Inside Me

Inside me I am the little girl who knocked out her two front teeth when she was three.  For years I was teased that all I wanted for Christmas was my two front teeth.

Inside me is a 40 year old woman who knows that good things come to those who wait, that the best gifts aren’t always wrapped in fancy packages, and Christmas isn’t about what we want but what God’s Son came to Earth to give to us.


Inside me I am the little girl who wanted to be a mommy, ballerina, a fashion designer, a rock star, a veterinarian, a teacher, and a doctor.

Inside me is a 40 year old woman who knows that I did not lack ambition to achieve all of my goals, but rather with exposure to new information and changing life circumstances, I was better able to choose my path along the way of this journey called life.


Inside me is the 7 year old little girl who still grieves from being locked out of the house because she didn’t come home when her mother asked, finding her favorite nightgown with the tiny pink rosebuds and the pink satin bow neatly folded with potted plant and a note reading “since you like it better somewhere else, you can find a new place to live.”

Inside me is a 40 year old woman who recognizes that her mother struggled with an alcoholic husband and in doing so feared her daughters probably did prefer other peoples’ homes where the aroma of liquor was not in the air and the nightly arguments did not fill the rooms with frightening sights and sounds sending her daughters huddling behind the red rocking chair clinging to each other crying. Inside me is a woman who recognizes that this was a desperate mother’s attempt to keep her daughters at home even if it was by scaring them or making them feel guilty.


Inside me is the thirteen year old girl who starved herself till she turned blue by eating only 200 calories a day for four months so that she could get thin quick and so that the kids at school would not have a reason to call her “buffalo butt” anymore.

Inside me is a 40 year old woman who believes that unpleasant words and unpleasant behavior is far worse than an unpleasant outer appearance.  Inside me is the woman who knows that we never know what a person is dealing with when we look at them.  The things we say to people and the things we do to them may seem trivial or small, but when added to what they are already coping with, it may be the one thing that causes their cup to run over.


Inside me is the sixteen year old girl who dumped her alcoholic father’s booze down the drain and then tried to rouse him from his face down, passed out state in the drive way only later to be told to go away and die.

Inside me is a 40 year old woman who is told by some people that it was the alcohol talking when he said that. But, I wonder if there was ever a time when my father thought about saying he was sorry, thought about putting his daughters before the booze, or if he ever thought about me at all.


Inside me is the twenty year old who lived out of her car for a summer because her college roommate bullied her so severely, living out of laundry baskets and looking for a couch to sleep on was better than living with cruelty, intimidation, and fear.

Inside me is a 40 year old woman who realizes that houses aren’t always homes, sometimes a place you visit feels like more of a home than the place you call your own, not everyone who says they are your friend means it, and having courage—not running from adversity but challenging it --is very important.


Inside me is a woman in her early thirties, mother of Noah.  It took five years of fertility concerns to have him.  Noah’s preschool teachers said there is something wrong with him.  The children in class did not play with him.  We did not get invited to the mother-child play groups or birthday parties.  We wanted the neighborhood kids to play at our house.  They stopped riding their bikes in front of our house just to say, “We’re not going to play with you, just so you know.”  I rearranged my living room furniture so I did not have to watch them play outside through my front window but when that didn’t work, I put up blinds and kept them closed all the time.  It hurt too bad to know my son was not included in their play.

Inside of me is a 40 year old woman who still lives on that same street and realizes that the pitfalls that Noah had socializing in the neighborhood and my emotional reaction to them robbed Nicholas of his opportunity.  Because of that, Nicholas suffers from loneliness … having a brother who is not neurologically available as a playmate and neighborhood kids who are established in their social groupings.


