To be mildly irritated by most tiring job ever?

[brasty]

A friend who is a teacher has been saying how exhausted she is, and that only other teachers would understand. She is not joking. AIBU to be mildly irritated by this? Yes teachers do a hard job, but there are other jobs that are also exhausting.

You still haven't said what your job is brasty but judging by some posts you are a social worker. If so then YANBU as that is also a tiring and demanding and thankless job. There is way too much criticism in the press about social workers & they can't win.
I think we all need to stick together - police, social workers, nurses, teachers, mental health nurses, carers.
Society seems to like to divide people - driven by the press mostly. We should be sticking up for each other on MN not trying to outdo each other.

Been the MD of a 2.7 million turnover business, then a teacher, and in amongst it, a single mother to two children, one of whom is severely disabled ( no speech, tube fed, doubly incontinent etc). Teaching was the most exhausting role, rewarding, fascinating, but knackering.

Hats off to those who stick at it for a full career.

Damn right holidaysaregreat.
Too many forces trying to divide us.
If you teach, then you can't help but come into contact with police, social workers, carers, CAMHS etc - and it's blindingly obvious that every public service is being squeezed to the point of destruction. Let's stop knocking them all. We all want those services - let's support them and vote to fund them properly. Our future will be poorer without them.

LightDrizzle hats off to you!

Yanbu

Yes teaching is a difficult and demanding job but no more than lots of others. I say that as someone surrounded by family and friends who are teachers.

I imagine it can be exhausting but in my humble opinion there are other roles, specifically in the health/nursing field that I would consider more difficult/stressful.

I have no doubt that teaching is exhausting, I wouldn't like to do it. I am a nurse working in a very stressful environment ( palliative care). I only do 25 hours but it is the switching between days and nightshifts that is really exhausting and rushing around for 8 hours solid. I think there are loads of jobs that are exhausting. At least I get to switch off when I get home ( that is if I can stop worrying about work situations) wheras teachers have lots of marking/ prep to do.

Yanbu I hate this moan too... if they don't like their jobs they should leave rather than trying to get people to feel sorry for them and think they are doing the hardest job known to man... "no one understands" .... more like no one gives a shit

BTW I'm a debt collector that's hard too

Yes it's so easy to just leave a job because its tiring!!

I know it is.

Do they?

Yes, join any nursing forum and you will quickly see that. People moaning about how GCSE Maths at C grade is too hard for nurses to achieve. It's a complete joke.

So nurses claim that nurses don;t need maths. That puts a different spin on your comment - I couldn't imagine the general public saying that. Basic maths (eg GCSE or equivalent) is useful for everyone, I don't see that nurses should be exempt. Heck, you need that to train to be a farrier (job I happen to know about - I suspect you need it for all vocational courses). By the way, farrier is very physically demanding job, but they are not a moanny profession in general. Teachers do have a reputation for being whingers and that must come from somewhere.

Tell her to try being a post lady. Five hours of fast paced walking with a heavy bag full of parcels strapped to you and then there's the flats. Six three storey flats on my route.

Then come home and make tea, clean and take dd to her clubs.

lemondropcake I did some temping as a post woman 1 Christmas. I lasted 3 days!!!

Yes, join any nursing forum and you will quickly see that. People moaning about how GCSE Maths at C grade is too hard for nurses to achieve. It's a complete joke.

So, you are saying nurses/prospective nurses themselves (do many other people join nursing forums?) are moaning about it not just 'people'?!

Teachers do have a reputation for being whingers and that must come from somewhere.

Perhaps it comes from responding to being told their job is really easy.

I work in a support role in a secondary school and am knackered so can well imagine how much moreso the teaching staff must feel with all their data deadlines and actually being with large numbers of increasingly tired and stressed kids all day.

The LEA changed the year of admission recently so for many teachers this is their first year of having to deal with both stressed Yr11's doing mocks and worn out Year 7's. We're also an all girls school so throw in the excess hormones and it's challenging to say the least.

That said I would hazard a guess it's no more challenging than some other jobs (especially the medical profession) but I think it's definitely different.

The 13 weeks hols a year are fab (although we don't all get the full 13 weeks) but you have to offset that against having no choice when you take that time which makes term time utterly relentless. If the shit hits the fan in your personal life trying to work round it and make it to the next hols can be really bloody grim.

Should all jobs really be exhausting? I can see coming home and sighing after a hard day's work, but really, so many of us on here are exhausted on a day to day basis. Is that the most a society can hope for?
I have only dealt with my own exhaustion by switching to part-time.

whattheseithakasmean

Teachers do have a reputation for being whingers and that must come from somewhere.

Maybe it comes from those that say teaching is easy, because its easier to say teachers whinge than admit that they are wrong.

Maybe it comes from those that say teaching is easy, because its easier to say teachers whinge than admit that they are wrong.

Ah, but it is chicken and egg. People respond to teachers moaning by pointing out that it is not the toughest job in the world. Then teachers get defensive and moan more - and so the merry day goes on.

My DH is a teacher and loves his job. So I find myself admiring him for some of the tough stuff he has to deal with, So he says its not that bad, he loves his subject and most kids are great, so I say I couldn't do it - a whole virtuous circle is created.

So teachers, if you want to be appreciated more, moan less

whattheseithakasmean

But your theory only works if they say that they have the hardest job in the world, no teacher on this thread has said it, in fact it wasn't even mentioned by the OP, yet here we once again have teachers defending themselves against something that they haven't said being accused of moaning.

Maybe people should stop making shit up about what teachers say?

It's not so much how hard it is, it's that everyone has an opinion. They went to school so they know how schools work. When really, really you don't.

A teacher makes one slightly snarky comment on a bad day and parents rush to complain - see any 'I'm angry at my DCs teacher' thread. Kids and parents behave however they want but teachers have to be perfect all the time.

Nursing is a hard job but nurses are regarded, largely, as angels of mercy. This must make you nurses feel a bit better.

I know it is not as simple and clear cut as that, but there is an attitude that nurses work hard and teachers whine.

Having said that, just try sitting in a meeting with teachers. They all want a say, they all think they know best and they never know when to shut THE FUCK up so we can go home.

If anyone from the tories is reading this they must be rubbing their hands with glee. They have different professions competing to work the hardest for the least money and accept it. When they manage to destroy the nhs and education in this country (and they will) they can simply pass on the broken yet still hard-working employees to the private companies (cronies) and say "you're welcome". Why are people arguing - it's the bastards at the top who should be getting the shit for allowing this state of affairs to happen.

Smellslikeoranges-that is so true.

I agree with comments upthread that we should not be coming home absolutely exhausted after a days work. Different thread I know, but I don't see how I can personally carry on working like this till 67 or older.

You know the thing I hear teachers "moaning" about most? That I "moan" about most?

Having to push children through increasingly academic curriculums, with no coursework or foundation papers for less able students. The level of stress caused by knowing some of your students will fail and not only is there not a damn thing you can do about it, but that you and your school will have judgements made because of this.

That for those children, everyone teaching them has been doing pretty much two lots of planning because they can't access the lesson otherwise.

Is it ok to "moan" about that? Or does that just make me part of a "moany profession"?