Four years ago I released my very first book, Worthless No More. I began writing it the year before after a particularly difficult few months for me where I had been feeling especially worthless and making some bad choices for myself.
In writing the book, and with counseling, I began to see the reasons for why I felt so worthless. I saw the patterns of relationships throughout my childhood, teen years and young adult life that contributed to me feeling that way, but at some point it was no longer the people in my life making me feel worthless, I had internalized the feeling.
I believed that I was worthless.
Writing the book helped me see that and set me on a course of healing and realizing my own value as a person and a child of God. It’s been difficult, but well worth it.
When the book was finally published and I had copies in my hand, I had a book release celebration. For the celebration I found as many songs as I could that had to do with knowing your value and persevering through difficult times. The first song on the playlist that night was Fight Song by Rachel Platten. The first time I heard that song it spoke to me and reminded me of the inner strength I have. Here are the lyrics:
Like a small boat On the ocean Sending big waves Into motion Like how a single word Can make a heart open I might only have one match But I can make an explosion
And all those things I didn’t say Wrecking balls inside my brain I will scream them loud tonight Can you hear my voice this time?
This is my fight song Take back my life song Prove I’m alright song My power’s turned on Starting right now I’ll be strong I’ll play my fight song And I don’t really care if nobody else believes ‘Cause I’ve still got a lot of fight left in me
Losing friends and I’m chasing sleep Everybody’s worried about me In too deep Say I’m in too deep (in too deep) And it’s been two years I miss my home But there’s a fire burning in my bones Still believe Yeah, I still believe
And all those things I didn’t say Wrecking balls inside my brain I will scream them loud tonight Can you hear my voice this time?
This is my fight song Take back my life song Prove I’m alright song My power’s turned on Starting right now I’ll be strong I’ll play my fight song And I don’t really care if nobody else believes ‘Cause I’ve still got a lot of fight left in me A lot of fight left in me
Like a small boat On the ocean Sending big waves Into motion Like how a single word Can make a heart open I might only have one match But I can make an explosion
This is my fight song Take back my life song Prove I’m alright song My power’s turned on Starting right now I’ll be strong (I’ll be strong) I’ll play my fight song And I don’t really care if nobody else believes ‘Cause I’ve still got a lot of fight left in me
I haven’t written a blog post since February, there are many reasons for that and someday, I may fill you in completely, but for now, I will let you know one of the reasons… my Mental Health.
May is Mental Health Awareness Month and I began this blog in May 2016 as a place for me to discuss mental health and sexual assault issues. This blog has been a life saver to me as I wrote about my own struggles with mental health issues in hopes of helping others with theirs, especially during the times when I felt completely alone as though nobody was listening.
This past year has been a struggle with my anxiety often being in overdrive and leading me to question my very existence. There were weeks where getting out of bed in the morning was a herculean effort, just to do the things required of living was exhausting, never mind keeping two other humans alive as well.
I realized that my mental health needed attention and sought help in the form of a Christian counselor. I do my best to keep the fact that I follow Christ out of what I write on here, but this year that has been part of what has saved me so in this blog, I’m going to include it.
I wanted to find a counselor who understood mental health issues like anxiety, and also understood my belief in God and how strongly I hold onto Jesus in the deepest, darkest of times in my life. It has helped tremendously!
I know I will always have anxiety, it’s just a part of who I am. Most of the time it’s my superpower, but sometimes it’s my unraveling, as it tried to be this past year. Talking with someone who understands anxiety and lots of prayer helped me pull out of the deep trenches of anxiety and back into the land of the living.
Recently, a Christian told me that because of my anxiety, I live in fear. Because I’m living in fear, I’m not a good Christian and I’m allowing the devil to have a stronghold in my life.
This person has not talked with me about what I’ve done to combat my anxiety and fears. They have not asked to pray with me about my anxiety. They have not asked what they can do to ease my anxiety. They haven’t asked if my anxiety is better or worse.
They just decided that because I have anxiety, I am allowing the devil a place in my life and I need to get my life right with God and back on track. When I do that, then everything will be better.
This person has no idea the work that I have done with my counselor and with God this year to get better. I am better for the time being. I know that a bad bout with anxiety will come again, that’s the nature of the illness. It pretends to be my friend for a while, then BAM, it turns on me.
This person telling me that I just need to get right with God reminded me of this cartoon:
If we treated physical illnesses the same way we treat mental illnesses.
Mental illnesses are real! They are no more about the devil taking over a person’s life than any physical illness is.
