***Disclaimer: Please read with caution as there are details of this story that may be triggering for some.***
This story is based on events that occurred to someone close to me. While she is all right, there are many others in similar situations who are not as lucky, and some for whom it is too late. This is a story about teenage bullying, and the kid who goes unseen.
This isn't my story but it's a story that had to be told. It was too important not to. I had to do something to stand up against the bad people in the world. And I had to do something to protect one of the people that I care most about in the world--my little sister.
Ellen was a really happy baby. She was a really happy toddler and a happy kid. Everyone loved to be around her. She was the type of kid to sing songs and do dances just to make other people smile. That all changed when my mom and step-dad got divorced.
I think at first she was too young to understand. She was only 7 and her dad was always away on work anyway. But then he stopped coming home at all and she only could speak to him on the phone a couple of times a week. She saw him once every couple of months if she was lucky because he had moved 3 hours away to be closer to his job and his mother. It was hard on all of us, but I think it was hardest on her.
When I went to college things got even worse for her. It was just more changes. Mom moved the family to be closer to her own job. My siblings changed schools and eventually my mom's new husband moved in with them. Even though Ellen and I were the furthest apart in age out of all of our siblings, she and I were always the closest. I was her protector. When I was around I never let anything bad happen to her. When I went to college all of that changed--I wasn't there to protect her anymore. Over the course of a couple of years, Ellen went from being a happy-go-lucky child to a surly, brooding preteen. She didn't like to spend time with our family, she never went outside, and she had stopped hanging out with her friends. I think my mom was too scared to see what was really happening with Ellen. She just saw it as a phase. As phase that lasted years.
Let's fast-forward a few years. In this time my family has made another move, my siblings started at a new school district, and I graduated college and moved out of state. I tried to stay close enough so that I could still drive home in 3 hours or less. I might not have been there everyday but I was still Ellen's protector shielding her from the bad when I could. Or so I thought.
Ellen was now in the 8th grade. She had made new friends (finally!) and was starting to pull out of her self-imposed isolation. Our family couldn't have been more thrilled. She wanted to spend more time with her friends and less time with us, but she was 13 and at least she was spending time with someone.
The night of Ellen's end-of-the-year 8th grade field trip she spent the night at her friend Ashley's house. Our mom had given Ellen permission to spend the better part of the weekend there which was something she had done before. The next day, Ashley's boyfriend Jake and his friend Scott came over to hang out with Ellen and Ashley. Ellen didn't particularly like Jake or Scott but she went along with the group hang out. The boys decided they wanted to go out into the wood. Ellen didn't want to go but she figured it was either go with them or go home early so again she went along with everything.
In the woods, Jake and Scott decided they should all hunt birds and Scott was successful in killing a bird. He didn't stop there. Scott then when on to gut the bird and mutilate it's body. At that point Ellen was so uncomfortable she was near tears and just wanted to go home. She was able to convince Ashley to go back to the house with her. When Ellen for home later that day she talked to another friend, Claire, and told her what had happened. Claire and Ellen talked about how they didn't think Jake was a good boyfriend for Ashley, especially since he had friends like Scott. Ellen and Claire decided they would talk to Ashley and have an intervention the next day.
When they tried to have their intervention things did not go well. Ashley accused them of being jealous and said that she and Jake were perfect together. Ashley and Claire had been friends since they were in preschool, so Claire quickly took back her words and agreed with Ashley for the sake of keeping peace in their friendship. Ellen stood her ground. She told Ashley that Jake was not good for her. This did not go well. Ashley was furious with Ellen and had decided they were no longer friends. Between the time of their conversation Sunday afternoon and school Monday morning, Ellen had lost all of her friends and she didn't even know it.
During that time Ashley was very busy. She played games of "she said" and secret telling. Ellen was twisted into the villain in the situation and everyone else was the victim. As the new kid in the friend group she didn't have much standing with them. All of the friends assumed what Ashley had said was true and they all agreed to stop being friends with Ellen.
