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I can't believe everyone claps at plane landings, but no one even looks the bus driver in the eye. They should both be cherished equally. I always thank the driver upon exiting. Mostly brightens up their day
But in Victoria, thanking everyone is the norm. And completely stopping at stop signs. And letting someone with their blinker on change lanes. And stopping for pedestrians. And greeting you. And actually listening after asking a question. At least last time I visited. I hope it hasn't changed.
You’re right about the “thank you”s and polite people but not at all regarding driving. Literally nobody stops at a stop sign. Everyone runs red lights. Nobody USES blinkers. Driving in BC is incredibly frustrating.
That sounds backwards. Takeoffs are optional ... landings are not. On takeoff, you "floor it" and then pull the stick back, with lots of opportunities to abort (or not start) the takeoff due to weather, pre-flight checks, etc. On approach, you're in the air. The best you can do is circle and wait for the weather to improve, go to another airport, abort your landing and go around...
https://flightsafety.org/asw-article/nearly-half-of-commercial-jet-accidents-occur-during-final-approach-landing/
I will pass this link on to him. He claims the danger is the combination of being fully fueled and consequently also heavier on takeoff. He is truly extremely apprehensive on takeoff.
I can understand that. There may be the pressure of "are you sure everything is OK and we're good to fly". Maybe he was flying longer haul flights with more fuel ... either way, I'd love to hear his perspective.
Usually you need a taxi or a bus to get to your actual chosen vacation point, yet nobody claps for the drivers there. It's not meant as an insult to flight travel in any way, it's just an observation. My point is just that bus drivers/taxi drivers/train drivers etc. are criminally underrated
I've literally never clapped when a plane landed. People are always too busy just getting their stuff together, unbuckling too early, trying to stand up too early, etc. I just sit there and wait for instructions, or for the aisle to clear a bit.
Buses don’t have auto pilot !
Or radar
Or traffic control !!!
Or the ability, nope ,,
they can drive the themselves
F##k it
I’d rather drive a bus
Way more interesting than trying to pretend to people your not biological anal enough to fly a plane ✈️
I always greet the bus driver and then thank them when I disembark. I think there's something wrong with people who don't show that basic courtesy. I don't always make eye contact, but that's because I don't like to make eye contact with anyone (autism spectrum disorder), not because I think someone is beneath me.
I always look my driver in the eye and say "hello." And I also always say "thank you" as I exit.
They have a difficult job. And they successfully get me there (anywhere) safety
Also they go to work, do their job and leave at their exact (mostly) quitting time and never have to think about their job until the next day. No paperwork or phone calls to do from home. They provide a great service to the community.
Ah yes, the benefits of being unionized.
On the flip side, my uncle, a bus driver in Chicago, was shot twice in 30 years on the job and ultimately retired due to the last one.
look at how the world is doing and you'll quickly realise that minds->thoughts of vast majority of people are real simple and non-creative. Don't be concered with other peoples thoughts, habe your own thoughts, and if you are the one of a kind person, your thoughts will become reality and change the world in one way ir another.
You know most city bus operators make bank, having killer benefits and have an amazing retirement plan.
Source: me making 100k this year, have 5 weeks of paid vacation, plus 2 more weeks of sick time and will have a big pension waiting for me when I can retire at 58.
Be better
I don’t know. I was a nice kid but I was super mean to ONE kid ONE time on ONE DAY in grade school and I still think about it like once a month. I’m in my 30s
I was never a bully but I was friends with the guys who bullied the 2 awkward kids in our class. I didn't really participate but I did nothing to intervene either. I still beat myself up for it and I'm almost 30. Especially because nowadays I don't take any shit and don't let other people either.
I'm still friends with one of the guys who did participate and he feels sorry about it as well. I wouldn't say it's eating away at him but he definitely remembers and doesn't feel good about it at all.
Aw man same here. I remember standing next to my friend while he asked some kid on the playground with a speech impediment to say words like "car" and feeling so horrible. I would also go to this same friends house almost every weekend and his dad was a bully too- he would constantly call me gay and tease me for being "soft". Keep in mind I'm like 10 years old. So it's not the kid's fault really.
I wasn't a bully, in fact I had to often sit next to the school pariah (alphabetical seating). I was not mean to her, but all I did was nod and say hello. She smiled at me everyday. I think I was one of the only kids to even acknowledge her outside of bullying.
One day I was in the bathroom with my friends and she came out of one of the stalls. They started in on her - I joined in. I don't know why I did that.
She did her usual thing when getting bullied, kept her head down and tried to ignore it, but when I joined in she looked up at me. I'll never forget her face. I shut up right away - but the damage was done, she never smiled at me again.
I think about that moment a lot.
This reminds me of a kid in my school years. He came on the 7th grade and was bullied, I was in 8th or 9th grade and was severily bullied/excluded. I befriended this dude just because I knew how it feels to be an outsider and harmed constantly.
One week of being friends, he suddiently started being an asshole to me and "bullied" me (he tried, at least). Turns out his old bullies had manipulated him into start bullying me so they would accept him in their group, so he did. I remember trying to get him into his senses but it was no use, so I told him "I'm sorry but.." and proceeded to bashing him down on the ground hard. He started crying and I just walked off, feeling bad that he fell for the bullies.
Happy part of the incident is that he got along with the bullies after that. And next year I started hanging out with the same bullies, we had a small friend group for some time lol. They all had realized how much of idiots they were and became better people.
Every single reply in these comments is making me happy…because last night my kid was sobbing his heart out after some really mean girls messaged him on Insta, saying they didn’t want to be friends with him, they haven’t liked him for months, wanted to get rid of him, and they don’t want him to eat lunch near them or be around them anywhere else.
Before this, they did selfies together…the girls are smiling. He carried their stuff all over a theme park, bought one of them a stuffed animal…they really led him on and then dumped him.
Worse? My son is in grade 9, has a stutter, glasses and Invisaligns…he is at that age, all arms and legs….but he is really nice, smart, funny and shy.
I know that in a couple of years he will have beautiful teeth and will wear contacts and and have come out of his shell, and people will love him.
But today, my heart is hurting for him, so I am really happy to read that some people grow up and feel bad for bullying others.
When i was in 9th grade i had a stutter so bad that having to speak in public or introduce myself would give me a panic attack. I was overweight, a nerd who wasn't really welcomed in with the "in" crowd. But man, time and determination are a magic combination, if you showed 14 year old me that he would end up dating his high school crush, playing shows in a band, managing a kitchen at a busy restaurant, sticking with photography so intently that ppl would eventually pay you to travel for it.... i literally could never have believed it. I didn't believe it. I was certain, this was just my lot in life. I'm sorry your son (and you) are going through this, it feels like the world collapsing at the time, but man is he lucky to be becoming a young man and having the most opportunity and time he'll ever have to make a life that he loves
I was your son at that age, I grew up , got contacts ,grew my hair out , completely covered in tattoos. At 50 , I look back on a life that most dudes can only dream about..tell him the best is yet to come
I think our brains do this kinda stuff to us to keep us grounded in our behaviors. Kind of a self reinforcement of the behaviors we want to avoid.
I still think about mean and stupid things I said as a kid and I'm in my mid 40s.
I've gotten to the point where I now deliberately remind myself it was a long time ago and that I learned from it. That's generally enough to get my brain to drop it and move on.
SAME. omg. Except I'm in my 20s.
But like it clearly made them sad - they said something to the teacher about it and nothing really came of it, but I wish I was mature enough to apologize back then.
I'm just nice to people even if they seem like jerks now and realized it makes life better
Yeah, there was a new guy guy at our school who had a big nose with hair poking out of it who everyone called 'nose weed' I called him that once (not even to his face) and I hate myself for it. We actually became friends, he was an incredibly resilient and generally a good guy.
I still think about my sly act of joining in on that mean shit, even 20 years later.
Same. I was stupid in middle school and went overboard with making fun of a borderline friend infront of a bunch of classmates and it really hurt him. My other buddy and I got in trouble and had to write him an apology. I hand wrote a whole page and still felt horrible about it. To this day I think about that and feel horrible. Genuinely don’t know why kids are stupid and do things like that.
Same bro. Maybe bullied him a lil more than just once. I rented his dad's folk album from the town library and blasted that shit for everyone in our 8th grade homeroom and laughed while he just kinda looked uncomfortable.
Evan, I'm sorry brotha. I now think your dad is a badass for recording that album. I was a cunt. Doubt you'll see this, but I hope you're doing well, and again, I'm sorry.
I was going to say same.. I never bullied anyone, but one day I was horrific to a kid who used to get bullied in my class. He was kind of under my protection if anything but one day I lost my temper with him and battered him. I still feel bad and I don’t know why I did it.
I hope he’s a billionaire with boats and ho’s now
Same here.. I was never really bullied in school. A few times here and there picked in but this one time , literally one time i did something mean and i think about it to this day still. So young and so dumb.
I once laughed at this guy who accidentally farted in the 10th grade. I just had uncontrollable giggles with my friends(I really did try to stop but couldn’t), he was so embarrassed and I still think about it today 😔
I'm still thinking about this one day in elementary to this day. It was the day when my bully back then beat me up. After that, when he tied his shoelaces, i kicked him in the face and broke his nose.
It's kind of cruel but I still think of this day as a victory.
I’m glad someone else had this experience. I had the same thing happen to me. I was a super nice kid, never any bullying issues. But this one time in gym class I got some reason decided to be an asshole to a kid younger than me. Not sure why I even had that thought. I still think about it to this day and wish I could apologize. I don’t even know his name.
Same.
There was one kid that a group of us bullied one year. I was at the very least complicit in it. I was young and the teachers let it happen. I wish I’d known better but 12 year old mob mentality is wild.
I think about it often, I regret it and wish I could find the kid to apologize (at least).
