Homeschooling can absolutely be done with illness/medical challenges! One thing to remember is that you are in charge of your school calendar. Take those days off every month and decide if you simply want to extend your school year a bit into June, or do the occasional Saturday learning, or want to not worry about the calendar. Another option for the kids at home while you are handling the medical things is to have school assignments overseen by whoever is caring for them.
My background: Mom of 10 kids age 1-18, always homeschooled. The biggest medical challenges started with my 7th child, who is 7 years old now. He was born with a number of medical challenges (spina bifida, hydrocephalus, chiari 2 malformation, bilateral clubfeet) and has developed others along the way on top of the care for those (including osteoporosis). It has meant a NICU stay, spinal cord surgery a couple times, 7 brain surgeries, and many many more – we’re about to schedule surgeries number 23 and 24. Add in literally hundreds of doctor appointments, hundreds of therapy appointments, and more.
Homeschooling has worked well through it all. We have the flexibility to do learning any time of day, any day of the week. We don’t take 7 hours to get through one day of learning like the public school. It is so much more streamlined. Sometimes daddy or grandma oversee lessons/practice if I’m gone with my son. His work can go on the road with us if needed. Or we school year round and take 1 week breaks more often and a shorter summer break. Or I work with kids in the afternoon after appointments, or schedule appointments in the afternoon and finish school work by lunch.
Also – praying for your family through this challenge! Sometimes life is enough learning. My kids have learned as much by being set loose with a guideline to ‘read something from this shelf, write something, and get outside in nature’ as they have in sit down lessons in some seasons.