Would somebody ever tell a person with cancer that they just need to pray more, or that they just don’t believe in God enough to be healed, or that they must be allowing the devil to have a stronghold in their life because they aren’t getting better.
Unfortunately, there are Christians who believe these lies about physical and mental health. Well I don’t.
We live in an imperfect world and I am an imperfect human. That means I have flaws and illness and I make mistakes and I have heartbreaks.
It also means that I am worthy of love.
Period.
No, “You are worthy of love; if you do this…”
I am worthy of love because I am me. That’s it. Whether you approve of who and how I am and the illness I have or the mistakes I make. I am worthy of love.
I have value because I am a human being.
I will not be ashamed of my mental illness.
“But you’re not ashamed?” “I trust GOD with all my heart. He hasn’t taken my anxiety and depression away yet…but he has taken my shame.”
Growing up, children should feel safe, secure, loved, and cherished. Unfortunately that isn’t always the case. Many children grow up feeling like the love of their parents is conditional. That their safety is reliant on their parents mood that day. That security is the guy at the door of the Target store. They’ve never heard of nor felt being cherished and wouldn’t even know that it was something they deserved.
Children growing up in these environments tend to become peacemakers, putting the needs of others before their own. Working their hardest to keep everyone else, especially their parents, “happy” so that they can feel safe and loved. It sounds like it might be a good thing, but it’s not for many reasons. Children who do this begin to believe that they don’t matter, their feelings don’t matter, their needs don’t matter. They internalize the idea that the only thing that matters is keeping the people who are supposed to love them unconditionally happy, so that they will continue to love them.
When they grow up, these children have a higher tendency to wind up in a physically or emotionally abusive relationship and may not even realize it, because that’s what they’re used to. They have learned that the people who love them also hurt them. That love and pain go together. They have been conditioned by the situation they grew up in to believe that those who love them will also make them feel worthless.
Or maybe, the abused child has learned they were abused as a child and healed from it. Maybe they thought they learned from that. Maybe they find a romantic partner who values them and shows genuine love. Somebody who totally understands the abuse they suffered and helps them continue to heal throughout the rest of their life. That would be amazing. There are people out there who will be that person for the abuse survivor.
Then there are people who will know that the person is an abuse survivor and try to understand, but because they don’t have empathy, they may be unable to truly help. After awhile, they may end up saying things to the abuse survivor that are hurtful, that cause the survivor to revert back to the hurt, insecure, scared child, but because of therapy, the survivor is able to say something to the partner. The partner apologizes or explains away the behavior and the abuse survivor, wanting to be loved, accepts and forgives and moves forward.
The hard part in all of this is that the words leave scars. If the motivations for the negative words are never dealt with, the scars may get infected. If the words continue to happen, if a pattern of negative words emerge, the childhood abuse survivor may end up becoming the victim of adult domestic partner violence.
The survivor of childhood abuse needs to heal from that, face it and always confront it in all relationships moving forward. Nobody ever deserves to be abused, sometimes abuse is so covert that we don’t even realize it’s happening, even more so if you are the survivor of childhood abuse.
Always, always, always be careful with your words. According to several relationship researchers, including John Gottman and April Stevenson, it takes a ratio of 7:1-4:1 of positive to negative interactions for people to maintain a positive relationship. That means that you need to have somewhere between four and seven positive interactions to every negative interaction to maintain a good relationship and build a person up. So when you criticize a person, you better have at least 4 good things to say about them too, I would tend to go overboard for a child. But be specific. Say things like, “You did a great job cleaning up the clothes off your bedroom floor.” “You worked really hard on that math homework.”
If you are an abuse survivor though, I think you can set boundaries without doing this. Telling somebody they hurt you, is not being critical as long as you do it in a way that emphasizes your feelings. Such as “I felt hurt, when I was told________________, because_________________.”
It would be amazing if we could end childhood abuse and domestic abuse, but as long as there are humans involved in relationships, we won’t be able to. Until then, my hope is that all who have been abused will find the help they need. Here are a few resources if you have been abused or know someone who has been abused:
As 2020 comes to an end, I’ve been looking back on the year, specifically the past nine months. These have been extremely difficult for so many people to say the least. As a meme that’s been going around the internet says, “We are not all in the same boat. We are in the same storm. Some have yachts, some canoes, and some are drowning. Just be kind and help whoever you can.”
This year has brought old as well as new struggles with my mental health. There were days that the thought of getting out of bed was too much, the effort it takes to live was too much. The difference this time is that I know that I’m valuable, I have worth and that made the struggle doable, it was like a life preserver.
