For Anyone Who Has Ever Been Bullied
- simonmorrell
- Apr 10
- 17 min read
For Anyone Who Has Ever Been Bullied. My misery at the hands of bullies was becoming too big for me. My pain, both physically and mentally, was becoming uncontrollable. Panic attacks were my daily diet, sleepless nights almost a ritual. Something had to give.
Eventually, I started doing things that frightened me outside of the bullying environment. Things that frightened me, but things I knew would eventually lead me to the path of confidence.
It worked, and the more confident I became, the less the bullying happened, until one day it went away forever.
If you are being bullied, my book From Bullied to Black Belt might help.
The first chapter is free to read below, and the link to the full book is at the very end.
I am available for talks and seminars, so if you would like to book me for a Zoom call or a public speaking event, please just WhatsApp Julie on 07484 331572 or email info@simonmorrell.com
I sincerely wish you well.
Simon Morrell
From Bullied to Black Belt, a true story.
CHAPTER ONE
Things are good for me now. I have achieved lots of what I set out to achieve and I am looking forward to the challenge of achieving the ambitions I have yet to fulfil.
As I reach one goal, another presents itself. In the past, I would baulk at such challenges, but I now know that we need challenges, fears and adversity to help us grow.
"They are tests, sent to strengthen us," a friend of mine once told me. A very wise man indeed. The tests may be of your own making, such as taking a risk in business or your personal life in order to better yourself.
It maybe they are caused by the hands of another or brought about by fate. In such cases, you may feel you have been dealt a bad hand, and quite possibly you have. You may have been the victim of bullying or just simply another's lack of code or ethics, and had to endure what, at the time, seems like endless pain and anxiety. You may feel like giving up, or more correctly, you will feel like giving up. But if you can find the strength within yourself to last the course, see through the business risks or stand up to that bully, then you may be, no, you will be victorious.
Sometimes the victory isn't the obvious one, and, as in my own experience, you may not even realise you have been victorious until much later, after the event. But you will do, and when it hits you, the sense of confidence and well-being your victory brings will stay with you forever.
These victories will be your vehicle to and through the next challenge. How do I know this? Because it happened to me. I have tasted both the deepest depressions and most satisfying victories.
So don't worry. You are not alone in the way you feel, and there is a way forward. Many of the greatest achievers in history were prone to anxiety or started their life as victims so you are in good company. Your anxiety can be channelled into an almost unstoppable energy.
During my childhood and adolescence, I was the victim of bullies. I spent my life in a dark cave of anxiety. I developed severe agoraphobia and suffered from terrifying panic attacks. At times, I thought I was losing my mind. In a desperate bid to do something about it, I managed to change my life for the better. I started meeting challenges and creating opportunities for myself. However, the more opportunities I took the harder the tests were, but as a result of that, the bigger the rewards were also.
You now know that my way out of my former life as a victim was through Karate and the Martial Arts. First of all, I plodded along, not daring to try and excel or stand out. But gradually, I started to have some successes. People began complimenting me on my efforts, and others paid me the ultimate compliment in trying to avoid fighting me. My attitude changed, not in a horrible, arrogant way, but in a positive and assertive way. After training for some time, I realised I had become a fighter.
Please, don’t think me a coward or a bighead when I tell of my weaknesses and strengths. I tell them only to be informative, but for the first and only time in this book, I apologise if what I am about to say does sound conceited.
I had become not just a fighter, but a good one at that.
However, becoming good meant the tests got harder. The fights and the training were now much tougher, and at times I felt like giving it all up. I wondered if it was all worth it. But the more I stuck at it, the stronger I became mentally. This spilt into my life outside the combat arena, and mountains suddenly became molehills. I became a much more confident, outgoing person, able to contribute to all sorts of situations.
I had become a fighter on both a physical and mental level. It was a good job I did because the conflict with the drug dealer I mentioned in the prologue was a conflict that lasted almost three years. Imagine that? Three years of going to sleep at night worrying about the problem and waking up in the morning knowing the problem was still there. Only I could make it go away, just like only I was the only person who could put a stop to the misery of my bullying years. The funny thing was that my issue with him had nothing to do with his drugs and his dealings. It was over a legitimate business deal that went wrong.
He ripped me off over a large sum of money, and then he and his gang tried to bully me into submission without paying it back. Along the way, they also tried to persuade me to turn a blind eye to the dealings…right next door to my family home. Not a chance. My days at the hands of bullies were long gone, and submitting was something I no longer did. I emerged from the conflict with my hand raised. He emerged from it in the gutter where people of his ilk belong.
It took me a while to realise that I had just passed one of the biggest tests of my life, and with it came the sweetest victory and its prizes.