In school on Monday, Ellen didn't realize the extent of the situation until lunch time. Sure she and Ashley had an argument and weren't speaking, but friends fight. Especially teenage girls. When Ellen got to lunch one of the girls in the group, Brittany told her, "we've decided that it's in everyone's best interest if you no longer sit with us." Real. Life. Mean. Girls.
Ellen set her lunch down on the table, when to the bathroom, and proceeded to cry for the entire lunch period. These were her only friends and they had all turned their backs on her. Sure she had a couple of acquaintances she liked to talk to in class and a few friends that were already in the high school, but for the most part these girls were it. They were the people she sat next to in classes they had together, ate lunch with, hung out with on the weekends, and texted 24/7. And now they had all rejected her. Ellen was totally distraught. When she got back to the lunchroom she found their table empty and saw that her lunch had been thrown out. So much for eating that day.
Ellen went home and told our mom everything. She told her about the situation in the woods with Ashley, about arguments she and her friends had in the past, and about how they were treating her. In 24 hours a fight with one friend had turned into 6 girls freezing her out. And things just got worse.
The girls that Ellen used to consider her best friends become her worst nightmare. They were rude to her in the halls. They began posting things on their social media accounts to mock her. They would take pictures of her and repost it to their accounts so they could all comment and publicly humiliate her without being caught.
My mom and Ellen went to the school to see what could be done. The school has a "zero tolerance" policy for bullying and my mom was hopeful. They explained the situation to the guidance counselor and then Ellen told her she wanted to switch schools. She told the guidance counselor she and her peers were at the age when friendships and peer groups solidified. Making friends was hard enough, especially in a small school, but now that she had been ostracized by her former friends, Ellen was doubtful she's make new friends, real friends, in high school. She wanted a fresh start and thought that switching districts would help. Our family lives on the line between districts so my mother didn't see why it would be a problem for either school.
The guidance counselor told my mom and my sister that switching schools was not the answer. The solution was for Ellen to be strong and ignore the girls. And they would do their best to make sure Ellen didn't have class with any of them next year. She gave my family a figurative pat on the ass and sent them on their way. Bull sh*t lady.
Meanwhile things just kept getting worse for Ellen. They started reposting family photos of hers to mock. Somehow they acquired a pair of her jeans and video recorded lighting them on fire. They posted several videos of the burning jeans during which they said things like "oh my god I love Ellen so much" in sarcastic voices or said hateful racially charged things. They continued their hateful and demeaning dialogue in the comments of the videos.
My mom saw the videos and photos they were posting and decided enough was enough. She was going to the police. These girls were harassing Ellen and it was time for something to be done. My mom showed the police the videos and pictures but their response similar to the guidance counselor's. They told Ellen to be strong and keep her head down when it came to these girls. They told my mom to let the school handle it. And then they went on their way. That's it.
Ellen may very well be stuck in a school where she is a target of ostracism and harassment all because no one can do anything; all while these girls are free to continue with their antics. It's disgusting. There are many cases like Ellen's where this is just too much for the targeted child. Bullying and cyber bullying are serious things that can lead to psychosocial issues, they are stress factors that can contribute to mental illness, and in some cases kids commit suicide. What if Ellen didn't tell my mother about the situation? What if she didn't have her family supporting her? What if she had been so emotionally distraught over losing all of her friends and being a target of their bullying that she had decided to kill herself? What then? Would the school have gotten involved with anti-bullying seminars? Would the police have decided to take action against the perpetrators? I guess we'll never know.
I understand that both the school and the police are busy with limited resources. They have to decide what takes priority in many situations, but what about prevention? What about preventing more kids from being bullied? What about preventing this situation that my little sister has gone through from getting worse? Prevention is important and it needs to happen. People need to understand. Harassment is not acceptable. Bullying is not acceptable. Cyber bullying is not acceptable.
**Though based on true events, some parts of this story have been dramatized for retelling purposes. All names have been changed to protect the identities of any minors involved.**
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