Bara, nanny in Ottawa (lower town / sandy hill / university of ottawa) K1N

The last 4 years of my life have been the best years I have ever lived. I have a natural gift and ability with kids. No matter how difficult the child is, leave me with him/ her and that child will change to the better. I love children to death. After all my years of search for what I am meant to do in life, doing my bachelor’s degree in Journalism and media and my post-graduate diploma in Documentary production and screen-writing, I still was not fully fulfilled until finally, 4 years ago, I decided to tutor on the sideline in my free time. One of my students was a 7 years-old little girl. God bless her for showing me the way. She did not do anything but being herself. Being herself, she taught me that the only medium where I don’t feel like I have to drag myself out of bed to work every single day and hate my life for not having any real purpose to it, is working with children. I was finally excited about my day every single day. I could not wait for my lessons with her. Sometimes her mom would be with her friends and would not pick her up until 4 hours later. That was still so wonderful to me. I know I taught her a lot in our lessons but she taught me so much too and changed my life forever. It was then that I realized that my purpose is to be a good teacher to make a good and much-needed change in this world. I realized then that God had bigger plans for me than making movies or publishing books or becoming a journalist. Of course I still do those wonderful things but teaching and babysitting are very noble vocations and I was meant to pursue my life in that path.

Four years later, after going back to school and getting my master’s degree in Childhood and Early childhood Education, now I am so grateful every single day of my life that I finally found my calling. I taught children of different ages and different backgrounds and geographical locations for the past 3 years and I have always, every single day, felt like I was finally in the right place. I made many differences in the lives of children and they have all made many differences in mine. They have been my mentors too and I love all my kids to bits. I was waking up every single day looking so forward to going to work and being with the kids. Waking up at 6 in the morning was finally exciting. Being a night owl all my life, having to become an early bird and sleeping early to wake up early, finally felt Great. Every single thing in my life changed for the better and became happier. Every day in the classroom or childcare environment was different than the day before and I finally felt the rewards of doing something I am so passionate about.