More than butterflies

It's been nearly 3 months since the last time I blogged. This summer wasn't as restful as I intended it to be. I guess that's what happens when you and your husband decide to open a restaurant when it's probably one of the hardest times to find help.  The good thing about this was that I forced to completely step away from school. 

And stay away from school I did. I didn't work in my classroom from June 2 until just this past week...3 days before our first in-service day. I rarely checked my email, and I didn't feel guilty about it. 

Last year drained me--emotionally, mentally, and physically. I was just spent and still thought about changing careers. 

The time came to start working in my classroom, and I just felt overwhelmed. I knew there was a lot that needed to be done...and to be honest it needed to be done last year, too, but when most of the students were remote, it was mainly for me and not for them. 

I did a little cleaning and made posters. My room wasn't completely done, but it was acceptable for students to have their half day at the end of the week. 

Then the day of our in-service came. I didn't sleep well the night before and chalked it up to nerves. But when I was getting ready to go to the school, I started feeling super anxious to the point that I had the worst stomach ache ever. As our new superintendent was talking about his short and long term goals for us, I felt okay-ish. But then the health department started giving their presentation. It was a lot to take in. How to determine if a kid would need to be quarantined. Vaccinated vs. unvaccinated protocol. Seating charts for contact tracing. And much of what they told us could change within the weeks or days to come. I was sitting in a room with more people than I had ever been in contact with over the past year.  Then the what-ifs starting being asked.

I had to get out of there. Luckily, lunch time was just around the corner.  I was not feeling well at all. I pushed through to the end of our meetings and went home as soon as I was able to. My anxiety was causing me to feel physically ill. Yet another new thing to deal with. It had been 18 months since we'd had all of the students back in the building, and I was freaking out about it. 

Here's the silver lining though. I had the best first day of school ever. Students were happy to be there. I could actually hear reactions to my lame jokes and hear them interacting with each other. This was all I wanted every day last year. And I finally got it.

I know that I wasn't the only one who was anxious about this past week. It's pretty reasonable to expect that most teachers would be given what we dealt with last year. We are still wading through these turbulent waters. And the tide may turn on us at any time. I'm going to try and live in the calm and soak it up as long as I can.