I learned from a lot of people throughout my young life that I wasn’t valuable, that I was just a waste of space and time. My family let me know, adults and students at my school let me know, the people at my church let know and society let me know; I was worthless.
People didn’t seem to care about my feelings, they just dismissed my fears and anxieties as being over dramatic or just shy or just too much.
My mom used to take us to this park in our town that you had to drive on a levee road to get to. I was terrified that we would go off the road into the water, be trapped in the car and drown. So terrified that I would have nightmares about drowning the night before we would go to the park, waking up in tears. She dismissed it by saying that it would never happen. I learned as an adult, we could have gotten to the park without ever driving on the levy road. This fear of drowning by going off the road into the water got so bad, that I hated going over bridges, my mom continued to tell me that my fear was irrational and that bridges wouldn’t break, and cars wouldn’t go over the edges until the 1989 Loma Prieta Earthquake where the San Francisco Bay Bridge broke and reinforced my fears of falling off levy roads and bridges, being trapped in the water in the car and drowning. It took months of specific therapy to get over just that fear to where now I can drive on levy roads and over bridges with only minimal fear and no panic attacks.
By her dismissing my fears, she reinforced the fact that I was not important, that my feelings were not important.
My dad was rarely home when we were with him, when he was home, he was busy working in the garage or watching television. We weren’t allowed in the garage; we could stand in the door to ask him a question and he made it obvious that we were interrupting his rebuilding of whatever car or motorcycle he was currently working on. If he was watching TV, we had to wait for a commercial to talk to him. Everything else was more important to him than we were.
Whatever I was, I wasn’t enough for my parents.
When I started Kindergarten, two things stood out to me that first week that showed me that the adults didn’t think I was smart enough. First, I went to school knowing how to spell my name; M-I-S-H-E-L-L. An adult helper thought she needed to inform me that I spelled my name wrong. I just remember feeling helpless and lost. I knew how to spell my name, but an adult was telling me I was wrong, so she must be right. Another adult told me that I was wrong when I said that my sister was starting high school. She absolutely was starting high school, she’s nine years older than me. I learned not to let teachers or even students know how smart I was. I needed to go along to get along. To be just smart enough, but not too smart.
Church was another place that I learned the lesson that who I was wasn’t good enough and that I had to keep who I really was hidden to be accepted. My very first Sunday wasn’t like that. I went to Children’s Church and there was a very large, extremely loud, bearded man in the front of the crowded room trying to get the kids to quiet down. I burst into tears because I was separated from my sister. He stopped what he was doing, came over to me, and helped me. He calmed me down and got me and my sister seats together. He paid attention to me, he didn’t dismiss me or belittle me, he helped me.
Then I got involved in the girls’ group at the church. In that group I learned that we are all sinners. One of the first Bible verses I had to memorize was Isaiah 53:6, “We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to our own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.” Another one was Romans 3:23, “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,” It was verse after verse about what a sinner I was. What a horrible person I was. How I wasn’t good enough.
Luckily, that loud, Children’s Pastor had a discipleship group, and I was in it. In that group I learned about God’s love for me from verses like John 3:16; “For God so loved the world that he sent his only son, that whoever believes in him shall have eternal life.” And Ephesians 1:4, “For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight.”
So, while I may not have been good enough for my family, or my teachers and others at school, or most of the people at church, I was good enough for Pastor Tim and God.
Unfortunately, I never believed I was good enough for any person. I always believed that I had to prove my worth to others, that they wouldn’t accept me for who I was, but then I wrote a book which I titled Worthless No More, and I realized that I am a valuable human being. I don’t need to keep any part of me hidden from others for them to accept me, if they don’t accept me, that’s their problem, not mine.
It hasn’t been easy, especially considering this last election because for some reason Christianity seems to be deeply tied into Republicanism. My Christian friends are where it’s the most difficult because I don’t like Trump. I’ve never liked Trump, since before he was President. I’ve had people question my Christianity because of it. Christians have called me a socialist, libtard because I believe that we should have accessible health care. Christians have called me a sheep because I believe we should wear masks to keep others healthy.
However, looking forward to 2021, I will no longer go along to get along. I will be me. I am valuable for who I am. I am Worthless No More.
I haven’t written much recently, but with what I have written, you know that I am broken, depressed, anxious, and generally not in a good place.
To help combat that I have been seeing a licensed therapist to gain insights and strategies to help navigate this cruel, cold, divided world we live in that is being ravaged by a disease that’s wreaking havoc on people’s physical and mental health.
