teachers and anti anxiety meds and or therapy

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I hear you OP. I remember seeing an article about caregiver fatigue and secondary trauma last years and I cried for 20 minutes. It was the first time I had seen it acknowledged for teachers. I decided to take a .5 position this year as a temporary fix. I was doing CBD and Magnesium which helped a little but I think I will be contacting EAP and starting some therapy or medication if things don't improve more with my reduced schedule.

What is a 0.5 position? I’ve seen 0.4 and 0.6.

I’d say it half time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Quit. There’s nothing wrong with taking antidepressants, but there’s also nothing wrong with leaving the situation making you depressed. Not everyone is temperamentally suited for teaching in 2019. You need to preserve your health. It is a physically and emotionally demanding career. Thousands of tiny decisions to make. Everyone a critic because they think they can do a better job. Loving kids is not enough to get you through 30 years.

NP
Quitting after 25 years is easier said than done. At that point one is too vested to just quit.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think it’s sort of always been the case. One reason why teachers usually hate retirement plans that allow for retirement before 65–like fire and police, the demands are just too high and there’s too much burnout. It’s so rare to see a teacher make it to 65 and those that do are usually teaching the little ones in a good school district with supportive admin, I think.

I don’t know of any teacher retirement plans that don’t allow for retirement before 65. I am at 27 years now and plan to retire at age 55 with 33 years. I can’t even fathom teaching for 43 years.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Quit. There’s nothing wrong with taking antidepressants, but there’s also nothing wrong with leaving the situation making you depressed. Not everyone is temperamentally suited for teaching in 2019. You need to preserve your health. It is a physically and emotionally demanding career. Thousands of tiny decisions to make. Everyone a critic because they think they can do a better job. Loving kids is not enough to get you through 30 years.

NP
Quitting after 25 years is easier said than done. At that point one is too vested to just quit.

Being vested in your health! Even with meds, long term anxiety and depression can have impacts on your heart, digestive system, and even epigenetic effects. Is it really worth the remaining 5 years if you then are too ill to enjoy your retirement?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I found the thing that helps me most with teaching burnout is leaving immediately at the end of the day and having something else to focus on when I get home—I have 2 small children, so I focus totally on them when I get home and don’t think too much about work. Also, regular exercise really helps.

It may be my content - secondary English. But even PT, I find myself drowning in planning and grading. I am in two different rooms, with two different preps. And my planning period is often taken up by useless meetings. I'm exhausted by the time I return home, and I'm faced with work I can't get done during my school day.

How do you do it? any tips?

I’m the PP you responded too. I teach elementary school so I have a lot less grading than you, but the main thing I try to do is be as efficient as I can at work. I’ve been at my school in the same position for ten years so planning doesn’t take me very long any more. I also bring my laptop to all meetings and do lesson planning or paperwork while at the meeting. I used to do some after school activities with the students, but I have cut them out completely, so no tutoring, no clubs, etc. this might change when my kids are older. Mentally, I’ve shifted my perspective towards work the past few years. I decided to do as much as I can for the kids while I’m at work during the hours I’m paid to be there but I’m not going to be a martyr about it any more. At the end of the day, there’s only so much I can do, and teaching is just my job, not my whole life.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Quit. There’s nothing wrong with taking antidepressants, but there’s also nothing wrong with leaving the situation making you depressed. Not everyone is temperamentally suited for teaching in 2019. You need to preserve your health. It is a physically and emotionally demanding career. Thousands of tiny decisions to make. Everyone a critic because they think they can do a better job. Loving kids is not enough to get you through 30 years.

NP
Quitting after 25 years is easier said than done. At that point one is too vested to just quit.

Being vested in your health! Even with meds, long term anxiety and depression can have impacts on your heart, digestive system, and even epigenetic effects. Is it really worth the remaining 5 years if you then are too ill to enjoy your retirement?

At 25 years I still had 8 years to go. I have 6 more now. Sure you should be vested in your health, but I still say it's easier said than done. One just can't quit.

What do you propose? Last year was my worst year hands down. Chest soreness and anxiety like crazy. I still think I'm recovering from it, but one just can't quit. At age 48 and well short of un-reduced retirement any pension payments would be minuscule. Talk about anxiety? There are still bills to pay. What then?

[Anonymous]

OP- What are you anxious about? I do my job and then leave. I remind myself that I am not my students’ mom. I am their teacher. If there is something I can do to help them do better in school, I do my best to make that happen. But most of their issues stem from issues at home and short of getting the counselor, social worker etc to help out, I have done my job. I don’t engage in much gossip and spend the time getting my work done.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Quit. There’s nothing wrong with taking antidepressants, but there’s also nothing wrong with leaving the situation making you depressed. Not everyone is temperamentally suited for teaching in 2019. You need to preserve your health. It is a physically and emotionally demanding career. Thousands of tiny decisions to make. Everyone a critic because they think they can do a better job. Loving kids is not enough to get you through 30 years.

NP
Quitting after 25 years is easier said than done. At that point one is too vested to just quit.

Being vested in your health! Even with meds, long term anxiety and depression can have impacts on your heart, digestive system, and even epigenetic effects. Is it really worth the remaining 5 years if you then are too ill to enjoy your retirement?

