by Band Back Together | Aug 27, 2014 | A Letter To My Younger Self, Abuse, Eating Disorders, How To Help With Low Self-Esteem, Self Injury, Self-Esteem, Teen Self Injury |
You are going to make mistakes, a lot of them.
Like seriously, A LOT.
Mistakes are okay to make as long as you learn from them.
You will make the mistake of letting people tell you who you are, not learning the first time, and believing the hate.
All of that means nothing to you now, you are probably laughing and saying to yourself “I would never do that!”
When you end up in multiple mentally abusive relationships, get out of there at the first sign! Believe me, you try so, so hard and it doesn’t work.
That doesn’t make you a failure though, it was their fault for not putting in equal effort and treating you right.
You aren’t fat, stop starving yourself.
You shouldn’t cut, put the knife down.
You don’t have to struggle alone, tell someone.
You aren’t a bother, speak up.
You don’t expect to much, keep your own standards.
I love you, Younger Self. When you grow up, make sure to remember to love yourself as well.
by Band Back Together | Jul 9, 2014 | Bullying, Childhood Bullying, Fear, How To Heal From Being Bullied, Self-Esteem |
I was 7 years old when they started to bully me. I was only a kid. I don’t understand what I did to them.
At first I would laugh along with them, but soon I realized that those words hurt. Didn’t they see I looked up to them? They hurt me so badly that many times I thought I didn’t deserve to live. I thought it was my fault.
They robbed me of my childhood, I would go to sleep crying, hoping the next day it wouldn’t be as bad. I asked for help, but instead, I was told to “man up.” How is an eight year old suppose to do that? After a few years they finally stopped. I had my friends and family, but I would still felt worthless, like I didn’t matter.
I forgave them, but those scars are still there.
I can still hear all those horrible things they said to me in my head. The only way I survived was that I made myself stop feeling emotions. Things would happen to me in my life, but I would no longer feel them. I talk to my former bullies now as if nothing ever happened, but whenever they look at me, I feel like I’m 7 again, hiding in a corner, scared.
Little by little, I have been able to put myself together again, to start to feel, but those painful memories just don’t go away. Whenever I remember those painful memories all I can ask myself is what did I do to them to make them hate me so much? I was only a kid.
by Band Back Together | May 21, 2014 | Bullying, Romantic Relationships, Self-Esteem, Stalking |
We all have letters we’d like to send, but know that we can’t. A letter to someone we no longer have a relationship with, a letter to a family member or friend who has died, a letter to reclaim our power or our voice from an abuser.
Letters where actual contact is just not possible.
Do you have a letter you can’t send?
Why not send it to The Band?
My sister called you “The Blond to End All Blonds.” There was a good reason for this. After you had been in my life, I had no interest in any other blonds until I met my husband.
I kept you on a pedestal. You were my ideal. No one could compare to you.
8th grade was a really hard year for me. I don’t know why that group of girls targeted me, but the bullying was rough. They made fun of my hair, my clothes, made me feel worthless. My mom and my sister were very supportive during that time, like they always were, but it wasn’t enough to keep my spirits up.
Then came the basketball game where I met you. I only sat next to you that night so I could have a chance to talk to the other saxophone player sitting on the other side of you. Justin was really popular with the girls, and I could never find a moment when he wasn’t talking to some girl. I don’t know why I was so brave that day. I wasn’t normally like that. I figured I could strike up a conversation with the cute blond sax player while waiting for a chance to talk to Justin.
You seemed startled, but pleased when I sat down and started talking to you. I still remember what you were wearing that day: blue jeans and an olive green sweatshirt with a bird on it, a parrot, I think. The longer we talked, the more Justin disappeared from my mind.
From then on, the weekends were what got me through the difficult weeks. My sister was always happy to let me hang out with her and her friends. I was at all of the high school football games, basketball games, and concerts – anywhere the band members would be. I would have gone with her anyway, but you were an extra incentive.
It was very flattering to have an Older Man pay attention to me. You were only two years older than me, but because you were in high school, and I was in junior high, that was a really big deal. You were always so sweet and so kind to me.
