You're never too old to be bullied. I got rid of all of my social media temporarily, while I try to figure out some things with myself. For now, I'm trying my best to give myself a week of solitude to get better bearings on my life and who I am after what happened. It's not easy being bullied, and if it's happening to you—Talk to someone about it.

Public Domain

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Bullies are Fake Friends

A few days ago, I found out that one of my best friends were being ostracized from the place I used to work at by some really mean girls when she started working there.

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You see, they didn't like her...

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Solely because she was my friend.
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So they put her in a box and called her weird because they judged people before they even got a chance to know them.
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I'm not even mad, that people would talk shit...
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What makes me upset though, is that my friends defended me when I wasn't there.
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It's like I'm a person that can't take care of myself.

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I think about the people I'm close to and all the additional hardships they must have by just knowing me. When this hit me, I first thought;
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Well shit, I better become someone worth defending.
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Then I realized that I need to be a person that doesn't need defending, because I can stand up for myself. I have some of the best friends, and I know they want to protect me.

I want to protect them too.

Pixabay

Friends are a Choice

"You don't let people choose if they want to be your friend. You choose if you want them as your friend. —Vivious"

This friend has a name, it's Vivianne—although I affectionately call her Vivious. She's brilliant, and one of my childhood friends that I care about deeply.

It was a mixture of wanting to cry and laugh, when she said that it was good thing, because she didn't want to be friends with people like that anyway, and neither should I. She's very right about that. Vivianne looked me in the eyes, and said with a sigh; "Sheryl, you can't be friends with everyone." That made me kinda sad actually, but I understand why. I need to find friends that have similar values and aren't judging, who love me for being myself.

So there I was with over 4000 Facebook friends, but not even sure if I had any real friends. I'll save the story of what originally happened for another time, but it did start with me minimizing my list to 100 people who I felt were my friends.

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Days Gone By

Heart on Sleeve: Weakness and Strength

It wasn't until our next hang out where Vivious spoke about other things about myself I should really be paying attention to. She spoke up about how I was one of the kindest people she ever met, but being able to see the good in everyone can easily be viewed as being weak. She paused; "But that's one of the things I like most about you."

She called it admirable.

We ended up joking about how I would spend a while being "extra selfish", which may give me a greater understanding about what self love really is. I apparently don't do anything without the consideration of others, so maybe now I can really be myself again and worry about me more. Being a special snowflake that needs to grow tougher skin sounds really scary...

But so is caring too much, and always being the only person that ends up getting hurt.

Tumblr | animebigworld

Everybody Wanted to Fight

The other day was a birthday party for one of my previous coworkers starting at a nightclub and later on at their house. Vivious invited me to tag along, and hang out with everyone including her bf who's also my friend, since I haven't seen many people lately.

There was one of the really mean girls there.

Luckily, the were a lot of nicer people there as well, including some friends. Vivious needed to go home early to work the next morning. The "mean girl" who was dressed up, and smiling and taking photos with everyone all night confronted me to take Vivious home, or else she would fight me.

She openly got in my face and threatened me multiple times.

Vivious looked at me, and said that I could hang out with her bf and friends if I wanted to. Also that taking her home really far from my own house was pretty unreasonable. The difference between this girl and the other ones was that she openly hated me and nobody else—in fact, she really loved Vivious. She continued getting in my face about how it was my duty to listen to her and she didn't want to have to hurt me.

Vivious called a cab and looked me in the eyes as she left; "Have fun. Don't listen to her."

Everyone ended up taking separate cars to our friend's house to finish up his birthday.

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Orzzzz

Real and Fake People

Vivious's boyfriend sat with me in the couch when we got inside; the mean girl staring at us. He looked at me and laughed. "Everything's good. Do you think we would hang out if I didn't like you?"

I thought back to all the hangouts I've had with Vivious and him, and how I even intruded on their anniversary movie date one time, and they didn't let me be a third wheel. He could be my friend just to make Vivious happy, but he was reassuring me that I was really his friend too.

Everyone at the house was super nice, and I met a bunch of interesting people!

He said to me; "I like you because you're real. There's so many fake people, but you don't front." He then looked up at the mean girl and said;

"If you lay a hand on Sheryl, I'll knock you out."

I'm not gonna lie, that was amazing. She got quiet and didn't say anything... and spent the ending of the night even being apologetic in a way. He reasoned with me that people don't take the time out to get to learn about others when they really should.

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Here We Are

I know I have a lot of great friends, but who am I for these types of things to happen? I got worried because I need to become stronger to stand up for myself. I went home, and deactivated everything, to give myself some solitude and work out my issues that are causing these problems.

I was shocked. Yesterday my phone blew up with every close friend who has my phone number checking if I was okay. Vivious and her bf both texted me. I had friends wondering if I blocked them and if things are okay. Even other friends who wanted to know why I'm deactivated in the first place. Even after removing my didgital presence, I had many loving friends that genuinely cared about me.

I originally wanted to disappear because all the trouble I was causing for others. It hasn't been as lonely as I thought I would be... Hanging out at home by myself.... But I cannot just run away, I'm going to keep working on being my ideal version of me.
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Not for my haters, fuck those guys.
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But for me, and all of the friends that believe in me.

Thank you @bollutech!


"If someone has a problem with you, always remember—It's their problem." —Anonymous