Looking for Stories from those who have been Bullied

[venusianx13]

This topic is something that's very close to my heart. I was bullied out of public high school at age 15. I'm 30 now, and I see very clearly the affect having gone through such a thing as a teenager had on the next 15 years of my life. I recently revisited the topic with my therapist (who is a Dr.) and he urged me to blog about it, write about it, do something with it because it was a very profound story. 15 years later, and I'm still healing. Being a very self-aware person, I can see exactly where it has impacted me in life, but it has inspired some ideas that I'm trying to sort out at the moment.

 

I'd like to hear from others here who have some sort of story to share about having been bullied. Either as children, teens, or adults. And in what ways has it affected your life?

 

I'll share my story later, but I'd just like to hear from others for the time being.

[Maleficent]

I think a lot of people were bullied. I'm sure I was a little. I remember being teased. didn't have much friends but I don't think it had that big an effect on me. Definitely not as bad as some people.

 

However, though I am 30, I was bullied by a friend for the last two years and a half and this I would like to share.

 

We met while he was still a student at the department where I worked at the time and I started going to see his shows.

We spend the first two years on and off talking and not talking.

 

Last Summer, he started diong this thing where he would either 'forget' our plans, cancel at the last minute or be so late that we would end up spending little time together and I decided to let him know how it made me feel.

and that's when it started.

 

He started by saying I was a very negative person and that his friends didn't like my 'vibe ' (he's an artist) and that he would rather spend his time with those friends than hang out with me. He said I had issues with my relations with others and that I was keeping people away from me. etc etc etc.

For a few weeks, we were talking about it a lot and it always came down to me and my so-called problems.

We had one final talk before he left for Europe last August and then things changed. he was in Europe and we'd emails once a while.

 

As soon as he came back, he started doing it again - promised we'd have supper than decide to make plans with someone else and not let me know.

So I told him that this time, I wouldn't have it. If it helped him sleep at night to think I was the one with the problem, so be it - I didn't care.

 

He answered that he was very disappointed that I was still not secure with my interpersonal relationships etc. Same bull**** as last Summer.

He told me he would miss my birthday party and that we should not talk until next September.

 

When my birthday came closer I sent him an email telling him I would very much like to see him at my birthday party. (that was in March) and he didn't answer.

So I basically ended up telling him 'aaw yeah?! well I won't be your friend anymore!'

haha! pretty weird but that gave me closure. A few weeks ago he sent me an email asking when my album release party would be an I answered that I didn't want him there.

 

the end.

[umirano]

I was bullied. In primary for my name, and in high school because of my political views. I don't think it impacted me a lot, except for that I started to not give a fu.ck at a very young age. Could be bad as today I have very little patience in social settings that aren't comfortable. I just disappear. Sometimes that affects my relationships.

[melodicintention]

I was bullied pretty severely by adults and children. I grew up mixed (black, native american and causcasian) in missouri in the country where it was very racist. No one cared I was native american or white, they still called me the N word. Stalked by the kkk. Beat up and picked on in school. "Excused" from neighborhood sunday schools. Shunned. Well, until I kicked this girls ass in 8th grade and it turned around and for some odd reason, I got popular. I think because it was the 80s and I went total rock and roll rebel and the kids started to look up to me. Stupid how all that works.

 

For years it hurt me, held me down, made me feel bad about myself. I actually let them make me feel as if i was subhuman. I didn't begin to feel good about myself until my early 30s.

 

Now I am 41 and I live in LA. No one here beleives me when I tell them I am part black. It's like the total opposite, I get accused of being latino lol. It's so weird how much things changed. And even if I can convince someone i am part black, they don't give a hoot.

 

So now today, in the long run, I am glad I was bulled. Why? Because I don't take ANY crap from ANYONE. I learned to become a survivor, I am not a victim. Although I never wish bullying on anyone, it can make you tougher. I have done things with my life I don't beleive I would have due to bullying. I was forced to be a loner as a kid, and now today I don't rely on anyone for because I turned it around and learned how to ignore them and better myself for myself.

 

Bullying sucks. The sad thing is, as an adult I still get bullied. Now it's white collar bullying though. My last job, my boss was a total bully. The upside, I was prepared because I survived high school bullying and understood his personality.

 

One kinda side comment I have, we hear all these anti-bullying campaigns. The problem is, bullying isn't going away if it's in the workplace where we are supposed to be adults and build a product together. Bullying isn't going to end no matter how much we cry about it or try to bring awareness to it. So my idea is, we need to start an Anti-Take Crap campaign. Teach people how to deal with bullying more than focusing on how to stop bullies. Bullies have no power if you can effectively ignore them. Most of them (at least in adolescence) are just seeking attention anyways. Just my 2 cents

[venusianx13]

Thank you for your stories!! I apologize that I haven't had ample time to continue with this thread, but will post my own story either later today or tomorrow and make comments to those who have posted. Just wanted to let you know I haven't jumped ship.

Edited June 4, 2013 by venusianx13

[hppr]

Everyone's been bullied at one time or another but some of us got it harder than others.

 

I was always the really scrawny, introverted kid at school so I got it good and hard from boys and girls all the way up to high school. Stuff like the 'hot girl' crowd rating me the ugliest guy in the whole school etc, hard to live down in your formative years when all you want to do is make friends/meet girls.

 

As a result I became more introverted and I also learned how to fight. One thing I learned is that if someone hurts you and you hurt them worse they leave you alone. Like how to verbally berate the 'hot girl' types and make them cry in class and how to sucker punch or otherwise outlast the guys who were beating me up in fights.

