Moral Injury and Teaching

I originally wrote this as a message for an amazing school I work with and was asked to put it into a shareable format. 

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Yesterday, in a lecture on resiliency during this COVID-19 time, I heard the term “moral injury” used to describe what teachers are currently going through. This is usually a term applied to soldiers at war who are forced to do something they don’t believe in, and I was struck in hearing it used in reference to us. 

The Wikipedia definition is:

Moral injury refers to an injury to an individual's moral conscience and values resulting from an act of perceived moral transgression,[1] which produces profound emotional guilt and shame,[2] and in some cases also a sense of betrayal,[1] anger and profound "moral disorientation".[3]

The concept of moral injury emphasizes the psychological, social, cultural, and spiritual aspects of trauma.[1] Distinct from psychopathology, moral injury is a normal human response to an abnormal traumatic event.[1][4] According to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, the concept is used in literature with regard to the mental health of military veterans who have witnessed or perpetrated an act in combat that transgressed their deeply held moral beliefs and expectations.[5]

“Moral injury is the normal human response to an abnormal traumatic event” when we are unable to complete work that we believe in.

Teaching is what drives each of us. Each of us wakes up every day ready to make the world better because of the work we do at Carlin Springs. We see the faces of our students when we go to bed at night, and if we wake up at 2am are filled with worry about what is happening to our students. Normally, all we need to do is get back to school to see them. Hug them, listen to them, teach them, support them.

Right now, we can’t. And frankly, that sucks. (excuse my language. In my house we’ve recognized that while we don’t usually use words like that, sometimes we need to have language that matches the situation.)

Something about naming the term helped me understand the deep helplessness we are each going through as we fight to match our beliefs in helping our students with the current situation.

I have no great advice here other than to be kind to yourself. Sit with this feeling of moral injury, now that we have a name for it, and consider what it means for you. Realizing that we may not be able to do what we believe in now is hard, and facing that we cannot do what we are trained to do is perhaps the worst part. No one got into teaching to sit on the sidelines. We won’t be here forever, and we will be back with our students and able to do what we love. Meanwhile, be kind to yourself, take deep breaths, long walks, and find ways to show your students your smiling face. 

The Cloud of Doom

This winter my family began reading Wayside School books by Louis Sachar. My husband and I both remember reading these when we were younger, so it was a treat to dive into them and revisit all the craziness that occurs at Wayside School.

While we were checking them out of the on-line library we noticed there was a new one - The Cloud of Doom that was just released on March 3rd, 2020. More Wayside stories? We were sold.

Readers.

I want to know what Louis Sachar knew when he was writing this book that the rest of us didn't. In fact, I think we should start looking at any Wall Street deals he had going on and any trades he made right before the pandemic hit, because, um, the story feels pretty true to life right now.

And published ten days before we were sent into our houses under our own clouds of doom?

Yeah, someone knew something to write a book about a Cloud of Doom settling over one elementary school. Pretty much sums up where we are.

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"What's the point" one of the Wayside School students asks his teacher in regards to why he should bother with his work... "The Cloud of Doom is getting bigger every day! ... What does it matter if we can spell?"

(I mean, it's like Sachar's heard every conversation happening inside the houses of all the kids trying on-line learning. "What's the point?")

The class agrees with the student until Mrs. Jewls, the teacher, replies, "I understand you're scared and upset, but what's the point of quitting? We can all sit around and grumple (read the book to get the joke), or we can try our best, cloud or no cloud."

"And it hasn't been all bad," Mrs. Jewls continued.... "Someday the Cloud of Doom will be gone and the world will be a much better place, even better than before the cloud. Colors will be more colorful. Music will be even more musical. Even Miss Mush's food will taste good. The bigger the storm, the brighter the rainbow." 

We haven't finished the book yet, so I don't know how it ends. Maybe the Cloud of Doom will eat the school and this comparison will just make me really, really depressed. But right now, we're able to joke that we are currently living in the upside down world of Wayside School, and that we can follow Msrs. Jewls' words of hope. Which may or may not be a good thing, depending on your opinion of Mrs. Jewls, her classroom management skills, and Wayside School in general.

Creating Meaning Amongst the Madness

My daughter's large school district went "back to school" this past Tuesday. For my kindergarten and second grader it went great. Their on-line classes were an hour, and were extremely well-run by their teachers. I was exhausted by just navigating our new schedule and helping them get online by the time my second grader finished up, but also impressed.

Then we woke up Wednesday morning. 

My girls were struggling the moment they woke up, and I soon realized it was because we'd lost what we had to look forward to. For awhile, we looked forward to Easter and then as soon as Easter was over we turned our attention to starting virtual school. Once that first day was completed we woke up on Wednesday to literally nothing else to look forward to but the routines inside our house. Of course, my children did not express this outright themselves, but after taking a moment and feeling where we were and reflecting on a class I'd been in the night before, I put it together. We took time and planned a virtual party for them and their friends on Friday. Clearly we are going to needing to actively work on making our own events we can look forward to in these coming weeks.

The "nothing to look forward to" problem solved, I busily started the day to prepare them for getting ready for virtual school - until we got an email saying there was a two hour delay due to improving security issues. OK, we can roll with this... Then we got another email from one teacher saying they were going to meet as planned... OK, we can roll with that. Our heads were starting to spin but this was important to our kids. Then we sat down to log on ... and tried... and tried... and tried. At first the error messages we were getting were amusing because they changed each time - Access forbidden! Error - try again! Network not available! You stupid parent, why can't you log on? 

