To be an adult whose confidence is still affected by school bullying?

[Serse14]

I’m an adult in my twenties and I left school several years ago but I’m still affected by the bullying and teasing I faced while I was in school.
This is embarrassing for me to feel this way but I’m extremely socially awkward even as an adult and lacking in confidence in some ways because of my experiences as a child/teenager.
I feel dumb for feeling like this but I can’t seem to let go of the past and view myself differently to that girl from school and I’m worried that people view me that way still.
Am I just being unreasonable?

I'm 44 and still feel the same way

My brother is 56 and feels the same way

Me too, especially with DC as playground brings it back. I am very wary of groups of women as well and find 1:1 easier, sometimes.

57 and feel the same - still conflicted about never having stood up to the bullies - leads to road rage at times (I am not proud of it)

No. We are all shaped by our school days. I would recommend some counselling.

YANBU - 40 here and it still affects me, on the outside you probably would say it doesn't because I do a role where I have to portray this strong confident persona. But it's all an act. I deliberately work in a male dominated field and avoid predominately female social situations.

I'm pretty sure this is actually something that a lot of research has been done about it and the research consistently shows that adults often still feel affected by bullying experiences they suffered in childhood. So I wouldn't let it make you feel stupid or anything.

I'm mid twenties and was bullied from years 7-9, it calmed down in year 10 and mostly gone by year 11 but still had that horrible atmosphere from the people who used to bully me and occasional name calling etc. I went to a different school for sixth-form. The bullying contributed to the development of depression and anxiety from being around the age of 12 which lead to self-harm. Mid twenties and depression free for a few years now but the anxiety is still a major problem for me, and I do fairly regularly think about my experiences as an adolescent. It has definitely majorly affected me and always will. I sometimes still have nightmares about being back at that school and being bullied!

Also I have had at least two courses of counselling that in part reflected on some of those bullying experiences but did not find they provided me with any closure or help to deal with the memories.

YANBU, it sometimes doesn't resolve without therapeutic help. CBT is a good therapy, but you need enough sessions, NHS provides CBT in England in most areas now but often not enough sessions to work through everything. As well as looking at managing situations in the here and now it uses tools such as imagery rescripting for bad memories that may not be PTSD but are present and influencing you in the here and now.

My own experiences were relatively minor and I was fairly robust, but I absolutely agree with you.

It makes me sick to see posts sympathising with bullies or minimising the effect of bullying. Not that I'm devoid of empathy for young bullies, who I'm sure have bad circumstances of their own - just the sheer idea that that's a reason to ignore the present and future suffering of the bullied child.

What has really helped me is the following mindset:

At school, school was half your world. Your friends all lived there and you went there most days. Being bullied could drastically affect a huge proportion of your life.

As an adult with a job, the things and people I love are all external to work. When any situation with work reminds me of how it felt to be bullied, I remind myself of how little work has to do with those things. It can't take them away. It can't make the people who love me love me less.

Same here, meeting new people makes me anxious, I have no confidence of what to say and my brain starts whirring "think of something to say, think...why can't you think of something, hmm maybe this. But what if they take it the wrong way, or think your joke isn't funny, they won't want to talk to you again, they'll probably tell their friends not to talk to you either blah blah blaaah"

I'm trying but damn it's HARD. Seeing vague mum acquaintances in nursery I just think "oh shit" not because they're horrible, in fact I'd love to be on the level where I can have a good chinwag with them. But I just can't, something in my brain just doesn't give me the confidence to be natural anymore.

DH on the other hand is great at talking to anyone and making them feel at ease!

Not bullied, but socially excluded. It's made it difficult to network (because I can't believe anyone would want to speak to me) and has hampered my career and reduced the contribution I am able to make.

I’m 55 and still badly affected by being bullied at school. I have depression, low self esteem and anxiety.

But it can be treated, and you can learn to get past it. It takes time and effort, and it isn’t easy, but things can get better.

Happy to chat more, if I can help at all, @Serse14.

I definitely find the bullying affects certain aspects of my life. I think it affected my mental health quite significantly in my late teens/ early twenties more than at the time. Now in mid-thirties it's more of a bruise which makes me wary of social interactions/friendships. I have to remind myself sometimes that I have a great life and that I deserve it.