Inside me is a woman in her mid-thirties, mother of Noah and Nicholas, soccer coach, president of the PTO, Scholastic Book Fair Chairperson, Cub Scout Den Leader, Soccer Coach, Autumn Harvest Carnival Chair Person, substitute teacher, reader and researcher about all things Asperger’s Syndrome, provider of at home speech and occupational therapy services, and holder of in-home whole class social events.  I tried to create a safe place for my son and for myself.  A place where no one would know there was anything wrong, where people would think my son just had some quirks.  But the kids at school said, “No one in class really likes Noah” and my best friend said, “So, you had to go off and drag my kid down with yours” when  I asked the scoutmaster to put one of my sons so-called friends in his patrol as he became a boy scout.

Inside of me is a 40 year old woman who realizes that it is not my fault that my son has Asperger’s Syndrome and that despite all the efforts that I made to help him and me, the only person I had control over in the end was me.   My son is always going to do and say things that may lead other people, no matter who they are, to say things that, while ignorant, will leave scars on my heart.   The grief a mother of a child with a disability has never goes away for with each unkind word, each eye roll, and each sigh of exasperation from a so-called friend or teacher rips off the scab where any healing had begun to occur and the bleeding begins again.


Inside me is a woman in her late thirties who after seventeen years of working for the Federal Government was once again let down by the system and not made a permanent employee after another promise was made.  This was the time when it mattered most.  My family needed the benefits for security.

Inside me is a 40 year old woman who knows that settling into a job and working hard does not guarantee you anything but your own pat on the back.  I know that even when you settled for less than what you deserved for 17 years it is never too late to start to establish boundaries for what you will accept.


Inside me the woman in her late thirties, after so many disappointments, finally broke. I quit.  I pulled out of living my life.  I withdrew from friends, family and work.  I quit.  I cried.  I slept.  I breathed.  I wrote.  I got by.

Inside me is battle raging every day.  Sometimes it is a battle between a 7 year old and a 40 year old.  Other days it is a battle between a 16 year old and a 40 year old.  And still others, it is a thirty-something year old and a 40 year old.  Some days, the battle rages all day long.  Other days it is just for a moment at a time.  There are times when the battle seems rage on for days or weeks.  And, there are times when there is calm before the storm.  But the battle is there, nonetheless.

Inside me, this battle rages to find a way hold the memories in place without re-living them when they come to haunt me.   And, perhaps if I can hold them in place, I can make peace with all of the pieces that are inside me.

WhenI Decided to Become a Teacher

  Knowing what it felt like to wake up and go to a place where I could be happy every day…losing that…that was what it took for me to know that I had to become a teacher.  For years, I had wanted to.  But, I was pushing 40. Maybe substitute teaching was good enough.  I thought that maybe the teachers in the teacher’s lounge were right when they said that it is different when you have your own class because you have to deal with the parents.  I thought that maybe they were right when they said I was lucky I didn’t have lesson plans to write and papers to grade.  But now, I knew better.  I had a taste of what being a teacher was like when I substitute taught a kindergarten class from the start of the school year through the end of January.  The regular teacher had taken off to battle cancer and I was asked to fill in at the last minute.
      I actually worked two jobs during this time--my regular job at the Veteran’s hospital where I had worked for 16 years and this ½ day kindergarten teaching job.  The days at the VA were dull, unfulfilling, and meaningless and lacked any pleasure.  For 16 years, I served at the VA and had never been made a permanent employee.  The lack of benefits was taking a toll on my family financially and the lack of respect was taking a toll on me emotionally.
     When I was teaching every day, I knew what it felt like to get up and be happy every day.  I would wake up before the alarm went off.  I wanted to go to work.  None of the things the teacher’s said in the teacher’s lounge before made teaching full time less appealing to me.  I collaborated well with parents.  I developed a family atmosphere within my classroom…we were a community of learners…they learned from me and I learned from them.
     But at the end of January, I lost that happy place and those happy days.  The regular classroom teacher came back.  I am glad her battle with cancer was successful.  But for six months, those children were mine.  For six months I got paid in smiles and hugs every day.  For six months I got pictures and notes to hang up on my refrigerator at home.  For six months I got told I was the best teacher in the world.  For six months I got to watch my efforts help my students become readers and writers.  For six months I got to know what it felt like to get up to be happy.  And now, I was going to have to go back to forcing myself to get up and go back to the VA hospital every day where I knew no matter what, nothing I did was going to ever matter to anyone because for 16 years it hadn’t.
     On my last day of teaching that January, I did not get the opportunity to say good-bye to my kindergarten angels.  We had a snow day.  I went to the school and cleaned out my desk as tears streamed down my face.  My throat closed off as I tried to hold back the sobs while I put the book that I had written for the children in their cubbies.  I had wanted to read it to them...it had a picture of each student and a few sentences about how uniquely special each one of them was to me.
     I felt such tremendous loss of losing my students before the year was out... wanting to see the year through with them was my dream.  I felt such overwhelming despair at having known what it felt like to get up and be happy that returning to the emptiness I had before forced me to realize that decision regarding whether or not to become a teacher was not something I had to think about anymore.  It had been made.  When I came home from cleaning out my classroom that January day, I applied to graduate school at the University of Dayton.  Being a teacher was not a decision I think I made.  I think I was a decision that was made for me by God and I just had to find the path to it.

