I wanted to be a teacher more than anything. I worked incredibly hard to get through college as a non-traditional college student. I applied to and got accepted into a program that placed me into a classroom quickly, and I immediately loved my students. I was so proud to have accomplished the goals I had set for myself and everyone around me was constantly telling me that I was meant for teaching.

I don’t mean to toot my own horn, but I was good at teaching. I designed and taught my own curriculum. I created lessons that helped my students to feel seen. I related to them. I made sure to be engaging. I affirmed all of my students’ identities every chance I could. I regularly built meaningful connections inside and outside of the classroom. I gave my students my all every single day.

One day, on my lunch break, I sat inside a closet between two of the science classrooms hacking so hard that I started vomiting into a trashcan while I was waiting for a virtual doctors appointment. Weeks later, after finally going to the emergency room after school I was diagnosed with pneumonia as well as two other conditions. I checked myself out of the hospital against the doctor’s recommendation at 4:45 A.M. in order to go change clothes and go back to work my typical 16 hour workday.

My principal had made it clear that I could not miss work. She even came in to observe me that day because as she stated, she wanted to make sure I wasn’t going to be the “…type of teacher who phones it in when sick”. While lecturing, I coughed blood into a napkin and then took a hit of my new inhaler trying to catch my breath in front of my tenth graders when one of my students asked me, “Mr., why are you here when you’re so sick?” I explained to her that I wasn’t allowed to take time off, and in unison almost every single one of my fifth period students turned around and glared at the principal who was sitting in the back of the classroom.

I’d like to say that I decided to leave that school right then, but I didn’t. I kept pushing myself to give more and more of myself. I gave everything that I could to teaching, but then my second grader made a comment that I couldn’t shake. They asked me to turn off my camera for my zoom class one night after I got home from teaching and was in one of my mandatory educators classes. I turned it off and looked at my baby.

“What’s up, Bud?” I questioned.

“Daddy, do you think My teacher has to work as much as you?”

My mouth hung open. My eyes widened. Before I could even respond though, my kiddo continued.

“I’m ok. I know your students need you. I just worry about Ms. S’s daughter, ‘cuz she doesn’t have a bigger sibling to help take care of her like I do.”

It hit me like a meteor. My second grader felt that they weren’t a priority in my life. They felt like their older sister, who was only in the third grade was the one who was best able to take care of them. It broke me. I cried in the office to my principal and assistant principal. I brainstormed a way that I would be able to work less than the 12-16 hours I was working everyday. I asked if in the next semester I could teach the same grade level so I didn’t have to completely redesign a new curriculum and I requested to possibly take less of the educators courses. I didn’t want to stop taking them entirely, I just wanted to have a bit of breathing room. I wanted to be able to grocery shop for my family, cook my kids dinner, and be a present father outside of teaching.

My principal and assistant principal let me know that they would not approve either of those requests. They told me I must not care enough about my students. They let me know that I was going to be teaching another grade the next year, but that they would be keeping the curriculum I had created and giving it to another teacher. They let me know that they would have my credential pulled if I didn’t take a full course load on top of teaching. They made sure I knew that they didn’t value me or my family.

So I quit.

I quit because I loved my kids more than any job.

I’ve had four very different jobs since I left teaching. None of them have been a “dream job” but that’s because the only job I view as a dream anymore is being a dad to my babies.