I graduated from college in 2021, and after a few months trying to find OPT during the peak of COVID-19, I finally returned home to the BVI.
Despite being depressed from a pandemic that forced many of us to stay inside, I still tried to see the brighter side of things. I worked part-time in a small sewing shop, but my mother insisted that I apply to the high school to utilize the math minor I’d gained while attending fashion school—so I did.
Throughout my tenure of teaching, I went through several stages of anxiety that each felt more real and more broken than the last. However, before my first day of teaching, the Spirit spoke with distinct clarity when He said that my season there was temporary.
I was there for a reason; my assignment was a short one: “Three years! Don’t go over three years!”
Phase One: Fear of Being Let Go
In the first year of teaching, I panicked almost every day that *this* was the day they would surely fire me. Clearly, I wasn’t good at this teaching thing. I cried many nights because I couldn’t get it right. I couldn’t manage my classroom, the children wouldn’t listen to me, and I was being supervised.
I prayed, asking God … actually begging God not to let them fire me, but His word was certain: “Your time here isn’t over yet. You still have work to do.”
Even when my co-workers assured me that it would take the government too much to actually fire me, I still feared that it could happen. After all, my contract was temporary, and it stated that they reserve the right to terminate me if they find any discrepancies.
Yet I completed a year of teaching and was still promised another year at the school.
Over time, the environment began to take on a whole new shape. A drastic change in government, the end of the COVID era, and the construction of a new school meant things were about to shift.
The administration also slowly changed, and new rules were introduced. Soon, I found myself not panicking that I’d get fired, but almost apathetic to the situations around me. I was angry, frustrated, and bogged down with work, feeling misunderstood, and many times, targeted.
Phase Two: Fear of Being Unheard
Most of the time, my opinions were swept under the rug. Nothing that I said or did held its weight. Whenever I asked for help or pointed out an issue, it was blatantly ignored, and that shaped who I was becoming.
I began to harden myself, lashing out at anyone who tried to blame me for an issue that I’d been attempting to shed a light on for months.
It seemed as if this new leadership did everything in its power to shift blame rather than address the issue at hand. It was this period when my panic began to change drastically. I was no longer begging God not to have me fired; I was praying that they would fire me.
There were moments that I threatened to leave, but couldn’t because where would I get the money to pay my bills? God didn’t authorize a release yet. Instead, He continued to say, “It’s not over until I say it’s over.”
There was a moment when I actually stared down the dark tunnel of being let go from the job. I’d gotten pulled into a lot of serious meetings, and a write-up was coming, the first indication that I would soon be standing in front of the teacher’s board with my job hanging in the balance, but that never happened.
Also, strangely enough, I was coming near to end of my three years, but before it happened, the Spirit came to me once again: “If I were to increase your pay, would you stay for one more year? I need you to stay for one more year.”
It was such a strange request. In the beginning, before I took the job, God was clear: three years, but if I took too long, three years could easily stretch into never leaving.
But I knew when God was speaking to me, so I asked, “How much would I be paid?” and He replied, “Would you stay for one more year if I increase your annual salary to around 50,000? This increase would take place in April.”
I remembered this conversation, and I said ‘yes’. A few months later, there were talks of raising government employees’ salaries, but the government seemed to backtrack on the decision, and the promised increase we were supposed to get seemed no longer in sight.
But I knew what God said. He said, distinctly, that my staying at the school was directly tied to the salary increase. And I proudly knew that if there was no increase, year three would be my last.
Phase Three: Fear of Never Leaving
It was March 2024 when the pay increase came as a surprise. I was actually planning to purchase a new car, but I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to afford it with my current salary. However, with as much faith as I could muster, I gathered all the information I needed from the dealership and the bank, including a job letter stating my annual salary.
To my surprise, the job letter said that I was being paid $51,000 annually, though my pay stub still reflected the old amount. That’s how I knew for certain that God indeed wanted me to stay another year. So, I kept my promise.
But … God hadn’t planned for me to stay another *full* year. He wanted me to trust Him at His Word, and that’s what I failed to understand.
You see, at the end of that school year, I got a letter transferring me from math to the Home Economics department, and that shot a bullet straight through my chest. I didn’t want to move from math, and so I spent the entire summer in tears, crying to God, begging Him for another chance.
Throughout the summer, He tried to prepare my heart for this new change, but I simply couldn’t see that His plan for me was even better than I’d anticipated. However, on the eve of my tears, God answered my prayer: I was transferred to the Exceptional Department to teach math for one year.
That’s when a new fear took shape: the fear that I’d never leave.
I realized that I hadn’t seen the exit plan; I let it slip past me through my own determination of wanting to stay in a department that was toxic. In the initial stages, I thought this new department would be *easier*, but there were new responsibilities, attitudes, and challenges I wasn’t prepared for.
It took a toll on me and my mental health. Not only was this new department challenging, but the landscape of the teaching environment began to change once again, leaving me feeling isolated and without any support.
