How can you help someone get past being bullied

[Amanda]

I just found out a few days ago that highschool was apparently hell on earth for my brother. I have tried talking to him about it but he says that since I wasn't bullied and I'm not a guy I wouldn't understand. I told him I was bullied some but because of extreme abuse mental, sexual, emotional, physical I have some serious anger issues and when I was picked on it usually ended with me being pulled off the offender and a trip to the principal who would give me inschool detention or suspend or whatever. He says that since I'm a girl I could get away with that but if he had attacked someone that bullied him he would have gotten beat up instead. I understand that my brother is not a fighter i don't think he should have been like me that's not the way to handle problems that's just the way I knew. He is 22 has had one job that I got him working for a friend of mine but she had to lay him off because he acted scared of her customers and very nervous around anyone he didn't know. I truly think it stems from the bullying but I don't know what to say to help him. Part of me is mad because I can't believe he could let other people influence how he is so much they were just kids at his school 4 years and you never have to see them again get over it but the other part of me knows that I haven't and probably never will recover from the damage my mom has done to me and I let her influence me and so the anger makes me a hypocrite. I just wish he could open up about it some but I hate to press because if I really push and ask him to tell me about then he starts to cry and I mean great big hiccuping sobs:( and then I cry because I can't stand that he hurts that much he's my baby brother and I should have protected him. If I had known I would have gone to his school and probably gotten arrested but I guarantee word would have got out not to mess with my brother. So do I wait until he can talk without breaking down, is breaking down his way of letting it out and maybe that helps or I don't know but I'm open to all suggestions.:confused:

[2002to2009]

As far as what you said about his behavior on that first job being due to bullying: there's a very good chance that's correct. The same thing happened to me. It's a very discouraging experience, because you feel like your past is following you.

Time heals everything, and that's been the case for me. After trying to write a book about my experiences being bullied, (Bad idea, because it dredged me through all the muck I needed to put behind me) I realized I had to think about something else.

I would highly recommend him joining the Toastmaster's. That helped me immensely with shyness in general.

I won't mince words. There's an IMMENSE amount of work involved with healing from the experience of being bullied. And yet, going from being too panicked to talk casually with anyone to being able to give speeches to crowded rooms and be funny, even charming with anyone I meet is an experience most people don't get to have. You earn it. You have a unique perspective of the human psyche most people don't. It's almost worth all the years of bullshit. :-)

[malign]

Amanda,

I'm not sure exactly how you can help your brother get past being bullied, but I bet it's not that different from how you're going to get past being abused. I know his reaction to his peers was completely different from what your reaction would have been, but the causes are buried in the same place as yours are. You two grew up in the same environment, just different perspectives. That might possibly make you the best equipped person out there to help him, because you were there, too. It might even help you, some, too.

[Amanda]

Ty you both for your thoughts. I will look into the Toastmasters and see if I can get him interested in it. I try not to burden him with what I went through when I was younger. I don't want to taint good memories he may have of someone. We are 10 and half years apart in age and I protected him from our family. Our mother only hit him once he was 2 and she left a bruise that went all the way across his back. After the way I went after her she pretty much left him alone and I raised him she just stayed away from him until our dad had enough and they got divorced. She got custody in the divorce but my dad got him every weekend and on school breaks and I would stop by and check up on him. Once he was all she had she treated him like gold he was waited on hand and foot bought everything he wanted and never disciplined unless I stepped in when he got out of hand and I try not to ruin the way he thinks of her. I try to take him out with me when I go grocery shopping and then I will usually stop somewhere and let him pick out a book or movie kinda like positive reinforcement for being around people but that's hard because I don't like being around people myself it's just a necessary evil of life. I feel like the biggest hypocrite alive trying to help him with it. Yet again thanks for the thoughts.