Find me an overly behaved child and I'll stop

I'm so sick of my supervising teacher telling me that I need to lower my expectations of my students.  Not educationally.  I set realistic goals for them there.  She thinks I expect too much out of them as far as making them be responsible for their own actions.  I demand respect from them and I give it right back to them.  I assign homework and if it doesn't come back the next day after ample time to complete it in class, I take points off.  I don't let them roll their eyes at me and I make them make eye contact when we're discussing the choices they've made.  If they mumble under their breath, it does not go unnoticed. They're in SIXTH grade! Are these crazy demands?!  Don't be a disrespectful snot, do your homework, and recognize that actions have consequences.  I don't have them sitting in neat little rows with folded hands saying "Yes Miss G."  I clearly state my expectations and then hold them accountable.  I've had it with this crappy student teaching placement.

Success!

My kids were naughty today.  I know you're not supposed to call the students in your classroom "yours" but screw it.  I would jump in front of a bus for those buggers.  So anyway, they have an assistant who goes to P.E. with them to keep them in line because they have trouble holding in their bad behaviors in unstructured times.  Because they were being so naughty, I decided I'd go to P.E. with them today.  They were great.  I was surprised at how great they were and wondered why they even have an assistant go with them in the first place.  However, as I was leaving with them, the P.E. teacher pulled me aside and thanked me for coming down with them because things went so smoothly.  It was presidential fitness testing week (pull ups and sit ups) and he knew that it was going to be tough for my students to keep it together.  In special ed, it's sometimes hard to see the impact you're having on students because they don't progress as quickly as "normal" students.  Today was one of those moments where I really truly knew I made an impact and it made my day!!! :D

The breakdown

It happened today.  My disability disabled me.  Sure, all of the disabling was what led me to get diagnosed in the first place, but it hasn't happened since starting medication.

Let's backtrack a bit.  In October of last year, I dropped out of all of my classes due to overwhelming anxiety.  I couldn't do my projects or even get sleep.  I was diagnosed with Generalized Anxiety Disorder, started meds, did some counseling and moved on with life.  Sure, I'm still an anxious person, but I'm generally in good spirits about it.  Anxiety saves lives.  It forces me to be prepared for the absolute worst.  It's hoping for the best that I struggle with, but the boy scouts would be so proud of me.  I think there's a branch of the military with the "Be Prepared" motto as well.

Anyways, as a special educator (graduating soon, yay!), I'm supposed to be all gung ho about embracing disabilities and blah, blah, blah.  Let's face it, people.  This is something that prevents me from doing things that so called "normal" people can do no problem.  I'm not too big on being all "Yay! I totally freak out at the mere thought of misfortune!"  Sure, there's nothing wrong with me, but that doesn't change the fact that it's annoying as all get out and today it hit hard.


I recently decided to stop taking my birth control pills because I don't take them regularly.  What's the use of irregularly regulating your hormones?  So now my ovaries are screaming, "Why should I have to do this?! I haven't had to make estrogen in like 5 years!" and my hormone levels are all over the place.  Turns out making estrogen is not like riding a bike.  I randomly cry.  Today I randomly cried and then cried about how I was randomly crying.  "Normal people don't do this!" I said to myself.  I was quickly overcome with guilt.

No special educator should say anything like that.  It's true.  There is a majority and a minority.  The majority of people can stop themselves from randomly crying or hyperventilating or vomiting about situations that occur on a daily basis.  I can't and it infuriates me.  Even though my anxiety is under control (for the most part) I can't control my emotions.  And while we're on the topic, that's a terrible saying.  No one can control their emotions.  I'd like to be able to control my responses to my emotions, though.  I blame the saying for my anger.  It implies that I should be capable of controlling the natural feelings I have at various times. 

I guess that's how I handle things.  I blame other things for the issues I have that are not under my control.  I used to be really good at finding silver linings, like always being more prepared than the boy scouts, but I seem to have lost my flair. 

That's my goal for this blog.  I want to find my flair again.  Sure, I'll be writing about my anxiety (and I haven't even gotten to the angst yet.  That part comes from my 6th graders) but I'm hoping to get some insight into myself here.  My anxiety causes my mind to go a million miles a minute but I can only type so fast.  It focuses me and forces me to fixate on what I'm really trying to say.  So, I guess if you're reading this, you're getting the real me.  I'll do my best to keep it that way.  Unedited and uncut. I won't even go back and read this until I hit the "publish" button. 

Be prepared tip of the day:  Knowing your emergency exits is only half of being prepared.  A truly anxious person also knows where to hide when the exits are blocked.  I've lived in four different places in the last year.  If an axe murderer came in and I couldn't get out, he'd never find me ;)