Raw Transcript: Parents & Teachers Confront What Kids Really Need | Spectrum

[Music] I've neglected my own needs to be a good teacher or parent. And I think back to my first year, first couple years. I mean, I just I wasn't getting sleep, wasn't eating right, wasn't, you know, just socializing right, wasn't, you know, wasn't doing anything right. And I remember pulling allnighters, stuff like that. I mean, just stuff that totally was not healthy for me. Uh, I've gotten more mature in the profession, so I've improved that work life balance. But >> work life balance, what is that? I know what that I went to school for a long time to get my degree in nursing. And the year that I graduated, I got pregnant. I got married. And yeah, I had to put my stuff aside, my career aside for them. But I know that as they're getting older, they're needing me less. My children are 12 and 14 now. And I graduated about 14 years ago. It's something I pushed aside. I feel like I can kind of piggy back off of what you experienced. I was going to school a few years ago. Childcare became an issue, so I had to stop. Like I'm not angry about it, but I would have definitely liked to have finished school. But that's just part of being a parent. I mean, we want our kids to thrive and succeed and whatever that takes. If it's like putting us on the back burner, then I feel like most of us just >> Yeah, exactly. >> I agree with you. >> You know, being a single parent is extremely hard. There's a lot that goes into it behind the scenes that people don't realize. Uh child care being very big one. I was working two jobs, taking my son to school, picking him up, trying to have dinner ready before I went to my second job, get home to let the babysitter go, to have to do the whole bath routine. And it was exhausting. I felt very stuck. I felt like, well, what's the point? What helped me push through was knowing that giving up wasn't an option. No, I don't I don't have that luxury to give up. I didn't want to give up. Single parent just the same. So, single parent, educator, just many different hats. Both roles require heavy levels of sacrifice >> to care for all of your students, but then your own children need some said things. Things may be going the way they are at home, but the teacher, you have to leave that at the door. But sometimes you're with students and you've got that challenging student. You're like, you know what? My life is already a mess. So, if you don't sit down, all the things just pile on top of each other. When my son started kindergarten, I stepped down in my career. I was a principal of an elementary school and I couldn't keep up with being a principal so I make less money and I have a lot more hours with him. I chose to be a single parent. I adopted my son when he was in kindergarten. Even though he's 13, I still am watching him at night and making sure like I know where he's at and being available. And so some of my social life has really changed. >> What motivated you to adopt? >> I always wanted a kid, but never found the person I wanted to have a kid with. And it was fun. But I did the foster system. I got him when he was 2 years, 10 months, and I adopted him at five. >> I'm doing it alone, and I did not want to ever do it alone. >> It is. It's different. Like there's no one to no >> bounce things off or like there's no good cup, bad cup. >> Yes. Uh, so I sometimes I'm also a tennis coach. So sometimes I've left campus like at 8:00 p.m. just because I've had some athletes who can't get a ride home or until that time. So I've stayed with them, you know, going home so late. I I come home so tired and sometimes I've skipped lunch because I've had students come in who need a talk, who need extra tutoring. And so just just those those small sacrifices I feel. >> You're like a second parent. >> Yes. for >> I think just being there for my sons, my my own children just as an educator, missing a lot of moments that mattered greatly. You know, sacrificing time with my kids has been the largest detriment and they've they've said as much. For my own specific reasons, it's hard for me to tap into emotional things. I don't know often how I feel. I'm just really thinking about how they feel. And if they're sad, then of course that makes me sad. I'm certain I don't take up space to fill my emotions because they're heavy. I think if I take the time to look at, to analyze, to dissect further, to maybe get some therapy woven into that, I I think it'll be so heavy. And I know I'm the single parent of my children. And I don't know where I'll be in the place of growing and healing cuz I know there's going to be a time maybe when I'll heal and I'll get to the desired objective. But in the midst of me, I don't know what would happen. So I just stay away from it. I feel like when my kids are a little bit older, I don't have to take them to practice. I don't have to have, you know, spend the night things with other. I just don't feel safe enough to be able to heal my pain. Quite honestly, >> what if the story you're telling yourself isn't the whole story? We're all moving through life boxed inside an invisible personal reality filter, a perception box. Your perception box shapes how you see the world and how you judge yourself and others, often without you even realizing it. So, if something in this episode makes you a little uncomfortable, ask yourself, what am I reacting to? What story am I believing? And what might I be missing? Now, let's get back to the video. I've lost control of my emotions in front of a child. My daughter's seventh grade was hard on me um last year and I did blow up on her um really bad. It was a just grades were just going down for 6 months and no nothing better in