074 - Clare Gregg - Classroom to Entrepreneur and Advocate

In this powerful episode, we sit down with Clare Gregg, whose journey into teaching was anything but ordinary.

Statistically, Clare should never have made it into the classroom. As a child, she was a school refuser, on the child protection register, and at 18 found herself homeless and pregnant. Yet against all odds, she fought her way into education, inspired by the teachers who believed in her.

Clare went on to teach Religious Education, working in challenging schools, comprehensives, and even a pupil referral unit. Along the way, she navigated personal health struggles, raising a family, and the crushing realities of leadership that left her unsupported and, ultimately, broken by the system.

Today, Clare has rebuilt her life as a mortgage advisor, business owner, and activist. She shares her story with honesty and humour, opening up about complex PTSD, breakdown, resilience, and why she still believes in the power of education even after stepping away.

Clare’s story is one of survival, transformation, and the fight to create a new identity beyond teaching.

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Transcript

Thank you to our sponsors Little Voices. Are you a teacher with a passion for drama, music and performance or feeling stuck in the classroom? Little Voices gives you the chance to step into a role where you can truly inspire young minds through the arts. This is a company I know well and admire. 

They're passionate about child development, highly rated and genuine and transformative. With small group teaching, a focus on confidence and creativity. With the opportunity to guide children through lambda qualifications, you can make a real impact. 

Plus, with the support of a nationwide franchise network behind you, you can run your own successful business, doing what you love while teaching in a way that truly fits your life. Hello and welcome to the Pick Pony podcast with myself Sharon Cawley and me Sarah Dunwood, in which we talk to teachers from all walks of life who exited the classroom from what they thought was a job for life and thrived on the other side of teaching. Coming up in this episode... I had a full blown, like I was like, I'm going to have a full blown panic attack. 

I've never had one before or since. I had a teaching assistant. I was like, I've got, I've got to go. 

I've just got to get out of this classroom. Left my teaching assistant with the students, walked out downstairs to go into the little staff room that we had to just like pull myself together. And a member of senior leadership was in the work base, had seen me come out, followed me down. 

I'm having a full on, I'm crying, I'm, which is not like me at all, ever. That's not me. And she started talking to me and I was like, and she's like, this isn't about you. 

I was like, I'm really sorry. Can you leave me alone please? And for me to ask somebody to leave me alone is massive because I'm a real people pleaser. Like I will go above and beyond, but I was like, can you not see that I'm in no fit state? And then that was it. 

I never went back. Hello and welcome to a wonderful episode of the Pit Pony Podcast. And today we have a great guest who I have been in contact with for quite some time.

So I feel as though this has been a long time coming and I am so excited to hold this space for you today, Clare Gregg, to talk about your journey into teaching, through teaching and the other side of teaching, because Clare is not a traditional pit pony by any stretch of the imagination. And actually, if you look at Clare's early years in life, she should never statistically have made it into our profession, which makes it all the more tragic that she is no longer in the profession. Clare came into teaching at the age of 28. 

But prior to that, as a pupil, was a school refuser. She was on the child protection register. She left school at the age of 16, very abruptly through the tragic death of her best friend to suicide. 

Her dad had a heart attack. She found herself in the parental role to her younger siblings and at the age of 18 was homeless and pregnant. So this is somebody sat in front of us today, ladies and gentlemen, who should never have made it to the other side of the desk, but she did. 

And she tells her story better than I ever could. So sadly, Clare, you are no longer with us in the teaching profession. Welcome. 

Thank you. And what is it you actually do today, Clare Gregg? So I am now a mortgage advisor. I own my own business and I'm an activist.

Cannot wait to get into this. Cannot wait to hear your story. And with that said, Clare, nobody tells it better than you do. 

So starting where you feel most comfortable. Let's hear about your journey, Clare. So yeah, like you said, I came into teaching as a late entrant at 28. 

Yeah, I left school when I was 16. I had a brief spell at sixth form college that just didn't pan out, didn't work. And I left to go into full-time employment. 

And when I was 18, I was expecting my oldest child, who is now 26 years old. When I was expecting him, my parents decided that I could no longer live at home, which was how I found myself homeless. I had my son.

I had a second son when I was, I'd just turned 21. And at that point, I was working for Bradford and Bingley Building Society. And my plan was that I would go back to work after I had my youngest child, Joseph. 

He's now 24. Unfortunately, he was born with a congenital abnormality of the lower limbs that meant that he required significant hospital treatment. He still has treatment today.

That's how significant the condition was. And his condition was that he had to have weekly hospital treatment, multiple operations. So I did what any sane person does when they've just had a baby with a congenital lower limb abnormality and has a two-year-old, and I signed up for a degree. 

The only qualifications that I had were my GCSEs that I had done pretty well at, even though I wasn't a big fan of being in school. And because I'd just turned 21, the university that I applied to, my local university, were prepared to consider me as a mature student. And I went for my interview with a three-week-old baby. 

And the admissions tutor said to me, he said, what makes you think that you can do this? And I was like, well, I'm here because I knew that I needed something to get me through to focus on whilst going through the treatment with my son. And I also knew that I needed to build a future for my children. And he was like, well, will anyone give you an academic reference? And I was like, my head teacher at school, he'll give me a reference. 