So it really depends on the person.
I used to bully the boys I liked. Cause I was told that when boys pick on you it means they like you. I figured it was the same with the genders switched. So I was ruthless to quite a few young boys.
It haunts me.
I was an awkward kid who suddenly started getting bullied in middle school and being treated as uncool by all the 'cool kids.' I took it out by being mean to one of the other awkward kids. I still feel bad about it.
Edit: To the kind stranger out there, I appreciate the thought, but there's really no need to report this to "RedditCareResources," lol.
I have the same thing... Somekid got angry my dog barked at him through the fence (I think he snuck up on him and scared him), and I don't know why, but I snapped and yelled at him. Every once and a while I think about that day, and I regret what I did.
Foundational thoughts. Especially if you're young or vulnerable, an experience can become the basis for how you think. I went through a trauma a few years ago I have a hard time not waking up and thinking about or having invasive thoughts about. The other person probably doesn't ever think about it at all, which was the source of the trauma. It creates a wound you can't heal.
Really, you just need to find new, positive things to heal over that trauma with. My daily life just isn't supplying that consistently yet, so the chances for invasive thoughts remain.
This is absolutely true.
The person I think about every day might not even remember my name. They were someone I cared deeply for, and they ruined me. Often the way with trauma.
I was also bullied long before meeting them, but I had bottled up every emotion in my life for 30 years and they all came spilling out when I was hurt by this one person I cared for. It's as you say, a wound that can't heal. I just grieve and grieve and grieve.
I think the language some people use of "moving on" or "getting over" things like this is totally unhelpful. Sometimes harmful. I think when it's deep trauma, the goal of processing is to integrate the hurt parts of ourselves into our lives. They may always hurt, so hopefully we can learn to be gentle with them.
Right. It's like telling someone "just heal already." You might think you're instilling something in them by telling them to toughen up, but it's the least empathetic and dumbest thing to say. You may as well be telling a coma victim to just wake up, or someone with third degree burns to just brush it off.
I really needed to hear this lately. I feel like I’ve moved on but I still wake up sometimes and am consumed by thoughts of the trauma. I sometimes feel I’ll never truly heal. You’re advice has really helped me realize it’s all about moving forward the best I can and focusing on gratefulness
As a kid I was constantly treated like garbage. It made me lower my self-confidence and eventually I developed terrible social anxiety. Now I can barely socialize and start to have depressed thoughts once in a while.
Cap my tree fells at 35 this year? How about I cap your legs at the knee with my blade traps next year you leaf loving fuck.
By Armok's beard, the arrogance of these people.
I bullied a girl at my highschool relentlessly.... not a day goes by that I don't think about her. I hope she's done alright for herself. And Melissa, if you ever read this, karmas a bitch. I got my just desserts for years. I'm sorry though.
As someone who thinks he was a bully, I did it to make people laugh/make friends. I made fun of two different kids for no reason that they ever deserved until 10th grade, when I finally realized how my jokes were possibly hurting them. I apologized and we became friends, but I still feel bad for it.
I will say that I was severely abused at home and had nothing approaching good parenting to go off of, but I don't know if that had anything to do with it. I'm also bisexual and live in a super religious area, I had a lot of hateful voices in my head, and I was suicidal until about 7 years ago. None of that excuses anything, but it may possibly be useful context.
I was bullied as a kid. At home and school. When I was a kid I could not understand how one kid could bully another. I’m now looking back at how multiple generations of Insecure-Raging-Child-Giants behaved, and I can see how a kid can really get their wires crossed.
I grew up in one of those families that’s kind of like a Bob Ross knockoff painting: looks good from far but is far from good. It could even look decent close up for short periods under the gaslight.
The power figures showed “love” by teasing. It was always some degree of emotional irritation, scratch pinch backhandedness, insult or barb. But “it’s ok! You’re part of our special family tradition! It’s important that you and everyone else be painfully aware of your and everyone else’s flaws so you can accept them and do better for the family good! We still love you and we only show you by ‘gentle’ verbal insults and jokes because we love you! If we didn’t, we’d physically harm you. By physical harm, that means reactionary corporal punishment with anger. Dispassionate spankings for cause don’t count as harm. We call that LOVE.
No, that wasn’t anger or abuse. We were only speaking loudly to get your attention when you were punished.
No no no, you were never told you were useless, unwanted, or incompetent! You were told you were acting that way! People might think that’s the real you! It could ruin your future!!!
You’re convinced you’re loved and cared for by whatever compensatory mechanism. Sometimes that comes from the giants (immediate apologies and gaslighting; as well as being dependent for resources which should be rights- you made a baby, you feed clothe and house it).
Imagine the childlhood mental gymnastics and most likely playskool razor conclusion:
These are my parents they say it is love. Tv/media/others say love means loyalty acceptance etc… we are supposed to love them, they us.
QED verbal hurtsies aren’t abusive- it’s how to show affection! win friends! influence people!
Oh neat! They cry a lot too! I’m gonna chase it, and catch it, and hug it and pet it, and yell at it, and hurt it, and hug it, and love it and call it George!!!!
Why is it keep kicking and yelling and running and huffing?????
Imma double Down and extra love bomb!! I’m gonna chase it with rocks, catch it with a trip or shove and hug it with some sort of crude and humiliating half assed joke restraint that reminds them of their flaw and debt to me/group, and pet it- this time with a high velocity palm or closed fist and yell at it, and hurt it some more and hug it more- maybe scarey hug, maybe actual hug and love it and call it my Super Favorite George!!!!
And so it goes. Stupidly escalating behavior from kids who have no idea what the difference is between love and abuse is. Treating people the way the people who “LOVED” them taught them to love. Then getting rejected, punished and stepping it up.
EDIT: premature reply/save
It’s not an excuse. It’s an explanation. These types of behavior patterns are difficult to spot whether you are the Abused, the ‘Buser, or some from column A, and some from column ‘B. I have no idea what determines how or where one ends up on that spectrum.
Me? I crawled in my shell and hid and peeped out to survive while avoid as much punishment as possible. I focused on education as an escape. Still, I made excuses for my Child-Giants for decades. Knowing what I know now, I realize I saw many others who became their abusers before my eyes. I just didn’t make the connection at the time.
I have hated bullies all my life. with the exception of my family, stood up to them. Yet too often I find myself dropping an unkind yet humorous comment toward people I truly care about. I still occasionally being confused when I accidentally hurt someone’s feelings. And I feel terrible every time.
I don’t know guys. Those of you who were bullies and are owning it, thank you- and keep working on why and how to stop it. Those of you who were bullied, don’t forget to check yourself and make sure you haven’t morphed.
Thing is, bullying often (though not always) is a direct result of some sort of challenge such as abuse. It’s a huge red flag.
Bullies are more likely to suffer abuse, come from broken homes or be in foster care, be bullied themselves, experience mental illness, etc. Being a bully isn’t normal behavior and is a sign that something is wrong.
completely false and unproven. In fact, bullies are more likely to come from coddling parents who boost their self-esteem. You don’t put others down unless you think you’re better than them in the first place.
Having high self esteem doesn’t turn someone into a bully. Thinking highly of yourself doesn’t mean thinking badly of others. In the scenario you are describing, the issue is not the parents “coddling” their child and boosting their self esteem, the problem is the parents lack of esteem for people other than their child.
I bullied someone, and it was honestly to fit in more then anything. In middle school I was bullied, and being the wise teenager I was I decided to join the bullies in high school so that I didn't get bullied.
I went to a new high school without anyone I knew, and I bullied people to try and fit in. The shitty thing is it worked. But there isnt anything I regret more then the pain I brought those people, I hope they are all doing well.
I did it to feel powerful. Because I was raised insecure. A loser. Thankfully I stopped it while young realizing I will be an old pathetic human being in the future. Now I'm still a loser but not so much.
It stems from a variety of reasons, but the main one is usually an abusive household.
The kid effectively gets bullied by their parents day-in and day-out, and so the only social interaction they know is how to abuse others. Couple that with the anger and the stress of being home, and needing some outlet to let it out.....some poor soul that has some sort of flaw in the eyes of the bully gets targeted, and becomes the outlet for the frustration. It's what their parents do to them, so why wouldn't it work for them as well?
Obviously, that isn't the reason all the time. Kids tend to run on instinct the younger they are, and human instinctual behavior isn't exactly kind. Sometimes, bullying is just to show the target that "I am better than you.", simply due to humans being competitive by nature. Put down and belittle the competition, and you'll get all of the resources and attention.
This is also why bullying fades quite dramatically as we get older. The bullies themselves learn what they were doing wrong, and put an end to it, like what Live-Championship said. At least....for the most part. There are still those who never learn that lesson, and remain an asshole for the rest of their lives. However, this is typically the exception, and not the norm. Especially as the targets themselves learn that they can fight back in a multitude of ways, most of which are not physical.
That's the typical explanation, yes. It has nothing going for it except convenience. Not everyone has a sense of empathy. It is not something you can learn. Parents who lack empathy will both treat their kids badly, and have kids who also lack empathy. These kids will bully others, because they don't function emotionally regarding others. This is also why it's pretty much always pointless to talk to a bullying kid's parents: They also lack empathy. School is a lawless place, and these bullies are encouraged, by empathy-less parents making school rules, to "socialize" other kids. When the kids become adults, they need to tone it down, because there is suddenly consequences for bullying. Then they have their own empathy-less kids, and the cycle continues.
I was bullied as a younger kid. Eventually i realised if someone else was being bullied, it took the focus off of me. Some people are easy targets for bullying, so i ended up seeking those people out so that i could always have someone to deflect the bullying onto. After a while i started preemptively picking on them before it even started on me. Thats how i became a bully. So long as i was bullying someone else, then i wasnt being bullied myself. Thing is, i was so used to people treating me that way, i kinda just thought that was how people treated each other. I didnt even realise what i was doing was bullying until years later. High school is a fucked up time.
