Teen Health

Bullying is a pervasive problem that knows no social, racial, or economic boundaries and takes many forms.

It is just as likely to occur on the job as on the playground.

Today, we invite you to share your story: let's kick bullying to the curb.

This story pains my heart – deeply. This story should not have to be told.

This story is about my son. My son was bullied, and sadly, his father and I missed the early signs. As a parent, it still breaks my heart to think of the silent pain. The pain he did not share.

Thankfully, a teacher from his school called us one day out of concern. She shared with us that she had been noticing that Zach had been throwing away his lunches daily instead of eating them. She finally asked Zach if there was something wrong with the food and did he want to purchase hot lunch? He quietly brushed her questions away. “No... no. I’m just not hungry.”

Luckily the teacher listened to her heart. She saw the signs and she was concerned. For that, we are so thankful.

During my conversation with the teacher and the following conversation with my husband, I still had no idea why our son would be throwing away his lunches. I really had NO idea. I was extremely heartbroken when I found out why. As a momma, you naturally turn into wanting to fix the hurt, and in my case, I wanted to go to his school and be that parent that confronts THAT kid for hurting MY kid.

As Zach told us the story, I did my very best to stay composed, to not break down or show the RAGE that was developing on the inside.

The bullying began one day during lunch; an upperclassman pinned my son to the wall and called him fat, told him Zach that he was gay, and that MONSTER told him he was going to... (boy, it’s hard to type this) fuck his brains out. This monster told my son that “girls do not like fat, gay, ugly boys.” This went on for a few months and our son did his best to avoid this MONSTER. The boy constantly was bullying him, threatening him . The result of this bullying? Our son became anorexic.

MY SON WAS BULLIED. He was verbally assaulted. He was 14-years old and being threatened sexually. This should NEVER have happened. NEVER.

I gripped my husband’s hand so tightly I remember the marks I left. We asked him why he wasn’t eating his lunches. His words pained us - "I don’t want to be fat. I don’t want to eat. I will be hurt if I eat. I can’t eat. You can’t make me eat." He admitted to not eating breakfast AND lunch for well over 2 months. How did I not notice my son was losing weight? How did I not notice he wasn’t eating before school? We made him get on the scale, and there was a significant weight loss.

I instantly made a phone call to his doctor and Zach, after refusing to go, went. He listened to what the doctor had to say and admitted that not eating was something HE could control. The doctor did the “tough love” and explained the severity of this. Zach broke down and sobbed, admitting he needed help. I sobbed, holding my teenage son, wanting to take the hurt away.

The meeting with the principal? Amazing. After the principal did some talking to other students and talking to the bully - the offender, the MONSTER - this senior upperclassmen was expelled from the school. The principal had a ZERO tolerance policy on bullying, and had that not happened, I would have gone as far as I needed to go to see justice served.

No child should ever be bullied.

After a year of counseling and taking a few confidence-building classes, he is doing better. Our son has never been overweight, never chubby. For a long time he didn’t see it that way – every pound he gained back from his weight loss scared him, until he finally broke free from the pain of being bullied.

Bullying is a pervasive problem that knows no social, racial, or economic boundaries and takes many forms.

It is just as likely to occur on the job as on the playground.

Today, we invite you to share your story: let's kick bullying to the curb.

Once upon a time...

No.

That's the start of a fairy tale and this, this is not a fairy tale. This is a tale about a girl and a school and another girl. It's a tale about a girl who had horrible secrets and who simply had to deal with them the best she could.  It's a tale about the bullying that made all of it so much worse.

I started school just like any other little girl, but I wasn't just any other little girl. By kindergarten I'd already been abused both physically and sexually. I'd been put into the foster care system, and I'd been adopted. I'd been expelled from preschool for fighting. My socialization did not include other children since my adopted parents were so much older than I was.

I don't remember anything really bad until after my mother died when I was 8.

I had normalish problems for a child, with the exception of nighttime enuresis (bed wetting) and some rage issues (but those were mostly at home). That was a really embarrassing problem to have when sleepovers are such big things, but I tried really hard to deal with it and keep it a secret. When my mother died, my father went from a man who enjoyed a few beers to someone who needed to get lost in them. I went from a little girl who had problems to a little girl with big problems.

