A Letter For My Old School

Content Warning: This piece includes discussion and description of psychological and physical abuse of a child.

Starting when I was super little (around 4, I think) I went to a private school. I stayed for eight and a half years, and left in the middle of 6th grade, when I switched to public school. I left because of what we’ve mostly called a “personality conflict” with one of my teachers. This letter is intended to tell my story- not in complete detail- but more than I ever have in a public way before. I’ve gone ahead and left out the name of the private school I attended (and replaced it with just “the school”). I also omitted the name of the main teacher in this story, and changed her name to “Ms. W.” The story doesn’t change if you know anymore than that, so if you know then you know, and if you don’t, then you don’t need to.

Dear people from my old school,

Hey. How are y’all? I know I still talk to some of you sometimes, but for most of you guys it’s been awhile. I realized recently that I’ve been gone for almost as long as I called the school home, which is totally crazy to think about, at least for me anyways. From the time my parents enrolled me, I kind of assumed I’d be a lifer, and graduate from the school. Obviously, those plans didn’t work out. I have no idea how many people are actually going to read this, but for those of you who do, I want to explain the story, and the real reasons, behind why I left the school.

I know, I know, the basic story is that I left because Ms. W and I disagreed on literally everything. We had horrible daily arguments that had gotten way out of control, and I was a self declared “bad kid,” stuck in a cycle of misbehavior. Or maybe you prefer the version where our personalities “didn’t mesh well,” and she wasn’t “equipped to handle a difficult student like me.” Trust me, I’ve heard all the ways people talk about it, and I’ve explained it like this too. But the problem with these explanations, is that they don’t match up with my lived experience. Not even close. I was trying, I really was, I just wasn’t ever given a real chance. Hear me out.

However much I may have appeared to enjoy it, I hated acting out, and I hated always being the kid who got in trouble. By the end of my time at the school, I felt like I was only known for one thing- causing problems. And honestly, that really sucked. I’m not saying I didn’t have fun getting into some of the sh*t that I got into (because let’s be real, sometimes it’s just fun to do whatever you want), but all in all, I desperately wanted to be normal. But here’s the thing- there was a reason behind all my bad behavior. It’s taken me years of therapy to be able to understand this, much less say it outloud, but Ms. W wasn’t having trouble dealing with a “difficult student with behavior problems,” rather, she was abusing a little kid, and my reaction wasn’t something she was prepared for.

Ms. W did a lot behind the scenes, before and after classes, during recess, and during those little “talks” we had when I was sent outside that most people didn’t see. She used to yell at me for speaking out of turn or talking back to her, and she’d tell me that I should be behaving, because the school was expensive, and my parents paid a lot of money for me to go there. Later, she’d ask me if I even wanted to be at the school and when I shook my head no, she’d ask me why I didn’t just leave. She’d refuse to help me with assignments, saying that if I was as smart as people thought I was, I should be able to figure it out myself. She made me hold a pencil between my teeth so I would smile more, and when I refused, she’d kick me out of class, and tell me that kind of behavior was why most of the other kids in my class didn’t like me. She made me run laps with a broken foot. She pushed me down a flight of stairs. She lost my daily medication at the school when we left for an out of town, overnight trip, but still wasn’t able to find it when we returned home. She withheld my asthma inhaler when I was coughing a lot in class because going to get it from my backpack would be “disruptive.” Those last two are the events that led one of my old therapists to file a CPS report for medical neglect, which had it been filed when the event actually happened, easily could have led to her being charged with medical neglect of a child. The list of things that she did and the ways that she both psychologically and physically neglected and abused me goes on and on. Some of the stories are mundane and silly compared to the ones I listed, and some are a lot scarier- the kind of scary that messed up my memory so bad I’m just now staring to remember them myself. But hopefully you get the point.

On a non-abuse related note, and simply on the fact that she was a terrible teacher, I don’t know if any of my old classmates remember this, but she’d teach us things that were just plain old incorrect. Remember how the school re-worked the middle school math program in part because we learned fractions…wrong? Or the time when she spelled a word wrong on our spelling words list and then refused to be corrected? Good times, good times.

Here’s the kicker though, Ms. W wasn’t all bad. In addition to the really awful days, there were good days when she’d let me skip lessons and hang out outside with my best friend, there were days when she would let me make hot chocolate in class, and days when she’d even give me food and snacks she knew I liked. And no matter how bad it got, she always reassured me that “our relationship was the most important thing” to her. Looking back, these were the things she did that confused me the most, and led me to believe that she wasn’t actually doing anything wrong- it was just me, being a bad kid, as usual. Her manipulation skills were next level, and at the end of the day, I think this is what kept me quiet, and convinced me that if just acted in a certain way, or said a certain thing, or even wore a certain kind of clothing, she would be nicer to me.

