Were you bullied in elementary school?

[EmiliaB]

Bullying is really becoming an issue today that was in my opinion overlooked in the past in schools and I am so glad this is finally being addressed in a more serious way.
So were you the object of a bully in your formative years and did it effect you somehow in later life.

 

[AshleighM]

No. In high school I'd have probably been classed as a bully. My bad

 

[CaroleH]

I was briefly bullied in my early years at secondary school (high school), but that stopped when the bully moved away.

I was teased about being a martial artist, but that stopped when I blocked a haymaker with my eyes closed.

 

[BunnyButt]

I get great satisfaction from running across the thugs from school who are invariably struggling to pay child support to the four mothers of their four illegitimate children on a minimum wage job.

Was I a teachers pet 20 years ago? Perhaps, but today I can make those bitches argue over who gets to clean horse crap from the wheel arches of my car.

 

[jayonthabeat]

No, I practiced the ancient art of "keeping your head down" and made it through school relatively unscathed.

 

[Zaxo]

My school Phys.Ed. coach was also a Taekwondo instructor who put on classes during a lunchtime, so that's where I spent all my time. There were only about five or six regular students.

 

[StuartD]

I know that feeling

One of the guys from my class is head of decommissioning for the nuclear power industry. At least half were Oxbridge students. I lasted about a month into the 5th year and got suspended indefinitely until my o'levels, they let me back in for each exam which was pretty pointless as I'd never been allowed to any of the lessons. Didn't get on with authority so much then

 

[BloodMakesNoise]

I was bullied, starting in primary school and all the way thru high school, some 7 years in a row I'm guessing. It's affected me dramatically and still does today.

I lack selfesteem, selfconfidence, have a paranoid like fear of failure and tend to react very aggressively towards those that may approach me with unclear intentions. Added to that I can't walk past a group of youngsters not feeling threatened or laughed at... I can't deal with authority and find it hard to show my true feelings to others, afraid of getting hurt.

It's cost me a job or 3 in the past, I simply couldn't deal with people and still find that very hard if not impossible today. 10 years into marriage and I've nothing but the deepest respect for my wife for sticking with me and my difficult personality (dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde), or maybe even personalities.

So, yes, you could say bullying is a nasty thing that should be dealt with in a quick and harsh way. People bullying others simply have no clue how much damage they're really inflicting. I'd call myself a prime example without asking for sympathy mind you.

I can and will stay on top of my son's life in school as I would never ever want this to happen to him as well. He's a gentle, caring child and gets hurt easily and with his being part Chinese he could easily become what we call 'pispaaltje', the one that gets pissed on.

 

[iang]

OK....here goes. You asked, so I'll tell ya.

Its been a pretty long road for me, though I am glad that the matter of "Bullying" is finally getting its due attention. Growing up, the attitude during my own childhood was more akin to the sentiments of a PE instructor who was interviewed on natioanl TV just after the event at Columbine, Colorado. His expressed belief was that bullying was "just a rite of passage" that all kids go through as they grow-up.

For you "chicken-or-the-egg" people, I'm going to guess that my own Path started at home with what most folks now call a "disfunctional family". I'm guessing that by the time I got to school on any given day I was easily the "weird little kid" that the rest of the kids whispered about. It didn't help that the hell at home made me over-reactive, hypersensitive, attention-seeking. It also didn't help that I was the single smallest person all the way through grade school and high school, both. What I remember to this day, is a Lifetime of never being safe, either at school or at home. Nor did it stop there.

After High School, I joined the US Army....and promptly went to Vietnam. Growing-up the way that I did had taught me that there are people who need to be "stood-up for" even if noone had "stood-up" for me. But now I had to learn the other half of the lesson: that people can play games about when and how and why they want to be "stood-up" for. The Vietnamese, as a country, did not want to be "stood-up" for. And if the US people wanted me representing---"standing-up" for---- their principles they had a real funny way of showing it when I got home.

Since I left the Army in 1972, I've been through 5 Recessions (three major, two minor). I've been denied employment because I am a Vietnam vet, or White, or Male, or Middle Class, or University educated. When I did find employment I was quick to learn--- as in the case of the Veterans Administration--- that having a job is about who can deal best with the bullies in the workplace. My recent stint with the TSA here in Chicago only enhanced this perception.

