You know you’re a teacher if you’ve cried after school on numerous occasions, have eaten a whole box of Halloween candy while doing report cards, and have seriously contemplated changing professions.

You know you’re a mother if you’ve wondered what your life might look like if you didn’t have (or had less) kids, and have fantasized about needing a minor surgery or getting into a car accident, one that doesn’t have life-threatening injuries but does have injuries severe enough that would warrant you a couple of nights (at least) in the hospital.

If you are disgusted by my words right now, you are probably not a teacher, or a mother… and chances are, if you ask your friends who are teachers or mothers, they will confirm that they’re had these thoughts, too.

That’s because being a teacher is hard. And being a mother is hard. nd being both is beyond challenging. And, we are human.

This Friday, I had a really, really hard night. Nothing out of the ordinary happened, but the build up of the last few months finally just became too much for me to bear. And I fell hard, finding myself sitting in my bathroom, in the dark, crying for a long time. I didn’t need fixing. I didn’t need a plan to try to make things better. I didn’t need advice or uplifting words. I just needed to feel it all. I eventually ran myself a bath, lit a candle, and cried some more.

If you are a teacher, or a mother, or both, and you find yourself in a low like I had Friday night, I hope you find comfort in knowing that…

Chin up. It won’t always be this hard. You’ve got this.

xx