Joe Wicks has explained his decision to take his eldest child out of school a year after she started.
The fitness coach, 37, was met with a barrage of questions when he announced on his Instagram last month that his daughter Indie, five, would be out of school in September after a year on reception.
In a new interview, Joe, who is also a father to Marley, three, and Leni, eleven months, has explained how he simply wants to spend more time with his children – who he shares with former glamor model wife Rosie.
“I just love being with my kids,” he has shared The times. “It’s not something permanent, but we want to be together for another year.”
‘It’s not like I’m saying: I’m going to home school my children and live on a farm in the middle of nowhere. It’s really just about our lifestyle (now),’ he added, pointing out that children in many European countries don’t start school until they are seven.
Big decision: Joe Wicks has explained his decision to take his eldest child, daughter Indie, five, out of school a year after she started
Freedom: Joe, who is also a dad to Marley, three, and Leni, 11 months, has explained how he just wants to spend more time with his kids – who he shares with wife Rosie
In Britain, most children start full-time school in September, after their fourth birthday.
Reflecting on his own upbringing, in which he left him in the care of his heroin-addicted father at the age of twelve after his mother sought help for her severe obsessive-compulsive disorder, Joe explained, “I don’t want to be someone who isn’t. present in my children’s lives.’
“What I try to give my children is stability and love, and I want them to know that I am always there for them.”
In July, Joe admitted that Indie ‘maybe go to school next year. We have no idea in the long term, but we want to do home schooling for at least a year.’
The national gym coach added that the family looks forward to spending more time in the US in the coming year as he is determined to “take my message and my mission elsewhere.”
They’ll call his Santa Monica apartment home for a while, but he’s insisted it’s not a permanent move from their £4m Surrey mansion.
The fitness guru explained his own difficult upbringing in his 2022 documentary Joe Wicks: Facing My Childhood.
Joe’s mother Raquela left him with his heroin-addicted father Gary at the age of 12, to get help for her OCD.
Joe has praised his mother for being ‘brave’ enough to get the help she needed in the form of five months of therapy, while his older brother Nikki, 38, tried to protect him from life’s daily horrors with their addicted father.
Family time: “I love being with my kids,” he told The Times. “It’s not something permanent, but we want to be together for another year” (pictured with wife Rosie and their children)
Present: Reflecting on his own upbringing, which left him in the care of his heroin-addicted father at the age of 12, Joe explained, ‘I don’t want to be someone who isn’t present’
The fitness guru explained how his mother feared he and his brothers would be put under surveillance if she told people about her problems.
“I was born in 1985 and she was only 19 when she had me. There was that fear: ‘If I tell people about my eating disorder or that I’m struggling, they’ll be taken away’.
Joe recalls always being “aware” of his father’s addiction and explained how it affected him as a child: “Heroin addiction is a really destructive thing.
“I was just anxious, scared and nervous all the time. I acted at school. I was disruptive, I was the naughty little boy because nobody stopped me and said, ‘What’s going on?’
Joe has previously joked that he is an “old-fashioned parent” who doesn’t allow his kids to sit behind iPads and use phones.
Parenting: Joe’s mother Raquela left him with his heroin addict father to get help for her OCD (pictured with his mother and brother Nikki)
Adventure time: The country’s gym coach added during lockdown that the family is looking forward to spending more time in the US in the coming year
He said, “They watch Disney or Netflix on TV, but they don’t know how to use a phone and they don’t have an iPad… They can read, write and speak well because that’s all they’ve ever known.
“They don’t miss iPads or screen time because they never had them. One thing I’m most proud of with my kids is how friendly, open, talkative, and confident they are with new people.
“Most days we look around and Indie and Marley are making friends with other adults at restaurants or by the pool and cracking jokes. Their personality is no coincidence. They are a product of their environment and the stimulation they receive every day…”
He said boredom is a “good thing” for children because it allows them to use their imaginations.
He also previously revealed that he encourages his brood to walk barefoot on the streets because it’s “good to be in contact with the ground.”
Joe made a fortune with his Body Coach diet and workout plans. Last year he received an MBE for his achievements in fitness.
His virtual workouts during the pandemic also earned him a Guinness World Record for the most viewed live stream of fitness workouts on YouTube