I didn’t tell anyone what was going on. I tried to tell my parents, but I struggled. I didn’t really understand what was happening, and every time I’d try to explain it, Ms. W would come back with her own version of the story, often directly contradictory to what I said, usually bursting with lies about things I did or didn’t do or say. The only things I knew for sure back then were that (1) Ms. W didn’t want me to tell, and (2) if I did tell, she’d lie to cover her own ass, and then things would get better for a day or two, but afterwards they’d get much, much worse, and those were the worst days of all. Some of the stuff that happened the school knew about, but they only knew the twisted story that Ms. W presented to them. The two or three times I tried to explain my side of what happened to other teachers or administrators, I was told there must have been some sort of miscommunication, so I stopped trying, and started to believe it was all one giant misunderstanding.

After I left the school, I switched to public school. I know a lot of y’all remember this, and I know especially when it came to my old class, I cut a lot of you off in some harsh ways. I’m sorry about that. I had a lot in my head, and I didn’t know how to deal with it.

Things in public school were rough in the beginning. At first, I wouldn’t look teachers in the eyes, and shaking their hands made me sick to my stomach. I couldn’t be alone with teachers, and so I always made sure I wasn’t the first to arrive or the last to leave. I did everything I could not to catch attention, because in my mind, when it came to teachers at least, attention meant getting hurt. But, I ended up finding two teachers who met me where I was, and radically changed my middle school experience. I still talk to both of them today, and they’re two of the most amazing people I’ve ever met. I am incredibly grateful for their ongoing support and mentorship, and I don’t think I would have survived the first year or so in public school without them. In high school I was also able to find a couple of teachers who made everything in my head a little easier to deal with, and I know that even as I graduate and prepare to start college, some of these teachers will continue to be really important people, mentors, and friends in my life.

Even though everything got a lot better in public school, even when I went to high school, there were many things I did that are easily traced back to Ms. W and the school. Freshman year, a teacher tapped me on the shoulder and had he not caught my arm in the air, my trauma response to slap him in the face could have resulted in me getting suspended. Sophomore year, I got to go on a trip to Costa Rica with my school but I was so panicked that they let me pick my teacher chaperone, and they gave me the itinerary early, so I could go over it with my mom, and map out where the hearest hospital to every place we’d be staying. Junior year I ended up dropping out of a teacher’s class because she gave me panic attacks, but I wouldn’t pin down why, until my mom said out of the blue one day that the teacher reminded her of Ms. W. And then, at the begining of this year (my senior year), I was able to introduce myself, face-to-face, to two new teachers, entirely on my own! It was a hard fought battle, and I was, and am, pretty damn proud of myself, but at the same time, it infuriates me that introducing myself to teachers is something I’m proud of. What 18 year old struggles to shake a teacher’s hand and say Hi I’m Julia, and I’m in your 5th period AP Lit Class? Apparently me, that’s who.

I’m excited to start college in the fall. I’m also terrifed, but honestly, find me a high school senior who isn’t terrified. Even so, for me, it’s different. I feel like with every step I take- graduating high school, getting into college, and moving through the world, I am proving Ms. W wrong, and there’s almost no better feeling in the world. There has been one way that I’ve still been listening to her though, and that is that up until now, I didn’t tell. And I’m done with that. There are parts of my past that I don’t remember, and there are parts I do remember, but don’t feel the need to share. This is me, telling my story, my way.

To my old classmates, thank you for a bunch of really good years at the school. I definitely have some good memories there before all the bad ones take over. Remember when we used to kick rolls of tape around under our desks and we basically never got caught? Or when a group of us would get sent outside and we’d go play soccer? Or when we would climb above the stage in the PAC and make a fool of ourselves in the light booth? I hope you remember all that, because I certainly do.

And to the teachers at the school who cared, but never really knew what was going on (if you’re reading this off my facebook post, it’s probably you), thank you. I know that if I had let you in you could have helped more, but even so, y’all were what got me through. Taking me on walks, making me laugh when I burst into tears at the smallest things, and being understanding when I acted out in your class made all the difference. You saw me as more than a trouble maker or problem kid, even when that’s really all I saw of myself. I’m so grateful to each of you for the kindness you showed me when I so desperately needed it.

If you’ve gotten this far, thanks for reading, and thanks for taking the time to try and understand what happend.

Sincerely,

Julia