Sick & Tired of Being Sick & Tired

The last month and a half or so has been very rough for me. In that space of time I have had, in order: strep throat, the flu, bronchitis with an ear infection, and a mild case of food poisoning. And now my seasonal allergies have hit with a vengeance. If anyone in a northern climate reads this, there are already trees in bloom here in Alabama. And where there is pollen, there is my allergy to green things.

All of this has been hard on my teraching in a couple of ways. First, I have been out a quite a bit in a short period of time. God’s way of telling me my plan to miss no days this semester wasn’t gonna happen. So, I was not here for somme days of direct instruction. And I found out the hard way that at least one day (when I went out of my way to leave work), the sub showed my English class a movie instead. I also have the busy work I left for the students to do to plow through and evaluate somehow. And it has affected my rapport with my classes. The continuity that I wanted to establish has not been established. It is more than a little upsetting.

Then there is the fact that, even when I am here, I am not ALL here. I am not at anywhere near 100%. I feel lucky to be at 50% on some days. And it affcts how I teach, how I interact with my students, my patience, my temper, and all manner of other aspects of classroom life. I have been short tempered at times and slipped into sarcasm before I could control it. I have been better at controlling it this semeseter, and want to get back on track with that.

My brain has been so foggy that I have gotten behind in my grading. Even with the wasted week of testing I have not completely caught up on everything. And that also affects my performance in the classroom. I need to rev it up and get up to speed on this. All the medicines in my system aren’t really helping much either. I feel like I am going through the days like a semi-zombie.

On the bright side, I am healthy enough to work and I can do my job. I just need to get up off my butt a little and get it done better. That is always a worthwhile goal: doing the job better.