Less Than Human

"Isolation is the cruelest of punishments, and it had never occurred to me that I was something less than human... Survival was my only hope, success my only revenge." - Patricia Cornwell in Postmortem.

When I read this sentence, the 1st memory that came to mind was that of my childhood. The only child, straight back home after school & forbidded to interact with anyone outside of school hours. It may or may not have shaped me into the social outcast I turned out to be. But I was definitely a shy & quiet child. As a result, I didn't have many friends in school. As I went into Upper Primary, I became the victim of relentless name calling & bullying becoz I am fat & quiet all the way through Secondary School.

I remember once we had to scale a high wall during PE & we had to help one another by grabbing their calves as they jumped up & give them the additional boost over the wall. When it was my turn, nobody came forward. Not a single 1. They allowed me to fall backwards. Unlike Scarpetta (the lead character in Postmortem), I wasn't thinking of survival or revenge. I only felt lousy. I knew I was unwanted. But surprisingly, I still turned up at school everyday. I hadn't learnt avoidance or escapance yet. What is self esteem? As far as I know, I didn't have 1. It really never ocurred to me that I was something less than human. My coping mechanism was to ignore which in retrospect probably was the best solution to it all. Despite not deriving the satisfaction of illiciting a reaction from me, they kept at it. It wasn't just the boys, it was the girls too.

I recently saw on FB, a picture of 1 of the guys who used to call me names. I can no longer remember what they called me but it was along the lines of fatso or fatty bonbon or something. He is probably twice as fat as I am now & I'm nowhere near slim. I don't feel like I've been avenged or anything like that. I just felt that it was reinforced to me that I should strive to always be kind becoz it was proven to me that what goes around does comes around.

Nevertheless, I did survive Secondary School. I'm still awkward socially, preferring to write than speak. But I say all sorts of nonsense to hubs & he thinks I'm hilarious. I can't baby talk to friends' kids but I do it all the time with Ah Ton. I'm glad that I've come a long way since then. I know my worth & nobody can tell me otherwise. I'm a survivor.