How was your high school experience/youth?

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We lived in remote forestry plantations in South Africa and were moved around a lot. I was sent to boarding school to try and bring some stability to my life. Boarding school is basicaly full immersion in 24 hour a day socializing (except when asleep of course). I lived in communal dormitories all those years. Consequently, I was forced to learn social skills or else.

I suffered for sure, and ran away from boarding school at the age of 16 years. In the school I was at, prefects had the authority to cane pupils. What was awful was that a particular night every week was 'jacks night' and so if you were charged with a misdemeanour (not polishing your shoes sufficiently or not remembering the names of the members of the 1st XV rugby team was sufficient) on the night after jacks night, you had to wait for a whole 6 days till you recieved your caning. The instrument of caning was a leather thong (several layers of laminated leather). The prefects called you (by alphabetical order) into their common room. You then received a tongue lashing and were intimidated to a sufficient extent and then told to bend over in one corner. You had to peer back through your legs. A prefect would then take a run up from the other side of the common room (about 4 metres) and lay into you as hard as they possibly could. If you had been unfortunate to have committed two misdemeanours, then you had to stay down and get a second lashing. Blood blisters occurred most of the time. I seemed to be a regular in that jack parade. I seemed to really irritate those prefects. I didn't ever show any emotions and I have a high pain threshold. I realise now that my lack of emotions was Aspergers Syndrome. I was being emotionally traumatised but they couldn't see that.

As I was saying, home was in rather remote places so running home meant a journey of approximately 500km. I got about 250km by hitchhiking at night; it was one lift really and then I walked about 30km at dawn. As soon as daylight came I didn't get anymore lifts because people were naturally wondering what a kid was doing walking along the road on a school day. I phoned home and got fetched and taken straight back to the boarding school. I was caned (4 of the best) for my trouble, but things changed after that. The people who were giving me trouble stopped doing it for fear of getting into trouble themselves.

Now, you might find all this hard it believe but I can state categorically that this is all 100% true and without embellishments.

I left that school after I ran away. I had to repeat a year of school to get my academics back on track. Luckily I was able to go to a day school the next year because we moved to a city when my father was promoted and change regions yet again. My academics had suffered badly in the whole process but the next two years (not in a boarding school environment) were a lot happier and I did well enough to get to university.

Wow. These are some really horrible stories...

I never did like going to school, esp MS and HS... it was the '80s and for a kid with signs of ASD, my community was still accepting of what now would make the papers... but really, many of the above stories top mine easily.

I knew from very young, prolly 7 or 8, that I didn't fit in. I know now much of that was because I'm LGBTQ, but also because I processed the world and the gorgon's head of stimuli in that f*****g gladiator's pit that is HS, much differently. I tried vainly to be fake being just like everyone around me... and denying that anything was wrong. Oh, HS brats can be sooo unforgiving of someone like that. In the end, I lost on all counts, and ended up depressed and confused as ever as a graduate. It wasn't until I joined the Army and left... that a lot of me emerged. Still confused, but as least free of some of the turmoil.

My 20th reunion was in 2008. I didn't go. Most of the f*****s that tormented me (but much less than some here) went to work in the community and never left, or went to school and came back to work there... 20 yrs later, that's still what some do (think 'Lima loser', and you're not far off). There's no way I'd spend what little money I had to go meet these asses and revisit my coping mechanisms all over again, no way... esp with possible BPD.

Yeah it was the '80s and yeah it sucked to be LGBTQ *and* spectrum... but not as bad as for some. Still, there are issues that formed there that still haunt me today. Not too many happy memories from it.

Sucked. I spent half of each day in regular classes and half in sped. And the other ppl in that sped room only spent at most 2 periods daily with the rest of the time in regular classes. Wtf. I got jealous of kids in honors and AP classes and tons of extracurriculars, where I never got to partake. Good thing I made some friends, some of them from the popular group. Still, I was so glad when I graduated in '07. Went straight towork. Been through a couple years of college, which sucked, but working was better. I dropped out of college and been working exclusively since.

Primary and secondary school were hell. I was continually bullied. I also had quite severe problems with navigation. I could get lost very easily and end up spending ages trying to find my classrom even though I had been there many times before. 'I got lost' was not considered an acceptable answer when asked why I was late for a class. Whenever possible I used to hide in the library or computer room.

In the first year of college a tutor videotaped me during a class. Watching that video was a real shock to me. It highlighted how differently I behaved compared to the others. After that I consciously started watching people and copying their behavior. I deliberately started paying more attention to others, participating in group activities etc. After that things improved a lot. The bullying mostly stopped and I became more accepted in my peer group. I can't remember the tutor's name but I am really thankful that he made that video. It changed my life in many ways.

