Holiday pains

by Hayley
(birmingham)

I finished the last post pretty much at the end of year six, about a quarter of which I spent feeling incredibly sorry for myself. I actually don't think we went away between years five and six, it was when I was 11 when we went to Portugal and I passed out on the plane.

Portugal, the area we went was beautiful, the weather was glorious, such a shame that I spent a few days lay in bed with a serious bad case of the runs. At least it made my brother leave me alone, he didn't touch himself during that time. That holiday was largely okay until the last day.

I was using the bathroom as we got ready to travel the journey back up to Faro airport and my brother was also in there. How my parents didn't realise that I don't know, but hey that's in the past now. My brother was starting to irritate me by keep singing, I don't know why it did, it just did - other than the fact that I was in there first. I kep telling him to shut up and he kept annoying me. Suddenly my mother stormed into the bathroom, bent down in front of me and slapped my legs hard, yelling at me "That's what Jo doesn't like"

This Jo was a Guide leader at the Guide company I attended. I had been on a camp some time earlier, where the partol just seemed to exclude me or taunt me. It didn't matter what I did, they would have a go at me. Unfortunately I had to lie by the door of the tent, which was very cold, and with a hot drink in me, the outcome was inevitable. I had got home from school on the monday, and received something of a frosty welcome. It was a barrage of questions, I had leant on a picnic table and accidentally damaged it. I wasn't to know that those things weren't for bums! All in all I got a hefty slap across the face, and was made to feel as if I was nothing all over again. When my dad got home, I had to listen to my evil deeds all over again. At this point my guiding days were apparently over, but my dad took a different stance. They both sat me down to ask what had happened and I told them. I still had to apologise to the guide leader, but thankfully I was allowed to go on guide camp with the whole company. There, it was okay, we had some fun except for one day we had been swimming - which was rather chilly in the outdoor swimming pool. I had been forced out of a cubicle so had to change in front of everyone. the rest of the girls didn't mind but I felt very self conscious and didn't like it one bit. I called out "Lessie" a couple of times, as two other girls squeezed into a tiny cubicle. How Jo B. could prove that I was the guilty one out of all those girls I don't know, but she obviously had my card marked, anything wrong blame me.

I should have gone into their tent that night, but got yelled at and I was back with my patrol. The minute we were back home, and unloading the camp stuff from the minibus, one of the girls in my patrol commented, "Oh it's the table that Hayley broke". Immediately my mother pulled me to one side assuming that I had broken another one. Shortly after that, Jo pulled my mother to one side and told her about that day in the toilet block. It seemed that it wasn't just at school I couldn't do anything without my mom hearing about it. I had no where to go, no where to hide, school offered me no shelter, home was where I suffered so much secret pain, and now the Guides was a tough place for me to go. At least on guide camps my brother couldn't hurt me. Surely all these tales of my terrible deeds would have suggested that something was seriously wrong?

It didn't, and I was left to suffer bullying the entire summer holidays before we went away. I think I was better off in school, all ready for year seven.

I don't feel much better, still exhausted, and a few yard leaves me out of breath. Roll on next monday when I can hope to find out what is wrong!