The Bully

From the time I was little, I was a bully.

I bullied my father. I'd stand up tall, look him dead in the eye, and tell him every single thing he did wrong. It was almost like I came out of the womb knowing how to bite back at the world around me. Maybe inherited it from him. "Mean as hell" is what he called me. And somehow, he said it like it was a compliment. It made him smile, and for a long time I was daddy's little girl. I did exactly what he taught me. Even to him.

He had one way of dealing with conflict: "If someone pisses you off, walk right up and bop 'em in the nose." So that’s what I did. Weekly, I punched my little brother right in the nose if he pissed me off. Weekly my little brother cried with blood running down his face. Dad never told me to stop. If anything, he cheered me on. He and his friends used to watch us fight while they got drunk, laughing like it was an underground pay-per-view.

That all changed when I turned sixteen. My brother had outgrown me in height and strength. That day in the front yard, he beat my face in with a cordless telephone. After the fight, I stood up, chin high, and said, “Yeah, you better not ever do that again,” like I’d won. Then I went to my room, shut the door, and cried until I fell asleep.

And I didn't just bully my brother physically. I witnessed him suffering and struggling with life, and instead of seeing his pain, I ignored it. Told myself I had to live through the same things he did, and it just pushed me harder to get out of it. But that wasn't truth. My brother received the worst abuse from my father. I didn't see it then, because I was suffering and didn't see it in me either. My only focus was getting far away, and it didn't matter that I left my brother alone with my father.

I don't regret a lot of things in life, but how I treated my brother still weighs on my heart, and to be completely honest I'm still trying to forgive myself for it.

My brother has been lost for a while now. Last time I heard he was living on the streets of Atlanta somewhere. Last time I spoke to him, he had no idea who I was to him.

Away from home, I didn’t always show that side. We moved so often. From one city to the next through Texas, Florida, Georgia, two towns and one city in Tennessee by the time I was ten. In some schools, I was shy. In others, goofy. But I started getting picked on around age ten, after I tried to dye my hair blonde at home and ended up with bright orange hair, like the pop singer Vitamin C. One girl on my school bus wouldn’t let up about it. her name was Laura Miller, an eighth grader who towered over me in height.

I finally told my dad about her. He gave me a line to use: “Next time she says something, I want you to walk right up to her and say, ‘If you want a piece of this, come get it.’”

I was so excited that I had his permission. The next morning, I got on that school bus, walked straight up to her, and said the line exactly as he told me. She didn’t say a word. She stood up, grabbed me by my hair, and beat me up and down the aisle of the bus. My sister joined in to try and help me, but I got completely destroyed.

When the bus arrived at school, our parents were called. We were sent home. My dad asked, “Did you win?” I told him no, shame all over my face. But he said he was proud of me anyway, for standing up to her.

From that point on, I fought at school all the time. If anyone said anything about me, I’d say, “Okay, meet me in the parking lot.” And I meant it. Laura taught me how to fight dirty in our fight. I also learned being the first to attack was important. The impact energetically carried the whole fight. I also developed a method for preparation. I would pause and shake out my whole body before the fight. Then, I was ready.

At my first high school, the coaches would literally watch me fight instead of breaking it up. They liked it. Just like my dad. They’d wait until the fight was over, then tell us to leave the parking lot. Occasionally, a teacher would see and I’d get suspended. But no one ever really tried to stop it or asked why.

The summer after eighth grade, I discovered alcohol. Dad drank, so I drank. When I drank, I got mean. Angry. Just pissed off. A lot like dad. My liquor of choice was always whiskey. I vaguely remember a party on a farm, drinking tons of shots. A guy kept picking on me and I chased him around a barn until I couldn't run any more, trying to catch him. He was faster than me, and he just kept laughing.

Then came another move from Tennessee to Louisiana. Only one girl talked to me during my first week at the new school. The rest ignored me completely. Back in Tennessee, I was kind of popular. I was a cheerleader. A good one, too. All star at cheer camp two years in a row. I had just made the varsity team when my dad decided to move us overnight after my stepmother disappeared in the middle of the night with someone she met online.

