Have you ever had an idea so big that you didn’t know where to start? This happened to me recently, which is why I am here.

Just to give a little background about myself, I am the daughter of hard working parents from a small town in south Texas. Being the middle child and only daughter of three definitely had its perks. I learned what gets you praise from the older brother, and what gets you in trouble from the younger one. Growing up in a small town was a lot like all the country songs describe, until it wasn’t. I knew that I wasn’t meant to stay there, so I accepted an athletic scholarship 460 miles from home. 

Going from a small country town, where your daddy knows you got a speeding ticket before you even get home, to being on a college campus in a new state gives you a wide range of emotions. I remember feeling independent and terrified all at the same time. My parents leaving me is one of my favorite memories. It was one of the few times I had ever seen my father cry. In that departing moment I knew they loved me, and I knew I had made them proud.

Being on an athletic team gives you a sense of belonging, and thank God for that because I learned very quickly that I was not great at meeting new people. I rarely had to meet new people in my hometown. I went to pre-k with the kids that stood next to me at graduation. Being on a team also meant I was more likely to meet athletes on other teams, which led me to meeting my husband. My teammate had a get together at her campus apartment, and I was a freshman, hit on by all the older guys, as freshmen are. He was the ONLY guy at the party that didn’t! Well of course that intrigued me, which led me to make the first move, and almost two decades and 3 children later, here we are. 

Back to the topic of college. Typically people go to college because they want to ‘be something when they grow up’. I thought I wanted to be a nurse because in my hometown nurses made good money, and being the first in my family to go to college, it seemed logical and realistic, plus I loved the idea of helping people. I learned that first semester that nursing was not what I was meant to do, and decided to change my major to athletic training. When I realized how much an athletic trainer may need to travel with a team I knew that wasn’t going to work out because having a family later in life meant a lot to me and I would not want to be gone so often. That led me to occupational/physical therapy. Still in health care, I got to help people, no needles involved, and depending on the job setting my schedule would allow me to have a nice work/life balance. So I ended college with a bachelors of science in health science, fully planning to go to grad school and earn a degree in therapy. 

Plans are funny. I have spent so much of my time making plans and then they fall through or change. After college we moved back to my home state. I told my husband, then boyfriend, that I was going back with or without him. He’s a smart man. We were married for just over a year when we moved. No jobs, secured a rental house with extra deposits, and knew only two people in the whole city. We were also fostering to adopt a 5 year old girl. Needing to secure jobs, we both took anything we could get that paid decently. I took a job in a payday loan office, and my husband got a job as an entry level IT guy for a local news station.

Jumping ahead 5 years, I never went back to school to pursue therapy. My husband and I purchased our first home, our foster girl’s mother had a change of heart and took her back, and we found out we were unable to conceive on our own. Looking back, I think we both handled this part of our lives very differently. I turned inward and worked on what I could control and my career, or lack of, was what bothered me most. After talking with a friend, they recommended I take an alternative route to teaching. They felt I would be a great teacher. 

Like many little girls, I played ‘teacher’ with cousins all the time. Being in charge of a room and the children in it was such a fun idea as a child. The reality of it as an adult was kind of frightening. I have never been a good public speaker. Speech class as a requirement for all students is borderline evil. However, I was not proud of the job that I had. When people asked what I did I was usually embarrassed to tell them I worked at a payday loan place and often just said that I worked with loans. Not a lie but also not the embarrassing truth. So the idea of being a teacher, someone that could have an impact on children, was something that I could be proud of, so I signed up to begin my alternative program.

Getting my teacher certification was a huge step for me and becoming proud of myself. I hadn’t realized how much I was feeling like a failure working at the loan place. But then reality kicked in, and I went to my first interview. A room with this long table and about 10 people staring at me when I walked in.  Remember that fear of public speaking? Needless to say I bombed that interview. I was so traumatized that every interview would be like this, I was afraid to apply anywhere else. That was until I became a mother.

I will share more about our journey to parenthood in a later blog, but man! This baby! This little boy that we were so thankful for was the best thing that had ever happened to me. I had no idea that I could ever love someone so much. I did know that I wanted to be someone he would be proud of some day, which meant I needed to feel that way about myself, so I applied to more teaching jobs. I don’t know if becoming a mother gave me a fearless spirit or what, but I crushed my teaching interview! They called to offer me the job before I was able to make it home. 

Fast forward 10 years, I am still teaching! Our family recently moved to a smaller town, purchased our second home and had our 3rd baby. With these changes came a new school for me to teach at and I love it. Teaching in the community that my children are part of is rewarding; my last teaching job was in a district other than my children’s. With all these exciting new things in my life, I also had a feeling that I wanted to do more. I don’t mean volunteering at school more, but something in addition to teaching. I feel when I teach it is always for the kids. It is rewarding, but I do it for them. I needed to do something for me. Which led me to write this today. I want to write…

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