It takes life experience ie being more social and having meaningful friendships/relationships to get you out of that mind frame

Don’t feel bad
Mine has all come back as my DV approach secondary
I am really triggered by it and overreact to bullying at my kids I think
I forgot it for years but it’s all popped up again
My child won’t suffer like I did , not if I can avoid it
OP get some therapy . Nip it in the bud you are still young x

I’m the same. It has led to lifelong social anxiety. I’ve just accepted this now and accepted I will be like this for the rest of my life and to just live with it.

I understand completely but your feelings can change over time. I had a horrible time at secondary school. Although I was never physically bullied I faced a lot of humiliation, mocking, being laughed at. I sometimes felt like I couldn't walk from one classroom to the next without being humiliated. I started to skive off school because the thought of going in made me feel sick. My confidence reached rock bottom. I couldn't tell anyone, not even my loving parents because I felt I deserved it all. This affected me so strongly that for many years after I left school I was very socially anxious and shy. As I started working I felt that every adult I met could immediately see what a weirdo I was, like I had Freak branded on to my forehead. Very slowly as time passed I could see that these colleagues didn't view me the same way as the bullies. They respected me and treated me as a normal human being. Some people genuinely seemed to like me, want to hang out with me. It was very occasionally commented on that I was shy or that I should be more confident/assertive but that was it. And it's true. I was /am shy and that's ok. It wasn't a criticism. I have no easy answer for you but naturally my confidence grew and I started to see myself differently. I am still very aware of my flaws and limitations but equally I'm aware of all my good points - the things people say they like about me. I like myself. As I started to believe in myself I made lots friends. After feeling so weird for so long I opened my eyes and looked around me and I realise everyone is weird in their own way, not just me! I started to feel comfortable with my own quirks. I stopped being so painfully self conscious and self focused. Now I don't really care if someone doesn't like me. I think generally the worst someone can think if me is that I'm a bit quiet. No one's going to think I'm a bitch. I'm now 44. I'd say it took my entire 20s for my confidence to grow and for me to become comfortable in my own skin. By the time I was in my 30s I was pretty much transformed. I'm never going to be a very loud, extrovert who's overflowing with self confidence but that's fine. I'm perfectly happy with who I am.

Scars you for life for sure.

I'm in my early 40s and am still very badly affected by it. I am very quiet still and shy but I can sometimes put on a good act. I'm also quite uncomfortable around groups of women. My current workplace has brought a lot of bad feelings back because from my first day, another team member, very popular with the rest of the staff, seemed to take a dislike to me. He'd totally ignore me and be extra super nice to everyone else, although I really did try to be friendly as I initially thought we could be good friends. He'd quite blatantly exclude me and I often got the feeling he was slagging me off to others. He has left now but I still feel as if I'm not one of the 'gang' and I always feel like a spare part. I don't know if that's me projecting my old insecurities from the bullying or everyone else really does think I'm a twat.

38 and signing in to the club. Age, experience (including a couple of fairly miserable experiences that were horrible at the time but I now know helped enormously in the long run) and quite a bit of therapy have helped.

It can definitely affect you for a lifetime. I remember being fairly confident as a small child but school and bullying have made me very wary of people, especially clicky groups of women. I have a tendency to take a step back and feel like they’re talking about me - even when they’re not and have no reason to. I have to consciously over ride that learned behaviour.

I’m currently in a job where I fit with the group and this has really helped repair some of that damage and brought out some of my early childhood confidence but I don’t think I’ll ever get over those school days completely.

My life was badly affected by bullies at school. It was never physical. Sometimes I wished it was because I'd have stood a much higher chance of getting real help if I'd got bruises to show.
It was just near constant verbal abuse. Constant belittling, also insults. They'd even do it in class if I answered a question wrong - and the teachers did nothing. That annoys me even more than the little scrotes who thought it was fun to pick on the smallest girl in the class who never had the fashionable clothes.
My brother was also a bully.
I have spent a big chunk of my adult life dealing with the consequences of it. La k of self esteem, chronic social anxiety.
One day (after I had been taking antidepressants for a while) I realised that the people who had done this to me, who haunted my nightmares, were no longer any part of my life. No contact from any direction. They were nothing but pointless irrelevancies. That help me take a big step forward.
My life will never be what it could have been. My physical health is now poor. But I have a lovely husband, two brilliant children and a nice home. I'm content and happy.

What’s make me 😮 are the people on my fb/instagram/twitter who are constantly going on about bullying and how it affects children etc. They are teachers, teaching assistants and social workers- they seem to have forgotten the bullying they inflicted on people at school 😒

Yep
At school and by my sister