[h4ch1]

Not bullied in school since I could usually hold my own, but bullied by my father throughout my life. Being in a country where parental corporal punishment is normal, even encouraged, I was hit for minor to major (getting bad marks, staying out late to play with friends) events all throughout my life till I could save up enough to move out when I was 18.

It took me my entire college life to get over the feeling of dread of an incoming kick or slap to my face when I said something that would be confrontational, it made it incredibly difficult for me to say no to things because any sort of response that wasn't in line with what an authority figure wanted would give me major fight-or-flight rendering me useless. Even at this point I avoid conflict but have done much better to face my fears and build the ability to speak my mind confidently.

The PTSD made me leave my consultancy that I worked incredibly hard to build with a professor and a senior because they were working me to the ground and I didn't have the ability to say anything. Even at this moment the remnants of my past make me fearful of even applying for jobs even though I know I have a skillset that's industry standard.

Bullying in any shape or form is horrible and can have lifelong consequences on your psyche. To those who perpetrate it or stand by and do nothing, please reconsider that it may affect someone's life as negatively as it has affected mine.

Apologies for the rant, more power to those who feel they cannot stand up for themselves.

[gomijacogeo]

Yeah, my dad was my first bully too. First at my mom and then shifted towards me once I got old enough to have independent thoughts and interests (around 6-7). Led to me being a twitchy, withdrawn kid which garnered more negative attention at school.

[em-bee]

i am sorry you had to go through this. my dad wasn't as bad. from todays perspective what i experienced looks more like loss of self-control than intentional action. in any case i probably would never have been able to stand up for myself. partly because the outbursts were always connected to something we did, so it was easy to see it like the reason or the trigger was caused by us, and not my dad just being in a bad mood. like what you experienced. we blamed ourselves and didn't have any way to defend ourselves.

however, once my dad was going at my one year younger brother, and for some reason i had enough. interestingly i can't even remember my brother being a target before that, so maybe that was why it was to much for me. it wasn't something i was used to seeing.

i got between the two and pushed my dad against the wall, and told him "that's enough". i was not strong by any means but strong enough to do that.

that was the end of it.

the key element of that experience is that while i never tried to defend myself, something in that situation triggered me to defend my brother. and we were not close as brothers go. and still are not, this brother in particular. so the desire to protect and stand up for others is what helped me to get out of this experience.

i can still sense something like what you feel when someone is going at me. but if anyone is going at someone that i am somehow responsible for or have the ability to support, be it people under me in my team, or children or my partner or even friends, then my reaction is different. at a minimum i will get the person out of harms way and have them going at me instead.

i don't know if this is helpful to anyone. i suppose that wanting to protect others helps me tolerate abuse better. but the other thing i learned from that is to simply walk away when the abuse gets to much. i have cut of contact with anyone who is in any way critical of any aspect of my life or my work. i just don't have the desire to defend myself, and i don't need that kind of unfounded criticism. (i love constructive criticism however, and find that very helpful, so it's not like i can't tolerate any criticism at all)

[leechy]

In some ways you became the person you would have needed as a kid. Now relax, you done good and broke the cycle of abuse.

[em-bee]

thank you!

you became the person you would have needed as a kid

pretty much, yes. it took me decades to understand that myself.

i still sometimes loose my temper with my own kids, but once i noticed my kids copying my own behavior i started reflecting on that and try to avoid repeating the same mistakes.

the kids also helped me realize how much of what i do, both positive and negative is a reflection of my childhood. the same is true for my wife. and really, how could it be otherwise?

growing up is how we learn how to raise children. it's not school, or anywhere else.

this is a sort of different topic but i feel that this simple realization does not really reflect in public policy.

everyone seems to think that good education is enough to give people a better life. but little emphasis is placed on helping parents who are struggling. (and by helping i mean not taking the kids away, but provide services that lighten the parents load)

[sekh60]

You are a good person.

[taskforcegemini]

> Not bullied in school since I could usually hold my own, but bullied by my father throughout my life. Being in a country where parental corporal punishment is normal, even encouraged, I was hit for minor to major (getting bad marks, staying out late to play with friends) events all throughout my life till I could save up enough to move out when I was 18.

> It took me my entire college life to get over the feeling of dread of an incoming kick or slap to my face when I said something that would be confrontational, it made it incredibly difficult for me to say no to things because any sort of response that wasn't in line with what an authority figure wanted would give me major fight-or-flight rendering me useless. Even at this point I avoid conflict but have done much better to face my fears and build the ability to speak my mind confidently.

> The PTSD made me leave my consultancy that I worked incredibly hard to build with a professor and a senior because they were working me to the ground and I didn't have the ability to say anything. Even at this moment the remnants of my past make me fearful of even applying for jobs even though I know I have a skillset that's industry standard.

> Bullying in any shape or form is horrible and can have lifelong consequences on your psyche. To those who perpetrate it or stand by and do nothing, please reconsider that it may affect someone's life as negatively as it has affected mine.

> Apologies for the rant, more power to those who feel they cannot stand up for themselves.

