This will come as a shock to many people. I mean, get this: I have the best parents in the world. I went to schools where my individuality and ‘weirdness’ was encouraged, fostered and lauded. I had cool friends of all ages. I’ve had an incredible life filled with people who love me and care about me, even if we’re not related. I’ve been ‘adopted’ by hundreds of people who want me as their niece/daughter/friend.
So you’d think I had a perfect, charmed life, right?
I was bullied growing up. I was picked on, teased, harassed and hassled. And guys, I’m wearing purple today to tell you that it does get better.
Look, my parents claim I’ve never, in 33 years, disappointed them. They love me no matter what and even though we’ve fought a few times, the worst either of them said about my sexuality was they wish I wasn’t because it was going to be hard. And they’re right, you know, it is hard. My cousins, aunts, uncles, grandparents and everyone in between have been nothing but loving and supportive. Hell, my teachers have been supportive.
I’m breaking a few hearts today to tell them that I too was bullied and I never told any of them.
Yeah, me. The kid who will ask the tough questions at work that no one wants to ask (how to deal with abuse etc). The kid who took people to Planned Parenthood because they were too scared to go alone. The kid who had a roommate try to commit suicide and ‘forgot’ to tell her parents that she helped take care of it, because it wasn’t their business. I’m a bad-ass, okay. I’m a get-it-done, protesting, in-your-face, deal with the world person.
Why didn’t I tell anyone? Well. Part of me says ‘Everyone gets bullied, we have to learn to deal with it.’ At the time, that’s partly what I felt and thought. Not through any failing of my loved ones, but because I looked at the world and thought complaining won’t help. I saw a world where we had glastnost and perestroika and the Berlin Wall fell down and Russia collapsed. I saw the world of change and action. Telling people ‘Hey, they kids are picking on me because I love sci-fi and fantasy and comics and I’m weird’ didn’t seem like a way to help.
I tried to fit in a bit. I played sports, I joined clubs, but mostly I decided to fight back by just being me. I continued to do the weird things I love and I continued to be weird. And I continued to be picked on.
My dad may remember the day a window in our bathroom mysteriously broke. I did that. Sorry. I was angry and frustrated and in mental pain and I broke the window. Miraculously I didn’t cut myself, and I lied and told him it broke when I closed the window. Lie lie lie. I didn’t want my dad to know I’d been physically angry like that. I felt like it was a failure in myself, to get that mad because the blonde girls on the softball team picked on me for being weird.
There were other little incidents at school. Boys teasing me in elementary school because I wanted to play sports. Girls picking on me in middle school because I didn’t do girly things. Kids at high school teasing me because I was just weird. It even happens at work with people saying because I’m a lesbian I don’t understand GUI aesthetics (true comment, to which I asked “You wanna rethink that one or do we go to HR?” He apologized and we’ve become friendly since).
And I never told my family. Instead, I started telling total strangers on the Internet. I never told them my name, but I told them my problems. And they told me I wasn’t alone. And I felt better. I got stronger. I came out to my parents.
To a degree, yes, we all need to get thicker skin and be braver when it comes to people harassing us. It’s because they don’t understand us, and they fear what they don’t understand. And as people grow up and learn they don’t have to be afraid, they stop. Or they become the real assholes. It’s sort of a split decision there, sorry.
But it gets better for us because the more they learn and get cooler, the more they join your side and become your friends. The more you get a support structure and help and people who love you. I’m 100% certain that if I hadn’t have the love and affection I had growing up, that I would have run away one dark night in my senior year of high school, when I seriously considered it. I’d even packed a camping backpack and was ready to go. But I knew I had people who loved me, and I stayed.
I don’t regret that at all.
So if you’re out there, and you feel alone or like no one cares, I want to tell you that we do. There are total strangers out there who love you for who you are. If you can’t talk to your family, remember there are places you can go online or in person to talk to total strangers in a safe environment and know you’re not alone or unloved.
Check out the It Gets Better Project. We’re here for you.