i have a VERY strange old man who i teach in his home, he does nothing but go on about his poor wife, who is in care, that lasts for five minutes the rest of the time he is going on about how brilliant he is at everything and then it's all 'jesus lord my saviour' etc, he phones me up in the week, which i have told him not to unless he is cancelling a lesson.....

the question is, as i have never come across this before, should i 'dump' him face to face or would a letter be ok..... yes i'm a chicken.... but, i know he will be phoning as i would like to take my number off him, but i expect he has it elsewhere, if he can find it!!!

any suggestions????? aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh

As they say round here, "drop him like a soiled glove". Can you recognise his number if he rings, and not answer? On my home phone I have saved different ring tones for certain people, so I am able to ignore calls if I wish and let the answer machine take them.

you also used to be able to block certain callers with BT I'm not sure if you can still do that.

I teach quite a few pensioners and often i have to lend a sympathetic ear if they've had a bad week or haven't been feeling well etc which i don't mind doing - but to a certain extent!!! Some of them at the start of the lesson will tell me about their week, but never longer than five mins as i then steer them towards the lesson and how their practice has been going etc. I would not be happy teaching the man you teach, that's for sure. No teacher should be made to feel uneasy when the day comes for a particular person's lesson, or indeed uneasy when their phone rings. If i were you, I'd tell him that you are no longer able to fit him in for lessons. Don't give any specific reasons. Probably not worth potentially upsetting him by telling him the truth! Once you've told him, there should be absolutely no need for him to phone you again. I hope it goes ok for you.

This is not unusual, for someone who is upset by some trauma, to want to confide in someone he trusts. As music teachers, we are all in a position to offer sympathy and support where it is needed by pupils. You may be the only person your pupil feels able to trust outside his family. If you can bear it, give him a little time. As to him phoning you, this is a sign that he does trust in you. I would tell him you really cannot take calls other than those directly concerned with his lessons, because you may be teaching, or awaiting an important call and need the phone to be free. If you cannot help him by listening, I would suggest to him that he asks his doctor for referral to a councellor. I sympathise with you . If he is a Christian, you could suggest that he should remember he has the best of all councellors in Jesus. He will listen and send comfort to him. Busylizzie.

thanks, but he is REALLY creepy..... i do empathize with his situation, and i try to steer him back onto his music lesson, but he is obliviouse (can't spell that one!!) to my attempts and then tells me how he told a professional entertainer how to play beethovens moonlight sonate properly and if it wasn't for him etc (i've had this one for three weeks now, being two lessons and 2 hours on the phone enquiring about lessons!!) and then he talks about unappropriate things and also, when he is on the phone you can't get rid, my phone ran out of 'juice' and he immediatly phoned me back, TWICE!! and also phones me in work!!!!

yup, i'm dropping him..... anyone want a new student????????

[quote name='flutey1' date='Oct 19 2009, 12:04 PM' post='885544']
[quote name='busylizzy' post='885540' date='Oct 19 2009, 11:47 AM']
[quote name='flutey1' post='885522' date='Oct 19 2009, 10:50 AM']
i have a VERY strange old man who i teach in his home, he does nothing but go on about his poor wife, who is in care, that lasts for five minutes the rest of the time he is going on about how brilliant he is at everything and then it's all 'jesus lord my saviour' etc, he phones me up in the week, which i have told him not to unless he is cancelling a lesson.....

the question is, as i have never come across this before, should i 'dump' him face to face or would a letter be ok..... yes i'm a chicken.... but, i know he will be phoning as i would like to take my number off him, but i expect he has it elsewhere, if he can find it!!!

any suggestions????? aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh
[/quote]

This is not unusual, for someone who is upset by some trauma, to want to confide in someone he trusts. As music teachers, we are all in a position to offer sympathy and support where it is needed by pupils. You may be the only person your pupil feels able to trust outside his family. If you can bear it, give him a little time. As to him phoning you, this is a sign that he does trust in you. I would tell him you really cannot take calls other than those directly concerned with his lessons, because you may be teaching, or awaiting an important call and need the phone to be free. If you cannot help him by listening, I would suggest to him that he asks his doctor for referral to a councellor. I sympathise with you . If he is a Christian, you could suggest that he should remember he has the best of all councellors in Jesus. He will listen and send comfort to him. Busylizzie.
[/quote]

Thanks busylizzy, i have done all that, i'm the church organist so i don't need converting, but he is soooo interested in his own voice he doesn't listen... i was in his house for 2hrs with him constantly talking on his first lesson, he doesn't come up for air!!!! i moved numerous times to go, got to the kitchen and then the garden still talking!!! going on about how wonderful he is.. i even suggested he join a male voice choir to make friends... he harped on about how wonderful his voice was, how he used to sing all day long because he loved the sound of his own voice!!!! ah, that's why he talks so much!!! i do feel really sorry for him and really guilty for wanting to drop him, but he is really stressing me out... perhaps it's me......
stick with kids they are much easier.... one of my kids is buying me a car as he told me i need a new one and he is also making me a shop!!! hahahahaha, now that's the kind of stress i can deal with.......

thanks for letting me vent........

Errgh, I would get a phone with call screening right now. Then you can pick up the call as and when you wish. Sounds like this guy wouldn't even get the message if you told him you were going to stop the lessons! Or just put your phone on answer phone so you can hear people leave a message.

You could always say you re emigrating. I think your excuse needs to be drastic!

