about bullying
Apr. 20th, 2010 01:10 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
valis2I just read a link to a bullying story (link from ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
atdt1991).
It hit really close to home. I'm sitting here thinking of the ways in which the bullying I experienced in my past echo in the present. It's like a bitter well inside of me that might never run dry. Like the author of this story, I fully expect those I meet to dislike me or not want to talk to me. I am always surprised when people want to be my friend or spend time with me. Going into any new social experience gives me the shakes.
I was a strange girl in elementary school, and I became stranger to my classmates when I changed grade levels, moving past third grade into fourth during the first month of the school year. The kids were older and taller and a little suspicious of me. I'm tall, so eventually I did manage to keep pace with the kids in my grade level, but as far as emotional maturity or social adeptness, I soon lost my footing. I managed to stay afloat through the rest of elementary school, mostly by being strange and hammy, but I made no new friends, and lost the few friendships I'd had because of the change in class.
In retrospect, I was completely unprepared for junior high school. My only sibling was an older sister was nearly seven years older than me and who was strictly forbidden from any sort of rough play or antagonistic behavior. And because I'd had so few friends and was so socially stunted, I was swallowed whole by junior high school. My home life was rule-oriented, so I was ready for rules, and even though I chafed against them, I understood them and wanted to follow them.
It mystified me when people broke rules or did antagonistic things toward each other. I had been taught not to hit or hurt, and to feel empathy toward those who had been hit or hurt, so junior high school was a horrible new world for me. I was introverted and moody, and I thought about strange things and wore strange clothes. I was definitely a target from the start.
What probably made me so entertaining was my over-the-top reactions. I'm sure I was amusing as hell. I gasp pretty loudly, and my face shows my emotions really well, and hurt comes through like a beacon. I'd get angry, too, but just could not get past the Do Not Hit rule, which made my impotent fury all the more entertaining, I'm certain. It was easy to get a rise out of me.
I made a couple friends, including a sad sack I felt sorry for, and it was one of the bitterest flavors in the well when she turned on me and used her mocking of me to secure herself a higher position on the social ladder.
The teasing was unending. The tormentors were sometimes complete strangers--kids I didn't even share a class with and who weren't even friends of the usual bullies. I was tripped. Things were stolen from me. I can even remember which things, all this time later. Gloves. Books. A Swiss army knife which was given to me by my father.
The bus was the worst. When the bell rang, I would grab my things and run, as fast as I could, to the bus, so I could sit behind the bus driver. It lessened their ability to mess with me. I learned this strategy the hard way, after having to tear a huge chunk of my hair out of my head because someone had put gum in it and I couldn't bear the feel of it flopping around. I still wonder what the bus driver thought when she found it on the floor.
The morning ride was much worse, actually, because I was on the second-to-last stop. And no one wanted me to sit next to them. I would get kicked off seats. I'd try to sit down in the aisle and the bus driver would demand I sit down on a seat, but wouldn't help when I was repeatedly kicked off. Once in a while someone would take pity on me, but it wasn't often.
I hated school. My grades suffered. In one class I sat in front of a kid who was a hoodlum, basically, and he made things horrible for me. And he made things horrible for the teacher, too, actually. He must have been held back, because he was at least two years older than me. I went up to the teacher after class one day and asked him if I could punch the hoodlum. The teacher said yes.
The next day, the hoodlum did something nasty, and I nearly did it. But I could not get past the fact that you Do Not Hit. And, staring the hoodlum in the eye, I saw how much worse it could get. How my life could be even more of a living hell than it already was. After class, the teacher rescinded permission to punch him.
I was desperate for any way out of this problem. One of the teachers I confided in just told me to ignore them, that it would go away. So I did. That made it even worse. I would pretend they didn't exist, so when I got tripped I'd just get up again like a robot and keep going. This was even more amusing than me shouting or insulting them, which I'd done a little of up until that point. So yeah, it got worse. And because I'd been given this strategy by a teacher, I couldn't fathom why it wasn't working, and I just kept trying to ignore them.
The last half of my eighth grade was the worst time of my life. I wanted to escape so badly. I withdrew completely. It felt like I was behind a waterfall, like I couldn't feel things properly any longer. I daydreamed about killing myself. I remember going into the ninth grade planning session and not caring, because I didn't think I'd be alive for it. I couldn't even imagine going through another year of that torture. My only problem was that I just couldn't figure out how to kill myself properly. I was terrified that it would go wrong.