All of us were in tears, trying to log on using different devices, scanning Facebook to find out if other parents were in the same boat. "Keep trying" someone recommended on facebook. But no one said they got in.

Finally we sent an email to teacher saying we loved her but that we couldn't do this anymore. We'll try again tomorrow. 

It was by far the worst day of our quarantine yet. 

SO, we put down our expectations and hopes of the day and just sat in our disappointment. No more rolling with it. No more "this is going to be OK!" We let ourselves just sit in the suckiness of it all. And it sucked. 

Yes, it sucks that we are stuck inside and you can't finish kindergarten in person. It sucks that there will be no kindergarten parade for you. We won't have our Kentucky Derby party. We can't hug our family members. You can't do gymnastics. We can't go to the park. You can't see your friends. You can't see your teachers. You've lost your autonomy outside of our family. It just sucks. 

Sometimes we need to feel it all.

And so, 

we ate ice cream Sundays for lunch. 

We held each other.

We colored our massive coloring page a bit.

Amazon came and delivered all the audiobooks I ordered last week. I let my children stay in their pjs, blow off their virtual taekwondo classes, and binge listen to the Boxcar Children. They listened to THREE novels. At one point my husband and I wondered what they were up to. They were so quiet we were sure they were up to no good, but we were both getting work done so we let it go. Turns out, the girls were re-organizing their bookshelves while they listened.

My husband and I recognized that our low moods were not going to let us get any more work done today so we turned off our computers and walked away. We took time for us, ordered delivery for dinner, and just sat as a family.

That night at dinner we were able to reflect on the "worst day yet", and you know what, that reflection made it all worth it. We recognized all the things we needed to do to calm down, talking about how we are problem solvers and we can get through this and do hard things - but that sometimes to do hard things you just need to breath. One of my girls commented on the fact that I was really good at taking deep breaths while we were trying to get onto their classes today - and we talked about why I'd stopped talking for a bit and just started breathing.

We made meaning of all of it. 

Research and academic writing on what makes children resilient shows that resilient children are not those with perfect childhoods, perfect parents, or children who are naturally not bothered by anything. Instead, resiliency is built from recognizing hard moments, sitting with those uncomfortable feelings, and reflecting on them later. We build our resiliency when we make meaning from how we handled the conflict, or how we restored a mismatch.

Yes, we lost it and yelled at someone, we sat and cried, we ate ice cream for lunch. Now, instead of ignoring the feelings we had then, we take those moments and create meaning. 

On-line learning in our district is postponed until Monday so they can work out the kinks in the system. I now know better than to put all of our hope on Monday. There will be future bad days, and there may be many of them. We can't avoid them, we can hide from them, and we can't just pretend everything is OK. 

These are the moments life is based on, and these are the moments we can come together and create the meaning we will rely on to move forward with the rest of our lives. 

So breath deeply, slow down, honor the feelings of sadness and despair. Sometimes we need to go slow to go fast.

And listen to Elmo's daddy. 

stream of consciousness from a quarantined working mom

There is a roller blade in the middle of our living room. Just one. Alone. Propped against the coffee table as though it's going to join in our next game of Clue. The coffee table itself is covered in a giant coloring map of the world, with markers strewn across. A taekwondo belt is in the middle of the floor, next to a pair of sun glasses. The box of Easter decorations sits nearby. Easter is on Sunday, three days from now, and the decorations are slowly being placed around the cluttered surfaces, one by one, by a bored family member.

Easter. The girls are worried that the Easter Bunny may have the corona virus, or may spread it if he comes in. And yet they still want it, and ask repeatedly, can we still do normal Easter? Just without the church and the big family dinner.

My to-do list grows by the day between my various work projects and keeping up with the family. Why does it seem so much harder to keep on top of it in our new reality? On paper we are home all day. Shouldn't it be easy to get through work, do laundry, keep up with the mess of the house and play with my kids? Doesn't my normal guilt come from the fact that I don't spend enough time with my kids. Now we are together, day in and day out. Just, with a door and a stop sign between us as I try to work and balance their needs.

Advice is everywhere, from everyone.

Cherish these moments with your children. These are the moments they'll remember when they are older - the ones where you connected with them. Let them as much TV as they want - let them indulge and they'll remember how great that was too. Make a home-school schedule (don't see too many of those out there anymore, do you?) Learn something new. Start a new project. Plan ahead for next year. Deep clean the house. Practice self-care. Manage your emotions. Breath. Wash your hands. Don't watch the news. Limit your social media. But watch enough to make sure you are learning all the advice everyone else wants to share.

When this first started, I filled my days between work and my girls. I knew I needed to stay busy, so I made sure I was. Now, I'm starting to realize the busy-ness was simply masking panic - like reorganizing the chairs on the deck of the Titanic. That's great, but what I need is to slow down enough to listen to my body and to listen to what I need.

I need an uncluttered house. A moment to dive into the deep work that drives me. I need to snuggle with my girls. Take deep breaths. I need my commute where I spent time in deep thought and listened to audiobooks and podcasts that intellectually challenged me. I need time to check facebook without feeling guilty that I'm not working, connecting with my kids, my husband, my extended family, or friends. I need permission to just be.

We all need to grieve. Be able to stand up and say "this sucks". Recognize that we are going through a grief process that no amount of creativity, organization, productivity and positive memes will mask. We've lost the world as we knew it, and that's quite a blow. We need to be able to sit with that. Not wallow in it, but sit with it. Sitting with it, naming it, talking to it, will all help us identify what we need instead of pushing it down and ignoring what is pulling at us.