‘Popular’ (mean) people from school working in salons...

[Stubbornuincorn]

Not really an AIBU more of a wondering if this happens to anyone else!

I’ve returned to where I grew up and went to school, and I keep finding that the people working in spas/hair salons etc are annoyingly often the ‘popular’ girls that were horrible to me when we were at school.

Recent examples are having to have my hair washed by a girl that used to make fun of me during P.E (literally dreaded PE because of it) and having a sodding full body massage from a really chavvy girl who used to really intimidate me. Even though I’m an adult now I find it really uncomfortable!!

Has this happened to anyone else?

Another point is that some bullies are reacting to discord in another part of their lives. The worst bully in my secondary school was being raised by her racist skinhead dad after her mum left the house when she was three. Her dad came in and verbally abused teachers every now and again. She was ok as a primary school kid but got angrier as she got older and was a full blown bully by year nine. She bullied me into swapping my brand new Gap hoody for her old, stained market one. She said she'd kick the shit out of me if I told anyone.
Last I heard she had three of her children taken into care. Her brother committed suicide. Her youngest daughter has lots of health problems and has to have multiple operations. When I saw her in town her crack head boyfriend was loudly putting her down for not lending her money.
I'd be a pretty shitty person to feel smug about her current status.

Yes all the populars at my old school either had kids young and are SAHMs or do shop/care work.

I think people who say this is snobby must be saints. Everyone is judgmental. Everyone.

What did I do to deserve getting bullied? Hmm, wore glasses, liked reading, listened to rock music, hung out with the Goths and other outcasts in the year above because they were nice to me, was poor and didn't have fancy clothes. Eventually became a Goth myself because I fitted into that particular niche (and then I was the weird kid who self harmed and wrote weird poems about suicide!) Bonus of that is the girls who were picking on me were so horrified by what I was doing to myself they stopped. (I know that doesn't happen for everyone, and by that time the boys who had been beating me up had I think been moved to a different school I certainly didn't see them after Year 9.)

Jackfruitburger Tbh I don't give a shit what her background is.

In those circumstances yes.

But the smug, self satisfied knobbers I was at school with lying about her stellar qualifications. It was just too good to resist.

She followed me on IG. I couldn't give a stuff. I was trying to be open minded. Turns out she's still self obsessed and lies. Nothing changes.

Bullying wrecks lives.
If you don't understand that, then lucky you, you've never experience bullying.

We move on, we cover it up. Free from the bullies we try to reclaim our lives, to allow the person we were, and often had to hide, to shine through.
Often we have nice happy lives, surrounded by people we love.

But every now again it attacks you when you least expect it. You think you are over it, but then in your 40's you find yourself crying in the middle of the night over something you saw or heard about at your kids school. Didn't even involve your kids, but blimey it sets you right back.

The chance comes up for your dream job, but it's in a school and you realise that actually, there is no way you can enter that environment again.

You realise you do need help, counselling, something.

I moved away from home at 18, degree, worked in retail, SAHM. I love my life, I'm very happy.

But if I saw the bullies again, when visiting my parents. I would think about what I'd like to say. I wouldn't say it though, because immediately I'd become the victim again, I wouldn't have the words.

People change? No, most people I know didn't change between 6/7 and 18. I doubt they changed after that.
If, at the age of 16, you can stub your cigarette out on someone's skin, for no reason, without words. I doubt you can change. You've done most of your character development by then.
You might change your external behaviour, but inside, you are the same as you were at 7, at 10, at 15.

Can I forgive? Yes.
But please do not minimise it.

lost I'm with you.
snow I live in a different world to you.

This is such an awkward problem!

I was one of the geeky, spotty and socially awkward people at school who was very firmly put in my place by those in the higher social echelons. As time has gone on, I'm still geeky, spotty and socially awkward but I'm also pretty happy with where my life is generally.

I've always identified salons and glamorous settings as very much 'not for me' because I still feel that the glamorous and popular girls own those spaces. The minute I plonk my bum in one of those seats, I feel like the chubby year 7 girl being told that the pretty girls are 'better than me' (actual words).

I don't get any classist sense of satisfaction - for me it reinforces those bullshit roles that glamour is for the glamorous and that I will always be an outsider.

That's really sad. Most people change. Why wouldn't they? You think you alone are on a journey through life? Why on earth wouldn't people grow and change?

It seems really strange to assume that your bully wouldn't have changed.

Anybody who was a bitch to me 20 or 30 years ago, I assume they have matured and lived and learned.

I never think about those people.

I think most bullies try and rewrite history.
Try to play down the damage the have caused.
Try to write it off as childish behaviour.
Try to justify it as something that doesn't count because they were a teenager.

It does count!
You did know what you were doing!
You got pleasure in driving someone else to the brink!
You can't justify this behaviour. Ever

I’m with the Magician on this one. You are judging her and people in service sector jobs in a snobby, mean and snide way. You are the same as the perceived enemy as they may have been likely to have judged you in a snobby, mean and snide way. It is poor form tbh.

I've not actually judged anyone's job.

magician Ok, so I'll admit I have a big split in my life.
The people I knew to 18 years, I haven't seen since.
On the the other hand, loads of people I met at 18 I'm still in contact with.