sight. So then I reached out to an educator which they were great and he's like yeah we we she hasn't turned anything in. I'm like why are we not turning it in? Like sit down and do it. She would not get to sit down and do it. I don't even think she told me no anymore. I think she just sat down and didn't do anything. I was like, I've been trying to help you. I' I can't sit down and do it for you. I think that's was part of my yelling and conversation. I want this for you, but you need to want it more than I want it. Immediately, you just feel bad. You don't want to see yourself intimidating your child when we're trying to teach them. It's I'm trying to act like an educator. I'm trying to be a teacher and not be not be a terrible parent. I'm usually so hopeful, so positive. I try not to be angry, but I'm like, why? I don't why am I this person? How can I move through my frustrations as a parent, my lack of listening, my lack of, you know, discipline here? And when I'm getting agitated or very upset, I'm choosing to walk out now very respectfully, too. So, they've respected, they've grown. I've hope they've seen me grow. So, I'm trying to be better. Always. Always. But yes, we we lose our cool. I don't think I was able to apologize in that moment or even months later, but it did feel so really good to apologize a year later. I think I saw myself then as a parent who was trying to be kind and loving and understanding and taking accountability, but I really was not. What I showed a year later was a real good parent trying to take accountability, trying to embrace her. I I want to connect with her. So, she wants to connect back with me and share back with me. She was able to confide that things were hard. There was bullying going on that were very, very difficult on her mentally and physically as well. So, it felt really good that I was able to get there with her and her with me. >> Unfortunately, I have to strongly agree. I have lost my emotional cool with my son as well as like another adult individual and I'm I've acted out of like character during the incident. My son stayed quiet. You can tell he was embarrassed of my actions. Um, that definitely made didn't make me feel good. So him staying quiet, I can see that he was like maybe a little uncomfortable, maybe even scared of what the situation could escalate to. His safety is always, you know, should be my number one concern. In the moment, I was not thinking of that, but um it is something that I work on all the time now. Like I'm not an angry individual, but working on like my emotions and controlling them and talking through things as opposed to like immediately yelling and cursing and like that doesn't get anywhere. Are there any tools or mechanisms you decided to implement in your ability to regulate um emotion because people will push it down but then it's really not addressed and you know maybe healed past. I will say I was a very angry person because of a situation not that said situation but a situation um of with another person like a unhealthy relationship. So, while I was in this unhealthy relationship, I was angry and bitter and I've gone through depression, not wanting to do things with my son. And you don't notice it at the moment, but like you're literally walking around with a big black cloud over your head and it's constantly raining and storming and you're just unhappy about everything. And then when you work through that and you get to the other side, you see like small things make you smile and you're just so grateful. And I noticed that without that toxic relationship, the relationship that I have with my son is so much better because I have so much more patience and I live in the moment. I had a disagreement with another person. It got blown up out of proportion because of um a personal at home issue. My son was there. He did witness me get out of character, meaning um raising my voice, saying some foul language that I am not proud of. Reflecting back on it now, I definitely have seen like the growth that I've made and like not to repeat those same patterns and behaviors. And so I am ashamed. Um I mean I don't feel like that's something any children child should see. Once my at home issues got resolved, everything else kind of got resolved. As things slowly get better, you start to patch the piece work back together. You're like, "Oh, wow." Like, I can see how that behavior doesn't come up anymore. And it takes time and you look back and you're like, "Oh, I can see how everything fixed itself out." I have definitely lost it at some points. The good thing is he sees when I'm starting to lose it now. So, he'll say, "Mom, like you're starting like I see where it's going." He's calmer than I am. I have gotten tutors so that I don't have to be that person. >> Yeah. My first year teaching I very much yelled at a student. It was quite intense. I don't feel good about it. Especially I taught seventh grade my first year. Seventh graders can be irritating. I just started shouting at the kid. More experienced teacher overheard it happening. Him and I were both fans of the movie The Big Labowski. >> And I remember he came up to me and was like, you know, you're being very undoed right now. like, you know, you're you're letting your emotions get ahead of you, but I certainly have not lost my emotions that way since. I mean, I'm not going to say I'm Spock. I mean, I've definitely had emotional moments, but it's very much impacted how I think about my role as a teacher. >> I felt helpless when a child was struggling and I couldn't help. I mean, a big part of what brought me into education is is addressing educational inequity. you know, the idea of an achievement gap and that there are some kids that are