Something you were bullied about as a kid

[littlepinkkitty]

So I am sure you have all heard stories in the media about kids and teens being bullied to the point where thay feel like the only way out is suicide. The most recent story is of a Rutgers university student jumping off the George washington bridge after his room mate posted a video of him being intimate with another man. http://abcnews.go.com/US/gay-teen-suicide-sparks-debate/story?id=11788128

This story made me really angry. So many kids and teens are bullied every day. I thought of myself as a kid. My mom sent me away to summer camp one summer. Coming from a family that didn't have a lot of money I didn't bring a lot of outfits to wear. I was also the kid who was insanely skinny with big thick glasses. I was was never a shy kid and I tried to make friends with the othr girls but I made few friends. I had this one shirt that I loved it was a collared shirt with red and white stripes. I didn't care how it looked on me. I liked because it reminded of a farmer. I pictured myself picking veggies everytime i wore it, someething i still like doing. One day in the art room i had the shirt onand the most popular girls were at the other end of the table giggling in my direction. I was so desperate for the friendship i actually started giggling too( I had no idea why they were giggling). Then one of them Rachie came up and said "you're shirt is ugly" I couldn't believe that. I loved that shirt. I replied "This is my favorite shirt" All of them started cracking up. "That ugly thing is your favorite shirt!" Rachie said. I felt felt so small at that point. That same summer they wrote on a picnic table in permanent marker that i was ugly and hated me. They also took my blanket and hid it in a hole somewhere. They were rarely punished.

I know I wrote a lot so if you skimmed through its okay. I have been bullied more beyond what I wrote. I would really like to hear some of your stories because i feel we as a people can come together and look out for kids and adults who aren't treated nicely. Sometimes it takes one voice to save someone.

[Shaun]

I was always the quiet, shy kid that cried easily. Kids used to fuck with me just because they knew they could. Girls were the worst though because I couldn't really do anything about it. My childhood was basically hell. I think it made me the aloof, thick skinned individual I am today though. Insults don't really faze me anymore and I haven't cried since 6th or 7th grade. Just because someone insults you doesn't mean you have to be insulted. Lesson painfully learned. That being said though kids will be kids and I don't really see much you can do about it short of separating them.

Oh and I still say the roommate in that article deserves to be shot.

Edited October 3, 2010 by Shaun

[Glory13666]

Rather than being bullied I just made myself disappear. I also came from a family who didn't have a lot of money so I never had any cool clothes and just didn't fit in. I was also overweight but I was an outcast before that. I just accepted it and stayed to myself and didn't ever talk to anyone. I wanted to kill myself often but knew I never would but a lot of that happened after my dad died when I was 12. It really pissed me off when the kids who were mean to me all of a sudden decided to stop by my house to see me after he died. I knew they weren't genuine.

[KatRN05]

Hmmm let's see:

When I was in 7th grade I went to the old River Rouge high school till about 3 months into the school year before moving to Southgate. Anyhow, between classes we would have to take the stairs to get to our next class on the first floor. There was a girl that would always try to push me down the stairs between classes because she thought I stuffed my bra. I'm serious.

When I went to Cabrini elementary school, the other kids picked on me because I was from River Rouge and they thought my parents paid my tuition with food stamps which they did not.

Edited October 6, 2010 by KatRN05

[kat (1)]

I was bullied for the way I looked, and also the kids said I was weird,(I am so what) and because we were very poor, I mean even though I grew up in Southwest Detroit, where most people live in poverty, we were still worse off then alot of people. Also, you had to be a fighter in school, no crying was aloud. I was not a fighter at all. One time, these girls wanted to fight me for like being poor or something, so the one girl chased me home and I ran in the house crying, well my mother said, "get out there and beat her fucking ass or I am going to beat yours". So, I did until she started crying saying her neck was breaking.

