Growing up with a Bully

At a young age, I found out what having a bully meant. Over an innocent rumor, my life was flipped upside down.  At this time is when my imperfections became an issue to me. I learned about how ugly I was. It was brought to my attention how disgusting I was to look at and how repulsive it was to be near me.

Like many children that are bullied, my grades dropped and I began to hide, fit in or simply just disappear. I was always loved and spoiled with the best stuff my parents could afford. Then, I wake up one morning not wanting to go to school, just so I could stay in the space of love and comfort of two loving parents. But of course, I had to go to school.

Yes I did tell my parents and my mom wanted to go to the school, but I asked her not to, to save myself from any more name calling like tattle tale, etc. like I had already been called when I would tell a teacher. I lived with that bully for 3 more school years. Each year, my inner beauty died along with the desire of wanting to live. I began to hurt those around me by expressing my desires of death. I began to hurt those around me by no longer caring about them.

Soon enough, I became indifferent to the words of my bully and I became a bully to others. I WAS NO LONGER A VICTIM….or so I thought. I began to do things just to fit in like fights, smoking, drinking and gangs. At age 14, I had a “real relationship”. We moved in together and at the age of 15, I was blessed with a wonderful little girl that I had prayed for…yes, at 15, I prayed for a baby.  It wasn’t long before I realized that love wouldn’t pay for diapers, milk, clothing and all of the needs to raise a baby. After 2 years of living together, we went our separate ways and I took on the responsibility of working for the needs of my baby. Not long after, I met an amazing man whom is now my eternal husband. My husband and I have shared 10 years together as of 2014. We have shared the joy of bringing 4 more beautiful girls into the world and we have also shared the sorrows from our life trials.

So know what?

Now, I worry about the 5 loves of my life being bullied and going through the same path I did. Remember when I said that I was no longer a victim….

Boy, do I realize how wrong I was. I was always a victim of my inner bully. I was always the slowest, the dumbest, the ugliest and well, to make my list short, I was the most repulsive human being on Earth. That bully never went away. When I realized who the biggest bully was in my life, how was I going to protect my girls from their inner bully?

I took charge of that bully back in Elementary and I can take charge of my life long bully too!!! I LOVE ME… I AM AMAZING… I AM BEAUTIFUL! That is my daily affirmation. Yes, some days were harder than others to believe these words, but with a deep inhale and chin raised high; these words were repeated over and over until I believed in these words. After so many years of dealing with my inner bully, I was going to need some time to make that bully a true friend.

Through my husband, I met the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS or Mormon for short). After several years of being a member of the church, I found out the hard way, that by becoming a member of the church it was not going to make my bully go away. Joining the church actually created more mean things for my bully to say. I never felt worthy enough to be part of such a great church. I felt like leaving the church many times and I would express these thoughts and feelings to my husband. He would always try to ease my discomfort by saying, “You go to church to learn.” or “It’s not you it’s them.”

Ha!!! That last one was always hard to believe since it seemed that I was the only one without friends in or even out of church. You see, after I stopped going out and I began to dedicate my time to my family and followed the callings of being a mother and wife, not many of the friends that I had grown up with talked to me anymore. Of course I would get a hello when we bumped into each other at a store, but it was always a quick catch up game and that would be it until we bump into each other again.

Being a convert to the church, it was always hard for me to know the level spirituality a member of the church was. Like in any church or religion, you have the members who abide by every law, commandment or calling of the church. Then you had the members who went to church once a month, if that (which that would be us at that moment of our lives). So, since we didn’t go to church the way we knew we should, I obviously didn’t know much about the church and I never knew if I was offending someone by something I said or did. Feeling uncomfortable by not knowing what to say or do, I never made the attempt to get close to members of the church. The times I would make an attempt to get close to some of the sisters in the church, I felt so out of place and ignored. One day, I pushed myself to the fullest of my capacity and made one phone call, which in return I made one…that’s right, ONE true friend. We would talk for hours on end. I would always listen to her joys, her problems and her sorrows as she would always listen to mine. We knew so much about each other that we became best friends. Unfortunately, in this friendship, we were both dealing with our own inner bully. My best friend would always make the time to listen to me put myself down and would always try to comfort me with all the kind words that she felt about me. Then of course, we would switch roles and I would listen to all the horrible things she felt about herself and all I could think of while she was talking was, how gorgeous she was. I am a full believer NOW, that with every year that you are blessed with, you are also blessed with the wisdom you seek.

I began to think that maybe, just maybe, the way it would hurt to hear my dear sweet friends’ words about herself, was also the way I was hurting those I cared for and those that cared about me.

I began to study more and learn more about my connection with spirituality, God, the universe or whatever you want to call it. I always felt that there was more that I was supposed to do than just being a mother and wife. But what? How was I supposed to do something important if I didn’t feel important?

 I had the opportunity to take classes to become a yoga instructor and what I got out of it was what I had always looked for. It was my something else.

(TO BE CONTINUED)