My mom and dad were in the midst of their own worries, and I don't think they fully understood what was going on at first. Maybe they still don't, I don't know. I think my mom had been bullied, however, and even though they couldn't afford it, she took action and sent me to a private high school for my ninth grade year.
I will always be grateful for that, but not in the way you might think.
You see, this high school had a marching band. And you had to show up two weeks early for marching band practice (before school even started). So I did.
By the end of the first week, I was getting teased.
By the end of the second week, I was getting bullied.
Not one kid from my junior high school was there.
I had always assumed that it was the bullies. I always assumed it was their fault. That they were evil, sadistic little bastards and that I just needed to get away from them for my life to be perfect. I blamed them for every little evil action they took, for the horrible hopeless life I was living, for the bald patch on my head where I'd yanked out that hair.
When I came home that second weekend, it felt like I was waking up and really seeing myself. And I realized that I wasn't just a victim, I was acting like a victim. My reactions were so comical, my social skills so awful and awkward, and it all conspired to make me a beautiful target.
I spent the entire weekend coming to the realization that it wasn't the bullies, it was me. I had inspired this reaction in them. I had caused my own bullying somehow. They weren't blameless, not by a long shot, but they certainly weren't the full origin of my suffering. I'd made it myself with my own two hands. And it hurt to realize this.
I came to high school and I changed myself. I made myself ham it up, poke fun at things, laugh, anything. I forced myself to talk to people. I consciously became the Oddball, who is funny and goofy and strange. I did end up with a little teasing and a little bullying but it was nothing compared to what I'd gone through before. And by the end of senior year, I had friends (best friends, even) and I was sad to see high school end.
Of course, this is sounding pretty triumphant right now.
Nowadays, though, I see it as a mixed bag. On one hand, I adapted and made myself into someone more socially acceptable in order to protect myself. But on the other, that bitter well still flows inside of me. It's full of poison that I can only dilute a cup at a time, if that.
I went to a party several years ago, and met a bunch of new people. At one point I was introduced to a guy, and he made a crude joke about me within the first few lines of conversation. I think that most people would find him rude and offensive and just blow it off and forget about it within minutes, but I was horrified and stood there, frozen in shock for a split second, scared that even being an adult was no protection against this. Later, I dated a friend of his, who insisted that the guy was a complete sweetheart who would give the shirt off his back to anyone who needed it.
For me, though, it was predator and prey, all over again, looking into the tiger's eye and shrinking in fear. I know--my gloves weren't stolen, I wasn't punched in the stomach in front of people, and I wasn't on the floor with all of my books and papers spread out everywhere with people walking all over them and laughing. But it was enough to take me directly back to that time, to feel it like a jolt of electricity through my spine.
Some things never change. I feel things too deeply, I crave acceptance too much, and I'm scared of other people, of their power. There are things you forget, and things you can't forget. I read the linked entry and could not help but remember feeling those things, and remember being so thoroughly miserable, and I understand only too well what she's talking about.
Unlike the author, though, my bullies were not so easily targeted. It wasn't a trio of identifiable girls. There were lots of them, and I don't remember most of their names, nor even their faces. And if they apologized? I don't know if it would even matter like it did for the author. I don't remember what was said; it's really not even individual events or people. It's about the echoes that I still feel from it, the way that I want to protect myself, how I get scared about going into new social situations. How this sort of thing does make one stronger, in a way, but also leaves one more vulnerable in other ways.
My first job after high school was at a Wal-mart-style store. One of my old tormentors began to work there as part of the cleaning crew, and after a few weeks, I could sense that he was working up to making fun of me. Eventually he did, calling me one of the old names he'd used in junior high school.
I turned to him and said, "Well, at least I'm not a janitor."
You may see this as a triumph, but I do not. You see, standing next to him was a guy who was a sweetheart, who had asked me out for a date at one point. Who was also a janitor.
Um. This is not meant as a Poor Me thing. I am trying to deal with this and understand it better, and it always helps to write it out, and share it. Especially because oftentimes people have similar stories, and to share just makes it feel more bearable. So please don't feel like you need to send me virtual hugs or anything like that. I just want to process this and think about it.
atdt1991).It hit really close to home. I'm sitting here thinking of the ways in which the bullying I experienced in my past echo in the present. It's like a bitter well inside of me that might never run dry. Like the author of this story, I fully expect those I meet to dislike me or not want to talk to me. I am always surprised when people want to be my friend or spend time with me. Going into any new social experience gives me the shakes.