Another thing, I remember one time a girl came up to me, she knew that the kids called me fat and ugly so she said "we don't make fun of you because we think your ugly, we make fun of you because the way you dress. (I'm not sure if she thought she was helping the situation or not) The kids called me "scarface" because I have a scar on my forehead from falling and one on my check from it getting sliced. (I was a clumsy one) I believed all the things the kids said to me because, after I came home from school being teased daily my own mother would do the same, by saying things like "your so ugly, how could I have such an ugly daughter". Instead of doing what most mom's would do and say something nice to make a little girl feel better she did much worse. I cried every day, literally, this was all stuff in elementary school too. I finally had to beat up another one of the bullying bitches and this stopped for awhile but it started again in middle school and than I started hanging with older girls who were involved with gangs (these are still some of my best friends today, they have straightened up mainly) There were many times I came home from school and wanted to kill myself because of the hell I went through, I once thought I could do this by drinking cough syrup but I just slept for hours instead. It was either be the baddest, prettiest, toughest bitch in the neighborhood so everyone likes you and no one can beat your ass or pick on you because you will fuck em up or die. Those were what I saw my options being. I coped by laughing at myself and in turn, became the class clown and in 7th grade I discovered glee club and, and believe it or not of all things, this was what made alot of stuff stop, I kinda built a name for myself through singing, even when I was hanging out doing bad shit, I would start singing to the latin freestyle music and everyone would shut up, they would even turn the radio off to hear me. My mom eventually kicked me out because we couldn't live in our house anymore because it was not inhabitable, so she told me to go live with my friend I eventually stopped going to school because well I was now homeless and also I couldn't tolerate the bullshit in high school so when my mom found out I was not going to school she basically came and changed her mind about me not living with her and I was like "you put me out" she tried to make me come back but I wasn't going that easy so some stuff happened and as a result she threw me in a girls home, which I ended up going to school off grounds, did well, academically but got teased for being white!

But anyway, the reason for a partial life story is because, I understand what it is to get made fun of for things out of your control, I wasn't pretty so the kids made fun of me, I was poor, kids made fun of me, I was white, etc,,, all of these things you cannot change, and when it's out of your control and there is no simple fix for it it sucks, it hurts. I know for me, the best decision my mother made was locking me up because I needed help, all of my problems stemmed mainly from teasing and bullying (at school and by my mom) Her locking me up gave me somewhere to turn, someone to talk to and to find out I was not alone, it saved my life and made me who I am today. It's actually a big reason why I do the work I do now.

[prick]

I was bullied in elementary school for my weight and teased in junior high for my height and hairy chest.

[Slogo]

I was bullied in elementary school for my weight and teased in junior high for my height and hairy chest.

You sure showed them. LOL

Mostly my last name...it's easy if you think about it for more than a few seconds.

And of course the fact that my family didn't have a lot of money (though I wouldn't have called us poor). Didn't matter past 7th grade anyway. Once you start to get bigger than the football team, they start to shut up.

Edited October 4, 2010 by Slogo

[FarrIL]

I just didnt get along with the majority of my peers. Then again, I didnt really care much. Most girls my age were talking about boys or mommy letting them get that new doll or wearing lip gloss for the first time. I'd rather talk to the boys about scraping a knee or that cool bruise or talking about vampire-fish, etc. The girls would tease me but it never was so horrible that I didnt want to go to school.

6th and 7th grade wasnt bad. Wasnt bullied ever. I was friends with a few older students too so no one really teased me. 8th grade was a different story. Got teased a lot, the popular girls would single me out and try to convince me that they knew a boy who liked me and got me to believe them. Next school dance rolls around and right before they introduce us, the tell us it was just a game and they werent serious, etc. I even remember one time in Home Ec, one group that most popular girls were in made cookies and they offered me one. I was wary and didnt take bites, I broke it off in pieces. Good thing I did, because I found what looked like a pubic hair baked into the cookie. That and there were a few boys that would tease me constantly. It didnt help that our lockers were near each other's. It got to a point where I went to the office to tell the workers that I wanted the boys to leave me alone. It didnt help because the 2nd time around when I went to the office, the boys were there and were claiming (in truth) that I was swearing at them. I owned up to that but the fact was that I wanted these boys to leave me the fuck alone.

High school rolls around and I just didnt give a flying fuck. And other than one girl whom I had a drastic misunderstanding with, no one messed with me. This girl and I met in 8th grade and I remember on the bus, freshman year, a few seniors picking on me. I was hyper and annoyed so my voice got really high-pitched. The girl turns around and screams "If you dont shut your fucking mouth I'm going to beat the fuck out of you." I just looked up at her, smirked and said "Prove it." She removed her rings, rolled up her sleeves....... and did nothing.

