Nonchalance &theOlympics while your family crashes

[SDFoundGirl]

FIB...

No matter what this procedure you'll be doing is, you are still helping people. Helping is helping...and there are no degrees of value if you are in that space. Additionally, from what I hear you say on this board, you are helping your kids and yourself have a better, more peaceful life.

It is easy for us to glamorize certain jobs and situations. Me, I'm a teacher, and Hollywood provides a really messed up view of what a good teacher *should* be. If you aren't poor, spending all of your own money on the kids, and working to the point of neglecting your personal relationships, you aren't a great teacher.

I worked for YEARS in an inner-city school, and people met me with some combination of awe and worship for it. I worked myself to the point of panic attacks and depression, to the point where I would not stand up against the regulation of not taking a personal day during the first 10-days of school and did not go to the hospital with my husband when he had a catheter ablation...because I'd told him the "rule" and he'd ignored it. Do you see how maybe I got to the space I was in with my M?

So, now I live in a different state teaching kids who aren't in such dire situations. I teach kids in a whole range of needs, from kids who are developing substance abuse problems, to kids who just need me to help them find out they *can* be successful, to a lot of my gifted, well-off kids who are under such pressure that a B on a progress report leaves them sobbing on the bathroom floor. In 8th grade. My kids now aren't *as* needy as my kids before who were dealing with extreme poverty and unsafe conditions, gangs, and crime, but they still need the service I provide.

Does it make me a less valuable teacher now that I'm in a fairly good school with more "normal" and less life-threatening issues?

Am I a bad teacher now because I set boundaries around when I leave everyday and refuse to take work home at night?

Is it wrong to place my personal well-being above my job?

I don't think so. I think I am providing a valuable service to the kids and parents in front of me. I think they have need of me to the same degree that my other kids did, just in different ways. I ALSO think I have become a FAR better teacher since I have put taking care of myself and my R above my job--which I love and have an unrelenting passion for.

So, don't you dare put whatever you're doing in the next part of your life into some sort of less-than box. Might you prefer one to the other? Sure; I loved my inner city babies passionately...and it kills me that the system is set up to fail them. But I love the kids I have now as well...and this job, with its DIFFERENT challenges, opportunities, and experiences.

Sorry if I've come off kind of strong...it's just that this particular conversation has been coming up again and again in my life (especially with our newer teachers who beat themselves up because they're not working 24/7 and dare to leave at 7:30 at night), and it's something that gets me all fired up. And, probably, something of which I need to remind myself.

Congratulations on your new position! I wish you joy.

SD