corporate ladder when he was made Cardinal of New York. Of course, this has nothing to do with the millions of members of the laity, some of whom are (or were before we lost touch) dear friends. I have found most - if not all - organized religion to be reprehensible when you get toward the top where the money and power lies. I don't know all of my friends religious views because it is irrelevant to our friendship, just as my humanism is.

Not only would I accept a Catholic kidney, I would accept it for one of my boys if (heaven forbid) one of them needed a transplant as a child. I think such a kidney's power to influence my boys' views might be significantly less than a teacher who would see my child 6+ hours per day for four years.

I probably should have just said "this is a school with a certain religious leaning that I don't share, would any of you be able to do this in my position" and left the details out. I guess I just like the sound of myself typing, because I rarely can keep these questions brief. My kids are currently learning about different religions in RE (religious education) and I think it's great. I teach them to not prejudge and discriminate, but I also teach them that their views are as important as anyone else's. We'll see how things turn out in about 15 years.

I truly did not see any anti-Catholic bias in the responses, in fact I thought everyone was able to separate out the difference between talking about institutionalized religion and the followers. If you don't mind, please let me know which comments you found sad. I apologize in advance for any that I made.

[jbeany]

As a practicing Muslim, I find this anti-Catholic bias from other so called Christians and non-believers, as both amusing and sad.

In my case, it's not anti-Catholic, it's anti-Organized Religion.  None of them work for me.  I have issues with bits and pieces of all of them - most often the way they are used against anyone who doesn't fit a certain mold the religion has decided is acceptable.  To me, the Catholic church is less tolerant than many others.

The real question was about sending your child to a school that is based on a religion you don't believe in, and if you would be comfortable with your child being exposed to/indoctrinated in beliefs you don't follow.  I would follow my parents' choice to expose my child to different religions, but the indoctrination and pressure to conform at a religious school, especially a Catholic one, wouldn't be acceptable to me.

[justjen321]

Accepting a 'Catholic Kidney' is rather a non-starter, yes? Far as I know, the kidney doesn't affect ones spiritual upbringing at all.

I don't think there so much anti-catholic sentiment amongst this thread as there is advice suggesting that having a child immersed in a world of a religion one does not practice is likely very difficult. But I genuinely don't see anti-Catholic bias at all.

I'm a believer that somewhere, at their core, most religions are saying almost exactly the same thing. They all have some different window dressings, but at the core, the product is very, very similar. Be good to one another. Give more to the world than you take from the world. The end.

I chose to purposefully avoid organized religion after immersing myself in it for years, because I found the window dressing to be just so much clutter, it affected peoples ability to hear the REAL 'product'. I am also a huge fan of personal responsibility, and I prefer to ask myself 'Jennifer, is this how you should be behaving/acting/speaking to be true to your core?' versus 'Jennifer, you know your 'deity of choice' would frown on this behavior.'

So for me, it has nothing to do with 'Catholic' and everything to do with 'a religious school' at all. I truly do want my children to venture forth, and sample ALL that is out there to find what works for them.

[Jean]

Girls, I really think Galvo is pulling your legs as far as the " catholic kidney" is concerned. He is famous for that.

[cariad]

Girls, I really think Galvo is pulling your legs as far as the " catholic kidney" is concerned. He is famous for that.

Oh, I hope so, Jean. It was the first comment more than the second that worried me. You're right - he usually is just having a bit of fun with us. Now if he would just come back and clarify....

[CebuShan]

My grandfather was Catholic but he only went on Christmas and Easter. When I was 9, they tried to get me into a Catholic school but I was refused because my we didn't attend Church regularly! As an adult, I have found a Church that I really love. But I think I would have a problem sending a child somewhere that I was uncomfortable.
You may not share my beliefs but I will pray that you will find the answer that is right for you and Dyl.

[lmunchkin]

Been a couple weeks, but came across your post Caraid. As far as the Expired Tamflu, eeh, I think 2006 is a bit of a stretch. I wouldn't risk it.

As far as the school, I share your concern also.  As a Christian, I was always concerned for my daughters schooling. What she would be exposed to. Her elementary years K-4 was spent in public schools.  I was able to put her in a private Christian school 5-6.  She loved it there and we wished at the time it had gone all the way through 12th.  It does now, but back then it didn't.

So she had to go back to public school 7-12.  Students with all different views there, but they were kind of like in "clicks" if you know what I mean.  She had her group of friends, and other groups had theirs.  All in all, she turned out to be a pretty good girl with a family of her own.  If she had ended up with different views than mine, I still would love her just the same.

Id say just trust your gut and Dyl.  He may surprise you.  But I understand totally your fear of the influences around your children.  I don't think you & I are different from that aspect.  I want the best for my children, and You do too.  We definately disagree on alot of things, but we diffinately agree for the safety of our childrens and protection from evil or bad things that could happen in their lifetime.  I would die for my family and I believe you would too.

As far as others who have posted above!  I respect your opinions.  They are yours!  We all have a right to our own. I too have heard about the Sexual deeds of the Catholics.  It is very disgusting.  But I have know people of all faiths & non-believers, Agnostics, Atheist ect....  who have had these same problems within their own beliefs. 

I as a Christian, still have a trouble with sin.  Im not perfect.  Im not a goody to shoes either,  I try to be, but I fall short sooo many times.  If any of the above will show proof of their perfectness or righteousness, I would be the first to commend you. 

I believe in the God of the Bible.  He came to this earth as a Man named Jesus.  He was perfect as the Bible says.  He died for our sins so that those who believe can have eternal life with him.  This is how I believe.  Im not shoving it down anyone's throat, it is just simply my beliefs. We all have free will.  Choose the way you want, but please have the respect for others who may not believe as you.

I hope everyone had a Wonderful Christmas & a Blessed New Year to All of You!   Another year bit the Dust!

God Bless,
lmunchkin