I also just finished teaching a unit on stress and how to better manage stress in our lives. Between the two, therapy and teaching, one strategy stood out, being thankful, or showing gratitude.
I’m not talking about toxic positivity, the idea that if you think positive thoughts all the bad stuff will go away and you’ll feel all better, depression will magically disappear and your thoughts will suddenly slow down.
I’m talking about taking a few minutes each day in the midst of the turmoil and chaos that is life at the moment (because it is a moment, no matter how long it lasts, it will pass) and seeing the good things that are still there. We may have to squint our eyes and look really hard, maybe even pull out a magnifying glass or a microscope, but they’re there; those positive things that give us hope in humanity, that make life worth living, that make it that much easier to get out of bed the next day.
When my therapist first suggested the idea to write down five things each day I thought it was a dumb idea. I didn’t see how it could help, I knew it wasn’t going to make everything magically get better, but I did it anyway. For about three weeks now, I have been faithfully making a daily list of five things I’m thankful for.
I was right, the world hasn’t changed, my life is still in turmoil, I still feel broken, but it has made it a little easier to get out of bed each day. It has given me a challenge to look forward to as I try to find a few good things everyday, and I love a challenge.
Here are some of the things I’m thankful for (in no particular order)
My kids because they made me a mom and showed me what it is to love someone so much that you can’t imagine life without them and how bad it hurts to see them hurting, and how amazing feels to see them happy and successful and being who they want to be.
My job because it allows me to be immersed in my favorite subject and to be with my friends on a daily basis (pre-COVID; now it’s more on a weekly basis) and my co-workers are some of my best friends.
My friends because they are there when I need people to talk to, to have fun with, etc.
Food, because I love food, especially homemade food that I get to feed to my family at dinnertime all together talking about our day.
My family, the ones that are by blood and the married in ones, because we are there for each other no matter what and help each other out.
My students because I know that distance learning isn’t easy for most of them, but they show up on their computers every day and listen to me, then they go off and do the assignments I give them. They tell me things about their lives and struggles with school in emails, they ask for help, they’re doing their absolute best in this weird new world we live in and it gives me hope for the future that we have such a resilient group of young people who will go out into the world in a few years.
Jesus because without him in my life, I wouldn’t have any peace.
This idea of giving thanks in the turmoil is actually biblical. In 1 Thessalonians 5:18 it says to “give thanks in all circumstances: for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.” Sometimes I think people mistake this to mean that Christians have to be thankful for our circumstances, but that’s not what the verse is saying at all, it says IN all circumstances.
That means, looking for the little things that make the living in those circumstances just a little bit easier. Seeing the things that make getting out of bed worth it every day.
Some days I do have to pull out a magnifying glass to find what I’m thankful for, but I still find at least five things every day to be thankful for, it hasn’t changed the chaos in the world, the division in the nation or the turmoil I feel in my life, but it has made getting out of bed each day easier.
I have been very open about my mental health struggles for years, hoping that in doing so, others who struggle would know that they are not alone and find the strength within to reach out for help. I started this blog to help end the stigma surrounding mental health issues. I talk to my classes about mental health. I teach them stress reduction strategies, we talk about suicide prevention, we learn about various mental illnesses, all in my attempt to make the world a friendlier place for those who struggle with a mental illness.
The worldwide COVID pandemic has finally caused people to talk about mental health. I hear all the time that schools need to open for kids’ mental health. Businesses need to open and get people back to work for their mental health. Depression and anxiety are on the rise because of the economic recession caused by the COVID shutdowns.
A common headline these days; this one from the Washington Post.
I don’t really think that COVID has caused the increase in depression and anxiety though.
Some of you might be getting upset with me right about now, but let me explain.
I’m not saying that more people aren’t reaching out to therapists for help because they are.
I’m not saying people aren’t self identifying that they are having difficulties dealing with the new normal that the pandemic has thrown at us with physical distancing, reduced workhours, being laid off or working from home, kids doing school from home and all the rest of the changes that have been forced upon us from this global health pandemic, because they are.
This is a terrible situation that we find ourselves in and many of us are not handling it well, especially those extroverts who want to be with other people and huggers who need to hug people. I feel for them, I really do.
But I don’t think that the COVID-19 pandemic caused the current rise in mental health issues that we are seeing.
What if the cause is the constant busy-ness we found ourselves in so that by the time we went to bed at night we were so exhausted we collapsed and immediately fell asleep and we never found ourselves with enough quiet time to contemplate the complexities of life?
What if the cause is that we never learned to deal with disappointment because somebody always swooped in to make sure that we got what we wanted when we wanted it?
