My charge in this study is to explore the lived experience of a high school teacher while immersed in a problem solving situation in a classroom setting. The main gist of this investigation is to textualize and, thereof, capture the essence of a teacher's encounter of failing to solve a mathematics problem during one of the classroom sessions. To this end, I use personal experience as a lens to reflect on a teacher's reconstruction of the situation where personal meanings about problem solving and the problem-solving instruction are concealed.