And he did. I contacted my secondary school. He gave me a reference. 

I got onto my degree course and completed my degree. I initially went into teacher training when I graduated when I was 24, but my relationship broke down. It had been abusive. 

I was fleeing domestic violence. And I started the PGCE and just couldn't continue. I had a, oh, crikey, a three-year-old and a five-year-old. 

And I just couldn't make it work. And my youngest son was having more treatment. He was going to have another operation. 

So I just put it on the back burner. I temped, looked after my children, got over this relationship, got settled, got life going again. And it was once life was settled that I decided, and I'd taken a job as a cover supervisor and a teaching assistant.

And I just loved it. I was just like, this is, do you know what I mean? This is it. This is it for me. 

I've always loved learning. I've always loved education. Knowledge is power.

And I fundamentally believe that, still believe that today. And so, yeah, so I'd been working as a teaching assistant and as a cover supervisor, and I just loved it. It was so much fun.

And it was something that just came really naturally to me. So it felt like, it just felt like the right progression just to go back and do my PGCE, which I did. Yeah, I did that in 2008.

I qualified in 2009. And I just, yeah, I just had a real passion for it because education had changed my life. I would not have got to that position if teachers hadn't believed in me, if my head teacher, who even, you know, I owe so much to him, because if he hadn't supported me in writing that, in writing that reference, then I wouldn't be, I just wouldn't, I wouldn't be in this position.

And my oldest child is on the autistic spectrum. So I just, I had this insight and I was just like, this is the right thing for me. Yeah. 

And I just, and I loved it. I mean, what an entrance into the profession. When we hear so many stories, I went to university, I did my PGCE, I went in. 

Then later on, I had my children and everything changed. You've sat with a three-year-old at your university interview. So you've definitely come about this in a different way. 

So what was your subject by the way, Claire? What was your specialism? My specialism was RE. Okay. So you do RE. 

Okay. So I'm thinking at this point, you make your way in, you've made it, you should not have a seat at this table. So there's gratitude, there's disbelief. 

What was it like for you on the other side of the desk? What was your time like as a teacher? My time as a teacher was varied. So my first role was in a challenge, what could potentially be considered a challenging inner city school, which I absolutely loved. There was a great senior leadership team, people that I'm still in touch with today, an amazing sense of community, an amazing team. 

It felt very much like the school that I'd gone to myself. And it was really, really supportive. It was progressive, it was forward thinking. 

They had a very fresh way of looking at how do we deal with the problems and the issues, the social issues that we've got in front of us. They were trialling something called human scale education, where it was schools within schools, and you had communities within a school so that the students stayed within the community, the staff moved around, and there was a set number of staff that worked within it. So you really got to know the students really well.

We only had 10 children in our tutor groups, which were called learning families. It was really holistic. It was a wonderful place to learn my craft. 

I learnt a lot there. And I'm going to bring Sarah Dunwood in at the moment, on a couple of levels really, because number one, I think knowing the types of schools that Sarah worked in, you recognise Claire as a kid, don't you? You recognise Claire as a pupil in the first instance, more than a teacher. Yeah, for sure. 

Yeah, I do, because those, you as a child, would have been the child that I really, really focused on in school. Life's dealt you a fairly rubbishy hand, and what can I do to help? And I think there's that, but there's also what you've described in terms of the school that you were at in that first job. You're describing one of my schools that I absolutely adored, and it was everything. 

It was community, the staff were together, the kids were hard, but they were lovely. It was everything. It was everything.

So, it has just made me go a bit warm and fuzzy, but also I kind of know what's coming. So, how many years do you do at this school, Claire? You're in there, you're loving it, there's the communities, the families. I'm waiting for the book. 

So, I was there for three years, and it's intense, and by this point, my children are becoming teenagers. I've got a blended family, so I have two stepchildren, I have two children of my own, and I have four boys. There's a year between each one, and my stepchildren, the oldest one, live with us, and they sort of bounce back, they bounce backwards and forwards. 

So, I had a really full-on family life, and my oldest child, number two, had an HCP. He was really struggling with the transition into GCSE, and I was having, you know, it was quite a distance from where I lived, and actually, it was about, this isn't a good fit for my family anymore. My family come first.

That's it, that's my bottom line. They always have, they always will. There's no job that I will ever do that will be more important than my children, and so, I left with no job to go to, to do supply, because I needed that, I just needed that flexibility. 

Took a supply role in a local comprehensive, very, very different to where I'd been. Very affluent, very middle class, but because it was a small school, had quite a big SEN department, people opted for that school because of that. So, they named that school on the was statements, now EHCPs, and I started there on short-term supply that developed into long-term supply and ended up as a fixed-term contract, and I loved it. 

Again, a different kind of teaching, but because of the SEND, which has always been my passion and inclusive teaching, I just loved it. It was also an opportunity to teach English and Geography, which I had as part of my degree, which was great, and that was, that was brilliant. I was really enjoying it, and then I ended up quite seriously ill and needed an emergency surgery. 

That meant that towards the end of this fixed-term contract, I was covering a maternity leave. Obviously, I was off work sick for three months. It was a significant medical emergency. 