What if the cause is that we don’t know how to communicate with our family members so this extended time together is a struggle; as we are daily around each other, always physically together but emotionally alone?
What if the cause is that our children are so used to others taking care of them, teaching them and making the boundaries for them and their parents only providing the fun that nobody in the situation (parents included) know how to change it up now?
What if the cause is that we are so ingrained to believe that our job or career is our identity and to lose our job means we have lost who who are?
What if we were never taught healthy, productive ways to handle stress when it comes our way (because this whole situation is definitely added stress)?
What if we were taught that the best way to deal with things is to “suck it up, Buttercup.” or “Stop being a sissy la-la.” or “I’ll give you something to cry about.”?
I think that the COVID pandemic that has hit the world is not the CAUSE of the mental health crisis we are now seeing, I believe its placing the spotlight on a mental health crisis that has been in the making for number of decades.
It’s made it so that it’s finally its okay to seek out help. It’s finally okay to talk about our mental health issues.
If you need help, as I have, during this stressful time in our lives here are some resources:
These two are from the Anxiety and Depression Association of America and offer helpful tips for navigating stress in the time of COVID.
There are lots of ways to get help, you can also start by talking to your general care physician, looking up a therapist in your area on psychologytoday.com or just using Google.
If you need help, please get help. I’m not trying to downplay the fact that mental health issues are on the rise, I just don’t believe that COVID is the cause, I think it’s the spotlight on an issue that has been decades in the making.
Last weekend I finally told my husband what I’ve been afraid to tell anybody, but since it’s Suicide Prevention Month, I decided to be honest.
I don’t want to be here anymore.
I’m actually feeling much better now, that I put it out there to another human being and not just keeping it in my head and it was much worse back in July when I wrote the blog titled, “Broken Nation, Broken Me.” Back then it was so bad that I thought everyday what life would be like for those I left behind, now it’s maybe once every couple of weeks.
I don’t have a plan, I’m actually scared of the thought of going through with it, and I would never willingly leave my children without a mother, but somedays it is extremely difficult to get out of bed and do all the things required of living.
Now, with that out of the way, let me explain why.
I’m hypersensitive. Many people don’t know that about me because I learned at a young age that showing emotion caused me to be called weak. If I cried over something my dad would ask, “Do you want me to give you something to cry about?” usually reaching for the stick he used to beat us with. The “stick” was a piece of wooden baseboard about 3 feet long that he kept on top of the refrigerator. I learned rather quickly to not show when I was upset by something and just bury my emotions.
That was probably the beginning of my anxiety and depression issues, but that’s not what this post is about.
Every four years our nation goes through a presidential election cycle and of course people choose sides. I was raised by my mom in an uber-conservative Christian church, part of the “Moral Majority” led by the likes of Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, and Jim Baker. While my mom was a registered Democrat because of John F. Kennedy, she completely agreed with everything the Moral Majority preached and pretty much always voted Republican as far as I knew. She and my Grandma loved Ronald Reagan and everything he stood for and voted for George Bush when he ran because he would follow in Reagan’s footsteps.
I say all that to say that I was raised in a religion that attempted to teach me that if I was a true Christian I would always vote Republican because they were the party that supported life. The Democrats were the evil ones who supported killing babies. I was even taught that some Christians weren’t Christian enough if they were Democrats, because Democrats were so evil.
So every four years, I see our nation divided between those who vote Republican and those who vote Democrat, however this year seems to be the absolute worst!
If someone criticizes anything that the Republicans or Trump has said or done they are automatically labelled a “libtard,” a “sheep,” a “bleeding heart liberal” or many other not so nice names. If a person criticizes Biden or the Democrats they are “haters,” “Trumpkins, ” or “racists.”
In my lifetime, I have never seen our country so divided. I teach history, so I know that it has been this divided in the past, I mean we had a Civil War, talk about division! However, I wasn’t alive for that, so it didn’t affect my mental health.
The election isn’t the only thing people are divided on. People are divided on race issues, whether or not there is systemic racism in this country (there is).
Whether or not we should wear masks.
Whether or not hair and nail salons should be open as well as other businesses.
Whether or not COVID-19 is real.
Whether or not schools should open and if teachers are actually working when they do virtual school. (This one really hurts me mentally and emotionally because I am working my behind off to be there for my students and teach them and answer their questions any time of the night or day. I mean, I am getting emails from them at midnight and one o’clock in the morning sometimes.)
All this division is wreaking havoc on my mental health as well as on our nation.
