I have a hard time writing what amount to a "Headline" for the blogs, never mind I was forced more than once to be a "Headline" judge at UIL contests. Hated doing it.
So, when I was teaching in a much larger high school than Buna, there were all types of troubles that occurred when I was teaching there.
One Monday morning, I walk into the school and there was total silence.
At a secondary school, kids are loud. Walk the hallway of a secondary school, high school, junior high, middle school, during period changes and it is loud. Kids are talking, lockers shutting, walking, several hundred kids and the commotion is just loud.
This Monday, no one was saying a word.
You knew something was up.
It was not long before word spread that one of the cheerleaders had tried to commit suicide over the weekend, and she was still in the hospital in Houston.
An overdose of sleeping pills, opiates, and vodka.
Very popular girl. A girl who knew everyone, liked everyone.
Word soon spread that she was on the verge of death....
And finally, it was discovered she was brain dead. Machines were keeping her alive and they were waiting for family to come and say goodbye.
The family, for whatever reason were not disconnecting the machines.
And she stayed hooked on life support, for weeks.
Not for sure why....
Finally, after an agonizing period of time, and the doctor's, other family, suggesting this can't go on forever, she is unhooked.
An autopsy is run and it turns out she is pregnant. They think it is the boyfriend's and the boyfriend is adamant that the child is not his, that he and the girl had not even had sex.
DNA in those days was very slow and it was finally discovered the father was a family member. And after weeks of research, it was the father of the girl
It turns out they had been having sex for years, apparently, allegedly, willingly.
The girl had asked for birth control and both parents had told her no, and there was some belief that the mother knew of the affair.
The father, at the time of the girl being unplugged, was laughing, it seems he though he had gotten away with it.
The father after what seemed like a painstakingly long period of time, was convicted and sent to Huntsville, for what I felt was not a long enough period of time.
The school, set up a group therapy, a PhD in psychology was brought in for counseling and guess who was chosen to to be the moderator of the sessions? We met twice a week, for several months. That's right, the Govteach. And I met with several of the kids one on one in between the group sessions.
That was the same year, I was counseling the student who was dying of AIDs. ( She passed in the Spring of that year.)
It was too much.
I left that school at the end of the year.
I quite liked it there at that high school, but emotionally, I was drained. I was shot. Teaching school is hard enough, but the additional duties......Well, I was breaking down crying several times a week on my 50 miles drive home.
Again, sometimes, bad things are foreordained, had I not left my previous position, I would have never gotten the phone call to interview at Buna....
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