It’s ironic that it’s teacher appreciation day, but I don’t feel appreciated. In fact, I’m feeling like the worst human on the planet. My workplace is a sad place to be. There have been so many teachers coming and going over the past year and soon, there will be more leaving. Honestly, I’m worried about how things will be when the ones who are closest to me are gone. There was some of that sadness floating around today. Although, I can’t get into specifics, but some news I got set the tone for the day. It also was a rough day for the kids. They were tired, some were not feeling well and others kept having accidents.
The cherry on top happened as I was about to leave. One parent was talking to my co-teacher. The parent was saying how much her little girl loves Miss J and Miss T, but she isn’t a fan of Miss D which is myself. When she realized I was overhearing the conversation, she started whispering so I didn’t hear everything else that was said, but I thought it was very rude and disrespectful to have this conversation. If you’re gonna talk about me when I’m in ear shot, say it to my face. I’m not surprised this kid doesn’t like me. Our personalities are like oil and water. She can be very bossy, demanding and inserts herself in everyone’s business. Sometimes you forget she’s only three. The thing is, I’ve never done anything wrong where she’s concerned. I get frustrated when I have to repeat myself ten times telling her to go to the bathroom or not to take toys from her friends. I don’t want to dislike her or her to dislike me. I want to show her that she can’t take toys from her friends so that she will grow up getting along with others. I want her to learn how to successfully interact with her peers. I don’t get on her about being kind to her friends to pick on her. I tell her to go to the bathroom because I don’t want her to piss herself and when she doesn’t listen to me, I tell her again. It’s not because it’s fun for me. It’s in all of our best interests for her to listen to e and get in the bathroom before it’s too late. When I tell her these things, she tells me not to yell at her and to be quiet.
The reality is that she doesn’t like anyone who puts boundaries in place because there seem to be very few for her at home. The problem is that parents legitimately get pissed off if you tell their children what to do. They leave these kids in our care, but at the same time, they treat us like inexperienced babysitters. Second class citizens in some cases. Just last week, there was a parent who told us that she wasn’t sure if she was going to come and pick up her sick child. Who does that? Eventually she did, but she argued with us about it. We had a parent complain because supposedly one of our teachers insinuated she was a bad parent which was completely untrue. That conversation had three witnesses. There was even a schedule change over that complaint.
When I was growing up, parents almost sided with the teacher and I know that approach is wrong. I’ve been in a couple situations where what I was saying was true, but my family believed the teacher instead. Partially because that’s the way things were done and partially because they trusted that the teacher was telling the truth. There are always bad apples though and situations where that doesn’t work. So I am glad that children have a stronger voice now, but it has done a complete shift. Now the teachers are the ones who can’t be trusted at least in the eyes of the parents. I believe there has to be a middle ground where everyone’s voice can be heard.
On more days than not, I feel like early childhood education was the wrong choice for me. I chose this field so I could teach children, be a positive role model and to make the children feel like they could be safe in any classroom I worked in. I had many negative bordering on abusive experiences when I attended a preschool. I wanted to ensure that nothing like that happened for the children in my care. It’s hurtful to get complaints especially when they are unfounded. It’s heartbreaking and makes you doubt your teaching ability and sometimes if you are a parent yourself, you start to wonder about your parenting abilities as well. You even start to wonder about your self worth and if you should be doing something different. Over the years, I’ve gotten a couple of complaints. They were mostly mild like this one, but it’s so easy to ruin someone’s reputation and career.
I’m generally shy so talking to parents has always been difficult for me. I’m much better at making connections with the children. I can count on one hand how many genuine connections I’ve made with a family and I’ve been in this field for over a decade. I’m amazed at some of my coworkers who seem to be able to make a connection with almost any family and have the ability to put people at ease. I know part of my problem is that I’ve never been good at pretense. I’ve found that more and more, you have to pretend because if you don’t, people will complain. I miss the days when we had time to actually play with children, plan cool activities and actually follow through with them and weren’t so caught up in rules, regulations and assessments. I think we’ve lost sight of what is important. We’ve lost sight of having fun and building relationships. Now there is so much pressure and there just aren’t enough hours in the day. Parents are spending less time with their children and a lot of things that used to be taught in the home are falling on us as well.
I’m at the point where I need to fix what I see as my biggest and most costly mistake. I’ve spent so much time, money and tears on this career path and now I need a way out. I need this change for my mental and physical health and for the relationship with my daughter. I’m in preschool teacher mode all the time. I want to just be mom for a change.
I made Rosebud give me the cup because I don’t know who it belongs to or where it came from. I’m a bit of a germaphobe. then I explained to her that it was trash and how we shouldn’t leave trash on our playgrounds. I also told her how we need to be careful what we pick up from the ground. She is forever stopping to pick up strange things.
She is too young to understand how littering is bad for the environment and everything that goes with that. I brought the cup home and threw it away, but I couldn’t help but be disappointed. The playground is supposed to be a safe place for neighborhood kids to play and people are leaving their trash there. It’s the carelessness that annoys me because many of the neighborhood kids are around Rosebud’s age and they are still at the stage where everything goes in their mouth.
When I was a child, there used to be a blind man that sat in front of the grocery store usually with his accordion. Of course he had a tin cup sitting there for people to put money in. Whenever I’d walk by I’d be embarrassed for him. Everyone knew about this guy and occasionally people would mention him to me. I’d ask myself why he was sitting there basically begging and why he couldn’t get a regular job. I never liked that he was there because if people saw me with my visual impairment, they’d assume I was like him. Eventually he started appearing less and less, but perhaps that older man in Dunkin’ Donuts had that image in mind. The image of someone in need and not capable. I find that some of these assumptions are long-lasting and extremely hard to change even when there is plenty of evidence to the contrary.
Normally when I write in my blog, I only focus on the positive and rarely ever write about something so personal, but I suppose that isn’t exactly authentic. People who know me in real life know that I’m visually impaired, but most people who I interact with online don’t. I usually dread telling people and do whatever I can to hide or minimize it. It’s because I know people will think of me differently once they know. I’m having second thoughts about posting this as I type. Anyway, I left the store today in frustration and I didn’t say anything, but there have been times where I’ve stood up to that.
While I was in the hospital after Rosebud was born, there were mostly wonderful nurses who were caring and supportive. However, there was one who was absolutely horrible. She was rough while drawing blood from my baby, she was abrupt and generally had a negative attitude. It was obvious that I made her uncomfortable and that she didn’t think I could handle caring for my newborn. I’ll mention that I had a c-section due to complications and it was impacting my ability to breastfeed. Sometimes women who have had c-sections take longer to produce milk because of hormones and the trauma to the body. Anyway, for whatever reason, Rosebud wasn’t feeding very well and like a lot of mothers, I was having trouble getting her to latch. Most of the nurses were fine with helping me with this. Rosebud and I were starting to figure it out, but it was taking time.
I want other mothers to know that yes, you can fire your nurses. I did not know that and only learned that out of desparation. Also, it’s okay to advocate for yourself. It’s hard and sometimes you don’t know if it’s worth it or not, but it usually is. It’s not okay for people to treat me like that and I wish they wouldn’t, but at times proving people wrong has been a strong motivation for me. It has pushed me hard to achieve my goals. Sometimes it’s okay and absolutely necessary to surround yourself with a protective bubble.