Did your mother tell you that she was in excruciating pain when you were born? When I asked my mother if it hurt to have a baby she said, "Yes, but you forget about it." See...she didn't leave me with any guilt on that score.
However my guilty feelings started early because I was a story teller. In other words a fibber....a liar....a purveyor of tales. I remember in grade school I was talking to a girl by the name of Sherrill who was a year old than I was. She told me how her father gave her a special doll. Not to be outdone, I told her that my father, who was a truck driver, (which he was) brought me home a special doll too that was wearing a fancy dress. And so it started.
One school day we had an assembly with a magician. He went into the audience and started finding money in students' hair. At dinner that night I was so excited to tell my mother all about him and I told her that he had found money in my hair. I failed to remember that my older brother had been at the same assembly and he said, "He did not!" My mind is a blank after that. Was I punished? My father was not there so he must have been on an overnight driving trip and even if he had been there, my mother was the disciplinarian. Maybe she forgave me that little slip up.
Guilt was always present in my life, but the thought of getting caught and punished and having my parents be disappointed in me often kept me on the straight and narrow. Growing up I would say I was basically a good kid.
Yet there are things I did or did not do that still haunt me to this day. I was 21 when my mother became severely depressed. I was newly married and living in East Lansing so I couldn't help much. I was finishing up at Michigan State University and then started my teaching career. I was over three hours from home and it was impossible to see the big picture. Often I would just feel frustrated that my mother could not snap out of it.
My mother took her life when I was 23 and in my second year of teaching. There was a helplessness and an extreme guilt that I could not see where she had been heading. At the end of the funeral when everyone had left us alone to say our final good byes, an old woman came up to the casket and started asking questions. I didn't know who she was although my father did and I just became angry at the whole situation. I was angry with my mother and angry at this woman and the guilt of both was more than I thought I could bear.
There are things I remember from my teaching career that also brought me guilt. I taught 7th and 8th graders at two different country schools for several years before I started teaching at Hart High School. One student I had came from a dysfunctional home and he was always a handful. One day as I was escorting him to the office for something he had done in class, he got belligerent. I swatted him and knew immediately how wrong it was and that I had lost him forever. I'm sure he was used to getting hit at home and to have a teacher do the same thing was beyond his comprehension. I was a young teacher, but it was no excuse for what I did. I still carry that guilt with me.
Teaching at Hart High School for 22 years also brought situations that I wish I could change. I had a male student, Don, who also could be a problem, but I was usually able to keep him under control until one day I failed him too. I always taught a unit on poetry in my American Lit class. I did a lesson plan I got from my own 11th grade high school English teacher. While reading poetry from our lit book for several weeks I told my students that on one project they could pick the grade they wanted to receive. To get a C they had to read a poem to the class and explain what they thought it meant. To get a B they had to memorize a poem and recite it in front of the class and to get an A they had to write a poem. To get an A+ they had to write five extra poems.
As the unit came to an end I told one class that Don had written a poem. They all started talking and one student asked if I would read it. Caught up in the moment of everyone's surprise that such a thing could happen...Don would write a poem...I read it in front of the class. Needless to say I lost that boy as well. He heard in the hallway what I had done. His macho status was ruined and I had humiliated him. I apologized but the damage was done. To this day I still remember my guilt at having let down a student who before that time had respected me enough to try to behave himself in class.
There are other guilty feelings that a mother always has who works outside the home. I felt guilty leaving my children with babysitters. I can still see the face of my little boy looking out at me from a window of a babysitter as I drove off. But I knew that I could not NOT teach. My mother had been a teacher and I thought that if she had continued her career and still had children she might have felt more complete. However, like most women of the 50's she stayed home to raise us.
As my father aged and his second wife died, he wanted to move near us. We found property 1/2 mile down the road so he could be close and then the guilt was really heaped upon me. Even though he was still very independent he became a needy person and no matter what I did to help him, it never seemed enough. I tried not to feel guilty but even after his last two years in a nursing home and his death I wondered if I should have done more.
So here is a message to my children. I have my own interests. I have friends so if I live a long long life, I do not need you to entertain me. If I am not in my right mind, feel free to deposit me where you will. When I die, do not feel like you didn't do enough to please me. Even in taking my last breath, I do not want to feel any guilt of being a burden. It is not up to children to make their parents happy. That has to come from within and it is all right to feel euphoric when I pass over. I felt it when my father died because I knew he had lived a long full life and I was finally free from all the guilt. I should probably feel guilty about those feelings, but I don't.
