Hi, I’m Sam Osmond. I am a crochet designer, storyteller and an educator. Being an educator is something I don’t often speak about because that is the day job, the thing that I do to earn the money to pay the bills. But if we had been meeting in 2008 I would have confidently said I am a lecturer, I teach business studies. 

I have chosen to focus on this chapter of my story first because during this time something was ignited in me, an ember of something that for a long time I didn’t understand and I couldn’t explain.

Sometimes all we can do is trust the universe, trust that we are in the right place at the right time, even if it doesn’t feel like that at the moment. We can’t predict the future, and we can’t control all the outcomes of our decisions. 

Chapter One: It starts with a dream job

My story begins with a nudge from the Universe. The start of a chain of events that has brought me here to tell my story.

I was born in the 80s, I grew up in the 90s and was the first person in my family to go to University. I am incredibly lucky that I have a supportive family, I could have been anything, my parents just wanted me to be happy and find something I loved doing. I don’t remember when I decided to be a teacher, I do remember wanting to be an archaeologist though, I loved history and even did my work experience at the Roman Fort in South Shields. This was the end of my dream to be an archaeologist. It was cold and not as exciting as I hoped. Time Team had lied to me.

I was motivated by the question “What’s next?” My life was mapped as a series of goals to be achieved and ticked off. By the time I finished my A Levels I knew I was going to University with the goal of one day becoming a teacher. For a while the plan I had made for myself was going well. I met my husband at University and I could see my life mapped out in front of me. Get the dream job, the house, get married and start a family. 

After getting my degree I needed a break, so I applied for a full-time job at Debenhams. They were opening a brand new store in South Shields. I didn’t get the job. Oh well, not my opportunity. However, a few weeks later I was sent a letter with my start date for the training and induction at the Metrocentre. I rang them, it wasn’t a mistake, I had the job. Fast forward a year and I’ve started my teaching qualification and at Debenhams I’m now a mentor for new employees. One of these new employees that I’ve been looking after is the daughter of a curriculum manager at South Tyneside College. I didn’t know this at the time but her Mam was looking for a lecturer to teach a night class for accounts and I’ve just passed my financial planning module with the highest grade I had ever gotten throughout my PGCE. She had shared this information with her Mam and I was invited to teach a class. I was training to be a business studies teacher in a secondary school. I had never considered teaching in a college but I knew this was where I was meant to be.   My journey, the long way round, started with a job I didn’t get.

In 2008 I achieved my goal of becoming a teacher, my PGCE completed, I started working full time as a lecturer at South Tyneside College. Another goal ticked off the list. The reality was different from what I had imagined, and 5 years later, I made the life-changing decision to leave my dream job and abandon the plan. 

Teaching for me wasn’t just a job. If any of you have worked in education or have loved ones working in education you know that it is a vocation. If it wasn’t a vocation you wouldn’t do it. The pay isn’t as good as what people assume, the hours are often gruelling, the school holidays used to recover from the relentless pace of work or the inevitable illness you’ve been avoiding all term. All of that being said, it is incredibly rewarding. I have worked with some of the most incredible, dedicated and inspirational professionals, and have witnessed the positive impact on the lives of young people in their care. So why after 5 years did I decide to quit?

This wasn’t an easy decision but just as I was starting my first teaching job in the FE sector the credit crunch hit the UK and what followed was significant funding cuts. What this meant for the College I was working at is courses cancelled and round after round of redundancies. I had joined a thriving team of qualified professionals, a busy department with lots of people to support me and help me develop as a teacher. Our department shrank rapidly, class sizes increased and workload increased and my responsibilities increased for running and managing courses. There was more pressure on results to secure funding in an increasingly competitive marketplace. I was overwhelmed, exhausted and drowning on a daily basis.

There are three pieces of advice I remember from this time. The first piece of advice was from my mam. 

I didn’t know what she meant at the time. But my mam is wise, and worked as a nurse, she understood what it meant to have a vocation. Being in my early 20s I of course ignored this advice. I have spent many years looking for the person I had lost. This might sound a bit dramatic but I’m going to come back to this.

My second piece of advice came from my manager at the time. 

As my workload increased I started to feel more overwhelmed and was struggling to keep up with all the different demands on my time. So much of teaching happens outside of the actual classroom, there is so much preparation and planning and evaluating and recording of data. Her advice is something I revisit when I’m stuck in the messy middle of tasks and projects. She made it okay for me to give the perfectionist a break. One bad lesson is better than a series of bad lessons, when you are in the messy middle, stop what you are doing, gather together what you need and make a plan so you can be better prepared moving forward. 

This period of time wasn’t all doom and gloom, this job did give me the financial security to buy my home and I got married to my lovely husband.

However, with so much change in my life, so much uncertainty and working 80 hours a week without a proper break meant my mental health wasn’t great. To be honest my health generally wasn’t great at this time. I was fighting for survival, holding onto this dream with my fingertips. The thought of just quitting was unbearable. I had spent a lot of money to get my qualification. I had worked relentlessly. Literal blood, sweat and tears had been poured into this dream and I couldn’t just give up. 

My third piece of advice came from a counsellor.

Although work was challenging at this time they did have an onsite counsellor. I had been diagnosed with an anxiety disorder. This is something I’ve experienced throughout my life but didn’t have the language or understanding of anxiety to talk about it. But by this time my life was reduced to work, I was in survival mode. My world had shrunk, I was having frequent panic attacks. I wasn’t listening to my body. I just kept pushing myself to the breaking point. Years later I’m still learning to manage my anxiety.

Some of you might wonder why I didn’t leave sooner?

I honestly didn’t know if I would be able to get another job in teaching if I left. By choosing to work at a college instead of a secondary school it meant I hadn’t completed an NQT year. Even though I had experience teaching and had a teaching qualification by choosing to be a lecturer it meant I hadn’t completed the bits of training that I would have done if I’d followed a more traditional path into a teaching career in a secondary school. I also wasn’t in position to think that far ahead. I knew something needed to change though.

I had ignored my mam’s wise words. My whole sense of self was defined by my job. It was meant to be my dream, my forever job. I wasn’t coping but I didn’t know who I was if I wasn’t a teacher and I didn’t know what I would do next. I’d committed to a mortgage, and we had planned to start a family. But the counsellor’s words stuck with me. “If you can’t change your job, change your job.” I had fought long hard to keep my job but I was powerless to change things to make it work for me. 

Thank you so much for reading to my story so far, it continues next week with Chapter 2. Take care beautiful daydreamer.