 

Academically I went from a 4.0 in my freshman year to graduating with a 2.something GPA my senior year and dealing drugs was my main hobby. Parents never really cared other than to berate me when I got a bad grade in a class or had to go to summer school because I flunked something from ditching so often. They never cared about me, still don't, they are only being nice to me because they want grandkids now.

 

I enlisted after graduation and spent 4 years in the air force which were great years, the best of my life, after that I went back to school at a working-university type place and got a bachelors and now everything is fine.

 

But yeah, from around age 12-20 was Hell on Earth for me lol.

[Taramere]

Agree with everybody else that most people will experience bullying at some point. I can think of times I was bullied at school, and I can also think of times that I was the bully. Not often, but occasionally.

 

Generally it was a case of you would fall out with two or more of your friends and they'd gang up against you for a bit until it got resolved....and at a later time you'd be part of the group ganging up temporarily against the friend you'd fallen out with. It was a case of switching power imbalances - and when you were on the right side of the power imbalance you made the most of it. Horrible, I know, but kids often are.

 

In terms of more serious bullying that had long term effects, I was bullied a lot by my older brother when we were kids. Perhaps the extent of that made any bullying I encountered at school seem fairly trivial in hindsight (though doubtless falling out with schoolfriends and dealing with their cattiness upset me at the time). I feel bad even saying that he bullied me, because we get on well now and we share a lot of good memories from childhood too - but there's no doubt that he could be a bully. The odd thing about it is that he struggles now in ways that I don't. He harbours a lot of grudges against my parents. Stuff that I feel he should have been able to let go of long ago. On the other hand, he has succeeded in certain areas of life (eg going on to have a family of his own) in which I've failed.

 

I hesitate to say that bullying is character building, because that gives positive connotations to the bullies' actions that they should not have. However, like any obstacle in life, bullying can present you with challenges that force you to develop exceptional strengths in some areas. Unfortunately there are often long term costs to other areas of your life.

[Anela]

I was - and in a way I have been for over a year now - but I don't want to talk about it at the moment, because I'm having a nice afternoon. I'll probably be back. ♥

[hppr]

Generally it was a case of you would fall out with two or more of your friends and they'd gang up against you for a bit until it got resolved

 

Yeah that happened to me it took awhile before it 'resolved' as well.

 

School, especially teenaged schooling, is literally Lord of the Flies.

[HokeyReligions]

I wasn't bullied I was tormented from age 3 until after highschool. I will always carry the emotional and physical scars.

 

I was the kid whose dad was sick. We hwd a wheelchair ramp on our house. My parents and grandmother overcompensated for what they endured during the depression by stuffing their kids with food constantly.. we were all chubby. Mom was bipolar though no one knew what that was then. She never had friends so I had no role models when it came to socialising. I tried to get onto Campfire girls in grade school. They refused my application! I did finally get into girlscouts but was an outcast. I was hit with rocks and a hard rake handle to my head once. That and more was all before I was 12. It got worse later. I could go on but you get the idea.

 

I survived but I still daydream sometimes about what life might have been like but I don't confuse the daydream for life and I don't obsess. I very seldom think of those time and when I do I make myself remember the few interspersed events of "average" living I enjoyed.

 

Maybe all of that toughened me up to handle the many deaths including my two beautiful children and the serious illnesses that sometimes seem to plague my family.

[MercuryMorrison1]

I was bullied a little in high school for being the introverted reader type who kept to myself.

 

''Apparently if you could care less about Football then there's something wrong with you''

Anyway, on one particular day I was walking from the Woodshop building back to the main building of our high school when I noticed I was being followed by two of the Football players. I didn't pay them much attention, they made a few cat calls to try and provoke me into saying something back to them.

 

At this point, I guess they became frustrated because I wouldn't conform to their ridiculing, so one of them (now only about 5 feet behind me) kicked me in the left ass cheek! At this point I finally lost my cool and swung my back pack which had around 30lbs of books in it as hard as I could striking him in the face, Bully #1 was down for the count.

 

At this point Jock # 2 attempted to attack me, but unbeknownst to him I was at the time a Blue Belt (now Black) in Jiu-Jitsu. I quickly took him down and sub missed him as well. I do give them credit though...I am 6,1 and about 190lbs...So at least they were in fact picking on someone their own size.

 

The best part of all of this was that it was witnessed by the majority of our graduating class, I of course had to attend ISS (In School Suspension) for the rest of the school year, and the coach's really hated me after this because I beat up two of their beloved Football players.

 

But in retrospect I'm glad things turned out the way they did, I believe they both learned an embarrassing lesson the hard way, and I never had ANY problems with bullies for the rest of my time in grade school.

[Shooting_Star]

I think everyone has dealt with a bully at some point in their lives.

 

I was bullied a lot in school because my family wasn't "rich enough". I wore a lot of hand me downs because I have a lot of older cousins. It effected my self esteem and I gained a lot of weight in middle school. That plus my issues at home, caused me a lot of issues and eventually I just stopped going to school. Because of that I was placed in DJS and in group homes. My last group home was a therapeutic placement and I learned a lot of coping skills. Once home (at 15), I still didn't want to go back to the school I originally attended. So I was placed in alternative schooling. When I turned 16, I dropped out.

 

I've gone to classes to get my GED but still haven't gotten it. It's become one of my goals in life to do so. And hopefully it'll be soon. I'm only 23 now, so a lot of time hasn't really passed, but because I surrounded myself with a lot of positive people, I don't really struggle with self esteem issues anymore.

[Col1]

People who bully are broken on the inside.