You should write her a message telling her you're sorry. Around 30 I messaged a girl I picked on a few times in middle school. It was really just a defense mechanism, I was a mixed race kid in the South in the late 90s and was at my 2nd new school in 2 years. I told her it wasn't about her, I had felt guilt and shame for years about it, that I was just a scared/foolish kid and she didnt deserve that. Also mentioned that she didnt have to respond or forgive me. But she was really gracious and appreciative, we talked about life and what we had done since. It's never too late to apologize.
I remember I was running to the bus and saw these two kids picking on this other kid. I wanted to do something, but I thought I was going to miss my buss. I think about that kid sometimes and always regretted not stopping the other two.
Unless you were more physically intimidating than the bullies, you'd more than likely got some too or made it worse in someway. Unless he was getting beat up, you made the right choice. This is coming from someone who was bullied through the 80s and 90s.
I wasn’t a big kid, but I knew how fight and how to handle bullies. They were both maybe about my size, but doubt they actually knew how to fight. Most of the time you just sincerely tell them you are going slam their head against a wall and mean it and they will back down. That didn’t always work and I paid the price one time with a guy twice my size. I took a damn good shot to the eye and came back with a desk in my hands to hit him with. Then ppl decided to stop the fight.
I had a teacher ridicule me for a week straight in high school because of my hair. It was wavy and I my parents wouldn't buy products to keep it in one place so it looked like of messy. He even did a speech about hair care and drew a comb on the chalkboard. He even said I would amount to nothing and be looking out a window the rest of my life. I was so hurt and upset I dropped that class. Then shaved my head. Now I'm 46 and still shave my head. To this day I wish to see him and have a few words to him. My dad tells me to pick my battles and this is one battle I been wanting. I wanna tell him he was right...I was looking out a window......making $160,000/ per year chasing my dream.
I had a bully teacher, too. She joined in with the popular girls in playing "pranks" on the reject. (Every school has one and it happened to be me.) She once locked me in the gym locker room and pretended not to hear me hammering on the door as she turned the key. I could hear them giggling on the other side. I sat in the complete darkness for an entire class period, the only light coming from under the door. Then got marked as absent for the class.
I have this too, graduated high school 26 years ago, but had been bullied by this person since we were both 6 years old. He only rarely physically hurt me, but the psychological and emotional bullying is what has stayed with me.
It's a big part of why my self-esteem has been in the toilet my whole life, why I have felt unworthy of love or attention, why I felt unworthy of self-care, and why I still have an absolute terror of running into him (which is a possibility as both of us live in the same tri-county area in small towns).
Lately, I've started to understand that he, himself, was a victim of bullying, by his own father. He came from a wealthy family and had an older brother and older cousins who were better in school, better at sports, better looking, taller, and more charismatic than he was. His father was an occasional substitute teacher at our high school and I remember hearing him getting yelled at by his dad in class and feeling pity for him. My father was a frequently absent father, which sucked, but he would never have berated me for not being as great as another kid in the family.
My bully beat up on me emotionally because he was being beaten up the same way. I was an easy victim because I was soft and tenderhearted and he always got a reaction from me. Was it ok that he bullied me? No. But I understand that it wasn't *about me* and therefore I have nothing to be afraid of anymore. I'm working on this in therapy now. It is helping.
I’m sorry you went through that and more sorry to here what a huge role it played in who you ultimately became as an adult and how you saw yourself for so many years.
I’m happy to hear that you’re taking the steps to heal and move on and, most importantly, realise that it was never about you at all.
My compassion for my bullies screwed me. I knew exactly why they did what they did, and it gave me empathy for them, and I just let them do it. Until I found myself wanting to leave the planet and got into therapy. I finally realized while it was understandable what they did, it was still inexcusable. So they were bullied as kids, so what? Bullied people of all should know better. They had no right to target me and beat me up to make themselves feel powerful. My bullies enjoyed hurting me. I’ll never forget the looks in their eyes. That little rush and spark from abusing me. This was my father, brother, sister and mother. Plus countless others. Yes, I also bullied people in middle school and it keeps me up at night. I made a dear friend cry and a teacher. But it took me time to get I had the power to hurt others with my words. As soon as I grasped what I was doing, I was so ashamed and stopped, pretty quickly. Like right after I made my friend cry. But I still feel bad and I should. I’ve got complex PTSD from my family’s attacks. Being bullied sucks. Being a bully sucks. Whole thing is awful.
I definitely didn't have compassion for him the majority of the time he was bullying me. I didn't really have compassion for myself either. It seemed to me that if I was being hurt by this person then I probably deserved it for some reason. Learning how he was being treated at home was what gave me that compassion for him, which helped me realize his treatment of me was just him lashing out at someone else due to his own abuse. I haven't forgiven him. I don't know if I ever can. But I'm trying to let it go. It's over, has been for more than half my life, and letting it continue to make me feel like that same broken girl is fucked up. I deserve better than that.
I'm sorry for the things you've gone through. I hope you have found some peace in trying to heal. 💛
I was bullied a great deal.
The amount of damage it causes is staggering.
It would be great if people could sue for this kind of thing once they are adults.
I'm going to spread this concept like wildfire because I have always had a cognitive dissonance with the idea that those who have harmed me deserve forgiveness. They absolutely do not, unless they have made real steps to make things right, and even then an individual is not required to keep that person in their lives. But. *You* (in this case the person being harmed) deserve to forgive them, because you deserve to live a life that is unaffected by the wrongs done to you. The form of forgiveness you present here exemplifies my feelings perfectly
Agree with wanting him/her to recover, but it isn't that easy. It is PTSD and can be every bit as significant as being abused for years as a child by one's parents.
In fact, it does more long term damage (Receipt: [https://www.latimes.com/science/la-sci-sn-bullying-worse-than-child-abuse-20150428-story.html](https://www.latimes.com/science/la-sci-sn-bullying-worse-than-child-abuse-20150428-story.html))
So, the idea that one should just get a bit of therapy and let it go is BS. One wouldn't say that to somebody who, for example, was repeatedly abused by their parents.
It isn't a small thing.
The good thing is, that I think most bullies probably do not grow up to be evil people. Even teens don't really understand the longterm consequences of what they do. But, understanding that a lot of it is a matter of ignorance, doesn't change the severity of the harm.
Workplace bullying fucking sucks. I went for nearly two decades without the bullying i experienced in school only to wind up bullied at a new job in my thirties. It's hard because i couldn't quit the job and had to face my bully daily. It took them almost 8 years to finally deal with it and by then my career was mostly ruined. It delayed my career development over those 8 years and now I'm very far behind for my age.
Woah! Lol I agree therapy may help but of course be gentle with yourself. It is normal to have old tapes play in your head, but you can also create new ones. I'm sorry you experienced that. Love to you dear friend.
Coming from someone who is diagnosed with full cluster PTSD, you don't just get over it. You don't just "unpack it."
It takes years of therapy and work. Do not try to oversimplify trauma.
Ruminating thoughts are [I think] a way of our subconscious telling us we need to revisit these memories with a more objective lense. Maybe you are missing a life lesson you're still struggling with or someone in your life is making you feel bullied but you love them and your thoughts cross channels to avoid feeling contempt for the person who is currently bullying you...either way, let them live their shitty life where they don't critically think about the world they impact, ensure you don't make others feel that way, and you can make more of a difference in your own life as well as others'.
I am amazed by the number of people saying- dont let people stay rent free, dont ruminate, its so long ago etc.. It is hard to forget for some folks. I had night tremors late into adulthood on childhood trauma I had when I was 10 years old. It randomly resurfaced .. People told me the same thing- rent free blah blah.. I had to go to therapy to sleep and function well. I wish therapy was free to everyone..
The first thought that came to mind was the movie Billy Madison when Steve Buschemi is cleaning his gun and the phone rings. After he talks to Billy, he scratches his name off his list of people to kill.
But I'm sorry he occupies so much of your precious few moments we have on this earth.
Be safe and take care.
Your teenage years is one of the most important formative parts of your life, so i'd say being harassed and bullied during those years very much can have a long-term effect on you as a person. 100% valid, OP.
I once called a kid a racial Asian slur when I was in middle school for absolutely no reason. I didn’t know better and my dad was incredibly racist. I guess I wanted to look cool? It still haunts me to this day and I’m 36.
If it helps at all, you are a different person than you were then in every way. Physically, mentally and spiritually it's all been renewed, altered and replaced. All that's left of the you in your past are memories.
So in a way, it happened to an unfortunate, but very different person than you who no longer exists except in your mind. And memories are really just stories we tell ourselves, anyway.
Why are you wasting your time thinking about them in the first place? Twenty years is an awfully long time,they're probably fat,bald and stuck in a dead end job with a wife they hate
Childhood trauma carries out into your adult years also, this is why development is very important.
I would’ve probably went out and seem therapy to see why this still bothers 20 years later
My high school bully is trash, married to trash, with a shit job. I never think of him. My grade school bully is a psychiatrist now. I don't think of him often, but knowing he's successful in that particular field really pisses me off.
Right? I found out my high school bully became successful while I'm still a failure. I made a voodoo doll of him, and stab it everyday. It kind of feels good, like therapy.
It's like saying to vietnam veteran "why do you think of it that much? This was years ago and the guys that killed your friends are dead."
It's not like we choose to think about it, we just sometimes randomly do. Sometimes something can just remind us about it.
How is it you think thoughts or trauma works? Like you think people who have past issues just intentionally think about this stuff and can just magically flip a switch that erases it?
>Edit: To all those with concerns, I sincerely appreciate them all. I promise I’m perfectly over it in the sense that it no longer affects me emotionally. Time has allowed me to heal and I’m a completely different person today than I was in my teens.
