Were YOU a bully at school?

[mummycan]

Don't know if this has been done before but were any of you mumsnetters bullies at school?

If so, at what age, did you pick on one child in particular, what made you pick on tnat particular child? Was it physical or verbal bullying?

My dd (6) is being verbally and very insidiously being bullied by a girl in her class. This girl has bullied others in the past but now it just seems to be my dd to the extent that she is trying to isolste from the rest of the class - just trying to understand - although all I want to do is punch this girl's lights out.

Off to make lunch - will be back later to check responses.

Sorry for the erratic nature of the post.
I don't mind if you change your name, but I am desperately ttrying to deal with this.

If you were a bully what would have stopped you? Being dragged off to the headmaster/mistress? Being told off in front of your friends? Being challenged by the other parent? Being smacked in the chops?????

All posts gratefully received.

No I wasn't

But I remember being bullied by an older child

Personally I think the ONLY way to deal with this is to report it to the school and let them deal with it

Sorry- just wanted to add that I am concerned that my dd may turn in to a bully as she doesn't know how to deal with this and will think it's the only way to survive.

Will go away now.

i wasn't a bully but remeber being very mean to a girl
I suppose my nicer nature made me realise it was wrong and I realised I could get ito trouble so I stopped and started to be nice(i was about 8)
I think the trouble with a real bully is that they don't have the "nicer me" so the only way to stop them is to report it.

Hi, I am really sorry to hear this.

I was mean to a girl at scool once when I was about 10. She confided in me that she was still weting the bed which I thought was outrageos so I told a couple of people and was a bit nasty to her for a day. I felt really really bad for it though. Decided I was an evil person and asked my dad to take me to a psychiatrist (thank god he did not). I was always extra nice to her after that and never did it to anyone else again.

To your question why people do it - because they can! It is a power thing. I think at 6 this girl is probably incapable to refer to her nicer nature on her own anyway (if she has one).

I think the way to deal with it is for the school to come down on her really hard. This means you going after the school really hard too.

Btw my husband was bullied at school. He would go in every morning and his bully would be waiting for him and beat him up. Every morning! Until one morning he fough back and won. It was the end of it. It has not tuned dh into a bully, he would never voluntarily pick a fight. So don't worry about your dd in this sence. Anyway I do not advice this course of action.

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Bullies tend to be jealous of those that they bully IME. I wasn't a bully but was picked on from time to time for various reasons - by those that were supposed to be my friends too at one point. Sadly what stopped it was a swift smack in the mouth to the ringleader in front of everyone else and then she wanted to be my best friend (this was at age about 14 BTW not 6!).

My DD is 7 and hasn't encountered bullying yet thank god but I am trying to prepare her. DS has been constantly hit and bitten throughout preschool by one child who is now in his reception year. The child pushed him a few times in the playground last week and DS pushed him back and I'm afraid to say that is what we told him to do instead of the usual "ignore him, play with other children" line we'd told him previously.

Law of the jungle and all that - goes against my instincts to hit back (and DH and I have rowed over how to deal with it) BUT from experience it stops it and I have to agree with DH now.

BTW I mentioned this child on a no names basis to DS's reception teacher.

I said something along the lines of "one day DS is going to get sick of him hitting him so just so the school know a bit of background it has been going on for a year prior to school and I have told DS to tell the teacher if it happens but don't be surprised if one day he has enough and punches him back".

There is only so much a person can walk away from, even if you are 5.

This seems to be a problem that is never going to go away, i was never a bully and i would not allow either of my DSs to be a bully either, they know there would be hell to pay if i ever found out that they had been unkind to someone. (im with kbear on the hitting back, as a girl who had taunted me for a very long time stopped very fast when i backhanded her) Although that just took me to her level, but at least she stopped.
DS1 is being bullied, the child doing it to him is a real little shit, his mother is one of the most stupid women you will ever meet and will NEVER admit her child can do wrong and the father was the school bully when he was at school and thinks hitting, shouting, swearing, thretning and being a prick is how you deal with life as a grown up as well.
It has gone on in and out of school for the past 3 years with no sign of letting up.
DS has ignored it, told the teachers, and even hit back (as this seems to be the only level of intellegents the other boy understands).
I think it is stemed from the other child being jealous, as his father walked out then back and hitting is the norm in their household (we were friends with them before the bullying started so know how they live), DSs have a strong family, good home and we dont all yell, sware and hit each other. DS1 is also very bright and the other boy is not.
I have yet another meeting at the school, who i have no faith in the head is a t*at of the higest order, but we will go through the motions again and nothing will change, its getting to the point that i would love to hit the little shit myself.

Thanks for your replies.
MC
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absolutely and categorically NO!

more bullied but not horrendously - more with sarcasism than anything.

