I didn't realise there was anything different about me until I started secondary school. Until then I thought I was the same as all of my friends. I thought I was normal.
But from the moment I started high school it was clear that the other children saw me as different. I stood out for being ginger, for wearing glasses and for just wanting to learn.
My years at that school passed so slowly. Each day was filled with snide remarks and name calling that turned into getting tripped as I walked to class, having shuttlecocks whacked at me and getting water poured over my head at lunch time.
I wasn't just picked on by girls - it was boys too. But at least the girls stuck to name calling and threats. Being picked on by boys was so much worse. There were four or five of them that were relentless with their torment.
Those boys would sit behind me in class, pulling my chair out from under me and stealing my bag. They had friends in other years and before long I was getting called names by people I didn't even know, getting pushed around by people I had never even seen before.
I turned into a recluse at school. I had a couple of friends who were also bullied and we stuck together - we were social rejects together for fear of otherwise being very much alone. I would stay with this group as much as I could but would still spend breaks hiding in the school corridors, reading a book and eating my packed lunch. I needed to immerse myself in a world of fiction and get away from the reality of those school days.
Everything came to a head halfway through school when my closest friend and I were on the bus home together. All of our tormentors were at the back of the bus and we were sitting a few rows in front. We were getting shouted at but we didn't turn around, just willed the journey to pass quickly. The bus stopped in our local town and they all got off the bus, spitting on us as they went past. I remember it being in my hair, on my school blazer and even on my face; I felt humiliated and more alone than ever before.
I went with my parents to speak to my head of year. My parents were adamant the bullying had to stop. The teacher listened to everything we told him and then he said something that has stayed with me for the last 16 years.
"My wife is Sri Lankan. She walks down the street and people call her names. She's used to it, she expects it, she knows that she's different. Donna, you have red hair. You're different, you're going to get picked on and you need to get used to that."
I listened to his advice. I kept my head down, worked as hard as I could and tried to get through. The bullying carried on but I didn't bother telling anyone - I just had to get used to it.
In my final weeks of school I was attacked with a metal woodworking file in my design technology class by one of the main bullies. He smacked me and smacked me with this file and all I could do was put my arms up to shield the blows. So many things happened that now feel like they happened to someone else.
I decided to write a letter to my headteacher and told him everything that had happened over my time at the school and I told him how let down I felt. I told him about the teachers that had turned a blind eye, I told him about my lack of self-esteem, lack of confidence, and how I couldn't bear to talk to anyone I didn't know. I opened up about how - at times - I had felt almost suicidal, how I didn't see the point in getting up in the morning and how I would dread walking into school each day. I explained how I'd got used to being picked on - I was ginger after all. I told him that I hoped, despite my years of bullying, that I would walk away from school with good GCSE results and that the bullying would ultimately make me a stronger person - that I would not let the bullying define me and that I would learn from every single thing that I had experienced throughout my school years.
My head teacher apologised to me and promised that no one would have to go through that again. In the end, he restored my faith in teachers and I believed him - I am sure he kept that promise.
And me? Well, I got those decent GCSE results and got on with life. I felt so free after my school days had finished. I was bullied relentlessly but I am not a victim, or just a product of my past. Those bullies have made me stronger than I ever thought I would be.
Photo credit: Hayley Willis, Shutterflies
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Guest post: "Bullies made me stronger than I ever thought I would be"
MumsnetGuestPosts · 25/01/2016 16:12
Arken 
Dpyjamas Yes! My bullying ended due to leaving school. The cut off point should have been years earlier. I only mentioned to my mother years later. Shame definitely accompanies abuse. I felt ashamed that I was being bullied. I was scared that I would only make matters worse if I informed her. After all she could not be with me during the school day.
Friends and family members expect me to shrug it off but it is still very much a part of me. I sometimes wonder if people would befriend /employ me if they knew I had no guts as a teen, that I was petrified of going in but knew no way out. No matter how well I do in life, how attractive people say I am - I cannot erase the memory of being unattractive, dorky, unfashionable, awkward, part of the wallpaper.
I wonder how useful it would be to NOT look for "reasons" for bullying and say simply "The reason some people are bullied is because some people are bullies." Nothing to do with accents, hair colour, skin colour, academic ability. It takes the responsibility away from the victim and makes it sit firmly on the perpetrator.
I am so thankful I was never really bullied despite being almost a classic bully target - ginger, musical, bright, hardworking. I really feel for those people who are. I will always remember a friend of my younger sister who was being bullied terribly by some older girls. The head's response was "We don't have bullying in this school" and advised her to stay in a classroom at break 
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