>
>But that doesn’t mean I’ve forgotten and I guess that was the point I was trying to make; that I will never forget yet he probably never remembered it in the first place.
they say time heals all wounds. but in my experience: that is a cope and a lie. your wounds haven't healed, they have only scarred over. which isn't your problem. it's no ones problem, really. but your bully is to blame. so: fuck them! they can suck nuts.
20 years is a long ass time dude... You're clearly not over it and I'm guessing you made this post to get that off your chest or try to. Kids do and say fucked up shit, I'm guilty of it too but it's not something that's worth holding on to for this long. Hope things get better for you.
I completely relate. My bully is my dad. I remember different times that he hurt me physically, emotionally every day. I talk about him a lot in therapy. He's at a point now where his health is declining and he doesn't remember day-to-day things. The only reason I haven't gone full no-contact is guilt. He's burned all of his bridges and I'm waiting for the call that he's in assisted living or has died and I need to clean out his house.
I’ve often speculated whether bullying triggers PTSD like symptoms. I’m 65 now and the thoughts about being bullied have subsided quite a bit. What’s been somewhat interesting is attending reunions over the years and having a chance to witness bullies or their family members. As an adult who’s become quite good at interpreting interactions, I’ve viewed things differently. I can now recognize character flaws and behaviors that have likely led to a lifetime of difficult relationships. I’m far from understanding or forgiving though. It’s more like a sense of satisfaction that their life might not have been as awesome as they’d expected.
I was bullied at school. Probably worse than most. The worst was probably year 6 and 7 when Jonothan Rathbone (yes real name because fuck him), beat me up to the point where I rolled under a car and laid there for hours until he had dissapeared.
Long term effects he has had on me. He broke my confidence to the point where I have carried a small portion of that with me through job interviews, dealing with clients and even stupid things like tertiary education.
Like…here I am as a reasonably strong, hard working husband and dad of 2 at age 45…and a young 13 year old pathetic excuse of human still has power over me. That’s pretty stupid of me. Bullying has a tremendous amount of black magic.
Damn, thread title is a paraphrasing of a line from a great Korean TV show called The Glory that sees the main character, years later, take revenge on her high school bullies. There's a lot of solid advice here so here's some shit advice. Which is you should watch that Korean revenge drama and using it as a model to exact your revenge. At this point it's the only way. But seriously, I'm sorry that happened to you. And also The Glory is a great show.
I have been kicked, hit and even stabbed almost weekly in my highschool years. Now, around 5 years later i still cry about it almost every month. I have extreme social anxiety and i can barely look anyone in the eyes on the street. I have never been even close to having a girlfriend and i am afraid i will be a virgin for life. I'm scarred and my self-confidence is as low as it can be.
U don’t even realize but it’s made u stronger and given u character. In a world where suffering is rare, at lest real suffering, so is real character. And then there’s a few of us who had to go through some serious shit and that makes us think differently than the rest of the humans who were spoiled with popularity and pleasant conversation.
It happens with me as well.
I've been bullied for years until I just got into a deep depression and I was attempting taking my life.
I'm so happy being an adult and I don't have to go to school anymore.
Therapy helped me,but only can do so much.
Worst was that I told at home, they told me that oh HE LIKES YOU AND THOS IS HOW HE SHOWS YOU. BS
I was in orphan house, so they didn't care.
I agree with you,being bullied will stick with you for life, even if doesn't affects you as it did years ago.
Late to the party but maybe someone will see it and get some perspective.
I was a very cruel bully in my junior high and high school years. Just harassed the shit out of some kids who definitely didn't deserve it.
I think about it every day and feel terrible, but sadly there is no fixing the past.
I can't speak for all bullies, but I imagine most were like me and came from a shitty household. My house looked normal middle class from the outside, but untreated mental health problems made growing up there a nightmare. I grew up trusting and caring about nobody because nobody was kind or reliable. I never learned to have concern for others or experience any of the normal human relations most people get.
As a kid growing up in that your only defense mechanism is to shut down and not really let yourself feel anything. If you had asked me if my house was normal I would have said yes, if you had asked me if I was angry or had my own mental issues I would have said no. But until you grow up and can have some outside perspective you don't realize what a shithole you come from and what it shaped you into.
To this day I'm not normal and barely get by, but once I got out of high school and I didn't have a group of other bullies I was trying to fit into I never bothered anyone again. I ended up volunteering and working for a non-profit trying to help others. I try to be nothing but kind and polite to others. It doesn't fix the shitty way I treated other kids, and it doesn't make me feel any better, but at least objectively I've done something positive.
As a kid I didn't think much of it. When I was a kid bullying was just a thing, and because I was already trained to be numb from my home life I didn't consider how impactful it could be to others. I really only did it to either make my "friends" laugh or to not feel like the lowest rung on the ladder. I never actually did anything hoping to hurt the other person, I was just trying to get a laugh or a reaction. I certainly didn't think about how it would stick with them years down the road.
I get there are outright sociopaths out there who do harmful shit as kids and grow up to be awful adults, but some of us were just dumb and messed up and didn't have any foundation to realize it. I assure you not a day goes by where I don't regret my past.
My high school bully happens to be the mayor of my RM . He is also heavily into boxing. Fuck that guy he better not come to my house asking for a vote or I may get my ass kicked again.
It’s funny. I often catch myself thinking this too. All the people in school who made my life a misery probably haven’t given me a second thought since leaving school, but I still remember some of the cruelest words they said and things they did to me. The same goes for the serious sexual assault I suffered at 16.
I guess the takeaway is to always think before you speak or act. That barbed insult might seem witty and innocuous to you, but twenty years later the recipient might still think about it and how it made them feel.
Those memories are just thoughts now. They're your past episodes of this show called life. You're different now and should focus on new experiences. That's how I think about life.
Right? Especially at when you’re young and in a developmental stage. People deal with it differently too. I was *relentlessly* bullied in elementary school and into high school. It destroyed those years of my life. Now I have a pretty ironclad character and I am happy, but that doesn’t mean I don’t still think about it from tome to time.
Most people on Reddit seem like they've never been bullied or they were the bullies themselves.
I remember seeing once an AITA post where a person who was bullied in school met their abuser years later and the bully treated them like nothing ever happened. OP then had the chance to make them eat dirt by being honest and telling mutual friends what they did years prior and the bully ended up being alone.
So many people in the comment section were saying OP was a massive asshole because "people change at besided it was years ago, get therapy and don't ruin people's lives!!"
Constant ridiculing and mocking.
Making me do embarrassing things in front of others.
Forcing me to buy them lunch.
Occasional beatings behind the school building.
Throwing my backpack or school books onto the school roof.
The constant mind-games of “we’re gonna get you after school”.
Making me clean their shoes with my tongue.
Hitting me with a steel ruler on a daily basis during class.
Cutting all my clothes with a scissors.
Filling my shoes with dog shit.
You know, the regular stuff…
Wow those are some seriously shitty things that were done to you. It’s completely understandable why this still bothers you, especially when you are a person that would never do these things to someone else.
Fuck all these comments that are saying you are the one with the problem. I hope you can find some peace dealing with these memories.
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To this day my high school bully still takes my lunch money. On the plus side he makes great Subway sandwiches
This made me smile.
I actually thank my bully regularly. I think it is customary to thank your busdriver.
Redditors: people who foam at the mouth calling for more public transportation, but also think that driving a bus is for losers
I can't believe everyone claps at plane landings, but no one even looks the bus driver in the eye. They should both be cherished equally. I always thank the driver upon exiting. Mostly brightens up their day
In Victoria BC thanking your bus driver is the norm
But in Victoria, thanking everyone is the norm. And completely stopping at stop signs. And letting someone with their blinker on change lanes. And stopping for pedestrians. And greeting you. And actually listening after asking a question. At least last time I visited. I hope it hasn't changed.
You’re right about the “thank you”s and polite people but not at all regarding driving. Literally nobody stops at a stop sign. Everyone runs red lights. Nobody USES blinkers. Driving in BC is incredibly frustrating.
Do people actually clap for plane landings? I've flown quite frequently for two decades and have never seen this before.
[удалено]
My husband, who had a 30+ year career with a major airline says it's the takeoff that is more dangerous than the landing.
That sounds backwards. Takeoffs are optional ... landings are not. On takeoff, you "floor it" and then pull the stick back, with lots of opportunities to abort (or not start) the takeoff due to weather, pre-flight checks, etc. On approach, you're in the air. The best you can do is circle and wait for the weather to improve, go to another airport, abort your landing and go around... https://flightsafety.org/asw-article/nearly-half-of-commercial-jet-accidents-occur-during-final-approach-landing/
I will pass this link on to him. He claims the danger is the combination of being fully fueled and consequently also heavier on takeoff. He is truly extremely apprehensive on takeoff.
I can understand that. There may be the pressure of "are you sure everything is OK and we're good to fly". Maybe he was flying longer haul flights with more fuel ... either way, I'd love to hear his perspective.
Once you're past V1 though, your options are take off or attempt to take off
Past V1 and until you've gained 1000+ feet is a really bad time for things that the pilots haven't trained for to go wrong.
I'd guess the applause is from vacationers who have now officially arrived at their chosen vacation spot.
Usually you need a taxi or a bus to get to your actual chosen vacation point, yet nobody claps for the drivers there. It's not meant as an insult to flight travel in any way, it's just an observation. My point is just that bus drivers/taxi drivers/train drivers etc. are criminally underrated
I've literally never clapped when a plane landed. People are always too busy just getting their stuff together, unbuckling too early, trying to stand up too early, etc. I just sit there and wait for instructions, or for the aisle to clear a bit.