When you don't have a choice to do anything but survive, you find a way.

For me it became hiding from the world. By 4th grade, I was starting to skip school and my nighttime enuresis problem was becoming more of an issue during the day. I'd get so nervous about calling attention to myself that I literally could not get up during class and ask to be excused. Of course, inevitably, I started wetting my pants during the day.

In fourth and fifth grade, the teasing got really bad. Teasing is actually such a kind word for what it really was. I was tagged with multiple nicknames all involving pee. Pissy Pants followed me until I graduated high school. It was so humiliating, and there wasn't a damn thing I could do about it.

In fifth grade I attempted suicide and put myself into a coma for 3 days. I simply couldn't take it all anymore. Now I look back and wonder why no one did anything. My father's family knew what was going on at home, or at least the broad strokes of it. My birth grandparents knew (it was an open adoption except for contact by my birth parents).

I was dirty most of the time, our house smelled horrible since it was never clean, and the bar owners near our home knew what my voice sounded like on the phone when I called to get Daddy to come home. I watched him get arrested for a DUI in front of our house. My teachers had to have seen how I was treated and how I kept retreating. I know they had to know I wet my pants; it wasn't like I was keeping it a secret very well. The school certainly knew I wasn't in class more than was normal for a child.

Middle school is usually the worst time for bullying, but oddly enough it contained my best consecutive years at school. I don't know if my suicide attempt gave me some kind of "hands off" status, or if I was simply able to deal with it better. By then my father had stopped drinking, and I had good friends who supported me. It was a good time, until the rape.

Then I self-destructed and it all went south.

In high school, it got worse - again. My arch nemesis had been in my class for most of my school years (our town had 2 elementary schools, 1 middle school and 1 high school - there was no escape). If someone was making fun of me, she was right there making it worse (or starting it). By high school she had honed her keen edge on me for so long that I would spend massive amounts of energy to avoid her. A teenager trying to fit in does not want to hear those grade school nicknames - especially said out loud during a break between classes while the entire school streams by heading to their lockers.

I went back to missing school, this time not to escape my home life, but to escape how school made me feel. She made fun of my old problem (which was rapidly starting to come back from nerves), how much school I missed, my weight, my hair... basically anything she felt could make me deficient in the eyes of others.

I was a smart kid - I had been in our school's advanced placement program since I was in 4th grade (the year it started for us). I should have had great grades and been one of our top graduates. By 10th grade I was missing so much school that I had two different teachers start making comments IN CLASS like, "it's so nice of you to join us today, I suppose we won't see you again until next week."  Yea, that was helpful. *eyeroll*

By my senior year it had gotten so bad that the school wouldn't allow me to go to the regular high school. I either went to alternative school (where I was the only non-pregnant girl), or I quit school. I went to alternative school, and I made it through, although it was close.

When I see a school shooting on the news, I'm sad.

Of course I'm sad because of what happened, but also because I know the rage that often plays such a big role in that kind of thing. I never really fantasized about killing everyone, because even in my own sad, little way back then, I liked most of the people, and I REALLY wanted them to like me. I did fantasize, so often that I can literally see the exact sequence of things I would do to her even now, of hurting my arch nemesis who seemed to thrive on my pain.  I fantasized about standing up to those teachers who made fun of me in front of the class. I fantasized about saying all the things I couldn't say to all the people who shut me out and made me pay for being different. Different in ways that I had absolutely no control over.

No child should ever have to feel the way I felt during school. I was shamed on a daily basis. I dreaded school so much that I would rather have been at home in my room hanging out by myself than go to school and be around my friends (and I had some excellent friends). I became pathologically afraid of one of the most popular girls in our school, one who led the pack that feasted on my pain. I was convinced that I was inferior to everyone.

With the advent of Facebook, I've gotten into contact with so many of the people that I went to school with. Some friends, some people that I didn't know very well, and some that even made fun of me. No one seems to remember what happened back then, and I suppose for someone who wasn't traumatized, they probably wouldn't. When I see them make posts about how bullying is bad, I remember how they stood by and watched or participated in my torment.

I should feel happy that they've changed, that they want to teach their children to be better, but a small part of me still wants to cry and ask "why me?"