But all the people I've known since 18 are now in their 40's or 50's, they all still have the same character.
They've matured, they've been hit by different life experiences. They choose to behave differently in certain situations than they would years ago. But their good points are still the same. Their flaws are still the same. They might be able to hold in some unpleasant aspects of their character nowadays, better than they did when they were younger. But it's all still there.
Sometimes the good has been dulled by bad experience. But it's still there.

Maybe people do magically change at 18. I didn't, my sisters and cousins didn't. Perhaps we are weird.

The bullying threads really do seem like a chance to sneer at menial jobs.

I'm not denying the schadenfreude but if you're reading these threads and you're a hairdresser/shop assistant/ waitress and weren't a bully in school it must be hard not to think "wow people think my life is so shit they feel that it's an adequate punishment for being a bully"

I DGAF about whatever job people do. My bully works a professional job, as do her equally nasty Mates from school.

I will judge you on how you treated people though.

Totally with isittheholidaysyet on this one. Sugar,you do live on another planet.

No idea what my bullies do...
But there was a few years when my mum would keep me up to date with news.

There were a lot of Oxbridge entries, then a few years later loads of firsts and 2:1s. So I guess they're all doing ok for themselves.

Wow some of you lot really don’t understand how bullying can affect you. I don’t think anyone can actually get over it fully. One minute you’re happy and then it suddenly hits you like a brick. All those voices come inside your head and you remember all those nasty things people have said about you. Can barely look in the mirror sometimes because of those comments. Everyone saying that teenagers change into adults is irrelevant. In the uk, the criminal age of responsibility is 10. Someone who bullied you in high school was fully aware of their actions . And should be reminded of how nasty they were. Not fair how they can live their lives but those who got bullied have to suffer everyday!

There’s nothing wrong in being in low paid/skilled jobs. But equally there’s nothing wrong in someone getting that satisfaction that the bully hasn’t done as well as you. It’s not like you’re going to tell them. My brother went to private school and was also bullied. Of course they are all still rich now and have very good jobs....yet he’s still suffering. To me being bullied and seeing someone not do as well, would be a glimmer of hope. And would make me happier and easier to live life.

Personally, all those mean girls that were nasty at school are still the best of friends despite bitching about each other ,have great jobs, boyfriends etc. Just makes you feel worse about yourself ...like why did it have to happen to me

I'm not denying the schadenfreude but if you're reading these threads and you're a hairdresser/shop assistant/ waitress and weren't a bully in school it must be hard not to think "wow people think my life is so shit they feel that it's an adequate punishment for being a bully"

Exactly.

As someone who has done waitressing, is currently awaiting a DBS check to start work as a home care assistant and is training towards level 3 hairdressing threads like this do make me sit back and think "Wow, people must think I'm really thick."

It's not upsetting enough that I'm going to lose sleep over it or shed a tear but it's not nice to read. I do know I'm glad I'm not friends with any of you. I can't abide people who judge an entire profession/job as unworthy. However you want to dress it up, it's sneery and says more about you than the person just trying to make an honest living.

One thing I do want to know is why it is always typically women's trades that are looked down on and sneered at? Hairdressers and Beauty Therapists train for tree years minimum. There's a shit tonne of science to remember and course work and exams to sit similar to plumbers, electricians, gas fitters etc yet you never read threads about how thick plumbers are, do you?

I have to agree with the impact bullies have on you especially in your teenage years...

I was bullied severely because of my appearance (think big African lips that people now die for literally)

I now get routinely asked if I paid for my lips and I keep in shape and have no problem attracting men (yeah stealth boast). I’m also now advancing quickly in my surgical specialty so I’m good and I like to ensure that those “bullies” know it not that I talk to any of them now but knowing I’m doing better (which is generally the case) makes it even sweeter!

If anything I think the bullies have made me determined to be confident and succeed.

I’m not going to lie that I absolutely do take pleasure in the fact that some of the people who bullied me have mundane, unimportant and probably (hopefully?) crap jobs and lives. I don’t think about these people on a daily basis or dwell on what they did, but yes, I do feel superior that for all the ‘geek’ jibes (and worse) it’s actually paid off for me to be a nerd because I’m the one doing well. If I ran into them and they asked me if I remembered them my response would absolutely be something along the lines of ‘yes, I remember what a vile piece of shit you were’. Frankly I don’t care if they’ve changed or what circumstances led them to behave that way. I care about the psychological damage they inflicted when they bullied me. Maybe they do feel bad, but I’d never resist an opportunity to make them feel worse if it presented itself

DS1 was bullied by one boy, from around the age of 9, until he left school.

That boy is now a 30 year old alcoholic, whose brain is addled by drugs, with a tattooed face and neck (not artistically done), and has spent time in prison.

This brings me no joy whatsoever.

He appeared to be spoilt as a child, with wealthy parents, whereas DS only had me at home, desperately trying to keep up mortgage payments. There was nothing left for designer anything.

The truth is, his wealthy stepdad and his mum were regularly drunk and tearing chunks out of one another. He was drinking on the park by the time he’d hit his teens.

Popular on the surface because he had all the gear and he could get hold of alcohol, but desperately sad underneath.

Most of the mean girls at my school became teachers.
Dont know about ths mean boys.

The girl who bullied me is now a mental health nurse. I was so shocked when I found out as she continued to bully people well into her 20s. I never ever go back to where I grew up, so no chance of anyone I care about ever having to be cared for by her.

Yoghurt