August is a little over halfway done. I keep waiting for the panic to set in. Between all the Back to School commercials and friends talking about setting up their classrooms something is bound to push that Oh No What Did I Do? button soon and send me into a panic. And yet, I feel nothing short of relief about deciding not to go back to teaching in the fall.
I keep looking at the trees, guessing which leaf will turn red first. I keep picturing walking through Tamaques Park with my little boy wearing matching plaid shirts. I keep smelling banana bread and asking Zoe what she’s going to be for Halloween. I don’t know mommy. Please stop asking me.
I keep imagining walking Zoe home from her 1st day of 1st grade. All of these images. All of these cravings. And not one of them has been of my classroom. I can’t quite reconcile if this is surprising or not.
In June I decided I wasn’t returning to my classroom in the fall. All the fighting. The politics. The physical requirements. Trying to get from class to class, holding onto walls. Breaking up fights. Teaching drained me to the point where I had nothing left for my family by the time I got home. I would come home, try to get more work done and head to bed when my husband got home. Having MS, something had to give if I was going to preserve the better parts of me. I had to be honest with my limitations, even if it was scary financially. Do I want to live a healthier life where I’m present with my family. Or do I want to make more money to the point of exhaustion?
I didn't want them only remembering playing on the floor by the couch where I collapsed in the evenings. It sounds like it is obvious which course I would choose, but finances are scary. It isn’t easy taking a financial hit or giving up a job that so many of my friends would die for. I had a hard time reconciling that in my heart. Also, how would that cut hurt my family? There is a whole other level of stress that comes with financial struggles.
Being home has been stressful and chaotic too, but in a different way. I’ve been working from home freelancing with two kids. Writing while bouncing a 35 lb 2 year-old on your lap is tricky. My 6 year-old is actually harder than my 2 year-old. She is needier; Mariah Carey specific in her demands. Neighborhood kids always running through my living room; right after I finally contained the mess that was there from the morning’s play time. Handling conference calls with kids screaming that someone punched someone in the head. Whaaaaaaa. Working from home while working at home is a 2 for one—you are doing two jobs at once. It gets tricky.
It hasn’t been lounging on a beach in the Caribbean like some would think. But that said, I’ve noticed differences in my health. I’m not as tired as I was teaching everyday. Some days are harder and I have to push through, but when I was teaching I was constantly battling a crushing fatigue, all the time. I haven’t had that since I left teaching.
And I think I’ve started to get a rhythm going. It’s hard, but like any other job it gets easier after being there a few months. You get your own system of managing things. I know when to give my son a bath to minimize the chances of him hopping out of the tub with soap in his hair. I know when he won’t go down for a nap to go ‘mail something’ at the post office. He falls asleep on my lie of a mail run, I pass the post office and continue around the block back to our house and carry him up to his room and lay him in his big boy bed.
Leaving teaching has allowed me to explore another level of teaching—teaching my kids. I spent so much time teaching other people’s children. Since I left teaching in June, I’ve had more time to teach my own children. I taught Zoe to tie her shoes. We sit and read chapter books. I helped teach the Vacation Bible School she attended.
I’m figuring it out, slowly but surely. And just in time for Zoe to start 1st grade. And for fall. And changing leaves. And flannel shirts. I don’t feel any remorse about giving my notice. Only relief. I'm not scared about this next chapter, just excited...in a very calm sort of way. God is good.