I have mono. I have no idea how I contracted it. It's been many months - far beyond the incubation period - since I last kissed anyone; I don't drink after anyone; and I don't even use drinking fountains.

I'm confined to bed because my spleen is enlarged. My friends are away at universities far from here and cannot visit me. I'm sixteen, so my university classmates are understandably not eager to form social relationships with a sixteen-year-old who doesn't even look fourteen. I only get to use my computer for an hour a day. I get to use my phone for the same amount of time. The rest of the time I watch mindless TV and stare at the ceiling of my bedroom.

Even though mono isn't typically fatal unless a spleen ruptures or something equally unlikely catastrophic occurs, I'm feeling as though I wouldn't give a rip if mono did finish me off. Maybe I should crawl out of my bed when no one is paying attention and go participate in a rough contact sport.

Life sucks right now.

I wrote Part 1 of this story a few months ago. I've found it really hard to sit down and continue, but it's time to get it all out.

Names have been changed.

When I was in high school, I dated Rick. During our short relationship, I befriended his best friend, James. While Rick was cocky and arrogant, James was sweet, funny and paid attention to me. The first time I met him, he was the third wheel on our date. Rick walked right through the door to the movie theater, but James held the door for me, smiled sweetly, and put his hand on the small of my back as I walked through. My body shivered and somehow I knew that someday, we'd be together.

Things with Rick ended shortly after that date. We stayed friends, and a few months later - the fall after we graduated - James and I started dating. We slept together right away. I cried afterward the first time because I was sure he'd just use me for sex. But he was different - we fell in love quickly. I was genuinely happy.

A few months into our relationship - just shy of my 18th birthday - we moved in together when his mom kicked him out. We were completely broke, but we had each other and we were in love. A year after we started dating, we got engaged. I admit that I pressured him into it - I didn't want to live together for years without an engagement - but as soon as we were engaged, we set a date and began planning.

Two weeks before our wedding, I was out shopping with one of my bridesmaids. I was in the fitting room when I got the call that my dad was in the hospital because he'd tried to kill himself. We learned he'd been having an affair for a couple of years and the stress of leading two lives had become too much. To make it more complicated, the affair was with my best friend - a girl I'd known since kindergarten, a girl who'd joked about having a crush on my dad - who we'd innocently teased about marrying my dad (little did we know).

They both swore the relationship was over. She begged for forgiveness; she couldn't bear to lose my friendship. She stood up with me on my wedding day. Two weeks later, she and my father ran away together. It was years before I spoke to either of them.

I remember on my wedding day, as I was about to walk down the aisle with my mom and dad, the moment it hit me: I wasn't throwing a big party - I was getting married. This was the wedding, but it was also the start of a marriage. I said to my mom, "I don't know if I want to do this."  But I pushed my fears aside, reminded myself that I loved James and wanted to spend the rest of my life with him.

Two months into our marriage, Rick struck up a conversation. It wasn't unusual - we'd stayed friends - but this time it was different. He was more flirty than usual. He admitted he still had feelings for me; he wished I hadn't gotten married. It was the first I'd heard of it - he was our best man AND living with his girlfriend.

Somehow, we began an emotional affair. Things escalated. One night, it got physical and after that, our affair ended.

James was still upset, of course. He had every right to be but it was over, I was sorry, and we tried to move on. I got pregnant and, at seven months pregnant and on bedrest with pre-eclampsia, I found out about the affairs James had been having. He had met a woman online and had been planning to run away with her before I got pregnant.

I was jobless, sick, pregnant, and had nowhere to go, so I stayed. I tried to make the best of it, but with the baby came postpartum depression. And when the baby was four months old, I discovered I was pregnant again. I was a new mom, depressed, pregnant, and stuck.

This man I'd once loved, this relationship we had...none of it was the same. Our relationship did remain stable throughout my second pregnancy. Things weren't great but they didn't get worse. We were parenting a baby, expecting another one, and James worked long hours away from home during the week.

