Self care.

Thank you for joining me for Interlude #21 on The Staffroom! My name is Pav, and this is my moment of Zen. 

A few days ago, when Chey and I were discussing what our topics would be for our interludes this week, I shared with him that I had an idea to talk about self-care, but mentioned that while I was brainstorming my notes, they had became so long and convoluted that I felt it was going to be too much for an Interlude. There was just too much history - too many feelings that went with this topic. We talked about it and decided that this is likely a very good topic for an actual episode. So we decided to hold off on the idea of Teacher Self-Care for a little bit.

Now, I was happy with the fact that we would do a full episode on this topic, because it’s important, it’s current, it’s what teachers want to hear about because we are starting to talk more openly about Wellness and how we, as teachers, take care of ourselves. This is concerning stuff. But at the same time, I want to be open and honest about MY thoughts and ideas surrounding the issue. I didn’t grow up with this idea of “Self-Care” - I know that many people didn’t. 

To me, Self-care was always made to be equivalent to self-indulgence. For me, the idea of it brings up strong feelings of guilt. I’ve gotten better, but truly, the question is - why do I feel this way?? I began to think about it, and started to explore why this is. We hear so much about the importance of taking care of ourselves, and that we should be participating in activities that allow us to recharge our minds, our bodies, our hearts, and to fully take care of ourselves so that we can best take care of others. But what if our own feelings and understanding of what that means are so distorted that we can’t allow ourselves the freedom to be able to?

From my communication with colleagues over the past 13 years, I’ve learned that most teachers don’t really give themselves the benefit of self-care very much. And why is that?? I can’t answer that for all teachers. I can only reflect on why that’s the case for myself. So I figured that this interlude would be a good time for me to get all that background stuff out in the open…so that when Chey and I tackle Self-Care as a full-length episode, that part is already taken care of, and we can talk about the things that we could, and SHOULD be doing.

I don’t think we reflect on ourselves as much as we should. I’ve been fortunate enough to be able do a lot more reflecting through this medium of podcasting, and I have encountered people that are along for our personal pilgrimage, who find commonalities and feelings that resonate with me. If you find that to be the case today, I’m glad I was able to help with that. If not, I implore you to think about topics such as these for yourself. Do some journaling, leave yourself some voice notes, start a vlog. There are such great ways to explore your feelings and to work through some of your challenges. I know that it has really helped me.

So let’s get down to this topic. I tend to not like talking about self-care for two reasons. Primarily because I never feel like I “deserve” it - although this ideology is starting to change slowly, and because I know I don’t engage in it as much as I should.

Growing up, I watched my mother do it all. Everything. Except…take care of herself. She did all the cooking, most of the cleaning (she would argue it was all of it), most of the child care, and absolutely none of the self-care. She didn’t ever go out, she didn’t have friends outside of her colleagues, she didn’t have hobbies or activities that she participated in. Other than the daily phone calls to her mom or sisters with her cup of tea in her hands, I can’t recall that I ever saw her do anything to take care of her social and mental well-being.

As an immigrant to the country, my mother arrived in Canada very soon after getting married, with next to no knowledge of the English language. Almost immediately, she began working a labour job. Life was assuredly very difficult, and the likelihood of mental distress was probably great. I can only imagine what it must have been like for my mom. She knew no one except for my dad, had very little knowledge of the culture and the way of life here in Canada, and began working to bring in money right away. The thought of me having to do the same in a new country gives me all kinds of anxiety.

I didn’t think much about my mother’s parenting style until I became a parent myself. As many people do, I compared my parenting to that of my own parents. What was I doing the same? What was I doing different? What was I not doing enough of? What were my shortcomings, where did I need to do better? What was my goal, where was I failing? I think all parents question themselves at times. I compared myself to my mom as a parent. Those times when I felt like I couldn’t do it anymore - I thought about my mom, and how she never stopped. She didn’t take a night off to go out to the movies, that I can remember. She didn’t have an escape, she didn’t ever seem to ask for a getaway from it all. And I think I grew up thinking she expected me to do the same.

As a parent, when I really needed to get away for a little bit, when I felt overwhelmed and unable to be my best self, when I was losing it and thinking I wasn’t ever going to be good enough as a mom for my children, all I could think about was how much I just needed to go be somewhere by myself. Solitude was my self-care.

I went to the gym.

I took nights off to go sit in a coffee shop with my book.

I went away on day trips by myself.

I “INDULGED” in doing things by myself - for myself, without my kids, and not for my kids. I didn’t NEED to do these things…I wanted to. It was how I coped. Should there be guilt associated with this? No. Of course not. But was there guilt associated with this? Absolutely. An unbelievable amount.

But this is all still just my personal story. These are my reasons for resisting the things that might bring me joy, comfort, sanity. What does this have to do with teaching? I feel like many teachers are resistant to self-care because of many of the same reasons. We may have started our teaching careers emulating our favourite teachers from when we were young. We may have had mentors that we are all still trying to catch up to, with respect to their style and educational ways. When you think about your favourite teachers, you mentors, you think of them in the best light. You remember them being perfect. You remember all the amazing things they did. You don’t remember them needing downtime. You don’t remember them saying, “everybody out - I need to be alone today at lunch.” You don’t remember them taking sick days to lie in bed all day and catch up on daytime television.

I think that as teachers, we sometimes feel guilty about participating in self-care practices. I have had many conversations with teachers about foregoing our mental health for the well-being of our students. We trade it off, because we are grown ups and we don’t think we need it as much as our students.

We are a nurturing bunch of individuals, that often will let our kind nature take care of everyone around us before we take care of ourselves. And maybe that shouldn’t be the case all the time. I’m coming around to the idea.

I still feel quite guilty when I do something for myself. Every time I get a massage - something our benefits cover - I feel like the queen of the world…doing something that feels like pure indulgence. But it isn’t - it’s a massage. Our backs are aching from standing all day. When we try to get a few minutes of peace during our prep periods or lunch breaks locked away in our rooms with the lights off, watching the small pairs of eyes peering through the window looking for us, it feels like we are letting them down. It feels wrong. It feels like we are going against the grain of the expectations of being a teacher.

In a few weeks, Chey and I will tackle the topic of teacher self-care. If you have any thoughts or ideas about this topic…let us know! Our twitter handle is @Staffpodcast.

Our episode is brought to you by OnPodcast Media, by Voice Ed Canada, and by School Rubric. We thank each and every one of you that are always by our side supporting us with all that we do.

Check out Chey’s Interlude on “The Greatest Asset” - it’s one of my favourites! Remember to Inspire, don’t Require, always be a humble servant, and Education never dies.

See you next time, friends.