Article January 9, 2012 Issue

When your best friends bully you

Name withheld

Four years ago my family and I decided to enroll me in our local middle school. This meant that I’d have to leave the private girls’ school I had attended since pre-school. I was going into sixth grade and it was hard to leave my school and friends. I went from a class of 50 girls to a co-ed class of 300. I had worn a uniform my whole life and in my new school I could wear whatever I wanted. The new school came as a shock to me at first, but as the days went by, I was adjusting more and more to a whole new environment. 

Before long I became especially close with two girls in my class. But as I became greater friends with them, I started drifting farther away from the person who I held myself to be as a Christian Scientist. I became infatuated with my social life. I gave less effort to my grades, my relationship with my family, and most important, my relationship with God. I had gone to Sunday School and attended camps for Christian Scientists my entire life and my parents were very devoted to the Cause of Christian Science. I’d had many healings, but felt like I had never really comprehended what God truly was and what He did for me every single day. Christian Science and God seemed less important to me as I became more and more preoccupied with social status, beauty—basically being popular.

At the end of sixth grade it all started to fall apart. One of my best friends began bullying another friend. She would cyberbully by posting mean messages about this girl online, and even physically hit her sometimes. I became filled with fear that she would turn on me as well, so I didn’t do or say anything. I didn’t turn to Christian Science and pray about this problem when it faced me. I also didn’t tell my parents or any adults at my school . . . yet.