Teaching is out the door

Hey friends! It has been a while since I have written a blog entry. This has been a messy past few months. Money has been hard, I have had to move to a new apartment, student teaching did not work out, and I got into a new job. I just now managed to get things back into good shape. I am happier again, and I feel less stressed. Let me summarize how these last few months went.

Starting with student teaching, this was a risk in the beginning. My adviser last year tried to recommend I find a different career because she was concerned that teaching was going to be harder than I envisioned. I chose to keep going because I wanted to know myself through experience if it was something I could do or not. It took me until I was student teaching to realize it really is a more complicated job than it appears from a students perspective. I did not realize being a special education teacher was more than just teaching students. You have to develop relationships with parents, manage paraprofessionals, write IEP's, set up meetings, communicate with all the general education teachers.....you basically are another administrator but you are getting paid like a teacher because that is your job title.

Another thing that made student teaching hard was that my placement was awkward. I was put into a classroom with another student teacher who happened to also be the teachers girlfriend. Because I do not want to tarnish anyone's reputation, her name will be left out. This was hard because it made me feel like I was being shadowed even further than I anticipated. Not only was I working under the teachers shadow, but I was put under hers as well. I was always 3 steps behind her because she was able to ask questions and talk about it outside of work. I did address this as a concern to the teacher and he promised me he would keep it 50/50, but after a couple weeks, I realized that was not happening. She always had the 1st choice, and I could tell he was teaching her outside of school. On top of that, because she dated the teacher, she seemed to feel like she was a co-teacher. She would manage me more than the teacher did. She also was not very respectful of my feelings. I would go home feeling like garbage because nothing I did seemed good enough for her. It was a whole jumbled mess. I ended up having to withdraw from student teaching and all classes associated with it.

Unfortunately this created a new mess. Due to withdrawing, the University of Utah ended up charging me over 3,000 dollars which only added to my stress. Because I had that huge balance, I was not allowed to register for classes in the spring. (Which I should add I switched my major to Family and Consumer Studies and only need one semester to get a bachelors for!) I ended up filing a petition and asked others for letters of agreement on the petition. It would take over a month for the income accounting office to come to a decision, which they ended up accepting my petition. Thank goodness!!

Due to all this, cutting out teaching and not feeling like I was good enough to work in the classroom, I went into a depression for a few weeks. I started having doubts about myself and my future. I began eating horribly again, and overall I had a hard time caring about my overall well-being. Thankfully, my Mom was willing to talk to me, even if I needed to call her more than once a day. She would always remind me how far I came, and how successful I have been. She also reminded me how good of an employee I have been in years past and that this just happened to be a situation where I had bad chemistry. To quote her "you have always been amazing working with kids with disabilities and you are easy to work with. You are just butting heads with a coworker, which I have never seen you do until now. You are letting her tear you down. You need to either find a new teacher to work for or find a new job". After hearing this, I started to feel motivated again because I realized she was right. I ended up doing exactly what she advised and looked for a different job.

At first I was going to request a new teacher to work with, but it only took me a couple days to realize I would be better off finding a new job entirely. Working as a paraprofessional no longer was getting me anywhere due to me not aiming to be a teacher anymore. I decided I still want to help people with disabilities because they were the reason I wanted to be a teacher in the 1st place. I was able to find a job quickly at Columbus Community Services. I have now worked here for 3 weeks and so far, I feel very proud that I made the decision to jump ship. I get along with my coworkers much better, I am still helping people with disabilities, and I have promotional opportunities offered if I stay here a few months and get my bachelors degree. All this has made me feel much better about myself, and less stressed. I love this new job and am excited to see where it gets me.

Since I found a job where I feel like I fit in better, I have been eating better again, I have been hanging out with friends more, and I have been sleeping much better. My overall health has been amazing. Thanks for reading. If this sounded like a rant, it was not intended to be like that. This is an update about what happened the last few months and how I was able to fix it! Thanks friends and family for sticking with me and encouraging to push on. I love all of you!