My Fat Story and its Bullies

For pretty much all of my life I have struggled with depression. And yes, at some point I will probably write about that. But this post, this isn’t about that. This is about more than that. This is about the events that caused my depression to go to extremes. The events that led to suicidal thoughts and self-harm. This is my story, and for the life of me I hope that it teaches someone something.

Bullying is something that is all over the media these days. We all talk about it like it is something that is more common than we would like, and still not that common. We talk about how horrible it is, and how children should feel safe at school but we don’t really do all that much about it. So here I am, sharing my story on the internet, in the hopes that maybe, just maybe it will teach someone something and prevent someone from going through the hell I went through. And if I am being completely honest, which I am choosing to be no matter how horrifyingly embarrassing that may be-I also hold a secret hope that my former bullies will read this, and realize that the seemingly unimportant words they said to me altered my life forever. And maybe just maybe, they would apologize, and mean it, and understand truly and completely what they are apologizing for.

My story isn’t the story of a girl who was physically bullied. I wasn’t beat up or thrown into lockers or shoved or any of that, and for a long time people told me that what I went through wasn’t all that bad, or wasn’t real bullying because there was nothing physical about it. But it was real bullying, and though I wasn’t physically shoved in a locker everything that made me who I am, all of my confidence was shoved somewhere, who knows where, but it sure as hell wasn’t within me.

There are a lot of different places I could start this story, and a lot of different ways I can tell it. But this is how I am going to tell it, for it is my story and grammar and all that shit doesn’t matter in my story. What matters is what happens, and the message I want to portray.

So here goes:

I guess it started in the 2nd grade. My (at the time) best friend, E, turned to me while we were rehearsing from our school play and said:

“No offense Leah, but you’re fat.”

How was I supposed to respond? What was I supposed to think? I don’t know. What I do know is that hurt like hell, and from that point on I was never truly comfortable in my own skin.

After 2nd grade I moved, and there was a break in the obvious bullying, but that doesn’t mean it went away. It was still there, just more subtle. Then came 6th grade. The dangerous waters of middle school. The earthly definition of hell.

There was this boy, L. He sat at my table in my Ancient Civ. class, and he was really nice to me. Naturally, as I was a young girl, I developed a crush. I told one of my friends, and that was when I found out.

Behind my back, L, the same boy that was incredibly nice in person was calling me a fat ass.

Honestly, looking back I don’t know why that one stands out so much. Why over all the times I was made fun of for my weight this one stands out, because it sure wasn’t the first, or last time a boy I had a crush on hurt me. And it really wasn’t one of the worst things that happened, which in itself says something.

But anyway, yeah that hurt. But I was a resilient 6th grader and within a month I had a different crush, on a different, and supposedly nicer boy. Little did I know this would be the last true crush I would have for far too long.

This new boy, B, he was quite the character. Remember him, he comes into play soon, but first there was J.

I didn’t like J. Ever. He was that boy in school that you always knew was, for lack of a better word, a douchebag, a dick. He was just a mean piece of trash. And on one of the last days of 6th grade, after a half day when the majority of my grade went into our town center to get lunch J showed the colors we all knew he had.

I was with my 3 best friends, only 1 of whom remains. We were walking to pick up some pizza when from across the street we hear good old J:

“Hey Leah, guess what?! You’re fat!”

I pretended to blow it off when in reality I kept replaying it in my head. We kept walking, went and got pizza, and then went to have a picnic. Of course, good old J wasn’t done. He was kind enough to repeat himself just in case we missed it the last time.

On his way out of the local Chinese restaurant, he repeated:

“Hey Leah, guess what?! You’re fat!”

This time I couldn’t hide my reaction and that one friend who I am still close with jumped up and went to speak her mind. She was the most quiet, and shy of all of us, but she was ready to fight. I stopped her.

And now, remember B, that supposedly nicer boy who I had a crush on. Well here is 7th grade. And here is his shining moment.

B and his twin brother, D (stands for dick) were people who I thought I could trust, people I could confide in and count on, people who betrayed me in a painfully horrendous way.

They left me a voicemail on my phone making fun of pretty much every aspect of my being. They made fun of my voicemail recording, and other petty things but what hurt the most was the rap.

They created a rap, with one of them (I choose to believe it was B since I go to school with him now, and have to see him still) beat-boxing in the background and the other rapping hurtful lyrics such as:

“Lardy-Lardy Lard”

This voicemail was my final straw. After listening to it time and time again, and losing pretty much every bit of trust that I had in another human being I completely lost control of who I was.

It was this time, midway though 7th grade when I first started to cut myself, and it wasn’t until after my 2nd freshman year (yes there were two) in high school that I finally stopped.

Though I did think about suicide there was one thing that prevented me from an attempt, or a few.

That was hope.

All my life the one thing that I have never lost about myself, through essentially a decade of bullying was my belief in romance.

I am a hopeless romantic. I believe there is someone for everyone, and that fate brings us together. I believe that one day I will find my soulmate, fall in love, be treated the way I always deserved but never was treated, and feel like someone’s first and only choice. It is this belief that keeps me going even in the darkest of times. (that sounds a little Dumbledore but still true)

It took me three years at the most amazing school ever to find myself, accept myself, love and embrace myself. I am so proud of who I am, and so empowered by all that I went through.

But that doesn’t mean that every time I see B’s face in the cafeteria, or in a class, or at a frat party that I don’t want a true apology. No, I don’t blame him and his twin entirely for all that happened to me, and I am not saying that he caused my suicidal thoughts or that he made me cut for 3.5 years, I just wish that he knew how greatly I was affected.

That said, I also never want him to know that I felt the way I did. Because if he is the person I like to think he is, aka not awful, he will feel awful for his role, and I don’t want him to because that won’t change anything, and it wasn’t his fault.

He and his twin played a role in my struggles. It was their actions that hurt me the most out of the decade of bullying that I suffered through, and it was that event that was my final straw, but that doesn’t make it their fault.

But it is INCREDIBLY important that we all understand that our words affect a hell of a lot more than just one moment. They can be a tipping point that leads to a young girls demise, as B’s words were for me, or they can be the words that keep a young girl going.

I guess I just want my story to be a lesson of sorts. I struggled. I still struggle, and when I do what gets me through is still that hopeful romanticism. But on top of that, what makes it all feel worth it is the idea that my struggle, and my story can save a young girl from going through what I went through.

I will never be the same. The word

FAT

will always be a faint scar on my thigh from where I cut it there over and over.

UGLY
is there too.

But those words don’t have to be on anyone else. And yes the selfish part of me would love a sit down conversation with B, so that we can have the talk I have wanted to have since I got myself back, but really why I write this, and why I will be posting it on Facebook, without rereading it for more than red squiggly lines under words, knowing my brother will tell me it was a bad idea, and in all likelihood B will be incredibly pissed (sorry!) is the unselfish reason. The desire to prevent this from happening to someone else.

So that was my story, or at least the bullying part of it. This is my struggle, and like I said, it wasn’t just these few events but these big ones and a hell of a lot of little ones pretty constantly from 2nd grade to my 2nd freshman year in high school.

If you made it this far I ask nothing from you. You can share this if you want. You can roll your eyes. You can be like my brother, and other family members and recommend that I remove it, though I would rather you keep that to yourself, you can contact me, whatever you want. Take what you take from this. All I ask is that you don’t bully me for my story. I don’t deserve that, no one does.

And with that I say good night, this wasn’t supposed to be grammatically correct or any of that, and again, B- sorry if this pisses you off, but it really isn’t about you.

PS- I’m not fat, I’m normal, I’m awesome and I’m me-and if you can’t see that than you don’t deserve me.