A Love Letter to Teaching

My mother said something strange to me today.

We were discussing my upcoming career change -- she's been trying to be supportive, which I know must be hard.  I hesitated to tell her I was leaving my job for a long time because I teach in a very prestigious school district, top 15% in the nation, and she's the kind of person whose identity is wrapped up solely in being a parent.  She tied up a lot of herself in my job as a teacher.

She might be a little overbearing, but I still didn't want to disappoint her.

To her credit, she's trying.  Thankfully she seems to recognize how unhappy I was teaching, even if her issues with empathy mean she never asked any deeper probing questions and thus my battles with anxiety remain unspoken.

We were talking about how my school year is drawing to a close, and thus my new job is starting soon.  She's excited for me.  My friends threw me a going-away happy hour yesterday, complete with gifts.  I'm going to a jazz band concert this week, and prom is next weekend, and some other friends and I are going to our principal's retirement party, co-opted only a little since they couldn't make it to happy hour.  On the new job front, two managers I know well are arguing over who gets to hire me.

It's going to be a good end to the year, I hope (assuming my anxiety doesn't get the best of me, as it might).

I explain all this so what happened next makes sense.  My mom listened to all this, and eventually gave me a hug and said: "I'm so glad you're getting a job in IT.  I always thought you were too smart to be a teacher."

My world ground to a halt.

Don't start shouting, my brain cautioned once it had gotten over the initial shock.  She's trying to be supportive.  

In her own way, she was.  She knows how intelligent and motivated I am, how much I enjoy throwing myself into something, how dedicated and creative I can be.  She wants me to have a job I love, something I want to go to every day, something I am proud to do.

My mom was trying to compliment me -- to tell me that she thinks I'll be great in IT.  That sentiment is nice to hear.

The rest of it? Not so much.

There is nothing stupid about being a teacher.  Too much of our society seems to think that for some reason; we even have idioms saying, "Those who can't, teach," which has never failed to infuriate me.  To dismiss educators as stupid maligns the profession in ways that are not just painful, but fundamentally outrageous.

There is nothing dumb about building lessons that will help students learn to read, write, think, more effectively than they could yesterday.  There is nothing foolish in dedicating time and energy to grading, giving feedback, learning from other teachers. There is nothing trivial about the time and love that teachers devote to their relationships with students.

And there is absolutely nothing shameful about trying to change the world.

The teachers I work with are some of the most intelligent, empathetic, motivated people I have ever met.

My best friend at Herbert High* is a guy I'll call Sandman, who is easily one of the smartest, most interesting people I know.  The first time I met him, we talked about how to teach Samuel Coleridge Taylor's "Rime of the Ancient Mariner" utilizing Iron Maiden.  I remember being impressed not only that this teacher was into Maiden, but that he had the stones to teach Coleridge Taylor.  Last week, I walked into his classroom to find him using an elaborate metaphor involving some jerk eating all the leftover Easter candy at a crowded lunch table to explain why Lenina from Brave New World sleeps with everything that moves.  In the five years in between, Sandman has taught me how to be a teacher, usually by example -- how to be clever and effective in my lessons, compassionate but firm in my due date policies, empathetic when students are upset but tough when they need boundaries.  We've rebuilt curriculum together, solved a myriad of student-related crises, and argued over whether or not Guardians of the Galaxy is actually a good movie.

Never once have I thought "Shit, this man is way too smart to be a teacher."  Instead I'm grateful to have learned from him so that I could be a better, smarter teacher.

It would be easy to say that Sandman is an isolated example, but you'd be wrong.  Another close friend, Susan*, has been teaching for nineteen years, and every August, she's got something new and exciting she can't wait to try in her classroom.  I'd always thought that, after a while, teaching gets stale -- that's something I feel now, and it's only been five years.  Not Susan.  She learns new things every year, sometimes every day it seems, and it's usually about incorporating technology into her classroom so her students are always trying something different.  The rule in teaching is to change ~10% each year so you don't get bored; Susan easily doubles that.  Beyond the classroom, I have never met someone who reads as much outside of school as she does, both 'for fun' books so she can talk to her students about what they're reading and curriculum/best practice textbooks to help her be a better teacher.  She is constantly improving, constantly inspiring, and her kids are constantly learning as a result.

Geri, another Language Arts teacher I hang out with, teaches her students meditation and mindfulness practices alongside To Kill a Mockingbird.  She's made mental health her priority, and in a school where we've had five deaths (including two suicides) in four years, students adore her commitment to helping them manage stress.  I've never met a more compassionate, truly kind person.

