Dear Bully ...

I was stunned to get your email on classmates.com. The one where you apologized for the years of bullying you handed out when we were in junior high and high school.

It's been decades since I've even thought of your name, and here you pop up in my mailbox, unannounced and unwelcome.

You want to know if I'm well, if I'm happy. You say I deserve to be after all the shit you handed out. You want me know know you think I was one tough kid.

Let me fill you in:

Scarcely a day has gone by when I haven't suffered the effects of poor self esteem. It turned my high school experience into a tightwire act, where I willed myself to present a solid front so no one would know what I failure I really was. I didn't question the fact that I had no friends -- you told me every day that I was not worthy of friends, that I stunk and that I looked and acted bizarre.

It made college tough. Tormented for years on the school bus, I guess I had come to believe no one would like me, so it didn't surprise me to feel left out at college, either. I remember one of the most pleasant feelings was of being hidden, alone, in the carrels at the back of the university library. I remember thinking, "No one in the world knows or cares where I am." It was an awesome realization -- no one would miss me if I didn't come home, but no one could find me to harass me, either.

I bristle like a porcupine every time I'm forced into a human interaction. Oh, I'm facile enough with strangers, I like to chitchat in the grocery store line, people think I'm outgoing and extroverted. What they don't know is that I'm fine when I'm on my own ground -- when I start the conversation or am sought out. It's when I'm alone in a crowd that I feel naked, without skin. I imagine everyone is laughing at what I am wearing, at how I look. I worry that I stink though I know my personal hygiene is better than most. I am conscious of where my hands are at all times -- I don't want people to think I pick my nose or touch my private parts, all things you whispered and yelled at me while we were on the bus. If I had my coat over me to protect me from the brutal cold, you insisted I was playing with myself under there. If I hid it over my head to cry, you said I must be digging for boogers.

I'm 45 years old right now and it still makes me cry.

My career has been both brilliant and disappointing. I am never confident of my work, or I'm overconfident and become a bully myself. I force people to see things my way, and when they don't I get devastated and disappointed. I've often been told that I can dish it out but I can't take it, and it's true. I like to tease other people -- tease, not taunt or torment -- and yet I can't bear it when I'm the brunt of the teasing.

I am successful by material measures, but feel no joy in what I do. For I know I'm a fake. I know you know the real me, the one who lives in near poverty out on a farm, the one who doesn't have new clothes, whose hair won't lie flat, whose shoes are old and who is constantly disorganized as she rushes for the bus, half hoping every day that she'll miss it. Knowing the consequence for missing the bus would be missing a day of school, the one place she felt competent. I had to force myself to take a deep breath and climb those bus steps, but I couldn't force myself not to do it, either.

I think you could say my relationship history is one that's a failure as well. I've been married, twice, and neither man really loved me. Or maybe they did and I didn't know it, because I have a very hard time accepting love. Every word of criticism or sideways look was like a cruel lash to me. They tried to be careful, but no one can be careful enough around a person who doesn't have skin. I walk around every day feeling like I have no skin. Even a drop of rain can sear me, because I have no protection.

So regardless of how sincere your apology is, or the reason you wrote it, I can't forgive you. I want to beat the living daylights out of you. I want to throw all those thousands of punches I held every time you put gum in my hair or flicked me hard on the head with a knuckle or taunted me or told someone who mistakenly sat near me that they'd get cooties if they didn't move.

I realize now that it wasn't that they didn't like me nearly as much as that they were thankful to me for being the brunt of your teasing. They were guilty on some level for not standing up for me, for not standing up to you, but they were also quite relieved that it was me -- not them -- that was your target.

As I got older, I came to see this as my role. I was the target for abuse, and this helped protect others from the same thing. I wouldn't tolerate you beating on anyone else -- I remember pulling you off someone. I couldn't protect myself, but I could protect the others. Bring it on, bitch, bring it on. I can take it.

And you will Never. See. Me. Cry. You will never see the rivers of tears and the canyons full of sobs you caused in my life. Your teasing, your constant and brutal bullying caused something to change in my brain. Being told enough times that I sucked made it true. I believed it, I knew it, but I had to hide that I knew from you. I became arrogant, pretended I was better than you, but ... we both knew the truth. I was a fake.

And I'm still a fake in much of my life. I wonder sometimes who I really am. Who was I before I started riding that bus? Who was I before I endured an hour or more every day of name calling and abuse? Who was I before I got sick at the idea that you MIGHT torment me, so sick that my stomach was in knots whether you did or not. Sometimes when you did hurt me it was a relief, because I didn't have to wait for you to do it.

You get nothing from me. No answer, no forgiveness, no understanding. You were old enough to know better. You were old enough to know better.

The Impostor Syndrome

I'm a fake. They made a mistake hiring me, and they'll fire me when they figure it out.

It's called "the impostor syndrome," and it's all about low self-esteem and not being able to internalize -- believe -- our successes while being all too willing to accept our failures.

This syndrome is common among bright women, especially gifted women who find themselves pushed to the head of the class, admitted to the best schools, hired to important positions. A feeling of panic can well up, a sense of dread, a paralyzing fear of "Oh my god, what have they done?" It's often possible to "fake it" for years. The dread never leaves, the fear of not being good enough is always there, but the work is usually done anyway. (And, ironically, it's usually brilliant work, but that's because we're lucky, or it's a fluke.)

It's time to get over it. A woman named Dr. Valerie Young has these tips to overcoming the syndrome on her site The Impostor Syndrome. There is a lot of information there on what the syndrome is, too.

Here are her ideas, in a nutshell. Read the full descriptions on her site:

1. Break the silence. We don't need to be ashamed of feeling this way. Many of us do.
   
2. Separate feelings from fact. Sometimes we all feel stupid, but just because we feel that way doesn't mean we are.
   
3. Recognize when you might tend to feel fraudulent. If you're one of the first or few women in your field it would be natural to feel like you don't fit in. Take your self-doubt for what it is: A normal response to being an outsider.
   
4. Accentuate the positive. We excel, in part, because we seek perfection. The trick is to stop obsessing. Do a good job when it matters most; forgive yourself when mistakes happen -- they will happen.
   
5. Develop a new response to failure and mistake making. Instead of beating yourself up for making a perfectly human mistake, see if you can learn from it and move on.
   
6. Right the rules. If you’ve been operating under misguided rules like, “I should always know the answer,” or “Never ask for help,” start asserting your rights. You have just as much right as the next person to be wrong, have an off-day, or ask for assistance.
   
7. Develop a new script. When you start something new, instead of automatically telling yourself, “Wait till they find out I have no idea what I’m doing,” try thinking, “Everyone who starts something new feels off-base in the beginning. I may not know all the answers but I’m smart enough to find them out.”
   
8. Visualize success. Do what professional athletes do. Spend time beforehand picturing yourself making a successful presentation or calmly posing your question in class. It sure beats picturing impending disaster and will help with performance-related stress.
   
9. Reward yourself. Break the cycle of continually seeking ­ and then dismissing ­ validation outside of yourself by learning to pat yourself on the back.
   
10. Fake it ‘til you make it. Now and then we all have to fly by the seat of our pants. Instead of considering “winging it” as proof of your ineptness learn to do what many high achievers do and view it as a skill. Courage comes from taking risks. Change your behavior first and allow your confidence to build.

I like that last one the best. It's one of my greatest weaknesses, err, skills.