Secondary school is usually labelled as the “best years of your life” and a time where you learn about yourself and what you are capable of for the future. This was certainly not the experience I had, and I certainly would not give what I experienced in the early stages of school a positive label. The bottom line is that I went through years of hating myself due to persistent bullying in secondary school. Of course, none of this was going to help me to become who I truly wanted to be in the future, but it did make me stronger.
Every day I would be faced with name calling. I would walk through a busy playing field on my way to my next lesson and within seconds, I would hear loud voices, sneering and laughing coming from behind buildings and before I knew it, I would be surrounded by people. I felt so helpless and I never really knew which way to turn. I would not be spoken to or sat next to in class because I was 'too ugly' and 'nobody liked me'. I felt restless in the classroom with fears that, yet another object was going to be thrown at me.
I would come home, and although I could drop the physical heavy load from my backpack, there was still heaviness that remained in my head. It also remained in the verbally abusive, angry voicemails that were left on my phone from people finding my number online. I couldn't bear to see the comments on my social media left on everything I dared to post. There was no escape, but there was still hope.
According to a 2019 bullying survey from Ditch the Label, the highest motive that young people recorded for bullying was 'Attitudes towards appearance' with a result of 59%. This was the main reason for my story back in 2011. .
When I first joined the school, obviously as scared as a mouse who had just been caught, at the first parents evening, I was informed by my tutor that I was a "happy and delightful girl who was ready for the secondary school experience." Sometimes those words haunt me because this was all about to be flipped around.
There is no denying of the fact that I did not exactly have a ‘normal’ secondary school journey like most other people. I moved classes overall 3 times and almost moved school. I was never really fully accepted as myself until year 10; I wasn’t properly listened to by a teacher about my concerns until year 11. I feel strength in the fact I went through all of it alone, but I now still have feelings of anger about the fact that I wasn’t believed and listened to in the way that I should have been. I had my friends from primary school who would sit on the bus with me coming home from different schools, cheerfully chatting about how amazing their days were, and then there would be me, barely wanting to give away the horrifying details I had to experience.
The true 'light at the end of the tunnel' was when I was moved to a different class for the last time and had made some better friends at GCSE. We were put into different sets and mixed with people from different tutor groups. “Some people in the class are making her life a misery” my previous tutor mentioned to a supply teacher as I walked into the new class for the first time. It was a real eye-opener. Where was this 4 years ago? I wondered. This brings up the debate of whether schools are actually doing enough to help young people and students through bullying, and it breaks my heart to know that young people still go through what I did.
I knew deep down things would get better and I knew that I wouldn’t be in school forever. I think that's what got me through a lot of the tough days knowing that one day I would be free and able to speak up. If I could go back in time as the person I am now, I know I would not have let it get to me and I would know that I deserved far better. I am no longer the scared little girl who didn’t know what to say or do, I am now someone who is heard and someone who can now help others to fight through a similar situation.
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