I’d never seen anyone look good in those horrible marching band uniforms, but you did. I will never forget the night of that one football game. I stood there holding a heavy quilt because it was supposed to be very cold that night. As I listened to the band teacher gruffly instructing everyone what he expected of them, I looked over at you. You grinned at me.
My heart stopped.
That was the most beautiful smile I had ever seen, and it was just for me!
You never came right out and said that you liked me back, but your actions did. I felt like the only thing keeping you from pursuing more of a relationship was the fact that I was only in junior high.
I was sitting behind you at a football game one afternoon, talking to one of my sister’s friends about the party we were all going to that night. I made a point of mentioning whose house we would be going to, for your benefit.
Little did you know you were actually going to show up!
A car pulled up in front of the house that night. I heard one of the seniors say that it looked like your sister’s car. When I got outside to see what was going on, I saw a pack of boys standing around the car. They all looked too afraid to come closer with all those big senior boys in the house. I yelled for you by name. The other boys laughed and said you weren’t there, but when some of the bigger guys came outside, and everyone jumped back in the car, I saw you.
I got up the nerve to call you the next day. Our conversation was a little weird and awkward, but you were sweet. You admitted to being with the boys in the car the night before, but wouldn’t say anything else about it.
Was I wrong to believe you were there for me?
But then came the horrible news that you were moving. I was heartbroken. After you left, I used my school connections to find out what school you had transferred to in Texas. I wrote you a letter, and mailed it, care of your new school. In it, I jokingly threatened to write to you constantly until you answered me. I regretted it as soon as it was in the mail. It sounded creepy. I was sure you would think I was insane when you read it. I never wrote again, but I missed you all the time, and always wondered what might have happened if you hadn’t moved away.
A couple of years passed, and I took a trip to Washington to visit a friend. On the way, I had a long layover in Utah. My sister was going to school there, and we took the time between my flights to go shopping. We drove to the mall and pulled into the parking garage.
As we looked for a parking place, I noticed a familiar face. I asked my sister if she thought that looked like your sister. My heart stopped again when I realized the guy walking behind her looked just like YOU. I begged for my sister to stop the car, but she was afraid she would lose me if we didn’t stay together. She rolled the window, yelled your name, and YOU TURNED AROUND!
As soon as we could find a parking space, I was on the hunt for you, but I never found you. I cried through much of the flight to Washington, devastated that I might have just missed my chance to connect with you again.
You and I are friends on Facebook now. I’ve apologized about basically stalking you back then. I’ve thanked you for making me feel good about myself during that tough year. I enjoy seeing pictures of your family, your wife and pretty little girls. You look so happy, and I’m glad.
I’ve tried to ask you more than once if that really was you in Utah that day, but you won’t tell me. I wish you would. We all have unanswered questions that we wish someone could answer. You have the ability to ease my curiosity. It’s an important question to me because seeing you that day opened the doors in my heart to allow me to fall in love for the first time.
Thank you for being kind to me at a time when I really needed it.
by Band Back Together | Apr 17, 2014 | Adult Children of Mentally Ill Parents, Child Sexual Abuse, Date/Acquaintance Rape, Guilt, Rape/Sexual Assault, Self-Esteem, Shame |
It seems that in the last month, the mental block I once hid worries, pain, and hurt has fallen away. My life has been a roller coaster of emotions and difficulties.
When I was four, I was sexually molested by an older cousin; someone I trusted. The abuse corrupted my life and tore at me – I’d cry with guilt and shame. I believe it was at this time I set up my mental block.
When I was eight, my mother was diagnosed with a terminally debilitating physical illness and delusional paranoia. She’d just given birth to my sister and was so ill that I became the mother to my sister; I cleaned up cuts and cooked dinner. My mother didn’t like this. When her mental illness reared its head, she’d abuse me physically and emotionally while my father was at work. Eventually, he had to stop working to look after her.
As a teenager, I was severely overweight; I was paid no attention by boys other than disparaging remarks about my appearance. My best friend was the total opposite – pretty and bubbly, however she controlled and dictated my early years. She controlled a variety of sexual experiences that I wasn’t comfortable with, but was too afraid of being called frigid or that our friendship would end.