I'm very lucky to be telling the tale. This was my first experience of going, hang on a minute, you can't do that. Oh, oh, oh, actually, you can. 

I returned to work, and the person who's coming back from maternity leave wasn't coming back for about another two and a half, three months, but my contract was ending at May half-term. They were coming back in September, and because I'd been off sick, they didn't extend it, and that was the end of my contract, and I was furious. I'd put my heart and soul into it, and to me, I was just like, this is so unfair, not just to me, but also to the students, who ironically have since become clients of mine, and now I do mortgages for them, and it really, I was like, oh, right, okay, do I still want to do this? So, I was like, right, I'll try some more supply.

Got a great, so again, short-term supply that turned into a permanent role. Again, another challenging, comprehensive, great place, really, really enjoyed it, but then an opportunity arose to go and work in an online school. After I'd been there, I'd been there for about, I'd been there for about six months, and my oldest son was really struggling, and sort of, you know, when an opportunity presents itself, and the planets align, it fits with your family, it just felt like that was the right thing to do, so I took this role in an online school. 

It was a head of department, it was sort of a middle to senior leader role, and it was an opportunity to build this online school, and it was an alternative provision for students who were unwell, school refusers, mental health issues, my ideal job, like, I was like, oh, this is a bit of me, but also, it was the opportunity to learn something very different, to build new skills, and be involved in something that really felt like it was life-changing for students, and I also felt, because of my experience that I'd had as a child, I was like, if this, like, this would have been perfect for me, like, that would have been ideal, and I was there for three years, again, loved it, until I decided my children, by this point, had, my youngest child, by this point, had gone to college, was in the process of going to college, and I was like, do you know what, I really want to get back into the classroom, and so, and so, I applied for a role in a pupil referral unit, and that was my, that was my final role in teaching. Okay, so, well, varied, varied roles, so you end up in this pupil referral unit, this PRU, tell us about the PRU. Um, it's not for everyone, um, but because my thing with teaching was always about the fact that education is supposed to empower, education is supposed to be transformative, it is supposed to change lives, um, and I was really good at, because I, because of my personal experience, I was really good at working with those kinds of students, um, and it just, it felt comfortable to me, it felt familiar to me, um, and I, and I really enjoyed it, and working at the PRU, there was, there was a, there was a brilliant team, amazing, like, amazing camaraderie between staff, um, and, and it was, and, and when I first started there, it was, it was really, it was, it was really, really positive. 

Unfortunately, my, like, I had some issues with my health, which was a recurrence of the, of the previous issue, and had to have, and had to have some more surgery, and that really, that really knocked my confidence, um, on one level, because when you're, when you're, when you're teaching in the pupil referral unit, you have to be able to team teach, which is very physical, which is essentially, worst case scenario, essentially, it's, it's restraint, and if you're not physically up to it, which I wasn't, because I'd had abdominal surgery, it really knocked my confidence, made me feel uncomfortable, there'd, there'd been some, there'd been some changes, there'd been a change in Matt, there'd been a change in leadership, and it just, it wasn't the place, it wasn't the place that it, that it was before. We were understaffed, we had too many students, and it was starting to become unsafe. I raised concerns about, about feeling, you know, this isn't 100%, I'm not, you know, you know, and there were, there was a couple of, a couple of situations where there were students who I felt required more supervision, who I didn't feel we were equipped to deal with necessarily, and then I had, I had an, there was, there was an incident where we were understaffed, and I ended up being assaulted by a student, that wasn't the assault that was the problem, it was the way that it was managed afterwards, and given my experience, my level of resilience, the fact that I can, I can face any challenge head-on that is thrown at me, it was very overwhelming to feel that actually this is a bit too much for me, and with hindsight, the reason that it was too much was because I didn't feel safe, and I didn't feel supported by, not by my, it wasn't my colleagues, it was the senior leadership, and the way that, the way that this particular incident was dealt with, the way that my concerns weren't addressed, and the way that I was spoken to and made to feel that somehow it was, it was the way that I had dealt with that situation was lacking, when actually it wasn't, we were understaffed, and I ended up basically, basically having a breakdown, you know, there's no, there's no, there's no two ways of, of describing it, and I had a period of time off, I returned.

Can I just interject that because we very often use the term breakdown, and people listening to this, because I know that we're going to talk around the fact you have complex PTSD, you've had a lot go on in your world, what do you mean by a breakdown? Talk to me as if I don't understand this term, what does a breakdown look like for a teacher? So for me, I wasn't able to function, is probably the best way of describing it. My youngest son had gone off to university, and so all of my children by this point are adults, and I think that probably was a contributing factor to it, because I could indulge myself, maybe, I don't, I don't know, but I think when your children are young, like you just, you keep your game face on, and that's not to say that they don't like their father, their stepfather, he's, he is an amazing hands-on parent, like he's brilliant, so it's not that I was doing it all on my own, I absolutely was not, but because I didn't have to, I guess because I didn't have to think about the day-to-day parenting, I could just, I could just let go, and what that looked like. You could, you had the luxury of being able to have a breakdown. 

