My friend is going to kill me if she ever discovers this photo featuring her butt on the internet, but it is just way too cute not to share with everybody. I'm talking about the image of the colt leaning forward to "kiss" his "grandmother", not the woman's butt itself. 
This afternoon after work, I was treated to a visit with my friend's mare and three week old colt. The colt was absolutely adorable! I even got to pat him a little after he overcame his initial shyness of me. I've never been that close to such a young horse. The experience was kind of special.
Anyway, my second day of being back in the workforce went as well as the first. Oh my gawd, I am exhausted though! I had forgotten just how tiring work could be. So far it is tiring in a positive sense. Perhaps a little guiltily, I am glad that I have tomorrow off. I need a break already!
I experienced a small success with one of my students today. Shortly after meeting him yesterday, I discovered that he was a bit of a ratbag, not in the nasty sense though. He just seems to get bored with the work very quickly, becomes quite talkative and refuses to continue on with any further work, saying that it is "too hard". Over the past couple of days, when I tried to redirect him back to his work, he had a tendency to just ignore me and keep facing the other way. Yikes! That sort of behaviour would have gotten old very quickly! I decided to try to nip it in the bud this afternoon. I calmly knelt down in front of him and explained to him that I didn't appreciate being ignored when I was speaking and that I expected him to stop his chatting and pay attention to me ... you know, using all the "effective communication techniques". Lo and behold, the student actually turned back to his work and let me sit with him while he finished it all. Holy gawd! I don't think I have ever had such a resounding success using "proper communication" with a student before. I was pretty chuffed!
Perhaps a bit of a bizarre thing, considering how good my last two days have been, is that I am still thinking of self harm. I am keen to indulge in a little bit of it tonight. It seems silly that it has been on my mind today. Maybe it's due to me having a pdoc appointment tomorrow. Maybe it is just because I am feeling a little tired. I don't know. Hubby is on days off at the moment, so I will probably not get the chance tonight anyway.
diss_k,
ReplyDeleteWanted to visit again and LOL at the beginning of your post. I'm sure your friend won't mind becasue it's used with love.
I can understand how great you felt with your successul positive communication. It amazes me all the time when it works. It doesn't always work, but when it does, it is great!
I can also understand how the urge to self harm still remains despite having good moments. I often tell people I work with to have back ups ready like (don't laugh) holding ice cubes, putting your arm or leg in a bucket of ice water, cutting or burning a doll or or visiting on online voodoo doll:
http://www.virtual-design.com/cgi-bin/Voodoo.pl or
http://www.virtual-design.com/demos/voodoodoll/voodoo.asp?section=demo&subsection=voodoo
It is a step towards stopping, but gives you room if your still have the urge to selfharm without really hurting or maiming yourself. I hope you have more success with your students! And wish you my best.
~Deb