I was bullied my entire school life. It all started in Reception (I dunno if they have that in America, but it's sort of holding pen between Nursery and Year/Grade 1)> I got chosen to take the lead role in some ridiculous play and this other, more popular girl didn't. That was the kick-off. From then on I didn't really catch a break. One time this girl and her friends got a boy to push me off a wall from behind; landed right on my face, and was lucky my nose didn't break. Another time they all ran around me in a circle chanting 'nobody likes you, nobody likes you'; when you're five, that hurts, I'm telling you. Of course my school work suffered, and I'd make excuses or just outright beg not to go in. The teachers were absolutely useless; my parents even went as far as accusing them of condoning the violence. Their idea of stopping the bullying was taking the bullies inside the school building in the dry and the warm and leaving me to stand out in the playground while it tipped it down with rain.
High school wasn't any better; the popular blonde 'It girl' had followed me. Things became violent, but the mental aspect carried on also. I was knocked down stairs, pushed into puddles and mud, threatened... abused basically, because it IS abuse. Even the boys did it to try and gain favour with the 'popular' girls; they pushed me into desks or into walls. One lad asked me what gave me the right to exist because no one liked me, and another even slapped me full in the face and tried to cut my hair off with scissors. One good soul tipped me off in my last year at school that fifteen of them were planning to jump me after school finished and try and put me in hospital because they said I was weird and I deserved it and it wouldn't matter if they hurt me because no one cares. If anybody took any interest in being my friend, or they found out a boy supposedly fancied me, they'd stop it dead, making up rumours about me to put them off. Low and behold; the teachers did nothing again, instead asking why I was sent to the school when they knew this other girl would be there (I should point out, I live two streets away from that school. She lived in an entirely different area, and only got accepted into that school cuz her grandparents live on my street). I got sent to counselling with Connexions, a young persons help group, which is closed down now. Instead of counselling they sat me there with the kids who wouldn't work because they were too badly behaved and just ignored me. Again, I would beg not to be forced into school, I'd spend nights crying and asking 'why me' and wishing the ground would swallow me. I never attempted suicide, or any sort of self harm, though I will admit I came damn close.. I had nobody really for my entire education I could call a friend; every now and again someone would take pity on me but it wouldn't last long or they'd have been dared to do it.
It's affected me deeply; I'm more inclined to be on my own than go out and meet people, hate social interaction in person and I'm deeply mistrustful, sarcastic and pessimistic about everything, though I have managed to get a relationship somehow that's still going on six years later.
Bullying is a serious issue, and I have a really negative view of these people who say they're zero-tolerance but don't/won't prove it. My teachers said they were zero-tolerance, but they did nowhere near enough to help me, or others, because I wasn't the only one. I truly think because I was shy, timid, tall, lanky and (I suppose) a natural loner and would rather stay quiet and keep to myself, that my teachers thought I was just a 'born victim', and when I did actually approach them for help they wouldn't take me seriously and tell me to stop being dramatic. Not enough is done in schools to stop it, at all.
I realise that this post is ridiculously long, but you've probably realised by now that I find it easier to communicate online where no one can see my face, and these are things that I haven't spoken about this openly at all, not even to my parents or my partner. They say you shouldn't let it get to you, but it's hard, you know? So really, I guess I should thank the OP for starting this thread and giving me somewhere to speak frankly, and if anyone's actually managed to read all that, then thanks, even if you think I'm just a whinger
