i really love my job. it can be exhausting and extremely frustrating (especially when hearing "4:00 4:00 4:00 4:00 4:00 snack snack 4:00 get a snack" over and over and over and over and over again), but at the end of the day, i can't help but smile and learn from the people i serve every day. at the end of the day they are grateful for our effort to maintain a positive and fulfilling daily environment and every day is a clean slate no matter how difficult the previous day was for them. i really am grateful for that and am trying to follow suit. i can get really frustrated when someone refuses to make a good choice (like simply climbing up into a chair instead of waiting for someone to pick you up off the floor) and it's easy to continue reminding that person that s/he didn't make a good choice, but i can say with confidence that if i messed up, they wouldn't even think to rub my face in it for the rest of the day, so i'm striving to be more like them in that way. life is full of too many good choices to just focus on the few not so great ones (and they're hardly even "bad").
that brings me to something else i've been thinking about a lot lately. as a teacher, as a parent, as an authority figure, your limits will always be tested unless you put a stop to it from the beginning. my sister-in-law Gaia and i were talking about this last weekend, specifically the example that if your child is screaming and crying for candy or something like that in a store, it means nothing to threaten leaving unless you actually do it. that may mean leaving a full cart of groceries and having to make another trip to the store, but otherwise, the battle will never end. it may be really challenging in the beginning, but it is so worth it in the end. in my field of work, that may mean waiting over an hour for a man to decide he's going to pull himself up into a chair after going limp expecting his staff to carry his weight while he's walking (he is fully capable of carrying his own weight) and consequently dropping to the floor. he was so convinced that someone was going to come rescue him and pick him up off the ground and ultimately he was right. we were prepared to leave him where he was with a staff and take the rest of the group home, when 2 other staff members (who don't work in the home, but are therapists, etc, in the community center) came and pulled him up off the ground. any possibility for progress was immediately lost (as well as about an hour of our time which was now for nothing) and well, he was right. it not only impeded progress, but further engrained in his mind that if he decides to drop to the ground, he just has to wait long enough and someone will come rescue him. frustrating. he is very seizure-prone, so he has to be assisted when walking, but that doesn't mean doing the work for him. it means supporting him enough that if he has a seizure he can't fall forward and crack his head open on the ground. in the past few years he has decided more and more to let staff do the physical work for him that his actual abilities are diminishing as a result. really, it comes back to the fundamental principle of choices and then being made accountable for the choices you have decided to make.
it may be easier at the time to just give the screaming child the candy so s'he'll shut up and let you finish your shopping, but do you really want to deal with that over and over again? then all of a sudden you have a spoiled rotten kid who is so convinced that they can anything they want out of you and your credibility as an authority figure is obsolete.
anyway, just something i've been thinking about a lot lately because of some of the things that i encounter at work along with my overwhelming desire to try to not be a horrible parent.
5 comments:
I remember once when I wanted gum SO BADLY. I kept putting a pack of gum on the belt. My mom kept putting it back. Eventually, she hit me.
Now, my grandmother's ring that is supposed to go to my older brother is going to my little sister. Why? Because, as my little sister said, "When I cry, I get what I want. And I cried. So I get the ring."
Fantastic.
The therapists should freaking know better! Have you talked to them?
I struggle with this daily. I try so hard, but it's much easier said than done when your four year old is screaming "I HATE YOU!!" at the top of her lungs because you won't buy her Fruit Loops. Most of the time I succeed in staying calm (although I disagree about leaving the store, I think it just shows the kid that their behavior is allowed to dictate your life) but sometimes I blow up at her. Not something I'm proud of, but it happens to every parent, no one is a saint.
Good that you're thinking about these things now, before your daughter can talk back!!
I know what you mean. Everyday of my life, I know what you mean. Well the parenting part isn't worrying me too much right now, but the entire impeding results and teaching others responsibility and stuff is what I understand right now.
Other than this, how's life?
I'll give you a ring, Katie!
Even something as simple as "you get two bathroom passes per 6 weeks. They are for emergencies" gets annoying to keep saying. We've only had 3 weeks this term, and already students have used both and can't understand why I'm telling them "no, you can't go to the bathroom." "But it's an emergency!" "That's why you should have saved them for emergencies, and not to go use your cell phone in the bathroom."
Even with all their whining, no one has peed their pants yet. :)
Why can't I remember what your new job is?
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