It’s taken a long time for me to accept that anxiety and panic attacks are part of who I am. I didn’t struggle with my mental health as a child, or as a young adult, and I have thoroughly enjoyed progressing in my teaching career to date.
I started my career as a secondary mathematics teacher in East London 21 years ago, a short while after which I became a mentor for trainee teachers and subsequently moved on to becoming a Head of Department. I successfully completed a Masters alongside my NQT and NQT +1 year, and was graded outstanding by Ofsted for my use of project based learning within the mathematics classroom, instead of more traditional methods of teaching. As part of my research, I was able to take my ideas and successfully implement them in a couple of other schools within East London, and it was this desire to make a difference to mathematics teaching and learning as a whole that led me to accepting a lecturer in mathematics education post at the IoE.
I currently work as a Senior Lecturer in teacher education, and in September 2024 I gained the Principal Fellowship award recognising my sustained leadership of higher education practices leading to high quality teaching and learning.
Over the years many staff and students have asked about my journey to leadership and progression in the field, alongside asking for support and guidance in developing and progressing in their own. The advice I had always given was to seek out gaps where you could offer additional support, and to volunteer for additional responsibilities in order to learn and develop, and move into positions of leadership. I also promoted speed and efficiency in completion of tasks, and advised many to mentor and coach, and gain qualifications and training in leadership and your own subject specialism.
I lived by these rules for many years as I had seen the impact of this strategy on my own career progression as a result, but as I added more and more onto my workload, I had my first panic attack and stumbled. Despite the signs telling me to slow down, I tried to carry on as though nothing had changed, only to be signed off from work 18 months later.
It was only through this forced time off, and regular therapy, that I truly started reflecting on my journey. What began as conversations about my unsustainable workload, developed into a realisation that choosing to invest so much time and energy into each role I had taken on was stopping me from processing the impact of life events that had accumulated over the years. I had become a pro at masking the impact of bullying, racism, abuse, chronic health issues triggered by high levels of stress, infertility, postnatal depression, and being a first time mum with a baby who had congenital heart disease, so it was only inevitable that, in amongst all this chaos that I was blocking out, something had to give.
In the 21 years I have worked as a teacher, I have spoken with many students and members of staff who have struggled with their own mental health and well-being, but it was only after I had my first panic attack and started to struggle with my own mental health, that I truly realised how difficult it was to manage the day-to-day.
As I navigated my way through the new challenges I faced, I became more empathetic of the struggles that students and staff were facing too, and I started to reassess my role in raising awareness of the importance of prioritising health first. The more I opened up about my own journey with my line managers and found adjustments that would help me continue to develop and succeed in HE, the more those around me opened up about their mental health and well-being challenges and the support they needed in order to navigate their progression too.
Over the last few years I have worked in a variety of leadership positions and teaching roles, none of which have been impacted negatively by the adjustments that I have requested. I have worked compressed hours, flexible work patterns, remotely, face-to-face, as a line manager, as part of SLT, in the classroom, online on Teams and on a specific campus and this has only been possible as I have always kept my managers up-to-date on any changes in my health and well-being.
Its taken me years to accept that anxiety and panic attacks are now a part of who I am, and that my IBS struggles may never go away, but I had to learn the hard way that prioritising my own health and well-being far outweighed anything else. What I found was, asking for adjustments in my working hours and pattern, and requesting the support I needed in order to continue to be successful in my working life, has always been welcomed without negatively impacting my career.
I hope that sharing my story will help others realise that putting yourself and your wellbeing first is okay, and requesting additional support or a change in your work pattern to ensure the best version of you is able to show up, is okay too!
Aniqa T Khaliq 