Still Carrying Baggage...

General Questions
#1

OK guys another one for you to help me understand

The other day I was watching a talk show and it was about how people were picked on 10 years ago (or whatever time) and now they want to say look at me I’m not a nerd or fat (or whatever) now.

My question is do people honestly carry baggage that long. I think back on my life 10 years ago and there is nothing upset me then that I care about now.

I had a friend who says he was a a fat kid and people made fun and he has low self esteem but now he’s 36 and executive and thin and every woman in the office wants him (good husband material) but he still doesn’t see it.

I can’t even remember half the baggage that long ago, much less caring about it.

#2

Markxx, I think it depends how badly one was scared, ie how low the self-esteem went to. I was a fat kid, but I can’t remember being bugged by it. I was always comfortable with my self-image. Sometimes maybe too comfortable…you know with a big ego " I can’t do no wrong" attitude and so on.
Well that is another story, ther is another SDMB memeber that can fill you in.

Unforgiven

#3

Well, it wasn’t a whole ten years ago, but when I was in junior high (say 6 or 7 years ago), there was this girl who would constantly waver between nice casual conversation with me and helping her friends humiliate me in public. It drove me crazy, and eventually I got to the point where I couldn’t stand seeing her. Then, last year, I found out that she was a (back-stabbing) friend of my best friend, Livia. When we were “introduced”, she broke out into how good it was to see me again, and how had I been lately? She began telling people how we had been the best of friends in junior high. I wanted to break her neck. (Not literally, good lord, don’t think I’m the type to start shooting up the lunchroom over this!) Instead, I made it my mission to let everybody know what a back-stabbing little **** she really was, all the while smiling to her face and showing off my many boyfriends. A little vindictive? Maybe. But it felt good. And, let me tell you, had it been one of the other girls from junior high (the ones who were outright mean to me at all times, spreading crude rumors about my sexuality and other nonsense) it would have been a lot worse.

#4

I think you’re lucky, Markxxx. Did you happen to notice this over in MPSIMS?

http://www.straightdope.com/ubb/Forum4/HTML/001023.html

I don’t have any great need to go back and prove to anyone how well I’m doing, although I was treated pretty badly throughout grade school. I have a pretty good life and the only evidence of any “scarring” is the way I treat bosses, thanks to a two-year experience with a bad teacher. But I can see how some of this stuff can get to you.

We would all like the world to be fair. It isn’t fair. (“It’s round, mostly” according to Gus.) Depending how badly our sense of fairness was damaged, we are going to hurt.

As a guess, I would say that folks who feel a need to go back and prove themselves have lots of unresolved issues that are focussed on (not necessarily encompassed by) those events.

(Many of the respondents to the MPSIMS thread, above, probably have moved beyond those issues, but have a memory that rankles. Many people who truly have unresolved issues can still have happy, fullfilling lives. There just happens to be a shadow in the corner of their memories that they would love to either illuminate or excise. Some poor folks, of course, never get beyond the pain/humiliation/whatever and it messes up their lives.)

If you have no similar issues, count yourself fortunate and move on.

Tom~

#5

I was fat in Jr. High school (and high school), but that wasn’t what I was teased for.

No, I became the target of (apparently) everyone’s derision because, for the first 2 months in Jr. High, I kept up my old grade-school habit of play-acting by myself. Star Wars had hit the theaters that summer, and I pretended I had a blaster pistol and a light saber – sometimes even making a “pschew!” blaster noise and “shooting” someone with my non-existent pistol in the hallways.

When I realized what a bad reputation I was garnering for myself, I ceremoniously “broke” my air-lightsaber in two and vowed never to play-act in public again. But it didn’t help. My reputation was now set in stone. For the rest of 7th grade – and a little bit of 8th grade – the taunts of “Hey, Star Wars! Pschew pschew pschew!” came fast and furious. (I also “acquired” a schoolyard bully who decided to pick on me exclusively – not my actually beating me up, but by the continual threat of beating me up. His name was Paul Perdigon, so if you ever run into him, beat him up for me, will ya? :wink: )

What psychological scars the whole experience left on me, I cannot really say. But I’m pretty sure it’s partially to blame for some of my lack of confidence with women. Hand me some prozac.

Visit the Internet Stellar Database at www.stellar-database.com

#6

I was tormented mercilessly in Junior High. I was a total geek and i was treated as such. It was horrible! Fortnately, I gradually started to realize the problems I had and changed them. And since I went to three High Schools in four years, I was able to successfully start over, as it was, to get less “geeky.”

Sure, there are times I wish I could show my tormentors how I turned out. Apparently, I am somewhat attractive now, whereas I couldn’t get a date back then to save my life. A part of me wants to go back and tell everyone, “Hey! Look at me!”

But that’s a small part. The big part is just looking towards the future, not the past.

Yer pal,
Satan

#7

I, too, was teased ruthlessly in jr. high (I also just got engaged, which makes me Cessandra’s long-lost evil twin) and, psychologically, I suffered for at least 6 or 7 years afterward. No confidence, no self-esteem, no dates in high school. It was truly terrible - especially since I had been teased for being smart and good at sports, which, gee, I thought were good qualities.