On June 16, 1858, Abraham Lincoln quoted Matthew 12:25 in his “House Divided” speech when he said that, “A house divided against itself cannot stand.” Matthew 12:25 actually says that, “Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation and every city or house divided against itself will not stand.” New King James Version.
This amazing, great nation that we call the United States of America is not very united right now. It is extraordinarily divided right now.
This division is breaking me. I speak about something and I’m attacked by one side or the other. Just seeing the division is disheartening and making me not want to be a part of this life.
When I have spoken how disheartening this is for me, I hear amazing platitudes like, “God is in control.” or “Give it to God.” or, “It’s just the devil trying to get you down, you need to rebuke him.”
I’m tired of Christian platitudes.
I want to see Christians begin to live by the example that Jesus taught. To love your neighbor as yourself. When they asked who was our neighbor, Jesus told the story of the good Samaritan where a priest saw a person who needed help and he walked by on the other side of the road, then a Levite saw the man and he also walked by on the other side of the road. When the Samaritan saw the man who needed help (Samaritans were looked down on by Jews in that time) he helped the man, took him to an inn and paid to have the innkeeper look after him. (Paraphrased from Luke 10:25-37)
Instead of Us vs. Them how about we begin to look at it as we. We need to get along. We need to survive this life. We need to help each other. We need to understand and support one another. We don’t always have to agree with everyone in order to love them.
Love is a choice and it seems the United States of America have become the Divided States of Hate and my mental health is deteriorating in this nation as well as the mental health of many of my fellow Americans.
Instead of demonizing “them,” maybe we can begin to work to understand where they are coming from.
Instead of demonizing “them,” maybe we can listen to what they have to say instead of what “Us” says “they” want, believe, are going to do etc.
I find myself retreating further and further into my shell to get away from the division in this country, in this state and in my city. There are still days I don’t want this life.
I LOVE this country! My favorite place to visit is Washington D.C., I have been there more times than I like to admit (about 18 times, 3 times last year alone.) Other people go to Disneyland over and over, I prefer to walk among the buildings and monuments that tell the story of our nations’s 200+ year history. I especially love to take other people and share it with them. (Hit me up if you ever want to go when this pandemic is over, I can’t wait to get back there.
I love DC so much that one of my retirement goals is to be a tour guide at the Nation’s Capitol for at least one season before finding a beach to relax on for the rest of my life.
I LOVE the United States so much that I became a U.S. history teacher to instill just a tiny bit of the knowledge of our past into our future generations and maybe a few of them will begin to truly LOVE our country too and want to pass on the knowledge of our past.
I say all that because many people believe that it’s impossible to LOVE this country while at the same time acknowledge that we aren’t as perfect or exceptional as we’d like to believe we are. It’s one of the divisions I wrote about in my last post in July. It’s part of why I haven’t written since then. The division seems to have grown and I’m still struggling with that.
Instead of working to make this a better place for everyone, it seems like a very loud group of people are trying to say that everybody is already treated equally and we should all just be happy with it. That same group of people are also “helping” police keep cities safe from Black Lives Matter protests by showing up with guns when according to a report by the nonprofit Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project released on September 3, 2020 has said that 93% of the protests that have taken place this summer have been peaceful and non-violent.
In fact, as I write this, there is a planned Black Lives Matter protest happening in my lovable, livable town and a possibly armed group there to “defend” our town against them, even though the chief of police has been letting people know all week that the police don’t need civilian “help.” They don’t want what happened in Kenosha to happen here.
In 1776, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Roger Sherman and Robert Livingston wrote the Declaration of Independence, the most famous break up letter ever. In it, they wrote that “…all men are created equal…,” but they didn’t all believe that when they wrote it and many Americans still don’t believe it today.
If they truly believed that ALL men were created equal, then why at first did they not want to include enslaved people in population counts? Then when they settled that question, why did they decide to only count them as 3/5 of a person?
Once slavery ceased to exist at the end of the Civil War, yes we had to fight a deadly, costly war to finally end the peculiar institution in this nation, many states passed laws that became known as Jim Crow laws to keep African Americans in a second class status. People in power in those states, cities and counties, still didn’t believe that ALL men were created equal.
In other places around the country banks instituted redlining, where they wouldn’t approve loans for houses in certain areas, usually areas of town where people of color lived.
There is a whole lot, I won’t bore you with about how all of that led to institutionalized or systemic racism, which is defined by McGraw Hill in Sociology and You as the type of discrimination that results from unfair practices that are part of the structure of society and that have grown out of traditional, accepted behaviors. That leads to discrimination in education, employment, the criminal justice system and many other public arenas.
