Friday out right sucked.
When my students came in, I had a full-blown panic attack. My anxiety took over, and I allowed my stress to control me. One of my students asked if I was okay, and the tears just started flowing. I asked her to grab our AICE coordinator to come watch my class because I knew there was no way that I was going to get myself under control until I removed myself in that situation.
When she came in, a veteran teacher was with her. The coordinator sat with the class while the other teacher walked with me so I could just breathe. The coordinator was talking with the class, and one student said, “oh she’s just having a bad day.” The coordinator just looked at her and asked, “How can she just have a bad day when you guys are her first class?”
Living with anxiety is taxing. The last time I had a panic attack this bad was over a decade ago when I was living in Brazil. Loud noises surrounded me. I was in a dark space with people that I didn’t understand the language, and my ex-husband was getting blackout drunk. I felt so helpless in this situation that my brain just shut down because that was easier than dealing with how lost I felt. That night broke me so much that I knew my marriage was ending.
Breaking in my classroom like that really made me wonder if I needed to end teaching and move on to a different career where I don’t invest my emotions that strongly into the workplace.
When I broke in my classroom, it was because I was at a loss, but differently. The administration’s way of dealing with students on their phones or causing disruptions is to write them up, issuing a referral. I don’t want to do that because, for seniors, if they get any referral they are no longer allowed to participate in any of the fun activities. So instead of giving them a referral and stopping them from going to Grad Night or prom because they don’t want to stop talking while I’m trying to teach, I repeatedly asked them to stop doing whatever they’re supposed to not be doing.
I broke because I’m trying to protect them from destroying their senior year within the first three weeks of school, but not a single one of them was thinking about what they were doing to me. And when it’s the students that you look forward to seeing most that end up being the ones on their worst behavior, it takes a toll on you.
If I had been at home or out in public somewhere where I wasn’t worried about my job, I wouldn’t have had to swallow all of this negative energy. I could have screamed, yelled, or told them to just stop at a level that a mom does with their children that puts the fear of God into them.
But I don’t want to be screaming at them. I don’t want to do that to my children at home and I don’t want to do this with kids, who are almost adults, that I’m trying to work with them at a professional level. A large majority of them have worked their butts off to earn that respect.
But there are those who forgot that this is a classroom. They have forgotten that I’m a teacher and that they still need to learn. What is worse is that they forgot that their actions have full consequences.
I’m no longer going to be protecting them. I need to protect my peace. And if writing them a referral is the only way to get them to understand that I am very serious about them learning and bettering themselves, then so be it. They don’t deserve to go on all these fun things if their behavior doesn’t earn it for them. I won’t allow myself to swallow all the negativity again. They not only affect me at the workplace, but they affect me at home. And the children that I have at home don’t deserve to get that backlash that I swallow for 8 hours every day. It should be those who are mistreating me that deserve that response.