10th grade year, we had a confrontation. I told her I'd had enough, I was tired of the bullshit and there wasnt ever going to be a fight. Get over it and move the fuck on. That was the last of it. 11th grade year, I ran into her at a gas station and she was hungover from a party the previous night. I told her to please take care of herself. Senior year, she offered me a ride to the bus stop. I kindly declined but I thought it was nice. She'd turned over a new leaf, it seemed.

But I dont ever remember being relentlessly tortured in the ways I've read. Was never hazed or bullied like that. I held a lot of stuff in but I'd eventually lash out verbally at whomever was bothering me. And once I stood up for myself, it ended or happened way less often.

[TitsMcGee]

I had buck teeth. And people in this town just really didn't treat us that great anyway, because of my dad's job. Because he worked on the boats, we were considered "rich" even though we were far from it. And I was weird to being with, so in elementary school I was teased for that along with my buck teeth, then in jr. high and high school it got worse because of my mental illness issues. I was told to go kill myself on a daily basis. I dropped out as soon as I could, and went to the alternative school, where I still got teased because I was fat because of all the anti psychotics I was on. Once I hit college, I just really didn't talk to anyone.

[TheGimp]

I remember being teased for....well look at me first of all haha....ah but on a serious note...i was extremly short had some shaggy ass hair and thick plastic frame glasses, and grew up lower middle class so i got K-Mart clothes or salvation army clothes, bein in the SPED classes didn't help either seemed girls were more ruthless then the boys to at being mean...two things that stuck out from being fucked with as a kid were a girl pretended to like me for a week on a dare and then one girl accidently bumped into me in the chow line and went "ewwwwww i touched it" that made me feel like i was 2 feet tall, i had like 2 or 3 friends maybe and we all kinda had the same probs

[LadyKay]

Geee...Where do I begin? I was funny looking, I talked funny and was dyslectic which made me think I was retarded because that was how they treated kids who where dyslectic when I was a kid. The school instead of helping me or anyone else to over come disability put me into a "special" classroom and gave me school work that was 2 or 3 grade levels below my grade. Just so I could pass. I got passing grades but they didn't mean anything. I had to be careful to hide my school books from the "normal' kids because anyone finding out that I was in the 5th grade but working out of a 4th grad spelling book would use that has an opportunity to make me look stupid. I use to get jumped by several older boys on the way home from school who would surround me and tell me they were going to beat me up. This actually happen a lot. It seem like simply leaving my house put me in danger of being jumped by someone. Or called names by people I don't even know who hate me because of the way I look. I guess what was the worse though was when someone acted like they were my friend only to play a joke on me which I was the butt of. I can't really say how all of this effected me. I know that I do not trust people. When someone is being nice to me in the back of my mind I am always thinking about what "joke" they are trying to play on me.

I think that this is the reason why I am so accepting of people who are "different". I have always thought people with "punk" hair were cool and admired anyone who had to guts to look different.

Edited October 4, 2010 by LadyKay

[creatureofthenyte]

I have a big head(the one on my shoulders).

It was more readily apparent when I was a kid.

Most noticeable when I put a baseball cap on; no such thing as one size fits all for me on that.

So I got teased for that.

The other kids dubbed me "Big Head".

I also have never been one of the cool kids.

So I got picked on for that.

I never had anyone take me aside and point me in the right direction as far as style goes; I just made it up as I went along, which was a horrific failure.

On the flipside, I look at pictures now, from back then, and I find myself asking wtf was I thinking, I can now see why I got picked on. Fast forward to today, I still am not a trendy person.

However, I Am comfortable in my own skin, so I like what I like and do what I want.

Edited October 4, 2010 by creatureofthenyte

[Gaf The Horse With Tears]

I was picked on almost daily all the way through school. Imagine being 6 inches shorter than everyone your age... with platnium blonde hair and paper white skin. It never stopped until the summer I turned 14.. and grew to my present height. At that point I started punching people in the mouth if they tried to bully me or pick on me. It seemed to get people to stop picking on me.

[prick]

Big hug to all that were teased!

[bean]

I was teased horribly starting in first grade. I was overweight, and I didn't know how to take care of my curly hair, so it was always frizzy and puffy. My parents were also very poor, so I wore Salvation Army clothes. I would get called all kinds of horrible names every day, and I sometimes was pushed around on the playground.

This continued on, and in 4th grade, I got braces and had to start wearing a bra. The teasing was even worse then. Boys would pull on the back of my bra as far as they could and let go, which hurt like hell. At that point, I didn't want to go to school, and when I went to bed every night I wished that I wouldn't wake up in the morning.