I coped.

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No.

I am by NO means a sweet-natured person, but man, if you don't like it or agree w/it, why not leave it the hell alone?

i haven't read the thread thru properly but i was a school bully in High school in Yr 8 and 9 and a little bit of Yr 10.

Before u all jump on me, let me tell u my reasons..... I grew up on a council estate so all i saw was violence, i was physically abused so all i knew was violence and i was struggling with self esteem. I felt like i got attention when i hurt people taht i didn't get elsewhere, i felt wanted and it wasn't until Yr 10 that i decided to take my life in a different direction. I apologised to everyone i had ever bullied and decided taht i never wanted to be that person again. I was one of the "hard" ones - you know the kind, sits on teh back of the bus fag in hand leering at everyone else, drinks on street corners kind of person.

Its not an excuse but you asked so i answered. I am so ashamed that that was what i usded to be like.

Would definatly take it up with the school, at 6 years old the headteacher telling them off would scare them enough. it took a criminal record and finding god to stop me !

I made friends with a new girl in our class when I was about 9 years old. She taught me all sorts of naughty things and, as she took a dislike to one girl in particular, we used to be really mean to her. I feel awful about it now as I realise that my friend at the time was definitely just jealous of this girl as she was really pretty and popular. In the end we got in a lot of trouble with the headteacher and never bothered the poor girl again. My parents didn't let me stay friends with this girl and I got back to being 'good'. You definitely reap what you sow though as when we got to secondary school I was bullied for years!

I think most bullying is done because of jealousy. It is awful and only getting worse in schools these days. The best thing you can do is talk to the teachers at your dds school. She's very young to have to deal with this and I think that's the only way to sort it out. Good luck!

I made friends with a new girl in our class when I was about 9 years old. She taught me all sorts of naughty things and, as she took a dislike to one girl in particular, we used to be really mean to her. I feel awful about it now as I realise that my friend at the time was definitely just jealous of this girl as she was really pretty and popular. In the end we got in a lot of trouble with the headteacher and never bothered the poor girl again. My parents didn't let me stay friends with this girl and I got back to being 'good'. You definitely reap what you sow though as when we got to secondary school I was bullied for years!

I think most bullying is done because of jealousy. It is awful and only getting worse in schools these days. The best thing you can do is talk to the teachers at your dds school. She's very young to have to deal with this and I think that's the only way to sort it out. Good luck!

I made friends with a new girl in our class when I was about 9 years old. She taught me all sorts of naughty things and, as she took a dislike to one girl in particular, we used to be really mean to her. I feel awful about it now as I realise that my friend at the time was definitely just jealous of this girl as she was really pretty and popular. In the end we got in a lot of trouble with the headteacher and never bothered the poor girl again. My parents didn't let me stay friends with this girl and I got back to being 'good'. You definitely reap what you sow though as when we got to secondary school I was bullied for years!

I think most bullying is done because of jealousy. It is awful and only getting worse in schools these days. The best thing you can do is talk to the teachers at your dds school. She's very young to have to deal with this and I think that's the only way to sort it out. Good luck!

Sorry I posted that message three times, my computers playing up again!!

Remember how the whole class (about year 8) ostracised a girl. She'd been a bit bitchy about just about everyone and so her (ex) best friend and the rest of the girls in the class decided not to speak to her. But it continued day after day and the boys decided not to speak to her too. It makes me go cold thinking about how ill it must have made her feel. But as she had never been a particular friend of mine anyway, i didn't see it as being my responsibility. Wish I had done something.

Teachers spoke to the whole class telling us to make friends with her again, but it was by then too big a step to take. Luckily, I remember a girl called Mandy from another class came into the classroom one break time and said "Well if you lot aren't going to be her friend, I am" which was very courageous. I think that by then, most of the class were deeply ashamed and afraid.

Sometimes you just need to do something to break the cycle.

I was bullied very briefly at much the same time by an older girl for questioning her 'authority' in chucking us out at breaktime. She picked on me and for a few days i was terrified she was going to 'get' me until a friend of mine stood up to her and told her to leave me alone. She then stopped.

My mum is a teacher and has just told me about a horrendous incident of bullying at her school , she is in charge of the bullying policy and is currently very very upset about it. I don't know about all schools but many, like my mums school work tirelessly to deal with bullying. Many of the senior staff have undergone some training in counselling and when a big incident occurs or is reported they offer support not only to the victim but to the perpetrators once they have been punished. Mum says one of the most difficult issues is that nice kids are often drawn into bullying through fear and hysteria, much like Emmylou above and are devastated later on when they realise what they have done. I agree with my mother in that the only way to get to the bottom of what makes a bully is to offer them support and counselling which may help them understand why they bully and the effects of bullying