Cheers to a guilt free life.
However my guilty feelings started early because I was a story teller. In other words a fibber....a liar....a purveyor of tales. I remember in grade school I was talking to a girl by the name of Sherrill who was a year old than I was. She told me how her father gave her a special doll. Not to be outdone, I told her that my father, who was a truck driver, (which he was) brought me home a special doll too that was wearing a fancy dress. And so it started.
One school day we had an assembly with a magician. He went into the audience and started finding money in students' hair. At dinner that night I was so excited to tell my mother all about him and I told her that he had found money in my hair. I failed to remember that my older brother had been at the same assembly and he said, "He did not!" My mind is a blank after that. Was I punished? My father was not there so he must have been on an overnight driving trip and even if he had been there, my mother was the disciplinarian. Maybe she forgave me that little slip up.
Guilt was always present in my life, but the thought of getting caught and punished and having my parents be disappointed in me often kept me on the straight and narrow. Growing up I would say I was basically a good kid.
Yet there are things I did or did not do that still haunt me to this day. I was 21 when my mother became severely depressed. I was newly married and living in East Lansing so I couldn't help much. I was finishing up at Michigan State University and then started my teaching career. I was over three hours from home and it was impossible to see the big picture. Often I would just feel frustrated that my mother could not snap out of it.
My mother took her life when I was 23 and in my second year of teaching. There was a helplessness and an extreme guilt that I could not see where she had been heading. At the end of the funeral when everyone had left us alone to say our final good byes, an old woman came up to the casket and started asking questions. I didn't know who she was although my father did and I just became angry at the whole situation. I was angry with my mother and angry at this woman and the guilt of both was more than I thought I could bear.
There are things I remember from my teaching career that also brought me guilt. I taught 7th and 8th graders at two different country schools for several years before I started teaching at Hart High School. One student I had came from a dysfunctional home and he was always a handful. One day as I was escorting him to the office for something he had done in class, he got belligerent. I swatted him and knew immediately how wrong it was and that I had lost him forever. I'm sure he was used to getting hit at home and to have a teacher do the same thing was beyond his comprehension. I was a young teacher, but it was no excuse for what I did. I still carry that guilt with me.
Teaching at Hart High School for 22 years also brought situations that I wish I could change. I had a male student, Don, who also could be a problem, but I was usually able to keep him under control until one day I failed him too. I always taught a unit on poetry in my American Lit class. I did a lesson plan I got from my own 11th grade high school English teacher. While reading poetry from our lit book for several weeks I told my students that on one project they could pick the grade they wanted to receive. To get a C they had to read a poem to the class and explain what they thought it meant. To get a B they had to memorize a poem and recite it in front of the class and to get an A they had to write a poem. To get an A+ they had to write five extra poems.
As the unit came to an end I told one class that Don had written a poem. They all started talking and one student asked if I would read it. Caught up in the moment of everyone's surprise that such a thing could happen...Don would write a poem...I read it in front of the class. Needless to say I lost that boy as well. He heard in the hallway what I had done. His macho status was ruined and I had humiliated him. I apologized but the damage was done. To this day I still remember my guilt at having let down a student who before that time had respected me enough to try to behave himself in class.
There are other guilty feelings that a mother always has who works outside the home. I felt guilty leaving my children with babysitters. I can still see the face of my little boy looking out at me from a window of a babysitter as I drove off. But I knew that I could not NOT teach. My mother had been a teacher and I thought that if she had continued her career and still had children she might have felt more complete. However, like most women of the 50's she stayed home to raise us.
As my father aged and his second wife died, he wanted to move near us. We found property 1/2 mile down the road so he could be close and then the guilt was really heaped upon me. Even though he was still very independent he became a needy person and no matter what I did to help him, it never seemed enough. I tried not to feel guilty but even after his last two years in a nursing home and his death I wondered if I should have done more.
So here is a message to my children. I have my own interests. I have friends so if I live a long long life, I do not need you to entertain me. If I am not in my right mind, feel free to deposit me where you will. When I die, do not feel like you didn't do enough to please me. Even in taking my last breath, I do not want to feel any guilt of being a burden. It is not up to children to make their parents happy. That has to come from within and it is all right to feel euphoric when I pass over. I felt it when my father died because I knew he had lived a long full life and I was finally free from all the guilt. I should probably feel guilty about those feelings, but I don't.
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