Bullied| My School Days

I believe that most bullies don't know or understand what they do. They don't know how much they are hurting the person, because to them, everything is a game and a joke. It hurts to be bullied, but it can change your life for the better, or for the worse. It is usually for the worse, but if it teaches a person to grow and stand up for themselves and to stand up for others, like it did me, it can help make a change for the better.

I have been to four "real schools" since I was around 10 years old and I have been bullied, a lot, in three of those schools. I guess I was an easy target, as I have always been the shy and friendly person who hates bringing attention to myself and would rarely tell the teachers what people did. But, it has not just been classmates bullying me, but the teachers too.

The first school, that I remember being bullied in, was an international school. I don't even know what I did to start being bullied but some of the boys in the class I was in just decided they wanted to pick on me. They would try and trip me up, or hide my things so I would get in trouble with the teachers. It was just the small things, and I usually just pushed things away and tried to ignore what they said,especially with one boy who would tease me for my difficulty in maths or language skills as he had many of the same problems as I did. The problem in this school, was I rarely spoke up, so my teacher would usually believe the bullies over me. 

One time, I arrived to class a little late, and was approached by my teacher who said one of the boys, one of the ones that bullied me, had lost one of his inside shoes (we changed our outside shoes to inside shoes in the coat room) and nobody else in the class had seen it. I told her that I had never touched the shoe, but people were always kicking shoes around in the small room. However, the boy said he had seen me with his shoe so I was sent down to look for the lost shoe and had been told if I did not find it, I would have to buy him a new shoe. In the end, the shoe had been found in my sport bag, and had been put there by the boy himself, to get me into trouble. And, the teacher never believed that, when I tried to explain to her.

The bullying in that first school, was not that bad, as I had friends and would try and ignore what people said to me and pretend it did not bother me at all. But in the second school, I was also bullied but a little differently.

In the second school I went to, there was this boy who did not seem to like me from the first day I saw him. He would spit at me, and a couple of his other targets, and spread rumours about people, and even spy on girls when they were in the toilets. He would always spin things around if someone tried to confront him about something, like saying his sister had got into an accident or his mum had just died and he was upset about that. This was the first time that someone bullying me got to me the most, and probably dragged me down the most but all the same I was able to help others, who were bullied, and stick up for them a bit which helped me to stand up for myself a little at the same time. 

But, as well as this young man, there was also one of the teachers who was a bit of a bully, especially towards me. She was the maths teacher. She would often say that I was not trying, if I did not do well in maths. She would get annoyed if someone gave the wrong answer to a maths question and was never there to really help anyone with any problems they had in class. One time, she was a substitute teacher for sports class. I am really bad in sports, and the actual sports teacher we had always let me go into another room and practice catching or something for most of the class. I tried to tell her this. She said that he never told her this. So, she made me play with everyone else but I was not very good so she told everyone to stop playing and then she looked at me, and with everyone listening, she called me lazy. Just because I was not playing very well, she called me lazy. Another time, my mum write a note to complain about her, and told me to give it to the head of our department of the school. My main teacher insisted that she took it, and I said no, but she took it anyway and then later that day the maths teacher took me out of maths class, and into another room, and had a go at me saying i was a lying, and that she did not just call me lazy that time in sports but was calling everyone lazy and she said i should not go home and tell lies to my parents about her. She also, always believed the boy who bullied me over me. One time he spat at me, and then he told her that I spat at him and she told me off, no matter what I said. She even made me tell her that I spat at him. I had to tell her I spat at him, or get in trouble, which could have meant staying in after school or extra homework.

But during the same time, that I was bullied, there was a boy who was bullied too. In fact, in the school he had been in before he had been bullied so much that the police got involved. He was a bit slow when it came to some lessons, and he had learning difficulties and as I too have learning difficulties I understood and went out of my way to befriend him, even though this caused me to be bullied even more. After I befriended him, I started to stand up for other people that were being bullied, and even though I was shy, I would go to our main class teacher and tell her what was happening. It did not really help, as the teachers did very little about it but it helped me to stand up for myself, as well as to stand up for other people who were going through the same thing as I was.

After I left that school I home-schooled for a bit, but the next school I went to was not much different from the others, when it came to being bullied.  There was a boy in my class, who arrived a little after the year started. The very first day he came to the school I showed him round the school and even sat with him at lunch, but a couple days after and for the rest of the year he suddenly just turned against me and started pushing me around, spreading rumours, laughing and teasing and lying to the teachers about me. I am a shy person, always have been, but I became to shy to even answer questions in class sometimes, because if I got something wrong he would laugh at me and tease me. The teachers would never say anything when he would and often would tell me it was just playful teasing.  In the same school, there was a girl, who was a friend of mine but after refusing to take part in a challenge in sports class she fell out with me and started to poke fun at me too, and sometimes helped my other bully to get at me. 

Again, my teacher was a bit of a bully. She would make me share my food, like sweets or edible gifts I had been given, to people in my class, and one time she told me I had to write an essay about something that I had a different opinion to what she taught, and when my mum talked to her about it saying it was way to hard, as I was going to have to write it n French when I had little french, after I was trying to work on it the teacher said that she had never said I had to and that it was optional. She also had favourites in the class, and always thought they were perfect and if they did anything she would always overlook it or say it was the other persons' fault. 

As well as being bullied, in this school, I also befriended another boy who had no friends and was also bullied, and for this I was bullied more but I would usually try and ignore this and continue to have him as a friend. I would also stick up for other people who were bullied or pushed about.

I have been bullied most of my life, and I am sure there is never really a reason to be bullied but I think in my case it has helped me to grow and help other people, and even though I hated every moment of what people did to me in the past, I can still easily say that I forgive all of them for what they did And everything that has happened in the past has helped form the person I am today, which I would not want to change.  However, bullying can cause many issues like depression and suicide, and you never know what anyone is going through at any point in time. You should raise other people up and encourage them not bring them down and discourage them, which is what bullies are doing.

I think that bullying is something that everyone should spread awareness of, but instead of focusing on telling students to be aware, they need to watch out and be aware themselves, because it doesn't matter who's watching if a teacher doesn't do something about it. And, if you see someone being bullied, you should not be afraid to stand up for them, and the same for you. Never be afraid to talk to someone, or find help if you need it.