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My Dear Bully

You won’t hurt me no more.

By Sissy JacksonPublished 6 years ago 5 min read
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Bullying. A word so many people are aware of! Being bullied doesn’t make you a weak person. It can happen to the strongest of people—people in the highest of places and even the nicest people in the world.

People who bully have been bullied themselves and feel the need to bully the next person for their sorrow and hurt.

For me, bullying started in primary school (where most bullying does start and end usually). I was bullied for my name, my accent, my hair, my freckles, and anything else they could find wrong with me. I would cry often, but never confronted my bullies or told my story. I would use crying as a defense and then take my upset and rage out on people at home because they couldn’t hurt me anymore.

Unfortunately for me, my story of bullying continued into secondary school. It got worse. People still bullied me for my name, looks, and weight. People even bullied me over the phone I had. I still didn’t tell anyone my story or what was happening to me. Soon, the bullying got out of control to the point where I was scared and sad to go to school. I worried what would happen next. What happened next was the worst thing that could happen in my life.

15 years old and still suffering daily bullying from the mean people in school. This resulted in depression; self bullying, I called it. Not only did I have to deal with the things going on in my physical life, but my own emotional state of mind started to bully me as well.

I had a daily struggle with my sad feelings and the constant feeling of failure. Constantly feeling like I was doing wrong and that I wasn’t good enough for myself, let alone the world.

Depression continued to bully me for the rest of secondary school. Once I was old enough to leave school and start work, I did.

Finally, my bullies are no longer in my face every day, taunting me over something I could not change. I’m now in the world where adults worked and lived their lives. Naïvely I thought bullying stopped in the school playground...I soon found this out to be untrue.

Wherever I went, whatever job I had, bullying followed me. It wasn’t physical bullying or other people bullying me. It was myself. I was bullying me. I would be doing normal day to day tasks and torturing myself over something I did back in school, or worry about how someone might think of me. I would constantly remind myself of how unhappy I was, but could never change it.

I would always worry about what people would think of me. I would worry if my family liked me, I would worry if the girls back in school would still remember me as the fool they bullied, I would worry what the man in the corner shop would think of me. The more and more I would do this to myself, I would lose a piece of me each time.

I finally admitted I had depression when I was 21, a full six years later once I’d hit rock bottom. I was still being bullied, but this time I was being bullied by people closer to home. My family, my support line, my everything.

It felt like they had turned on me, always asking: “Why are you so sad?” “Why are you so miserable? Angry? Dismissive of life?” They always asked such demanding questions that I didn’t have the answers to. It always felt like I was being attacked by them. They didn’t understand why I felt the way I did and I couldn’t tell them how I felt.

Finally I sought out help. Doctors, tablets, counseling—everything everyone tells you to do with helping depression I did. It didn’t fix it.

The bullying was still going on in my head. “You’ve let everyone down,” I would tell myself. “You make everyone worry,” “why can’t you fix yourself?” I didn’t have the answer to that question either.

One bully that always made it worse for me other than myself was my sister. My sidekick, my best friend, as everyone would call her. She used to use my depression against me. “Why don’t you fix yourself?” “Why's everything got to be about you?” More questions I had no answer to.

I was shocked and upset that my own sister would say the things she’d say to me. “You’re a selfish person” was always her best line. She would always pressure me into talking, and as soon as I would start to talk, she would tell me I was wrong. She always tried to play the puppet master. She always had me on strings. I needed to get away.

The years went on and the depression went on. Sometimes it got easier, sometimes it got worse. It was still a daily struggle with self bullying and the bullying from my nearest and dearest.

27 and the bullying finally got too much. She had stepped too far! She once again harped on about how selfish I was and how it’s gone on for too long. Eventually I’ll be alone. This will never happen as what she can’t see is over the years. The self bullying has become bearable and I’ve finally let people in to help me with my feelings and fears, but she’s always been kept at an arms length. She will no longer bully me. She has no control over my life or feelings.

So as I sit and write these thoughts out, I have one thing to tell you, my dear bully. You won’t bully me no more. I don’t need your help, approval, or love if it isn’t genuine.

So from me, the selfish one with all the problems, I don’t need you no more.

I’m happier alone.

Go bully someone else.

X

depression
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