Maybe, but I never called it bullying and still don’t. Aside from the occasional mean comment that many kids get, one situation really sticks out in my mind. I may have already told this story on here before, but I will again.
My high school best friend and I had a rocky relationship – fight, make up, fight, make up, etc. I met my husband the summer before senior year and he was very aware of the constant drama in my friendship with this girl. Well, senior prom rolls around and we go with a large group. She ends up getting stood up and was the only one in the group without a date. When everyone went off with their dates, my husband and I hung out with her so she wasn’t sitting alone somewhere. We separated from her one time to dance to a couple of songs while she danced with some guy and then we left shortly thereafter, as we had not planned to go to after prom with the rest of the group. I found out an hour or so later that she was mad at me, but I couldn’t figure out why. First she said that we were pitying her, then she said that she got mad because my husband and I were “all over each other” and completely ignored her – which is not even kind of true. I ended up coming down with mono and missed a whole week of school after that. By the time I got back to school, I had no friends; she had turned all of them, and the rest of our classmates, against me with her lies. I’m still not sure what all she told them, but I do know that I ended up spending my lunch period in the library because I had no one to sit with in the cafeteria. I sat alone in class as well. The last few weeks of my senior year were absolute hell thanks to her. I suppose that was a type of bullying, though she never taunted me or made fun of me to my face.
I’m actually still friends with this girl; how stupid is that? We reconnected and put high school behind us while we were both freshman in college and we’re now 24. We’re not nearly as close as we once were, but we do keep in touch and occasionally hang out. It still affects me in that I do not have close female friends and don’t have much of a desire to change that.
Have I been a bully? Yes, in elementary school. I was the “popular girl” that everyone wanted to be friends with and I acted as you’d expect that girl to act – singling out certain girls and treating them like crap because I thought it was all about me. I ended up switching schools in the 4th grade and became an outcast, my entire personality changed, and I was never even close to popular in school again. I also packed on some pounds thanks to eating my emotions. I guess I got what was coming to me for being a little shit in my early years.