Making peace w/ my former bullies at my 20 year reunion.....

Post Reply New Topic

It seems from reading the forums on here that most aspies on here were bullied (if not physically, they were emotionally tormented like myself) and/or ignored by their peers during those awkward middle school and high school years.

Since my current obsession is learning more about AS and building AS awareness in the NT population, I'm actually considering going to my 20 year high school reunion in 2014 to give a speech about AS and apologize for I may have provoked the other students to pick on me without knowing what I was doing. Then I'd like to make peace with my former tormentors if they are interested.

I was inspired to do this by reading Jodee Blanco's Please Stop Laughing at Me.http://www.amazon.com/Please-Stop-Laugh ... t_ep_dpi_1

Is this idea a crazy fantasy asking for trouble or a worthwhile pursuit? I go back and fourth between the two.......

Whether or not if I have the courage to actually do this will depend on my personal status in 2014 and also the input I get from the other WP members.

I have similar dreams at times, idealized hopes that if something makes sense to me that it can make sense to others as well, given the right amount of explanation.

Personal experience has led me to believe that such things are never understood the way you'd like them to be. I don't think the risk of confusion is worth your dignity. What's more you may inadvertently create a willingness in these individuals to accept a 'blame the victim' interpretation, which may lead to them purging their consciences of any need to feel responsible or contrite.

If you really feel that you didn't know you were provoking other students to give you a hard time I don't see why you should even apologize or what for. I attempted something a bit similar many years before I was diagnosed with AS with my 8th grade Catholic School class. Don't remember much of it but I don't think they cared for anything I had to say and continued to treat me harshly. (Though honestly my apologies are always as I realized backhanded and confusing as sometimes I don't even know what I'm apologizing for). After getting my AS diagnosis years later I've come to the conclusion that I had no fault in my provoking them but if they feel I deserved their treatment I couldn't blame them either much as I really deep down want to. (What did middle school students, let alone Catholic school students, knew about Autism or Asperger's in the late 1990s anyway?)

But I know how it feels to want to be able to confront those parts of the past and set the record straight. Almost had that oppurtunity when my parents were considering sending me to the same Catholic high school as a good number of those kids. In the end, I'm glad we moved instead. I've dealt with them, humiliate myself infront of them a billion times, and have no interest in confronting that part of the past anymore. I now accept that they were just immature teens who will probably deny or have long forgotten the way the treated me if I were to confront them now. And I'm willing to bet dollars to doughnuts a few of them would still say I deserved it, Asperger's or no.

And like Dinosaw says, you might only humiliate yourself doing what you're interested in doing so you might want to put some extra consideration into this.

Last edited by raisedbyignorance on 05 May 2011, 11:41 am, edited 1 time in total.

Don't do it. If they were dicks about/to you then, chances are that hasn't changed. I sometimes fantasize about beating up the boy who used to beat me up at a school reunion but its not worth it.

People become more mature over time, but their inherant personality never changes.

I don't think you should put yourself through it. I toyed with the idea of going to a school reunion once but really, those years are behnid me now and I am thankful that they are.

Nah id love to go to one and show them that im looking good while they arent. I wasn't bullied very much suprisingly, but i still went through school full of anxiety.

Don't apologize.

I didn't go to my 10-year reunion because I'm fairly certain I would've beaten up my worst high-school tormentor if I had.

People grow up, mature and move on with their lives. More than likely the bully will not remember after 5, 10 or 20 years+.

Anyway it would be best that you did not attend the re-union and made a fool of yourself. If the bullies still adversely impact you than you should not attend the re-union. Old wounds may re-open or you may do something that you may regret.

Thanks you all; I've decided not to go. I can increase AS awareness in the NT population in more productive and less potentially humiliating ways. I just got carried away after reading Jodee Blanco's book. Just cuz it worked for her doesn't mean it will work for me.

Chances are that my former tormentors may laugh at the very notion of AS and continue to believe they were just engaging in typical "teenage fun" may not "want" to hear the truth about what did to me. As they say, you can lead a horse to water but you cant make him drink.

I don't think you owe them an apology. It's not like you did it on purpose. They owe you one. If there was anything you did intentionally or thought there were things you could have done better at controlling or could have tried harder, then you can apologize for that. That's how I feel about myself anyway and also feel some of the bullying I got was my fault. After all, that is what got me to change and fake it and start listening to other kids about what is rude and mean. I just wouldn't do that again once told because I wanted to be liked and have friends, lot of them and wanted to get rid of these negative labels kids had on me. I felt I was a bad person and wanted to be good. So it's like they did me a big favor. I should thank them for it. But then it might enabling their reason that bullying is acceptable and should be okay and encourage their kids to bully someone so they would change and stop it so maybe not a good idea. So no I shouldn't thank my bullies nor other kids for gossiping about me and them not understanding me. Because it might enable them to do it and encourage them and make them encourage their kids to do it.

um. Some people never grow up.

They don't all grow up, they don't all feel bad about what they did.

In my opinion if you do this, you're making a complete fool of yourself. I've done the whole "speech" thing before and now I cringe.

i think you could sitll go; you could still talk with people there and bring up aspergers. but you'd just bring it up and explain how it drives you to make decisions differently. and leave it to that. they will likely apologize to you; but you neednt try to expect them like some disney fairytale, and be prepared for people to not care.

good luck with working through this and similar situations.

I'd recommend not saying anything, keep five topics in your mind, something easy for people to respond to. Most of the people in the room will have something in their past or recent past to occupy their minds. If you wait for a bit chances are you'll be treated to a floor show of the people resolving their differences with unknown results.

What your saying and thinking is constructive, but I don't think it's going to be easy to achieve a good result.

You don't have to appologise to them. You never did anything wrong and certainly were not responsible for being picked on. As far as they're concerned it will be a very long time ago and they will have moved on with their lives and probably forgotten about school mostly, whereas for you it may be still fresh in your mind. I'd say go in with an attitude of "it was a long time ago and we all have new and different lives now".