I was a strange girl in elementary school, and I became stranger to my classmates when I changed grade levels, moving past third grade into fourth during the first month of the school year. The kids were older and taller and a little suspicious of me. I'm tall, so eventually I did manage to keep pace with the kids in my grade level, but as far as emotional maturity or social adeptness, I soon lost my footing. I managed to stay afloat through the rest of elementary school, mostly by being strange and hammy, but I made no new friends, and lost the few friendships I'd had because of the change in class.
In retrospect, I was completely unprepared for junior high school. My only sibling was an older sister was nearly seven years older than me and who was strictly forbidden from any sort of rough play or antagonistic behavior. And because I'd had so few friends and was so socially stunted, I was swallowed whole by junior high school. My home life was rule-oriented, so I was ready for rules, and even though I chafed against them, I understood them and wanted to follow them.
It mystified me when people broke rules or did antagonistic things toward each other. I had been taught not to hit or hurt, and to feel empathy toward those who had been hit or hurt, so junior high school was a horrible new world for me. I was introverted and moody, and I thought about strange things and wore strange clothes. I was definitely a target from the start.
What probably made me so entertaining was my over-the-top reactions. I'm sure I was amusing as hell. I gasp pretty loudly, and my face shows my emotions really well, and hurt comes through like a beacon. I'd get angry, too, but just could not get past the Do Not Hit rule, which made my impotent fury all the more entertaining, I'm certain. It was easy to get a rise out of me.
I made a couple friends, including a sad sack I felt sorry for, and it was one of the bitterest flavors in the well when she turned on me and used her mocking of me to secure herself a higher position on the social ladder.
The teasing was unending. The tormentors were sometimes complete strangers--kids I didn't even share a class with and who weren't even friends of the usual bullies. I was tripped. Things were stolen from me. I can even remember which things, all this time later. Gloves. Books. A Swiss army knife which was given to me by my father.
The bus was the worst. When the bell rang, I would grab my things and run, as fast as I could, to the bus, so I could sit behind the bus driver. It lessened their ability to mess with me. I learned this strategy the hard way, after having to tear a huge chunk of my hair out of my head because someone had put gum in it and I couldn't bear the feel of it flopping around. I still wonder what the bus driver thought when she found it on the floor.
The morning ride was much worse, actually, because I was on the second-to-last stop. And no one wanted me to sit next to them. I would get kicked off seats. I'd try to sit down in the aisle and the bus driver would demand I sit down on a seat, but wouldn't help when I was repeatedly kicked off. Once in a while someone would take pity on me, but it wasn't often.
I hated school. My grades suffered. In one class I sat in front of a kid who was a hoodlum, basically, and he made things horrible for me. And he made things horrible for the teacher, too, actually. He must have been held back, because he was at least two years older than me. I went up to the teacher after class one day and asked him if I could punch the hoodlum. The teacher said yes.
The next day, the hoodlum did something nasty, and I nearly did it. But I could not get past the fact that you Do Not Hit. And, staring the hoodlum in the eye, I saw how much worse it could get. How my life could be even more of a living hell than it already was. After class, the teacher rescinded permission to punch him.
I was desperate for any way out of this problem. One of the teachers I confided in just told me to ignore them, that it would go away. So I did. That made it even worse. I would pretend they didn't exist, so when I got tripped I'd just get up again like a robot and keep going. This was even more amusing than me shouting or insulting them, which I'd done a little of up until that point. So yeah, it got worse. And because I'd been given this strategy by a teacher, I couldn't fathom why it wasn't working, and I just kept trying to ignore them.
The last half of my eighth grade was the worst time of my life. I wanted to escape so badly. I withdrew completely. It felt like I was behind a waterfall, like I couldn't feel things properly any longer. I daydreamed about killing myself. I remember going into the ninth grade planning session and not caring, because I didn't think I'd be alive for it. I couldn't even imagine going through another year of that torture. My only problem was that I just couldn't figure out how to kill myself properly. I was terrified that it would go wrong.
My mom and dad were in the midst of their own worries, and I don't think they fully understood what was going on at first. Maybe they still don't, I don't know. I think my mom had been bullied, however, and even though they couldn't afford it, she took action and sent me to a private high school for my ninth grade year.
I will always be grateful for that, but not in the way you might think.
You see, this high school had a marching band. And you had to show up two weeks early for marching band practice (before school even started). So I did.
By the end of the first week, I was getting teased.
By the end of the second week, I was getting bullied.
