Bullies!

This may come as a surprise to you, it may not. I was bullied.
Yes, for as long as I can remember I have had 1 to multiple bullies in my life.
When I was in elementary school I had several. Mostly classmates. I was teased, beat up, called names and most nights I spent crying from the torture I was being put through in school.
The first major school transfer I did from Hillcrest to Frank L. Bowser came because my parents thought taking me to a new school would help and I would make friends. Well, that didn't exactly work. I was very developed in Grade 6, and this brought a new type of bullying, from boys in Grade 6 who would grab me, comment on me, and yell what they would like to do to me sexually.
Then came junior high. This was met with a group of girls that would steal my clothes during gym class, throw things at me, beat me, and pick on me.
Then we got transfered back to Hillcrest. I was actually met with a small amount of popularity upon my return. Then I saw it, they had a new girl to torture. So being me, and not being able to stand seeing them do to her what they spent so many years before doing to me, I stood up and sat with her at lunch. that was the end of my popularity streak. I lasted at Hillcrest for about 3 months before I was transferred back to Riverview Junior High. My previous bullies had moved on to someone new, and I actually made some friends. Until the end of the year, when a girl who actually wanted to fight my sister decided to fight me instead as my sister had transfered to a new school. The problem, I won the fight. Beat the crap out of her! Her older sister then began to torture me. She would wait for me after class with friends, threaten to kill me, they would follow me through the halls yelling and taunting me. It was actually a guy we called Porky, real name Shawn, that decided he didn't like what he was seeing and he or a friend of his would wait for me after classes and walk me to my next class. I have always been very thankful that he took the time to do that. He didn't know me, but he stood up for me! Not sure what prompted him to do that.
I was then transferred to the Moncton Wesleyan Christian Academy! This is where I met a girl that would become one of my best firends for many years, and later the maid of honor at my wedding, Miriam! Miriam was the first real friends I had ever had, and I was 14.
I also met a new kind of bully at this school, not my classmates, but my teachers. I was called names mostly freak by them. Told I wasn't good enough to be at their school. I would come in and they would make fun of my clothes and make-up because I didn't look like the rest of the kids there. I wasn't prim and proper, not really my fault. I just didn't feel comfortable looking the way the other kids looked, and since I always felt ackward, and was told I wasn't good enough anyway, I may as well have something about me I liked!
After 3 years at that school, Miriam had been expelled over a year before, I requested to return to public school. The reason, the boys at the school had made it their pet project to beat the crap out of me on a daily basis. I would walk down the hall and get grabbed and have my head banged repeatedly off the wall, or elevator door if they met me in the right spot. I was hit and punched and told that I was worthless.
Most of these men are now Pastors, and a few hold high spots in various churches in Moncton.
YEAH!
So I returned to public school at Riverview High. By this time my education was a little scattered. Although I should have been in Grade 12, my math and sciences were at a grade 10 level. So I was at Riverview High for 2 years. While there I made new friends, they found me.
It seems I was Goth.
I had no idea what a goth was, we didn't have those at the Christian School, well apparently we did, it's just I was the only one and no one told me.
I became friends with my fellow outcasts. We were called names, mostly Satan and Marylin Manson. Teased, hit, had various items thrown at us while walking through the halls, however we suffered this abuse together!
When I graduated from Riverview High in 2000 I knew 2 people in my graduating class of over 300! I was pretty popular.
I am now 32.
I still have bullies in my life, but I see them differently now. I feel bad for them. How sad must your life be if all you can do is spread rumors, and belittle everyone around you who doesn't have a use to you at the moment.
Whatever! People need to grow up!
I am seeing things now as there is a big push on ending bullying. This is good. I would love if no one else had to suffer the way I did growing up.
The problem I have is how much power people give bullies after the fact. Tears streaming down their eyes "I was bullied, and I'm here today because of those bullies!"
Really?
You're gonna give those assholes the credit for what you became?
I still see people from time to time that were the people that bullied me growing up. Hell, my husbands cousin Emily's wedding was practically a reunion of various childhood bullies and me.
I don't like them. I don't want to chat with them. What are we gonna talk about? "Hey, remember that time I was walking through the halls in high School and you mimicked my lisp, call me Satan then tripped me? Good times *sigh*"
I walk away. I know who they are, they know who I am.
I am not here today because of them. I am not happily married with an awesome son, because of them. I am who I am because I chose to walk away and continue on with MY LIFE!
Stop giving these people control over who you become! I know it's hard, but if you live your life dwelling on the fact that you were bullied, then even when their gone they are still controlling you!