hi, okay this post is kind of long, so be prepared,right well...i may have posted something like this ages ago, but im especially insecure, now more than ever.you see, when i was 12, 13, i made a lot of mistakes. i started high school, age 12 ( i wasnt a genius, its just we go straight from elementary to high school in the UK ) very scared. i dont know, i had lived a very sheltered life. my mom and dad raised me to be well spoken even though we lived in worker class ( lower middle, average joe basically ) surroundings ( something my mom is too proud to admit which makes me feel bad but her choice ) and i was considered a weird kid in elementary school, but it didnt matter. i had great friends who accepted me, there was very little bullying, i only got bullied once or twice in one year, and i was kind of unaware of how cruel the world can be. so the time for highschool comes and i speak like i was raised, well spoken, never thinking to maybe talk a little cockney so id fit in better. on top of this i needed glasses...my mom refused to get me contacts because she didnt think i was responsible enough. im not blaming her for my being bullied, but its safe to say that had she bought me lenses i probably would have been bullied a lot less. in fact, if i had taken the instinct to talk cockney and had gotten lenses at the very start of school, its safe to say that things would have gone a lot smoother. i mean sure the kids who bullied me in elementary went to my new school but they didnt matter. anyway, i got bullied a lot. i overcompensated for my having very few friends and not being liked by showing off- a fat kid jokingly made fun of me in the locker rooms and i mouthed off and said i could beat him up easily, and needless to say a fight started, he kicked the shit out of me and i even cried. that started things. i got a reputation and people liked me even less. then i got punched out by a random guy who was told to do so by a bully. then again the next day. i was so scared of getting beaten up and i didnt have anyone to protect me, very few friends, so i became submissive. if someone told me to jump up and down so they could hear if i had change, and then take it, id do it. if they slapped me in public, id let them. all of these memories are so painful, and it wasnt because of my race or weight or anything that i got bullied, so for some reason at the time i couldnt put my finger on it. that hurted even more, why where people pushing me around? i knew people who wore glasses and didnt get bullied, but i forgot that my glasses where the kind that go dark in the sunlight. i dont know what in the hell possessed me to get those but i got made fun of even more and people called me neo and shit, and that drew more attention to me. then in the year before last, i kind of got a little more instinctive, made more friends, roughened up my accent so id fit in, and people seemed to forget how dorky i was. i was still a dork but at the very least i didnt draw too much attention to myself, but i still got picked on. and then, i lost those friends because i was so insecure with myself i just annoyed them to death and i was a prick and i started arguments. now i have a few friends, theyre alright, and like 2 or 3 people im super close with. theyre all girls, and i dunno, i dont wanna be typecasted as one of those guys who just hangs out with girls and is thought of as gay. but yeah i have some male friends. i dont get picked on a lot, but i mean, when i do, like if someone pushes me or calls me a name, i let it slide. im stronger now, i can throw an okay punch and probably take one, but if someone pushes me around i dont know how to be all bad ass because i dont get pissed off enough. like, one kid made fun of my hair, and i just called him a name. he laughed me, so i pushed him. and he did nothing. but i mean, my stronger friends, if it had been them, would have sworn and got mad and fucked the kid up. this was a younger kid too. i mean like, a kid younger than me called me something and i didnt do anything cuz his brother is in a gang, but i have friends who wouldnt care, and still fight, and i dunno, i wish i was like that. im just so insecure, i feel like i have no friends and i feel like i cant be a different person from who i was because of my past. i rarely go to friends houses, im rarely invited out, i piss off most of the friends i make, and when i hear people talking about their friends it makes me feel bad, like i dont have any. i wish i would feel confident and like having friends is no big deal, but to me it is. and i hate this feeling, and i know i should fake confidence, but its so hard to when i used to be the geeky kid who got punched because he was so skinny and wore sunglasses and talked funny. i feel like everyone looks at me and thinks, yeah, hes okay now, but remember what a dork he was? and it hurts. i hope when im older ill just look back on it and think of it as the old me, but i dont think i will. i know ive posted a few whiney long whinded threads like this, but i mean, i really feel badly about it now. and i wish i could do something. anyway if you feel like replying go ahead. thanks.-ak
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Very insecure, dont know what to do
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It's hard, and I feel for you. I had a bad time at school too, and didn't know how to handle it.One thing that comes through strongly to me is that you believe there is a right way to do everything, and if you don't do the right thing it's terrible and you deserve to be beaten up. It's not so. There's nothing wrong with wearing photochromic glasses, and it wouldn't have made things a lot better if you hadn't had them. They were just a convenient handle for bullies, but if they hadn't had that, they'd have used something else. Success with other people is not a matter of doing the right thing, it's a matter of being confident with yourself. If you have self-confidence it doesn't guarantee there will be no problems, but there will be fewer and they will hurt less. If you know you're an OK person, as good as anyone else, it won't matter so much if someone makes fun of your hair, and you won't feel you have to do something about it; while at the same time it will help you stand up to humiliation that does really matter.You're a decent person, Africa, and someone who it is good to be friends with. Once you accept that, you're well on your way.
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thanks ineligible, but im no saint. ive bullied people in return to make myself feel better. ive provoked people a lot. so maybe im a hypocrite.
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I know you're no saint, but none of us are. If you had more confidence in yourself, you would have been better to other people - you wouldn't have done things to them to try to prove something to yourself.