A Chicago Tribune article yesterday got me thinking.
From about age six to age eleven, I was a victim.
Bullies beat me up on my way to school. They pushed me into chairs and lockers between classes. They lay in wait for me afterward, too. Even a girl I had an enormous crush on helped them with a neat trick called "tripped by the dog." She dropped to her knees behind me so a couple of my tormentors could shove me backward over her.
Fed up with my bruises, my headaches, my fears of walking or riding my bike to and from school and elsewhere, my parents sent me away to summer camp. Unfortunately, they didn't consider who some of the other campers might be. Those two summers were hell.
It wasn't until boarding school that I brought the bullying to a halt.
A kid shoved me down a flight of stairs one day, hurting me so badly I had to go to the hospital. Actually I faked most of the injury because I thought I could get a ride in an ambulance (which I did) and out of doing homework (which I didn't). The next day he shouldered me into a wall. I remember the searing white anger that propelled me to punch him twice, trip him, and then smash his head into the floor. I did such a good job that a teacher came up to me later, shook my hand and asked me how it felt not to be a crybaby any longer.
It felt pretty good. So good I started reacting the same way each time I was attacked. I added screaming as an additional weapon. Not the thin little pitiful whines of before but the sort of sounds I imagined Sergeant Rock from my favorite comics would make. I took a brick to one kid and a dumbbell from my brothers' weight set to another. And that's where it stopped.
They thought I was nuts. I went looking for fights. So the bullies made friends with me instead.
And no, becoming a whack-job is not the moral of this story or what I'd suggest to kids of today who face the same kind of turmoil I did. But it sure helps.
More on fighting back tomorrow.
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