Rupture, Repair, Repeat: A Mother’s Logbook from the Field

Preface: The Body as Litmus, the Field as Teacher

Sometimes, what we call parenting is actually translation. Not of rules or roles—but of resonance. What we call defiance might be justice unrecognized. What we call resistance might be the body’s last effort to stay in relationship with itself.

In our family, I’ve learned to treat disconnection not as failure but as feedback. I track the pitch of our days—not just through behavior, but through breath. Through the feel of a room. Through the word unsaid or the moment delayed. We are a constellation of nervous systems, all trying to tune.

Sometimes I talk too much. Sometimes I say too little. But when I speak from my body—when I let my voice drop from head to heart to gut—it becomes something else. A kind of knowing. A kind of calibration. For some of us, our consciousness is the hearing we hope to take with us after death. And so, the sound of our voice matters. So does our silence.

I write this not as an expert, but as a participant-observer in the field. A field that is not theoretical, but literal: the kitchen table, the breath held, the loud critic, the quiet return.

This is a logbook from the body. A record of how we rupture. How we repair. And what becomes possible when we stop trying to control each other and start tuning instead.

Rupture, Repair, Repeat: A Mother’s Logbook from the Field

We didn’t stumble into unschooling because we were anti-education. We arrived here through rupture—first with institutional systems, then with their well-meaning replicas in our home, and finally with our own ideas of what learning should look like. What we have now isn’t an absence of structure. It’s structure in service of relationship.

Each day, I ask my kids to read from a physical book and complete a few pages in a math workbook. That’s it; though, by rigid unschooling standards, even that might be heresy. But our current unschooling model emerged not from my need to control, but from their desire to explore futures that require literacy and numeracy. They are not mandates; they are consent-based scaffolding. Education, for us, is no longer performance-driven. It’s body-led. Future-conscious.

My children are wildly different. One masks. One refuses. One finds quiet comfort in math and gets lost in books. The other tolerates reading and resents math but argues with fire and brilliance. I do not ask them to respond the same. I ask them to respond honestly. I do not expect symmetry in behavior. I expect resonance in relationship.

When my child argues, it’s never random. He has what some call PDA—Pathological Demand Avoidance—but what I now think of as PDR: Persistent Demand for Resonance. If he resists, it’s because he senses misalignment: between his body and the moment, or between what’s being asked and what feels just. Argument, in our house, is often intelligence in disguise.

Today’s math problem was simple. But the moment was not. He asked for help. I sat down beside him. I explained a foundational step—a step that would later open doors to bigger concepts. He interrupted. He deflected. He argued. I snapped: “Everything is an argument with you. Everything.” I stood up and walked away. The rupture happened.

I didn’t feel good about it. My breath was tight. My chest, hot. I paused. I returned to my body. Then, I returned to him.

I began with honesty. I told him I felt frustrated and needed less arguing. I apologized for responding bigger than the moment called for. And I said I was wrong—that not everything is an argument, and it was unfair to say that.

Then I invited a third voice into the room: my partner, someone who knows both our nervous systems intimately. Not as a referee. As a pitch-pipe. A resonance anchor. The three of us reflected. What we found wasn’t surprising, but it felt truer because we arrived there together.

My child argues when he doesn’t see the need for something. Or when it feels unjust.

He has previously communicated that it feels unjust to be asked to spend time on anything that doesn’t serve his two loves: professional gaming and amateur surfing. He’s good at both. He loves both. And if he knows what he wants, why should he be made to do anything else?

It’s a fair question.

So I responded with my truth: We’re committed to supporting him. But our support has limits—not limits in desire to provide; rather, limits in capacity to provide. And if he wants to retain the freedom to pursue what he loves, he might one day need to support himself. For that, certain doors must remain open. Reading. Math. These aren’t punishments. They are bridges—ways to keep possibility open.

He listened. And as I viewed him through a more compassionate lens, I realized his frustration wasn’t about the math—it was about not getting it right away. That made him angry with himself, and that anger got projected outward.

There it was.

So we talked about old frustrations. Past shutdowns. The stuckness that comes not from the content of the problem, but the content of the past.

I explained my role. That when we’re both activated, someone has to do the resonance labor. That person, for now, is me. I read the moment, track the patterns, and help us return to clarity. It takes energy. And yes, sometimes I get tired. But I don’t want to use that tiredness as an excuse to lash out. I want to name it, so we can both see it.

He understood. Not defensively. Just... understood.

We made a new agreement. He would practice noticing when he’s arguing. I would practice gently mirroring that awareness without nagging or harping. We would ask:

• Am I arguing to meet a need?

• Am I defending a sense of justice?

• Are my needs and sense of justice aligned with my compassionate center?

• Is arguing the most resonant way to communicate this right now?

  
  

We agreed: we are not trying to eliminate arguing. We are trying to listen to what it reveals.

We also affirmed that we both deserve to name our needs. To name what feels unjust. And to be heard—not with compliance, but with empathy.

And all of this rests on something deeper: our bodies.

The body is the tuning fork. It tells us when we are off-key. When I feel disconnected, I check in with the others in my field. My children. My partner. We are learning to trust that if one body says, "I’m not well," the rest of us listen. We don’t fix. We calibrate.

This is slow work. Sometimes uneven work. But it is the work of mutual resonance.

And in our home, education is no longer a matter of right answers. It’s a matter of right relationship.

That is the math we are learning.That is the reading we are doing.That is the voice we are reclaiming.

Rupture, repair, repeat.

We are still in the field.

Epilogue: The Sound of Resonance

Sometimes I think what we’re really practicing is listening.Not with ears, but with presence. Not for rightness, but for resonance.

In this family, voice is sacred. So is silence. Some of us speak too much, some too little. Some shut down. Some shut others out. But each of us is learning how to say what needs to be said in a way that leaves room for return.

When a child argues, we listen. When I rupture, I listen too.

We’ve begun to understand that the resonance of our communication is as important as its content. That tone is not just mood, but frequency. That how we say things becomes part of what we mean.

What if education isn’t about control or performance at all? What if it’s about learning to feel each other honestly?

If my child remembers anything, I hope it’s not the math. I hope it’s that I stayed in it with him. That I treated him with integrity. That I did the work to attune, not dominate.

We are all still learning how to use our voices—and how to listen when something feels off. Sometimes we get it wrong. But when we get the repair right, there’s more willingness to keep going. To try again. To reflect. To reconnect.

This is what we’re practicing. This is what education looks like in our field.

We’re doing it, Harry.