Some of my friends, like Amy, don't necessarily get along well with others due to their commitment to their students.  Amy will often fight with teachers when they push students too hard without reason, and she's never afraid to say what she thinks.  That can rub people the wrong way, but it also makes her the fiercest advocate for students I've ever seen.  She's the person who will be late to events with friends because she's on the phone with a student's parents or helping our counselors write a life plan.

Other teachers in my building, though I might not know them as well personally, do absolutely amazing things.  One of our math teachers has built a program from scratch to get students who failed Algebra I to not just passing, but loving math in less than a semester.  Another Language Arts teacher is routinely at school until 6:00pm working with students to better their writing.  A science teacher routinely destroys her own classroom (and her living room -- I've seen the pictures on facebook) to create a pseudo-crime scene for her forensics students so they get the true CSI experience.   These are people devoted to what they do, and smart enough to do it well.

I'm always in awe that my school is lucky enough to have people like Sandman, and Susan, and Geri and Amy and all the rest.  I have always been proud to be a teacher, especially because I got to teach alongside other teachers.

The insinuation that somehow all these people aren't smart, or that if they are, they are wasted on teaching, is more than insulting -- it is degrading to them and to the profession.  To suggest that somehow I'm smart because I'm getting out is frankly disgusting.

And what does it say about me that my mother is willing to insult my job?  Likely she never would have said it if I wasn't leaving, but I've been teaching for five years.  I have a Master's degree in Education.  I worked my ass off to be a good teacher, and it was never because I wasn't smart.

There was never anything shortsighted about my joining this profession other than failing to understand myself.  Everything else I felt going in -- the desire to help people, the passion for reading and writing, the excitement of getting up in front of a classroom, the joy of watching students actually learn -- everything about that is true, and valuable, and amazing.

I wouldn't have survived the downs of teaching if I wasn't smart.  I wouldn't have been able to pick apart what didn't work, and make it better.  I wouldn't have figured out how to forge better relationships with students so they'd actually learn.  I wouldn't have been able to learn from some of the smartest people I know, and I wouldn't be walking away with some truly amazing friendships in tow.

In a lot of ways, leaving breaks my heart.

I have to do it for my own mental health.  I know that.  Just a few days ago, I found a teaching blog I started in Fall 2015 in an attempt to stave off the inevitable; instead, its entries chronicle the anxiety that slowly started destroying my mental health.  Re-reading it, it's easy to see just how damaged and hurting I was, how much stress I was under, how broken by the emotional demands of this job.  But it has some ups too:  the community I am a part of, the reminders of what I loved about my students, the successes I will miss.

Teaching has changed my life, for good and ill, and I will defend its value, and the amazing people who do it, with every breath if I have to.








*Disclaimer: Though the situations depicted here are factual, all names -- including those of teachers, students, parents, schools, and districts -- have been changed to protect those involved.  The opinions expressed here are mine alone; I do not, nor would I presume to, speak on behalf of my school or district, nor on behalf of others in my profession.

Herbert High is a fictitious title used to represent the school where I teach.  The name was chosen as a reference to Frank Herbert, author of my favorite book Dune.  

#ThisisWhatAnxietyFeelsLike

I stumbled across a hashtag on Twitter this morning, one that's been around for a while but gaining traction the past few days:  #ThisisWhatAnxietyFeelsLike

I was surprised by how strongly I reacted to it.  I've dealt with anxiety on and off for close to two years now, and while I've done plenty of research about how to function with it, I tend to stay away from reading about others' experiences of it.  I don't want to know.  I don't want to dwell on how debilitating it can be, or how painful.  I don't want to be constantly thinking about it, since I'm doing enough of that already.

What I'm realizing this morning is that, yes, I've kept myself from thinking about it even more than I already do.  But in doing so, I've deprived myself of a community that may in fact be crucial to recovering, to feeling 'normal' again and not so much like my life is spinning out of control.  There's camaraderie, community in sharing these experiences, and there's value in seeing that I'm not alone.

I'm very much the "I can deal with this alone" kind of person.  I saw a counselor briefly, but didn't like going.  I didn't like feeling like I needed someone else to get better, to be okay.  My husband knew, and he encouraged me to seek counseling, and keep going, but when it came down to it, he trusted me to know what was best for myself.  When I stopped going, he just hugged me and said that if I changed my mind, he'd support me.

