Cried my way through this thread remembering the amazing teachers I had the honour of through my school life.
The head teacher Mrs Woods and my Y3&6 Teacher My Weston. They where both amazing, helped me through critical illness, coming into hospital to see me every week, supporting me and my mothers while we escaped my abusive father and went through a lengthy and nasty custody dispute. The teachers reports went a long way in preventing me having to live with my father, something that without their support was very likely. There where thousands of individual things they both did. I would be here all night. Me Weston sadly passed away a few years ago, Mrs Woods would be in her 90's now so who knows.
In high school there there where a few again, Miss Watts the PE teacher who gave me the confidence defy bullies and she taught me to dance on the ski trip disco and continued building my confidence but by bit until she sadly died too soon due to breast cancer. Even while going through treatment, losing all her hair she still ruefully came into school to see everyone and continue her efforts to help me. Every single time I take to a dance floor I remember her, 'just move your legs Roadkill. Look you're doing it' (making myself cry now).
Then there is Mr Gerry Lynch. A truly amazing hero of a man he was. He was head of English and opened the library every break and lunch time to me and my only friend to escape bullies and have a safe place, over the years a few other waifs and strays found sanctuary in the library with us until suddenly I had a group of friends. In y10 and 11 as I struggled to deal with issues around the forced contact with my abusive father and then just before my GCSE's when my beloved step Dad was diagnosed with terminal cancer. Mr Lynch was there, door always open. I cried on his shoulder, confided in him things I struggled to talk to anyone else about. He was always there, he always listened. Even though my step Dads diagnosis must have been hard for him having lost his wife to cancer some years before he was still there for me, readying me, loving me. He celebrated my achievements, he sat and listened when I sang a song I had found that summed up my terrible feeling of impending loss, I must have sounded terrible, I can't sing, I was crying the whole way through but he sat next to me, held my hand, told me it was beautiful and then let me just sit there, head in his shoulder and cry about the injustice and the pain, my anger and confusion that the wrong man was during, it should have been my biological father. I will never ever forget that day, the feeling of his rough tweed jacket, the shoulder wet with tears...
Even after I left school we stayed in contact. He retired at the same time. I visited him from time to time in a local public library. The horrific tragedy was that he had a massive heart attack and died just a few months later, three months before my step Dad died. I don't know how I would have survived if it hadn't been for the group of friends his 'Library club' had given me and the self belief he had installed in me. Mr Lynch couldn't solve my problems and make everything all better but if it hadn't been for him and all he gave me who knows when or if I would have come out the other side.
There where other teachers who made a difference and went above and beyond and now my children are at school I see their teachers making such a difference. My ds has SN and the teachers at school have really rallied around to ensure DS can access his education and make his very first friends. The amazing TA's who are so patient and encouraging. My sons doctors are always blown away by the speed of DS's progress and the well oiled machine school and I have going. I write many thank you letters in Christmas and end of term cards, I find it so important to recognise how much of themselves our teachers give, so far above the job description and pay scale.
None of them would call themselves a hero or say they where doing anything special. That's why we need to tell them and anyone who will listen how amazing they are!
(Sorry for the epic post, once I started the memories complete with sensory imput just flooded out and I 'had' the write it down)