5 Lies I've Told Myself

My lie detector got activated on Monday morning, as I returned to school.  I was walking towards the office with my packed to the brim, busting out one side (literally) rollie cart when I passed my principal on the sidewalk. We stopped for a moment to exchange New Year’s greetings and a few quick pleasantries about family and the holidays. She then asks me in a rather perplexed and concerned tone, “You didn’t take all that home with you to work on over the break, did you?”  I had to confess, somewhat sheepishly, “Yeah I did.  But, I guess that’s a lie I told myself.”

The truth is when I got home the Friday before Christmas, I parked my rollie cart in the corner of the spare bedroom and did not touch it again until the morning I returned to school. I pondered my response to my principal throughout the day and began to realize that's not the only lie I have been telling myself. Maybe it was time to stop lying and be honest.  With me.

Lie #1   “I’m taking all these things home so I can work on them (a) over night (b) over the weekend (c) over break.”  The truth is, when I finally get home, the last thing I want to do is more school work.  Let’s face it, if you’re anything like me, you get home from school (late) and there are family responsibilities like homework, baths, laundry, dinner, cleanup, sports activities, or maybe an ill or aging parent.  And when it’s all done you are just plain ol' tired. The last thing you want to do is dig down in that school bag or box or rollie cart and do anything. You just want to unwind.  So there it sits. Untouched.

Lie #2   “I’m just going to spend a few minutes on-line.” HA! Another lie!  A few minutes has a way of turning into 30, which turns into an hour, which turns into several hours, and then its, “Where did the evening go and why aren’t I in bed?”  I have CADS.  Computer Attention Deficit Syndrome.  I get on line and can’t stay focused on any one thing. There’s just so much to see and do and read.  I tell myself, I‘m just going to check my email real quick.  Big mistake.  This email mentions a Groupon sale, or a link to a video, or an article I might want to use for school. Click, click, click. And then I’m off. I’m bouncing from site to site, shopping on-line, looking at Pinterest, Facebook, LiveBinders, and YouTube.  Oh please, and now I am looking at cute kittens and inspirational videos and realize I was going to bed 2 hours ago!

Lie # 3 “I really don’t need that much sleep,” or “I can get by on 4-5 hours a night.”  Of course, I realize all of our physical needs are different and there are great people, genius people actually, who get by on minimal sleep.  However, I personally need at least 7 hours a night to function at my best.  I try to fudge that a bit and go with 5 or 6 hours pretty regularly, but eventually it shows.  I am drowsy when driving, falling asleep at my computer, straining to stay awake while listening to a student, or my personal favorite, falling asleep in the waiting area at the doctor’s or dentist’s office and snoring.  Someone please wake me before I start to drool.

Lie # 4   “I had too much work I HAD to finish at school and now it’s too late to go to the gym. I’ll just skip for today.”  I tell myself, I had to stay late because there just so much I am expected to do. There are too many people counting on me.  If I don't do it, it won't get done.  It's for the kids.  And now the parking lot is empty except for me and the evening custodian.  I’m tired and hungry and soon it will be dark.  Besides, I don't really need to go to the gym,  I just got a work out picking up my rollie cart and putting it in the car.  And what about all that walking I did around campus today, that counts for something right?  Another lie. The thing is, for me anyway, once I miss it’s just too easy to miss again.  And again.  Then before I know it I am totally out of the habit of going to the gym. I have now reached that place where the thought of going to the gym doesn’t even cross my consciousness. At. All.

Lie #5    “Someone turned the dryer up on high an shrank all of my clothes!”  It couldn’t possibly be the soda and fries from the local fast food place I frequent each afternoon as I drive the opposite direction of the gym. The goodies in the lounge, snacks and candy in my office, and the fast food snacks and dinners are convenient. They keep this super tired, stressed out School Counselor going but are not a positive influence on my waistline or overall health.  The consequences include high blood pressure, the inability to paint my own toenails, and the need to shop for different sizes.  Unfortunately, the shopping in my future is not for cute new clothes I am excited about wearing.  *BIG SIGH*  If only we could just wear sweat pants, PJ bottoms and over-sized T-shirts to school. 

