Was anyone else bullied at school?

[theamazonstar]

Sorry for such a miserable topic on a Friday night but I have to get this off my chest.

I had a miserable time at high school. I was horribly bullied and ended up with bulimia and severe depression. I contemplated suicide too. As soon as I could I left for uni and I was much happier there but still very slow to trust people. I've recently moved back to my home town for family and work reasons, and I've run into a few of my classmates. I can't talk to them, even of they didn't bully me. I start shivering and gibbering and I bloody hate it- I'm not the person I was back then but seeing someone brings it all back. Is this normal?

Help :(

Yes I think so. Little things set me off too. People laughing too loudly - I think they must be laughing at me. Someone shouts something from across the street or a car and I think it must me something about me. The adrenaline kicks in and I feel horribly panicky. I hate being in the town I grew up in, I look at every teenager I pass thinking they're going to start on me even though they're too young to know me. I look at every adult wondering when I'll walk into one of the bullies. One of them tried to add me as a friend on facebook. I actually had a restraining order on this person so I still wonder if she did it because she had forgotton, because she wanted to make amends or to continue my suffering. I am bitter and angry about it but I wish I wasn't.

Yes. But it was primary school for me. I survived because I went on to grammar school where I thrived and found I could be loved by being class clown.

I think bullying in secondary school is a whole other thing that would carry on into adult life.

Yes magneto, it's exactly like that! And you say things to a friend and they can't remember it happening, but you relive it over and over again.

Yes. Resulted in depression and started me self harming.

I was bullied all through primary school (from my very first day) by one idiot, then when I moved to secondary school I was bullied by a whole group of "friends". At no point did anyone in authority help. In fact, at one point a teacher decided the very best plan was to get me and the girls bullying me all together and say, "Empusa says you've been doing X, Y and Z. I think you should make up". Of course they smiled sweetly and told the teacher everything would be fine, then they walked me out of the classroom with their arms around me. I knew I was in trouble at that point. :(

yes, hideously.

it took me a long, long, long time to get over it (in fact, still affects me now)

i sometimes have dreams where i am walking around my old school, but if i think about it when i'm awake it makes me feel sick and scared

magneto yes yes! to all of those things.

the thought that the people who have left me like this are just happily living their lives makes me sick too. they have no idea what they've done

Due to some of the mind games they played with me I struggle with certain fairly normal situations, I just shut down as I can't cope with it. Am only just starting to sort it out now with counselling.

I was bullied too, for no particular reason, when i was 10 a new girl started and decided she didn't like me and all my friends agreed with her, even my best friend - didn't have one friend.

I was teased, hit and spent many an afternoon being sick at the thought of walking down the long school drive knowing that they would all be waiting for me at the end - that horrible panicky, sick to your stomach feeling of dread is the most awful feeling that i will never forget.

I have no idea how i would react if i saw them again, i might lose all control and punch them. I left the school and became louder and more obnoxious so i was never picked on again!

It never leaves you though.

Oh Empusa that sounds do familiar :(

If you don't mind me asking, thisisyesterday, how did you get over it? DH has suggested seeing a counsellor but I'm not sure, it still feels so private.

yes, it was over 20yrs ago at senior school. Nothing physical, just nasty bitching and isolating me. But enough to get the deputy head and head of year involved.

It set me back a lot as I left at 14. Lost contact with my peer group and struggled to re-build a group of friends, which TBH I've never really managed.

Oddly enough one of the girls is very friendly when I see her now and I'm happy to chat with her. We've never spoken about what happened at school but she does seem to be a different person these days, nice and sensible etc.

oh yes, and the ringleader tried to add me as a friend on FB. I ignored it and she tried again, so she's blocked now. Daft cow.

Yes, and my mum told me it was my own fault :-(

I know what you mean and I know that feeling which magneto describes.

Your shivering and gibbering response is not abnormal but I'd say you need to resolve it in some way, you shouldn't need to feel like that.

What reassures me is that my bullies are now working in dead end jobs and look like shite. Bizarrely, they now make me feel better about myself. I'm a better person than them.

I've seen all the bullies from grammar school since then. They all treated me like an old valued friend, as if nothing ever happened.

Hokeycokey, that's the feeling that comes back, the dread.

Yes. All through secondary school. Tried to off myself in year 10. Am now shitting myself about the day I have to send my daughter to school, and trying to figure out how to stop my feelings being obvious so she doesn't get scared.

I still get upset encountering the bullies on Facebook. And I stiffen up when I have to walk past a group of teenagers on the street because I expect them to start on me.