Right before 5th grade, we moved. I continued to get teased for being overweight, having bad hair, braces, uncool clothes, and now, severe acne and for playing violin. I was also weird, and would get made fun of for what I said. I remember that I liked this boy, and he told me that if I did his homework for him, he would like me. I did his homework everyday for a few months, and of course, he told me that he didn't like me and that I was ugly and fat, and that no one would ever like me. Kids would throw snowballs at me when I was walking home from school. They would throw pencils and shoot spitwads in my hair during class.

To this day, I have to sit in the last row in class, because I'm paranoid that someone is going to fuck with me.

When I got home from school, I was bullied by my parents. I was made to feel worthless pretty much every waking hour of every single day. To add to things, one of the bullies lived behind me, so I never went outside when he and his bully friends were outside.

The teasing let up somewhat in 7th grade. I learned how to take care of my hair, the braces had come off, my skin cleared up, and I lost some weight. I was still called ugly and made fun of for not wearing brand name clothes and shoes, and there was a group of 8th grade girls who threatened to kick my ass almost daily.

At the end of 7th grade, I started rebelling and doing things that most of the other kids in my grade weren't doing. I was hanging out with older kids, and I felt accepted by them.

In 8th grade, I was smoking, drinking, and got my nose pierced. More kids thought I was cool, so I had more friends, and wasn't made fun of much in school. I was still afraid to talk though because I didn't want to say something dumb. At home, my parents would constantly criticize me because of my looks, and other things.

In high school, I was goth, so the preppy kids would make fun of me. I was called Elvira because I had long black hair, and some of them called me a witch. I started hanging around the stoners and was getting high all the time. During my sophomore year in high school, I lost a lot of weight and was super skinny. I had huge boobs, and was nicknamed double D's. I also looked older than I was. I was getting a lot of attention from guys, which was nice, but then some of the girls would call me a slut and spread horrible rumors about me.

My home life was torture. I attempted suicide when I was 17. I was made fun of for that by the preppy kids, who would tell me that they wished that I had succeeded.

Edited October 4, 2010 by bean

[kat (1)]

I was teased horribly starting in first grade. I was overweight, and I didn't know how to take care of my curly hair, so it was always frizzy and puffy. My parents were also very poor, so I wore Salvation Army clothes. I would get called all kinds of horrible names every day, and I sometimes was pushed around on the playground.

This continued on, and in 4th grade, I got braces and had to start wearing a bra. The teasing was even worse then. Boys would pull on the back of my bra as far as they could and let go, which hurt like hell. At that point, I didn't want to go to school, and when I went to bed every night I wished that I wouldn't wake up in the morning.

Right before 5th grade, we moved. I continued to get teased for being overweight, having bad hair, braces, uncool clothes, and now, severe acne and for playing violin. I was also weird, and would get made fun of for what I said. I remember that I liked this boy, and he told me that if I did his homework for him, he would like me. I did his homework everyday for a few months, and of course, he told me that he didn't like me and that I was ugly and fat, and that no one would ever like me. Kids would throw snowballs at me when I was walking home from school. They would throw pencils and shoot spitwads in my hair during class.

To this day, I have to sit in the last row in class, because I'm paranoid that someone is going to fuck with me.

When I got home from school, I was bullied by my parents. I was made to feel worthless pretty much every waking hour of every single day. To add to things, one of the bullies lived behind me, so I never went outside when he and his bully friends were outside.

The teasing let up somewhat in 7th grade. I learned how to take care of my hair, the braces had come off, my skin cleared up, and I lost some weight. I was still called ugly and made fun of for not wearing brand name clothes and shoes, and there was a group of 8th grade girls who threatened to kick my ass almost daily.

At the end of 7th grade, I started rebelling and doing things that most of the other kids in my grade weren't doing. I was hanging out with older kids, and I felt accepted by them.

In 8th grade, I was smoking, drinking, and got my nose pierced. More kids thought I was cool, so I had more friends, and wasn't made fun of much in school. I was still afraid to talk though because I didn't want to say something dumb. At home, my parents would constantly criticize me because of my looks, and other things.

In high school, I was goth, so the preppy kids would make fun of me. I was called Elvira because I had long black hair, and some of them called me a witch. I started hanging around the stoners and was getting high all the time. During my sophomore year in high school, I lost a lot of weight and was super skinny. I had huge boobs, and was nicknamed double D's. I also looked older than I was. I was getting a lot of attention from guys, which was nice, but then some of the girls would call me a slut and spread horrible rumors about me.

