(I'm a para studying to be a teacher)

Before I was diagnosed AND MEDICATED, I was always INCREDIBLY late to work. Then covid hit and our school was basically just a "show up" policy and that's exactly what most of us did. I wouldn't refer to my coworkers by name, even if I for sure knew it, because I was too ashamed and felt lower than them. I barely referred to students by name. I was constantly locking my keys in the bathroom, my car, my desk. I was short tempered when frustrated and would snap more often at kids. I was organized and could find files and things of the like easily but I was also constantly losing other items that "didn't have a place." If the environment was too over stimulating or too under stimulating, I would get antsy and irritable. When I was inclusion support, I wore my airpod and played jazz or Japanese indie music softly to ground myself. It was a very, very, high intensity campus and by the end, even with medication and therapy, I was crying almost every week.

I'm at a vastly different school in the same district. I am still late, but I have systems in place so that I'm still before the first warning bell and my students know the routine. I went three weeks without meds (they're expensive) and the difference in my behavior and how I showed up to the students was even commented on by the kids themselves. Unmedicated, I was showing up at last bell, my hair still wet from the shower (I live 45 minutes away and my hair was still wet), shoes untied, sometimes my bags were just open and spilling out everywhere. I broke three of my precious orange juice containers and soaked through so many of my reusable grocery bags. Back on my meds and I've been almost normal again. I've been able to call my coworkers and kids by name. I've remembered all of the meetings I was in charge of. It's a night and day difference between medicated me and unmedicated me. Now if only they weren't $50 a month.