Insults/comments that have stayed with you

[hellocats]

Has anyone ever said something so mean and cutting that it's stayed with you for years and years?

A boy at school said I looked like a man, this was between the ages of 12-14 so very sensitive age. It ruined my confidence, and even now when I'm in my early 30s, it's still there in my head. I don't believe any compliments if I receive them, and I've had very low standards in men because quite frankly I've been amazed a heterosexual man would be attracted to me in the first place.

No amount of therapy or reassurance from others will eradicate it from my head.

A teacher once wrote on a report, ‘she is not a naturally gifted academic.’ i.e, not very bright.

I am a teacher now and have a total opposite style of communicating with my children and families.

True this, yes. There was a boy in my class who called me ''ugg'' short for Ugly. He even clarified this to me in case I thought it meant something else. It was weird because although I knew I wasn't beautiful, I also knew I wasn't ugly. It was like somebody determined to take you down and shame you and belittle you. My feeling at the time was just perplexed whyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy. I wish I'd responded with something cutting. He was more popular than I was. I felt at the time that I had to be careful. I met him years later and I reminded him he'd called me ug for four years. He did look embarrassed.

My mother when I was 11 'your size is hard to buy [clothes] for'. It wasn't the only comment along those lines that's never left me and I feel like a hippo whatever my weight.

I was tall and wore a 90s size 10-12 so not huge, just an early grower. I don't know why she couldn't just buy me adult clothes.

I was 16 and my history teacher wrote in my report: "I can confidently say we are all weary of Limited's asinine comments in class."

My parents had to look it up before deciding what to do. They told me to take no notice. Still, we all learned a new word.

I honestly was no trouble and history was one of my favourite subjects. I just used to ask questions when I wanted to understand something, which I thought was the point of education and still do.

I toned it down a bit but continued to ask a few relevant questions and was rewarded with an A at A level. Luckily the teacher who doesn't like you isn't the one who gets to mark your final exam.

When I was about 13 a girl in my class asked me when I was going to get my ears pinned back. There was and is nothing unusual about my ears but I was self-conscious about them for many years.

I was told by a boy in my class, at around age 12 that my knees turned inwards. Which doesn't sound like a huge deal but I was massively paranoid about it to the extent I considered taking a hammer to them to knock them outwards.
I was also told by my mother around age 15 that I'd never be "sexy" - she had called me back to the living room just as I was walking out and I kind of swivelled around the door frame to poke my head back in, obviously reminiscent of some kind of pole dancer in her head. It was an off the cuff remark but one that has plagued me as an adult. I've never felt alluring and frequently wonder if my partner feels the same way about me...

No. It doesn't. And this is a harmful message to perpetuate. It sets the scene for girls and women accepting being spoken to like crap and their self esteem damaged just because a boy "likes" them. People who like you don't insult you.

A boy at college publicly said I looked like a wide mouth frog when I smiled.

Arsehole.

My ' best friend ' told me I was coping with the covid lockdown because I was so insular.

Yes,

My auntie told me I had a big nose at age 10! Never forgotten it.

Also a guy said a very racist joke in my early twenties at a new job. Never forgotten that either - and I wouldn't repeat it here.

That I've got big hands. I'd never given much thought to my hands before that but I realised at that moment that I did indeed have big hands and I'm aware of that all the time now.

"You're small, spotty and have glasses and braces, don't have much going for you do you?" Still sticks with me. I'm still small, spotty and have glasses but at least the braces are gone!

A friends mum made reference to my "thunder thighs" when I was age 11. Still hate my legs now.

My grandmother would tell me the following -

I wasn't pretty like the other girls but "maybe" one day I'd be attractive. (Aged 5 onward)

I was like Dawn French to look at. (Tweens/teens)

She also called me fatty and fat shamed me until the week she died.

It destroyed my confidence actually but I appreciate now I'm not a child she was full of shit and I'm not the grotesque girl she painted me as.
And I'm fat but not remotely unshapely fat. She used to make me breathe in when we'd go anywhere, it was hell.

At 14-15 had a teacher make a humiliating comment to me in front of the entire class. In conversation said I liked lots of blankets on my bed and that I was always cold and she said, “You’re too pale and skinny, it’s not healthy. You’re probably anemic.”

I told my uncle later that day and he said, “when someone says something like that, remember that they are either cruel or stupid.” He also had a witty comeback that made me laugh. He knew her and told me he thought in her case she was stupid and rather unhappy.

It really helped me and even today I tend to think of people who say hurtful things as idiots. I’ve been able to laugh off quite a bit because of it.

It definitely helped me blow it off later when a kid yelled “Shut up, you’re ugly!” At me in front of class. (I haven’t forgotten, but I thankfully didn’t take it to heart.)

Also, when I look back as an adult, all the kids in my school were really adorable. Looks had nothing to do with who was popular or the recipient of mean comments. That was all about the person speaking.

A school teacher told me before a school photo that my hair was a mess and I needed to brush it (my hairs naturally curly) and that I needed a longer skirt because big girls like us can't get away with shorter stuff.

I was 9, not fat and my hair was curly but my mum had spent ages trying to tame it and had put mousse and things through it. My school picture was awful. Frizzy hair and I had tears when teacher had called me fat.

I was told to work on my resilience.

Yes, fair point.

My mum has form for all sorts of comments over the years… a particular gem which stayed with me was ‘you’re bigger than you look, you just hide it well in clothiers’ thanks mym!

Being called fat and stupid by my dad for most of my life (despite being very slim until around age 11 and I'm intelligent enough to have got a first in my degree).

A boy in year 7/8 telling me I had a piggy nose. Hated my nose since.

Form teacher in year 10 or 11 putting on the song 'fat bottom girls' and 'joking' to the whole form that it was my song (I was a size 12/14 at this age).

People can be such bastards.

Ughh….. your vagina lips are so long….

Absolutely fucked up my sex life and confidence even to this day.

A manager at work said to me 'are you just skinny or are you anorexic?' and another time 'are you ill or do you just have no make up on' I was 16-17 it was my first proper job whilst I was at school she was mid 20s. When I left my job it was because of her, I wish I had said something but her friend was in charge of personnel and was equally vile.

When I was in my first job a colleague bullied me and told me no one in the office liked me. Its affected my self esteem ever since.

When I was a teenager I always used to put bright eye shadows on, think blue ! 🙈 one day my science teacher told me to "take it off" and "why can't you wear natural makeup like Chloe?!" That girl was the most stuck up girl in the class who thought the sun shone out of her arse. He only went and added to her ego 😏

A man at work who had been at college with me. ‘You are very attractive now. You were pig ugly at university.’

I’d been going through an eating disorder.

It completely deflated me. I was running the event we were both at when he said this and it was tough getting through the evening after.

I was a late bloomer. Sorted out my issues. And with the benefit of actually being, I hope, a kind person too. So double win for me.

Tree trunk legs by a boy at school - I still don’t wear shorts 35 odd years later.

A boy I used to have a huge crush on at school once shouted at me "You're so fat, even WeightWatchers wouldn't take you!" as we were walking home.

I cried my eyes out several times at that comment.

Imagine my joy when 30 years later, he sent me a friend request on FB and is now bald and roughly the size of a house 🤫