Maintaining that I hated boys, at twelve, gave me the space to puzzle my feelings out in private. I wouldn’t be some stupid idiot, babbling all day long about some mean boy who would only make fun of me. Instead, I had a big crush (endorsed by my two best friends) on…
I always prick up my ears when someone talks about losing a parent during childhood. I think this is the first time I’ve heard someone explicitly say he isolated himself. He had also been bullied. He didn’t say a lot about feeling isolated, and he didn’t describe “holing up” as self-protection, but still I felt I could relate.