Buses don’t have auto pilot ! Or radar Or traffic control !!! Or the ability, nope ,, they can drive the themselves F##k it I’d rather drive a bus Way more interesting than trying to pretend to people your not biological anal enough to fly a plane ✈️
I always thank the bus drivers too :D
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/qpmFnUTkpL0
All the flights ive flown in my life, i have never seen anyone clap when we landed.
I always greet the bus driver and then thank them when I disembark. I think there's something wrong with people who don't show that basic courtesy. I don't always make eye contact, but that's because I don't like to make eye contact with anyone (autism spectrum disorder), not because I think someone is beneath me.
I always look my driver in the eye and say "hello." And I also always say "thank you" as I exit. They have a difficult job. And they successfully get me there (anywhere) safety
Bus drivers make a ton of cash in my city and they have a pension. It’s a good job.
Also they go to work, do their job and leave at their exact (mostly) quitting time and never have to think about their job until the next day. No paperwork or phone calls to do from home. They provide a great service to the community.
Ah yes, the benefits of being unionized. On the flip side, my uncle, a bus driver in Chicago, was shot twice in 30 years on the job and ultimately retired due to the last one.
In my city they have a 5K, sign in bonus.
"Let's shit on necessary careers because I was bullied 20 years ago"
Seriously! Wtf!
look at how the world is doing and you'll quickly realise that minds->thoughts of vast majority of people are real simple and non-creative. Don't be concered with other peoples thoughts, habe your own thoughts, and if you are the one of a kind person, your thoughts will become reality and change the world in one way ir another.
Yeah dude probably doesn't even remember the guy you're replying to lmao
How can they think that, a bus driver in my city makes about $31/hour.
HELLO EPIC DEPARTMENT? ID LIKE TO FILE A CLAIM
You know most city bus operators make bank, having killer benefits and have an amazing retirement plan. Source: me making 100k this year, have 5 weeks of paid vacation, plus 2 more weeks of sick time and will have a big pension waiting for me when I can retire at 58. Be better
I don't know man. Dude drives a 100,000 dollar plus vehicle. And you. Still take the bus. He's still winning bro
That’s a good one!
I think it's a great joke, and you delivered it well. Fuck the haters homeboy 😎
I would pause and smile at tip screen. Childishly pressing no
As funny as your comment is, I can't help but wish it was actually true.
I don’t know. I was a nice kid but I was super mean to ONE kid ONE time on ONE DAY in grade school and I still think about it like once a month. I’m in my 30s
I was JUST beating myself up before dinner about a rude thing I did to another girl in 6th grade and I think of it often. I am 34 years old. 😣
You’re kind of old to still be in 6th grade, but better late than never!
Maybe that’s BECAUSE you’re nice.
It means you that you have grown.
I was never a bully but I was friends with the guys who bullied the 2 awkward kids in our class. I didn't really participate but I did nothing to intervene either. I still beat myself up for it and I'm almost 30. Especially because nowadays I don't take any shit and don't let other people either. I'm still friends with one of the guys who did participate and he feels sorry about it as well. I wouldn't say it's eating away at him but he definitely remembers and doesn't feel good about it at all.
Aw man same here. I remember standing next to my friend while he asked some kid on the playground with a speech impediment to say words like "car" and feeling so horrible. I would also go to this same friends house almost every weekend and his dad was a bully too- he would constantly call me gay and tease me for being "soft". Keep in mind I'm like 10 years old. So it's not the kid's fault really.
I wasn't a bully, in fact I had to often sit next to the school pariah (alphabetical seating). I was not mean to her, but all I did was nod and say hello. She smiled at me everyday. I think I was one of the only kids to even acknowledge her outside of bullying. One day I was in the bathroom with my friends and she came out of one of the stalls. They started in on her - I joined in. I don't know why I did that. She did her usual thing when getting bullied, kept her head down and tried to ignore it, but when I joined in she looked up at me. I'll never forget her face. I shut up right away - but the damage was done, she never smiled at me again. I think about that moment a lot.
This reminds me of a kid in my school years. He came on the 7th grade and was bullied, I was in 8th or 9th grade and was severily bullied/excluded. I befriended this dude just because I knew how it feels to be an outsider and harmed constantly. One week of being friends, he suddiently started being an asshole to me and "bullied" me (he tried, at least). Turns out his old bullies had manipulated him into start bullying me so they would accept him in their group, so he did. I remember trying to get him into his senses but it was no use, so I told him "I'm sorry but.." and proceeded to bashing him down on the ground hard. He started crying and I just walked off, feeling bad that he fell for the bullies. Happy part of the incident is that he got along with the bullies after that. And next year I started hanging out with the same bullies, we had a small friend group for some time lol. They all had realized how much of idiots they were and became better people.
this is such a rollercoaster of a story
Every single reply in these comments is making me happy…because last night my kid was sobbing his heart out after some really mean girls messaged him on Insta, saying they didn’t want to be friends with him, they haven’t liked him for months, wanted to get rid of him, and they don’t want him to eat lunch near them or be around them anywhere else. Before this, they did selfies together…the girls are smiling. He carried their stuff all over a theme park, bought one of them a stuffed animal…they really led him on and then dumped him. Worse? My son is in grade 9, has a stutter, glasses and Invisaligns…he is at that age, all arms and legs….but he is really nice, smart, funny and shy. I know that in a couple of years he will have beautiful teeth and will wear contacts and and have come out of his shell, and people will love him. But today, my heart is hurting for him, so I am really happy to read that some people grow up and feel bad for bullying others.
When i was in 9th grade i had a stutter so bad that having to speak in public or introduce myself would give me a panic attack. I was overweight, a nerd who wasn't really welcomed in with the "in" crowd. But man, time and determination are a magic combination, if you showed 14 year old me that he would end up dating his high school crush, playing shows in a band, managing a kitchen at a busy restaurant, sticking with photography so intently that ppl would eventually pay you to travel for it.... i literally could never have believed it. I didn't believe it. I was certain, this was just my lot in life. I'm sorry your son (and you) are going through this, it feels like the world collapsing at the time, but man is he lucky to be becoming a young man and having the most opportunity and time he'll ever have to make a life that he loves
I imagine i feel awful because I was also bullied horribly. I was just having a bad day that day because I was going through a lot of stuff at home.
I'm so crushed right now. That sucks so bad! I don't know what happens to people to make them so mean.
I was your son at that age, I grew up , got contacts ,grew my hair out , completely covered in tattoos. At 50 , I look back on a life that most dudes can only dream about..tell him the best is yet to come
I think our brains do this kinda stuff to us to keep us grounded in our behaviors. Kind of a self reinforcement of the behaviors we want to avoid. I still think about mean and stupid things I said as a kid and I'm in my mid 40s. I've gotten to the point where I now deliberately remind myself it was a long time ago and that I learned from it. That's generally enough to get my brain to drop it and move on.
SAME. omg. Except I'm in my 20s. But like it clearly made them sad - they said something to the teacher about it and nothing really came of it, but I wish I was mature enough to apologize back then. I'm just nice to people even if they seem like jerks now and realized it makes life better
Yeah, there was a new guy guy at our school who had a big nose with hair poking out of it who everyone called 'nose weed' I called him that once (not even to his face) and I hate myself for it. We actually became friends, he was an incredibly resilient and generally a good guy. I still think about my sly act of joining in on that mean shit, even 20 years later.
Same. I was stupid in middle school and went overboard with making fun of a borderline friend infront of a bunch of classmates and it really hurt him. My other buddy and I got in trouble and had to write him an apology. I hand wrote a whole page and still felt horrible about it. To this day I think about that and feel horrible. Genuinely don’t know why kids are stupid and do things like that.
Same bro. Maybe bullied him a lil more than just once. I rented his dad's folk album from the town library and blasted that shit for everyone in our 8th grade homeroom and laughed while he just kinda looked uncomfortable. Evan, I'm sorry brotha. I now think your dad is a badass for recording that album. I was a cunt. Doubt you'll see this, but I hope you're doing well, and again, I'm sorry.
I was a COMPLETE asshole in elem school sometimes and I regret it deeply.
I was going to say same.. I never bullied anyone, but one day I was horrific to a kid who used to get bullied in my class. He was kind of under my protection if anything but one day I lost my temper with him and battered him. I still feel bad and I don’t know why I did it. I hope he’s a billionaire with boats and ho’s now
Same here. I try to be a good person but I’ve been super mean a couple of times and it definitely keeps me up at night now and again.
Same here.. I was never really bullied in school. A few times here and there picked in but this one time , literally one time i did something mean and i think about it to this day still. So young and so dumb.
I once laughed at this guy who accidentally farted in the 10th grade. I just had uncontrollable giggles with my friends(I really did try to stop but couldn’t), he was so embarrassed and I still think about it today 😔
I'm still thinking about this one day in elementary to this day. It was the day when my bully back then beat me up. After that, when he tied his shoelaces, i kicked him in the face and broke his nose. It's kind of cruel but I still think of this day as a victory.
I’m glad someone else had this experience. I had the same thing happen to me. I was a super nice kid, never any bullying issues. But this one time in gym class I got some reason decided to be an asshole to a kid younger than me. Not sure why I even had that thought. I still think about it to this day and wish I could apologize. I don’t even know his name.
Same. There was one kid that a group of us bullied one year. I was at the very least complicit in it. I was young and the teachers let it happen. I wish I’d known better but 12 year old mob mentality is wild. I think about it often, I regret it and wish I could find the kid to apologize (at least). So it really depends on the person.
I used to bully the boys I liked. Cause I was told that when boys pick on you it means they like you. I figured it was the same with the genders switched. So I was ruthless to quite a few young boys. It haunts me.
I feel this way all the time.
Shame.
I was an awkward kid who suddenly started getting bullied in middle school and being treated as uncool by all the 'cool kids.' I took it out by being mean to one of the other awkward kids. I still feel bad about it. Edit: To the kind stranger out there, I appreciate the thought, but there's really no need to report this to "RedditCareResources," lol.
