Understanding Me

• Chloe Casten, Grade 9
• Short Story
• 2016

My name is Chloe and I am 14. My life before I believed in myself was a nightmare.
I was bullied because of my looks. I didn’t know why people had to, but they just did. They would say I was fat and slow and ugly. My whole class even made up a song about me that they would sing when the teachers weren’t around. No one would help me. As years went by, the bullying got worse. I became depressed and didn’t want to do anything, I even started to shut my family out. I would always be in my room, escaping into my own world were nothing could hurt me.
My mum and dad tried to help me. I moved schools but still the bullying happened. They took me to a psychologist but all the psychologist said was that I was fat and needed to lose weight. She put me on anti-depressives but that made me sick.
It felt like nothing could help me and I just wanted it to stop. I didn’t want to live anymore I wanted to kill myself.
When I started High School in grade 8, I was still the same. I couldn’t handle coming to school and one day I couldn’t take it anymore so I stopped coming to school. It was just too much.
The school tried to help and they found a class for me to go to. A boy in the class started to pick on me but the rest of the students would get mad at him. It was nice having people stick up for me. I started to ignore him and everything that had bothered me. I got help with my school work and there was no pressure. People listened and offered to help. Even the head of English came to see me to tell me how good my writing was. I started to get As and Bs for my work and I was starting to believe in myself. I started to feel like I could do anything.
I can now talk to people more easily even though I’m still shy and getting used to people. I still find it hard to trust. I now don’t care what people think or say about me, I only care about what I think and say about myself.
If you ever get bullied you have to go and talk to someone you trust. Make them listen to you. Make them understand how you feel. You have to learn how to ignore the bullies. It may not be easy, it wasn’t for me at first, but over the years I’ve learnt how to ignore everything that bothers me or anyone who bullies me.
If I had given up I would never have learnt to be as strong as I am now. I would never have been a school leader and role model to others. I would never have done so well in school. I would never have been happy.