Bullying for me has always been subtle. I was never physically bullied, but I have been severely emotionally bullied. It's worse when it's done by your friends, though I guess it's common for middle schoolers, anyway. My friends poked fun at my insecurities and told my crushes I liked them and when I lashed out they told me that I was being severely dramatic, and that it made me an insufferable person. I moved after eighth grade, after they finally stopped messing with me, and I swore off social connections from that school. I'm a senior in high school now, I came back to the same school during sophomore year, and the strangest thing is -- we're okay now, we talk. We're friends, at least, they believe we are -- I wouldn't trust them with anything. But I don't have any resentment anymore, I guess it's just stupid in retrospect to everything else.
One of them recently was talking about middle school and they told me they remembered our 'drama'. I simply replied that it had hurt me and had been the reason I moved out before freshman year and went to counseling for clinical depression and social anxiety, which I still struggle with today. The look of guilt and hurt in her eyes had been the exact sort that I had felt when they were messing with me, and though I hadn't said it with spiteful intent I felt an immature sorta satisfaction in knowing that she would be haunted by being so terrible for a long time, that she felt bad for hurting me, that she acknowledged that I hadn't deserved it. So I think I won, in the end.
Sorry. That was long. I just have a lot to say about bullies, lol.
I totally relate to this. I was in a similar situation. I had to deal with bullying from random classmates but, I think dealing with the insults from my friends was much worse. I used to just soak it up most of the time and ignore it. I just carried on being positive and friendly but, they just liked to bite away at me. They would make fun of me because I was interested in Japanese culture and I used to watch a lot of anime. They knew that I was passionate about studying Japanese at school but I guess they didn't understand it, for whatever reason. I wasn't obnoxious about my love for the subject, I wasn't a weeaboo, but it felt like somehow I should feel guilty for the things that I like. I used to cosplay and go to conventions, and one of my friends thought it was "weird" (although I think she was guilty because I invited one of my friends to come along with me once and I didn't ask her, but I know she wouldn't have liked it anyway). Sometimes they would just moan at me for any small thing I did. Once I was watching a video on my phone and one of them snapped at me and told me to turn down the volume on my phone (it wasn't even that loud) because it was distracting her, although all she was doing was looking at her phone too. I would get ignored by them on a daily basis, I would sit there and try to make conversation, only to get ignored by them because they were too busy texting and snapchatting other so-called friends who they would later moan to me about. They were small instances, and they weren't necessarily violent or abusive, but, the way they built up over time, it really got to me. I already had a lot to deal with outside of school (such as my parents splitting up, moving house, family members passing away, etc), I was being bullied by other people in classes, so it did get to me. Eventually, I told one of them how I felt and, she felt so guilty and awful. I admit, she had a lot going on in her personal life too and I guess that's just how it is - we were young and moody teenagers going through perhaps a difficult stage in our lives. But it was so uncalled for for them to take out their anger and sadness onto me when I would never do the same to them. One of the girls also used to do horrible things to me when I was younger in school and she would push me about but I don't know, I feel like this got to me a lot more. It was bad and I think, for me too, this is why it led to my depression and anxiety.
At the same time though, I realised people bullied me because I was an easy target. I was shy and quiet, I minded my own business, so I was vulnerable to people making fun of me. I liked "different things" so apparently that was also a reason to pick at me. But I have changed a lot now and even people who bullied me are nicer to me. Granted, I hold my grudges and I am not trusting of them but that's just how it is. Many of them said they admired me for being confident and following my passion in life, and for just being me. I was never a "weird" sort of different, I guess I just didn't follow the typical crowd in school, I wasn't part of the popular gang, so that's why I was picked on.
I think bullying is so common for young people to experience because, at that stage in your life, you are going through so much change (physically and mentally), you are being expected grow up and become an adult, so it is a very weird phase to transition through and, in all honesty, I think that's why some people bully others. People bully others because they want to feel better about themselves, they want more confidence, they want to hide their insecurities and pick on someone else to make them think they are okay and they aren't awful. Teenagers have such low self-confidence. I'm not justifying bullying at all, it's bad and it's wrong, but in some ways, with the way we are brought up, I feel like it's only inevitable sometimes. I definitely think bullying has become less common now that I'm older and if I do experience it, I deal with it so much better. (Most) people just grow up and realise they have better things to do with their time than hurt others.
