I didn’t listen to my gut soon enough. And I’ve thought a lot about what that cost us. We kept pushing through - because that’s what we were told to do - long past the point my instinct was begging me to stop. By the time I finally trusted what I could see with my own eyes, we weren’t starting from a hard place. We were starting from a really hard place: more than 100 days of school missed in a single year. A hole that deep takes so much longer to climb out of. And here’s what I can’t unknow now: if I’d intervened earlier - if I’d trusted that scream in my gut instead of overriding it - the climb back would not have been anywhere near as steep. We made it. But we made it the long way, because we kept going when everything in me was saying don’t. So if your instinct is telling you that pushing harder is doing more harm than good, please don’t wait as long as I did. That feeling isn’t softness. It’s the most important information you have. Save this for the next time you’r...