have access to opportunities that other kids don't. I have seen many times where a student starts getting wrapped up in the system, things like illegal activity and that and I've just I felt helpless to get them out of it to uh help steer them on the right path. And you know, I do everything I can as a teacher to try to teach them the content and try to connect with them, but the the forces for that are so overwhelming in a way that just were not for me as a kid who grew up in rural Minnesota where those things just weren't around. I have felt very helpless watching students with a lot of potential that could have been doing a lot of great things, getting in legal trouble, ending up in juvenile detention, things like that. I just I felt helpless to help them as much as I want to, as much as I try to. and having students succumb to the circumstance and not just, you know, gang activity or just different unfavorable behaviors, but to be they're gone now. Um, and it's very challenging cuz they come in the classroom and you see them and you're like, "Oh, if you could just," but it's not a just you could just do a thing because it's kind of the space that they're submerged in. And just to feel like this student could be so many great things and to hope that they could at least make it out of this particular space or circumstance and then to have them gone and just like man the loss of this potential. I have all 10 aces and that's adverse childhood experiences. So just different levels of neglect andor abuse. I was always an overperforming student because of the household that I was in. So I was like I have to do well in this school setting because this is the only thing that's going to save me from the circumstance. There was an incident and you know my mom was hospitalized and I was left in a circumstance and I ran away. But I was in an AP course, an AP history course, one of the only only black female student and the police had come into the classroom and it was just traumatic because I tried desperately to be the smart girl, president of the peer helpers, president of the chess club to overperform and to do well so people didn't have the microscope on what was going on at home. So if I was doing great and if I was smiling and following all the rules and being a great smart student, nobody could really see that my household was riddled with abuse. Because of that, it's developed a level of empathy cuz I just felt very alone in a space in a classroom full of other students. And I think the teachers did the best that they could at that time, but it felt the safest for me to be there. But I just remember feeling how in a room full of people just sitting by myself. Um, and I wanted to make an impact like that for other students and just realizing how important the responsibility and the honor is to be able to teach and to care for children and you don't know their background and just to be a safe space. So that you know what had happened at that time really impacted the way that I walked into the classroom with a bigger broader perspective. It wasn't just about academic proficiency and or performance. I wanted to make sure the students and the children were well and they felt loved and cared for. I tell my students all the time, especially when I work with teens, like I'm not just talking to you because I have all these degrees and I've accumulated all this education for whatever it's worth. But I've been in that thing, too. I see me in them. I have ADHD and I've known I've had that since I was not a child, but as an older adult as I try to struggle through high school and get through college. And now my children in turn, at least one of them really strongly has it. My ADD was is is very different than her. So, I've been trying to figure out ways to help her, guide her, and I feel very helpless. I feel inadequate. It's a terrible way to feel when you want to help your loved one. So, I'm trying to help. So, my son is in middle school and the homework, let me tell you, I don't remember having um this homework in middle school because he last year he came home and he had some math. He goes, "Mom, I I don't understand and I need help." I was not the one. I'm looking at it like it's a foreign language. I have no idea where to start. I couldn't even guess to to help you. To feel so uneducated and to not be able to help my child with something like that should be simple really hurt my feelings. So, we facetimed his aunt who is much smarter and she was able to work through the problem with him as well as use the internet for for resources and they were able to get through it. But like sitting back watching and I'm I can't help other than call somebody or sign you him up for tutoring. And it felt kind of defeating like I'm supposed to be the one that you come um for anything you need help with. And I I didn't know how to do it. >> In all fairness, it's common core cuz we do the work. We're educators. So we know the structure, how it shifted. But if I had to do so without going to school on my own, it'd be a mess. A lot of helplessness. As a teacher, I have felt a particular circumstance. I'm not a special education teacher. I'm general ed. And sometimes we get students quite often that very well need that additional support. So when you have a student who's neurode divergent and then to just have the student, you know, stmming at different times and doing things for regulation purposes every day to sit with a student that needs this support. But to have to take on additional responsibility with no support in order to do so, it just feels very cuz you just see it in the student and you're like, "Oh, I want to help." because that's what my whole role is to do is to feel facilitate