Looking at my year so far, I will say I have had an okay first half of the year. I haven't been able to get into classrooms for as many guidance lessons as would have liked, and I have been out more than I have needed and wanted. Being out more than I wanted, has made it feel like I was constantly playing catch up, and doing just enough to stay afloat. Ultimately, I know that I have made the most of the time I was at school and have provided the best services I can as a counselor. I just have to be able to accept that I can only do so much.
The "why" I've been out more than I want this year falls into the category that there are things that are more important.
WHAT?????
An educator actually uttered this phrase.....
Here is my why...On Friday, August 25, I left work early to take my amazing wife to the doctor to have a biopsy on her thyroid. On September 1, our lives changed a lot. She got the call that she had thyroid cancer. Things moved quickly and on 9/18 she had surgery to remove her thyroid. The surgery went well. We found the thyroid issue after a PET scan on 6/26 for my wife's lungs. The lungs seemed okay, but there was uptake on the thyroid. That leads us to my wife needing a lung biopsy on 10/6. My wife was then hospitalized with a chest tube due to a collapsed lung as a result of the biopsy. 3 days later, she was discharged. She was home for a day and a half and was back in the ER and was admitted back to the same hospital. They sent us home the next day. 2 days pass and she asked me to take her to Ohio State for a different opinion. Another collapsed lung and fluid in the pleura gained her another chest tube and another 4 day stent in the hospital. Fast forward to December and the radioactive iodine therapy for her thyroid treatment.
So would I change anything as to why I was out more than I wanted...Not a chance! My wife is the most important thing and I will always be by her side. I would sit in the hospital and wonder what I needed to be doing at school. I would be no good at school with my wife in the hospital. At that point, I realized it was making the most of the time I was there that mattered.
I feel like I have done that, but it has meant postponing classroom lessons because of student issues. I want to be able to do it all, but I know deep down I can't.
I got some of my objectives in place this year, but need to nurture them some more. One of my goals for the year is to provide my 8th graders with more exposure to college and career readiness. We have toured the local career/technical center and have gone to the local career fair. My plan going forward is to meet individually with all my 8th graders to check on their career and high school planning, and to select 10 to work on an action plan on what it will take to accomplish their goals. Oh, and do all my guidance lessons for my 5-8 grade caseload while organizing and administering state testing....Piece of cake 🍰🍰
After a great #leadLAP chat today (12/30) on twitter, I am motivated to get things going in the right direction. @suetonnensen laid out the call to action and I am going to accept and force myself to #bloglap more frequently this semester!!
As I start the second half of the year, I plan on creating more experiences for my students and continue to grow as an educator. Committing to take care of my health, my family, my students, and my professional growth is my plan for 2018!