Yeah, I had the luxury of being able to have a breakdown, which meant that, that if I didn't want to get dressed, I didn't have to get dressed, if I didn't want to wash my hair, I didn't have to wash my hair, and it literally, it was literally like going into pure on vegetation mode, of like not wanting to leave the house, not wanting to engage with people, not wanting to have conversations, basically just wanting to completely withdraw from life, hibernate, and put myself back together again, and I mean, I, I did things like, I, I made myself little lists, which were things like, and I literally, I ticked them off, and I was like, this is ridiculous, but I needed something to like get me going, and so I'd have like little lists that were like, get up, have a shower, put some makeup on, take the dog for a walk, speak to another human being. I do joke about it, because I joke about everything, because that is my coping mechanism, because I think, I think there's humour in the darkness, there absolutely is, and there were times there that it was, it was very dark, because I was just, I was just like, what, what am I going to do, and the thought of going back in, I don't know if it was the thought of going back into the classroom, it was the thought of having to deal with that gas lighting again, because teaching and that role had, it had become like an abusive relationship. There were so many things in that experience that mirrored my experience as a child growing up, that mirrored my experience as a survivor of domestic violence, and I just couldn't believe it.

Sarah, that, that's quite a powerful, powerful parallel. It's a significant parallel to draw, and I think it goes to something, we talked about this with, with Holly Jones in relation to neurodiversity, we've talked about it in, in other podcasts. Something happens somewhere along the way in the teaching profession where the psychological and physical safety of the adults was no longer something that was intrinsic to going into work. 

Something flipped, I don't know when it was, but, but I know having conversations, I'm just going to shout them out, I know having conversations with the drama lamas, that, that there was a tipping point where actually, why, why, why am I being asked what I did that, that caused that child's behaviour? So, sorry, I'm not engaging enough as a teacher and that makes it acceptable for that child to verbally abuse me, for that child to get in my face, for that child to shove me as they, as they barge out of the classroom. Something happened somewhere, and I don't know why, and for me, if we've got adults going into a workplace, regardless of what the workplace is, but in a school situation where our job is to keep children safe, then somebody surely must have a responsibility to make sure that we are psychologically and physically safe in our own workplace. Because here's, here's the irony with what Claire said and what I heard, it wasn't the attack, it wasn't the act of violence. 

How it was dealt with. It was how it was dealt with and that, I suspect, is what fed in to the complex PTSD. I am not being believed or I am at least being questioned and I'm questioning, how did they handle it in, in, in that respect to make you feel like that? So there were, there were two incidents. 

So the first incident, I was spat at in the face, which is, is really invasive and it was, it was particularly triggering because of previous experiences. But at no point was, so I just carried, I literally, I washed my face, washed it out of the back of my hair and it, because this had happened at lunchtime, when I was supervising and I just carried on. I carried on supervising. 

I taught all afternoon. There was a conversation at the end of the day. I was very clear about the fact that the student involved had total control over themselves. 

And the reason I knew that they had total control over themselves is because I had enough time to make a decision about whether or not I was going to move my face or not. And I knew that with this particular student, if I moved my face, that was it. If I moved my face and showed this particular student that he had the power to make me move my face, then it was, all bets were off. 

So I didn't move my face. And that's how I ended up being spat at in the face. I made this very clear. 

I made it very clear that this particular student was in control. If he had been, if he had been in, you know, we talk about this heightened state of arousal. If he had been up there, not a problem. 

That's the nature of the work. It's not a problem. All behaviours of communication, it is what it is. 

That's the way that I, and I think perhaps I see it differently because of, because of my, because of my, my sort of younger experiences. So, so I always found it really easy not to, not to, not to take anything that the kids did personally. It's just, it is what it is. 

But when I, when I raised that concern and said, he was in control, we need to address this. This isn't right. You know, we need, we need to talk about this and what we're going to do, what we're going to do to make sure that this doesn't happen again. 

I was told, oh no, that, that's, that's not possible. He was, he was in a heightened, heightened state of arousal. He absolutely was not. 

And I was expected to teach him on my own afterwards. And he would cut like, come nose to nose with me, threatened to stab me in the eye with a pencil. I raised it again. 

And I had a couple of days off because it was just, I was like, this is just too much. And I was working across two different sites. And I was like, I'm fine on the other site. 

This site, I just, until they do something about this, I'm just not sure I can, I just, I just can't sort of thing. Anyway, in the two days that I was off, this particular student had had an episode, assorted three male members of staff. And then they decided that, oh no, no, this isn't the right place. 

So, it's okay to assort a female member of staff. But the moment that three male members of staff can't contain this student, we're going to, we're going to, we're going to do something about it. And I just, I, I just, I was so exhausted with it. 

I was just, and, and, and angry and, and, and worn, worn down. And now, I can, you know, now I'm able to talk about it. Now, now like the, the sort of, the ability to challenge is back. 

I'd lost all, I'd lost all ability to challenge. And then I just, yeah, I had another, it was all too much. I'd had this period, I'd had this period of time off after, after this particular incident. 

I'd gone back and then there was a second incident that, that, that was, that was the end of teaching for me. So, we'd, at this point, we'd gone through COVID. So, I'd gone back at the beginning of COVID. 

I was out doing, like, doing home visits, doing, still teaching all through COVID because we, we had, because the nature of our school, we were, we were open. And so, we were sort of doing some classroom teaching, home visits, making work packs, doing all of this. We'd got through that period and we were back in school, sort of, on a more full-time basis. 