The United States government continued to prove that they did not believe that ALL men were created equal when they passed the Chinese Immigration Act in 1882 and continued to renew it until 1945, and again when President Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066 that resulted in the Internment of 122,000 Americans of Japanese descent, with about 70,000 of them being Nisei, a person born in America of Japanese parents (ourdocuments.gov). It wasn’t until 1988 that the Senate voted on a bill to apologize to the internees and offer them reparations for their time in the internment camps. The last camp closed in 1946 (New York Times).
I’ve been in teacher mode for this blog far too long and it’s time to end. If you’ve read this far, THANK YOU!!!!!!
I LOVE this country, but we have a problem with treating ALL men AND women equally. We can do better, we have to do better because Black lives matter as do Hispanic lives and Asian lives and the lives of every marginalized person in this country.
If you’d like to learn more, here are a few videos. There is also an incredible documentary on Netflix called 13th.
Our nation just celebrated Independence Day on July 4th. It was the 244th birthday of our country. Of course there have been times that our nation has been divided, once it got so bad it lead to the Civil War and 1968 is described in multiple places as a “tumultuous year,” but it hasn’t been this divided in my lifetime.
After 9/11, for the most part, Americans joined together against a common enemy; Al Queda. It was nice to feel the solidarity between most Americans as we stood together in unity.
Fast forward to 2020, the longest year of my life and we’re only in July. It started with wildfires in Australia and the threat of World War III and we’ve experienced COVID-19 protests to get our hair cut and go to a bar to have a drink as well as protests against police brutality. I just heard that most counties in California are having to close restaurants for in restaurant dining, bars, hair salons etc. yet we are debating how to open schools safely.
Everyone is an armchair epidemiologist and knows exactly how this new virus will work, even though actual scientists, virologists, epidemiologists and other doctors are constantly learning new things because they are seeing what the virus does to people in the hospitals around the world. Because of new knowledge, scientists, the CDC and WHO are giving new guidelines and recommendations that the armchair experts are calling BS on because its different than what was said earlier. That’s the thing with learning something new; sometimes it causes you to change your mind about what you thought was true before because you have more information now.
Then we are being led by a group of people at the national level who continue to make a physical illness political. Masks help prevent the spread of all kinds of germs, not just COVID-19. We have known this for years! However, now, if you wear a mask to protect others, you are actually wearing it to show your disapproval of Trump, or because you’re scared or a sheeple or a myriad of other negative connotations that people have come up with. If you are one of the people who for whatever reason choose not to wear a mask (which I honestly don’t understand except for some health reasons, that you should probably be staying home if you have) you are called selfish, a Trumper (or worse).
Masks are dividing us. Seriously people, this is our collective health.
That brings me to the next thing that divides us. So many people who say, well it has a 99% survival rate. That means there is 1% that won’t survive and that doesn’t take into consideration that many people who “recover” will face lifelong medical complications from “surviving” COVID-19.
I also hear so many people ask about those dying of COVID, “how old were they?” or “what were their underlying conditions?” As if being old or having a preexisting condition is an acceptable reason to die of COVID before your time. I’m sure as long as it is someone they don’t know who is dying those people don’t really care.
Then there’s the argument about opening schools. All the real experts say the best way to avoid spreading COVID is to avoid crowds, close contact and confined spaces, but then so many parents who either don’t believe COVID is as dangerous as scientists say it is or are tired of having their kids at home or are worried about them falling behind some arbitrary educational goals that non-educator government officials created want their kids back in school all day. Unfortunately, there is no safe way to send kids back to school in the school buildings.
Classrooms are going to be crowded, mine cannot accommodate 6 feet of spacing between people, we’ll be lucky to get 2-3 feet of space between each person. The classrooms will be crowded and they are confined spaces. Add to that the fact that most classrooms are poorly ventilated and schools can’t afford hand sanitizer and Kleenex during a regular flu season. Schools will not be able to keep students safe if they are back in person for learning.
Schools will also not be able to keep staff safe if we have to return to in person learning, there is just not enough money to purchase enough safety product.
All of this stress leads to broken me.
People say schools need to open so parents can work. Why is it the schools responsibility to provide free daycare to parents? Why isn’t it possible for workplaces to provide variable schedules so that parents can be home with their children to provide some guidance with the distance learning that teachers are providing? Many social problems have been exposed by this pandemic, a lack of internet accessibility was exposed at the beginning of distance learning and it was up to schools to work with local internet service providers to get hotspots for families that needed it. Why can’t internet service providers provide free or low cost internet to students whose families make below a certain income? Schools already continued to provide food for children under 18 during distance learning. Many restaurants have stepped up and provided meals for seniors who are low income. That’s awesome, why can’t something similar be done for kids, oh wait, because schools will do it.