Outofplace, i had a similar experience in 8th grade,, parents moved from va to fla, i went from a middle school with kids i grew up with to a high school setting in a small town where everyone new everyone else and I was the outside. I was bullied for three years,, I was in band and was able to make myself a name there,, dispite the jealousies,, but it took 4 years and a LOT of heartache and pains.. those years were horrible,, I was never asked for a date or to any of the social events.. glad its all over.. its funny though i wound up working 15 years IN a high school.

Truly miserable. The rule at High School seemed to be 'Everybody hates the smart kid'.

I was bored. It took them three years to get around to teaching the math I had done at age 10. I didn't need help with reading or writing - I would correct the teachers' spelling and punctuation.

So I spent my time sitting at the back, drawing cartoons or making sharp comments to upset the teachers. And they couldn't do anything about it, because I would always end up coming top in exams, tests or even in spot questions. I couldn't be bothered with homework, I knew I wasn't going to be allowed to go to college (my mother only valued sports, not academic or artistic things) and I would get beaten up by various girls who didn't like me because I wasn't obsessed with boys as romantic partners, but spent time with them as friends.

The people who I ended up spending most days with were the bad boys, they didn't mind me being smart, they liked me helping them with schoolwork, and would protect me from the other girls.


I hated school. But it was better than being at home - at least when I got attacked at school, I could fight back - at home, I had to take it without reacting, or she'd get a metre stick to beat me with, or use it to go after my dog.

Simple answer: public school was a hellish experience that caused me to contemplate suicide. I am 33 and still occasionally have nightmares related to my school experiences.


Some more explanation: I did not have too bad a time from Kindergarten to about fourth grade--mostly because I was really, really in my own little world and didn't pay much attention to other people during all that time. Although even from then I can remember noticing other kids not wanting to be around me, taunting me, and teachers telling me to not come crying to them about it because it was my fault. But it really didn't overwhelmingly bother me then, because I just didn't grasp the need to socialize or care what other people were doing.

When I was 10, in 5th grade (I have a summer birthday), the teacher /hated/ me. She was the science and math teacher, only I'm pretty sure that at age 10 I was already smarter than her. She was very authoritatively telling the class that penguins live nowhere other than Antarctica one day early in the year, and I had just watched a National Geographic special on the Galapagos Islands. I immediately got very excited and had to tell her all about it. You know, to be helpful, because obviously this was new information, or the great authority that is Teacher (I had a complete reverence for authority figures up to this point in my life) would have known about it.

She called me a liar in front of the class. Demanded that I apologize for lying to her and undermining her authority in the class. Of course, I absolutely refused and ended up bawling because when I get very angry and frustrated I cry, and that had the other kids laughing at me, and I was scared half to death because this teacher was SO mad and turning red and screaming in my face to stop lying. She dragged me out in the hall and paddled me and took away my recess privileges for a month and assigned me to write 1000 sentences of "I apologize for lying to teacher." or something like that. I refused to go back to school. It was the one time my mother stood up for me the entire time I went to school. Well, she did a little. She made the principal make the teacher not assign the sentences. She demanded an apology in front of the class, but the principal wouldn't do it, and they still made me miss recess. I also think she told the whole town how horrible I was. Very small town, less than 500 people.

The teacher spent the rest of the year making me sit in a box at the back of the classroom, where I was forbidden to do anything other than stare at the walls of the box. I swear she had a mirror where she could see me. I wasn't allowed to read library books, work on the day's assignment while she was still teaching it, or to work ahead. I was about four grades ahead of my placement at the time, so needless to say, I was bored with her math lessons. She would intersperse having me in the box with dragging me out in the hallway, where she would put her face nearly touching mine and yell at me until her face turned red, veins popped out, and spit would fly around when she spoke.

From that year on the other students really felt like it was okay to also verbally, or occasionally physically abuse me as well. The high school was in the same complex and housed grades 7-12. There were many teachers in the high school just as sadistic as that 5th grade teacher. Overall, I had a worse time from teachers than I did from students. As far as students were concerned, mostly I was just very alone. The band kids tolerated me hanging out on the outskirts of their group, but I wasn't in band so it wasn't like I was really part of them.

Looking back on it with better understanding of my social limitations of the time, I can see a few fellow students who really looked out for me, because they knew I was different, and I am grateful for their little oases of niceness that I can remember from that time. It made a horrible time in my life a little more tolerable.

I'm in my early 50's. elementary school was difficult. I didn't like it there. Recess was good when I could swing for the entire recess but then they made us take turns and the timer I had on the swings was not enough to restore me. I had friends in elementary school. No friends at all in high school. I was full of dread at lunch. I was treated horribly by almost everyone, teachers even, school nurse, principal, not just kids. I didn't make it past 9th grade, actually most of that was with a tutor hired by my parents. I became an artist. I went to collage. I learned how to pretend my way through stuff. I have amazing strength and will.

Life is far from easy though. I still have a hard time with life and people. The way society is set up makes no sense to me at all.