OK....OK....so why drag you through this "60 year sob story"? Because the other half of the TS question was how being "Bullied" has influenced the person I am today...and I think this is where the real lesson lies.

a.) As you can imagine, at my age, I have zero-tolerance for bullies of any stripe. It might be a talk-show host, a radio personality, a supervisor at work, a co-worker....hell, it might be some D***head kicking his dog. Expect that I am going to speak-up. I learned that staying silent only emboldens a bully to increase the damage that they do.

b.) When I teach MA, I don't teach it--- or practice it--- from the standpoint empty gymnastics, nor do I apologize for coaching people regarding "organized violence". Bullies don't respect a person who "takes the higher road" or espouses some "noble truth". They learn to leave the "troublesome target" alone and go after easier prey. It usually takes a couple of run-ins before the Bully leaves-go, and there is nothing to say that they won't revert to some sneakier kind of predatory behavior if they can't take you straight-up. But whatever might happen during those confrontations is nothing like spending one's life remembering cowering and hoping not to be "hurt too bad".

c.) Bullies aren't born.....they're made. It starts early with the use of gossip to establish who is an "insider" and who is an "outsider". From there, depending on the culture, community and family various reinforcers cause the Bullying Behaviors to rise ever higher. Nor are all bullies "street-thugs". Some of the worst bullies I ever met in my life wore uniforms---sometimes a shirt and tie with a stethoscope--- and were well-educated with many letters after their names. Some bullies run Banks. Other Bullies run Corporations. Bullies are bullies are bullies--- and the "inside group" is ever-vigilant for "outsiders".

d.) Sometime back I made the conscious choice to stop being quiet about how I grew-up. Most people who are bullied during their childhood----especially males--- are shamed into silence. They don't like whats happening, but they are also ashamed of not being able to stop it. After all, "real males" stand-up for themselves so the conclusion is that if a person is "bullied" they are somehow not a "real male" or otherwise defective. F*** that. Think what you want. I know what happened to me and people are going to hear about it.

e.) Lastly....you might as well get it through your head right now that this stuff is not going away. Bullies are a fact of Life. Learning to deal with people who believe that "might makes right" or that Humans fall into two categories--The Hunter and The Hunted--- needs to be something that starts early-on, 'cuz thats when the Predatory Mentality starts. FWIW.

Best Wishes,

Bruce

 

[snakeman7772]

Wow man Im sorry to hear about that, have you thought about going to counselling?

I can kind of relate to the whole Jekyll & Hyde thing, but I had two people on two occasions sit down with me and talk with me for a few hours, as they said they could detect a hint of bitterness when I spoke on certain subjects a la bullying in the end I had to learn to let it go and that was very hard for me to do as my gripe stems from watching a friend jumped by his so called "friends" and that really meesed me up as I was powerless to stop them as several of these "people" had me backed down while they went to town on him.

I hate when people say that usualy bullys are bullied also, as while true to some extent I have only ever seen that proven on two occaisions the other times these people could do it because they sat at the top of the food chain.

I can really emphasize with what you have been through with the regards to your emotional rollercoaster and to be your age and to still feel they way you do, just proves that it doesn't always get easier with time.

As such you ever need to talk I'll be happy to listen even though we are in two different locations.

 

[RobertoC]

Mmmmm..... I never saw that. What I saw were individuals who were goaded by family or peers to "be tough" so as to be accepted. I've seen the occassional father who wants his son to "be tough" so that son won't be bullied in the future. Sort of a "pro-active" or "pre-emptive" kind of parenting after the fashion of "do it before its done to you"-thinking. The same goes for peer-groups where there is a pathological fear of being dominated---say by another group--- so the members make a big deal about proving how tough they are at the expense of others.



No, IT DOESN'T get easier with time. The memories fade somewhat, and the battered kid finds himself inside of an adults body rather than a child's, thats all. What matters is what you DO with the damage. Doing nothing guarentees that it will never heal. Some people will actually resist healing because they think that to allow something to heal means they were damaged with impunity and the bullie "got away with it". There are many ways to heal from an abusive childhood, but ignoring one's history and just "sucking it up" ain't one of them.