But you had all the cleaning stuff. And I was sprayed in the face with cleaning solution by different students. And obviously, it triggered something because I'd had this breakdown. 

I'd recovered. I'd gone back to work and I had a full-blown, like, I was like, I'm going to have a full-blown panic attack. I've never had one before or since. 

I had a teaching assistant. I was like, I've got, I've got to go. I've just got to get out of this classroom.

Left my teaching assistant with the students, walked out downstairs to go into the little staff room that we had to just, like, pull myself together. I'm having a major, like, and a member of senior leadership had, was in the work base, had seen me come out, followed me down. I'm having a full-on, I'm crying, I'm, which is not like me at all, ever.

That's not me. And she started talking to me and I was like, and she's like, this isn't about you. I was like, I'm really sorry. 

Can you leave me alone, please? And for me to ask somebody to leave me alone is massive because I'm a real people pleaser. Like, I will go above and beyond, but I was like, can you not see that I'm in no fit state? And then that was it. I never went back.

Wow. All that resilience, all that resilience, everything you've gone through, what you went through with your own personal relationship history, with what you went through as a kid, with all of that resilience, when you finally got through to the other side, it's the people who should know better that let you down. Wow. 

Yeah. And what did it in the end? So I went off, I went off sick after that. And I still, I still thought I was going back. 

And the process of sort of having to have these meetings with this particular senior leader, they were all really traumatic. They were really, really triggering. I had occupational health input who, it was occupational health who suggested that I had post-traumatic stress disorder. 

And that the only way that I was going to recover was to leave teaching. That was going to be the only way that I would recover. And the way that they described it to me was, there's only so much that a person can put up with. 

And this is the straw that has broken the camel's back. You've reached your limit. You've reached your limit. 

And there was just, I made good, once the occupational health had made it clear that it was the environment, it wasn't me. It made it much easier to regroup, make a decision, say, right, that's it. Enough is enough. 

So I took the full period of time off sick that I could take off sick whilst I made a decision. And then, yeah. And then I decided that I just wasn't, I wasn't going to go back. 

And that was Easter 2021. I left teaching. Wow. 

Okay. Well, let's take a minute, shall we, Sarah? Because that is, that is what a way to, what a way to end that career that it's horrible. It's absolutely awful. 

And in my experience, Claire and Sarah, when I'm speaking to members of the Life After Teaching group, and you'd be amazed how many of them are in Prews and how many of them are suspended. The amount of teachers who get suspended in Prews, because it is like the Wild West on the one hand. So, you know, it's quite lawless inside some of the Prews that are run within the UK. 

But yet the senior leadership team hold the staff to the highest of standards. And there's almost like a disconnect between the reality of what's going on in the classroom and then what's expected of the teachers. So many of them are suspended. 

Many of them get injured. Many of them are then put on support plans, a Prew and that kind of world of alternative provision. I've had horror stories. 

I mean, yours, yours in particular is, it is appalling. Sarah, what are your thoughts on what you've just heard? And I doubt you've made your notes. No, I haven't because I was, I was, I was listening and it just, I think the thing that, that injures us most as adults, I'm speaking for myself, possibly Claire, but I know other colleagues that I've worked with, is when you, when the people who let you down are the adults, kids, you can, and you articulated it, Claire, in that moment with that child spitting, he, he made a calculated decision. 

It wasn't a decision that was in the heat of the moment. A lot of what happens with children is because their brain chemistry is such that they've not yet learned to regulate. Doesn't make it right. 

It's part of learning that, that there's, there's those conversations afterwards. But the adults should, should be supporting the adults in the best way to support the child. I keep coming back to this.

How dare somebody who's seen you walk out of a classroom heightened, distressed, clearly not in any fit state to have a conversation, start, quite to coin a kid's phrase, pecking your head. Let me go. Telling you how you should be dealing with it emotionally.

It's, it's nonsense. So I've come back to psychological safety. I've come back to teachers are quite often victims of very inappropriate behaviour. 

Let's, let's be tempered, but very inappropriate behaviour. That young person spat at a police officer on the street, they'd be arrested. It would be a public order offence. 

We're not doing these. Spitting at a bus driver. Correct. 

Aside from the, just the disgustingness of it, it needed dealt, dealing with, but I want to go to something else about injury because we, you talked then Sharon about, about staff being injured in crews. And, and I think, please correct me if I'm wrong, that what you're talking about is physically injured. There isn't an extensive conversation going on about the number of adults who are being mentally injured in their workplaces. 

And ACAS, health and safety executive, class mental injury is, it, work-related stress, this sort of stuff is a, it's an industrial injury and it just gets swept aside because it's not visible. It's, and, and I'm going back to something you said, Claire. And when it's a woman, it's histrionics and drama, but when three burly men can't deal with it, then something else gets done. 

Makes me furious. Makes me furious. So the tough nut leaves teaching. 

She goes, kids have flown the nest. Yes. You are post COVID. 

You are out of teaching. What happens then? You find yourself, you've lost that identity. You know, you're not going back.