I’ve been with my current boyfriend for five years and he is my other half – he’s brilliant with my sister, kind and patient with my mother, and dependable. During our relationship, I’ve lost weight and look like a different girl. Still, my self-esteem is so low that I’ll avoid a deserved argument, afraid that someone will pick my appearance apart – fearful that I’ll be fat and fifteen again, crying in my bathroom.
Last year, my life took a turn for the worse.
I was being intimidated by my roommate’s boyfriend and felt so unhappy, lower than I’d ever been. My boyfriend and I were fighting and I was sure he was going to dump me. I’d found out that my father may have fathered a child with one of my mother’s closest friends and the child is very, very ill so the woman regularly comes to my house begging my mother for handouts and sympathy. My world had crumbled, so that when a friend – someone I considered to be like a brother – offered to take me out for a drink, I accepted.
At the bar, this friend of both myself and my boyfriend told me he’d broken up with his girlfriend and wanted to drown his sorrows. I got drunker and drunker so when he said he should go back to his place and get on Chatroulette (something we’d always done while drunk) that sounded fun.
When we got there, he realized he’d forgotten his laptop and mentioned we should probably go to sleep – I was too drunk to walk home, I should stay over. I had no issues with this – he was my “brother” after all – so I drunkenly pulled off my jeans getting ready for bed. On the verge of sleep and too drunk to know my own name, all of a sudden I was fifteen again, feeling pressured to allowing something to happen. I lay there not realizing that what was happening wasn’t right before shouting “stop!” He may have stopped, I think he probably did, but I was already unconscious.
I woke up later to him touching me, my pants pulled to one side. I lay for a second and the only thing I remember before I had the urge to vomit, was disappointment. Disappointment that he’d done this, for instigating this while I was drunk. Disappointment gave way to numbness. I stumbled to the bathroom and vomited. I looked at my face in the mirror – I wasn’t connecting thoughts together, I felt I was a completely different person – lost and bewildered. I stumbled back the bed, still too drunk to walk home. Besides, I reasoned, he probably didn’t mean to do it. I lay as far away from him as I could, my thighs clenched like a vice and my back to him.
He wouldn’t dare do it again.
I fell into unconscious or a heavy, deep sleep again and woke up to him doing it again. I was afraid he’d say something mean about the way I look or emotionally blackmail me into silence. So I just lay there, my head turned to the wall, my eyes glassy, my face pale as I vomited until I bled and my friend molested me. I was a child again, not understanding what was happening, merely knowing that it was outside my comfort zone and that I wasn’t enjoying what was happening.
I gathered the urge to say stop in a way that I knew would draw his attention. I don’t know why, but I knew that something was holding me back from telling him that what he was doing was wrong; a hunch that he would turn nasty. I told him to stop. He replied, “come on, no one will find out,” to which I replied “no!” once again.
My memory is fuzzy with pain, drunkenness, violation, numbness. I don’t think that he stopped, despite keeping my back to him, despite saying no, despite showing my discomfort. My brain told me that it might be over sooner if I pretended to play along, but I couldn’t keep up the act beyond a few seconds. I lay there, shivering, clutching my stomach while he rubbed his penis along my back.
Eventually I woke up feeling well enough to get away from him. Numbly, I informed him that as far as I was concerned that nothing happened; that I wanted to forget the whole thing. In my mind it was true, during those horrible few hours I never kissed him, touched him, or was in any way sexually excited.
Six months later my numbness is fading – now I’m having panic attacks and crying every day. What happened as a betrayal I see as a betrayal of my boyfriend. The guy who molested me was his friend. He assures me that he forgives me but that he wants to know who assaulted me.
I can’t tell him.
I want to. So badly.
I want him to know that the person he smiles when he mentions was my attacker. I want to come clean to him – tell him everything. The logical side of my brain tells me that if I do, my life might be over. I’d lose a lot of friends, my abuser could say that what happened was a fling – anything but the truth. My family and his would be at logger heads; not a good idea in our small community.
