To reflect is to give serious thought or consideration to an idea or thing. Or at least that’s what Siri said when I asked her awhile ago as I waited for the clock to count down to midnight. This year rather than put Ezra to bed early and spend the entire night pampering myself, I let him stay up and spent the evening watching movies with him, writing my novel and reflecting on what 2018 represented to me. We watched all of my favorites and shockingly enough he liked them (movies included: The Lion King, Beauty and the Beast, and The Famous Jett Jackson *rest in peace Lee Thompson Young*).
This year started off incredibly bumpy and I wasn’t feeling it. At all but thankfully things started to slowly reverse a bit. Therapy eased up emotionally and I learned how to manage my triggers and more importantly how to help Ezra manage his triggers. Therapy has helped my relationship with my son is so many ways and has strengthened our bond. It’s even more obvious that I gave birth to my twin when people hear us interact.
I’ve grown so much this year in my professional relationships and been blessed with mentors that have guided me in every way as I prepared to take the teacher certification test. They’ve taught me about classroom management, confronting my own biases and how to keep myself well during the school year. As much as I’ve taken from them, I’ve tried to give back by being a present contributing volunteer in their classrooms. Through these interactions I’ve learned so much about myself and about the way I want to work with my future students. There is nothing more special than seeing a student whose been struggling have a breakthrough and knowing that you had some small part in it.
Those same mentors have also been instrumental in helping me push Ezra to greater academic and social heights. They helped me teach Ezra to read, and it’s such a beautiful thing to hear your child read. They gave me the tools to help him make friends and sustain those relationships throughout the years. Those same tools even helped me to cultivate a few new friendships as well.
Looking back it seems as if in all things there was growth . And with growth there is always the weeding out of what no longer serves you. That weeding out hurt because it showed that what I was putting into relationships wasn’t valued as much as I thought it was. However at the same time it allowed me to focus 100% on myself, my health, my son and my goals instead of doing emotional labor for others constantly.
That focus churned out the book I’ve been saying I would write since I was a teenager and it was only because I stopped performing emotional labor for others that made it possible. That’s growth. (Glick Blue word)
I won’t deny that certain health struggles have made certain parts of the year sucky. Or that the lack of support from those I’ve held closer skin hurt like hell but I’ve grown from it and come out stronger. Always stronger.
I've learned about myself during 2018 and I'm so proud of how much I've grown and what I've accomplished both as a person/mother and academically. I cannot wait to see what 2019 has in store for my son and I!
Theme for 2019/Guiding Word: Continuation
My sweetie and I <3
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