Can Teaching Ruin Your Marriage?

Yes, it can.

I have recently listened to the podcast episode “What to do when teaching is ruining your marriage” by Angela Watson. This was one of many episodes that made me relate and say, “Oh my! It’s not just in my head! Teacher overwhelm is real, and it does affect relationships if not taken seriously. ”

I can relate to so many discussions led by Angela on her podcast. This platform actually became the first that helped me validate my good and bad experiences as a teacher. Those moments and hours of stress that I thought I had been experiencing on my own suddenly became shared by thousands of teachers who had gone through or are going through the same experience in this profession.

No, my life wasn’t irreparably ruined by teaching. Thankfully, my marriage wasn’t either. But two years ago, teaching took a toll on my relationship and made me a miserable person, wife, mother. I wrote about it in my post “Teaching K-12”. I wasn’t present with my family, always thinking about how to survive one more day and week at my job. I could not relax over a weekend and kept overworking myself. I was doing too many things at the same time, and I absolutely felt indifferent to my profession.

Now that I look back on it, I can identify the reasons my job was making me miserable. These reasons were:

Lack of balance between work and home.

Lack of professional direction.

Lack of support.

Lack of resources that would help me fight the overwhelm.

Lack of information at the school district level available to new teachers to deal with problems.

Tons of paperwork that I could not rationalize.

High and unfounded expectations from myself.

Perfectionism.

Lack of networking.

Lack of inspiration.

If you are still experiencing all of those or some of them, it’s time to have a conversation with yourself and take action to eliminate all or most causes of unhappiness in your life as a teacher. The time to make changes now, not tomorrow, not next year!

This is how I took action.

I stumbled upon the article “Why It’s So Hard For Teachers To Take Care Of Themselves (and 4 ways to start)” at Cult Of Pedagogy, and it shook me to the core because I was able to realize I was not alone in my struggles. This article led me to Angela Watson’s 40-hour-work-week club that “baptized” me into a new kind of teacher. I am not an affiliate of this program, but I have been in the program myself since winter 2017. That it has transformed my life is not an exaggeration. I have gained so much value from this club that helped me in so many areas in my profession. I am talking about grading, parent communication, efficacy with planning, student communication, and many more topics. This is indeed a program I wish every school district would pay for to enroll all the teachers.

I found (actually I was found) a fantastic teacher who became my mentor. We did planning together, talked about painful things in education; I observed, modeled, copied and was inspired by this individual. The power of support needed by every teacher should not be underestimated. This support is available once you connect to the right people in or out of your profession. I believe finding a mentor in your professional field is much more beneficial because the person will understand what you go through asking for very few details and explanations. You might connect to one person or two or more. Just find the person you can rely on while on your journey of becoming a teacher. In this choice, go with your gut. You need a personal connection, same values you share with a mentor. Otherwise, your communication will turn into one more school chore.

I started looking for resources to help me with finding happiness and find balance. I searched and searched as if my life depended on them, and it did actually. I found some books and podcasts that I recommend. These choices reflect my needs at the time I desperately needed changes in my perception and some new and fresh thinking detached from the school environment. I recommend Cult of Pedagogy, Truth For Teachers, Shameless Mom Academy (if you are a mom too), Happier with Gretchen Rubin, The Daily Refresh by John Lee Dumas. Among the books are a few that I devoured in a 3-month period. Read a post about them here.

I searched for my passion, and when I found it, I started dedicating more and more time to learning what I want to become, how I want to do it, and the tools I need to make my plans reality. I shamelessly leave all the school work at school and let myself flourish on weekends exploring horizons that keep me up at five in the morning on Saturday and Sunday. I started teaching on Udemy, signed up for entrepreneurial podcasts, like Entrepreneurs on Fire by John Lee Dumas and Do You Even Blog by Pete McPherson. I am experimenting with my interests, set goals, start projects. One of the projects is going to be revealed soon, so stay connected.

I stopped taking any things seriously, and I take every day as an opportunity to learn and grow, be it my profession, personal area, family, business. I focus only on things that move me to the next level of being happy, wealthy, satisfied with my life. Other things are treated as mundane work for which I batch strictly limited time to complete those tasks. I don’t sweat when I make mistakes. I look at the goal ahead of me and disregard moaners and complainers.

I ditched perfectionism. I opt for ” almost good and done” and not for “wannabe-perfect and incomplete.” I don’t judge myself for stumbling and give myself credit for any growth that I see.

I listen to my instinct and what it tells me regarding my work, relationship with people, my ambitions. I give myself a breathing room to think of the way out of traps and situations I don’t feel comfortable with. I listen to myself when my gut tells me I need a change even if the status quo is good, offers stability and money. I take action and wait for the power of the compound effect to take action.

I learn about things that are very different from my profession to keep a fresh mind and get new ideas. I’ve grown to like reading about stocks, day trading, real estate, and mind-gut connection literature. Things so dramatically different from education exercise my brain and infuse novelty into my work and education.