I hate him, but I miss the friend he was. I’m writing this because I’m sick of feeling depressed, full of guilt and shame. I’m sick of looking at my male friends and wondering would they hurt me like that? would they touch me while I threw up?
I worry I’m victimising myself when I wasn’t actually a victim; my memories of that day change like crazy – I can’t be certain what actually happened. One minute I see I was sexually assaulted while the next an evil voice at the back of my head cuts me down.
How do I even begin to move on from this?
My life feels like a black hole that’s physically and emotionally destroying me.
by Band Back Together | Apr 1, 2014 | Childhood Bullying, Coping With Bullying, Forgiveness, How To Heal From Being Bullied, Loneliness, Parent Loss, Self-Esteem |
Hi, I found your web site yesterday and decided it is time to seek friends who understand me and what I went through.
I was bullied in third grade on up to graduation. I talk to friends about it and they tell me I need to forgive the bullies. I have, but the pain resurfaces at times. Sometimes, I cry and just feel so alone and sad.
I had friends until the middle of third grade. One day, we were out on the playground, and all the girls in my class got around me. They pushed me, and I couldn’t get away. After that day, I had no girl friends in my class. The boys were always nice to me. My parents went to the bullies’ houses and talked with the parents, but they all still treated me differently from that day on.
In fifth grade, I went out for basketball where I met a bully on the other team. She hated me. She was there again in sixth grade, still hating me. In seventh grade I was put in her same section because they ran out of room in the higher section. What a sad reason to put someone where it would be scary. No one from my elementary school was in my section. I was alone with the tough kids, and I was scared to death. I found out later, that girl and some others were doing drugs.
In ninth grade, my daddy died, and I was even more alone. One night, I couldn’t breathe. Mom called the ambulance. I was taken to the hospital, where I was diagnosed with allergies and a cold. As I think back, I wonder if it was a panic attack.
In tenth grade, my entire English class was busted for drugs, except me. I never did drugs.
In high school, I finally started making friends, but I had to be careful. I didn’t want to get too close to one friend because she was loose. I didn’t need her reputation adding to my problems. I met another friend in summer school. She had been picked on too, but we didn’t have the same classes.
After I turned 16 and learned to drive, I learned to square dance. I always wanted to learn how. The other people there were older then me, and became parents and grandparents to me. I finally felt accepted.
I identify with Joseph in the Bible. What people meant as harm to him, God turned around for good. God always kept me safe and protected. If it weren’t for the situation I was in, who knows what trouble I could have gotten in. I have forgiven my bullies, but the pain and scars are still there, and will always be there. Sometimes the loneliness gets so great, I just sit and cry.
I have a wonderful hubby, sons, and mom, and I know they don’t understand me. I have been reading about triggers, and how they can take you right back to a bad situation. That is what I have been dealing with for the past two days. I have been crying a lot. After a church meeting last year, I asked to sit down with some ladies. One of them old me it was a private conversation, which triggered me right back to feeling like being left out in school. I ended up leaving that church because it was too painful and brought up too many triggers.
I love people, being around them and talking to them. I went to broadcasting school, and it brought me out of my shyness. Mom says that was priceless. I was once told that I was treated the way I was because the kids thought I was a snob. It made me laugh because it was just the opposite. I wasn’t a snob, just extremely shy with low self-esteem.
Thanks for listening, God bless.
by Band Back Together | Mar 14, 2014 | Adult Bullying, Bullying, Coping With Bullying, How To Heal From Being Bullied, How To Help With Low Self-Esteem, Self-Esteem, Teen Bullying |
I am a student at a university. I am good at what I study.
To cut a very long story short, a guy who was in my friendship group got jealous of my marks, and was mad that I wouldn’t give him my answers. He sent me horrible messages saying I was a snake and an academic climber.
I know its very little compared to many stories on here, but it has really affected me. I am not friends with the group anymore as no one stood up for me.
I feel so self conscious and my self esteem has plummeted, I feel like everyone is looking and judging me all the time, and I’m all by myself.
I don’t know what to do, these are meant to be the best years of my life…
