Last updated on March 5th, 2024 at 03:32 am
It’s an odd feeling when you turn over your classroom keys for the last time. Or at least, for the last time in the foreseeable future. In an elementary teacher’s case, the process is never simple. Turning over the keys happens only once you’ve had to box up and muscle an entire household’s worth of various educational items into your ten-year-old Toyota Corolla.
What I achieved once I could step away from teaching
This nonrenewing was actually the second time I turned over my keys. I had quit teaching, gone back, and quit again. This time around, I was able to achieve very important life goals.
The first time I left: After three years of teaching first grade at a charter school, I quit to travel, write a book, work on my health, and find my soulmate. I emerged from this two-year hiatus having traveled to seven different countries, lost forty pounds of excess weight, typed up at least half a novel and dove into the deep end of the dating pool. (A couple months after I returned to teaching, I met my husband on a dating app). A success by all accounts.
The second quitting: This time I had completed a year teaching third grade and another year (was it a year or a decade?) of fourth grade hybrid– with half my students in the classroom with me and half (presumably) viewing my instruction from a screen. Masks and desk shields and copious amounts of sanitizer also played lead roles in this scene. My goals with leaving this time included:
- to regain sanity and peace personally and relationally before I frayed my marriage
- to have a baby, and
- to start or create something– something I could hold onto and say it was mine, not just losing minutes turning into hours turning into days spent in the school system.
Was I successful?
Without spending my days in the classroom that year, I was able to organize our home, to learn to bake sourdough, to try my hand at gardening.
I babysat my friends’ kids and started house cleaning as side jobs.
I started testing cake recipes and posted my creations on social media. My friends started making requests, and I ended up baking two wedding cakes, a baby shower cake, and a decadent chocolate strawberry sponge for a fundraiser. Thus, my accidental home bakery business had started.
That fall, I found out I was pregnant! This was further validation for my choice to quit: I was ecstatic to be able to attend appointments without scraping together sub plans, and enjoyed the privilage of eating, drinking and using the restroom freely. Turns out one has to quit teaching to feel fully human.
I took on a tutoring student and enjoyed still teaching, but in a capacity that didn’t cause me to question my life decisions. Tutoring this precious first grader for a few hours each day gave me the teaching satisfaction I had missed–and a little income on top of that.
The value of quitting teaching
I recount this to you, reader, because creating time and space to complete important life goals is impossible to measure in numerical terms, but can be completely worth it. It’s hard to make the shift when there’s not a number so easily quantifiable. You think I’m giving up this job— let’s say 60K per year– for what?
Is the answer 0 dollars?
Is regaining health and family connection and stability and the easing of stress computed at $0?
Is being able to safely and healthfully carry your baby worth nothing?
Of course not. The value you may get from forgoing the paycheck could be worth vastly more than the 60K. Life is more than our jobs. Let’s have the courage (and imagination!) to make these decisions wihout all the numbers.
“…because creating time and space to complete important life goals is impossible to measure in numerical terms, but can be completely worth it. It’s hard to make the shift when there’s not a number.”
Charmaine
How to make the difficult decision to leave the classroom
I’ve spent a bit of time putting together what I think are useful articles to help those who may be in a similar place.
Leaving teaching is a hard decision for numerous reasons, including the way it sparks identity crises or financial worries. I went through these hurdles, too.
Take a look at my Ultimate Guide to Leaving Teaching to see if there is any additional post that could help you. With a bit of determination and creativity, I think it’s possible to make it work doing something you love.
It’s okay to love to teaching but want to hit the pause button on it for now. There are other loves in this life, too, you know? I’m rooting for you.
