The Honeymoon Is Over...

This week my family friend and NPR Education writer, Meg Anderson, wrote this important article about the challenges of being a new teacher at this time of the school year.  In it, she identifies October and November as times where many new teachers hit a point of despair upon realizing how hard it is to be a good at the job.  This article really resonated with me and even though I am in my tenth (!!) year of teaching, I found many of the new teacher fears still ring true for me.  

In the article, Anderson interviews Roxanna Elden, author of See Me After Class, who states, 

"Lots of jobs are hard," says Elden, "but with teachers, it's like, 'Wow, I'm hurting kids because I'm as bad as I am.' You have these exaggerated thoughts like, 'Well, what if I break my leg? I'd get three weeks off.' "

I can't tell you how much I identify with these sentiments.  I look back on my first year of teaching with gratitude that I (and everyone around me) survived it.  I am sure that I cried every week if not multiple times a week.  I commuted an hour to and from my first job and would regularly entertain the crazy thought of how maybe just a little car accident could net me a lot of time off of work.  I had so much anxiety about school that I instituted a policy that my husband (then boyfriend) and I would go to a movie every Sunday night just so that I could take my mind off of going back to school on Monday morning.  It was bad, guys.  

This week my husband was talking about some of the people he works with (Jon has been a project manager for a department called Educational Innovation at UW-Madison for almost a year).  He kept describing all of these "education people" as "just like you, Bryn...so emotional".  After hearing this a few times, I asked for clarification to ensure that "so emotional" was not intended to be disparaging.  He replied that what he meant to say is that he has never worked with people who genuinely care so much about the work they are doing.  Most people don't care about their work like you guys do, he said.  

So... when you care a lot, I guess you end up crying a lot.  At least this has been true for me.  

This week I was reading the book, What I Talk About When I Talk About Running by Haruki Murakami.  In his discussion of running and writing he states, "If something's worth doing ,it's worth giving your best - or in some cases beyond your best."  At my school, it feels like the honeymoon is over and the disillusion phase has set in.  I ran out of the curriculum that I created this summer, meetings are piling up on top of one another, and there is never going to be enough time to get caught up.  The combination of caring a lot and giving beyond your best is what I think is so hard about teaching.  

Considering all of this, and despite the many ups and downs that I have been through, I am glad to be teaching.  If I could go back and talk to myself as a new teacher, I would share a lot of the reassurances posted in the response to Meg's article.  There is solidarity in knowing that it is a challenge for everyone.  There is comfort in knowing that it gets better.  

So that is what I want to remind myself in this October/November/Post-honeymoon/Disillusionment Phase of the school year: You care about this a lot.  It is worth giving beyond your best.  It will get better, but in the meantime, it is ok to cry.

Thanks, Meg Anderson, for inspiring this important discussion and congrats on a well-written and powerful article!