So I’m almost 26F & I went to an all girls school for most of my school life. I always had issues with getting picked on & I guess bullied (if that’s not too exaggerated) by girls.
I did get bullied by guys for the brief time I was at a public mixed school but that was for different reasons (like racism for being non white in a white majority small town public school.) & we were really young (12-14 years old) so I’ve mostly gotten over that now.
However what still bothers me to this day is those girls that were the mean, popular bitchy girls in high school. They used to always embarrass others for no reason other than their own entertainment & to get attention. I thought those girls would grow up & stop being like that once high school ended but they didn’t. I’m almost 26 & girls that were mean popular girls in high school haven’t matured at all. I don’t mean girls from my own school of course, but even when you meet new girls in your 20’s, you can tell who was one of those girls in high school because they act like that for as long as possible after school. They’re still the same in the workplace or when you deal with them at retail stores – they’re cliquey, they’re always gossiping about people even when customers are in store, they look at people & laugh quietly, they make offensive jokes to embarrass you in front of others etc. I have no idea how to deal with them & how to get them to leave me alone. I feel like I can just never win against them or get away from them & I can’t believe I’m still dealing with this 8 years after high school.
But even with girls who weren’t one of those ‘popular’ mean girls in high school, I still always get spoken down to like I’m stupid, or just downright treated badly or picked on more than others. I guess the main reason is because I have a soft voice, but that’s not my fault. I can’t change my voice tone. I also think it’s weird for people to treat someone badly just because of their voice tone. Whenever I try to speak any louder than my natural voice, people ask me to ‘calm down’ & ‘stop yelling’ or they’ll ask why I’m angry. so no matter what I do, I always get made fun of for everything I say & do. Sometimes I think maybe people don’t respect me because I don’t say no enough or I don’t speak up enough, however when I do try to speak up or say no, people get mad at me and say things like ‘what’s your problem’, ‘why are you being such a bitch’ or ‘someone’s in a bad mood today’ etc when they themselves are rude and saying no all the time. Am I just meeting the wrong people?
However, I know a lot of other soft spoken girls, but instead of getting bullied & spoken down to, people are actually more gentle with them & always talk about how sweet they are. I’ve been trying to figure out & analyse what the difference is between those soft spoken people and me for us to be getting different treatments. Is it the level of confidence & maturity? Is it facial expressions?
I noticed that there was another soft spoken girl at my previous workplace, same age as me, & everyone loved her & felt bad to be mean to her & always talked about how she was really sweet, but I’m also soft spoken but people used to bully me and boss me around instead of be gentle with me. people would tell me I was really nice too, but I still didn’t get treated well like her. I couldn’t really pinpoint what the reason was for me getting treated differently to her.
With alot of the girls I see that don’t get picked on or treated badly, I can see that they often have deep loud voices, tough looking faces, they’re tall or they have loud personalities or all of them. Maybe I have some sort of vulnerable vibe that makes people think I’m weak and worthless to talk to or something. Maybe I come across as younger than I am and people don’t take me seriously yet. Other girls my age are often a lot more older looking for their age and their loud and confident personalities make them look older and more in charge. Maybe I’m missing that and it will come later when I’m a lot older.
My only solution has been to avoid socialising with people my age. My life is more peaceful not socialising too much, because almost everytime I’ve tried going out, something always happens where someone treats me badly & it ruins my night. So I’ve become sick of trying to socialise & go out to bars and clubs and places that people my age go to. I’ve only ever become close to older people recently & sometimes people my own age if they’re mature. But most of the time, I’ve noticed that being around people my age makes me uncomfortable because of how I get treated. Older people treat me equally & with respect regardless of the fact that I’m soft spoken.
Tl:dr – I’m almost 26F & still get treated badly by girls my age. It’s been happening since high school & I don’t know why people talk down to me. I’m soft spoken & reserved but I’ve seen other soft spoken quiet people who still get treated well whilst I don’t.