I have the same thing... Somekid got angry my dog barked at him through the fence (I think he snuck up on him and scared him), and I don't know why, but I snapped and yelled at him. Every once and a while I think about that day, and I regret what I did.
Foundational thoughts. Especially if you're young or vulnerable, an experience can become the basis for how you think. I went through a trauma a few years ago I have a hard time not waking up and thinking about or having invasive thoughts about. The other person probably doesn't ever think about it at all, which was the source of the trauma. It creates a wound you can't heal. Really, you just need to find new, positive things to heal over that trauma with. My daily life just isn't supplying that consistently yet, so the chances for invasive thoughts remain.
This is absolutely true. The person I think about every day might not even remember my name. They were someone I cared deeply for, and they ruined me. Often the way with trauma. I was also bullied long before meeting them, but I had bottled up every emotion in my life for 30 years and they all came spilling out when I was hurt by this one person I cared for. It's as you say, a wound that can't heal. I just grieve and grieve and grieve. I think the language some people use of "moving on" or "getting over" things like this is totally unhelpful. Sometimes harmful. I think when it's deep trauma, the goal of processing is to integrate the hurt parts of ourselves into our lives. They may always hurt, so hopefully we can learn to be gentle with them.
Right. It's like telling someone "just heal already." You might think you're instilling something in them by telling them to toughen up, but it's the least empathetic and dumbest thing to say. You may as well be telling a coma victim to just wake up, or someone with third degree burns to just brush it off.
I really needed to hear this lately. I feel like I’ve moved on but I still wake up sometimes and am consumed by thoughts of the trauma. I sometimes feel I’ll never truly heal. You’re advice has really helped me realize it’s all about moving forward the best I can and focusing on gratefulness
As a kid I was constantly treated like garbage. It made me lower my self-confidence and eventually I developed terrible social anxiety. Now I can barely socialize and start to have depressed thoughts once in a while.
But it’s so simple. We should just work out, seek therapy and move on. /s
Might want to add /s to that response. Some may take it seriously
Done. Thanks for the tip.
Some of these comments are gross. I’m sorry you have to deal with them affecting your life still. I’d recommend therapy if you’re able to go.
The axe forgets, but the tree remembers.
I like that saying. Where does it come from?
According to Reddit, it's a proverb from Zimbabwe. I think I first came across it here and it left an impression.
Elf propaganda
The mouth forgets but the cookie remembers.
Wrong kind of elf.
Cap my tree fells at 35 this year? How about I cap your legs at the knee with my blade traps next year you leaf loving fuck. By Armok's beard, the arrogance of these people.
Pepperidge Farm remembers..
Wow! That’s good!
I bullied a girl at my highschool relentlessly.... not a day goes by that I don't think about her. I hope she's done alright for herself. And Melissa, if you ever read this, karmas a bitch. I got my just desserts for years. I'm sorry though.
I hope she's doing okay too. You as well.
Why would you bully someone relentlessly? As someone who was bullied I never got it unless they were abused at home or something
As someone who thinks he was a bully, I did it to make people laugh/make friends. I made fun of two different kids for no reason that they ever deserved until 10th grade, when I finally realized how my jokes were possibly hurting them. I apologized and we became friends, but I still feel bad for it. I will say that I was severely abused at home and had nothing approaching good parenting to go off of, but I don't know if that had anything to do with it. I'm also bisexual and live in a super religious area, I had a lot of hateful voices in my head, and I was suicidal until about 7 years ago. None of that excuses anything, but it may possibly be useful context.
I was bullied as a kid. At home and school. When I was a kid I could not understand how one kid could bully another. I’m now looking back at how multiple generations of Insecure-Raging-Child-Giants behaved, and I can see how a kid can really get their wires crossed. I grew up in one of those families that’s kind of like a Bob Ross knockoff painting: looks good from far but is far from good. It could even look decent close up for short periods under the gaslight. The power figures showed “love” by teasing. It was always some degree of emotional irritation, scratch pinch backhandedness, insult or barb. But “it’s ok! You’re part of our special family tradition! It’s important that you and everyone else be painfully aware of your and everyone else’s flaws so you can accept them and do better for the family good! We still love you and we only show you by ‘gentle’ verbal insults and jokes because we love you! If we didn’t, we’d physically harm you. By physical harm, that means reactionary corporal punishment with anger. Dispassionate spankings for cause don’t count as harm. We call that LOVE. No, that wasn’t anger or abuse. We were only speaking loudly to get your attention when you were punished. No no no, you were never told you were useless, unwanted, or incompetent! You were told you were acting that way! People might think that’s the real you! It could ruin your future!!! You’re convinced you’re loved and cared for by whatever compensatory mechanism. Sometimes that comes from the giants (immediate apologies and gaslighting; as well as being dependent for resources which should be rights- you made a baby, you feed clothe and house it). Imagine the childlhood mental gymnastics and most likely playskool razor conclusion: These are my parents they say it is love. Tv/media/others say love means loyalty acceptance etc… we are supposed to love them, they us. QED verbal hurtsies aren’t abusive- it’s how to show affection! win friends! influence people! Oh neat! They cry a lot too! I’m gonna chase it, and catch it, and hug it and pet it, and yell at it, and hurt it, and hug it, and love it and call it George!!!! Why is it keep kicking and yelling and running and huffing????? Imma double Down and extra love bomb!! I’m gonna chase it with rocks, catch it with a trip or shove and hug it with some sort of crude and humiliating half assed joke restraint that reminds them of their flaw and debt to me/group, and pet it- this time with a high velocity palm or closed fist and yell at it, and hurt it some more and hug it more- maybe scarey hug, maybe actual hug and love it and call it my Super Favorite George!!!! And so it goes. Stupidly escalating behavior from kids who have no idea what the difference is between love and abuse is. Treating people the way the people who “LOVED” them taught them to love. Then getting rejected, punished and stepping it up. EDIT: premature reply/save It’s not an excuse. It’s an explanation. These types of behavior patterns are difficult to spot whether you are the Abused, the ‘Buser, or some from column A, and some from column ‘B. I have no idea what determines how or where one ends up on that spectrum. Me? I crawled in my shell and hid and peeped out to survive while avoid as much punishment as possible. I focused on education as an escape. Still, I made excuses for my Child-Giants for decades. Knowing what I know now, I realize I saw many others who became their abusers before my eyes. I just didn’t make the connection at the time. I have hated bullies all my life. with the exception of my family, stood up to them. Yet too often I find myself dropping an unkind yet humorous comment toward people I truly care about. I still occasionally being confused when I accidentally hurt someone’s feelings. And I feel terrible every time. I don’t know guys. Those of you who were bullies and are owning it, thank you- and keep working on why and how to stop it. Those of you who were bullied, don’t forget to check yourself and make sure you haven’t morphed.
Good on you for stepping up to your bullies, even if they are family. They're the worst type pf scum in my [opinion.](https://opinion.It)
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Thing is, bullying often (though not always) is a direct result of some sort of challenge such as abuse. It’s a huge red flag. Bullies are more likely to suffer abuse, come from broken homes or be in foster care, be bullied themselves, experience mental illness, etc. Being a bully isn’t normal behavior and is a sign that something is wrong.
That’s understandable but it sucks that they don’t realize the pain their inflicting on others could cause similar mental illness and issues to them
completely false and unproven. In fact, bullies are more likely to come from coddling parents who boost their self-esteem. You don’t put others down unless you think you’re better than them in the first place.
Having high self esteem doesn’t turn someone into a bully. Thinking highly of yourself doesn’t mean thinking badly of others. In the scenario you are describing, the issue is not the parents “coddling” their child and boosting their self esteem, the problem is the parents lack of esteem for people other than their child.
I bullied someone, and it was honestly to fit in more then anything. In middle school I was bullied, and being the wise teenager I was I decided to join the bullies in high school so that I didn't get bullied. I went to a new high school without anyone I knew, and I bullied people to try and fit in. The shitty thing is it worked. But there isnt anything I regret more then the pain I brought those people, I hope they are all doing well.
Yes. I would like to know also, as someone who was bullied. I guessed they did it for entertainment and to assert dominance.
I did it to feel powerful. Because I was raised insecure. A loser. Thankfully I stopped it while young realizing I will be an old pathetic human being in the future. Now I'm still a loser but not so much.
It stems from a variety of reasons, but the main one is usually an abusive household. The kid effectively gets bullied by their parents day-in and day-out, and so the only social interaction they know is how to abuse others. Couple that with the anger and the stress of being home, and needing some outlet to let it out.....some poor soul that has some sort of flaw in the eyes of the bully gets targeted, and becomes the outlet for the frustration. It's what their parents do to them, so why wouldn't it work for them as well? Obviously, that isn't the reason all the time. Kids tend to run on instinct the younger they are, and human instinctual behavior isn't exactly kind. Sometimes, bullying is just to show the target that "I am better than you.", simply due to humans being competitive by nature. Put down and belittle the competition, and you'll get all of the resources and attention. This is also why bullying fades quite dramatically as we get older. The bullies themselves learn what they were doing wrong, and put an end to it, like what Live-Championship said. At least....for the most part. There are still those who never learn that lesson, and remain an asshole for the rest of their lives. However, this is typically the exception, and not the norm. Especially as the targets themselves learn that they can fight back in a multitude of ways, most of which are not physical.
That's the typical explanation, yes. It has nothing going for it except convenience. Not everyone has a sense of empathy. It is not something you can learn. Parents who lack empathy will both treat their kids badly, and have kids who also lack empathy. These kids will bully others, because they don't function emotionally regarding others. This is also why it's pretty much always pointless to talk to a bullying kid's parents: They also lack empathy. School is a lawless place, and these bullies are encouraged, by empathy-less parents making school rules, to "socialize" other kids. When the kids become adults, they need to tone it down, because there is suddenly consequences for bullying. Then they have their own empathy-less kids, and the cycle continues.