My home life was torture. I attempted suicide when I was 17. I was made fun of for that by the preppy kids, who would tell me that they wished that I had succeeded.

Hugs to you, Bean, I completely feel you on this, especially the home bullying, that shit is the worst, it's like the family member in question just completely reaffirms all the bullshit the kids at school said to you, but it is 100 times worse because it is coming from those who are suppose to love us and protect us. You and I know that it was the family member who teased us (mine was my mom) that were the one's who had the problem not us, but it is so hard to not go back, emotionally to that place in our minds, that childlike state, and, as a result some of the things we do, like when you say you sit in the back of the class even now, (I also used to do that for a long time early in college) but it is a trauma reaction, at least for me it was. We have to always' keep in our minds that we are, very resilient, I try to remember this and it helps me a great deal.

[bean]

Hugs to you, Bean, I completely feel you on this, especially the home bullying, that shit is the worst, it's like the family member in question just completely reaffirms all the bullshit the kids at school said to you, but it is 100 times worse because it is coming from those who are suppose to love us and protect us. You and I know that it was the family member who teased us (mine was my mom) that were the one's who had the problem not us, but it is so hard to not go back, emotionally to that place in our minds, that childlike state, and, as a result some of the things we do, like when you say you sit in the back of the class even now, (I also used to do that for a long time early in college) but it is a trauma reaction, at least for me it was. We have to always' keep in our minds that we are, very resilient, I try to remember this and it helps me a great deal.

Hugs to you too, and everyone else that posted.

I still have a few trauma reactions that I haven't been able to shake yet. The sitting in the back of the class one is huge. I get to class ridiculously early to make sure that I get my seat in the back, and I panic a little if I'm running late because I'm afraid that I will have to sit in front of people. If that happened, I wouldn't be able to focus on class because I would be worried that someone was making fun of me or looking at me and criticizing everything that is wrong with me. It's stupid, I know. I just can't seem to shake that one. I did it all through undergrad, and now I'm doing it in grad school.

My mother and step-father were the ones to pick on me. I'm an only child.

I think what keeps me going is that I do remind myself constantly that I've made it through hell, so I can make it through whatever is going on now.

[Class-Punk]

I had a bad slouching problem, no fashion sense, social anxiety, was rail thin, and at the bottom of the social hierarchy.

In late High School I was picked on less, because I hated being there, had black clothes and long black hair, and played Counter Strike to the point where I gave a speech on it in speech class, which collectively made everyone think I was going to go on a shooting. I've moved on from the things that've happened in school, forgive but don't forget.

My father was a 200+ pound bodybuilder who has a history of anger problems and verbal abuse. As a child, I learned the meaning of fear. In High School, I caught him having an affair via email which is around the time I stopped talking to him with anything less than the fewest necessary words. Now, to pass the time in the recession, I use his weights.

[TygerLili]

I was picked on because because I had big boobs. By the time I was 12 I was already a 36D. My weight tended to yo yo, so by the time I got to high school I was overweight. I was picked on because I got good grades, and because my mom was a teacher at my school. I got picked on because I was shy. I got picked on because I was a good girl and I didn't drink, or smoke, or party. Tons of other reasons, probably, but those are the ones I can remember.

[victoriavengeance (1)]

my nose and my name.

[prick]

my nose and my name.

Your nose! Really?

[victoriavengeance (1)]

oh god yeah.

I've been made fun of for my nose FOREVER.

My nose is large.

but it fits my face.

I broke it when I was 8 years old, faceplanted in a shower on some tile and shattered it, it rehealed with a huge bump in it, and it isn't the smallest cute little thing. But again, it fits my face- that's something I've had to instill and remind myself of my whole life, 'cause kids are MEAN MEAN MEAN and will make fun of you for ANYTHING different.

Hell, I work with kids and the little buggers say some crazy mean stuff

Like when they ask why you 'look funny' or why your hair looks like a clown's nose orrr when they ask if you're having a baby and throw shoes at you.

[prick]

Strange, your nose looks small to me.

[victoriavengeance (1)]

eh. it's decent size. it's no cute little ski jump

[prick]

I looked at all your photos and I just dont seeit, I am however used to big Polish honkers.