There is no more time to be Miss Lambert in Days of My Destiny

This entry could’ve also been called, “Career Talk.” Or, “The Things I Ignore come with Big Feelings.”

This Summer Semester, I will be studying. The subject is How To Teach Special Ed Across Contexts.

Special Ed will always have a place in my heart - but I do wonder if that season of my life is over for good.

When I began my studies as a Pre-Service Teacher, I had 2 years’ experience working part-time in a Special Ed school as a Teacher Aide. I was excited at the prospect of working somewhat outside of the realms of mainstream, where it didn’t matter if kids wanted to take their shoes off for the day, or where kids didn’t actually have to all sit in the same way and behave like the person beside them. I LOVED that there was complete room for students to be completely and unabashedly themselves, and that teachers work with the student to achieve wonderful outcomes (social, emotional, academic, whatever it may be). I loved the flexibility that came with accepting a child wholeheartedly, and truly prioritising their needs above those of the Department (at least compared to mainstream education). I was observing
all these things with fresh, enthusiastic, younger eyes.

At the start of this year, I was thinking that maybe I’d resign at the end of it. I knew I had a lot on my plate - I was studying, homeschooling my daughters, helping run a business AND working one day a week. For a while I really ignored the whole ‘one day a week’ thing, because it was only one day a week, right? And I loved my job. And I could show up on a Friday, when everyone else was exhausted, and be cheerful and cheery and full of energy for my kids (my school kids). But after a while, that simple one day a week was feeling like too much - only because I was doing so much else outside of work. No-one else at work could see this, though. I’d cop a lot of jokey flak from others who told me I lived a life of leisure, or when I’d mention being tired they’d say things like, “Tired? You’re only here one day a week, what are you talking about??” So in that sense, I never had that ‘comraderie’ feeling at work because I was The One Who Only Worked One Day A Week. (Meanwhile, outside of those days, I was managing behaviour at home, navigating relationships with my children, meeting and greeting strangers each week to meet the ‘socialisation’ needs of my children, studying, organising, scheduling, providing a listening ear, etc etc).

I was still happy that I had something to offer (by way of showing up energised etc). But I also saw how exhausted the teachers looked, week to week. By the end of most terms, the teachers don’t just look exhausted, they look haggard. In the last week, some of the teachers show up to work with what looks like bed hair, and definitely tracksuit pants. I am not exaggerating. But this whole time, I would think, ‘That will be me one day. I will join the fold. I will be one of Them, and I will know what that feels like.’

Then May happened. My youngest brother and his toxic girlfriend had a big blue that ended up with the girlfriend showing up at my mum’s place, banging on all the windows of the house, yelling and screaming - and she took the dog. (Needless to say, there are drugs involved.) She was also making some pretty heavy threats that you would never ever want to take lightly. So quite suddenly, in May, our safety - and that of my mum’s - became the absolute top priority over everything else. I was at work on one of these Fridays when I had a missed call from someone claiming to be from “the Weapons Safety Course.” I absolutely FREAKED out, thinking that perhaps my brother was giving out my number as if it were his (because he was without a phone during that time) and it was too much to bear. I sought out my manager and cried and shook and told her everything. She was very supportive. I went to the police. I spoke with them. I couldn’t sleep. There were cars coming passed my house (this happens because our road is actually split in 2, and people tend to come down the wrong end and have to do a U-Turn right outside our house, even if we live in the middle of nowhere). This was terrifying me. etc. etc.

The stress of it all was so much. So I resigned from work. My managers completely understood and told me that their doors are open any time I am ready to come back.

Well, since then, I have felt more … grounding… in my life. The thing about working one day a week in a school is that, you still have to check all the emails. It is expected that you know what’s going on when you walk on site. So I was still reading about 60 emails a week, most of which did not actually apply to me - which for me, was a mental load that only added to my already full mental load. But after resigning, that was gone, and suddenly I had the appropriate and necessary brain space to deal with the situation with mum and the family. And I was still able to continue homeschooling my girls and studying.

During this time, I’ve also been able to take a breather and analyse.... because the truth is, I was starting to feel burnt out from my job. I had worked with pretty much the same age group for almost 4 years, and even though you get asked at the end of every year which sector you’d like to work with, and even though I always said I wouldn’t mind trying to work with a different age group, etc etc, that was never really taken into account. So I was always with the age group that I know isn’t quite for me. And this year, I was in a complex class with complex needs. The classroom itself had two doors on opposite ends of the class, and 4 out of 6 kids like to run away from the class most of the time. It was my job to somehow try to be in 4 different places around the school at the same time, and know which child had escaped through which door, and try to keep them all safe and preferably back in class. One child in particular enjoyed stripping all his clothes off and he was somehow able to urinate on demand, and he would do this for fun while running away, naked. So I found it all quite challenging.

Have I missed my job? Honestly, not really - because my life is full outside of that role.

Am I excited to be a pre-service teacher? .............................................. Yes and No.

Yes - because my 7-year-old self is excited for this.

No - because I know that the closer I edge towards graduation (which is still 5 years away, by the way, thanks to part-time studies), the closer I edge towards a career that will feel like a ball and chain. I feel like graduation will be the symbolic act of tying that chain around my ankle.

I don’t want to be exhausted and haggard.

I don’t want to have not much time for anything else. (Because it really is that kind of career, with all the marking, planning, reporting, meetings, training.)

I don’t want to face the poor child with trauma who is just now processing something that happened at home three days ago and therefore is throwing chairs at me while I try to stay calm and understand that child and help that child de-escalate.

