I used to be a pushover

Hello,

Today I want to write about what I think has had an impact on my health indirectly throughout my life. I usually give stress as one of the core reasons why I ended up becoming sick. And I think a part of that stress was due to that I used to be quite the pushover when I was younger.

When I was 7 years old I got bullied by my peers a lot. This was not directly caused by my peers, but by my teacher, who purposely provoked my peers into bullying me. Yes, it was that kind of teacher. She made someone the joke of the class with every new class she got. If I was aware of the concept of child abuse at that age, she'd probably be in jail now. At least she would not have been working there.

I can't directly say that this is what turned me into a pushover but, it definitely affected my self-esteem to this day. I was the kind of pushover that was often unable to say no and very often I just wanted to please people. And many people abused this trait. I have often done things for people just because I did not want to disappoint them. Or behaved a certain way because I did not want people to hate me or bully me for it. And I did not know how to behave around people anymore because of this.

The interesting thing is because I used to be a pushover I started to see who my real friends where. When I started to slowly become more aware of my flaws which aren't completely gone by the way, I started to notice how some people were trying to manipulate me when I started saying "NO". Or I don't have time. Even going so far as whom I thought was a real friend who ended up threatening me with violence because he thought I was whining. Wich even if it is true, real friends don't do that shit. And then one night when a friend of mine wanted me to come over, I said no because I already promised another friend I would go, whereafter he started screaming and trying to make me feel guilty because of his own bad life, wich ended our friendship. I never had a single regret about that.

Being aware of this tho, it did cause a lot of trust issues for me. I lost confidence not only in myself as a person to communicate well with people. I also lost confidence in other people's good intentions. And until this day when I talk to a new person, with some people I'm always very skeptical about whether I can trust their intentions or not.

But things are looking better today. I still want to please people around me, but on my own terms. I stand up for myself when I feel like I have to. I don't get angry quickly though. Only when I feel I have been severely mistreated. To me not being a pushover does not mean that I should not respect people. Common courtesy is something I hold dear to a degree and is an important principle of mine. It did leave me a bit anti-social and introverted, but I'm working on it.

I wanted to share this story. I hope you found this interesting. Love to hear your view and experiences.

Have a great day