The Advanced Training Institute (ATI) encouraged strong family relationships. This was a big draw for many families–seeing the tight-knit, glowing families that hinted of yesteryear’s ideals. But some ATI parents took it upon themselves to force this family ideal in order to be the perfect ATI family.

Most homeschoolers I know outside of ATI have a fairly close-knit family, and the siblings have better relationships than perhaps your average American family. I think homeschooling contributes to this, as you are around your siblings more than anyone else. It is a natural closeness that does not need to be forced. I love my siblings, and I think we have a good relationship today among those of us who are adults, in spite of (not because of) the forced relationship we were made to have within our family.

Sometime during our time in ATI–I think around the time we first joined–my parents came across the idea of  “making siblings best friends.” It sounded like a wonderful idea!

For us, this meant we were not ever allowed to call anyone our “best friend”; there were no BFFs in our friendships outside the family. We were not allowed to have our own individual friends–only friends whom we called “family friends.” We did things together as a family or with siblings. We couldn’t do anything outside our immediate family without another sibling.

This was the rule whether I was taking a class (even an ATI one), going shopping, or walking around the block. There were some large age gaps between us, but you’d have two or three siblings in the same level in the same class, because according to our parents’ rules, we had to be together.

My parents often limited friends–even contact with family friends–so that we could grow closer as a family. No personal cell phones were allowed. No personal private e-mail accounts. Any communication we did by e-mail or instant messenger was not considered private in the least and had to be on an account that a parent was on and could read “for accountability.” This applied to all ages. The only thing I had that was even close to being my own space and time alone was my journal–so I did a lot of personal journaling.

There was no consideration for age in this ideal of forced closeness. My parents would make ALL of us recite our Bible memory verses complete with hand motions as adults with our younger siblings, and sing children’s songs complete with hand motions with our younger siblings in front of people, strangers, Christian groups, church…etc. A lot of the memorization was forced onto even the adult children because it was “family” memory work. This made it more difficult to pursue individual memorization goals.

We also had “Wisdom Searches,” which to the rest of the world might be known as Family Devotions. I am actually glad for the family Bible time we had; those are mostly fond memories. However, in my family these Wisdom Searches were only conducted if ALL family members could be present. Somehow, if someone couldn’t make it, it wasn’t worth it. If a sibling “team” was at an ATI Training Center, Wisdom Searches ceased to exist for a time. Having the WHOLE family present was such a big deal, whether it was an event such as a wedding (the whole family down to the last baby was expected to be invited to all weddings), church or Wisdom Searches.

Taking our siblings to work with us as adults wasn’t an issue. We were not allowed to have jobs outside the home, though we did sometimes work in the family business. But for the girls, even working in the family business was more on the rare occasion an extra hand was needed and definitely not the norm. I was 20 the first time I did a ministry opportunity by myself without a token take-along sibling.

The irony of this whole idealistic plan for closeness is that the younger siblings often hated being dragged into something they didn’t care about, just because one of us had to have a buddy. The forced nature of this process actually bred some resentment.

Older siblings were expected to help parent their younger siblings. It was expected that older siblings handle younger siblings’ schooling, and my parents used other forms of relegating parental responsibilities like the buddy system the Duggar family uses.  However, this forced closeness wasn’t just limited to large ATI families. This practice was encouraged because it was “good training” for older daughters to homeschool their own kids one day.

One of the big problems here is that siblings were often given the responsibility, but not the authority, of the parents. We were expected to raise, educate, teach, and care for our younger siblings. Much of this starts when the older children are still only kids themselves. I was 16 when I was teaching Jr. High, Kindergarten, and first grade to my younger siblings. I wasn’t allowed to discipline, and I couldn’t enforce anything. I might give them an assignment, but my mom could decide in the spur of the moment to take them to the grocery store, which over-ruled me and the school didn’t get done. I had no way of making anyone do anything. I shouldn’t have had that responsibility anyway, but this put undue stress on the sibling relationships rather than strengthening them. Nor did it help my relationship with my parents. The majority of women I know who raised their younger siblings for their parents now have little interest in homeschooling their own children (if they even want children). Often, there is a feeling that they have already raised their families. The grand “plan” of helping prepare the older children to someday do the same with their own children has largely backfired in this respect.

Another problem was creating unrealistic expectations among younger siblings to be allowed to do adult activities with us, even after some of us moved out or were even married. They fully expected to be invited and included in everything we do. My youngest sibling complains about not being included if we do anything and she is not invited. When we were still in our teens, this created resentment among the older siblings for the younger ones whom we were forced to bring along. It limited what we could do, since some activities are age specific. If one sibling was 18 and the other was 10, the 18-year-old had to miss out on the adult-only event.

The bottom line is that the teachings of ATI encouraged forced family closeness at the expense of allowing personal space and personal growth. This resulted in a system that assumed all levels of education, age, and maturity could be equalized. We were not allowed to learn how to form our own friendships (which still affects me today). I still struggle with being nervous about doing things on my own. As an adult, I have responsibilities to call people, to set up appointments, to go to appointments, to meet new people, and to stand on my own two feet… alone sometimes. Rather than preparing us to be better adults and parents, this forced closeness arrested our maturity, strangled our independence, and caused fear when stepping out alone in the world. New experiences like teaching or parenting were old news to us by the time we were ready to consider marriage and family, and many have chosen to wait on jumping right into that experience again.