Fourteen months ago, I stepped away from teaching in order to pursue another dream.
As Glenn and I started getting answers from our fertility specialist and an amazing team of physicians, I realized that starting a family would require a commitment... a larger commitment of my time, energy, and resources than we initially anticipated.
While teaching, my students were my life, and their needs superseded my own aspirations. I could not make the appointments, get the necessary procedures, explore our family planning options, and still feel successful in my role as an educator. This is not meant to sound vainglorious. It is the educator's truth. I've watched my colleagues and friends make countless sacrifices, lovingly and even joyfully because that is our truth. We love our students more than our personal plans... more than money, sleep, and in many cases, more than anything else. I've cried with more than one friend as their relationships unravel due in part to the beautifully sacrificial act of teaching.
Nearly three years ago, I started looking into doctoral programs. It is important to me that I model the attributes that I want my students to live into... One of my Room 134 Family Precepts was to strive each day to be a bit better than yesterday. At the time, I wanted to start taking 1-2 online classes per semester. Leaving the classroom was not a part of the original plan. However, as I started applying to doctoral programs in the spring of 2019, I was also aware of the increasing demands related to my dreams of becoming a mom.
Last year, as Glenn and I started having hard conversations about our journey into parenthood, I was incredibly fortunate that several amazing doors opened financially through academic fellowships, so that I could pursue a doctoral degree full-time.
While, I am fully confident that God was present in our decision-making, it's hard to explain the heartbreak I felt, as I exchanged one dream for another. Teaching is not like other jobs. When I think about teaching, I do not think about my duties or the hours I spent planning, I think of 127 faces, and each one is precious to me.
In the fall, I stepped into the new season of writing and reading research while getting regular ultrasounds and trying various hormone treatments. The disassembled crib in our back bedroom became a source of pain rather than a reminder of promise, and I felt this unrelenting guilt for pursuing something that felt selfish.
At one particularly trying doctor's appointment, I sat in the little room waiting on the doctor to return with results from the HSG, and a teacher friend called me. Of course, I picked up because it was school hours, and I was curious and somewhat concerned. A former student of mine was on the line. He learned that I was friends with his math teacher, and he wanted to call and say 'hi.' The tears quietly flowed as I offered a bit of "Fantastic Spray" through the phone line.
I digress.
This fall, educators and families are faced with a terrible decision. This is not what we wanted nor anticipated.
I think of 127 precious faces, and I know how desperately many of them need the classroom and the safety and security that it provides.. the safety that my colleagues work tirelessly to provide.
While I ache for my former students and long for them to return to the safety and security of the classroom, I am also increasingly aware of the fact that my colleagues cannot provide that same sense of safety and security this fall.
I have stated before that science is a gift from God. In many ways, fear is a gift, too. We wear seatbelts, stop at red lights, and obey the speed limit out of a healthy respect (fear) of the consequences. In that same breath, we do not allow our students to bring weapons into school because we all have a healthy sense of fear. But, what happens when the weapon is unseen? What happens when an invisible weapon has the potential to do as much (and possibly more) damage, but we have no way of knowing if the weapon is present and no way of standing in the gap between the weapon and our children?
I know we are not called to live in fear, but we are called to fear God in a sense of respecting His power, His authority, and His love (Proverbs 1:7, Psalm 111:10, Job 28:28). We are also told that we should not test Him (Matthew 4:7).
I can and do respect the hardship that we are all facing, but I also implore you to consider the risk. If the data does not convince you of the risk to your own child, then please think about my husband. Think about my friends. Think about your most beloved teachers from your own academic experience. These are the individuals who will stand in that gap for your child because that is what they have always done. I was right there with them, standing between your children and the door to our classroom in every single lockdown drill. Knowing that in the face of danger, their lives mattered more to me than my own.
Right now no one knows where the threshold between the threat and your child resides. No one fully understands the weapon. Everyone is positioned at the same gap.
My fear is one sacrifice is one too many. If it's not my own spouse, it's someone else's. If it's not my own child, then it's someone else's. If it's not my own student, it's someone else's.
Regardless of the percentages and statistics, it only takes one to spread this virus. It only takes one innocent person to pass this on to countless others, and it only takes one life for it to be too many.
Rather than grow angry with each other, we should care for each other... endure for each other... and recognize that a risk to one is a risk to us all. One is one too many.