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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

Forgetting you were a bully?

51 replies

Grimtimes · 14/06/2018 09:23

Just wondering your thoughts on this. I've had two requests this week from old school acquaintances to be friends on Facebook. All lovely...apart from they both bullied me and made me miserable for 3 years of my life.
Why the hell would they want to get in contact now? Have they forgotten how nasty they were? Have they had memory lapses or just no shame?
AIBU to add them to my 'friend' list just to find out what they're up to then delete them? (Curiosity is rife and part of me wants to know what they're up to and where they are in life). Has this happened to anyone else?...what did you do?

OP posts:

youwillalways · 14/06/2018 09:26

I don’t blame you for being curious.

The sensible answer is to ignore but where is the fun in being sensible?

Aprilshouldhavebeenmyname · 14/06/2018 09:26

Add them for a day, remind them publicy of incidents against you, then block the cf!!

BottleOfJameson · 14/06/2018 09:28

Maybe they're sorry now? Maybe they don't want to admit to themselves how horrible they were? I would probably do what you suggest, have a nosey on their profiles then delete.

LemonysSnicket · 14/06/2018 09:30

I think bully's don't see themselves as bully's when they're doing it. I've had apologies from past bullies and it's quite cathartic.

Mumminmum · 14/06/2018 09:30

Oh yes, bullies always "forget" what they did or claim that everybody bullies. No, we bloody don't! And no we bloody didn't!

Hideandgo · 14/06/2018 09:34

Humans are notoriously bad at putting themselves in other peoples shoes.

Juells · 14/06/2018 09:36

I don't think bullies change, so they'll screw you over again. It's a bit of a coincidence that both have sent friend requests at the same time, sounds as if they've discussed you.

A friend's very shy daughter was bullied in school. At the time I thought my friend was smart, as she dealt with it by giving lots of parties, presents etc. and the bully turned into a best friend. I was impressed by her lateral thinking - I'd have gone in all guns blazing. But...there's always a but with bullies :( At the daughter's 21st birthday party the BFF and her boyfriend disappeared, ended up in her bed together.

I'd be suspicious that they're planning some new fuckery.

SnuggyBuggy · 14/06/2018 09:36

Even at the time of the bullying they often seemed oblivious to it. I can remember times where I would for example tell a bully that they were a fucking bitch and they were genuinely hurt that I thought that of them

I suppose time only makes their perception of themselves less accurate. I'd just ignore any requests, you can forgive people without inviting them into your life.

ThePositiveBuddhist · 14/06/2018 09:38

As curious as you are, the best route is probably to reject the friend requests and perhaps even block them.

If you look at their pages and see them doing well, it will negatively impact you and you will be filled with annoyance or frustration, because you won't feel that they deserve the good life they have.

If they have a bad life and are suffering, then you will feel triumphant, and taking pride in someone else's struggles is not healthy for you.

Posting publicly about how they were to you in the past, as a previous poster suggested, might make you feel a bit better at first, but won't reflect well on you in the long term. After all, you have no idea what is going on in these people's lives and you don't want to be dragged back into past negativity when you have moved on.

stuckficks · 14/06/2018 09:54

This happened to me too. I did the sensible thing of ignoring...i still (three years later) wish I'd accepted and had a nose on their profile!

Amatullah · 14/06/2018 09:58

Ignoring gives you the upperhand. They are no longer in control. It will probably really annoy them that you dont accept their invitation straight away. I wouldnt bother with them youl forget about them in a few days

NorksAkimbo72 · 14/06/2018 10:14

This happened to me too...but I called her out on it through messenger. I was honest, but not unkind, mainly because I do think bullies forget. I didn't accept her request, she didn't respond, but I'm glad I said something.

RhubarbRhubarbRhubarbRhubarb · 14/06/2018 10:18

I haven’t been on SM for years, but I had one of my bullies refuse my friend request once, which I found really rude. I thought I was being such the bigger person by adding them and nope! What can you do?

I’d like to think they’re sorry and that’s why they’ve added you. But maybe they have actually just forgotten.

There are certainly people I didn’t treat well at school tbh. Just stupid fallings out over nothing. But we’re all friends now that we’re adults.

Piffle11 · 14/06/2018 10:20

I went to see Sarah Millican live and she told this story about this girl who bullied her a lot at school. Then out of the blue - once Sarah was famous - she gets this gushing email from this woman: all self deprecating and friendly, how well you're doing Sarah, my family can't believe I know you, etc. Sarah responds along the lines of: Please don't contact me again as I do not remember you fondly.

midnightmisssuki · 14/06/2018 10:20

This happened to me a few months ago. A girl who used to bully me added me on FB, I thought to myself maybe I was now good enough to be her friend, she had a nose around, the deleted me and blocked me. I still feel sad till today,l, she can still get to me. I’ll never be that cool kid who people want to be friends with!

RhubarbRhubarbRhubarbRhubarb · 14/06/2018 10:22

Aw @midnight, what a wanker that person sounds! If I had SM, I’d totally be your friend. And I am vair, vair cool 😎.

Birdsgottafly · 14/06/2018 10:25

How are you going to feel if they have done really well (as in, they've lived a happy life (which you can't tell from FB really)?

