Leaving teaching behind...feel amazing!

[stupidmestupidme]

I worked really hard to get my PGCE (single parent) & I had always wanted to be a teacher.

After the classic '5 years' in the profession I decided to leave because I was fed up of the lack of management support, lack of respect and generally feeling anxious ALL the time.

Since leaving I feel so much better. I now wake every day feeling good, I'm spending more time with my children and I feel positive about the future again. It's so liberating.

The pay-off is I've taken a huge pay cut... but nothing beats the feeling of calm I have now.

To anyone considering leaving teaching: do it! You won't realise how bad it made you feel until you're not doing it anymore.

I went last year after 14 years. No more sleepless nights and have ended up with a part time student support job in an FE college. Earning the same as an NQT, only doing 4 shortish days, still term time and no bringing work home. I felt bad leaving thinking I was wasting all my training but I have since had time to set up my own little business which is linked to the subject I taught.

Ooh is that like a welfare role? Ive seen one like that here with safeguarding etc? Or more a TA? What is it like?

IheartNiles do you really know a lot of happy teachers?
Or do you know me; excellent game face and everyone who encountered me in role for years would swear I loved the job and was relentlessly positive and 100% dedicated.
Right until I quit.

Yes I do, they will be in work now though, not posting on here. I’m not saying some aren’t happy and the public sector is under a lot of strain. But a lot of my friends are teachers and middle aged like me and I just don’t hear all the handwringing you have on here.

I have a plan to get out of teaching. I feel it is sucking the life out of my soul....

I am one of the very happy teachers but I only work 2 days per week. Thinking of increasing to 3. I am passionate about education and genuinely love my job. It helps that I have incredibly supportive SLT who are committed to staff welfare.

@lovelyjubilly you're very lucky to have a supportive SLT!

Looking forward to the weekend: no planning/marking/stressing- can enjoy my life

I've applied for a HLTA job on piddly salary. Really hope I get it as I can't manage 12 hour days anymore due to a health condition.

I just don’t hear all the handwringing you have on here.
Yes because whilst having too much cortisol in my bloodstream from the stress, unable to sleep, palpitations, losing a stone in weight, periods stopping, needing medication, feeling suicidal once I became ill and feeling I was unable to ever work again, fearing I would lose my house because I couldn't pay the mortgage... handwringing... Yes that's exactly what it was 🙄 but hey, thanks for the compassion your post is soaked in and the definite confirmation that you have never taught. And probably that your friends don't teach in the type of schools I have. Bless you.

With all due respect just because you don't hear it doesn't mean the issues don't exist. My friends don't hear the "handwringing" as you call it but it doesn't mean I'm happy. I've seen a job I love change beyond recognition in the past ten years. It's become a miserable job for very many and attitudes like yours are part of the problem. Teachers aren't afraid of hard work so when so many are saying things are bad and so many are walking out for the sake of their health and sanity why are people still so unwilling to accept it?

As in accept that something has gone very wrong in Education.

Hand-wringing is a bit rude, I think.

I’ve been teaching 13 years. I want to leave so badly. But I feel trapped - no idea what I could do? I feel like the other types of world out there are so alien to me that I wouldn’t know what skills I could transfer. Also the pay cut at the moment would be too difficult.

I think this is so sad. It seems to.me that the school environment ( for whatever reason) seems toxic to both staff and a lot of students. Lots of children are pretty miserable at school too

I wonder if as a society we can come up with a different model of education, which doesn't make many of the participants in it miserable.

It's a sad state of affairs.

The HLTA job I applied for is an 8k salary (hoping to negotiate more hours once I'm established. This is for 2 days a week.) I'm lucky we can afford this in the short term. I found job shares in primary difficult even with a great partner, reasonable SLT, well behaved kids in a naice area. Ppa cover teaching jobs don't exist anymore in my area hence applying for HLTA post. I do wonder what my degree and QTS was for though 🙄

Hi

I'm not a teacher but I feel very similar. I'm a nurse. Once upon a time it was the best job in the world. Now I'm a constant mess of tiredness, stress and anxiety.
I love the actual bedside nursing part but more and more we are getting dragged away with paperwork, politics and generally trying to do the work of 3 people. The management appear and speak to you like you're a useless piece of dirt.
I'm done with it.

Perhaps handwringing prevents throttling of parents, SLT, spirited children and those who can’t understand why teachers are stressed.
What with all those holidays.

Thanks all for sharing your thoughts & feelings. I'm relieved it's not just me. But I also feel so sad: for all the lovely committed teachers who gave up so much & are totally beaten & for the children who are so unhappy with all the pressure being put onto them. The whole education system is a MESS in England.

@Iprefergin You have my sympathy. I know a few nurses & totally understand how shit things are in the NHS too. You hit the nail on the head with your comment about how management talk to you like you're nothing.

Oh it's nice when you stop, isn't it. I did 17 years, now 3 years out. I only just made it out in time I think, any longer and it may well have broken me irreversibly.

handbaghag I hear you, totally. I left 5 years ago, also for health reasons, and really miss the student and nice colleague interaction. I think the kind of person who writes a post like IheartNiles is probably basing their impression of teachers on friends of theirs who are the type of 'teacher'/SLT member who slimes their way up the greasy pole so that they can hide in their offices all day, emerging only to find fault with 'their' staff and make themselves another coffee, before disappearing by 3.30pm. The impact of these 'teachers' skiving and having nearly-zero timetables on front-line teachers on full timetables is what is causing the retention crisis. If teaching hours were fairly distributed within schools, all teachers and the students would benefit hugely. Instead, the stress goes on and good teachers leave in droves.

LyndaLaHughes I agree with you, and it's deteriorating rapidly.

Iprefergin respect and thanks for working in the NHS.

I just don’t hear all the handwringing you have on here

There's always one, isn't there, the one who comes on a thread which is inviting teachers to say what they think about their lived experience and dismisses it.

Please go away.

@echt

I only know classroom teachers @albertcamus. Not SLT. All aged 30-50 in east London and Essex, mixed ability, state, not easy schools. No one is without stress but most seem to be coping. There is a lot of moaning about SLT and constant government interference but no one seems to be near breakdown. If you want to feel totally powerless and bullied come and work clinically in the NHS.

Maybe it’s just the wrong career choice for some of you.