If you were bullied at school/if you were the school bully....

[DilemmaADay]

If you were bullied at school, have the perpetrators ever been in contact to apologise, or have you bumped into them years later?

If you were the school bully, why did you do it and have you tried to make amends?

I was bullied and have heard stories of bullies growing up years later and messaging people they hurt to apologise. When Facebook became popular when I was at uni, I had everyone on there from school. I waited a few years to see if anyone would reach out and they appeared to be getting on with their lives without a care in the world. I blocked all of them when I hit 30, as the lack of apology was making me feel bitter and blocking was much more cathartic.

Met my bully 8 years or so after leaving school when she started dating my partners mate and appeared on the fringes of my social circle now and again. She was lovely to me, went out of her way to be friendly but framed our 'history' as me being someone she vaguely recognised from the year below her at school. In one conversation she said she thought I was really great. I responded that she hadn't used to think that when she called me a bitch and a slag and made my life a misery every day. She looked totally shocked and said 'We were all like that at school. It didn't mean anything'. I could have explained exactly what it had meant, but I was young still and didn't want things getting awkward in the group, so I let it go. She split up with her bf not long after and I didn't see her again.

I was bullied for two years in primary school. Physically and emotionally.

I saw her about 10 years later and she behaved as if we were best friends. I really regret not pulling her up on it then.

it also irritates me that she has a top level medical role without anyone knowing about her horrible behaviour presumably (but at least she isn’t more successful than I am, I suppose).

I was bullied at high school, not like some of the experience on here - more name calling, evils, spreading rumours etc.
I also bullied people, - taking the piss, coming up with mean names etc. I thought I was being funny, but it was definitely at their expense.
I don’t need an apology.
i would like to apologise to a couple of people.

Sorry for what some people had to go through, truly horrendous. Mine was pretty low level compared to these stories but like others have mentioned it involved being teased & excluded. A mutual friend mentioned a while back that one of these people would like to get back in touch with me & I said ‘no way!’ As others have said I think some people that engage in bullying behaviour have different recollections & little idea about the impact they had. Says a lot really.

I had the weird experience of somebody apologising to me for having bullied me at school. I laughed and said ''you bullied me?''. Apparently she said ''yeh, I used to call you square''. I didn't remember that. I remember thinking she was extremely rough. I think I said yeh I was still a virgin at 14, so squuuuare. But I'm unusual I think, I wasn't bullied at school (well, I didn't think so) but I was bullied as an adult which is worse because they use the silent treatment to exclude you. They have plausible deniability and what can you say ''please pay attention to me, speak to me too'' But there is a certain type who will only associate with you if an association with you reflects well on them and validates them. If they think they're better than you, but you don't seem to be taking your place beneath them, they notice and then going to get the silent treatment.

I'd never receive an apology with good grace from my childhood tormentors.

I'm so sorry @Megifer your poor cat. I'm glad your bully has a shit life now.

I was lightly billed at school cistern done of these experiences. Some name calling, a few trips and shoves, knocking my stuff off the desk. Went on for a couple of years. One day I waited for her to leave the lesson first, walked out behind her and then as we all walked down the stairs, shoved her in the small of her back as hard as I could, so that she went flying in to the person in front. I knew she wasn't going to break her neck or anything as there were too many of us in the crowd. She knew it was me though, and never touched me again. Not in touch with a single school peer, could give a fuck about any of them.

My daughters bully turned up at my workplace for an interview…… enough said 🤗

I was bullied and no, no one has apologised but I do take pleasure in the fact the bullies are living sad miserable lives from what I’ve been told/seen on social media and I’ve done well.

I was bullied at primary school and a bit at secondary school. I see them on a Facebook group for my town and I'll speak to them - I think they know who I am - they don't apologise but I think they know that I know who they are and maybe they're scared of me outing them

I was picked by a boss at work 10 years and people turned a blind eye - better I got it than they got it. One of the people who turned a blind eye asked to meet me and brought me flowers as a way of apologising to me and wanted to keep seeing me but I thought - No, you were gutless and didn't support me when I really needed it so you aren't getting my friendship

I started evening classes and one of the other students was my school bully. She hadn't changed much, other than she didn't go round the class demanding money for fags.
It was an art class and it was obvious she hadn't drawn or painted most of the pieces she brought in from home, because the stuff she did in the class wasn't anywhere near the same standard. And I thought that just about sums her up, cheating at evening classes.
I just made sure I got a work station at the opposite side of the room and ignored her.

to you too.

It never leaves you does it?