Thank you for writing this, it helped me realize something about some issues I have.

[yungporko]

i also experienced bullying from a parental figure and quickly enter fight or flight mode as a result, which for me almost always leans towards fight. unfortunately for me that does not work well at all in office environments where you're supposed to be excessively fake and friendly and rely on passive aggression.

in the past i've ended up snapping at coworkers and saying stuff like "either tell me what your problem is or keep your bitchy comments to yourself" which obviously makes me the aggressor in the eyes of management. of course by the time i go back to "normal mode" and think about whether it's better to bite my tongue rather than say anything, i've already said it.

[orwin]

Wow, try to change team. Is he working at the same level as you?

I only know 1 ex-coworker that was passive aggressive, and he was one of my managers, along with two other fake-friendly managers who were mostly inofensive. Luckily I wasn't the first target, and well, he targeted the most competent dev in the building, who also was a tad too honest. Didn't ended well, and by the time is axe went for my head, my product was mostly done and I was ready to go.

[imadierich]

tbh two different people gain two different lessons being raised this way. your experience is unique. others have went to the military and/or had tough dads and it made them completely better as a person. "bullying" is a natural part of human life. its always up to the person to be courageous and get through. Your personal perspective is apart of current societies views on it...plus your own. there are kids who had no father with no discipline and ended up worse than you likely. choose your battles with parents because the hardest lessons come with the greatest rewards

[yungporko]

i think you're getting discipline and bullying confused, they're very different things. discipline is of course necessary, but going through life walking on eggshells because you don't know exactly what is going to set your dad off but you know it's coming for one reason or another because he's clearly in a bad mood is not having a "tough dad", and does not make anybody better as a person.

in order to hold this opinion, you either have to not actually know what it's like to experience parental bullying, or you have to be in complete denial.

[illiac786]

Very much agree. It is a very common way to justify one's bullying, by calling it discipline. But the truth is, if there aren't any clear rules and it's up to one's mood, then it's bullying.

[daddydearest]

Exactly. The only lesson my dad taught me is to be around him as little as possible, and to be as invisible as possible when I did have to be in the same room with him. I never knew what would make him explode.

[jraph]

Absence of bullying doesn't mean absence of discipline.

In no situation bullying is a good thing. Bullying is devastating and an unhealthy way of teaching things.

You comment is basically saying "bullying didn't work on you because you were too weak". That's borderline victim shaming and completely insensitive.

Courage has nothing to do with coping with bullying, and you should not need courage for daily interactions with your parents who ought to be your support instead.

You need validation and constructive criticism to grow and bullying is kinda the opposite of this. This validation and constructive criticism will give you the chance to build up self confidence which, in turn, may also you to grow a "thick skin". No need for bullying, which usually takes away your self confidence.

[danielheath]

> Absence of bullying doesn't mean absence of discipline.

If you're caught and punished immediately every single time you do X, you develop the internal discipline to avoid doing X almost instantly. A mild punishment is ample in this case - for many children saying "you know that isn't right" is sufficient.

If you're caught only 10% of the time you do X, whether the punishment is mild or severe, the lesson is "don't get caught". No severity of punishment is a deterrent to those who do not believe they will be caught.

Essentially, if kids aren't being called out for misbehavior reliably, it doesn't matter how severe the punishment is (because kids have poor judgement & don't think they'll be caught _this_ time). If they _are_ being called out for misbehavior reliably, they know they aren't going to get away with it - so the punishment only needs to be unpleasant enough to make a poor trade for whatever advantages the behavior has.

Further, parents occasionally mis-identify the situation and kids get falsely accused (when perhaps a sibling actually did it). A severe punishment undermines parental authority in a way that a "I'm disappointed that this happened" conversation does not.

I'd argue that this makes what's typically referred to as "parental bullying" the opposite of effective discipline training. Severe punishments handed out haphazardly teach you not to be identified as a culprit.

[saltcured]

To make matters worse, it's a whole spectrum rather than some clear delineation between constructive discipline and psyche ruining abuse.

On the constructive end, you have feedback and learning that can improve someone. It reinforces healthy feelings encouraging positive and discouraging negative behavior, both for the individual and for their expectations of others.

On the destructive end, randomized punishment leads to neurosis. Without any proper correlation between actions and consequences, the recipient develops fear and agitation without any useful training on how to improve outcomes. As I recall, this is a textbook result even in lab rats. It doesn't require the complexity of the human psyche.

In between, you can still have things like PTSD or the "walking on egg shells" mentioned upthread. In this broad gray area, one might at best learn avoidance of abusers or toxic environments. Or one might infer that they are punished for their mere existence, which could channel into all sorts of detrimental coping strategies.

Another result can be generalized anxiety. One might learn that the world is just full of random threat, rather than taking the more personal view that the abuse is punishment focused on the self.

[jraph]

I more or less agree, and I'm not sure to identify your stance wrt to bullying / punishing, etc.

In any case, for me, calling out your child's bad behavior is not bullying the child.