I need to be alone a lot just to function.

Too much pretending and I'm in meltdown.

I think my worst was junior high.

When you mentioned lunch, you reminded me of something that I hadn't thought about in many, many years.

In junior high, every day after lunch when the weather was not really bad (i.e. not during blizzards or the very rare heavy rain), I would climb up on the stone wall along the steps outside the entrance to the school building and sit there by myself minding my own business until time for class to start. I always sat in the same place facing the same direction.

There was some girl in the next class behind mine who wore the shortest skirts of anyone in junior high. She hated my guts because I was one of the least cool people in the school. Every day after lunch, she and a friend of hers would walk by where I was sitting. She was always convinced that the reason that I sat there was so that I could watch her skirt blow up in the wind.

Looking back on that time, it was kind of funny, because every single day when she walked by me, she would put her hands on the hem of her skirt and hold it down so that I wouldn't see her panties. In reality, if her skirt had blown up every single day, I would probably not have even noticed if she hadn't made such a big deal about it.

Mine was okay. I wasn't bullied, I got the help I needed in high school so the work wasn't that hard. I felt normal because lot of kids were in special ed, I was left alone. Middle school was okay too even though I was in the resource room all day long. We only had once recess during lunch and I felt like a little kid at times because we had a playground and no track field. We used the high school's is why. I still got the help I needed and elementary school, I wouldn't say it was bad despite that I was picked on, rejected, treated different, made fun of, but 6th grade was the worst. I would not go back there again. I was still treated different in middle school and high school but not as bad. Teachers had better respect for me was why.

High school was a very lonely time for me. I wasn't bullied anymore, but I only had like one friend

My mom said that when she came to pick me up from my first day of kindergarten, I was lying down in the corner because all the other kids gave me a headache. It went downhill from there...

I relate to bits and pieces of the prior stories, and will simply say:


"Every day of school was the worst day of my life."

I was told at the time that I just had a bad attitude and when I would become an adult I would cherish those memories as the best years of my life. Now that I'm past the 30 year mark I would love nothing better than to have total amnesia from age 12-16 as if I had to repeat those years again as my naive, defenseless Aspie self I would have to contemplate suicide and they were nearly unbearable and I don't know how I survived with my sanity intact. Luckily I don't have to worry about that one since I haven't mastered time travel

I always said at the time and still believe at least if I went to a prison I would KNOW I was a prisoner and surrounded by bad dudes who are mostly sociopaths. In school, they liked to pretend they taught essential, valuable skills yet I was able to learn all the Math, Geography, etc in about 1/5 to 1/4 the time allotted. I spent more time sidestepping gang fights (that luckily I was not involved in) than actually learning anything useful.

I also always said that I 'd like to have an amnesia from 11- 25. I am not good at dealing with people. It wasn't really bad in high school as nobody picked on me although I was mute.

I was only bullied in elementary school, so in that regard junior high and high school were very easy for me. I was never made a target, and my classmates were generally nice people to go to school with. My junior high school class in particular was great, a very good atmosphere. None of my high school classes were bad either. There were people in junior high I had a lot of fun with in school, and a few girls claimed to see me as a friend, but I only saw them as friendly acquaintances and I never had any interest in spending time with them outside of school. After school was out I just wanted to go home to my life.
However I hated the school part of it. I had already suffered from my problems with maths in elementary school, but in junior high I didn’t have any hope of catching up at all, and in high school I couldn’t even get through it. It was the same for physics and chemistry. I never got the help I needed. Or enough of it. In all my school years I had one assistant teacher who was able to teach me maths. I saw him for a few lessons in junior high and he had a way of explaining that made me understand. No other maths teacher have done that. If I could’ve had him throughout junior high I would have made it with at least average maths grade and been much better prepared for high school maths. I didn’t lack skills in languages but that didn’t help me because we were given assignments I generally found boring and hard to get into, or we had to read books it took me forever to get through because they were so boring, or we had to “interpret” texts and look for ‘meaning’ I sure didn’t see in them. Not only do I take texts a face value, I think putting “meaning” in them (like claiming zombies are representatives for communism) ruins all the fun of a story. I just find it to be BS and I can’t understand why some people have such a hard time just enjoying a story. Therefore I didn’t do all that well in languages either, and I only had so much interest for history, religion and geography (zzz). And I was lousy in PE. I lacked motivation and the longer the school days became, the worse it got.

As for my youth besides school, I generally enjoyed it. Like now I spent a lot of time with my obsessions and I had pets who meant the world to me. I hear a lot of people saying they wouldn’t have their teenage years back for anything, but that’s not the case for me.

Whoa, that's a huge class! Biggest class I was in was half that size! (Unless you count 5th grade music when they put all 3 5th grade classes together for that subject, but that's different because we were still 3 separate classes).

Off topic but... @ RazorEddie:

I think your signature is neat!