What are your next steps? Because I think it's quite important because the term mortgage advice, advisor certainly whets the whistle of quite a few of our pit ponies, because it is something they fancy doing. I know we had Rob Newlands on. He's a mortgage advisor. 

It is something that teachers can segue nicely into. Tell us what you did going back to your Bradford and Bingley days. Hello, loyal listeners. 

We're not going to go full on Bob Geldof during Live Aid, but if you could give us some of your money, even pennies to help us fund the amazing Pit Pony podcast, the link is in the episode notes below. It's called Buy Us A Coffee. And we really do appreciate your contributions. 

Thank you. So when I worked in Bradford and Bingley, this was before mortgage regulation. And I was essentially a cashier. 

I used to open accounts and things like that. And all of my jobs before I was a teacher had always sort of been customer service based. So my first job was working on the ferries between New Haven and Dieppe when I was 16, 17, which I loved, but wasn't going to be going back to do something like that.

So I've always been very practical and pragmatic. So I've always been like, right, what have I got to do now? How do I solve this problem? What are the next steps? And so I literally, I wrote a list of all the jobs that I'd done before that I'd enjoyed. I worked out roughly what I needed to earn, which I'm really lucky I'm in a privileged position that because my children were grown up, there wasn't the cost of the children. 

My husband is in a role that means that he can take the brunt of the household costs. So there wasn't the same pressure to earn what I was earning when I was teaching. So I made a list of everything that I enjoyed, made a list of all the skills that I have, what are the transferable skills, what are the things that I'd seen and thought, oh yeah, I could have a go at that.

And what qualifications would be needed? How much would it cost? How long would it take? And literally I was like, well, I worked in the bank. I enjoyed that. Google was my friend.

And I was like, yeah, I'll be able to do that. That's literally all teaching skills. It's educating, assessing, research. 

That'd be fine. Not a problem. So I did the CMAP qualification, which I think I did it in about six weeks. 

I just crammed for it, did the exams. And then I looked for a trainee role. I knew that if I was going to learn it, I didn't want to be in a bank because you're only dealing with one lender. 

I wanted to be in an estate agency because that's where houses are bought and sold. And I figured if you're going to be a mortgage advisor, you need to know how estate agency works. So I applied for a trainee role at the largest estate agency group in the country, got the role and handed in my notice. 

And that was that. And so, yeah, I started in a, how old was I? 40? 41? Started in a trainee role. Yeah. 

It's got a bit of kudos for that, hasn't it? I'm a trainee. I'm a trainee. I'm only a young thing. 

It's like the reverse. It's the reverse of mature student, isn't it? When you're in your early 20s. Mature student's a great thing. 

Yeah. Trainee. Oh, honestly, I was just excited to be able to go to the toilet when I wanted to have a cup of tea.

I was delighted. I think your story's a great one. So what does your day-to-day look like now? What does your working day look like as a mortgage advisor? Oh, so because I run my own business, sort of half of my work is sort of working on the business and the other half of the work is mortgage advising. 

So for me, it's really important that the work that I do has some kind of social impact. So I specifically work with a very small niche. So my thing is about supporting regular working people, working class people out of the private rental trap and into home ownership.

I'm furiously passionate about it. And I've started to get involved in some activism alongside that. So it's not just sort of traditional mortgage advising. 

There's a real education bit involved in that as well. And I'm working on building a platform so that I can provide resources and like a plan for like, you know, here's your blueprint for if you're renting at the moment, this is what you can do to become a homeowner because there's so much out there that people don't know about. And my industry doesn't shout about because it's not profitable enough for them. 

So my day to day work is meeting with clients, problem solving, researching mortgages, decisions in principle, mortgage applications, a lot of handholding of guiding people through the process. I feel like my tribe find me. So I have a lot of neurodivergent clients who my approach seems to appeal to. 

I can't imagine why. But yeah, I do a lot of handholding through the process. The name of my business speaks for itself. 

I'm that mortgage woman. So you either love me or hate me. So when I bring up solicitors to hassle them about why things aren't progressing, I'm that mortgage woman. 

But yeah, so it's a real mix of everything. And because I'm because I'm self-employed, I can work everywhere, anywhere that I want to. So last week I was in Portugal. 

Yes, you were because you were supposed to be recording this last week. I mean, whilst we were stuck in the airport. And you know, I do think it's great because you've now, you've not lost who you are at the very heart of who you are because of your activism. 

You're still championing the underdog, you're championing the working class person. You are championing the person who should never own their own home, just like you were the girl who should never have been in that classroom. So thank you for spending some time with us this evening. 

It's been glorious. And I'm going to, I'm going to ask you to reflect now, Claire, since you've left the classroom. And I'm going to ask you to think about your sliding doors moment.

What, what has happened since you left teaching that you know for a fact would never have happened had you stayed in that classroom? So there are lots of things that have happened, but the big one, the main one is that my, my partner of, well, it's 20 years this month that we've been together, but he went from being my partner of 17 years to becoming my husband. I got married. Oh, that's lovely.

Which I don't think, I don't think would have happened. He, leaving, leaving teaching was very difficult. The first year was a real process of grief. 

You're grieving for your identity, you're grieving for your hopes for the future, all of the things that you thought were going to be and going to happen. Then, and being a teacher, like, it's a massive part of your identity. I still tell people that I used to be a teacher because I'm, I'm really, really proud of the fact that I was a teacher. 

