At the start of this year, following the usual ‘happy new year’ text messages that we invariably send to everyone on our phone contacts list (unless you’re neurodiverse and then you systematically filter out those you don’t believe would care whether they received a message or not then realise you’re left with less than four—maybe just me, then) I happened to mention—during an extended back and forth chat—to someone I used to share a house and who married one of my ex boyfriends, that thankfully this festive season I hadn’t had to try and contact The Samaritans.
She thought I was joking, because that’s how she remembers me being. Always the joker. And because we lost touch when I left the town we both lived in, five years ago now, we hadn’t kept the relationship going. Not the way we had done in the past when we’d try and meet up during school breaks. You know how it is. Geographical, fair-weather, call it what you will; if the wheels of momentum start to slow, then in all likelihood it’ll grind to a halt. No blame on either side. It’s just the way things seem to go in our disposable age.
So when I went on to explain that, yes, I had felt a need to reach out—to someone who wasn’t close to me (slim pickings already) because I hadn’t wanted to ruin anyone’s festive season by telling them how miserable and lonely I felt, and The Samaritans had seemed the only recourse, she’d seemed genuinely shocked and told me she was my friend and we would stay in touch.
Which has turned out to be virtually every day since then… and it’s been lovely. We don’t do actual speaking calls or zoom sessions or anything, we simply text and send each other the occasional picture of where we are at the time we’re chatting. There are pets, and images of our gardens. I love it. I feel connected again.
Anyway, she works in a school in the town I moved away from, and when I lived there, I also worked in a school and she was saying this morning how much she’s looking forward to the summer break which I think begins at the end of this week for the private ones as they always get way longer than state funded schools.
I told her I remembered well, the feeling of the six-week summer break getting closer and closer as the last Friday in July crept ever nearer, and although my body would be longing to not have to get up at 6.30am, four mornings a week and endure an exhausting four hours of physical work on those days, I also knew that my heart and soul would be affected much differently.
Because at the start of every summer break over the 12 years I worked there—which is a record for a neurodiverse person I’ve since discovered; generally, we jump from job to job in a bid to top-up dopamine levels—I’d feel what I can only describe as a kind of bereavement on the last day.
Not being a member of the teaching staff, I wasn’t laden down with ‘thank you’ cards and gifts from the children and their parents, although we support staff did get the occasional plant or box of chocolates from teachers or the management team as a thank-you for our hard work over the term. It was nice to be appreciated and some of their comments were lovely.
As an undiagnosed neurodiverse person who wasn’t a member of the teaching staff, I’d never formed a close friendship with other staff members. Although I did have a friendly connection with the SENCo Coordinator (now there’s irony!). Her office was next to mine, so that could easily have been simply geography again. I’d tried socializing with some of the office staff, but my natural mistrust and my discomfort in social settings, which must’ve been perceived by others as weirdness on my part, meant that these fledgling ‘relationships’ fizzled out before they had a chance to begin.
And so, as the last day of term drew nearer, I could sense an ever-growing frisson of excitement. The atmosphere around me would start to morph into something wholly different from the cut-and-dried, timetabled one I was used to as everyone prepared to celebrate not having to be there for six weeks. It was like watching the scores trickle through for the Eurovision Song Contest. There’d be after-school drinks in the staff room on the last day; everyone swapping dates they’d be free during the holidays; arrangements to meet up—a group used to go on regular camping holidays—and I’d start feeling familiar little pinches of exclusion, Missing-Out syndrome.
Although it wasn’t that I wanted to join in any of these extra-curricular pursuits. I think it was more that I could feel the support structure I was so used to having during my working week, slowly dissolving and I knew that soon I’d be left to my own devices, need to fill in whole blank days with ‘things’ to do for myself.
Which I’ve never felt remotely qualified to do.
I also used to find the teachers dropping their ‘mask’ of Miss or Sir, disconcerting, which I think stems from the ADHD mind requiring stability and routine… it’s how I’ve often felt seeing someone famous walking along the street going about regular human business – it tends to explode a little part of my brain because it Does. Not. Compute. They’re in the wrong place and doing the wrong thing. It bothers me. A lot.
And so, as I packed up my bits and pieces on the last day, I’d stare wistfully around my room and make a mental note of where everything was so that I could pick up where I left off in six weeks’ time, I had to convince myself to hold it together, often biting the inside of my cheek to distract my emotions with physical pain, until I’d left the building.
Once I’d driven out of the school gates, pausing at the crossroads and traffic lights at the end of the road, the surge of emotion would be too much to bear, and the wall I’d built up would start to crack and I’d let the tears fall, often necessitating pulling over at my ‘rescue place’ to sob myself dry. Then I’d spend a while composing myself and concocting a tale of irritated ‘computer-eye’ before I went home so I wouldn’t cause concern once I got there.
And I’d spend the next six weeks counting down the days until I could return. In fact, often I’d go in during the summer break on the pretext that it was quiet and I could get a lot of things done (I managed the display boards and other creative aspects including the school website). But on those times, it was so far from normality, like being the last one to leave a wake.
My friend says she can’t wait. She’s lined up all these things she wants to do and I envy her excitement. Because all I ever did during those torturous weeks was endure a week’s ‘holiday’ which was never something I enjoyed because I hated the disruption, and, every time I caught sight of a clock, wonder wistfully what I’d be doing now if I was at work.
Debs J Cooper 