I don’t want that kind of stress in my life. And yes, I am privileged to be able to choose this, but I couldn’t always. I’ve already been that person that was stuck in a situation I couldn’t get out of.

Years ago, I had the grit for that. I had the mental and emotional stamina. I knew this, and I knew it was because I had to be that calm person as a child, trying to understand my own parents in their trauma chaos, and forgiving them once they de-escalated. But I’m realising something: the older I become, and the more I reconcile the past with who I am now, and the more self-care measures I take - the less mental and emotional stamina I have for the chaos.

My priority for the future is to be there for my children when they need me. Can I do that while managing other children’s trauma and other needs? Can I do that while also managing aging parents?

And another question I have - can I REALLY make an impact as a teacher?

Why DID I want to become a teacher when I was 7?

.... well, it was because my Grade 3 teacher was so nice. And she stayed calm. I only ever saw her lose it a handful of times, when the really naughty kid, James, was dancing on the tables with his pants pulled all the way down (lol). But she was mostly nice, and pretty, and she sang songs to us. And she played fun games like Who Stole The Cookie from The Cookie Jar, or Heads Down Thumbs Up. And we did yoga stretches every morning, and she would say things like, “Inhale.................... aaaaaaaaaaand Exhale.......................”. And she wore these pretty blouses with pretty A-line skirts. And her face - her face..... - was always so beautiful.

THAT’S why I wanted to become a teacher. Because I wanted to be Miss Lambert.

But I know a thing or two about how the Education System has changed since 1992. I know for a fact that teachers don’t have the freedom to have a piano in their class that they ACTUALLY get to play as they sing to their children each and every morning, and they don’t have the freedom to play the games. Because the system now is such that there is no time for that. Standardisation means there’s more assessment, more reporting, more work, more accountability, less creativity, less time for show’n’tell (not exaggerating), less time to stand and look pretty. There is no more time to be Miss Lambert.

Deep down, as I study and slowly work away at my degree, I know this.

I know what I’m going in for.

Part of me has been proud that I won’t be naiive when I am finally a teacher, because I am already in the field. I have caressed the exhaustion and frustration. I have been a part of the conversations that teachers have when they’re tired and burned out - and somehow not sick and still showing up to work each and every day, never taking a sickie. In fact, I’m SO in the field that I know some tricks of the trade - never take a day off, crash and burn when holidays come, get sick then.

Is that really living? Is that how I want to enter my 40’s? I will be 40 when I graduate. I will have a 17 year old and a 14 year old. Potentially - most likely - they will need me more than ever, emotionally speaking, as one navigates life as an almost adult and the other navigates life as a teenager. I have been that child that emotionally needed her mother and was left with an emotionally unavailable one. I don’t want that for my kids. Neither do I want to be too busy, too stressed, too overwhelmed, to hear them out and be there for them. Otherwise - why bother bringing them into this world??

Also, I went into teaching because Miss Lambert made such an impact on me, and I wanted to make such an impact on other children. I wanted them to know that no matter what is going on in their lives, they will be okay. But can I really send that message to my future students when I am tied to the chain that has that heavy ball on the other end? Can I really influence them that strongly while working for a regimented system that more and more takes away creativity and individuality and time? Do I really want to go into a huge 40K debt with the government, just to NOT be able to influence kids for the better?

........ these are the things I delve into when I wonder.

And in the meantime, I continue each subject, ticking each one off.

Sometimes I wonder if I should become a chaplain.

That thought is scary.

But I’ve thought it a few times. I could influence kids better that way. I would have the time to listen to them, in fact, it would be my responsibility to do so. There would be all the space and time to listen, to guide, to provide options and resources, no matter what was going on. (This is my idea of what a chaplain does… I would have to really look into it properly and talk to some chaplains!).

I feel like it’s probably the role I imagined teaching would be, because that’s what my teacher Miss Lambert gave me. Grounding. Stability. A listening ear. A truly caring space.

But you know… it’s scary. It’s scary to have to start again, for the millionth time. I’m kind of getting sick of stuffing everyone around. Who? I don’t know........ mainly my husband, who has listened to my whining and wondering and pondering and doubts all these years while he steadfastly gets up every morning to earn the dough, no matter what’s going on in his life or how much he may want to give up doing what he does. We’ve actually talked so much about this, and the plan kind of is that when I graduate, I can teach, and he can pull back a bit and study something else. And this whole time, he’s been so patient, because really, I changed my whole life to follow him interstate years ago, so maybe he feels like he owes me. But I feel like I need to make up my mind. Dive in SOMEWHERE. Just dive, do it, get stability, get a career (because I’ve done the whole fish’n’chip shop thing and it’s not for me).

It’s just that these wonderings and ponderings seem to be on the sidelines of everything else I do… but when I have the time to really focus on it, turns out they are some pret-ty big questions with some pret-ty big feelings.

And then I talk to my friends who already are teachers, and they say that I can do this, that you can make a difference in children’s lives through teaching, even amidst the crazy demands of the system as a whole. One of my teacher friends tells me that she had the exact same doubts along the way, even toying with the idea of being a chaplain.... I’ve had so many teachers tell me that I’m going to be a great teacher. And I wonder if I freak out because it’s the unknown. And I remind myself that I don’t HAVE to work full-time. I could do part-time, or casual work, and still build a great rapport with kids in the way that I do. Maybe I CAN do this........ I get excited by the talk of curriculum and planning and I love teacher talk. It stimulates my mind in ways that my teacher aide role never did.

Hence why I keep going with the degree. Because what if it IS the right thing for me? And then I never try it because of fear and doubt?

Ahhhh.....

Last updated November 18, 2020