I have not posted in a long time.  Things have not gone well.  We are fighting for the survival of our program here at work.  I have been told that the success of the darkroom with the ABA program is my safety net, so to speak, but I never relax here.  I have had too much done to me.

My depression has been the worst it has ever been.  I had a very bad end of November and the Holiday break was the worst.  I am lucky that I finally found therapy and was able to switch medical maintenance doctors.  I had been trying for over a year to find a counselor.  My medicine dose has been doubled.  I live in a kind, caring town and have lovely neighbours, but my life is filled with work and acquaintances who are not like the people in my town.

I have decided to be open with my classes about my depression when warranted.  Why?  Well, we have been declared a "Stigma Free School" and I think the students will feel more comfortable with their own issues if they know there are teachers going through some of the same things.  I am judicious in when I talk about or divulge my illness.  So far, no negative ramifications.  It enables those students who have 504s or IEPs to know I mean it when I understand their anxiety and depression issues and will take their work late.  They know I am not lying and some have expressed their thanks.

I have been trying to work on things in therapy and things are not going well this week.  A friend is dumping me for his girlfriend, as he has been told to do with all his friends.  Another friend seems to have been put off by something I said to him.  He deleted his ill-timed joke to me after I made a comment and I have not heard from him since.

I was feeling bad and then I got a wonderful visit from two former students.  I left work feeling happy.  Then I headed to therapy.  She had been doing well since I started in January.  Then she made a comment about a political ideology that I hold dear.  She does not know this about me.  But I immediately felt vulnerable and let down.  I need to be able to be open in therapy but how can I when I know she holds this ideology in such a negative light?  I tried to brush it off for the rest of the hour.  Then as the night went on, I felt worse and worse.  I need to bring this up to her, but fear messing it up.  Just as I cannot turn away my students from feeling open with me by expressing disdain for a belief of theirs, I don't think a therapist should.  I would want my students to tell me when I have said something that made them feel bad - and they have and I have apologized - I need this from my therapist.  I am just scared to do it.

Then when my husband asked for my opinion about a work issue, he clearly did not like the answer I gave him.  It had to do with the sudden assigning a guardian to an elderly developmentally disabled client.  He tightened up when I gave my reasoning, and I could tell my opinion angered him.  I get that a lot.  When someone asks for my opinion and it is not what they wanted to hear, I am met with dismissal or disappointment.

With all this going on, I started ruminating about some things at work.  In my life, when someone has treated a family member or friend badly, I am expected to dislike the offending person and preferably cut ties with them.  However, when a person has done something to me, I can't even get anyone to defend me, let alone drop the offender.  If I express disappointment, I am told my anger at the offender's actions is my fault or I am too sensitive.  Students have asked me to deal with people who have treated them poorly, even former students, yet when one of their own does the same to me, no one will stand up for me.  When people here at work have treated each other poorly, I am expected to not like the offender anymore.  I cannot acknowledge any positive attributes of that person at all.  However, the names of people who have hurt me can be brought up a lot and friendships maintained and I am unreasonable for being upset by this.  I do not get it.  I have forgiven people for horrible things, for upsetting words, for stealing my ideas.  I do not know what more I have to do to get people to respect my right to be hurt and offended.  I was defended once, and that was recently, but I feel it was partly due to the nature of the subject and the identity of the offender.  He is not well liked.  If a chum says something bad about me or does something cruel to me, I will be the only one protesting such behavior.  It's kind of lonely doing that.

I have a union committee meeting in Trenton tonight.  These meeting days are incredibly long abut it is the only thing I am involved in where they are truly thankful and appreciative.