When the baby came, my depression worsened. I was raising two babies (mostly) on my own. Our one-year-old was a good baby, but she was very active and sick a lot. The new baby was a very colicky baby. James didn't help around the house, he wouldn't help with the babies unless I forced him, and he was completely oblivious to my depression and sleep deprivation. I knew the man I married could be selfish. I knew he was lazy and immature, but when it was just the two of us, it didn't matter. I thought he would grow up. When the kids came, though, I grew up and he didn't.

He started to complain to Rick about me. I was also talking to Rick - he was the only one I could talk to about how things were at home. He knew I was overwhelmed and had no help. He tried to make James be more understanding and helpful, but somewhere along the lines, my husband had quit caring about the kids and me.

Rick decided to quit fighting his feelings and try to pursue a relationship with me. At first, I was not interested. Crappy marriage or not, I was still married and had children with my husband. Even if I felt the marriage was over, I was still in it. Then I thought about it some more. Here was a good man who wanted to make me happy. Didn't I deserve that? It didn't matter that I was still married or that he was getting married; we began an emotional affair that soon after became physical.

I know the affair was wrong. Still...it saved my life. I couldn't have continued living that way. It's hard to admit even now, but I know I was on a path to suicide. Being with Rick in a relationship where I felt loved, valued, and cared about saved my life.

The affair didn't stay secret, though. A couple of weeks after Rick got married, we got caught. We were in love and neither of us wanted to be with anyone else. We decided we'd stay together. And we did...for about six months.

During those six months, I was tormented by his wife. She vandalized my property, stalked me, constantly called and texted me and threatened my children and me. I lived in the small town where Rick and James had grown up, so everybody knew our business. I was called a cheater, a slut, a whore. My own mother told me I was nothing but a cheater just like my father.

James moved out but tried to control me however he could. I don't know how many times he called me, threatening to kill himself because I'd ruined his life.

Despite all of that, things with Rick were amazing. He helped me, he was supportive, we communicated and were not just partners but friends. He treated my girls as if they were his own and I was put up on a pedestal. We had a real relationship and even if it started out in a terrible way, it was the way a relationship should be.

But James kept his grip on me. He did grow up, he did show me he could be the man that I needed him to be - the dad our children deserved to have. How could I end a marriage, a marriage that involved two little girls, to be with this other man? Yes, he was amazing and was good to me and things were easy with him, but he was not my husband and not the father of my children. I had no problem leaving a marriage that was doomed to be with him, but what if that marriage could work?

And so I ended things with Rick and went back to James. It was incredibly hard to look into the eyes of the man I loved and tell him it was over. I was a mess. Yes, I loved James and wanted to make our marriage work for the sake of our children, but I was madly in love with Rick.

Once I accepted the heartbreak of ending things with Rick and realized that it was going to take time to put things in the past, things became good with James. We had our problems and fought sometimes, but it was normal stuff, not like it had been before. We were happy more often than not. I would talk to Rick sometimes, but we weren't able to go back to being platonic this time like we were before, so I eventually had to be strong and cut off contact again. And, to be honest, any amount of contact at all was not fair to James. I was still in love with Rick and we had had an affair, so if I was still contacting him, I wasn't giving James my all.

And that is how I got to where I am now. That's the end of my "backstory" and now I think I can talk about how I am feeling and have it make sense. And, if nothing else, it has been good therapy for me to get it all out.

You know, I stalk The Band. And Aunt Becky.

I read. I  smile. I laugh. Sometimes I have to force myself to get through a story, but I think it's worth it. It seems like things are published here to be read, to be shared, confirmed, to get them OUT, and at a minimum, I can read and acknowledge them, even with just a momentary commiseration.

But I'm always nervous about how The Band would take my own story. My own problems, fears, and lifestyle. My own fuck-ups seem either trivial, self-induced, or far too personal. But today? I feel like writing, and hey, I may even actually submit this one, though I doubt it'll be published*.

(*ed note: THINK AGAIN. xox - AB)

I'm twenty-three and, of my own volition, have been sexually active for over ten years. There was no reason for it, or for the drugs, or going MIA. I mean, my dad died...but I barely knew him. My step-dad was sick with terminal cancer, but becoming self-destructive wasn't a proper response.

I've been diagnosed with a variety of mental health conditions: bipolar II, cyclothymic disorder, general anxiety disorder, PTSD, as well as a variety of social problems.

