Part 2: Bullying in the Eye of the Victims: On The Way To Recovery

After Elementary School I learned not to have high hopes, cause everyone tried to take my hope away from me. To tell you the truth, it worked. I went to the middle school with no hopes at all, i just wanted to get through the first day and then go hom eto where i wouldnt be bullied. The first day, nothing really happened. No one was mean to me, no one spit on me, everyone left me to myself. I sat alone at lunch, but thats all. It went like this for a couple of weeks. Then one day i went to school, and i was in the hallway and i had a huge amount of stuff that i was carrying. I had three text books, my book bag, my binder, my colored pencil box, etc, etc, and then someone ran into me and we both fell on the ground. I expected whoever had ran into to runh away luaghing or just get up and walk away, but when i looked in front of me, there was a guy from my grade and he was picking up my things and he appologised. For quite a while i just sat there, trying to calculate what was happening, and he was picking everything up, he didnt ask me to help him, he didnt ask ME to appologise for getting in his way. He just picked everything up, and handed it to me. He then introduced himself, and held out his hand and i just sat there starring at him like a freak. After a few minutes he started to luagh, and i asked him why he was luaghing at me, and he said that he wasnt luaghing at ME, he said that he was luaghing at my silence, and he held out his hand again and i shook it. Then he sat there waiting for something, and it took me a few seconds to realise that he wanted to know my name, and i told him that it was Katie Cross, and he looked at me for  a minute and he recognised me.  He said that he saw me sitting alone, but he didnt know if i wanted to sit alone, and i just sighed and said its the only thing i know how to do right. Then he looked at me like he was confused. He told me, he didnt ask me, to sit with him and his friends at lunch, and i said, ok. That was the first person who was nice to me at a school, and it fealt pretty good, and i am not going to lie to you. I had a crush on him, becuase he was nice. I guess it had something to do with me needing someone to love as a friend. He was kind, and we are still best friends to this very day. He turned my life upside down. Of course when i met him and we became friends i could not tell him anything about my past and I could not trust him, cuase everyone who i had ever trusted at a school, broke my heart. That was just sixth grade, and the next year when he asked me about who my parents were, and he wanted to meet them, i told him he couldnt, and he asked why, and i didnt know how to answer him. I had never told a single soul about my dad killing himself. It was like  a secret. I didnt have to tell my ex friend becuase she knew, and i didnt know how to tell him. Should i tell him strait up that he killed himself becuase he was very ill, should i tell him the whole story, should i just tell him that he was dead? I didnt know what to do and right there, he knew by the look of my face that I did not trust him and he was angry about it, and we just stopped talking to eachother for a while. Then one day i saw him sitting alone at lunch and that never happened to him. So i knew I had to tell him everything. Why i didnt trust him, what happened to my dad, that i was bipolar, every big detail. So i walked over to him and he looked sad, he looked up at me and looked back down and he whispered, Why dont you trust me? SO i sat down and started to explain, but before i did, i asked him if he had ever lost someone he loved, i dont know why i did, but i did. He told me, yeah i lost my great grandfather. Then i explained. Starting with my dad, then going to finding out i had bipolar disorder, then explaining what bipolar disorder was, then telling him about my bullying problem, then finally telling him about my friend, and he had tears in his eyes, and he said that he was sorry and he didnt know that i had been through so much. The strange thing about that moment was that i kind of felt a weight lift off of my shoulders, and I actually trusted him. It was weird. I had just told him why i didnt trust him, and then i trusted him when he appologised. After that day, i found it easier to trust people, but to this day, the only person other than my family, that i trust 100% is him, my best friend.

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To be continued.....