First Week

Of work was a great success. There's so much to share but still a lot to process, thus I will try my best to get out as much of it as I can [and feel comfortable doing so].

To remind you, I'm an assistant in a special education class at a middle school [a little background in this post].

My reactions and experiences are going to come to me really sporadically so excuse the lack of clear flow.

I have a range of 9 kids throughout the day, a majority of them are girls. A few are only around for one or two class periods, while the rest are with us for the majority of the day. Of our main kids [the ones that are with us for most of the day] all but two of them are in 6th grade and the remaining two are in 7th grade. So they're quite young, and quite small. I'm already in love with them.

There are a total of 4 us working in the classroom all day. Me, the teacher, and two other ladies in the same position as myself. There is also a nurse who is a personal caregiver to one of the students. Two other women come in for a period with their personal students. There are various therapists [speech, physical, occupational] that come in during the week as well. Finally, each period everyday we have groups of students that come in to help with our kids. It's a good opportunity for the kids to have an elective class that allows them to interact with the children and for the children to interact with them. We are with our main kids all day long, we feed them twice a day, help them in the bathroom, etc. So it's the long haul.

First of all, to give little snippets: I love it. Loved the kids immediately. It's easy work, time goes by fairly fast. I work well with everyone, literally everyone. The downsides include the new sleep schedule which is failing me so far, and that the work can be pretty boring sometimes.

There's a lot of interaction and watching going on. Teaching, helping, coaching, and loving. It's really like being a baby sister but with daily lessons.

Sleep, not getting much of it at all. It's hard to completely flip my schedule, but I'm really good throughout the day despite my inability to sleep. The first night consisted of me laying in bed for 6-7 hours doing nothing but tossing and turning and thinking. I wasn't as nervous as I could of been, but I just could not sleep. Gradually through the week I've gotten more and more sleep. It just takes forever for me to fall asleep and I've been waking up a lot [which reminds me to write about my dreams]. I've still not gotten anything close to a full night's rest, but I'm still very functional. I cope well without much sleep, despite my longing to sleep. The job adds more exhaustion to each day which makes me a little weary than I'm used to. Just gotta get used to the grind, which shouldn't take too long and I'm not very worried. I do know, though, that weekends are going to cause a huge glitch in my attempt to normalizing my schedule.

Tasks involve specific lessons to each child, singing, coloring, tons of playing, puzzles of different types [also part of lessons], feeding, wiping drool, cleaning, walking/steering wheelchair(s), etc. It's pretty fantastic and my desire to be helpful and caring in any way possible makes this an easy job for me. Which is what surprises me about the job, it's easy, laid back, and almost natural. Granted, it takes time to know each individual child to know their condition, their ways of communicating, and how to read their moods and needs. Just in 4 days, I've learned a lot about each child and already feel incredibly comfortable. But I can't say that I'm totally comfortable because this week was a really good week for each child. They were all mostly happy and very good.

One of the things I was worried about starting this job was being an outsider, a new person invading a comfortable and known space of the children. I wasn't sure if I would be a threat, invasive, discomforting, or scary. Not that I find myself to be of any of those qualities to anyone, but to be a person of authority that must take care of these kids that don't know me at all, I didn't want to frighten them. My worries were immediately eradicated the second I met the first student.

I'm going to call her Ms. T for short, it was a random idea I had, so I'll go with it. And make it a little more entertaining. In the mornings we wait for our students to arrive by bus [there's 2-3 different buses for them]. Ms. T is usually the first to arrive and she immediately decides to hug me and doesn't leave my side for about the first ten minutes, without exaggeration. She's randomly hugging me, holding on to me and my hands, cradling her face into me because she's shy, etc. I immediately take a liking to her, I've become attached already. What I love most about Ms. T is that she mostly communicates by visual means. She can hear and understands what is usually being said to her, but she cannot form words well. She definitely knows how to say "Hey!" and "No". She clearly nods when she is saying yes, and she uses sign language and points a lot. And she loves to laugh. Because she communicates mostly visually, she's is perfect for me. It takes one to read people to understand her, and that's a thing I've been doing my whole life. The others communicate somewhat similarly, however each kid is different to varying levels. Ms. T tends to be the most communicative and the most independent, thus she can do a lot on her own although she likes attention a lot. This makes her easier for me to interact with, being that I'm new to this. I've latched on to Ms. T quite a bit. But this does not, not even in the least, say that I favor her over the others. They're all different. It's just like parents...who say they love their children equally and all for different reasons. Yep, just compared my likeness for kids like those of parents.

I will, indeed, tell more stories about the other children, but Ms. T and I interacted quite a lot this week, for she latched onto me as well.

Using sign language on this job is awesome. Freaking awesome! Granted I'm not using sentences, but merely simple words/signs. It is effective nonetheless and I love it. I also love that I'm being asked by the teacher about some signs, he asked me! It feels great.

I'm noticing a lot of the effects this job is having on me already. First, I find it wonderful that I'm basically being paid to be affectionate. I get and give hugs all day long, I pat and rub backs and heads, hold hands, lay and sit near them, feed them. This is a great release for all of the affectionate energy I have! However, I'm noticing, instantly, how it is affecting me outside of work. After my second day of work I went out to dinner with two of my friends, one is a very short girl friend of mine [her size may jokingly be compared to that of a child]. I was consistently more affectionate towards her the entire night and I was realizing and verbalizing it as I did it. She didn't mind, but it was blowing my mind. That fast! It's only going to increase. I find myself wanting to reach out to everyone, even more so than I already had [which was a lot]. The difference now is, before I only wanted to touch those I knew well, now, it doesn't even seem to matter if I know them at all.
Another effect I'm noticing is the way I talk, I'm being more motherly [even in my actions]. I've already gotten used to interacting with young ones all week that being around my peers takes a little adjustment. My tone is different, and I'm offering more help than I already did. I'm constantly on the sidelines waiting for any opportunity to lend a hand. And here, are those motherly instincts all my closest friends know I have inside me. It's sprouting, and it's only the beginning.
I've also become highly alert to sounds around me. I've been known to kind of drown things out, sometimes purposely, sometimes not. Now, I react to little sounds, especially those of children so instantaneous. It's incredibly odd to me. I only realized this when I was out in public and I heard something that resembled a cough/rumble of one of my kids. I turned my head to find the source, and I realized what I was doing at once.
Those are the major ones I can think of at the moment.

I have much more to go into, but now it's time for me to get out on this lovely Friday night.