I work in education. Due to the nature of my work and also where I reside, being diagnosed with depression and anxiety is a serious social stigma that could easily cost me my job and end my career.
Every single day I have to haul myself out of bed.
Every single day I have to put on my ‘happy face’ mask just so my students don’t notice something’s wrong with me (teenagers can be surprisingly observant to the tiniest changes in us.)
Every time when a colleague asks, “How are you, Ms. X?” I’ll have to muster all the strength and courage in me to not burst into tears and just smile before saying “Yeah, I’m great. And you?”
At the end of every day, the only thing I look forward to is running to the car park/parking lot after work just so I can hop in, shut the door and sob (I park far, far away in an obscure corner at the basement car park just so no one can see me having a mental meltdown, sobbing every day after school.)
I think of dying almost every single day. I’ve come up with countless ways of doing it even, just have not acted on it…
I have at least 2-3 meltdown episodes every day (the worst would be weekends. I’ll literally cry throughout the day in intervals, from the moment I wake up right until about night time.)
There was one particularly bad weekend where I cried so much, my whole face was puffy and my eyes were so swollen, people thought I got beaten up or something.
I pace around in fear, very high strung. I cannot calm myself down once an episode is triggered.
I cry.
I fidget.
I break down.
I fail to concentrate.
And lethargy hits like a tonne of bricks.
So what do I do? I try to disappear. I try to go to sleep, just to pretend I don’t exist for that few hours.
I’ve stopped functioning like a normal human being…
I’m terrified that people at work will find out about my problems. Due to the pandemic, staff have placed great emphasis on the students mental health and that’s great. But at the same time, teaching through this pandemic is also costing ours. And the fear and stigma it carries (once it is officially diagnosed) is not something we can afford to take lightly.
When I actually try to open up by hinting something is wrong with me or mentioned that I’m considering to leave the profession… This is what I get in return:
“Why are you so negative?”
“Oh stop being such a lazy sloth. Be more energetic!”
“It’s all in your mind.”
“You made yourself this way.”
“Just snap out of it.”
“You’re so weak-willed.”
“That’s pathetic, quitting when things get tough.”
“Stop it with the self pity. You think you’re the only one with problems due to covid?”
“You’re an adult. Deal with it like the rest of us.”
I didn’t ask to be this way…
I want to be that teacher that I used to be.
I want to be the employee that I used to be; a competent, confident team player who takes on leadership, supporting and mentoring roles. The one whom the administrators and others could rely on for help.
I want to have that strong sense of purpose in life too.
I want to be brave and be able to conquer this too.
I want to be happy too.
I don’t want to die…
I want to LIVE. But I can’t see a way out of this…
I used to love teaching. I cannot afford to lose my job. But my best friend (one of the only few who knows what’s wrong with me) asked: What’s the point of trying to save your career if you lose yourself or die in the process?
3 comments
it’s the same thing I struggle with; choosing myself, my health, over my passion. I had a modest career in social services, and slowly but surely it became obvious that I would either fall apart at work or quit. I think I lacked a certain love and desire in the direction of my job; when I was done I would have rather spent the rest of my life homeless than go to work one more day.
So, now I’m disabled. I don’t get the pension, or any of the benefits, because the system is designed to ignore mental disabilities. Still, I have my family, my friends, and a share of my sanity and prior abilities. If I even try to get near to my old job, I start having panic attacks. I shake uncontrollably, and am paralyzed until I find a way out of the situation.
It broke my heart, walking away from my career. I’ve had a broken heart before though, having escaped from many toxic interpersonal relationships. It’s supposed to be the case that I am worth more than just the role I filled at my job. It doesn’t feel like that most days.
———
I was playing a game with my friends this evening, a role playing game that was entirely brutal. Cruelly I ended up with two status effects that I identify with; crippled and distraught with grief. The crippled status goes away if I get blessed or respected, and the grief goes away when my story gains a certain value. Meanwhile, the crippled status also increases my story earned.
I barely got the grief discharged by the end of the game, and that aligns with what little hope I have these days; perhaps someday I can stop being sad, stop my life being dominated by my loss. Recovering from being crippled might just be beyond my reach.
Regardless, I gave all that I had to my career, apart from my life. Maybe somewhere out there is some justice or reward for passionate people like us.
Reminds me of a Talking Heads song;
“He said be proud of what you are
there’s something special bout people like us,
people like us, who will answer the telephone
people like us, growing big as a house
people like us, we’re gonna make it because….
we don’t want freedom
we don’t want justice
we just want someone to love”
https://youtu.be/t9a1JQi7G3k
I truly admire and respect people in social services. The amount of shit and verbal abuse you guys have to deal with is just another level beyond anything (my teacher friends and I have an insider joke that hybrid learning/online exam is a special level of hell but it’s nothing compared to what you guys go through on a daily basis.) I have a friend who used to be in social services too. She ended up leaving the profession as well. She went in as a young fresh grad; a loving ball of energy filled with hope for the future and society. In the end, she left a broken person… It’s sad how something we used to love so much and have so much passion for ends up destroying and consuming us…
Powerful post, thank you for sharing this. I relate to some of it….no idea how you teach humans, but totally get the frustration of this condition and the impossibility of dealing with it at times.