Best Wishes,

Bruce

 

[asimjrmeyer]

I appreciate that gesture, really I do and I'll be sure to keep it in mind

Yes I have had counselling, but I'm afraid that at a certain point in life the scars can never quite be healed again, perhaps made less painful.

I've learned to deal with the fears and rollercoast ride that is my personality, getting better at it every day. I've even managed to hang onto my current job for almost 3 years, a new record for me. Mind you my short fused temper doesn't exactly make things any easier and I quite regularly have to turn away, bite my tongue, as I tend to let myself get worked up over the smallest of things.

In that sense Tai Chi and Wushu has already helped me quite a bit ; I'm focussing on taking my negative thoughts, putting them aside, acknowledging their existence, but no more than that, no more acting on those.

Thanks for your time!

Lawrence.

 

[JesusR]

This cold be me writing. as my story is the same. i was severely bullied in every school and i dropped out of high school and didnt complete it. Oweyn and a few other posters picked up a few of my issues - low self esteem and confidence, concerned about what others think of me and all that. I'm very untrustworthy of people and even my parents. I have behavior problems that have even caused my parents to call the police on me several times. I have a dysfunctional family too who also has a lot of issues though most of em deny it - i dont deny I've got a lot of problems. Instead of trying to help me my parents just called the police and one night even locked me outdoors for a night because i got violent because of the treatment I received from my ex. I didnt receive any help tho I'm back on anti depressants again now tho and they seem to be helping but i dont trust anyone not even my own family. I sometimes even question whether or not i can even trust my own best friends even though they had been there for me when i needed a place to stay when my parents had called the cops on me and they came and got me at 4 in the morning and took me to their place for a night.

I too have a jekyll and hyde personality though i try to be a nice person and I am most of the time but sometimes its hard. and I know my past is mostly to blame for it. That and my dysfunctional family not being there for me when i really needed them to be. I'm very aggressive and irritable at times - i cant help it - and I've told mikey things about how I grew up with authoritarian parents instead of athoritative ones which didnt help. I do like youngsters - but not strange ones. I dont like being around them cause i imagine them to laughing at me. I dont like many authority either like social workers, psychologists, and police who didnt do a darn thing to try to help me.

 

[pi]

Yes. In elementry school i was known as the "Weird Nerd".
Now I'm known as the kick-ass Asian ninja by my friends (as well as smart)(thank you martial arts).

 

[KatrinaD]

I got bullied a little. I was a scrawny little kid so I got all the comments, plus being Italian got a few comments. But it was never anything major. I played rugby league so I wasn't really seen as weak after a while, and I gave as good as I got with comments about being Italian.
My bullying was probably more like sledging; niggling little comments trying to annoy me, it never got physical. Not being physical didn't mean its not painful and my first year of high school (about 12 years old) was somewhat hard to deal with, the fact that I was very ill that year didn't put me in a good frame of mind to deal with things.
Has bullying affected me now, probably not to much except that I am pretty quick to fire back at sledging. After all this time I tend to see sledging as a game, more than something that effects me. Might make it hard for me to see people complain about comments in sport is about all.

 

[Loveis[bigger_than_uss]]

I hope all the ones that faced this were able to shake it off and realize you made it through this and have learned a lot about yourself and others.
I guess for me the first few years of school were the ones when I realized that you either got tough or you were going to have a hard time.The school system I did my early years in was really a hard place.And looking back I am so glad I didn't have to do secondary school years there.My family moved out of state and luckily took me with them . lol

 

[littlemisssmartypants]

I was physically abused when I was a kid and then had to deal with bullies at school and in my neighborhood. Never really felt safe. Go home gotta deal with my abusive and battling mom and older sister. Go to school have to deal with older kids bullying me.

But things sure changed around when I hit puberty. I got bigger than guys who used to pick on me and were older. I remember vividly one of my biggest tormentors pushing my friend. Without even thinking I pushed him across the court. I remember him looking at me angrily as if he was goina punish me then the looks suddenly changed to hesitation. It was a li'l later that I realized he wasn't picking on a smaller kid anymore.

Even though I still had to put up with verbal abuse my family also stopped hitting me. I remember distinctly going from being smacked to pinched to yelling to accommodating attitudes within a matter of a few short years.