Horrifically from age of 7 to 12, ended up having a break down and was admitted to hosptial following asult by one of my bullies (well several actually) My wonderful child phsycologist (how I still feel I owe both my life and my sould to) signed me of from school after 12 weeks in hopsital went up against the LEA, got me home tuition ( 5 hours a week) I was at college taking my Alevels by 14 (great, fantastic experience) and was at the best uni in the country (for my subject) at 15.

You're a better person than me, Meglet, I couldn't imagine doing that. I do want to though, to show them that I am better than what they thought I was/ could be- like MaryMother.

I was bullied but not as badly as some of you :(

But I do think schools take bullying much more seriously today than when we were at school, don't you think?

I posted a thread about my dd as a supposed friend of hers has turned on her for no reason and it breaks my heart to see her sad little face.

Children are horrid aren't they?

counsellor is a good idea.

actually, i probably am not totally over it, i have no idea how i would feel if i met any of them.
but for a long time i wouldn't talk to anyone, was too scared to speak in case people laughed at me, stuff like that. and what cured that was getting a job with lovely people where i gradually learned that i could say things and people would listen and that i could make a valid contribution without people thinking i was stupid

i am still crappy in new situations and with big groups of people, but in general i think i just learned to get on with it tbh

i have had counselling for other stuff, not specifically the bullying, and i suppose that gave me the tools i needed to deal with other issues? i'm not sure really.

i'm certainly more confident now, and perhaps that just comes with being valued bby others and listened to?

Yes I was bullied and ridiculed all the way through school.

Its shaped me into the perosn I am that doubts most things I do and lacks self confidence and always looking over my shoulder to see who is laughing at me, waiting for me to "cock up" etc etc.

I am 40 this year and it still effects me every day of my life. Not in a way that I walk around thinking "I was bullied" but just in natural mindset about myself. I have to force myself to do certain things and behave in a more positive manner because.

Bullying wrecks whole lives. I wish schools and people would take it alot more seriously and deal with it quicker than they do. That said compared to when I was at school - I do believe there has been a massive improvement.

leguminous, i am also scared of sending my kids to secondary school

the thought of any of them going through even a fraction of what I did just breaks my heart

I was bullied, followed by being dropped by all my friends. This was during Year 9 and 10, it was a very low time, and I was very lucky that by Year 11 I had a wonderful circle of new friends, which lessened the damage considerably, I think.

What I'm left with is a fear of being annoying (which is what I was told constantly for about a year). I have lovely friends now but I still go home and analyse whether I said or did anything to annoy them.

When the bullies pop up on 'people you might know' on FB I hate it (although I will admit to feeling a teeny tiny bit happy when I see how crap/old/toothless some of them look now ). Getting out of my home town and going to a different college to all my year group was the best thing I ever did.

I don't know what to say to help but I do hope bullies feel guilt for what they do, eventually. I like to think my anger about it has faded but heaven help the child who bullies one of my DC.

Bottom line is that you ARE better than them, regardless of what you / they are doing now.

You didn't bully people, ergo etc.

What you said about not talking to a counsellor because it's private has struck a chord. I would recommend seriously opening up though, maybe just by writing it all down, what happened, how it made you feel. If not to a counsellor at first, as much as you can here perhaps. This thread is a good start

Facebook and things scare me about my kids. At least when we were at home we were safe. But I do think schools are better now, and parents more aware- I don't think Bert2e's experience would happen again. DH tells the DC to hold their heads up all the time because they are amazing and they've not to let anyone tell them differently

Laughing is supposed to be a good thing . :(

I think I will try to see someone.

There are somethings that they will never know affected me and these things still affect me to this day.

For example, I do not wear make up because I feel it draws attention to me obvioulsy was the last thing I wanted with the bullies. I never learned how to put make up on, what is used for what etc sometimes I think I would like to wear it but I don't know where to start. Then I worry I will look silly wearing make up.

It took me a long time after I left school to buy anything "in fashion" because I could never afford the brands so I told myself I didn't want them even if I did like them. Then I began to think that I couldn't wear them because again people would think I looked stupid in them, like I was pretending to be something else.

I don't have any friends, I feel self conscious that I am boring people and always feel like I say too much. I also feel like I always do a lot of the "chasing" with potential friends and that puts me off them because I feel like they aren't interested.

I have no confidence to do anything I want to do - joining classes etc. Having ds has made me a bit better because I don't want to pass my insecurities on to him but I still don't fit in.

Yes, I do that too IHeart! I really do obsess over a turn of phrase or remark.

Thank you so much MaryMother. I do feel more normal!