The fact that he is saying 'inappropriate things' rings very loud alarm bells for me. I had broadly similar problems with someone except he was the teacher and I was the pupil. It ended very badly. Drop him, don't feel guilty. You shouldn't be afraid to pick up the phone. As to how to drop him, I can understand that you might find it difficult to do face to face - perhaps you could call him? Personally I would feel a bit cowardly sending a letter, though I can see why you might prefer this.

Depending on what level of inappropriateness this hit, did you feel the need to do anything about it to stop others having the same issues?

We have someone a bit like that at orchetra. His wife died a few years ago and he's lonely and wants to talk the whole time. Unfortunatly he talks at people and not with them. We have to "rescue" new members before they take fright and leave.

If you're not happy then don't teach him. As said before you don't have to give a reason. Be brave you'll feel better when you've done the deed.

I do sympathise. Some years ago, when I was an AB rep abroad, I was contacted by a teacher who wanted his pupils to get involved in the exams. He started phoning me more & more frequently and would talk for hours about his life and his problems and I found it very difficult to deal with, expecially as some of the calls were quite late at night. I realised that he was lonely and just wanted someone to talk to, but there are limits to my kind nature and I had to eventually make him understand that these calls were not welcome. He did get the message in the end, but I must admit I panicked a bit when he told me he was thinking of moving to my area!!
For your own peace of mind, you need to get the message across that this can't go on. I can appreciate how difficult this would be face to face, or even on the phone - do you have a mutual acqaintance who could perhaps talk to him on your behalf?

OK, here's the sad story:

The inappropriate talk consisted mainly of intimate details of his marriages. I thought the best way to manage it was not to show any interest and to steer back to the lesson. He talked far too much in general and wasted at least half of every lesson. He never showed any signs of winding up the lesson so I had to do it - I resigned myself to my one-hour lesson overrunning by 30 minutes every time, and would simply start putting my instrument away once we'd reached that limit. He also ranted in a grumpy-old-man kind of way about a range of issues, and was constantly making racist remarks. We had a bit of a confrontation about that one day and he toned it down after that.

I suppose I didn't worry about other people having issues - I felt that as an adult I could cope with the situation, and I knew his other pupils were adults too.

On the plus side - as it seemed at the time - he came to my house and was very flexible when I needed to rearrange a lesson. He took a friendly interest in my daughter, who was learning an instrument at school, and when she was at home during the holidays offered to spend some time with her and give her a few tips (my lesson was normally during school hours).

I looked on him as a lonely person who probably needed a listening ear, and tried to tolerate his foibles. I did find the lessons musically rewarding.

One morning the police arrived at my door and told me I should discontinue the lessons for my childrens' sake. My teacher was a convicted child abuser and had moved to my area after his name came off the ### offenders' register (apparently you only stay on it for five years). He is not supposed to teach children or even to teach on premises where there are children. Thankfully my daughter had come to no harm because I had supervised his time with her, but it gave me a bad fright and has made me a lot more wary and cynical.

I'm not suggesting that the OP's old man is the same, but I feel strongly now that if you find someone creepy and uncomfortable to be around, then you should just stay away from them. Even before the police visit, I had enough reason to get rid of my teacher, but I put up with him far too long because I felt sorry for him.

I thought of the emigrating one!! hahahahahaa



o.m.g sounds like mine.... yup..... i was 'trapped' in his house for 2hrs listening to him rant on about how great he was... yes, and the personal details how great he and his wife were....... better than anyone he new.. and how he used to be a fitness instructer and used to have women who could've been page three models!!!! mmmmmmmmmm


thanks to all the feedback on my creepy old man.....

i summoned up the courage and finally got hold of him, after the third phone call.... yes, i resorted to a phone call, couldn't summon up the courage to go over to his home.. luckily he doesn't know where i live.. anyway...

i told him i couldn't fit him in anymore due to work commitments.... not that you creep me out...
anyway, after all the stress and worry, i was pretty painless.... he accepted it and than went on to tell me, he is having lessons with another two piano teachers anyway!!!!!!! OMG!!!!

then i shouldn't be too surprised, as he was really shocked when i arranged one half hour lesson a week, he wanted one everyday!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! yes i know that should've have been a warning sign, but i had arranged the time and couldn't back out....... yes i am the lion out of wizard of oz!! hhahahahaa, cowardly custard.... i think i will stick to kids... less hassle...... thou i must add, he is not the first oap i have taught, the others where lovely and not at all mmmmmmmmmmmmmm..

THANKS TO ALL THE REPLYS, AND PUTTING UP WITH MY MOANING......
UPWARDS AND ONWARDS.......... AND GOOD LUCK TO HIS OTHER TWO and counting!! PIANO TEACHERS!! HAHAHAHAHAA

Recently discovered that you can also block numbers on most modern mobile phones...check the handbook

thanks ... i 'dumped' him last night.... i have him on my mobile so i now who it is when people phoned, if he is quick enough to do 1471, otherwise i didn't give him my mobile number...phew!! hahahhaa hopefully he won't phone anymore.... told everyone not to put him thru to me.. hahahahhaa. fingers crossed..... sad...

he also has two other piano teachers!!! and counting by the sounds of it, as soon as he finds out someone teaches the piano he asks them for lessons!!!!!! unbelievable... hay ho... i'm soooooooooo happy and relaxed knowing i don't have to teach him anymore... aaaaaaaaaaaaaah bliss...

Well done flutey! Glad it turned out to be much less painful than you expected. He's probably a harmless old man living in a fantasy world, but you can do without the hassle. And he's not short of piano teachers!