Classroom Community....The Child's Perspective Matters Too

In my writing course, we were asked to think about three questions.  I answered them from the perspective of what it may mean to the child.  Who are we there for anyways?  All the get to know you games, team building exercises, models of teaching and tricks in the world won't matter if YOU the teacher don't stand for and DO what you preach.  YOU are your student's primary role model.

What is a classroom community?

When considering my answer to this prompt, i googled the question to see what other people online had to say about what a classroom community was.  Oddly enough, the search engine did not deliver results for an answer to the question but rather information on how to develop one.   I did find an article by Mishael Hittie that stated "By definition, a community is a group of people who work with one another building a sense of trust, care, and support. This means that in our classrooms, part of our job is to provide opportunities and structures bywhich students can help and support one another. It also means that we provide explicit instruction and support so that students learn how to do this."  The ideas and tips presented ranged from getting to know you games to teaching models (cooperative learning).  While all of those things are good, having a child with an autism spectrum disorder has given me both the parental and educator's perspective of just what a classroom community means to THE CHILD.  We as educators can think all we want that we are doing a great job for the class as a whole but if we are missing what is best of fair for one child, we do NOT have a classroom community (my opinion).  The definition of fair that I use is that from Rick Lavoie who says that everyone gets what they need...not that everyone gets the same thing.
One example that I like to use is that of a child who is overly active, or even a child who is on the spectrum and we are seeing an impending "meltdown".  Quite often, these children get into trouble, are seen as odd, poorly behaved, and usually end up "having all their tickets pulled" or are "on red" at the end of every single day.  My suggestion has been over and over that these children be given socially acceptable tasks to alleviate their need.  So, if a child needs to move, give them a job where they can move.  Have them return a book to the school library, take a message to the office or a teacher next door...even if it is something that is not truly necessary...perhaps a pre-arranged task will alleviate the classroom disruption, allow the active child the physical outlet he or she needs (or allow the child on the spectrum some cool down time).  This will keep the child out of the "red-zone" and not put a target on the child's back.  Children who are often in trouble a lot end up getting tattle-taled on by their peers, particularly in the younger grades.  In the older grades, they may socially withdraw or deliberately disrupt the class because they don't stand a chance anyways.