The Truth about Lying

So now I've confessed.  I have not been doing a very good job with self-care. Okay, I've been doing a horrible job!  What’s worse is how I have been lying to myself about the things I do that contribute to my stress levels.  I had convinced myself taking all the work home was as good as doing it and staying at school was more important than going to the gym.  I let my sleep suffer by spending countless hours on-line telling myself it was to help me relax or find things for school.  I justified my poor food choices because it was such a tough and busy day and I didn't get lunch so I deserve a treat, or I just need to grab something to hold me over until dinner.

Yes, we have a tough job, a stressful job, and at times a heart-breaking job.  But I’ve come to the realization it's not the job that has me stressed.  It is how I have chosen to react to the job.  Taking work to the extreme, sleeping less, avoiding the gym, eating too much of the wrong things and spending empty hours on-line are ineffective coping mechanisms. These lies I have told myself have contributed to my poor physical stamina and mental fatigue.

Now what?
Isn’t it ironic how we find it so easy to tell others how to take care of themselves, but then don’t take our own suggestions? And then, we wonder how we got in this dilemma?  Stress, mental exhaustion, and more work than can ever be done in a day will always be part of my professional life,  I guess you could say it is the nature of the job.  However, I can minimize the stress and exhaustion by taking some time to take care of me.  So what will I be doing?  I am ditching my busted rollie cart and making sure I leave school with only ONE thing I might do in the evening.  I am packing my gym back and taking it to school with me every day. I am leaving campus before I am the last car in the parking lot and when I do leave,  I am making the turn towards the gym.  Even if I only go on the treadmill for 15 minutes, I am reinforcing a positive habit.  I am planning my evening so I can be in bed in time to get my 7 hours of sleep a night.  I am drinking more water, no more soda, keeping healthy snacks at school, avoiding the convenience of fast food, and preparing simple healthy meals at home. And I went shopping at Goodwill. I bought some clothes to hold me over until I get my old clothes “un-shrunk.”  

It’s only been 6 days and so far I have challenged every one of my lies except for getting rid of the busted rollie cart. But I am actively working on that.  Change takes time and sometimes you backslide, but that just means you were moving forward to begin with right?  Take a moment and check your lie detector. What lies are you telling yourself?  What can you do to provide the self-care you need to be your healthiest, most productive self in 2016?

The Value of Building Community with Your Counselor Colleagues

One is the Loneliest Number

We are a solo act, performing a solitary job, many times in private, involving the confidential fears, feelings, and experiences of our students, their parents, and sometimes our teachers. These jobs performed in private are often misunderstood and misrepresented, leading to inaccurate assumptions about who we are and what we do.  There is a constant need to prove our worth and the value we add to the student, parents, and teachers at our schools. We have a job that is frustrating and satisfying, depressing and joyful, infuriating and uplifting.  The need for self-care and collaboration is great, but not always available or encouraged. Building a personal and professional resource network with your Counselor Colleagues through Professional Learning Communities (PLC) is one way to do just that.

Finding Your Lifeline
Building a PLC with your Counselor Colleagues, wherever you can find it, is the theme I want to encourage here.  Whether it is by joining the online community with a terrific resource like the Facebook group Elementary School Counselor Exchange, involving yourself with Twitter, #scchats, Google Hangout discussions,  following this blog, or one of many other active school counselor blogs, or developing a Professional Learning Community with the School Counselors in your own city, county or district, these groups are our lifeline.  In a profession that is largely misunderstood, these groups give us encouragement and perspective when we need it most. They give us a safe place to vent, but most importantly, allow us to encourage and give back to our Counselor Colleagues.

For many who live in rural areas or districts where School Counselors are few in number, the online options may be your only resource.  However don't let too few, be a deterrent to establishing your own PLC. The camaraderie, emotional support, problem solving, idea and resource exchange shared by meeting with others (whether virtually or online) who know what you do and why you do it is that lifeline to the lone School Counselor.  For those in urban school districts or cities or counties with multiple School Counselors, I strongly encourage to develop you own local Professional Learning Community (PLC).

The Birth of an Idea
I live in a large school district with nearly 50 elementary School Counselors.  In the last 5 years I have watched my friends, collaborators, and mentors retire one by one. People I use to call with questions or bounce ideas off of, or call about a student that had transferred from their school were all gone.  In their place, were names and faces I did not know very well and a feeling of a lost connection from years of working and sharing together.  If I was feeling disconnected, and I had been a part of the district counseling team for many years, how were my new colleagues feeling? It was evident when we met as a district for various meetings and workshops my new colleagues longed for the chance to talk and share with other School Counselors.  Our lunch breaks and after meeting conversations were filled with questions, ideas, and the support you only experience from others who "get" what you do. We wanted, no needed, more time together but the how and when was a problem.

