[Dawn.]

Things have been a little rough lately. More than a little actually. Life has decided to pile up on me and it has finally taken its toll on my mental health. My anxiety and depression has heightened and I feel mentally, physically and emotionally drained. I work 3 jobs, 7 days a week in order to be financially comfortable. This week, I’ve returned back to tutoring due to the school holidays so my schedule has returned back to its usual extremely tight ship. At my full time childcare job is where I feel the most stressed and is what takes the most out of me. There are quite a few staff that are lazy and fail to have basic common sense that have resulted in numerous incidents and complaints from parents. I feel like I’m constantly telling these staff members what to do and I don’t get paid as a supervisor. There has been times when staff have just been sitting around, chatting instead of supervising the children like they should be. I’m extremely tired of having to boss people around. I shouldn’t have to. There’s staff that have been in the industry long enough to know better. I talked to my manager this week about all of this and she was really understanding of it. I was able to get a lot of chest and I did better for it. However, as much as she understood, I know things won’t get done about it because she fails to put things in place. Only now is she finally acted upon it and has done something due to the amount of incidents that have been happening and the complaints from parents. Or I hope so. Now I feel anxious and dread it even more going to work.

The last couple of years have not been easy for me - or anyone. It started off with the severe bushfires and drought, then covid, starting uni, moving houses, changing weekend jobs, my grandmother passing away (the last four all happened in the space of about 2 months), getting a third job and planning my wedding. I’m literally taking it day by day at this point in time. I haven’t felt like this in a very long time. I honestly feel like just resigning from all of my jobs but I know that can never happen due to my finances. The only positive thing is getting married and going on our honeymoon. Because of all the added stress, I can no longer focus or remember things. The last couple of days throughout the week, I had to ask my fiancée to drop off my lunch and water bottle because I forgot it two days in a row which has never happened. I can feel myself drowning but I have no lifeboat to cling onto. My mind feels foggy and it’s almost like it’s blocked. I don’t know if I should play it out until I finish my degree as getting another job may cause even more stress. I find that once I’m not at my childcare job, I’m a totally different person. I’m so much more relaxed and I don’t feel an ounce of stress. I’m a lot less irritated and I have a lot more patience. This week probably has to have been one of the worst weeks working in childcare.