I have mixed feelings about the kids who do that. As much I've lost in life due to damage they did, I don't think I'd trade that for instead having to come to grips with being a person who did that to someone else.
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Originally Posted by screamingfatgirl
I think you're assuming that they will come to grips with what they did. I think most (or all) of them just shrug it off as the type of cruelty "everyone" engages in when they are kids and teenagers.
No, I was assuming *I* would want to come to grips with it, if I had done that. I hope that's a safe assumption!
I do think that some who say nothing do feel bad and are too embarrassed to say anything. I don't think that's right. I think they need to suck it up and apologize. But I don't think that embarrassment is the same thing as thinking it was nothing. I was never saying bullies change easily. They don't. But a lot of kids also get caught up in peer pressure.
What an interesting dilemma. I wish some bullies that tormented me in junior high would friend me on facebook. I can't imagine I would think twice about writing something on their wall about it. Maybe I'll look for Tracy, the terrible track star who always made fun of me in gym class and called attention to my cellulite on my legs "Eewww, she has WRINKLES on her legs!!!!!" It didn't help that we had to wear these ridiculously short shorts for class. It took me 20 years to wear shorts again after that.
So my fantasy wall post would be. "Thanks for friending me Tracy, glad to see you are doing well. Unfortunately after reconnecting with you it brought to mind the horrible times in Jr. High when you rallied your friends against me and made fun of me every day. You were a horrible bully and because of you I lost out on an opportunity to enjoy gym class without being tormented. Are you still running?" And then I would promptly defriend her.
I'm 45 and when I grew up there was less sensitivity about abusing overweight people and I was the only fat girl in a class of about 80 kids. I don't know if this sort of thing is better for overweight kids nowadays, but I didn't know that anyone would ever love and accept me or that I was not defined 100% by my weight until I met my husband who loves me no matter what. I didn't know such people (people who could see me as an actual human) existed after the way I grew up. I told him many times early on in our marriage that I didn't like to leave the house because I only felt like a person when I was home alone with him and not exposed to the outside world.
Hmmm, there still is no cultural sensitivity towards overweight children IMO. I'm only 20 and I was put through **** because of it.
I was at the grocery store this summer and one of the guys who made fun of me a lot worked there. He tried to strike up a conversation and was like "We went to such and such school together, remember me?" I replied with, "Nobody from that school is worth remembering" and walked away. One of my more triumphant moments...
so like bullies will most likely always be bullies..what happens to those of us who are targets? will we always be bully targets? I sometimes find it hard to believe it's all weight related, since some people weren't even that big and got teased. just some people have that personality to be an easy target. it's like we have to become a bit of a bully ourselves to avoid getting bothered.
so like bullies will most likely always be bullies..what happens to those of us who are targets? will we always be bully targets? I sometimes find it hard to believe it's all weight related, since some people weren't even that big and got teased. just some people have that personality to be an easy target. it's like we have to become a bit of a bully ourselves to avoid getting bothered.
You're absouletly right...I was teased at a young age for being overweight but instead of taking it I punched the kid in the eye...i was sent to the principals office were I explained to him what was going on the guy apologized but no one messed with me and actually people wanted to be friends I think it was out of fear...i never thought about it till now...WOW!! I got teased by children and there parents at an older age...i was meanly the example of what they were going to end up looking like if they kept eating way too much...
I am reading through this thread with tears in my eyes - here's mine:
I went through chubby stages on and off in grammar school. In fourth grade, we were lining up to be weighed at school(anyone on here old enough to remember when thye used to do this?). As if that wasn't bad enough, there were two women doing it - one would check your weight and CALL OUT THE NUMBER to another woman taking the info down, loud enough for the rest of your class to hear. I weighed 89.25 lbs. She called out the number, and as I made my way out of there with my head down, a classmate grabbed my arm and said , "You weigh THAT much?".
Still remember it vivdily, over 30 years later.
YES - I am 48 (almost 49) and that was how it was done. The nurse would come and measure height/weight and call out the number to the teacher, I think. I think ONCE a sympathetic nurse just wrote down my number instead of calling it out.
I played sick whenever I knew that day was coming up. And learned a couple tricks - hold the thermometer close to a light bulb to heat it up; pat my face with Johnson's baby powder to pale myself.
Touche' to the smart chick here who will say "I wanted a box, not your opinion"
I'm only 18 but when I was at Catholic school, we were weighed twice a year. My whole grade of 50 some odd girls would line up by last name and we'd get weighed. And the numbers were always called out. It was the same with lice checks and other physicals. This went on until my freshman year, and then I switched schools. As far as I know, they do it until graduation. But lice checks were swapped for drug tests after a certain point. It was always humiliating. Luckily, I wasn't too overweight at that point, but I was always one of the heavier girls. I remember not eating for the week beforehand just so I would be a little skinnier for the weigh-in day.
It's a shame that so many of us have had to deal with these situations.