Society needs to step up and step in and begin to help with some of society’s problems that have been exposed. They can’t just leave it all to the schools to take care of. If we send all students back to in person instruction in a few weeks, there will be an even larger increase in the number of people who are infected with COVID-19. Many of those who are infected will become terribly ill, some will die. I hope it isn’t you, or someone you love.
I’m tired of feeling broken by our divided nation. We need to unite and work together to fight against this disease and stop its spread as much as possible instead of fighting each other.
Wear a mask. Stay 6 feet away. Avoid crowded places. Avoid confined spaces. Show compassion and love for others in your actions and words. And lets work together to fix society’s problems.
But at least we can remember that we’re all in this together.
As shelter in place is continuing in most places around the world (I know there are some places, even here in the U.S. that have chosen not to shelter in place or are coming out of it) more and more people are becoming restless for it to end soon. Even the President of the United States is talking about it ending by May 1st. And Dr. Oz said yesterday that sending kids back to school is okay because only 2-3 percent will die.
I’ve read multiple people complaining (?), praising (?), questioning (?), about how low the numbers of people testing positive for Coronavirus and dying from related complications. I’ve even replied to a few of them that perhaps the numbers are so low, because so many of us have been practicing social distancing and it’s having an impact on the transmission of the disease. Which is the reason that the shelter in place orders were given to begin with.
Sometimes I’ve been able to participate in civil discussions with people about different viewpoints about this whole pandemic. That’s interesting and fun and educational. I learn new things. I see things from somebody else’s point of view. These discussions can bring people together.
More often however, in social media as well as in the news media, I see people end up insulting one another. I see people turning against others.
Instead of the global crisis bringing people together, it seems to be tearing us apart.
Instead of people banding together to help one another, I see people blaming others.
Instead of listening to scientists as they race to figure this virus out, I hear people blaming them for creating the pandemic.
I hear people complain about what the government is doing to try to protect us, but not offering a solution except to let us all get the virus to have “herd immunity.” Which isn’t a good solution for the thousands who will die because their body cannot fight off the virus.
I know there is good out there. I see that too. I see the people sewing face masks for others. I see John Krasinski starting his “Some Good News” YouTube show. I see people thanking essential workers in lots of ways. I see people helping those who have lost jobs. I know there is good out there too.
We’re all frustrated. None of us really know when this is going to end. It’s having devastating consequences on the economy and people’s mental and emotional health. If we end the shelter in place orders too quickly it could have a devastating impact on the death toll and hospitals, which so far we’ve been able to mitigate in most places in America. I don’t have a solution to any of the problems we are facing economically, emotionally, mentally, or physically for the entire world, but I do have some suggestions that will help us all to get along a little better since we’re all in this together:
take care of yourself, stay away from people, places that you know can make you sick whether that with Coronavirus, allergies, flu, whatever–due what you can to stay healthy.
If you get sick, call the doctor and follow their directions.
If someone offers a different perspective, look at it, you might learn something new, even if you don’t look at it, don’t insult the person just because they think differently then you.
establish a routine for yourself, try to sleep, wake and eat at roughly the same times each day.
exercise every day, outside if you can. The sun and fresh air will do wonders for your mood.
If you’re in a bad place with someone who abuses you call the National Abuse Hotline at 1-800-799-SAFE (7233) or go their website https://www.thehotline.org/what-is-live-chat/ where you can live chat with someone who can help you.
Reach out to people if you need to, if you know someone who struggles with their mental health, reach out to them. It’s not always easy to ask for help.
Pray. Having a higher being to talk to helps many people.
If you qualify for unemployment, apply for it. It’ll take awhile, but it’s worth it to get that extra help. It’s going to be a long time before the economy gets back to normal, because it’s not just our economy, it’s the world economy that’s in bad shape.
I’m sure there are other things that will help you, you just need to figure out what they are. One of the biggest things I can encourage people to do is to remember that we may not all believe the same things, we may not all want the same things, we may not all be afraid of the same things, but we are all in this together and need to be nice and have patience with one another so that as many people as possible make it out alive and healthy.
Last night on Disney’s sing along (yes I watched it, no my kids didn’t) one of the last songs was from High School Musical: “We’re All In This Together”. It seems to be a fitting anthem for this global crisis we find ourselves in now.
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