FCYU-Feature Story

The Walking Flame
I’m still recovering from being bullied

By Eric

As a little kid, I was feisty, but I did not have to look for trouble. Trouble came looking for me.

I was in elementary school the first time I was bullied. I was doing my schoolwork when a student threw something at me. I looked back to see who threw it, then went back to doing my work. First warning. When the student did it again, I said to myself, “Oh, hell no!” So I got up from my seat and shoved that student against the wall. I said, “You wanna mess with me?” Second warning. He stopped.

But the bullying never let up. When I moved from Long Island to the Bronx, I was teased because I was smart and because of the way I looked. I was a geek. Yes, I had on those tight-ass pants, suspenders, a tight long-sleeved shirt and big glasses. If you saw me then, you’d be like, “Eric, you look like Steve Urkel! You look like a nerd!” Well, based on how I looked, I was humiliated by the whole school. It was not pretty.

When I entered junior high, I thought the bullying would be over. Wrong! But that year I decided there was no way in hell I was going out like a sucker. I had to let these bullies know that I could fight back. I started kicking and pushing anyone who touched me.

I remember when a student who looked like a punk tried it with me. He pushed me against the wall. Then all of my strength rushed through my hands and I pushed him back with full force. He fell backwards and slipped on a big puddle of milk that sent him flying across the lunchroom.

“See, that’s what you get when you mess with me, sucker,” I said. I thought he would quit it but the principal had to break up the fight.

High school was only worse. My personality changed. Remember Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde? Well, I was like that. I could not take one bit of harassment. I became the “walking flame,” warning people not to mess with me. Any time someone spoke to me I was ready to go off.

I got a little paranoid. I even began to feel as if the teachers were bullying me. “Oh, that’s just great. Just dandy,” I said to myself if a teacher asked something simple like, “Where’s your homework?” The way I saw it they were just harassing me.

My art teacher once said, “You’re just like an old man, so rigid!”

“Why did you call me rigid?” I said loudly. “I’m not like an old man. I don’t like to do things I don’t want to do. I am what I am, and you’re gonna have to deal with it whether you like it or not!” I was furious.

“Calm down, Eric. Don’t be so sensitive,” the teacher said.

Permanent Wounds

During high school, I was bullied more and more because I was gay. Sometimes students approached me with personal questions out of curiosity, other times to humiliate me. Sometimes it felt like being bullied was all I would experience in life.

Finally, I switched to an alternative school where the other students and teachers were much more accepting of my sexuality and my ways. Even so, it’s taken me years to stop feeling like I’m being constantly pushed around and harassed. I was even furious with my mother many times when I felt like she was bullying me!

When I look back on what I went through, I get very upset. I hate that feeling of powerlessness that I have been carrying for a very long time. For years I felt as if I deserved to be bullied because as a child I had nothing. I wasn’t taken care of by my parents, and I didn’t get much attention from my family or my foster families. I believed bullies picked on me because they saw that I was somebody who could not defend himself and had no one in life to defend him.

I wonder what I would be like now if I hadn’t been bullied. How would I be different if I didn’t have to watch my back when I went to class or didn’t have to worry about being picked on while I was trying to figure out my sexual orientation? How would I have grown if I’d had more friends and could’ve taken the chance to be more of myself?

I wish I did not have to be the walking flame, always pushing people away just to be safe. The habit I developed of defending myself constantly has definitely affected my friendships. Sometimes I see teasing but helpful criticism as a form of bullying. My feelings get hurt all the time.

I sometimes don’t realize that I’m overreacting because even constructive criticism rubs me wrong. Then people say, “I’m just trying to help!”

Not All in My Mind

I feel so confused. I can’t tell anymore if I’m being too sensitive or my friends are being too insensitive. Either way, the past bullying causes a lot of problems between me and the people close to me. Day to day, I still worry that someone will start harassing me for no reason, and that the terrible feelings of my childhood will come back to me at any time.

But sometimes it’s not my imagination. Even though I’m 23, I still get nasty comments, usually about my sexuality. They still have the power to make my self-esteem sink to the bottom and make me feel like I’m nothing. When people harass me on the street, I sometimes wonder, “If I fought back in the past, why is it hard for me to fight back now?”

But I am older and don’t want to fight anymore. I’ve learned that fighting doesn’t solve the problem. So I just try to keep walking, and I say to myself, “Eric, those bullies are not worth your time.”

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