Life Begins After Recess

Why i created after recess

Hi, I’m Wendy.

I’m a former classroom teacher, homeschool parent, lifelong learner, and the creator of After Recess.

I know what it feels like to love the work and still feel stuck. I’ve lived the burnout, the pivot, and the reinvention. That’s why I built this platform. I’m not only here to share resources, but to create a space where educators can explore options, find support, and remember that they are allowed to want more.

For more than a decade, I worked in education because I believed in its power to change lives. I still do.

What I didn’t expect was how often I would see students, families, and educators struggle inside a system that should have supported them. I witnessed incredible teachers carrying impossible expectations. I saw bureaucracy, red tape, politics, cliques, and hidden curriculum create obstacles where there should have been opportunities. I watched students get lost in the shuffle. I watched educators lose themselves trying to keep up.

Early in my career, staying late was expected. As the years went on, I fought hard to create healthier boundaries, but I quickly learned that many leaders interpreted boundaries as a lack of commitment. There was often an unspoken expectation that the best educators would sacrifice more, stay longer, and carry the work home.

That created a tension I lived with for years.

I knew the lack of work-life balance was unhealthy. I knew constantly running on empty wasn’t sustainable. Yet I also understood that falling behind, or earning a reputation as less committed, could bring its own consequences.

Eventually, I stopped asking how to survive it and started asking a different question:

How do I get out?

That question led me out of the classroom, into homeschooling, a new career, and ultimately to creating After Recess.

Today, this space exists for educators, homeschool families, and anyone navigating change. Many are still teaching, while others are exploring a different path. Some are rebuilding, and many are simply trying to figure out what comes next.

You don’t need to have all the answers to belong here because I certainly don’t.

Here, you’ll find honest reflections, practical resources, encouragement, and conversations about what happens when we give ourselves permission to question assumptions, change direction, and build lives that don’t require us to lose ourselves in the process.

Whether you’re staying, pivoting, homeschooling, or still figuring it out, I’m glad you’re here.

You’re not alone.

And you’re more than a job title.