Until I was in 7th grade, I really never noticed that I was overweight. I wore a size 11-13, was the same height as I am now (5'6"). Most of my friends were of course wearing 0, 2, 4, maybe a 6 here and there. Even after I started to realize I was heavier, it didn't really bother me. I was a quiet, shy person, but I had a lot of friends. We went to school dances, birthday parties, hung out at the pool in the summer. In 8th grade, one of them had a sleepover that I was not invited to. I wasn't good friend with the hostess, but all of my friend were invited still. I don't know what happened or why, but when they all came back to school that following Monday, it was not only no longer acceptable to be friends with the fat girl, but it provided great enteratainment to make fun of me. It crushed me. My two best friends never said anything mean, but they never did anything to make them stop either. I hung around, mainly because my two friends where still part of the group. I didn't have any other friends so couldn't give up the only two I still had. I just put up with the torment, faked being sick as much as I could, and cried my self to sleep at night. It was humiliating. After that year, we went to high school where I wasn't around the big group of bullies on a daily basis. I spent all of high school, and most of my life up to this point doing everything I possibly can to be invisable, and unapproachable because I figured if people didn't notice me, they wouldn't feel the need to bully me. I have to believe that most of my high school class wouldn't even know who I am if my name came up or I ran into them. What bothers me most is most of them not only don't feel bad about it, but probably haven't thought of it since 8th grade (although I had a class with two of them my senior year of high school and overheard them discussing and laughing about what they did to me in 8th grade). They never gave it anymore thought and it still today shape almost every part of my life. I don't trust people, I don't make friend, I don't have relationships...and I hate that my mind still lets a bunch of bullies dictate my life.
Even more, most of them have kids now, for their children's sake, I hope no one ever treats their children like that, but I fear more is that they will never teach their children that it is not okay to make fun of other people. Their children will mostly likely continue the cycle.
I don't remember the details, like how much I weighed exactly, but I do remember that when I was younger, I was at a friend's house. She had a plastic swing set in her backyard. I went out to the back to go play with my friend and her sister, when the friend turned to me and said, "You're not supposed to be on this."
"Why not?" I asked, baffled.
"The warning on it says nobody over 100 pounds."
She looked really embarrassed about bringing it up, she wasn't mean about it, but the look of pity she gave me has stuck with me for years.
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Also, I remember when I was maybe 7 or 8, my mom bought me a "space queen" Halloween costume. I was so excited for it until I realized I couldn't fit into it. My mom didn't know sewing so she had to borrow a friend's sewing machine and learn how to add extra fabric around the middle so I could fit into it. I really felt like I had done something bad, making mom do extra work, and I felt so embarrassed. Didn't help that she complained often about how hard the sewing was. :\
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I'm sorry everyone has gone through what they have. But I guess you have to acknowledge the bad memories before you can move past them...
I was a chubby kid, but I had lots of friends and even though I knew I was bigger than they were, they all said that I wasn't. I was actually quite popular. In the fourth grade there was this boy in my class, Adam, who didn't have many friends and sort of kept to himself. One day he just ran up to me, pointed and said "Oh my god, look- it's a blimp supported by two tree trunks!"
I didn't say anything back... even though HE was the one who had something wrong I felt like it was my fault- I deserved it because I was fat.
Other than that I just have awful memories of gym class. I never wanted to take part. And I would always "forget" my gym shoes at home so I wouldn't have to participate. For most of elementary school my gym teacher was this obese woman who couldn't even walk without being out of breath and would generally just sit on the benches while we played dodgeball or ran laps. She was always yelling at me and telling me that I had no excuse not to do gym everyday- you'd think she would have understood. I spent many, many classes crying in the change room.
Hmmm, there still is no cultural sensitivity towards overweight children IMO. I'm only 20 and I was put through **** because of it.
I was at the grocery store this summer and one of the guys who made fun of me a lot worked there. He tried to strike up a conversation and was like "We went to such and such school together, remember me?" I replied with, "Nobody from that school is worth remembering" and walked away. One of my more triumphant moments...
wow. i have had so many humiliating moments! once i walked in late to class and sat down only to have the desk give out on me. I was, of course,wearing a skirt...so everyone got a lovely view i'm sure. the chair of the dept was teaching the class and stopped to come over and help me up lol.
last spring i was crying about something and binging on a sandwich and chips and stopped at a stoplight when a group of college-aged, clearly drunk boys pulled up next to me and started screaming "that's right! eat up you ****-ing fat-***!!!" and laughing hysterically. (can you believe that one? what jerks!)
but the most embarrasing and funniest was when i was at a dinner party on christmas eve about 8 years ago. the host got into a heated discussion about talk radio (of all things lol) and spilled redwine all over my dryclean only khaki skirt. I said...dont worry about it...but his wife insisted i change into something else and wanted to keep my skirt to get it cleaned. They were, of course, stick thin so my only option was a purple, see-through mumu that showed off my black bra and panties haha. I was probly a size 22 at the time. This wasnt actually so bad because everyone at that party was like family. however, i had a first date later that evening with a neighbor and, when I was sneaking over to the door to my apartment I, of course, ran into him in all my purple see-through splendor. =0)