To this day, I would definitely love to bash in the heads of my tormentors. I won’t, because I am a relatively nice person, but man, do I still get upset when I think about it.

Where are we going?
And why am I in this handbasket?

#8

As far as carrying baggage goes,

My ex girlfriend was carrying all sorts of baggage from well before I knew her. She was the most bitter, angry, depressed, etc… person I’ve ever come across. (I think the reason I was with her for 3 years was a desire to help her, make her life better; she was really miserable).

Anyway, it finally dawned on me that she didn’t want to feel better. She had found safety in her world of misery, and would not (could not) see the positive side of anything. And the worst was that because she was miserable, she couldn’t stand anyone else being happy or even content.

If you meet someone like this RUN. They will do everything within their power to drag you down into their hellish existence, all the while resisting your efforts to help them.

#9

DIVEMASTER: Been there, done that, got the tee-shirt.

sigh

#10

For some of us, repeated suffering from a familiar past is less terrifying than the random blows of an unpredictable future.

I finally came up with a simple maxim that I rely upon to keep myself well adjusted and motivated: “Fuck 'em.”

Works like a charm, every time.

#11

During grade school, Jr. high & high school I was an outcast & beaten up regularly. This included being beaten unconcious 3 times, & being cornered by a guy with a knife on one occasion.
I have major emotional scars, & somewhat limited social skills. It tough to trust people sometimes & making friends can be hard.

Parents----if your kid says he is being bullied at school-HELP HIM! I can’t tell you all about the heartbreak this time in my life has caused me, or the barrier it created between me & my parents, who had said “It’s just kids. He has to work it out for himself.”

We have met the enemy, and He is Us.–Walt Kelly

#12

I went to a fairly country school for high school. Most people had only heard of computers. I and a couple of my friends had been using computers for a few years and we were into them. We saw their potential in our future and wanted to learn them. Due to this and the fact that we made good grades we were called “Nerds”. We accepted this title and referred to ourselves in that manner. But it still was not fun having most people think you are weird. We could not get dates and it really did not change until college. I met my future wife my senior year of college.

Part of me would love to go back and show those people how I got a degree in Computer Science and how if they have much of a job they likely use them too. But another part of me says why bother. They were jerks and I am happy in my current life. I love my job and my wife and daughter. What do I care what those bunch of rednecks think? See I am not bitter in the least.

Jeffery

#13

Why is it accepted that there are bullies? Why do people tell victims not to fight back because it’s something that kids do? That’s the dumbest thing I ever heard! Instead of accepting bullying behavior, why not just STOP IT?

I was picked on so bad because I was overweight. I don’t think there was a week that went by that I didn’t cry. When I lost weight I got hit on by the very boys that made me cry. I told them to go to hell.

Only once did someone show me sincerely that he was sorry. He didn’t realize how mean he was (not just to me, but to everybody). It took awhile, but because he was so sincere I eventually forgave him. But I’ll be damned if I’m EVER going to forgive the others. I’ve run into them, they act like nothing happened and are surprised that I’m still angry. There is no excuse for bullying and I will NEVER let them think that it was ok for them to act like an ass.

Flame me for holding a grudge but if you didn’t go thru the hell I did than you’ll never understand.
:::rant over:::

MaryAnn
Sometimes life is so great you just gotta muss up your hair and quack like a duck!

#14

Well,add me as another high school geek.I was tall,thin(5’10" and 110 lbs!)glasses,bad skin,quiet. I would go out and sometimes,females would point at me and laugh!I wanted to just crawl under a rock.Fortunately,I got a little better looking as I aged.I guess it makes you more compassionate to others who aren’t perfect.

#15

Yeah, the scars last a while. I remember once when I was in college telling my dad about the time I was picked last for teams in a gym class. What a stupid, pointless thing to rake over, but as I described it, I started crying.

Put an adult in the same kind of situation that we went through when we were pre-adolescents, and they have enough life experience to say “Yeah? Well fuck you too!”. Put a little child in those circumstances, and the adults around them will stand up for them.

But middle school and junior high? You’ve lost the automatic protection of grown-ups, and you haven’t aquired the skills to defend yourself and the knowledge of who you are that makes it easier.

I look back at some of the things I went through - taunting, teasing, and even a couple of physical attacks - and my throat still tightens up. The nice thing is, it doesn’t have a huge effect on my adult life.

After high school, I went to a women’s university attended primarily by returning moms. It was the best thing I could have done, and I lucked into it. In that sheltering environment, I got to be exactly who I was without ducking the slings and arrows of outraged cliques. My strengths came to the forefront, and my weaknesses were no longer glaring. It wasn’t perfect, but it helped an enormous amount.

I’ve met a couple of my fellow nerds and one of my former tormentors. They’re just people. They’ve got their own scars and their own way of handling things.

But if I could get my hands on that little bastard Jamie Hoggett, I’d make him pay . . .

“I’m surprised that you’ve never been told before, that you’re lovely, that you’re perfect, and that somebody wants you.” - Semisonic, f.n.p

#16

Markxxx, have we answered your question?

If you still don’t understand, then I sincerely hope that you never do understand, because the only way you will come to understand it, is by getting picked on the way we were picked on, and I would not wish that on anyone.