Some Weeks Remind You Why You Stay

by Rebecca Thomas

This week was a strange week.

My wairua was bruised, stretched and, at times, left wondering whether it had anything left to give. Adults frustrated me. Systems exhausted me.

I can't help it. I take this job seriously.

I know I can become frosty with adults who still don't understand neurodiversity or trauma. Admittedly, I lose patience with people who would rather defend the status quo than ask, "What if there was a better way?" Quite often, my passion spills over into something that probably feels demanding.

I know that.

I know I can be relentless and push too hard. I know there are days when I become... a bit too much.

But it never comes from ego.

It comes from spending nearly three decades looking into the eyes of children who need the adults around them to do better. Children who cannot advocate for themselves and whose behaviour tells stories long before their words ever will. They simply need the grown-ups around them to stop arguing, stop protecting systems and start protecting them.

I don't enjoy conflict. I don't wake up looking for difficult conversations. I don't get a thrill from challenging people or creating drama. I simply find it impossible to stay silent when I know we can do better.

So this week, on the brink of resignation—again—I bit my gypsy lips. I put down my imaginary box of matches. I stopped silently screaming just for a little while.

To those who work with me, I'm sorry.

I know my passion can sometimes spill over. I understand my determination can feel relentless. I know I ask difficult questions and challenge comfortable thinking. Please know it never comes from ego. It actually comes from love.

Love for children who have been misunderstood.

All the time, I wonder whether caring this deeply is healthy. Often, I wonder whether people like me should step away before the systems wear us down completely.

But then… They say things come in threes.

The first arrived on a cold winter morning.

I was almost done and the week was ending. Cross country. Children streamed past me, high-fiving teachers as they headed out onto the course. I smiled, clapped and cheered like everyone else. Then I saw him.

For months this little boy had thrown chairs across the classroom. He screamed until his whole body shook. Yet there he was having a go at running. Not plodding in his usual gumboots. He was bare feet! The wet grass must have been causing sensory overload. There was no puffer jacket zipped tightly around him. Just a jersey, a little blue toy duck tucked safely under one arm and the biggest grin you could imagine.

Usually he walks cautiously in his gumboots and hangs back. Historically he has never wanted to join in. Yet this morning—the morning I was about to give up—he was charging through the wet grass without a care in the world. Most people watching probably just saw another child doing cross country. I didn't. I saw the months of trust. A nervous system slowly beginning to feel safe.

I saw every beanbag, every quiet conversation, every Brick Club and music session, every sensory break, every moment of patience, every failed day and every tiny success stitched together into one beautiful moment.

The morning dew clung to his feet while hope clung to mine.

The second moment walked through my classroom door.

A Ministry of Education occupational therapist had come to visit one of my autistic students. Only days earlier I'd sat in his professional learning session, admiring how deeply he understood sensory needs. There are some people who don't just talk about inclusion, you can tell that they really feel it.

Notebook in one hand and a scrappy piece of paper in the other, he simply listened. Really listened. No judgement or criticism came. No endless list of things I hadn't yet done. He simply looked around our sensory breakout space, smiled and asked if he could take photographs because he loved what we had created. 

Then the children exploded back into the room after lunch. The volume lifted considerably—even a random harmonica became the backing track to our conversation. The movement returned. The beautiful chaos that lives inside Room 13 came flooding through the door. He laughed. Then looked at me with the sort of smile only another educator who understands can give.

"You can feel the energy in here."

He understood. Not just the noise. The humanity behind it. Sometimes the greatest gift another professional can give you isn't advice. It's simply being seen.

The third moment arrived in my inbox.

A mother had shared a digital photo album with me. Her son is yet to enrol. He carries three diagnoses and has been homeschooled, we were busy planning his transition. Years ago, school hadn't worked for him. But we're the school that says yes. As I scrolled through the photographs I wasn't looking at diagnoses. I wasn't looking at reports or behavioural histories, instead I was watching a childhood unfold.

A baby discovering the world.

Tiny hands.

First smiles.

ANZAC Day.

Earth Day.

A little boy crawling across the sand with a nappy full of beach and not a care in the world.

Every photograph reflected the same thing. "This is my baby." I could almost feel his mother's journey through the images. Her fierce love wrapped around exhaustion. The determination to keep believing. Somewhere along the way the world had begun introducing him through diagnoses. She never had. She introduced me to her son.

By the time I reached the final photograph I realised something. Children are born whole. The labels come later. How can we ever reduce them to words like stood down, excluded or expelled? Emerging, consolidating or proficient? How can we forget that every behaviour, every diagnosis and every struggle belongs to somebody who was once just a baby learning to crawl across a lounge floor? A boy who once chased bubbles and laughed. A girl who once believed every adult would keep them safe.

How dare we become so consumed by systems that we stop seeing childhood. How dare we squeeze children into Stanfordised boxes. How dare we deny them beanbags, movement, curiosity and joy because they don't fit somebody else's definition of success. How dare we slowly replace wonder with compliance.

That is why I am the way I am.

Childhood only comes once. There are no ‘do-overs’. No opportunity to rewind and give a child back the joy we accidentally took from them.

So yes…

Sometimes, I become frustrated with adults. I do ask difficult questions. Thankfully, I refuse to accept, "That's just the way things are."

If you're an educator sitting at your kitchen table tonight wondering whether you've got one more week left in you, I hope you'll do one thing before you write that resignation letter. On Monday morning, look carefully at the faces walking through your classroom door. Look beyond the behaviour and the politics, see the children who still believe adults can change their world.

The systems won't always change as quickly as we'd like or in the direction we know that they should. Some colleagues may never see what you see. There will always be things beyond our control. But never underestimate the power of being the adult who stayed. For some children, your classroom is the safest place they know. Your smile may be the first one they receive that day. Your belief in them may be louder than every voice that has ever told them they couldn't.

When the weight of the profession feels too heavy, let the children remind you why you picked it up in the first place.

Sometimes they save us just as much as we save them.