Not one kid from my junior high school was there.
I had always assumed that it was the bullies. I always assumed it was their fault. That they were evil, sadistic little bastards and that I just needed to get away from them for my life to be perfect. I blamed them for every little evil action they took, for the horrible hopeless life I was living, for the bald patch on my head where I'd yanked out that hair.
When I came home that second weekend, it felt like I was waking up and really seeing myself. And I realized that I wasn't just a victim, I was acting like a victim. My reactions were so comical, my social skills so awful and awkward, and it all conspired to make me a beautiful target.
I spent the entire weekend coming to the realization that it wasn't the bullies, it was me. I had inspired this reaction in them. I had caused my own bullying somehow. They weren't blameless, not by a long shot, but they certainly weren't the full origin of my suffering. I'd made it myself with my own two hands. And it hurt to realize this.
I came to high school and I changed myself. I made myself ham it up, poke fun at things, laugh, anything. I forced myself to talk to people. I consciously became the Oddball, who is funny and goofy and strange. I did end up with a little teasing and a little bullying but it was nothing compared to what I'd gone through before. And by the end of senior year, I had friends (best friends, even) and I was sad to see high school end.
Of course, this is sounding pretty triumphant right now.
Nowadays, though, I see it as a mixed bag. On one hand, I adapted and made myself into someone more socially acceptable in order to protect myself. But on the other, that bitter well still flows inside of me. It's full of poison that I can only dilute a cup at a time, if that.
I went to a party several years ago, and met a bunch of new people. At one point I was introduced to a guy, and he made a crude joke about me within the first few lines of conversation. I think that most people would find him rude and offensive and just blow it off and forget about it within minutes, but I was horrified and stood there, frozen in shock for a split second, scared that even being an adult was no protection against this. Later, I dated a friend of his, who insisted that the guy was a complete sweetheart who would give the shirt off his back to anyone who needed it.
For me, though, it was predator and prey, all over again, looking into the tiger's eye and shrinking in fear. I know--my gloves weren't stolen, I wasn't punched in the stomach in front of people, and I wasn't on the floor with all of my books and papers spread out everywhere with people walking all over them and laughing. But it was enough to take me directly back to that time, to feel it like a jolt of electricity through my spine.
Some things never change. I feel things too deeply, I crave acceptance too much, and I'm scared of other people, of their power. There are things you forget, and things you can't forget. I read the linked entry and could not help but remember feeling those things, and remember being so thoroughly miserable, and I understand only too well what she's talking about.
Unlike the author, though, my bullies were not so easily targeted. It wasn't a trio of identifiable girls. There were lots of them, and I don't remember most of their names, nor even their faces. And if they apologized? I don't know if it would even matter like it did for the author. I don't remember what was said; it's really not even individual events or people. It's about the echoes that I still feel from it, the way that I want to protect myself, how I get scared about going into new social situations. How this sort of thing does make one stronger, in a way, but also leaves one more vulnerable in other ways.
My first job after high school was at a Wal-mart-style store. One of my old tormentors began to work there as part of the cleaning crew, and after a few weeks, I could sense that he was working up to making fun of me. Eventually he did, calling me one of the old names he'd used in junior high school.
I turned to him and said, "Well, at least I'm not a janitor."
You may see this as a triumph, but I do not. You see, standing next to him was a guy who was a sweetheart, who had asked me out for a date at one point. Who was also a janitor.
Um. This is not meant as a Poor Me thing. I am trying to deal with this and understand it better, and it always helps to write it out, and share it. Especially because oftentimes people have similar stories, and to share just makes it feel more bearable. So please don't feel like you need to send me virtual hugs or anything like that. I just want to process this and think about it.
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(no subject)
Date: 2010-04-20 06:14 pm (UTC)You know what happened? I spent a whole detention getting slapped in the head repeatedly while trying to do my homework. By a girl who was rollerskating in circles around the room - man, I wish I'd had the guts to just stick my foot out once...
(no subject)
Date: 2010-04-20 06:19 pm (UTC)That's so absolutely horrible.
For me, it was opening my locker. I'd open it, and someone would come along and slam it shut, and I'd have to open it again. I just put up with it. Sometimes I'd try to actually force my body into the opening, but then, of course, they'd slam it on me, and after those bruises, I wasn't really keen on trying that again.
(no subject)
Date: 2010-04-20 06:29 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-04-20 06:32 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-04-20 06:54 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-04-20 07:07 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-04-20 08:01 pm (UTC)