In Louisiana, I couldn’t try out for the cheer team. You had to be on the pep squad for two years first. And pep squad? That meant cheering for the cheerleaders, from the bleachers. I was like, hell no.

That’s when I found the Dogwood crew, kids from our neighborhood who always had access to drugs. The first time I hung out with them, one kid was high on ecstasy. I thought he was special needs. I’d never seen someone high before.

I liked weed. I’d tried it once in Tennessee and had a blast. But in Louisiana, it was always around. I smoked a lot. I also started stealing my dad’s pain meds. Every morning before school, I’d take some pills and smoke half a blunt. The other half I saved for after school. I’d show up to class and immediately fall asleep. Most of the teachers were coaches, and they liked me, so somehow I kept passing.

One day in English class, I was trying to sleep and Walter Marshall wouldn’t stop picking on me. Walter was 6’2, varsity football. I don’t remember what he was saying, but he wouldn’t shut up. I told him, “Walter, you need to fucking leave me alone.” He didn’t.

So I got up, walked over and his smug smile, and hit him in the nose as hard as I could.

Quicker than I could process, he had me by the shoulders and lifted me up off the floor. I was flailing like a worm in midair, screaming at him to put me down. He just shook me hard and yelled, “Calm down, Jenny!” with blood running down from his nose.

I got suspended. Again.

It was sometime after my hundredth rewatch of Scarface that I decided I wanted to sell weed. I didn’t like cocaine, I tried it once in 11th grade and that was enough. But weed? I could sell that. So I bought a stash from a guy who lived beside us, at the edge of the ghetto in Haughton, Louisiana. I got cute little baggies and even researched how much to put in each one. I was excited.

But as I was packaging it, I realized the guy had shorted me. Badly. I was fucking teenager girl pissed. I had spent what felt like a lot of money, and I hated the idea that he thought he could cross me and get away with it.

So I threw on a huge white fuax fur coat I had just stolen from the mall, grabbed a baseball bat from my dad’s truck, and walked straight into the neighborhood. I knew where he’d be. Working on his go-kart, by the fire pit.

It was night time, but the fire was lit so I knew he'd be there. I walked to him with no fear, pointed the bat right at him, caught his eye and locked it in as I yelled, “If you don’t give me all of my fucking weed, I’m going to beat the shit out of your cart!”

His eyes got big. He put his hands up and said, “Damn, Jenny, okay.”

He walked toward a big trash pile, lifted something on the edge, and pulled out a bag. Walked over and handed it to me.

I was shocked it went that smoothly. I thought he'd push back or deny. I didn’t say anything. Just walked back home, repackaged my weed, and sold it all.

And then I realized: I didn’t want to hang out in the ghetto and sell weed. I watched Requiem for a Dream, freaked out because I knew people who were starting to behave like the characters in the movie. I left the druggie scene.

Found God and Bob Marley, and started reading everything I could get my hands on for healing, and still smoked a lot of weed, because it truly calmed me. I quit drinking by the age of 16, and didn't pick it back up until I was 22.

If you know me now, as an earth-loving Pilates instructor whose passion is helping people heal, you’re probably thinking, “WTF?” or “You’d never guess you lived like that.” And honestly, yeah that's because of how hard I worked to leave that version of me behind. I put her in a box, and I refused to let her out.

I didn’t let many people in throughout my young adult life. I didn’t talk about my suffering. I believed that if I had lived through it, and survived it, then I had already moved on from it. But that wasn’t true, it lived in my body like an undertow of energy.

A lot of the issues that surfaced in my 30s, especially in relationships, came straight from those old, deeply rooted beliefs formed in my early childhood trauma. Beliefs like: I should be proud of how much pain I can endure. That pushing myself to the edge and burning out made me valuable. That my body didn’t deserve tenderness, or rest, or respect. That I needed to constantly protect myself by controlling just how close someone could get to hurting me.

But those beliefs didn’t start in my 30s. They started long before. That’s why I’m sharing them now.

Because I don’t just see what's in front of me anymore. I see what’s underneath. When someone says, “That person hurt me,” I learned we don't stop don’t there. We ask ourselves: Where was I not listening to myself? What did I let slide? What did I learn that told me I had to take it?