Many tears were shed, but throughout those tears, God said to me, “It’s time for you to move.” At the time, I remembered binge-watching Yu-Gi-Oh, and there was this scene that talked about a field advantage for the different monsters. God used that to describe what I was going through. He said, “That school no longer gives you a field advantage. You can’t continue playing on this ground, so I have to move you.”
Even though God said those words, I didn’t act on them. I assumed, for some time, that what He meant was that He’d provide an escape. I’d be completely honest: every time I prayed for God to rescue me from the job, His reply was always the same. It was one word, and every time He mentioned it, I gave Him an excuse.
When I asked how long I had to stay here, He would respond, “Resign.”
“But, how would I pay for the car?”
“Trust me. Resign.”
When I cried tears to Him, He would respond, “Resign.”
“But the financial burden would weigh on my mom.”
“Don’t worry about her. Resign.”
When I complained how tired I was of the school and the environment, He would say, “Then why don’t you resign?”
“I can’t do that to the children. They need me.”
“But you can’t keep doing this to yourself.”
For one entire year, it seemed so difficult to trust God in His word. What would happen if I left?
Phase Four: Fear of Losing Myself
A new school year begins.
Prior to this, I confided in someone that I didn’t know how much more of this I could take. I told them I’d try to see if I can be retransferred to the math department, but if that fails, I don’t see myself continuing with this job.
I prayed, asking God to go back to the math department. I told Him that whatever His response was, I’d go with that.
He said to me, “Go to the school, and if you see the principal first thing in the morning, go in and speak with her. Whatever her answer is, that’s my reply.” I asked, “What if she said no?” God said, “Then I’ll take care of the rest.” He also said that if I don’t see her, then don’t bother to seek her out.
I went to the school that first day, and the first person I saw was the principal, so as God said, I did. I asked her if it was possible for me to go back to the math department. She said that, unfortunately, it couldn’t happen as they already had too many teachers.
It was later that I found out that they’d employed two new teachers after I’d asked to return to the math department at the end of the last school year.
But once she gave her answer, a sudden peace fell upon me. While it was a rejection, I knew something different was happening this year. I also knew I wouldn’t stay at the school for more than a term.
Immediately after that, I began applying for different jobs.
However, the tears came as quickly and as suddenly as anything I’d ever felt before. It was unlike anything else. The weight of everything was heavier, policies changed, rules became stricter and more stifling, and I realized, more than anything else, that if I stayed any longer, I’d lose myself.
For two months, I was angry. I was angry at the school, at the church, at my family, at myself, and even at God. I tried to push through it, sorting out what I could give up to satisfy a job that was literally taking more than I could already give.
At one point, I even contemplated giving up church and the new duties that I’d taken on.
It was through this that God began to teach me something: “Prioritize the work of God and yourself above anything else. Choose the things that mean the most to you, even if it means sacrificing the job.”
I was placed in a situation where I had to choose between the mission God wanted me to complete and the job that was vying for my attention away from the true reason God sent me there in the first place.
When I realized how little time I had left for God and how little time I had left for myself—when that realization finally dawned on me—the depression and fear became real, because I was about to lose who I was.
Then one week, I found it incredibly difficult to go to work. There was a moment when I got up, drove myself to work, then cried before I even reached the class. There was no prayer, no words, just tears. And right after, an interview popped up! I realized right then and there that God did indeed want me to move! He was giving a clear directive, an answer, even if I didn’t fully understand what He wanted me to do.
But two days later … I fell into that depression again, and from that moment, I realized that my values, morals, and my calling were no longer in line with the school’s. They prioritized policing, duties, and borderline unethical practices over the joy of teaching children. I could no longer be a part of that.
I could no longer choose to lose myself and who I was simply to satisfy the growing demands of a job that had shown how little it cared about me.
Phase Five: The Peace of Walking Away
For an entire year, God’s one-word answer, ‘Resign,’ seemed like a senseless and irresponsible decision to me, but the signs were clear.
When I finally sent in that resignation letter, the weight of the chains fell off. I had a peace I could not explain, and I experienced a joy beyond everything I understood.
Do I know what my next steps are? I am certain that God knows them. As long as He directs my steps, I will always be safe.
Finding myself once again, picking up the project that I’d left behind for the sake of a job, suddenly reminded me of who I was. But of course, the journey is never over. There will still be challenges ahead, and moments of fear and doubt.
However, I will always remember that God orders the steps of those who trust Him fully.
Psalms 37:5 says:
Commit your way to the Lord; trust in Him, and He will act.
He asks us to fully surrender our decisions to Him, to place the burden of our worries and fears in His hands, and He will act on our behalf.
God carries us through seasons, and sometimes it can be a bit hazy when we can’t ‘see’ what God wants to do for us. But we move by faith, trusting in Him even in moments of the unknown. In times when the waters seem troubled, or in moments when there is stillness, I remind myself that it’s not over until God says it is.
Signed,
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