swings and roundabouts

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I left my MiLs bungalow late last night in the morning dressed only in my dressing gown. The roads were busy with people, some of whom were also in their jim-jams. I waved to folk I used to know, but I was in a rush to get to a house a few doors down and didn't stop to indulge in pointless chitchat. I walked around the neighbourhood in a circle to get to the house a few doors down, at which point I could see MiLs bungalow again. The door was wide open, net curtains blowing in the breeze. D'oh! I hadn't locked the door and now my bits were being burgled. And then I woke up. This post isn't even about that ... My last lesson of the day brought with it both happiness and sadness. It was the last lesson before the GCSE English exam at the end of the week and to celebrate my awesome support with difficult student skills the teacher wrote me the loveliest message in a card and surprised me with a 'grow your own' strawberry plant. In my role we rarely get a thank you from either teaching staff or students, so to receive something with thanks and appreciation behind it makes my tummy glow with warmth. That was the happiness. The sadness came a few minutes later as I was taking my student to the exam office to check where she needed to be on Friday. She told me that she tried to jump from a bridge at the weekend - the voices told her to do it - and after the police and ambulance service were called she was briefly sectioned. Is 'briefly sectioned' even possible? Regardless, her mental health issues are becoming more apparent and she's not in the healthiest of relationships; her on/off boyfriend had to have his stomach pumped over the Easter weekend due to taking an overdose. She's a young lass whose adult life could go either way ... self-destructive, with the possibility of prison, or she receives the right treatment and finds happiness. That's if she even gets to adulthood, of course. In my job we have to take the good with the bad, trying not to dwell too much on the bad.