[courtney.w]

Friends,

I have finally come to terms with the fact that I am probably never going to teach again. It actually has nothing to do with my injury... I have faith that I will eventually be healed enough that I can be a good teacher... it's that my former employer is clearly out to do everything they can to ruin my life. They laid me off in May, citing budget problems in the school system (after I had been there for seven years). I interviewed for a job that sounded more than promising last Friday, found out Monday that they called my references (so clearly they liked me) and then got a call today that the chose another candidate, which makes me think my old boss probably threw me under the bus somehow.

Anyway, we are finally almost through our last week at my current job before winter break, and I plan to take as much time to rest as I can, not only for my injured brain, but also so that I can rejuvenate and hopefully regain some of my energy for finding more work. I can't keep working 11-12 hour days that are as unpredictable as what I'm doing now (substitute teaching and working in an after school enrichment program with at-risk students who tend to thrive on misbehaving), and I can't keep going through this vicious cycle of getting my hopes up just to get rejected by every job I interview for.

I can't NOT work. I know that would be best in terms of healing, but the best I can do is take advantage of the forced two week break that this time of year has given me and move forward... I cannot afford to not work. I really can't afford to keep doing what I'm doing, but it's marginally better than nothing. I don't qualify for any kind of aid because my husband's job makes us look far better off financially than we really are, but we are very close to losing our home, among other things, and that stress and the guilt I'm feeling for thinking this is my fault for not being good enough to find more work is killing me.

So here's my question: if I'm going to try my hand in other career fields, is there anything that you recommend as being a fairly good industry to be in with a healing brain? I need to be making at least $30,000/year... I would be making $50,000 if I was teaching right now. My current symptoms do seem to be improving from a few weeks ago, however. My headaches have become fairly manageable (still present, just not as intense). Honestly, the worst symptom I still see most frequently is the brain fatigue, and I'm hoping that resting for the next couple of weeks will help for that.

I'm extremely depressed right now. I had my hopes up that this job would be my ticket back to my sanity, maybe even to a chance to start planning to have kids in the near future. I've been wanting kids for years... seven years to be exact... and we were going to start trying when I found out I was losing my job. These people have taken pretty much everything away from me, and I need to overcome this somehow. Starting to think there's some reason why I just don't deserve to be happy anymore... really hating life right now. I can't stand this.

Sorry to be so depressing.