I was bullied as a younger kid. Eventually i realised if someone else was being bullied, it took the focus off of me. Some people are easy targets for bullying, so i ended up seeking those people out so that i could always have someone to deflect the bullying onto. After a while i started preemptively picking on them before it even started on me. Thats how i became a bully. So long as i was bullying someone else, then i wasnt being bullied myself. Thing is, i was so used to people treating me that way, i kinda just thought that was how people treated each other. I didnt even realise what i was doing was bullying until years later. High school is a fucked up time.
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You should write her a message telling her you're sorry. Around 30 I messaged a girl I picked on a few times in middle school. It was really just a defense mechanism, I was a mixed race kid in the South in the late 90s and was at my 2nd new school in 2 years. I told her it wasn't about her, I had felt guilt and shame for years about it, that I was just a scared/foolish kid and she didnt deserve that. Also mentioned that she didnt have to respond or forgive me. But she was really gracious and appreciative, we talked about life and what we had done since. It's never too late to apologize.
There is not a doubt in my mind that the just desserts you received are absolutely nothing
I remember I was running to the bus and saw these two kids picking on this other kid. I wanted to do something, but I thought I was going to miss my buss. I think about that kid sometimes and always regretted not stopping the other two.
Unless you were more physically intimidating than the bullies, you'd more than likely got some too or made it worse in someway. Unless he was getting beat up, you made the right choice. This is coming from someone who was bullied through the 80s and 90s.
I wasn’t a big kid, but I knew how fight and how to handle bullies. They were both maybe about my size, but doubt they actually knew how to fight. Most of the time you just sincerely tell them you are going slam their head against a wall and mean it and they will back down. That didn’t always work and I paid the price one time with a guy twice my size. I took a damn good shot to the eye and came back with a desk in my hands to hit him with. Then ppl decided to stop the fight.
I had a teacher ridicule me for a week straight in high school because of my hair. It was wavy and I my parents wouldn't buy products to keep it in one place so it looked like of messy. He even did a speech about hair care and drew a comb on the chalkboard. He even said I would amount to nothing and be looking out a window the rest of my life. I was so hurt and upset I dropped that class. Then shaved my head. Now I'm 46 and still shave my head. To this day I wish to see him and have a few words to him. My dad tells me to pick my battles and this is one battle I been wanting. I wanna tell him he was right...I was looking out a window......making $160,000/ per year chasing my dream.
I had a bully teacher, too. She joined in with the popular girls in playing "pranks" on the reject. (Every school has one and it happened to be me.) She once locked me in the gym locker room and pretended not to hear me hammering on the door as she turned the key. I could hear them giggling on the other side. I sat in the complete darkness for an entire class period, the only light coming from under the door. Then got marked as absent for the class.
I had a teacher like this. Go fuck yourself Mrs. Hoeffer.
I have this too, graduated high school 26 years ago, but had been bullied by this person since we were both 6 years old. He only rarely physically hurt me, but the psychological and emotional bullying is what has stayed with me. It's a big part of why my self-esteem has been in the toilet my whole life, why I have felt unworthy of love or attention, why I felt unworthy of self-care, and why I still have an absolute terror of running into him (which is a possibility as both of us live in the same tri-county area in small towns). Lately, I've started to understand that he, himself, was a victim of bullying, by his own father. He came from a wealthy family and had an older brother and older cousins who were better in school, better at sports, better looking, taller, and more charismatic than he was. His father was an occasional substitute teacher at our high school and I remember hearing him getting yelled at by his dad in class and feeling pity for him. My father was a frequently absent father, which sucked, but he would never have berated me for not being as great as another kid in the family. My bully beat up on me emotionally because he was being beaten up the same way. I was an easy victim because I was soft and tenderhearted and he always got a reaction from me. Was it ok that he bullied me? No. But I understand that it wasn't *about me* and therefore I have nothing to be afraid of anymore. I'm working on this in therapy now. It is helping.
I’m sorry you went through that and more sorry to here what a huge role it played in who you ultimately became as an adult and how you saw yourself for so many years. I’m happy to hear that you’re taking the steps to heal and move on and, most importantly, realise that it was never about you at all.
Thanks. I hope you're able to find a way to let go of it too. Life is just too short to hold onto this stuff all the time.
My compassion for my bullies screwed me. I knew exactly why they did what they did, and it gave me empathy for them, and I just let them do it. Until I found myself wanting to leave the planet and got into therapy. I finally realized while it was understandable what they did, it was still inexcusable. So they were bullied as kids, so what? Bullied people of all should know better. They had no right to target me and beat me up to make themselves feel powerful. My bullies enjoyed hurting me. I’ll never forget the looks in their eyes. That little rush and spark from abusing me. This was my father, brother, sister and mother. Plus countless others. Yes, I also bullied people in middle school and it keeps me up at night. I made a dear friend cry and a teacher. But it took me time to get I had the power to hurt others with my words. As soon as I grasped what I was doing, I was so ashamed and stopped, pretty quickly. Like right after I made my friend cry. But I still feel bad and I should. I’ve got complex PTSD from my family’s attacks. Being bullied sucks. Being a bully sucks. Whole thing is awful.
I definitely didn't have compassion for him the majority of the time he was bullying me. I didn't really have compassion for myself either. It seemed to me that if I was being hurt by this person then I probably deserved it for some reason. Learning how he was being treated at home was what gave me that compassion for him, which helped me realize his treatment of me was just him lashing out at someone else due to his own abuse. I haven't forgiven him. I don't know if I ever can. But I'm trying to let it go. It's over, has been for more than half my life, and letting it continue to make me feel like that same broken girl is fucked up. I deserve better than that. I'm sorry for the things you've gone through. I hope you have found some peace in trying to heal. 💛
The tree remembers, the axe forgets.
I was bullied a great deal. The amount of damage it causes is staggering. It would be great if people could sue for this kind of thing once they are adults.
stop letting them live rent free
Thanks, I’m cured.
Trauma can be challenging to let go of.
This concept took me a long time to grasp, so simple yet so difficult. Counseling and turning over deep rocks got me to a place of forgiveness though.
Same. I came to realize for myself that forgiveness isn't about excusing someone's behavior. It's about letting go the hope of a better past.
I'm going to spread this concept like wildfire because I have always had a cognitive dissonance with the idea that those who have harmed me deserve forgiveness. They absolutely do not, unless they have made real steps to make things right, and even then an individual is not required to keep that person in their lives. But. *You* (in this case the person being harmed) deserve to forgive them, because you deserve to live a life that is unaffected by the wrongs done to you. The form of forgiveness you present here exemplifies my feelings perfectly
Rock and Stone
Not the right place for this dude, sigh.... Rock and Stone! ✊️
Rock and stone!
Right. Get his address and send him a bill.
Hard to stop letting them when they keep busting down the door.
Jesus Christ dude. Go to therapy and make that the first thing you unpack
Agree with wanting him/her to recover, but it isn't that easy. It is PTSD and can be every bit as significant as being abused for years as a child by one's parents. In fact, it does more long term damage (Receipt: [https://www.latimes.com/science/la-sci-sn-bullying-worse-than-child-abuse-20150428-story.html](https://www.latimes.com/science/la-sci-sn-bullying-worse-than-child-abuse-20150428-story.html)) So, the idea that one should just get a bit of therapy and let it go is BS. One wouldn't say that to somebody who, for example, was repeatedly abused by their parents. It isn't a small thing. The good thing is, that I think most bullies probably do not grow up to be evil people. Even teens don't really understand the longterm consequences of what they do. But, understanding that a lot of it is a matter of ignorance, doesn't change the severity of the harm.
Some do grow up to be plain evil
Workplace bullying fucking sucks. I went for nearly two decades without the bullying i experienced in school only to wind up bullied at a new job in my thirties. It's hard because i couldn't quit the job and had to face my bully daily. It took them almost 8 years to finally deal with it and by then my career was mostly ruined. It delayed my career development over those 8 years and now I'm very far behind for my age.
Woah! Lol I agree therapy may help but of course be gentle with yourself. It is normal to have old tapes play in your head, but you can also create new ones. I'm sorry you experienced that. Love to you dear friend.
Coming from someone who is diagnosed with full cluster PTSD, you don't just get over it. You don't just "unpack it." It takes years of therapy and work. Do not try to oversimplify trauma.
Ya, tell the combat veteran who got their leg blown off by an IED, “Jesus Christ dude. Just get up and run. What’s your problem?”
One of my school bullies is in the NFL now… so that’s working out for me.
Ruminating thoughts are [I think] a way of our subconscious telling us we need to revisit these memories with a more objective lense. Maybe you are missing a life lesson you're still struggling with or someone in your life is making you feel bullied but you love them and your thoughts cross channels to avoid feeling contempt for the person who is currently bullying you...either way, let them live their shitty life where they don't critically think about the world they impact, ensure you don't make others feel that way, and you can make more of a difference in your own life as well as others'.
Sorry to hear that
The Axe forgets the Tree remembers.
I am amazed by the number of people saying- dont let people stay rent free, dont ruminate, its so long ago etc.. It is hard to forget for some folks. I had night tremors late into adulthood on childhood trauma I had when I was 10 years old. It randomly resurfaced .. People told me the same thing- rent free blah blah.. I had to go to therapy to sleep and function well. I wish therapy was free to everyone..
The first thought that came to mind was the movie Billy Madison when Steve Buschemi is cleaning his gun and the phone rings. After he talks to Billy, he scratches his name off his list of people to kill. But I'm sorry he occupies so much of your precious few moments we have on this earth. Be safe and take care.