At 25 years I still had 8 years to go. I have 6 more now. Sure you should be vested in your health, but I still say it's easier said than done. One just can't quit.

What do you propose? Last year was my worst year hands down. Chest soreness and anxiety like crazy. I still think I'm recovering from it, but one just can't quit. At age 48 and well short of un-reduced retirement any pension payments would be minuscule. Talk about anxiety? There are still bills to pay. What then?

I’m also 48 and I have 12 years to get to 30. If I had to quit tomorrow to protect my health (physical or mental), I would get another job. I was offered a position with a test company last summer. If I was stressed or unwell, I would have taken it. It was equal compensation to my position with MCPS, but the commute was ugly. Still, if the alternative was needing drugs to get through the school year or risking a mental breakdown, I’d have accepted the longer commute. If the pay had been less, but my mental health was at risk, I’d cut expenses so I could make it on less. I don’t know if you have children, but they need a healthy mom more than they need cable/streaming services, braces, soccer dues, or whatever else you are sacrificing yourself to afford. I used to work a second PT job on top of teaching, but it was too much and made me ill. We adjusted and now, three years later, we don’t regret it. Maybe you take a private school teaching position and tutor PT. Maybe you work for an education nonprofit or the State Dept of Ed. But depression can kill. Even if you don’t feel suicidal, it is damaging your health. Some of the meds damage your health. Same with anxiety.

Weighing all of that, why not leave? Might take you a few months to find something else so I’d understand not quitting on the spot, but you can interview and then give two weeks notice. Or make an intensive search over the spring and notify your principal in June that you aren’t returning.

You don’t want to look back in 5 years and say that you ruined your health over MCPS when you could have quit.

[Anonymous]

Why 65? It’s either 30 years or 62, whichever is first.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why 65? It’s either 30 years or 62, whichever is first.

I wish I could retire with 30 years. I mean technically I could, but the pension would be greatly reduced because of my age. For full retirement I need to be at least 55.

[Anonymous]

I'm the OP. I saw my primary care physician yesterday who recommended I start taking an anti anxiety medication. I have also put in some calls to therapists to try and see someone.

I need to stay until I can get my full pension. I'm not suicidal, I'm just massively stressed out. I have one kid in my class who, daily, rips apart my classroom library. He'll pull out hundreds of books and whip them across the room. We regularly have to evacuate the room because he's dangerous. (I'm going into the building tomorrow to pack up everything that belongs to me, including the entire class library, to give him less to damage and less to throw) He's not quite 4 and a half feet tall, but he's 100 pounds and strong. He's already injured a few kids. He shoved one kid into the wall so hard we were worried that kid had a concussion. He didn't, thank god. Then I have a little girl who will sit in the coat area, with her coat over her head and she either cries really loud or screams anytime I ask her to do any work. It is so loud, I can't teach and the other kids can't ignore her. Yes, social work has gotten involved with both kids. We've done an FBA and a BIP on each. I'm implementing "the plan" as best as I can. But I have 27 other students to take care of and my school seems to believe teachers should be able to deliver the work of a 1:1 aide, plus social work, plus psych care, and teach everyone else, too.

I'm going into my building tomorrow and my husband is helping me take home my classroom library and any other items the student can throw or damage. I personally paid for all those things and it doesn't make sense to just let him destroy them. It does mean that none of the other kids will have reading material outside the few school provided resources or games or any fun ways to learn. I'm moving to strictly paper and pencil work. They'll have to read stories from photocopies or from the smart board. I also have a lot of sick days banked and my teacher friends are encouraging me to use them as much as possible. I feel weird about that, especially because I several times, I've been able to step between the boy and other kids to prevent serious harm. If I leave the others alone with a sub, I'm afraid of what will happen.

My school is dragging its feet re: a domain meeting on either kid. It has been a few years in a row of this now. At the end of this year, I am going to put in for a transfer to a more calm school though so many teachers I know are dealing with similar stuff I really don't want to go from the frying pan into the fire.

[Anonymous]

Things only happen at my school when parents flood the administration with complaints. Has this happened?

[Anonymous]

I did therapy and took drugs. I also tried part time. The only thing that worked was changing settings. I now teach in a private school. I don’t need therapy or medication anymore. I am a new person. No job is worth falling apart for, and even the small pay cut I took is insignificant now that I don’t need regular therapy and psychiatrist visits!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Things only happen at my school when parents flood the administration with complaints. Has this happened?

Oh yeah, no. Parents have no idea. This is a hard working, blue collar, lower to middle income community. Most parents are working a job or two to make ends meet and are really good people, but they aren't able to be volunteering in the school to get a taste of what it happening. I'm not allowed to say anything to them either. I've talked to my union president, hell, I've been to the assistant superintendent. No one cares about anything but the test scores. I have been keeping data on the lost instructional time and showed that to the asst. sup. and *that* did cause her to raise her eyebrows. I have invited her and a few other people from central office to come and see what is happening for themselves. That was 2 months ago and no one can be bothered to stop by. It is stunning.

[Anonymous]

Has anybody else noticed a huge increase of posts on dcum about disruptive, disturbed and violent students this school year? I feel like this is new and really becoming a huge problem!