THE DAILY WRITE

She Wasn’t Perfect, But She Cared

For an insecure middle school kid, that was enough.

“I want to have lunch with every single one of you before the end of the school year. There is a sign up sheet by the door.”

That was Ms. M for you.

I was in the eighth grade, right in the throes of puberty and peer pressure. And she saw that we were all struggling in our own way.

But I also went to a tiny Christian school growing up. As an adult, I’ve looked back and realized that not everything that I was taught was healthy.

Ms. M taught a damaging purity culture metaphor in her health class that took years of unlearning. But I don’t fault her for that. I know she meant well and tried her best to protect her students from the realities of the world. I’m also living proof that damaging Christian ideology can be tough to unlearn.

It’s tough, wrestling with an image of a teacher that you admired so much but also taught you flawed principles.

Ms. M was also the reason why my faith in God grew stronger. She would ask me about my faith journey without judgement. I was open with her about any doubts I had and wasn’t afraid to come to her with questions.

And while she was open and forthright, she also wasn’t afraid of calling me out on my insecurities. I remember comparing myself to another kid in our class and saying I wasn’t smart. She quickly whipped her head around, looked me dead in the eye, and said,

“You are so smart, Bernice. Don’t you ever forget that.”

I didn’t, after that. She believed in me, so I had to have the courage to believe in myself.

While I looked up to her, I’m now realizing that she was a person with her own flaws like everyone else.

She wasn’t perfect, but she cared. And that was enough.

KEY MESSAGE: Even the teachers and mentors you look up to are human beings with their own flaws and insecurities.

This story is a response to MIDFORM’s daily writing challenge prompt. June 2nd’s prompt was: ‘Who was your favorite teacher or mentor growing up, and why?’

You can read more about that health class with Ms. M in this story: