Someone attempted to bully me recently [not here!!]. (I'm 53!) Perhaps they didn't see it as such, but that was what they did.
I've had a week or so to think about this and the emotions that are resurfacing as a result of this.
I was very badly bullied in my first two years of secondary school. For the next two years I was a bad choice for the bully but it still happened. My last two years; I was hunting bullies. I am someone who you should think very hard about having a, "go at" in any sense.
That sounds a bit gung-ho and agressive. That's down to me being badly bullied. I learned a behaviour, I don't like bullies and I know how to cause them worry. The basic trick is to not react in a way that they want.
A massively inappropriate reaction to a simple greeting, a simple, "cool" while being punched, a laugh in the wrong place. Don't ever let them settle, don't ever let them 'get' you, 'get' to them.
This was the stuff of my youth. I thought that it was gone and past and not needed anymore. Turns out the bullies are still here.
Again, I am being bullied.
I hate the fact that I have to dig out of my head behaviours that I really thought that I would never need again. But there is a bit of me will enjoy using them again.
This above is all very cerebal. The main problem is that my anger is out of control because I feel bullied. I hate that. I hate that people can do this to me. I know that I'm mad and I hate that.
I can't think of a round-up, so I'm going to post as is
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Ouch. With sympathy. I was packed off to boarding school when I was 8 and escaped when I was 16. Teasing under 13 was horrid enough but in early teens there were some characters who were simply malicious to the core. I tried to stay outside it ... and occassionally got caught in the cross-fire. What I saw was physical and mental torture. Quite unforgivable decades later leaving 'issues' for both the bullied and bullies. I like the huge posters schools have up that try to bring these behaviours into the open so that they had nipped out quickly and people learn to get along. Yet the world is the creation of centuries of bullying. Is it not an inescapable part of human nature? Is it not yet another one of the tensions or disruptions that oblige us to find coping mechanisms, to move on, to have guidelines, rules, laws and acceptable behaviours?New comment
Much sympathy Neil, been there and done that coz I moved school so much I was always the outsider and an easy target. My defense then was to be invisible.
Amazing that at our grand age we can still be targets - except those dishing it out shouldn't be so cocksure about the responses. I didn't react to a nasty remark yesterday because I was in the mood to 'go off on one' which would have caused a monumental row at work, but I am watching to make sure she doesn't think lack of reaction is acceptance of her behaviour.
Hope this situation gets a suitable resolution and the person involved backs off. Good luck.
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Thanks Jon and Cath
The terrible thing is not the bullying but my reaction to it, I was close to stabbing people. I hate that I'm still so conditioned by something that happened forty years ago.
On a better note, our school, one of the best in Scotland according to some statistics, generally comes out top of the bullying tables. A source of pride to us, we record everything. Bullying is something that we expect to happen and plan to tackle.
Which is probably why I went so bammy when it happened. We don't do this.
I hate a loss of control but I remember that a loss of control is exactly what you need when bullies are involved.
I think that I have control back but I'm having to watch my thoughts closely. I'm letting off a lot of flakk [an internal word for angry energy] and I'm feeling slightly calmer. Still not good, I want to reach out and hurt.
This has been a good bit of flakk and the fact that you understood what I was feeling meant lots. Bless you.
We can fix this.
arb
nellie