I amd going to explode into tears soon. I am SO sad. There is a week and a half before school starts and normally I would be setting up my classroom, making nametags, shelving books and planning lessons. I'd have a sense of excitement because here was a chance for me to start over. The new school year always represents new beginnings for me moreso than January 1st ever has. I can do things differently, better than I did the year before. I can take what I've learned from the previous year's class and apply it to fresh, pliable and a little bit scared new blood. I love teaching. There are some things about it that I don't like of course, the paperwork and politics and testing. The kissing up to my administration. Difficult kids. But for the most part, I love it and I love doing it. I am good at it. Kids feel comfortable with me. Anyway.
But last March I was told I was not going to be asked back this school year. Up until now I have felt like I was on summer break, just like every other teacher around. But I can't hide behind that myth anymore. Reality hit me right in the face this morning when one of my former coworkers called to see how I was doing/handling things. She had been at school yesterday and was sad that I wasn't there. While she was stapling borders to the bulletin board and printing nametags to laminate for her new students, I was here at home, still on "I'm on summer vacation" mode.
I had a dream last night that I was given a "break" and the administration had decided to keep me on for a probationary time period. I was teaching with another teacher, (a former male coworker) but he was the real teacher. I didn't have any power, wasn't in charge of anything. Yet, even though the classroom technically wasn't mine, I felt embarrassed that the room was plain and undecorated. I was like an asisstant and the students all knew it. I felt humiliated. And in my dream that's when I realized I didn't want to work for that district anyway.
I know deep in my heart that I am a good teacher. Parents ask for me, kids love me. I may not be the best teacher academically and I'm not very organized, but my students always felt loved and cared for. However, I'm having a really hard time remembering that in my heart because my former principal basically had a personal vendetta against me and did everything she could to make me feel like an incompetent, miserable educator. I know it isn't true. I know it...nobody would agree with her. But just the fact that I now have no job because of this....this is the perfect time for that part inside of me that sinks into depression and talks down to myself-it has now said to me, "See I told you you were a loser and a failure."
All of this has made me question whether I want to teach elementary school or school anymore at all. I waver between wanting to do high school history and college or adult education. I am looking for a way to still teach but get away from the "you will teach to the test and your students will score well or you suck" mentality. But then when I go looking into other jobs...I freak. I don't know if I am qualified to do any of these other things out here in the "real" world. Being unemployed makes me feel scared, useless, worthless and low. I have been able to pretend until now that I wasn't unemployed. But. Now all my friends will go back to work and make a difference while I sit here and feel like a complete failure. I KNOW these thoughts are wrong and all in my head. I KNOW the principal personally had it out for me and that is all this was... a personal revenge on her part. I HAVE to get these negative thoughts out of my consciousness.
Something I have tended to be "known" for is being outspoken. I always speak up for the underdog, ever since I was little. I always felt that I had to help our world be a more fair place. Unfortunately, I haven't always carried my message to others in the most healthy way. I have let my emotions build and build while I numb out with my many vices. Then, someone will say or do something that will break me open and I pop like a bottle of champagne. I cry, sometimes swear, am brutally honest. I lose that "social filter" that most of us have and say things loudly and publicly that are better discussed quietly and in private. My message is usually right on. I'm always correct about the injustices that are being perpetrated, but my delivery is my downfall. I have lost friends this way, lost my JOB this way and caused people to think of me as unstable or one who should be dealt with as if an eggshell.
So today, I am mourning my job....a huge part of my soul. I am also fighting the anger I have toward myself for all the "outbursts" I've ever had in my adult life. On top of that, our beloved cat, Mitch (11yrs) is dying.
He has large tumors growing under his neck and on his hind legs. He is eating less and less and moving more slowly. I never could have known that he would become so much a part of our family. His death will devastate the boys and I'm terrified will plunge me further into this hole into which I've been struggling to get out. I've told the boys that we need to love Mitch as much as possible now and cuddle him and brush him, just be there with him. I have a terrible feeling he is going to be leaving us soon. Today he couldn't walk very far with my oldest son and his eye is a bit swollen and watery. Perhaps this will be the opportunity for me to empty myself of my tears of grief for both our beloved pet and my career.
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