First Year Stress Relief

So I'm about a month and a half in to my first year of teaching and everyone is constantly telling me, "take some time for yourself or you'll get burned out." And I'm all over here like, "what do you mean burned out? I could keep prepping forever!"

An exact photo of me when my principal said to find relaxation time.

After hearing so much about this whole "burned out" thing I decided to do some research. Turns out my field of education, special education, has the highest turnover rate and the highest probability of switching careers. 

I decided to be proactive instead of reactive. Below I'm sharing some of my favorite ways to prevent a career switch...

1. Bath & Body Aromatherapy Lotion

I bought a bottle of this for my desk at school and I love it! Just a little bit is all that is needed. I also bought the stress relief hand soap, body scrub, and pillow mist. Just to make sure all my bases are covered :)

2. Dove Dark Chocolate

This is what I picture heaven to be like. I almost always eat one piece of Dove dark chocolate after school and if it's a really bad day I increase my daily dosage :)

3. Yoga

No none of these photos are of me but this is my yoga studio! It's in the cutest part of town and I just love it. It's hot yoga so I literally sweat out the stress of my day. The instructor is excellent and I always leave class feeling better. My school just hired a yoga instructor and our classes have yoga once a week. We start next week so I'm excited to see how it goes!

4. Baking

I am the self-proclaimed Katie Crocker! Here I am finishing up my raspberry lemon cupcakes on Easter...

...and here I am finishing up my shortbread cookies at Christmastime. 

Baking is so therapeutic to me. I love trying new things, making adjustments, giving baked goods to people, and recruiting taste testers. My class has already volunteered to be taste testers :) Watch out for my Christmas cookie pics in the next few months!

5. My friends and family

My family is my rock. They know how tough of a job I have and know how stressed I am and they have already been so supportive. My mom is always available to drink a glass of wine and vent about the day. Fun fact: my sister is also a teacher! She teaches health out of state. So 100% understands my struggles as a teacher.

My friends are thebomb.com. In case you missed my first post...I started a book club with my friends to keep in touch after college. Psssttt you can stalk us here! Each month we get together and catch up, eat, and talk about the book. There is nothing so therapeutic! I also have a close group of friends that are so understanding and put up with all of my teacher stories. Kudos to you guys!

I'm sure I'll have new ways to cope and relax with this new job but until then my system has been working out nicely!