There are have been posters who think income is everything, so they feel a sense of satisfaction if they are earning more than the person who bullied them. Likewise if the Bully looks rougher than them.

Is what you might find going to make you feel better or worse?

I moved away at 18 and didn't give anyone a second thought. then I moved back in my 40's.

The Bother of the main instigator of my bullying, is now my Gardener. He obviously didn't know the history because he talks at length about their childhood. I came to understand what had fucked the Girl up and she bought it to school and found someone else to take it out on. Given her childhood, the lack of consideration for self esteem etc at that time, there wouldn't have any understanding on her part about what she was doing to me.

There's another one, who I'd seen hitting her Daughter, she seems to not have changed in any way. She's constantly aggressive and subsequently seems to get no joy out of life at all.

Loyaultemelie · 14/06/2018 10:27

My bully recently friend requested me and I must admit I wasn't sure what to do. Her settings weren't private so I had a nosey and saw a lot of mental health memes and do anything to make my kids lives better. Curiosity got the better of me and I accepted and she liked a lot of my photos etc and then sent me a PM actually acknowledged that she had been awful in school and felt huge guilt for what she had done. She couldn't explain why as I hadn't done anything wrong I was nice to everyone just "different" but she was terrified someone would treat her children that way and wanted to apologise.

SDTGisAnEvilWolefGenius · 14/06/2018 11:33

I have tried to make contact with some of the people who bullied me for the full five years of secondary school (it stopped when we moved to the local sixth form college), but no-one has responded to me.

I have one or two FB friends from school, and although I do occasionally post things to do with bullying, and the long term effects it has had on me, none of them have ever commented.

There's a part of me that would like to ask them why they never stood up for me, or supported me in any way, at school - I can understand them not wanting to make themselves targets for the bullies too, but they could have said something to me, to let me know I wasn't totally on my own.

Ariela · 14/06/2018 11:35

I had this, a horrid girl who got me (as I was younger and not as outspoken) in to all manner of trouble at school eg accusing me when I was in a different class of stealing something she'd actually stolen from her class teacher. I had no idea what the teacher was talking about so they let me go without reprimand. She showed me later what she had stolen and told me if I told on her she would hand it in and say she had taken it off me. Nice!

Her parents thought I was a great role model (as I worked hard and didn't get involved with boys) and I was often asked to spend the night at hers when they went out - her parents were quite the social bees- this was supposedly to keep her out of trouble but actually it was torture as she invited her boyfriend and his friend over, they went upstairs and I had to resist the advances of this ghastly lad for what seemed like hours while trying to do my homework (I held him at bay with scissors at one point till I remembered my Dad worked in the same place as his mum so I threatened to tell on him if he touched me), and then lie to her parents that the 2 of us had done our homework and then just watched TV all evening.
She got expelled from school and went to a boarding school (parents couldn't cope I believe) not long after that.

She messaged me 2 years ago out of the blue and said how nice it would be to be in touch after all this time and reminded me of all the fun we had at school.
I said I would hardly call it fun the amount of times she got me in to trouble and that I couldn't see we'd have anything in common now.
And blocked her.

You should do the exact same, it is empowering. I told my Dad the whole tale after she messaged, and he was aghast at her antics and had had no idea how badly she behaved towards me.

DiscontinuedModelHusband · 14/06/2018 11:43

Agree with NorksAkimbo72 ...

Direct message explaining why you won't be accepting their requests, then reject.

If they've anything about them, they'll apologise (whether this will make a difference or not will depend on you).

Just as likely they won't bother.

MissWilmottsGhost · 14/06/2018 11:43

I would be suspicious of their motives.

As PP pointed out, it's a bit of a coincidence that both have contacted you recently, maybe they were chatting and said "remember x from school, I wonder what she's up to now..."

I would suspect they just want to have a laugh. IME people don't change much, if they were twats then they'll be twats now.

If my bullies contacted me now I wouldn't be interested and would just ignore them. Or maybe tell them to fuck off.

I'm not the forgiving type, can you tell

User12879923378 · 14/06/2018 12:11

this happened to me - someone who was absolutely bloody to me sent me a FB request thirty years later. I was genuinely really surprised as I vividly remember what she did and how miserable it made me, but we happened to meet and ended up chatting and she's just a very different person now. I don't think she remembers any of it in the same way as I do. I think adolescence does very weird things to us - literally growing new bits of brain and hormones all over the place so maybe some people actually go through some sort of mini psychosis that they then come out of after everything settles down? But I'm absolutely sure that she befriended me on FB just because she saw my name and thought "ooh, wonder what she's doing now". I don't think there was any malice or desire to sneer in it.

Trinity66 · 14/06/2018 12:14

Reject the friend requests, that'll sting most of all for them

prunemerealgood · 14/06/2018 12:20

There was a girl at school who told a lie about me and made just about everyone I thought well of fall out with me. We ended up friends again, it was a small town and you don't get much choice - but then she badly let me down away from home and in a way that could have had an impact on my safety.

I kept up with there for years, an email once or twice a year, that sort of thing. Then Facebook came along and I just thought, nah. Thinking back, she was a classic narcissist, all her life. Spoilt youngest child of a broken family, histrionics when she didn't get her way, great company and fooled people.

I really enjoy rejecting her requests to be FB friends, and they come about once a year. It gives me a rather sad satisfaction.

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