My mom was sick with me while she was pregnant so I had all kinds of speech and coordination problems growing up in Wisconsin and then Reno, Nevada. A great English teacher Mrs. Mitchell of Wooster High School in Reno, Nevada in 1975-1976 turned me around by making me fall in love with books and education. Bullies still have been a huge problem for me after high school but I got quite used to them from the high school counselor at Wooster High School who said I did not deserve the Michelle Mitchell Memorial Scholarship (after my teacher's murdered daughter on my birthday of 2-24) because I was not one of her "in" kids to my huge fight with various law librarians about getting practical information for victims/survivors of crimes into or accessible through libraries of all kinds. I just enlisted people to battle the bullies along with my using the wisdom taught to me by Mrs. Barbara Mitchell and teachers who came after her. I have had some great ones after Mrs. Mitchell too. The love of education planted by Mrs. Mitchell pushed me to get four degrees and take courses of some kind from the University of Nevada, Reno; BYU Law School (dropped out though); the University of Denver; the College of San Mateo (Spanish); and the University of Minnesota Law School as well as courses in Dutch, German, Italian, Russian, Japanese and Chinese at the regular or correspondence University of Minnesota college.
I could probably write a book or a screenplay about my extensive experiences with bullies. Doubt if many would believe it however. There's a lot I have trouble believing and I lived through it and probably e-mailed hundreds of thousands of people and organizations trying to document it as well as improve the situation for survivors/victims of various legal systems in the world. I managed to get nominated to 24 Marquis Who's Who publications from 1992 through 2002 fighting for the right of survivors/victims of crimes for access to practical information based on sharing my story with many.
The best way to battle bullies is to create your own tribe of supporters.
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