I believe now that all my earlier misery was for a reason. People look at me like I am mad when I tell them this (can't blame them for that, I did once see a shrink!), but hopefully you will see past that initial reaction when you read this book and begin to appreciate the tests in your life. Believe me, the end results are worth it.
How did I recover from the nightmare of agoraphobia and being unable to leave the safety of my own house? How did I become someone who actually enjoys standing in front of many people, teaching them to overcome their fears and learn to defend themselves? How did I snap out of victim mode?
And perhaps the most intriguing question of all, how did I go From Bullied to Black Belt? Read on and find out, and God love you if you’re a victim of any kind because you really can change the way you are. It is my extreme hope that this book will help show you how.
Here’s how it all started....
"Spaz!" A mean-faced kid with bright ginger hair spat the words in my face. This was the first time I was bullied. It wouldn’t be the last. I was waiting in line to go into class with all the other kids. I didn't know what to do and remember feeling shocked at the hatred in his eyes. Perhaps I should have done something, answered back or been more assertive, but I didn't. I did nothing. I just stood there and grinned weakly, feeling sick inside.
"Spaz!" He shouted again, to the amusement of all present. And there it was. That became my name, it became me. From then on, I was bullied into victim mode, a state that I would spend, to one degree or another, the best part of my life in.
As a youngster, I always felt like an outcast and didn't seem to be able to make friends easily. Being very shy, I would be an easy target for some thug to vent his frustration out on me and make a name for himself.
I can recall like it was yesterday, when I spent the day in pain after a bigger lad than me (they all seemed to be bigger lads) twisted my arm up my back until it felt like it was going to break. He only relented when I started to cry.
His idea of relenting was to push me to the ground and kick me. It was my sixth birthday. Even at that young age, I was already being bullied to the degree that it could have been assault.
I stumbled around the school, falling prey to both kids my own age and older. The teachers seemed no better. Once, when I didn't understand a math problem (at this age, I still thought of them as sums, not math), the teacher called me to stand in front of the class. She demanded that I know the answer. I didn't. To try and get my brain working, the teacher thought it would be a good idea to hit me across the knuckles with the sharp edge of a wooden ruler.
After dishing out her own version of inspiration, she gave me a further ten seconds to come up with the answer. Good teaching tactics, these, severe pain to knuckles would help increase brain power in much the same fashion as eating a plate of fish.
Did she honestly think that the answer would suddenly spring to mind once I had felt a bit of pain? Perhaps she thought I was bluffing!
"Yeah, I know the answer, you witch, but I am not going to give it to you. How many times can you hit me with your bit of wood before you get tired, eh? Believe me, I can go on forever! Your wood will break before I do!"
Sadly, this wasn't the case. It just hurt. I didn't know the answer, and no amount of whacking would help me produce one. After another dose of wood on knuckles, I was allowed to sit down.
Humiliated and sore, I longed for a school where the teachers preferred not to beat the kids up for their inability to perform complex math at the age of seven.
I now believe that certain people can smell a victim a mile away and that these people will think nothing of adding to the misery that some of us feel. This is true of both adults and children, pupils and teachers and yes, even friends and certainly enemies. It has been my experience that if you are a weak person (but please, believe me, you can make yourself stronger) like I was, these people will exploit this for any benefit they may get, be it your dinner money or your wages at the end of the week. Yes, that's right, wages.
Bullying is not, as some may have us believe, an exclusively childhood problem. It happens on a daily basis to many adults. What may be just a laugh to the lads in work, constantly picking on one person, may be to that person a living hell. He may have to go home pretending to his wife what a great job he has and how, "The lads in work are brilliant. A right laugh!"
Deep down, he may dread his working day and what it brings. It may be more than just having a laugh at someone. Violence in the workplace is now more common than ever. This little baby has spawned a whole new industry in the USA, with a multitude of books, videos and courses on how to deal with the problem, and wherever America is, we in the U.K. are never far behind.
Whether the victim of constant pranks, abuse or violence, whether male or female and whether young or old, the reasons behind your suffering don't matter to you. You just feel miserable and want it to stop.
I felt like this as early as the age of six and hated the school I was at, the people there and the kid I had become. However, I persevered at this school for about four years. Only once did I attempt to stand up for myself.
A particular chap who had been using me as target practice stood with his back to me one day. A perfect chance I thought. Not very brave, I admit, but for some reason, I saw red and ran at him. I remember jumping on his back and pushing him to the ground. He split his head open on a concrete step, and I felt I had redeemed myself.
"He deserved it," I told myself as I watched the blood gush from his head.
The head teacher thought differently, and a severe reprimand followed, then I was beaten with a cane. The bully got a cold drink and an afternoon off from school. This took the wind out of my sails. I now didn't know if it was right to fight back, as all I got was into trouble. I went immediately back into a depression and fell victim to the bullies again.