Another example.  I knew a student who was suspected to have Fetal Alcohol effects.  He displayed some severe behavior disorders in the classroom and one in particular was improper use of scissors.  This was a kindergarten classroom and the scissors were kept in group supply boxes at each table.  This student was eventually removed from a group table and sat at a desk by himself.  Considering that he was ALWAYS in trouble, his peers ratted him out on everything he did, how was this teacher helping to facilitate the classroom community?  I was friends with her and my suggestion to her had been to remove the scissors from all of the tables, put them in a bin and only get the scissors out when the students actually needed to cut so they were not available to him on a constant basis.  Her response was that she was not going to do that the she had taught for 30 years and had never had to do that before and he needed to learn.  But...the thing is...we KNEW his brain was NOT normal!!!!  What if he was not capable of learning...or just not capable of learning then?  So he was isolated from his peers and a bull's eye on his back.  Shameful.

Sometimes, looking at things from each CHILD's perspective and giving each CHILD what he or she needs individually can make a classroom community for the ENTIRE class.  That is truly no child left behind.  All the getting to know you games in the world will not accomplish that.

Why is it important to promote classroom community?

Failure to promote classroom community can be a life or death situation.  Having been involved in education for 6 years as a substitute teacher (two years of which i was attending graduate school), I have had one student commit suicide who had Asperger Syndrome....the same diagnosis as my son.  I am not saying that his suicide is the result of failure on the educator's part because I do not know all that transpired in the classroom and between the parents.  But, I do think that there was failure somewhere when a 14 year old kills himself by hanging himself in a tree.
What else can happen if we fail to promote classroom community?  During my student teaching, I had a student who was on the spectrum but on no IEP.  His teacher was so bothered by him, she sat him as far away from her as she could.  Again, a student always losing all of his "tickets" and being "on red".  Classic case of a teacher demonstrating to the class just who the "problem child" is and therefore he was shunned by his classmates.  No one would play with him at recess.  Children said out loud to him that they were not going to play with him, they did not want to sit by him.  During my 10 weeks of student teaching, the behavior of the student did not improve with her behavior management system but worsened.  He began to retaliate against other students.  Additionally, two students bullied him at recess one day...on the merry-go-round, one of them pried his hands off the bars while the other shoved him off of it while it was moving at high speed.  How old was this child?  Six.  One day, he said to me, "Mrs. A, I hope those two ladies don't hurt my feelings ever again and I hope Mrs. X (name withheld) dosen't hurt my feelings again either."  He was talking about his classroom teacher, the intervention specialist and the principal.  He had become fixated on the fact that another first grade classroom did not have a tornado drill sign and only a fire drill sign.  Instead of the teacher in the room doing what was best for the CHILD (making one up quickly so he could relax) and the others in the room (she would have been able to focus her teaching time back on the group instead on him), she kept having to tell him to sit down and do his work for 20 minutes.  Afterwards, he got berated by his homeroom teacher for 15 minutes....and a week later boisterously reminded of his misbehavior in front of the class.  What this shows me, is that children with autism disorders may not DISPLAY emotional feelings but they HAVE them.

Failure to promote classroom community from the CHILD's viewpoint...it hurts self-esteem, sets a precedence for how others in the classroom can treat another student and can lead to bullying.

What can we do in general as teachers to build classroom community?

Think beyond the normal.  Think CHILD first.  Think about what you are saying to parents.  I have lived the life of a parent who picked their child up every single day to hear what my son did wrong at school today.  Silly, ridiculous stuff...he dumped over her pencil cup...ok...he has 10,000 things he has to work on.  Can YOU the teacher solve ONE by putting your pens and pencils in your desk for a year?  The answer I got was no....he had to learn and none of the rest of the kids in the class had the problem.  Did I feel  like I and my son were a part of the community?  No.

Think about how each child feels at the end of every day.  Evaluate whether THEY feel a part of the community.  All of the tips, games, tricks, teaching models in the world are meaningless if there in ONE in the class who is hurting.  Figure out what YOU need to do, change, rearrange, communicate to reach that ONE child.

Integrate community building through critical literacy.  Many wonderful books are available especially for junior high students including  Missing May by Cynthia Rylant, Rules by Cynthia Lord, A Corner of the Universe by Ann M. Martin, Mockingbird by Kathryn Erskine and so many others.