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Bullying Guide

Persistent bullying can have very serious consequences on the health; relentless bullying day after day causes stress and with stress comes effects on the health such as fatigue, depression, anxiety, phobias and panic attacks. Anyone who is being bullied will eventually find it stressful and symptoms will begin to show if they are continually faced with stressful situations day after day.

Stress

The signs of stress first usually appear as sleepless nights, aches, pains and stomach problems.

The physical symptoms of stress

People suffering from stress will find that they catch more colds and generally feel run down all the time; this is down to a reduced immune system. General aches and pains may begin to show such as back pain, chest pain and headaches, other symptoms include dizziness, sweating, palpitations, skin disorders and loss of appetite.

Physiological symptoms

Symptoms such as panic attacks are common in someone suffering from stress and anxiety, feelings such as a dread of something unknown happening, feelings of loneliness, suicide, desperation and an intense fear. Poor concentration and forgetfulness are also common effects in someone suffering from depression due to stress.

Behavioural symptoms

A person suffering from stress can often be very tearful, irritable, become obsessive or have angry outbursts. A person can also become over sensitive, for example they may think everyone is talking about them when they walk into a room. Indecision, a loss of the sense of humour and excessive nail biting, teeth grinding and scratching can all be signs of stress.

Personality changes

The person suffering from stress will most probably begin to withdraw into themselves, preferring to stay at home where once they would have enjoyed going out with friends. They will have loss of self esteem, self image and self worth.

The usual response to stress is what is known as the “fight or flight” mechanism and this will occur many times a day in someone who is stressed and full of anxiety, this can happen for no reason and when the person is in no particular danger at that very moment and is termed a “panic attack”.

In the beginning these can happen every once in a while but continual exposure to stress can trigger them every few minutes. The person suffering can then even trigger a panic attack just by the mere thought of one occurring.

Serious prolonged attacks of bullying can result in the target shutting out what is happening to them and sometimes who is responsible for the bullying.

This can have consequences for those trying to help the victim put a stop to it so the quicker help is given the better, especially when it might be necessary to take legal action against the bully. Victims of bullies often don’t report the incidents for reasons such as:

* Fear they will not be believed.

* If they report the bullying then any action taken could make the situation worse for them.

* The person feels shame of being bullied.

* The person feels bewilderment about what happened and asks themselves why me.

* Bullying causes stress and this can prevent the person from being able identify the bullies.

Filed under: Bullying Guide: Learning About & Dealing With Bullying

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Bullying Guide

There are many different forms of bullying, it isn’t all physical violence it is also verbal or social abuse, this can be by way of intimidation, making nasty comments and excluding the person. Bullying can consist of threatening, persistent teasing, name calling, ignoring, gossiping and spreading vicious rumours. This done day in day out over a long period of time can have serious effects on your child’s health both physically and mentally.

Stages of bullying

When your child first begins to be bullied the effects can be minor, your child will of course be upset at what is happening to them and may often come home tearful, and they will perhaps go off their food and can also begin to have sleepless nights or bad dreams. If the bullying continues your child will then come up with more and more excuses to not to go to school, they will say they have a stomach ache, headache or other minor illness.

Perhaps if the bullying is taking place in just one or two lessons say for instance PE then they will make excuses just on particular days when they have those lessons. Gradually over a period of time your child will begin to show signs of stress developing; they may look tired and drawn, not sleeping very well, be very nervous and jittery, refuse to go out after school or begin to have panic attacks.

Ideally the problem should never reach this stage because the effects of stress from bullying can lead to self harm and suicide. By this stage you will know something is seriously wrong with your child and probably school will have noticed a big difference in your child too as stress affects learning.

More often than not children are reluctant to tell if they are being bullied due to their own feelings of guilt and shame, only occasionally are they too afraid of the bullies threats to tell.

The four common types of bullying

* Verbal bullying - This type of bullying is very often done by girls; it is a very cruel form of bullying and can have deep lasting affects on your child mentally even when the bullying has been stopped. Verbal bullying consists of name calling, sarcasm, teasing and spreading rumours.

* Social bullying – excluding your child from the group is a popular form of social bullying, bullies of this type will often make your child the scapegoat and humiliate them at every opportunity in front of others.

* Physical bullying – This form of bullying is one used mostly by boys and only occasionally girls, it takes the form of hitting, pinching, poking, pushing, chasing and destroying or stealing possessions.

* Cyber bullying – This form of bullying is becoming more widespread and consists of sending hateful text messages, e-mails or spreading rumours by these methods. Occasionally serious prank phone calls are made to the victim usually to scare them and is a form of bullying favoured by girls.

Whichever form of bullying takes place it can have serious health related issues long after the bullying has been dealt with and stopped, it may take a long time for your child to fully recover from the ordeal particularly if the bullying happened over a long period of time.

The quicker the problem is caught and dealt with the quicker your child can start to put it behind them and get on with their life. Even so your child may need to see a Doctor especially when dealing with the effects of stress.

Filed under: Bullying Guide: Learning About & Dealing With Bullying

Bullying Guide

Anyone who is being bullied will eventually have feelings of shame, guilt and embarrassment, these feelings are only normal when you are being victimised day in and day out over a long period of time. The victim of the bully will eventually begin to ask themselves “why me” and will feel embarrassment, guilt and shame that they can’t stand up to the bully and deal with what is happening to them by themselves.

It is important to remember that in fact there are very few people who could deal with persistent bullying over long periods of time by themselves. Persistent bullies are also called serial bullies and there are primarily four different types of serial bully, the attention seeker, the wannabe, the guru and the sociopath:

The Attention seeker

The attention seeker will always want to be the focus of attention; they are control freaks who are excellent in manipulating people. Signs of the attention seeker are:

* Emotionally insecure and immature.