And do you know what? If someone waved a wand and changed it and it got better, I'd go back in the morning. Who knows? But yeah, getting, getting married and my husband, he said, it's like the light has been switched back on and you are who I met. He said, it's like teaching sucked, sucked the essence of you out of you because I had to be quieter, smaller. 

I couldn't be as, as vocal now, you know, and I got back to being that, which is why my slide and doors moment is, is getting married. But I think the main thing is, is that I am myself again now. So, and that's why I've been able to get into the activism again, because I don't have to be small. 

I don't have to be quiet. I can stand up and say, actually, no, this is wrong. This is, you know, which is, is, you know, it's proving interesting in my work within my industry, especially as I refuse to do buy-to-let lending. 

So. You are talking to two women who never know when to keep their mouth shut and end up in trouble most, if not all of the time in their own Facebook group, in the world of the teaching profession. And long may we have those voices, Claire, long may we have them. 

And can I just thank you on behalf of Sarah, our listeners and myself really for spending that time. It's been an absolute delight. Thank you so much, Claire. 

Thank you. Thank you. Hello, friend. 

Hello. I've got a cup of tea. Good, good, good, good, good, good. 

I like, that was different, that one. I'm going to tell you why it was different, because she should never have made her way into teaching statistically. And actually she, she was the kid that we're all going to teaching to teach. 

Yes. Ironically, and she didn't make it, which was really, really sad to listen to her story. She should have been a head teacher, a hundred percent. 

She should have been a head teacher. Just it, it, it makes, it really makes me furious. This I've just been whilst I've been stood at the kettle, watching it boil and this whole thing about it being the adult's fault when a child behaves so, um, what's the word I'm looking for? Inappropriates an understatement of, of what I want. 

But, and, and even Claire herself said most of the time she could deal with that because, because she comes from a place of behaviour is communication and understands the difference and, and actually is a really forgiving attitude. And, and, but most teachers come from that place, to be honest, they might be angry in the moment, but afterwards we'll, we'll, we'll, we'll come to it. But there are far too many times my liking in my direct experience where I have seen staff challenged about what, almost to the point of what did you do to prevent it? It's the, oh, well she was wearing a short skirt. 

It's victim shaming. It's victim shaming. And, and there was a, unless I had very rose tinted glasses, it wasn't like that in the first 10, 15 years of my career. 

No, it wasn't. I remember the last school I worked in, they said, um, there's no such thing as, um, a badly behaved child, just a poorly prepared lesson plan. I know. 

I know. And it's, it's, it's the double standards, isn't it? It's the kid who can say that. Cause I remember when I was in the, started teaching the nineties, if the F word was used in front of the teacher, that was it. 

It was suspension out. It, that then by the time I was exiting common, common occurrences, to me, what annoys me is it's the double standards. The teacher can't even say under the breath, under immense pressure because they'll get hauled over the coals. 

But the tea, but kids can, I don't want to do a kid bashing episode because it's not the kids I'm bashing. Kids are going to behave like that. That is not the problem. 

It's the way the adults play with it. The teachers. Absolutely. 

Absolutely. Particularly. And I would go to, I go back to what, what Claire said, when there is a choice that the child is making. 

So as an example, I worked in a school that, that had 32 different languages spoken at its peak, 32 different languages. And there were, there was, I remember a particular year group, a particular cluster of boys who made it their business to utter expletives in their native tongue. Unfortunately for them, a lot of the support staff also spoke the same language. 

So the staff were made aware of what keywords were, so we knew what was going on, but that was calculated. It was, it was distinctly calculated. And yet the state, the same question would be asked, well, well, why, why are they not engaged in your lesson? What, what, what could you be doing better to, to mean that they're so busy? What was the antecedent? Shut up. 

Shut up. In your office and shut up. Yeah. 

The other thing that was really interesting for me, and it was very personal, is Claire's description of breakdown. Yeah. Because Claire's description of breakdown mirrored mine. 

And when she said she had the list of get up. And, and, and I, I think sometimes it's for somebody, for people who've never experienced it. So things that you know, you should be doing because they're basic personal hygiene, but you can't bring yourself to clean your teeth because it's just too much effort to pick the toothbrush up. 

It's too much effort to put your feet on the floor. You think so little of yourself. That's where it is. 

And I think that's the lack of the motivation. Why bother? It isn't though. It's for me, it wasn't rooted in, in thinking so little of myself, but literally no, I, and, and, and I've said this to you before, haven't I? There were days where Corian would come home and I would be in the same position on the sofa as I have been when he'd left work in the morning, except I'd have some crisp crumbs and, and maybe a few empty teacups next to it. 

That's, but when it literally, for me, a breakdown was I could not function on the most basic level. I didn't want to eat. I had no appetite. 

Um, and, and that is, I was telling you about it the other day, wasn't it? The book I'm reading at the moment, Wintering. And that's what that is about. It's not getting all snug and crackling fires and that kind of thing and getting all, what's the word? Is it heagy or? Hooger. 

Hooger or something like that. This is when the body shuts down and starts to hibernate. To helix. 

