The word bully never really entered my mind when I was a victim, hating having to go to school in the morning and battle my way through insults and demeaning words was business as usual, another day. 6th grade for me was the worst year of my life and it was when my story started. I was a new kid at a school with many who already knew each other for years, a scenario I can understand is not the most conducive for anyone. I remember distinctly, wanting so bad to find a friend just someone to talk to and sit with at lunch, unfortunately friends were very hard to come by. The worst of my experience began when I got into a push and shove fight with another kid who was very popular, after the fact, it it was deemed that I got my ass kicked, and news of this spread like a wild fire. After this the flood gates were opened for verbal insults and even some physical abuse.

       I thought that after surviving this that 7th grade would be better, I was wrong, the insults continued, getting pushed and hit for no reason were very common, and the word "faggot" became an almost everyday utterance. Athletics and football began and living in a small town in Texas this is almost a second religion, I was not good at football to say the least, and every practice they made sure that I knew this , not just the kids but the coaches, grown adults, as well. 

        I really feel like I could go on and on with this but I think the point would be lost. I am 26 years old, I've served in the Army, attended special forces selection, I have a beautiful wife and a wonderful home, I get to do what I love everyday in my studio and I can still feel the impact that these words and actions have had on me. They have affected my interpersonal relationships, they have affected how I view myself, they have affected my view of others and they have affected my quality of life. Today I want to make a promise to myself and to everyone here that is still fighting and still struggling, that I will stay in the fight, That these words will not be my demise.

    To all of you out there who are still fighting, 

    You are a strong, beautiful, radiant individual whose light can never be dulled by words or actions. 

    Stay in the fight and I promise I will too.

I am a parent who has a child that is being bullied and sexually harassed at school to the point of being removed from school at age 15.  Me and her mother are trying to support her even though we are divorced.  One thing we have remained united on is the well-being of our child.  We have been trying to get the attention of school officials.  We have decided to speak with an attorney because we believe that our child is not getting fair access to an equal education. The bullying has become so bad that our child has been hurting herself.  Our school principal is aware of the significance or the issues.  The school has freshman sign a general student handbook that has a bullying policy.  The school does not have any real anti bullying education for students.  I am hoping to bring some advocacy for all bullied students.  We live in a small State and I am hoping we can bring about some change even though there is clear resistance by the school.  I pray for my child everyday that no matter how bad the bullying gets she will not hurt herself.  After watching the Bully Project video with my child I am hopefull that we can make a difference for all bullying victims. Peace

it was after school and i was happy to come home. I picked up my phone to play my favorite game :) when i noticed I had 48 text messages which is unusual because im not super popular. My friends were texting me to check instagram. So i did. I hade been put on a hate page. I looked and somebody had taken my own profile picture and had captioned it "some people should stop breathing" they called me fat, and a whore, and ugly, and b****. I was so hurt. I didnt want anybody to know how i truly felt because i felt as if i was letting them win by doing that. I still do not know who posted the terrible status but it still haunts me

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I will never forget the one text message I received in middle school, it was someone sending me a list of all the people that hated me. I didn't go to school the next day because I was so upset. I am now a college student and I still remember that text vividly. I've always stood up for myself when it came to bullies but sometimes enough is enough.

I myself have also been a bully at times and it brings me great sadness that I sometimes picked on people.

But I've grown up and am looking for a way to make it right. I will be turning 20 soon and have grown up and matured a great amount. I want to help people who are being bullied and I hope to make a difference. 

