BULLIED

Submission 1074

I was bullied a while ago, in Primary School. I still get teased or pointed out and stuff, but it's never as serious, whereas before some people threatened to kill me or rape me. It was because of one kid. This one boy in my class who thought he was brilliant - everybody liked him, except me. I was new, and I have ginger hair, and I can be a bit of a nerd, so he singled me out. I remember it probably started when he accused me of stealing his stuff. His P.E kit, I think. He'd planted it on me secretly but I had no idea. When the teacher went out into the corridor to check our coat-pegs, there was the P.E bag, hanging on mine. I just felt sick and knew everybody would think it was me. I denied it loads of times but nobody believed me. When the teacher went out to get the headteacher to question me, the whole class literally started chanting 'thief! thief! thief!' and pointing at me like I was a zoo attraction or something. And that one boy was egging them on and laughing. I felt like I wanted to just vanish into thin air. It was completely unfair.

It just got steadily worse from then on. Another big one I remember was next year, when the teacher got me to read out my English homework in class, and when I stood up to read everybody started yelling and saying things like 'sit down, ginger, nobody freaking cares!'. I tried to speak but they were all drowning me out with booing. The teacher yelled at them for being unkind but they didn't listen, and as soon as it was breaktime, BOOM, off they go to torture me. People would sometimes jut yell 'Run, you're going to catch Gingivitis!!'. Sometimes they'd trip me up. One big thing was aiming footballs at my head. That happened about six times.

This kid, this boy, he ended up going to my Secondary School too, and boy, did he make my life a misery. Him and his little gang of friends would wait by the school gates super-early, and when I got to school, they would all spit gum at me or trip me in unison. And then soon my whole year was bullying me. One day, when the dinner ladies had left the canteen, this group of kids from my year sat at a table near me and just pelted me with food. I remember then, even now, three years later, how much I wanted to curse at them and beat them up. They took this delight in making me angry. They wanted me to cry, but the bullying never made me feel sad. It just made me feel spitting, killing anger.

It kind of reached its peak when this boy and a couple of his mates followed me home, saw where I lived, and took to posting these offensive notes through the door, like 'go kill yourself'. Or 'coming to rape you, watch out'. I never let my parents see them. I distinctly remember tearing one up before my dad came into the hall. But once, my brother saw, and he was mad. Me and my brother are quite close, and he was so angry that people would treat me like that. So he told my parents, who contacted school, who made sure it stopped.

So, yeah. Still don't feel all too happy going to school. I don't have many friends and even though people have stopped beating me up they still pass a bit of snark. Just wish I could have a friend to help me through it, that's all.

ADVICE: Yeah. I learned that it's no use playing tough. You have to tell somebody who you know will shut the bullies up, and they'll deal with it. You don't deserve to just have to put up with this, everybody out there who's being bullied. Don't suffer in silence.