* Has selective friends for example they can be over sweet to some people, rude and offhand to others and the rest of the people are just ignored.

* Very aggressive to anyone who sees them for what they are.

* Can be over friendly with their chosen target in the beginning, this gives a person a false sense of security.

* Everything that happens to them is a “drama”.

* Prefers not to solve any problems they have in their own life, this way they can continue gaining attention and sympathy.

* Has lots of self pity.

The Wannabe

This type of bully will crave respect for being competent despite severely lacking in competence, signs of the wannabe are:

* An underperformer or achiever.

* Craves undeserved respect and attention.

* Has no qualifications but says they have.

* Or very envious or jealous of others.

* Steals ideas from others and uses them as their own.

* Are very easily provoked and quick to anger.

* Female wannabes will surround themselves with people of the opposite sex delighting in the attention.

* Gives the appearance of loyalty but discards a person when they have served the purpose of the bully.

* Is likely to make friends or have affairs to gain power, status or position.

The Guru

The guru very often has the inability to understand how others feel, signs of the guru are:

* Will do anything to succeed.

* Isn’t very good with people and is often a loner.

* Does not accept responsibility for their own behaviour.

* Emotionally immature and sometimes cold and frigid.

* Puts the blame on others for their own inadequacies.

* Is a frequent liar.

* Often lives in the past rather than the present.

The Sociopath

The sociopath will gain personal satisfaction from power and personal gain and will do anything for their own survival, signs of the sociopath bully are:

* Have a Jekyll and Hyde personality.

* Charming to those that can protect their position.

* Likes to be surrounded by people who are easily manipulated.

* Pursues endless vicious vendettas against anyone they perceive as a threat.

* Enjoys seeing others distress which can either be caused by themselves or others.

* Has no control or limit to their vindictiveness.

Filed under: Bullying Guide: Learning About & Dealing With Bullying

* Over 5000 people commit suicide.

* At least 16 young people or children commit suicide due to bullying.

* At east 19,000 children will have attempted suicide, this is one every half hour.

* For males between the ages of 18 and 24 suicide is the number one cause of death.

* Over 30% of the workforce in the United Kingdom suffer from mental health problems.

Bullying, harassment and abuse causes severe problems with our health these problems are often diagnosed as stress and anxiety but also includes depression.

Strategies for dealing with anger to help eliminate depression

All targets of bullies whatever their age or gender will eventually come to a boiling point if the anger is left to fester and eventually the smallest of irritations can cause an outburst. This trigger could come from our adversaries but more often than not it will come unwittingly from friends or family.

Anger controls a person and when we become angry we lose control, bullies know this and this is what they are aiming for, this is why a bully will constantly provoke you.

By holding in the anger you are risking your health and by expressing your anger with friends and family you are in theory allowing the bully to control you even after the event.

Here are some tips for getting the frustrations out quickly and early:

* Take an empty plastic milk carton and jump up and down on it until you feel better, do this in private of course.

* Visit a counselor or therapist and talk things through.

* Every time you have a negative thought remind yourself “I am responsible for how I feel”.

* Read books on anger management and ways of dealing with stress.

* Save up all your empty glass bottles and take them to a bottle bank, drop them in and hear the glass shatter, breaking glass is thought to be soothing.

It is important to remember that you are not alone in how you feel, all targets of bullies get angry and let the anger build up until it’s uncontrollable. The important thing is to manage this anger and let off steam when you feel the need to but always remain in control of the anger and don’t let it bring you to the brink of serious depression or worse – suicide.

Filed under: Bullying Guide: Learning About & Dealing With Bullying

We have gathered a list of bullying facts to help you get a better understanding of bullying:

* Research has shown that 1 in 6 children are bullied in school.

* Bullying in the workplace varies from country to country, in Norway 5% of the workforce admit to being bullied while in the UK and USA 20% of the workforce say they have encountered bullying in the workplace.

* 1 in 30 workers are serial bullies.

* Bullying can continue for years.

* 84% of workers at some time in their life encounter intimidating behaviour.

* 73% of the workforce are unhappy and say the workplace is oppressive.

* 65% of the workforce won’t speak up out of fear.

* 43% felt a great deal of pressure especially when it came to meeting unrealistic targets.

* 40% of the workforce say they have encountered abusive language.

* 38% of the workforce have been on the receiving end of hurtful jokes or have been the victim of pranks.

* 23% have come across threatening behaviour in the workplace.

* 15% have been on the receiving end of a physical assault.

* 66% of the bullies encountered within the workplace were managers or supervisors.

* 1 in 4 primary school children are bullied more than once or twice a week in any one school term.

* 1 in 10 primary school children are bullied persistently.

* Over 25 children every year commit suicide because of bullying.

* More than a quarter of children get threats of physical violence while in school.

* Bullying against boys is a more frequent occurrence than by girls.

* Around 10% of children have time off school due to bullying.

* Up to 40% of children think teachers have no clue that bullying is happening within the school.

* About 17% of all calls to child help lines are made by children who are being bullied.

* More children in the age group of 12 call child help lines regarding bullying than any other age.

* Almost one third of secondary school children have reported being the object of sexual jokes, gestures or comments.

* Victims of bullying are more likely to suffer from common illnesses such as colds, sore throats and stomach problems.

* By the average age of 23 children who had been bullied in school were found to still suffer from depression and stress related illnesses.

* Nearly 60% of boys who were classified as bullies when they were younger had been convicted of at least one crime by the time they were 23.

Filed under: Bullying Guide: Learning About & Dealing With Bullying