when it all started i was in elementary school so  1st grade. Out of all the kids in my class i was the outcast the weird one just because of the music i listened to no one my age or even at my school listened to rock/metal music they all just pushed me aside because i was different in there eyes. It wasnt all about the music tho they would always go after  the fact that i didnt have a mom its hard to see all your classmates getting picked up by their moms and i had a grandma to pick me up they would always just tease me about it. I also dont and didnt look like any of them they would make fun of my by calling me a freckled faced freak and that made me feel as if i wasnt even a human being at all. And all this went on till about ^th gard when we got a new student who was just like me he listened to the same music and he listened he was my best friend form 6th grade threw 8th but then he changed he started being a jerk and just not acting like a real freind should like calling me faggot and fuck face and almost any other horrible thing you could think of. All the bullying that happened to me wasnt physical but mental and that just made me not like myself anymore so in about 8th grade is when i started cutting i look back on it now and i would say its a bad thing and stupid but i have only stoped for almost 10 months now. But back to what i was saying so my grandmother noticed and took me to se a therapist and yea it was good to let it out but in my head i was still sooo sad and thought that maybe all those kids were right maybe i am just a freak maybe i am just a nothing, the horrible thing is we couldnt pay for my sessions anymore so i couldnt go and rite around the time i stoped going my dads soon to be wife at the time left with out any reason or anything just left didnt even say goodbye she was like my mom she was always there for me when i needed her not as much as my grandma but still. so people started telling me "oh everyone you love is just ganna leave you, you dont deserve to be loved" and i believed it myself deep down but i still believed it. so once that video that said that gingers dont have souls i was getting harassed and called ginger every where i go. But what i didnt understand tho is that i have freckles thats it i didnt have the orange haire but still telling a nother human being that they dont have a soul is just plain horrible. so while that was still going on it was time for me to start high school and away from being a weird so called "satan worshiper" (because of my choice in music) and also a good for nothing mess up it was going fine. yea rite who am i kidding it was getting worse all my teachers though i was just a fuck up and i couldnt pass there class because i wasnt getting the right attention at home. Well they should have known that my dad and grandpa worked late and my grandma who was practically my mom for  12 years was sick and needed a lung transplant so there was no way for me to be helped at home. so about three weeks before school was over in my sophomore year my grandma passed away because her body rejected her new lung and that was the most horrible day of my life because i actually saw it happen and i dont wish that on anyone that is a horrible thing anyone can see and the memory just stays there forever. well i needed time to cope so about two weeks of not going to school i finnaly go back and it started again but this time i burst out crying and everyone starts laughing so i got up and yelled at everyone and said oh yea pick on the guy who just lost his grandmother the most loving person i know i walked to the door and said i hope youre all happy and slammed the door. Next thing i know im getting sent to a continuation school, for kids that are bad i mean cmon our mascot is the rebels. so even tho im a senior in high school i still get bullied and its happening soo much i cant even bare to go to school but my parents just think "oh its just teenagers being teenagers and dont want to do anything so i have a therapist again but i still want my parents to understand whats going on but yea that is my bullying Story. Thanks for reading and letting me share this with people who understand. -steven andree

I have been bullied since elementary school. Kids would call me four  eyes because I had glasses and call me other names because I had braces. When I first started middle school I was made fun of from one girl because I had not started shaving my legs yet. One day during P.E. she handed me a razor. I was picked on more so during PE and teased because I was athletic, so I guess my other classmates didn't like that very much. A girl had also threatened that she would break my jaw on a curb. When I got to high school things got worse. I was made fun of about my weight, how much make up I wore, how I dressed. People were talking about me, spreading rumors about me, and laughing at me when I had never spoken to them before. Senior year one of my classmates tried to hit me and kept shoving me for no apparent reason. Since I didn't fight back, everyone was calling me a panzy, among other things. Someone had keyed my car and left a voicemail on my cell phone telling me they were going to put me in a body bag. 

I started cutting, began isolating myself, and even bashed my head with one of my soccer trophies. There had been some kids that would make fun of me when I was at work. My manager had to get involved.

I finally spoke out to one of my teachers that I was cutting and had some thoughts of suicide. She had immediately called for the guidance counselor. After I spoke up I got the help I needed, and have been able to pull through. Even though I still have some emotional, and some physical scarring, I know that because I had spoken up I am here today and know that things will get better. 

Speak up, Speak out, Stop Bullying!!

I've been bullied since i was in 4th grade people would always call me fat,ugly,whore,prostitute and so on. One day at school in 7th grade a group of guys came up to me messing with me pulling on my shirt saying come on come on we know you've done things before dont act like you dont want it to happen. I stood up after enduring this for 15-20 minutes i poured a carton of milk on the main guys head and punched him in the stomach. And that was all my teacher saw i was sent to the principals office and from there when the principal was talking to me i broke down and told her everything that has been happening and that i cut myself repeatedly and tried killing myself 4 times. The school called my parents and from school i was taken to the hospital i was in the hospital for 3 months for severe depression, suicidal thoughts, and attempting suicide. Since then i have been going therapy but was still cutting when i saw this movie i saw that i wasnt the only one going through this and people actually cared. But i also noticed that schools really do need to start doing things about bullying and this movie help a lot of school realize this and have helped to stop bullying.

     Last year I was in 8th grade. I had art last hour with a mixture of grades. Three 7th grade boys were grabbing near my privates and hitting my butt with rules. They would grab my stomach and call me fat and ask me rude things and when the teacher asked me what I like to do they would say eat, and just say the rudest things and would grab my friends privates. 

      I told my art teacher, I told my History teacher who was helpful and told me if I needed help to tell the Principal or Vice Principal or if that didn't help then come back to her. The principal didn't do anything. Neither did the vice principal. It didn't end so I had to do homeschooling. On my last day I went to each teacher and talked to them. My math teacher apologised and wished someone had helped me. My counsellor told me it was my fault for not coming to her. This hurt me most of all. To be told it was MY fault for the bullying. They threw things at me and sexually harassed me. I came home crying every single day and would hit myself; until the last day. I felt relieved when I realised I didn't have to go back to school. 

     And to this day I still hate the way I look and my weight. I feel like I'm not good enough. It still hurts but something that made me feel good was letter I got from my English teacher about all the nice things the kids had to say about me and I was sad. I was sad that just three boys and a few teachers could ruin  everything.