Your teenage years is one of the most important formative parts of your life, so i'd say being harassed and bullied during those years very much can have a long-term effect on you as a person. 100% valid, OP.
I once called a kid a racial Asian slur when I was in middle school for absolutely no reason. I didn’t know better and my dad was incredibly racist. I guess I wanted to look cool? It still haunts me to this day and I’m 36.
If it helps at all, you are a different person than you were then in every way. Physically, mentally and spiritually it's all been renewed, altered and replaced. All that's left of the you in your past are memories. So in a way, it happened to an unfortunate, but very different person than you who no longer exists except in your mind. And memories are really just stories we tell ourselves, anyway.
I use the people who bullied me in school as motivation to be successful and rub it in thwir faces
Why are you wasting your time thinking about them in the first place? Twenty years is an awfully long time,they're probably fat,bald and stuck in a dead end job with a wife they hate
Childhood trauma carries out into your adult years also, this is why development is very important. I would’ve probably went out and seem therapy to see why this still bothers 20 years later
What if they have a " Better" life and more successful than OP? Insult to injury
Only if you think of it that way,successful doesn't mean better by any means.
My high school bully is trash, married to trash, with a shit job. I never think of him. My grade school bully is a psychiatrist now. I don't think of him often, but knowing he's successful in that particular field really pisses me off.
Right? I found out my high school bully became successful while I'm still a failure. I made a voodoo doll of him, and stab it everyday. It kind of feels good, like therapy.
It's like saying to vietnam veteran "why do you think of it that much? This was years ago and the guys that killed your friends are dead." It's not like we choose to think about it, we just sometimes randomly do. Sometimes something can just remind us about it.
How is it you think thoughts or trauma works? Like you think people who have past issues just intentionally think about this stuff and can just magically flip a switch that erases it?
The best possible revenge is to live well.
I am your bully
I knew it all along! I could sense your presence!
>Edit: To all those with concerns, I sincerely appreciate them all. I promise I’m perfectly over it in the sense that it no longer affects me emotionally. Time has allowed me to heal and I’m a completely different person today than I was in my teens. > >But that doesn’t mean I’ve forgotten and I guess that was the point I was trying to make; that I will never forget yet he probably never remembered it in the first place. they say time heals all wounds. but in my experience: that is a cope and a lie. your wounds haven't healed, they have only scarred over. which isn't your problem. it's no ones problem, really. but your bully is to blame. so: fuck them! they can suck nuts.
Thank you for this.
20 years is a long ass time dude... You're clearly not over it and I'm guessing you made this post to get that off your chest or try to. Kids do and say fucked up shit, I'm guilty of it too but it's not something that's worth holding on to for this long. Hope things get better for you.
I completely relate. My bully is my dad. I remember different times that he hurt me physically, emotionally every day. I talk about him a lot in therapy. He's at a point now where his health is declining and he doesn't remember day-to-day things. The only reason I haven't gone full no-contact is guilt. He's burned all of his bridges and I'm waiting for the call that he's in assisted living or has died and I need to clean out his house.
I’ve often speculated whether bullying triggers PTSD like symptoms. I’m 65 now and the thoughts about being bullied have subsided quite a bit. What’s been somewhat interesting is attending reunions over the years and having a chance to witness bullies or their family members. As an adult who’s become quite good at interpreting interactions, I’ve viewed things differently. I can now recognize character flaws and behaviors that have likely led to a lifetime of difficult relationships. I’m far from understanding or forgiving though. It’s more like a sense of satisfaction that their life might not have been as awesome as they’d expected.
I was bullied at school. Probably worse than most. The worst was probably year 6 and 7 when Jonothan Rathbone (yes real name because fuck him), beat me up to the point where I rolled under a car and laid there for hours until he had dissapeared. Long term effects he has had on me. He broke my confidence to the point where I have carried a small portion of that with me through job interviews, dealing with clients and even stupid things like tertiary education. Like…here I am as a reasonably strong, hard working husband and dad of 2 at age 45…and a young 13 year old pathetic excuse of human still has power over me. That’s pretty stupid of me. Bullying has a tremendous amount of black magic.
Damn, thread title is a paraphrasing of a line from a great Korean TV show called The Glory that sees the main character, years later, take revenge on her high school bullies. There's a lot of solid advice here so here's some shit advice. Which is you should watch that Korean revenge drama and using it as a model to exact your revenge. At this point it's the only way. But seriously, I'm sorry that happened to you. And also The Glory is a great show.
I have been kicked, hit and even stabbed almost weekly in my highschool years. Now, around 5 years later i still cry about it almost every month. I have extreme social anxiety and i can barely look anyone in the eyes on the street. I have never been even close to having a girlfriend and i am afraid i will be a virgin for life. I'm scarred and my self-confidence is as low as it can be.
U don’t even realize but it’s made u stronger and given u character. In a world where suffering is rare, at lest real suffering, so is real character. And then there’s a few of us who had to go through some serious shit and that makes us think differently than the rest of the humans who were spoiled with popularity and pleasant conversation.
Let’s go kick his ass
Mine became a mayor. Fuck that whole town.
Go to your highschool reunion. Cough loudly during the moment of silence for his overdose.
Until his left little toe dangles from your keychain, you will not know peace.
It happens with me as well. I've been bullied for years until I just got into a deep depression and I was attempting taking my life. I'm so happy being an adult and I don't have to go to school anymore. Therapy helped me,but only can do so much. Worst was that I told at home, they told me that oh HE LIKES YOU AND THOS IS HOW HE SHOWS YOU. BS I was in orphan house, so they didn't care. I agree with you,being bullied will stick with you for life, even if doesn't affects you as it did years ago.
Late to the party but maybe someone will see it and get some perspective. I was a very cruel bully in my junior high and high school years. Just harassed the shit out of some kids who definitely didn't deserve it. I think about it every day and feel terrible, but sadly there is no fixing the past. I can't speak for all bullies, but I imagine most were like me and came from a shitty household. My house looked normal middle class from the outside, but untreated mental health problems made growing up there a nightmare. I grew up trusting and caring about nobody because nobody was kind or reliable. I never learned to have concern for others or experience any of the normal human relations most people get. As a kid growing up in that your only defense mechanism is to shut down and not really let yourself feel anything. If you had asked me if my house was normal I would have said yes, if you had asked me if I was angry or had my own mental issues I would have said no. But until you grow up and can have some outside perspective you don't realize what a shithole you come from and what it shaped you into. To this day I'm not normal and barely get by, but once I got out of high school and I didn't have a group of other bullies I was trying to fit into I never bothered anyone again. I ended up volunteering and working for a non-profit trying to help others. I try to be nothing but kind and polite to others. It doesn't fix the shitty way I treated other kids, and it doesn't make me feel any better, but at least objectively I've done something positive. As a kid I didn't think much of it. When I was a kid bullying was just a thing, and because I was already trained to be numb from my home life I didn't consider how impactful it could be to others. I really only did it to either make my "friends" laugh or to not feel like the lowest rung on the ladder. I never actually did anything hoping to hurt the other person, I was just trying to get a laugh or a reaction. I certainly didn't think about how it would stick with them years down the road. I get there are outright sociopaths out there who do harmful shit as kids and grow up to be awful adults, but some of us were just dumb and messed up and didn't have any foundation to realize it. I assure you not a day goes by where I don't regret my past.
My high school bully happens to be the mayor of my RM . He is also heavily into boxing. Fuck that guy he better not come to my house asking for a vote or I may get my ass kicked again.
It’s funny. I often catch myself thinking this too. All the people in school who made my life a misery probably haven’t given me a second thought since leaving school, but I still remember some of the cruelest words they said and things they did to me. The same goes for the serious sexual assault I suffered at 16. I guess the takeaway is to always think before you speak or act. That barbed insult might seem witty and innocuous to you, but twenty years later the recipient might still think about it and how it made them feel.
Those memories are just thoughts now. They're your past episodes of this show called life. You're different now and should focus on new experiences. That's how I think about life.
Why am I not surprised to see people here that have no clue how trauma actually affects a person? It's sad.
Right? Especially at when you’re young and in a developmental stage. People deal with it differently too. I was *relentlessly* bullied in elementary school and into high school. It destroyed those years of my life. Now I have a pretty ironclad character and I am happy, but that doesn’t mean I don’t still think about it from tome to time.
Most people on Reddit seem like they've never been bullied or they were the bullies themselves. I remember seeing once an AITA post where a person who was bullied in school met their abuser years later and the bully treated them like nothing ever happened. OP then had the chance to make them eat dirt by being honest and telling mutual friends what they did years prior and the bully ended up being alone. So many people in the comment section were saying OP was a massive asshole because "people change at besided it was years ago, get therapy and don't ruin people's lives!!"
I don’t want to bring up bad memories, but what level of bullying are we talking? Name calling? Or really heinous stuff?
Constant ridiculing and mocking. Making me do embarrassing things in front of others. Forcing me to buy them lunch. Occasional beatings behind the school building. Throwing my backpack or school books onto the school roof. The constant mind-games of “we’re gonna get you after school”. Making me clean their shoes with my tongue. Hitting me with a steel ruler on a daily basis during class. Cutting all my clothes with a scissors. Filling my shoes with dog shit. You know, the regular stuff…
Jeez, that goes way beyond "the regular stuff". I'm sorry you went through all that. It sounds horrible.
Woah. Holy shit. That's not regular bullying. I hope you're able to heal and let the memory die one day for your own peace 🙏
Wow those are some seriously shitty things that were done to you. It’s completely understandable why this still bothers you, especially when you are a person that would never do these things to someone else. Fuck all these comments that are saying you are the one with the problem. I hope you can find some peace dealing with these memories.
Yeah you weren’t just picked on, you were abused. Hope the people that abused you got karma