Sleepless nights and dreadful mornings followed. I took the decision to approach my dad and asked to change schools. I missed the school bus deliberately and instead went to my dad’s office.
"I was in the shop, Dad, and the bus must have been early," I offered by way of explanation.
"Well, I'll take you in, come on, get in the car," he said, moving to get up from behind his desk.
I decided it was time for him to know the truth. Tears filled my eyes, and in one breath, I poured out to him the miserable time I had been having for the last few years.
He listened and then asked me what I wanted to do. It was simple. I wanted to change schools.
"Okay, I'll phone the school now and tell them you won't be going back," he promised. I was sent to get some sweets and a drink whilst he made the phone call. He was in mid-conversation when I returned. Pausing, he put his hand over the mouthpiece.
"Your head teacher has promised that if you go back, he will personally see to it that you aren't bullied anymore," he offered.
Panic set in. "No, no, I just don't want to go back there, please!"
I had no faith whatsoever in the head, his teachers or his school. The very thought of returning filled me with fear.
"Okay, that's fine. You don’t have to go back if you don’t want to."
My Dad turned back to the phone and gave the headmaster the good news. My escape had been arranged all the way to the border. I wouldn't be returning to junior Colditz. Instead, I was transferred to a different school, away from my tormentors.
It was with a smile on my face and a spring in my step that I entered my new school. I had a fresh start where nobody knew me. The children seemed okay, and I was put in the protective custody of two girls, Josie and Debbie.
As I was the new lad, I was something of a novelty, and it was at this school, once Josie and Debbie had become bored with me and let me off the leash, that I made my first proper best friend.
Richard was the same age as me, and we both shared a passion for sports and, in particular, Liverpool Football Club and their star player, Kevin Keegan. Richard and I played for hours, swapping places at pretending to be Keegan and for what seemed like the first time, I enjoyed school.
However, things were short-lived. We had a fall out, as ten-year-olds do, and fisticuffs were arranged. You would think by now that I had realised that I couldn’t fight my way out of a wet paper bag.
But no, my thinking was that this was different. I wasn't being bullied (and in this case, I wasn't), but this was a proper fight of which I was a willing participant. I was ready for it.
When we did get around to fighting, Richard absolutely hammered me (well, in the way that ten-year-olds do), but he was such a nice lad that he cried more than me and reported himself to the teacher!
Holding us both by the hand, the teacher didn't have the heart to tell us off but got an agreement from us that fighting was pointless. We went back to being friends and I thought that was the end of my trips out into violence.
However, having seen what a useless pugilist I was became the inspiration for another kid, Timmy, to try and make my head and the toilet wall one and the same thing. Very big for his age, and strong with it, Timmy approached me in the toilets. Without warning he grabbed my hair and smashed my head into a concrete wall. I was shocked, by both the speed and surprise of the attack. No words were spoken, just actions taken, and I was left dazed, hunched over on the floor.
Somebody told the teacher of my distress, which led to a very strange series of events. Timmy was called to stand in front of the class, whilst I sat nervously in my chair. The teacher addressed the class on the wrongfulness of trying to ‘amalgamate somebody’s head with a wall’. We looked on blankly…we didn't know what amalgamate meant as we were only ten years old.
Then she did something that totally surprised us.
"Simon, would you like to come up here and smash Timmy's head into the wall?" she asked.
I couldn't believe it. The teachers in this school were great! Somebody shouted an encouraging "Yeah!" and so, to the cheers of my classmates, I left my chair and made my way to the front. Timmy watched, horrified, as I approached, but when I got there, the teacher’s attitude changed.
"Simon, don't you dare! I am disgusted with you!" she yelled. "Sit down now!"
Slightly confused at this withdrawal of invitation, I went back to my seat. Timmy was also told to sit down, and the class resumed its work. I looked around at the kids with their heads buried in their books and wondered if I had just imagined the whole thing. Not one of the kids ever mentioned it again, but at least Timmy just left me alone.
As time passed, High School loomed on the horizon and with it the prospect of even bigger kids and tougher bullies. I had now become very shy, even skinnier and confidence was something I could not even entertain. I was rubbish at sport and not particularly bright, and so tried to keep a low profile in a school of sixteen hundred kids.
The problem was I could keep a low profile to most, but not to all. At the age of about fourteen, I was out one day riding my bike, minding my own business.
A local thug, RW, took offence to this for some unknown reason. He thought he was hilarious and a charmer, but I had seen this kid in school and knew him to be nasty piece of work. Until now, I hadn't had the pleasure of meeting him in person but that was about to change. As I rode past him, to the amusement of his friends, he ran at me and grabbed hold of the front of my bike.
