It’s anti bullying week so here at MAC we have decided to make all the parents and juniors aware of what can be done to prevent this.

“As adults, if someone harasses us, we don’t have to deal with that person anymore. But children are legally obligated to share space with their harassers at school all day, every weekday. Its torment”

– Dr. Joel Haber, author of “Bullyproof your child for life”

We have all experienced some form of bullying as a child or dreaded going into school at some point. But imagine the feeling of real dread every single weekday day morning, knowing that your day will just be as bad as the other day or even worse. Now imagine your just a child in that circumstance, and that you don’t feel that you even have a way out.

As an adult we have the skills to just ignore or avoid a bully if you wish not to deal with it directly, you understand that there are more paths to take than you one in front of you. Unfortunately though, as an adult you may not understand or forgotten what it was to be a child and the fact that they often only see the one path. The path that has the bully standing directly in front of them. The path that is painful for them to walk every day.

In today’s world there are many more forms of bullying than a few decades ago. With availability of internet access and mobile phones being introduced to younger children the bully has a variety of ways to torment and harass their victim. With the new forms of bullying comes the possible group bullying, and the victims not feeling safe even when they are at home.

“We cannot continue to dismiss bullying as harmless, almost inevitable, part of growing up”

School crime study reports that only a third of all bullying cases are reported to their parents by their child. This means that 2 out of 3 children don’t tell their parents they are victims of bullying. This is a huge amount of cases that go unreported and those same children have to deal with their torment alone. It is a very gloomy world when you think you are alone to deal with your tormentor.

But why don’t they report it?

There are many reasons why a child may feel they can’t speak up and feel the better option is just to stay and suffer. Of course just suffering more should never be an option.

Some reasons are listed below and may give you an idea of what may be going through the mind of a victim:

• Being seen as weak or a tattletale. Feeling helpless or trying to gain control by themselves
• Fear the bully will find out and it may get worse
• The fear of humiliation, and not wanting the adults to know what is said about them, or judged by adults.
• Feeling no one cares or would understand
• Fear rejection by peers and losing friends

In the next blog I will be discussing the signs that indicate that your child may be a victim of bullying.