That kind of self-accountability hurts. But it also frees you.

I’ve learned that forgiveness and compassion have to start with me.

And I’ll be real with you, there was a time someone called me out directly. My own personal bully once said to me, “You’re fake. And your Instagram is fake.”

At the time, I was furious. But deep down… she wasn’t wrong. I was only sharing the light, the beauty, the quotes. I was posting the words that were helping me survive... but not the pain I was actually surviving. Not the rage or the anger I was experiencing. I wasn’t sharing the authentic energy used while posting about my life. I wasn’t showing the fire I walked through to even understand them.

But here’s the truth:

I don’t hate the bully in me. I no longer feel I have to hide her from the world. She's my own mini Hulk. She is a protector that will forever live in me.

I don't hate those who bully me. The ones who love us throughout life fuel us with the reflection of goodness inside ourselves. The ones who hate and hurt us teach us to transform pain into goodness. They are the catalyst to our deepest unraveling and rebuilding.

And to this day, the mini Hulk in me still returns when my spirit feels like she’s needed. She just shows up differently now. A lot less baseball bats and punching. If you've been close enough to me to witness her, you know she's not the cutest, but she is important to me on my journey through life. I will not judge or shame this piece of myself.

The world’s changed. This generation has birthed a new kind of bully. One who doesn’t throw punches, they send messages. They post about you online. They talk in code on Instagram. It's all digital now, but it still stings. Research discussed in The Body Keeps Score supports that emotional abuse lights up the brain in the same way as physical abuse, especially if there's a history of physical abuse and emotional abuse.

And yet... the bully is still the same.

Still a hurt person, trying to hurt others. Still trying to feel powerful. Still trying to prove they’re untouchable, unbothered, above it all.

But it’s actually the opposite.

Because that need to dominate, to tear someone down, to strike first, that comes from fear. From the belief that if they don't control the room, they'll be consumed by it.

It’s so easy to look at a bully and say, “They’re a bad person.” But the bully is only one part of them. Just like she is only one part of me.

And if I can learn to meet that part of myself with understanding, maybe I can meet others that way too.

Because I know now: the seed of anger… is sadness.

If you find yourself relating to me, and you’re asking yourself, How can I apply these words to my life? What can I do today to take more accountability for the role I play in my own life and in others’? Or what could I possibly learn from the pain I felt or inflicted years ago?

I’d say, start with therapy.

It was one of the best things I’ve ever done for myself. I made getting help a priority. At the time, it felt embarrassing. I was in such a low space, and even saying “I need help” made me feel exposed and weak. But I did it. I asked. Not just for help in general, but for the kind of help that felt right for me.

And when you start asking for what’s actually best for you, not everyone is going to be supportive. Some people will just plain be mad about. Some will think you're being selfish. Some will talk behind your back. Some will have opinions and suggestions about how you're handling things. I want you to know that’s okay. That discomfort is actually a crucial part of the healing process.

It's a lesson in itself: Who do I really want to trust? Who gets a say in my choices?

And the first answer should always be yourself.

Your body already knows the direction you need to go. You just have to listen. Not force it, not silence it, but listen. Your body has a feeling about every choice you make and every thought you have.

But there are incredible therapist out there who can help set the pace for your healing journey and guide you comfortably so that you don't relive trauma indefinitely. The right therapist will teach to how to hear the messages from the body. Slowly building a safe connection with the body again.

After trauma, our brains rewires itself to our body, and it takes a long time to reset those wires. Starting thinking of this journey much like you're fitness journey. No quick fixes or quantum leaps any where. It requires more than consistency. It requires dedication and grace.

The second thing I would recommend is to volunteer.

I volunteer with men in recovery, because I understand and have a deep compassion for those who suffer from substance abuse because of the pain it still causes my father.

But if you’re able, volunteer with kids who struggle in the same way you did. Being around children pulls out something honest and playful and real. Authentic energy is incredibly healing. It reminds you of the parts of yourself that existed before the pain. It brings you back to your softness.

And beyond that, you get the chance to be someone you never had growing up. You get to be the protector, the guide, the safe place.

That kind of healing doesn't just move through you. It ripples out. And that’s where the real transformation happens.