"Give me my fucking bike!" he screamed.
"It isn't yours," I argued meekly as I desperately tried to hold onto it.
"Well, what about the smokes you owe me!" he yelled into my face.
"I don't owe you any," I tried to argue.
"You fucking do! Bring them here tomorrow or you’re dead!"
With a parting slap around my head, he was gone. The feeling of sickness is something I will remember forever. Panic, stomach churning, light-headedness, and I didn't even smoke!
I spent a restless night worrying about the next day’s events and what I would do. I decided I would ignore the whole thing, thinking it would go away, and for a while, I lived in ignorant bliss. However, a change of fortune would bring RW back into my life.
I had a trial for the local football team and made the position as goalkeeper. The qualification for this was that I was the only one who could be bothered to try out for it. It was the first time I felt I had actually achieved something and looked forward to being part of a team. The team's pitch was at the bottom of the road into a large housing estate, which happened to be the haunt of RW.
To get to the pitch, I had to enter the estate at the very corner where RW was to be found hanging around. The alternative was to cycle two miles out of my way to enter the training area via the local rubbish dump… I chose the rubbish dump route. The extra two miles I had to cycle were great for my fitness, but by God, the rubbish smelt!
I was picked to play in my first game against a local team. Instead of being overjoyed, I was terrified. You see, a "friend" had taken pleasure in informing me that RW would often be seen at the matches, hurling abuse at the players. So instead of looking forward to the match, I spent all of the day before, a Friday, shaking and feeling physically sick.
Some of the kids noticed how ill I looked and asked if I was okay, yet not one adult, teacher or otherwise, even noticed that I was pale and could not stop shaking.
However, it turned out my fear was all just a waste of energy. RW was nowhere to be seen. I scanned the area constantly whilst we waited for the cars to pick us up and take us to the opposition's ground. It was with a sigh of relief that I got into my dad’s car and relaxed as he drove us to our match. So, all that worrying was for nothing!
I could now just concentrate on the game and my opportunity to become a hero by saving everything that the opposition threw at me. Surely, this was my time!
It wasn't. We lost sixteen to one. As if I didn't have enough baggage, my newfound "friends and teammates" hated me as well. I had to put up with comments like, "You couldn't save at a supermarket!" as I walked through the school.
I persevered only because I felt too ashamed to quit. After a couple of months on a dark, cold night, I decided to take a chance and make my way home through the estate. It had been ages since I had seen RW and I was too tired to take the long way home.
It was a bad move! As I approached the corner where RW and his cronies hung out, I noticed a figure running toward me. Terrified, with panic rushing through me, I tried to pedal faster, but I had no chance. RW was too fast and too strong for me. He grabbed hold of my handlebars and jumped on my bike's front wheels, stopping me in my tracks.
"I have fucking told you, where's my fags!" Surely a question, not an instruction (no, I wasn't that smart and didn’t say that to him at the time).
"I forgot, I’m sorry!" I stuttered. His smack around my head made sure I would not forget again. For just a minute, it looked like I might have a reprieve.
"Leave him alone Ricky!" one of his mates laughed.
"Shut up, he owes me fags!" Ricky screamed back at him.
"I am sorry, I'll bring them tomorrow, honest!" I pleaded.
"You'd better do, now get lost!"
I did not need telling twice, I was off like a shot. Another sleepless night followed, and I made the decision to get him the cigarettes. This brought another problem. I had to find some money. I had some savings in the building society and managed to smuggle my savings book out of the house. I withdrew the minimum allowed, five pounds, and made my way to the local shop then, for the first time in my life, bought a packet of cigarettes.
Armed with the goods, I made my way to the park to meet Ricky. I waited nervously for what seemed like an age. He never showed up. Is that bad-mannered or what? Even he didn’t realise what a weak character I was, he just didn't think I would buy him cigarettes, but as I waited, a lad I vaguely knew from school wandered by.
"What are you doing here, Morrell?" he asked.
I explained my position and he laughed.
"Forget it. If you give in to him now, he will just keep getting stuff off you"
I sat on a swing looking down, knowing what he said was true.
"What will I do?" I asked, “I can't fight him."
"Then tell your Mum and Dad."
I nodded. They would tell me off for taking money from my account, but it would be worth it. I approached my Mum first when my dad was out having a drink. She was horrified. She sat down to think. My Dad had a friend who was a policeman, and she rang him for advice. After a while he phoned back to speak to me.
"He won't bother you anymore, Simon, a friend has had a word, and he will leave you alone," he told me. A feeling of shame dampened my relief.
"What a coward I am," I told myself. "Still, at least I’m free from him now".
However, my freedom was short-lived. My first girlfriend brought with her a psycho that made RW look like a family friend.
Buy From Bullied to Black Belt here
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