I think that can hurt more. Bystanders just keeping their head under the parapet. A member of my own 'family' gives me the silent treatment. Fawns obsequiously over everybody else like she is a charismatic little ray of sunshine while ICING me. Total cold shoulder for me, and the two are in motion simultaneously. It's chilling. If I speak to her, nothing. Tumble weed. I think it's because I once asked her not to misquote me. I felt she was doing it to make me look foolish, from that moment on, I have been persona non grata in her eyes. But she is one of those people that seems very confident, quite dominant. The family whatsapp group is her group and she never responds to anything I say and it's kind of 'spread' now. Nobody has made any effort to include me or draw me back in or give me any indication that they have noticed! Bizarre really. I would try to do the right thing even if I wondered if it was going to be me left bearing the brunt of the drama.

Bumped into one of the worse ones last year. She apologised to my astonishment. There’s another one who’s have on Facebook who is always posting anti bullying quotes. She’s never apologised though, although I did have a particularly satisfying moment when she turned up for an interview for a factory job and I was the interviewer.

I had two main bullies. One bullied me for 3 years, smashed egg on my head, called me awful names, used to hide and jump out at me. She never apologised. I've seen she's on Facebook, I still get shivers when I see her.
Another bully tried to add me on Facebook a year or so ago (nearly 20 years after I last saw her!) and I rejected it.
I was actually bullied for being pretty. I was really quiet and tiny and then around age 14 I blossomed and all the cool boys fancied me and the cool girls hated me for it. I had one girl say that the next time she saw me on a night out she would stamp on my face with her heels and another threaten to give me a chelsea smile. I was so shy, those girls took all my confidence. I pray to God my poor kids don't get bullied like I did.

Oh and I should add that I would never move to my home town for that reason. Just the thought of seeing faces I went to school with fills me with horror, I've lived all over the place but would never go back, even though my parents live there and it's a lovely town.

A boy I went to primary/secondary thought it was okay to tell me I was ugly etc all the time.
I saw him at an event with our children and he totally blanked me. His mum was all over me though.
He has a daughter himself who I see isn’t conventionally good looking and overweight. Wonder what he says if some boy called her ugly.

I had a boss who bullied me, he has health problems and I look forward to hearing how unwell he is any year now.

I was bullied and never got an apology. Unfortunately she is a midwife now and I genuinely pity the tiny baby that sees her face before any other.

In my friendship group, they were just bitches. It was like Mean Girls in that it was better to be on their good side and hating it, than be on the outside of the group.

I stopped talking to them all the last day of year 11.

One girl in particular disliked me and was just horrible. She apologised when we were 19/20. She lives in Dubai now so I never see her but we say happy birthday in Facebook and the like.

If I see the others now, we say hello but I'm not friends with anyone from school.

I can really relate to that. I would never go back to where I grew up because it's just full of bad memories and faces I'd never want to see again!

If I'm feeling masochistic I will look on facebook...I shudder too.

I was bullied endlessly at school… I was that fat and lonely kid always in a corner reading a book. But i went to uni and i stepped into a whole different world … eventually i got a great job, great husband, great kids. In later life i’ve met several of my old bullies … two of them apologized and we had a nice conversation. It helps when you meet f2f. You can see whether they mean it or not. One of my bullies was the mother of a kid in my sons class… she never apologized , we’ve had some awkward conversations over the years. But she had changed, i am changed.. there is a lot more respect now from both sides. It’s ok. It all made me what i am now.

I was a right bully ( I thought it was funny at the time) but I wouldn't apologise all these years later 🤷‍♀️.
Talk to me or not it's not going to make me lose any sleep.

If my bullies apologised, I wouldn't accept it. Depending which one it was, I might just wind up assaulting them for having the gall to talk to me.

A male one cornered me in an empty classroom (I had no friends and lots of bullies, so teachers turned a blind eye to me spending lunch reading in my form room) while his two friends blocked the door. He talked dirty to me and felt my ass and tits through my clothes while I initially froze. I then shouted at him to fuck off and smacked his hand.

A teacher heard it, looked alarmed, and herded us all out. The cunt of a deputy head told me I had to attend my next lesson with my assaulter, and refused to call my parents or allow me to use the payphone (lunch was now over) to call them, so I could be picked up and go home.

You know what? I'd be in danger of assaulting that evil old bag if she ever approached me and all!

I was bullied at primary school
None of the bullies have said sorry-but one had a ds at the same time I had my ds and they ended up in the same school year and became besties
I spoke to her,and I could see she was uncomfortable and was waiting for me to bring it up
I didnt-im a better person than that-she ended up in take a break at one point,talking about the condition she suffers from which means she stinks of fish
Another one doesnt work,just enters her kid into beauty contests which doesn't surprise me-she was always into her looks
Another ended up becoming a struggling single parent who is fighting addiction after addiction

I did have a friend as an adult,who beat me up and ran off with my then boyfriend-they both caused endless trouble for me at the time
He soon realised that she was an alki with mental problems and she soon saw him for the cocklodger he was and they broke up
Both have tried to get in touch to say sorry years later-i took pleasure in blocking them both