The Williams Girls

Hi! My name is April. I live in Greenville County, South Carolina. I am a (soon to be) single parent with 4 daughters. My husband (Bill) of 8 years has lung cancer and will not be with us much longer. He is currently living in an assisted living facility. My oldest daughter (Katie) is a soon to be sophomore in college at Anderson University (special education major), my second daughter (Kasie) is a soon to be freshman in college at North Greenville University (double major in English and Psychology with an emphasis on Christian Studies), my third daughter (Karie, who does not live with us now) is a freshman in high school and our baby (Kalie) is a soon to be second grader who will be 7 in August. I am also a nanny to a 2 year old girl (Carlee). I was a preschool teacher for 6 years when my older daughters were younger. I am in the process of becoming a registered home day care provider so I can afford to stay home with my youngest.

I homeschooled my three oldest daughters from Feb 2002 until August 2003 while we moved from Florida to South Carolina and got settled in. I continued to homeschooled my second daughter until August 2004 and then again this last year (her senior year) due to a knee injury from cheerleading. I started homeschooling my first grader in January of 2007. She was in a self contained special education class for kids with emotional disabilities. She suffers from severe separation anxiety due to PTSD. She is a very bright girl but I felt that she was not learning anything academic (and learning undesirable traits) in her class due to the behavior problems of the other students. Now that she has been home full time her behavior has done a complete turn around. Her therapist has even decided to cut her sessions back to once every two weeks. I am also much less stressed since she started homeschooling. Since she came home in Jan. we have spent most of our time deschooling and focusing on topics that interest her. I wanted to homeschool her from the beginning but I followed the advice from well meaning friends that said 'if she stayed home with me it would increase her separation anxiety' but really her anxiety increased when she went to public school.