Because you cannot function outside in the norms of society. And, and we do, we shut down, we sleep, we stay indoors, we stay in bed, we stay under a duvet because it is the body's protective mode because it's done and it's spent. And she said that, didn't she? She'd reached her limit. 

I've used it all up with what she went through with domestic violence. She was on the child protection register, her illnesses, her children's illnesses. And I think that's, that's probably what did for her.

You have been, you should have looked after me. The abusive husband is always going to be a dickhead. Yeah. 

Parents let kids down. You can't legislate for your kids being ill or anything like that. But when you have got a member of the senior leadership team, it's your job. 

And if you can't even step up and do your role and do your job, we're done for. I did. It comes to me, it comes down to, for me, there was, there was a point in time where we started treating children like little uniform sausages in a, in a sausage factory. 

It's the old Pink Floyd, put them through the mincer thing. And then it, and then it very quickly turned into doing the same for staff. And we talked about this on the back end of the episode with Nick about, about the, where's, where's the point where people have stopped taking into account the reality of what might be going on in people's lives and, and everything that they're bringing with them. 

We talk about it with children. We talk about childhood trauma experiences in children and how that carries through. Why, why does this, it's that double standard again. 

Why does that not apply to the adults? Why doesn't it? Yeah. It's just me, the urinating. The turning point came twofold.

We started, like you said, questioning the teacher and the teacher's handling of the situation and the teacher's behaviour. But where that also went hand in hand was the lack of parental support as well. When I first started teaching, you could threaten a kid by phoning home.

Okay, I am going to phone your mother. And they knew they would be in for it because by default, the fact the teacher was on the phone, it's fine. And then what happened was parent power changed.

Complaints were being made. I was taken into an office and told to apologise for the way I'd spoken to a child in front of their mother. And you totally became disempowered in front of the parents. 

Not all, because one of the things I don't want to do is start to talk about school as if it is one thing. Right? Our kids alone, my kid went to Manchester Grammar. Your kid went to a state school in Warrington. 

You look at the state schools in Warrington. They're not even common state schools in Warrington. Each state school is different. 

Okay, so schools are different. And we talk about them as if they are the same institution. It's not. 

And Clare Gregg touched on something. She talked about class within teaching after we'd finished recording. And in many respects, the point she was making is the class and the education levels of the teachers removed from the average kind of kid you're teaching, depending on what school you're in.

But the one thing that you will find that runs as the common thread, irrespective of which type of school your kid goes to, there will be children who teacher bait, who make it their mission when they go through the door to bait a supply teacher, a teacher. And that doesn't matter whether you're Eaton or Bass Street Comp. You're going to get that in human nature. 

And that's the behaviour she was talking about. That kid was at choice. Yes. 

That child was at choice, made a choice, was completely vindicated. She was then expected to go in and teach that kid on a one-to-one. I mean, Jesus, tonight, then only when the child starts to amplify to see how far they can get away with it, goes for three other members of staff who happen to be male, something is done.

Kids sit at choice. And they're the ones that gets me. When they decide before the lesson that they're going to destroy that supply teacher's lesson, or there is a certain NFL teacher who's going to get it. 

That's where I think there should be accountability for your senior leadership team. But what do they do? They put those teachers on support plans. Yeah. 

And so the cycle continues. But on reflection, she was a loss to the profession. She was massive. 

She's really, really passionate about empowering working class people onto the property ladder. She was at the Toll Puddle Martyrs Festival this year, wasn't she? She's a brilliant, brilliant woman and a sad loss to the profession. But such is the way of the world, my friend. 

Indeed it is. So. And it's another day where I'll be angry about somebody else's circumstances.

100%. It's been a long day. My night is, my light is fading as we speak. 

It's been a long day. It's been a good day. It's always a good day working with you, my friend. 

We're always on the right. Did you get rid of the spider, by the way? No, I've left the spider in our office. Not because I'm frightened of spiders, because you were so dramatic with what you did.

You can't just say it. You should have said it. It had tattoos.

It's got knuckle dusters, has it? Knuckle dusters. Was it throwing gang signs? In deepest, darkest limb. Right, if you've got a spider in our office in Lim, the chances are it's got a tweed jacket and it's got a privately educated child. 

Bloody hell. Spider in the office. Per-believable. 

Unbelievable. No, it's been a good day and that was a great podcast. And we've got some good guests coming up, actually. 

We've got some interesting recordings coming up. In the pipeline. In the pipeline. 

Quite looking forward to it. What do you think about the fact we're on video? You keep forgetting that we're putting it on YouTube, don't you? Yeah, keep pulling faces. And I want to drink my tea. 

And can I just point out that my can, even though it looks like it might be alcoholic, it is not. What is it? It's sparkling ginger and blood orange. Fair enough. 

Can't argue with that. Right, so I'm gonna go and get myself something to eat. I'm having cottage pie. 

Nice. Enjoy. Not go far wrong. 

I'll see you on the other side, friend. Thanks for staying with us during another great episode of the Pit Pony podcast. And on behalf of myself, Sarah Dunwood, Mike Roberts at Making Digital Real, we wish you all the very best and we'll see you soon.

If you wish to contact me directly for a support session or a clarity call for your next steps, please find my link in the comments below. See you soon.