to feel quite shocked that DH has PTSD from teaching?

[FunnysInLaJardin]

Its feels pretty awful tbh. He has just today received this diagnosis and has been referred for priority EMDR.

He has taught for 25 years in a secondary school, and got out last year due to clinically diagnosed burn out.

I knew it was bad, but I never realised it was this bad.

How can this be allowed to happen?

Although I have compassion and sympathy for some of the teachers experiences on here, I can’t help but notice a major discrepancy. There’s been multiple thread after thread started on mn usually by parents, desperately asking for answers and advice (from teachers and people with skin in the game) on their children having a hard time in school. Whether that be from bullying, school refuses or from the one tier education system not fitting all brains or personality’s. We’ve all had experience of enduring bullying or witnessing teachers looking on and turning the blind eye, whether in our own childhoods or our children’s. Yet teachers are coming out in droves to say “society doesn’t care or protect teachers anymore” Anybody not seeing the hypocrisy.

There’s been multiple thread after thread started on mn usually by parents, desperately asking for answers and advice (from teachers and people with skin in the game)

They normally get advice, sympathy and support, don’t they?

Sometimes yes but I see quite a lot of victim blaming or some very vocal teachers on the thread suddenly fall quiet when difficult questions are raised.

One of the issues raised in this thread gas been the impact of poor management and workplace bullying on teacher MH. It is perhaps unsurprising that this behaviour by SLT towards teachers may be echoed in the way SLT manage bullying by pupils (bullying is typically investigated by SLT rather than by individual subject teachers)?

I am not saying that there are no poor teachers, who may not investigate bullying fully. I am, perhaps, mulling over whether a poorly-managed workplace, with teachers very much at the end of their tether for all the reasons outlined here, is always going to be a good place for students, and whether one result of that is seen in bullying behaviour by students?

A classroom culture in which a teacher is routinely abused by students -and unsupported by senior management- is one in which m, I would argue, student to student bullying is also likely to occur.

There’s also a critical shortage of teachers which means that schools have to put people in front of classes that they definitely wouldn’t if they had any choice.

So I would say this thread and threads about student on student bullying are perhaps two sides of the same coin and come from many of the same root causes.

And may very much be a different person each day, which makes bullying - which by definition is systematic and repeated - harder to detect, and if the person in front of the class is junior / supply / unqualified / never been in the school before, harder to report accurately and systematically.

Not surprised, I wouldn’t want to do it.

Kids can be nasty little fuckers and that’s going back to when I was at school and some students would delight in making the supply teacher cry etc. There was respect for some teachers though, who only had to raise their voice. One of the school mum’s a teacher and was 6 months pregnant and got bitten and had a chair thrown at her.
Parents don’t give a shit these days.

That’s all well and good, but how often do we witness or hear about a teacher (whether that be in the class room, play ground or corridor pulling the bully a side and questioning them/explaining the long term impact on a persons self esteem. It’s virtually un-heard of unless the child is very small. If an actual bully was pulled up and shamed about their behaviour when it was witnessed and undeniable maybe that would have an impact on future behaviour.

Instead they are all just grouped together in an assembly and told to watch a short film on the dangers of bullying, when let’s face it how many bullies would consider themselves bullies. Whether that be adults or children they act gobsmacked and offended at the very idea they could be a bully, when they clearly are.

I have never encountered bullying being dealt with as you describe , in groups in assembly, so I cannot comment- in my experience, though bullying has not always been absolutely dealt with effectively, it has always been individually, as you describe in your first paragraph.

That’s absolutely not what happens in my experience. Teachers do pull individuals up and report upwards to pastoral team/SLT. The assembly scenario happens when problems start being widespread and it seems a good idea to talk to them all at the same time.
In your experience of bullies, are they easily ‘shamed’ by someone telling them off about their behaviour? If only it were so simple.

No you aren’t ’mulling it over’. In your previous post you accused teachers of hypocrisy.

Different poster, cardi, cant is a good-un!

Cardi, sorry if my post could be misinterpreted! The earlier poster was implying that teachers were complaining about bullying behaviour towards them, while hypocritically overlooking bullying behaviour between students.

The point I was trying to make was that this isn’t a ‘gotcha’ or a form of hypocrisy, more that bullying - of anyone by anyone - may come from the same root in the same type of environment, and arise because if the same problems.

Following the poster’s next point, though, I genuinely don’t know of any school that behaves as they describe following bullying incidents, so my thoughts are possibly beside the point.

I agree it’s systemic and needs a holistic approach.

But who is going to take the reigns and make the change, because it seems like governments aren’t listening to teachers, pupils or parents and only seem to care about the puppet masters at the top.

It's exactly the one size fits all army camp approach to education that leads to kids not attending school that also leads to issues for teachers.

When kids are told their exam results are the be all and end all and they have to perform 100% every day. When teachers are assessed on every child paying attention in every lesson... It's all part of the same crap system

No it's not the teachers fault.

I don’t really understand your points. You are stating the obvious. Of course nobody should have to work in a job that makes them unwell. But people have responsibilities, mortgages and bills to pay. People cut their cloth according to their income usually. A teacher can’t suddenly work at McDonald’s because they have MH issues. They would need to plan, possibly sell their home etc. You can’t just offer flippant solutions. It’s simply not that easy for many.

It is nothing about being ‘too good’ for a job. but a trained teacher is skilled and has studied and qualified for a job they want to do. They should not have to work at McDonald’s because the system is shit.

The system needs to change. We need to attract the right people to teaching and then retain them. The government needs to listen.

I work in MH by the way so no lectures please.

I work as a consultant psychiatrist. The days of needing to be involved in a bombing to be diagnosed with PTSD have gone.

Chronic long-term trauma can also lead to PTSD, including domestic violence and workplace stress.

I am a consultant psychiatrist. It is definitely possible to get a diagnosis of PTSD from something like bullying at work. And I have diagnosed people with such.

Sorry, think I may have quoted incorrectly!

It’s none of your business is it?

Nobody is disagreeing the system needs to change but I'm assuming with working in mental health you see on a daily basis how peoples struggles with mh can literally destroy their whole lives. So what I'm trying to say is when you get to a point where you dread going to work, your having panic attacks and your withdrawing from the world that is the point you say right I can't go on like this so I need a plan b because as you know the next thing that happens is these low level mental health issues get bigger and bigger and that when it gets serious. Plan b can be applying for a different school, going back to uni, downsizing, moving area, cutting back hours, changing jobs completely. Because if this stuff carries on and gets out of control you won't be able to work or use your plan b. Does that make sense I'm not good at explaining stuff

YANBUAA it's a bit odd that this profile didn't exist before today, you've posted on no other threads except this one and you've only replied to my comments which you've done 5 times in 3 minutes, even comments that go as far back as yesterday. Do you realise it's against mumsnet rules to use different accounts like that.