I didn't tell my friends.  They'd always told me I "hid it well" when I just had a migraine at work, when I was in excruciating pain, and they said it like they didn't quite believe I was really hurting.  How would they respond to finding that I was struggling on an even more abstract level?

I didn't tell my family, not for almost a year.  When I finally did tell my brother, he bought me a book about spirituality.  When I told my dad, he asked if it was all in my head.  There wasn't the empathy I needed, even though I didn't know how to ask for it.

Two weeks ago, I resigned from my job as a teacher.  At the end of this school year, I'm moving into IT, which I've written about before here.  As a result, I've had dozens of conversations about why I'm leaving, how I made this decision.

I'm not being honest.  I'm saying all the things you are supposed to say -- that I needed a change, that I was ready to move on, that I'm going to really miss teaching but that I'm excited to start something new.  I've told a grand total of one person the truth: that I have had so much anxiety with this job that sometimes I feel like I'm drowning, and I can't do it anymore.

Thankfully, that person is one of my best friends, and he's been nothing but supportive.  I don't know how I would have functioned if, like so many others, he'd said "you hide it well."  Instead, he's asked how I am, watched videos I post on facebook about what anxiety is like, made an effort to check in on my mental health.  It is the reaction I had dreamed of, that I wouldn't be judged or hated or anything else and instead supported.

But because I have anxiety, I worry that he'll get sick of me, just like I worry that my husband will get sick of me, and so when I found @AnxietyHashtag and #ThisisWhatAnxietyFeelsLike this morning, I had a little bit of a breakdown.

Instead of spamming my Twitter content with tweets, I'm going to put them here.  My Twitter, which is actually for Bishop and I's Let's Play channel (not that we do anything productive with that) is supposed to be funny, not sad. not anxious.

If I can, I want to be part of the community suddenly, so bear with my brutal honesty.  This is my experience of anxiety, and has been for almost two years.

#ThisisWhatAnxietyFeelsLike

• like I've had too many cups of coffee, jittery inside like I can't possibly sit still
• worrying a thought like a hangnail so it can't possibly go away
• wanting to call, text, facebook, whatever, someone but not doing it for fear of seeming clingy.  or crazy. 
• This tweet from someone on the feed: 
  
• having to explain my thought process, like why I checked with a friend that it was really them I waved to on the road a year ago, and feeling like that explanation makes me sound insane 
• talking too much.  All. The. Time.  
• physical symptoms: headaches, stomachaches, back pain, shoulder pain
• not explaining things to my friends because I'm afraid they'll judge me
• worrying that they'll think it's nothing.  or for attention: 
  
• finally working up the courage to tell someone, then feeling guilty when they said they had no idea and ending up apologizing for not telling them
• feeling guilty anytime I talk about it since I told someone, like they'll get sick of me; feeling guilty because that's all I want to talk about now that I've broken through the initial fear 
• wishing that I wasn't such a mess, that I could keep myself together instead of needing other people to help
• worrying that my husband will get sick of dealing with my mental health issues and leave 
• telling him this and having him comfort me and promise it'll never happen, which somehow makes it worse
• knowing that I probably need to see a counselor, but being unable to pick up the phone and start that process 
• Writing, no matter how small: 
  
• losing hobbies I once loved because I'm scared that I won't like that book when I start it. 
• struggling to play video games on bad days because the stress makes me susceptible to severe motion sickness
• correcting this post like six times to make sure it's perfect. 

Overall, I'm pretty lucky.  Bishop knows by now when I'm having a shitty day, and he'll take care of me -- snuggle me, get me food, make all the decisions, whatever it takes.  The one friend I trusted to tell pushes me to talk, won't let me hide and say I'm fine when I am obviously not (and gives me a hug when I start crying, which is usually what I need more than any words).  

I have the resources to get counseling if I ever manage to get myself together enough to do it.  I've pushed myself hard enough to have a new career waiting just beyond the horizon.  

I am doing well.  Everything could be so much worse, and I have come out the other side of this knowing I am so much stronger than I thought I could ever be.  

I worry that it'll happen again, that my career change won't truly alleviate what I feel now and I'll end up just as unhappy.  My friend at work keeps telling me that I have to make choices based on my own happiness, and he's right.  But there is safety where I am now.  I know how being unhappy here feels, and as sick as it is, I am used to it.  Changing my life means opening myself up to something new, something that could be good and could be terrible.  I'm willing to make the leap, and I'm ready, and yet that little voice is still lingering in the back of my mind, wondering if this is really the right move.
  

#ThisisWhatAnxietyFeelsLike