Not sure where to post this. Just want to tell someone the story of my little victory.

There was this one guy in a childhood group I was attending to. It has been about 8 years since I finally left that group. There were some people that seriously mistreated me back then. There was this guy, let’s call him Billy, who was the “leader” of the group that was bullying me.

For these past years, I have been trying to get over that part of my life.

A few months ago, I made the decision of forgiving him. I decided to do it in church on Christmas Eve, ie. yesterday. It was a bit scary. Our interaction was maybe 30 seconds long, but I think it was definitely worth it.

When I finally found him, he acted as if we were great friends all along, being all cheerful etc.. I kind of expected that, as I heard many stories of bullies acting similarly several years down the line after the contact ended.

I took him aside and the conversation went like this:

Me: “I am just going to go ahead and say it. I forgive you”

Billy suddenly switched off his cheerful pose and his face turned serious. There was maybe a 5 second pause.

Billy: “Thank you”

There was another 5 second pause. After that, we shook hands.

Billy: “Sorry”

Me: “Thank you. Happy holidays”

And then we went our separate ways.

The experience was almost surreal. The man who seriously mistreated me years ago now accepting my forgiveness. I was shaking for a while after the experience. I know he was being sincere. I hope he has moved on since then, and grew a bit as a person.

This does not really change much about what had happened or whether I want to stay in touch (I don’t).

But now, I feel a bit more free and the burden was lifted at least a bit. I seriously recommend, if you get the chance, to forgive the people that mistreated you.

14 comments

  1. I’m so happy for you, I’m now in college and I saw my bully attending the same college but its a pretty big college so I probably won’t see him again. I hope I’d have courage just like yours, but I guess deep wounds heal far longer

  2. Congratulations, many people would’ve held on to their anger and simply would let it fester inside them. I grew up with a physically abusive father and it never got any better until I forgave him. I understand how hard it can be to forgive someone and many people will never try, because that means putting their feelings aside, but it truly is a miracle that we can let go do the past. It’s like the burden disappears almost completely. I still have the scars, but they have no weight on my conscience now. I’ve even managed to build a relationship with my old man.

    I’m glad you could experience this weightlessness as well, there are few feelings more beautiful and elating.

  3. This is wonderful.

    You gave yourself a gift by deciding to not allow negative past experiences and the people who made them happen define you. You decided to act and risked a negative response from someone who hurt you deeply. You are now free to move forward and not revisit the pain on the people who are presently in your life.

    He gave you a gift by dropping the pretense and allowing you to express yourself without making excuses for himself. Similarly, he acted in a way that promoted growth and healing by simply acknowledging your pain and making an apology. In this, he gave himself a gift as well.

    May you both accept this peace as your triumph in a world where showing emotion, admitting fault or offering forgiveness is sometimes viewed as a weakness when it takes great strength of character.

  4. Congratulations! I don’t know why but I kinda have the feeling that your feeling of a bit more free may be because you also forgave yourself in a sense. But anyways congratulations and merry Christmas!

  6. LMAO he probably didn’t understand anything, but it’s polite to say thank you in every occasion, so he went for it without knowing was going on anyway

  7. I most definitely wish I had your kind of character hey. I just can’t bring myself to do it. Good for you and I hope you’ve found peace🥺

  8. Good for you.

    If they matured into a decent person with social skills, they tend to feel obligated to handle the pleasantries. You both need time to get a read on the situation. If you weren’t ready to work out a good peace, they would have needed to work out a temporary peace to avoid dropping back into bad old habits.

  10. I worked with the mother of the boy who bullied me in middle school. I was out for blood but she taught me to forgive. I was fired from the school (unrelated to the incident ) but hey that was a good lesson.

  12. yeah forgiveness is amazing as you realise you don’t set the person you were upset with go free you free yourself from the prison of offence

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