The problem: there's no damned trigger to explain away the things I've done. I seem to lack a "Hey idiot, bad idea!" buzzer. Or a "You can say NO!" buzzer. Your boyfriend and his four buddies at thirteen? Eh, why not? Living on three White Castle burgers, a couple bottles of Ritalin, and Mt. Dew for a week? With a carnie? At the grand old age of fourteen? Sure, awesome idea. Letting an old perv I met on the 'net videotape various indecent acts in a hotel room at sixteen? Fun fun. A similar situation with an older guy and Polaroids a few months later? Welp, we've done this much, might as well.

Honestly, none of that bothers me - didn't at the time, either. That it doesn't seem bad, or wrong, or much of anything really: that's what bothers me. That I can quite happily identify myself as a former slut just IS. I'm only a former slut thanks to the husband and kiddos.

My habits were very self-destructive. I did the math the other day: sex acts with twenty-two men; twenty in a five-year period (between 13-18). Five debatable/unsure. Six women/girls. So, between 26-31 people in five years, one year of which I was devotedly faithful to one person, and a year of no action, so really, it was about three years... before I was actually legal.

See why NOT being bothered bothers me? The risky situations, the meek little girl who wouldn't, COULDN'T, insist on practicing safe sex - it should be downright terrifying. I'm very lucky to be clean and not have gotten pregnant. I'm lucky to have gotten pregnant by my husband and not some random.

I just... I don't know.

I went to a counselor for the first time in five years today, not because I needed therapy. No, I went I needed a different kind of help. I function even less well without a pet, and my apartment complex requires a ridiculous deposit plus added rent unless it's a service animal. I went to a counselor because I want my emotional support animal papers back, not because I need a better way to deal with problems.

I'm sitting here now, running through things in my head after the fact.

A counselor. Not a psychologist, not a psychiatrist, a run-of-the-mill, degree in social work, counselor. The Band, I think this lady is in WAY over her head. That stuff up there? That's just what's running through my head at the moment. There's more I haven't mentioned - more secrets, darker places, actual bad things. There are details of things I've told you that I haven't even told my husband because I'm afraid of what he'll say or think of me.

I just don't know what the right thing to do is.

I kind of want to call, cancel my next appointment, and just add the pet deposit and rent amount to my next requested student loan. Fuck it, this whole talking to people thing is overrated anyway, right? I just want my fuzzy warm animal to bring me back to reality when I need it; I don't need to take myself further away from my reality by talking to this lady, especially knowing I'll consciously hide the things that really matter, for a couple of reasons.

She's a woman, first, and for some reason, I have yet to meet any woman on any level of psychiatry that I am willing (or able) to talk to. Women make me too nervous, too self-aware.

Option two is seeing the therapist, hiding what I think needs to be hidden, hoping she'll eventually recommend I have a pet, write me a letter take to my complex manager, and then go to plan A.

Lastly, the one I should probably do: I should call her office Monday morning, tell them I'm pretty sure I am beyond the scope of the school-recommended counselor, and ask for a referral to another psychiatrist? Preferably one NOT associated with the local hospital or inpatient treatment, as I would just freak out? Male, if possible, oh, and by the way, I won't be in next Wednesday.

The last idea is the one that would make the most sense. Hell, that's the one that would most likely get me my pet papers. But I don't do medication, which they'd want to start me on. Some of my current lifestyle choices (dominant/submissive) get the 'Oh hellz NOE!' from therapists, which I don't wanna deal with.

I'm really tired of hiding everything from everyone. I want people to respect that I have it mostly figured out. Right now, I'm stressed, my normal support from the fuzzy things is gone, and I'm cracking a little, but I'm not fucking broken. Yeah, sometimes I need some help, sometimes I'm fine with taking that help - whatever form - but I'm not interested in the solution I think will be offered by upper level psychiatry. I'm not sure that I'm even willing to try to find someone who may actually be able to know what help to give right now.

Head, meet brick wall.

The Band, I'm asking you to talk me into going back into psychiatric hell. Or give me a more concise, logical reason not to.

I know I need an outsider - one that I'll let in. I know I need help right now, until I can back to stability. I'm afraid I won't be able to find help that's willing to get me there on my terms.