One day I was talking with our Art teacher who mentioned meeting with her PLC.  I was curious and she explained she met with the other Art teachers in our district once a month to share lesson plans, work on curriculum maps, and share resources and ideas.  In addition to all this, they were able to arrange to receive professional development points towards certificate renewal and provide evidence for their evaluation of collaborating with peers. That's it! I was sold!  This is what my School Counselor Colleagues and I needed!

Creating a PLC
I started with my awesome Assistant Principal and floated the idea with her.  What did she think of the Counselors on our side of the county creating our own monthly PLC and did she think we could earn PD (professional development) points?  She was on board 100% and so were my Westside colleagues.  We chose a monthly meeting date and my AP created the PLC course description and registration sign-up through our county PD computer program.  Our first year was small, just the 8 of us on the "Westside"of the our county, including one Counselor who worked on the east side but lived on the west side.  We met faithfully every month, rotating the school host. Our meetings would last from 2-3 hours with sharing, consultation, some commiseration, and problem solving.  My desire was for this to be a positive, community building and personally enriching experience, and although this was never discussed, it clearly was the unstated purpose of our meetings.  In the end we earned more than 25 PD points towards re-certification.  But that was not the best part.

The PLC Benefits

As a result of our time together we grew personally and professionally in our relationships with each other. Our familiarity and comfort with one another created a trusted support system for emailing and calling each other to consult in difficult situations whether with students, parents, faculty, or administration. The feeling of isolation was diminished and the sharing of resources and knowledge was increased.  Each meeting we focused on our lessons and school-wide programming as it pertained to our curriculum map.  We shared resources, lesson plans, books, activities, websites, ideas, and more. We discussed our evaluation system and supported one another with ideas for improving our evaluation lessons and discussed various interpretations of the evaluation rubric.  We compared how our various administrators used the evaluation tools and how to effectively write up our personal growth plans.  But best of all, these once unfamiliar faces were now not only my trusted colleagues, but my friends.

PLC Year 2
A lot has happened to improve our PLC in the past 2 years!

• We have grown in numbers!  Another PLC in our county has teamed up with us for a group of about 20 members.  
• We have "offspring."  Our "eastsider" from earlier in the year left us to create an east side group who now meets monthly as well.
• We have gone to a monthly agenda (see samples here and here), with members submitting ideas, volunteering to present information, class or group lessons, and technology tips.
• There is greater administrative support in year 2.  A member suggested when we send out our agenda for the upcoming meeting we should include all the Principals of our PLC members.  This has helped immensely with administrative support  and School Counselors being free to leave school (after dismissal) to attend monthly meetings.  
• PLC minutes are now copied to our Principals and District Guidance Specialist.  This seems to have really done the most for legitimizing what we do and what we are trying to do for our students and our schools.  One of my Counselor Colleagues said her Principal commented after reading our minutes,"Wow, you all really packed a lot in that agenda!" 
• We are nurturing and supporting the newest School Counselors in our district and they tell us how much this group has meant to them. Our group is a safe place to ask questions, try new ideas, and get nonjudgmental help if needed.
• Our support base has grown professionally and personally as we add new members and spend more time together sharing, consulting, collaborating, and problem solving.  We have so many gifted School Counselors with a variety of backgrounds and experiences from private practice to all levels of counseling from preK to college. We have former classroom teachers who provide a teacher's perspective, a former behavior analyst and mental health therapist, tech geeks, and an entire group who will freely share any resource or idea they have.   

What sort of PLC, PLN, School Counselor support groups, or networking activities are you involved with?  I would love to hear your ideas for building community among School Counselors.  Any suggestions for ways we can continue to grow and improve our PLC would also be appreciated. I would be glad to feature your PLC or share your ideas here as well.

If you don't have a PLC and are interested in starting one with the School Counselors in your area, comment below or send me an email.  I would be happy to discuss how to start your own PLC.

I can't begin to express what the time with my School Counselor Colleagues has meant to me.  They offer comfort in difficult situations and challenge and inspire me to be the best I can be.  My wish for 2015 is for each of you to find a way to experience this too!