I can tell you that all of this definitely made me an angry individual for years. Although I usually stayed calm I was seething and as soon as some pushed a button or what was building inside finally overfilled I would pop off. I had a rule don't hit first but as soon as you are I really let whoever have it.

I didn't engage in much horseplay because I had a hard time gaging having "rough fun" and would usually be the first to flipout.

It really wasn't until after college when I beatdown a bar owner and then a belligerent drunkeness beat up one of my buddies. Since then I've gotten a grip on my anger issues and haven't thrown a fist outside of sparring.

 

[Sirecoke]

Once again, what I am about to write probably does not sound like the sort of "keep-a-stiff-upper-lip" attitude most people expect on a MA forum. However, what I have found on a lot of MA forums is that there is much more focus on Behaviors (Physical Plane) and Thoughts (Intellectual Plane) and if there is any talk about Emotions it usually has to do with hiding Fear or harnessing Anger. In Human society there is one skill-set that almost is never taught to males. Thats skill-set has to do with the ability to sooth one's spirit in the face of adversity. And, when I say "sooth" I don't mean just telling one's Self to "just relax.....take a couple of deep breathes".

The process of being able to "sooth" one's Self is very well-known in primitive societies where conditions are harsh and consequences of conflicts can be dire, if not Life-threatening. People who have had easy-living with little exposure to adversity are often easily un-done when calamity suddenly visits them. In Warrior Societies, the idea of "preparing" one's Self the night before a battle is an excellent example of what it means to "sooth".

So what, exactly, IS soothing?

Soothing is the process by which a person looks directly into their own Mortality and accepts their frailty for what it is. Some people use crutches such as Bible Scripture for Christians, "The Tao" for Confucians, or even "coming to a good outcome" as in the I-CHING. It could be something as simple as a closely-held belief like "whatever happens, I will survive this."
People who do not know how to sooth themselves, when faced with adversity, begin to yell and flail-about recklessly like people thrown suddenly in deep or stormy water. Soothing is about the person in that same stormy water allowing themselves to float like a piece of driftwood, rising and falling with the storm rather than flailing against it.

Usually our parents teach us how to do this, but in dysfunctional families the skills are not typically there and probably have been lost in generations past.
That means you will need to find your "soothing skills set" for yourself. Just don't confuse the technique with the result. There is no "magic thinking" or "esoterica" here. Its a very basic matter of identifying and holding-onto something solid inside of you, while the outside is being banged and tossed about. FWIW.

Best Wishes,

Bruce

 

[AZN_PRINC3SS]

I was the same, for a long time i couldnt tell the difference between a joke and horseplay and real insults so i would think people were insulting me, when they were joking. I've gotten to the point where I can do that now, I know who is joking and who is not, and i even am at a point where i am loving horseplay and think it is a lot of fun. This can be seen on forums when them guys here joke around and I know they are merely playful . but when i was younger i was just so paranoid. Like you.

and bruce, thanks for that post, you're right. A lot of times I would self soothe by turning to my cats for love. I had a cat since I was 8 and my cat really was there for me during childhoodand adolence. He passed on at the age of 15 - I was nearly 24 by then. But he didnt go without leaving me a parting gift - my bro's cat Zoey got pregnant that same year and gave me a kitten that looked just like my old black and white Fluffy. 8 years later, princess is still with me and she is still so soft and cuddly and gentle and sweet. I turn to her many times when I needed to be soothed by her softness and her purrs. I dont know where I'd be without my cats as I had grown up afraid of my parents and not knowing how to love - except my cats.

 

[xxholszagerxx]

My time in elementary school was fairly uneventful. I was about the smallest kid in my grade all through elementary school, but I never felt anyone did anything to me that felt like bullying.

I punched a kid in the mouth when I was in a pre-1st grade program. He kept knocking over a tower of blocks I was stacking. Hey, I asked him three times to stop.

I had another run-in with the same kid in 4th grade. He was trying to get past me, and I kept blocking his way. He eventually got mad and boxed my ears. So I punched him in the nose.

Other than general rough play, that's about it.

I think I got knocked out in 5th grade, but that was due to a collision with a kid on the playground, not a fight. I don't remember falling to the ground, but I remember the bell that ended recess ringing and getting up with some vague feeling that time had passed. I never asked anyone what happened, just went inside. haha