There are two points to this story — to illustrate another way that apologizing isn’t acceptable —
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And to illustrate what happens when blood sugar is out of control.
A couple of years ago, right after being diagnosed with diabetes and
with a blood sugar of over 400 … a teacher aide interrupted one of
my classes. I politely asked her to leave, and when she continued to
interrupt my class time by standing in front of the computer I was
doing the demonstration on, I yelled at her to get out of my room.
Probably a bit strong of a reaction, and if my blood sugar had been
lower, I might have not yelled as quickly. Woman never DID budge.
As a result, she complained to one of the administrators, and I
refused to back down. Geez, it was MY classroom, I was teaching MY
class, and she was interrupting. I ended up discussing it with the
principal, and no one ever did acknowledge interrupting me put her in
the wrong.
To mollify everyone involved, I agreed to let her come up to my
classroom, introduce her to my students, and apologize to her in front
of them. She wouldn’t accept anything less.
My students were appalled! I told them what was happening the day before she came.
And after she left, I let them know that while the witnesses agreed she was in the wrong, third parties had determined that I needed to apologize and it wasn’t a big deal for me. I truly
shouldn’t have yelled, even if she wasn’t listening.
Good things came of it. My students learned that apologizing for
misbehavior — justified or not — is not that big of a deal, and the
aide and I are at least cordial, and she sees things my way now.
She also hasn’t interrupted a class of mine since.