support, but I can't even do it the way that I want to. It's a very helpless situation. >> Yeah. As a parent, I think you feel hopeless sometimes or you don't know what you're doing, but I feel like the school system has really given me people to go to to ask questions, to get guidance. I adopted him through um Oliver Crest of a wraparound organization and they were super helpful in that transition when you get a child placed in your home. And there's a lot of things that kids are going to do automatically because of being put from one place to another. And they were incredibly helpful. I had to learn to deescalate with him and they really helped me. >> Not necessarily. I struggle as a child. I feel like growing up I had a support system. I had a good my siblings, my friends. I had good great teachers. Like how my teachers were with me. I wanted to give that to my students. The most I have ever felt helpless with a student was my first year teaching. I had the student who would come after school just want to talk for like the longest. He immigrated here. Um and his mom I believe pass had passed away and dad wanted wanted wanted wanted nothing to do with him so sends him here with aunt and aunt really didn't had anything to do with wanted anything to do with him so that's why he wanted to stay in the classroom with me one day he just he he had asked me if he can come home with me I was 24 at the time so I was I was like I I can't I can't I don't I don't I I don't know how to go about that. I felt really bad that I couldn't help the student, but for the rest of that year, I would say after school with the kid, I invite his friends over. I brought my Nintendo Switch so he can play with his friends, but that's the most I could do for the student. >> Our expectations of kids are shaped by our own childhood. >> Our own childhood. >> I mean, I think it just kind of comes naturally. It's like, well, when I was a kid, we were supposed to do this. like we are expecting them to jump through the same oops we had to jump through or go through the same experiences that we had to go through. There's like this unwritten expectation of that. >> You think as a teacher and as individual person um just growing up things were different and so some of the behaviors in the classroom um I don't know if I find it to be negative nor positive but I do have concerns with emotional regulation, self-control, autonomy. I just don't remember the behavior being the way that it was and I don't know if I think that's to a negative consideration. I I think there should be some expectations set and I feel like in the classroom there's such fluid flexibility in the kids just do how you feel but this is kind of the preparation to go to the next level and that next level will be like adulthood and if we don't set those foundational structures in that space feels like counterproductive. If there was a neutral, I would stand on the neutral. Um I don't feel like me raising my son today has I don't look back on. You know what? I guess I do. >> Yeah, I do. I was going to say I look back and I try not to parent the same, but then I'm trying to go with the new area the way things are now, too. >> You definitely take into some good like things qualities that my mom did and some things that cuz we're all every day it's like something new as a parent. There's no handbook. So today I know a little bit more about being a mom than I did yesterday. And so like some things that she maybe didn't do so great. And I try and incorporate incorporate both of those positive and negative things into how I raised my son. But I do know that when I think about parenting my son, I want to do it differently than the way I was parented and the way I grew up. And I definitely use that as a just to do better, you know, to learn from their mistakes because parenting is hard. And I don't think my mom knew what she was doing at the time. >> I agree. I don't think my parents knew what they were doing at all. But neither do I because there is no handbook. There is no directions. And and both my girls are so so different. I want to take all the good that they taught me, all the the loving parts, but also there's that other balance that like I can't be your friend because then you're not listening. You're not being respect. It's hard. Yeah. >> It's not easy. It's it's a balance. It's a with school work, with everything in life. I was raised very religious. So I went to all Catholic school and so I feel like I somewhat disagree. I I my son's in public school and I don't use guilt the things that the Catholic Church shame. He really had fear of going to hell. Now it's just like this is what a normal kind human being should be doing. And that's how I try to raise him. I've really enjoyed hearing from the teachers perspectives because moms talk all day long. Oh, this and this and this. But to hear like I mean we have parent teacher conference and you have open house and you talk to the teachers but I don't feel like they're ever truly comfortable enough to be like you know what damn these kids. I I I really appreciate you guys being here. The benefit of being both a mom and a teacher also is having those moments where I'm mom teacher Denise all in the one time with my students. My children have gone through different seasons of life with me as I'm growing at that same time and they give that unconditional love and grace. >> Mhm. >> When you're frustrated with someone, what if you gave them the benefit of the doubt before jumping to conclusions? How might that change things? Hit the link below for perception box questions that invite you to zoom out, soften up, and see things a little bit differently. How did you get [Music] teaching us?