A couple of weeks into term means it’s time for the return of the familiar feelings of tiredness. Before teaching, I had never experienced anything like the incessant groggy feelings that sandwich my day; maybe it’s an age thing and I just don’t have the stamina any more! But I do wonder how others cope.
When I wake up in the morning, it is often very early, and I recall a night plagued
by the thoughts rolling around in my head, morphing into strange and disturbing dreams.
Sometimes I have woken up once or twice in the night remembering work related things
that have no place creeping into my thoughts in the middle of the night. The drive to
work is enough to remind me to get an early night that evening, and then when I reach
school and start to see the kids trickle in, I start to become more alert, through
necessity. By the time our morning meeting is over, it’s time to get on with the real
business of the day, and I’m wide awake, even if that’s not really how I feel. In the
classroom I have to be energetic, dynamic, and ever alert – to field off-beat
questions, to swoop down on notes circulating the room, and to enthuse the pupils,
who may well be looking like I was feeling just an hour or two before.
The momentum of the day means there’s hardly a moment to let lethargy seep back in, although sometimes free periods can be a burden, as I lose the momentum and my eyes droop over the paperwork that I slump down to tackle. By the time the final bell rings, I’m fired up and seemingly full of beans, which lasts just about as long as the duration of my journey home. I make plans in my head for the evening, swearing to myself I will find time for the gym and to make a few worksheets; maybe even mark half a set of books.
By the time I step through my front door though, the feelings of tiredness are back
again, and I make the well-known error of sitting down with a cup of tea, something
which is guaranteed to make me feel overcome with weariness again. And so I do the
minimum I need to in the evening, promising myself I’ll get up early to finish the
chores in the morning, such as sorting out my paperwork or simply doing the washing
up. And so the cycle continues. By the weekend, I have no energy to make the most of
my free time, and spend it in anything from furious marking frenzies to
procrastination, as I struggle against the fog of fatigue. It only takes a few long
after school meetings or extra burdens that are often thrust upon us for me to fall
further down the energy scale.
I do try to energize myself - physical exercise to get the blood pumping, eating
as healthily as temptation will allow – and by the end of term I’m sure I won’t even
notice that I feel tired pretty much most of the time; it’ll be my norm, and come
the holidays I’ll wonder where all my energy has come from. I often wonder how those
with young families cope, or how those with busy social lives of evening classes and
pub quizzes and sporting practices manage to fit it all in. I need to know their
secrets of success! Meanwhile I’ll continue to carry the match-sticks that come in
handy to prop open my eyelids, and avoid lessons where I’m tempted to slump at my
desk and snooze while we read from dry text books. The thought of doing this until I'm 65
is enough to jolt me wide awake though; if only I had the energy to be active in a union,
I'd be weakly waving a placard protesting about raising the retirement age!
added 1/5/05
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