Pt. 1 - Middle School Mean Girl Turned Missionary

For Anti-Bullying month, I'd love to share the TRUE story of a twenty-something girl that I've known her entire life. Brini has graciously written out her middle school story to share, in hopes of helping some girls along the way. So grateful for her willingness and honesty. She is a changed person now and has much wisdom to share about middle school and mean girls.

Yesterday's blog also revealed some local teen girls thoughts on friendships in general. Make sure and check that out too for some juicy tidbits.




But first, let's go back a couple of decades! Here is sweet Britni ate age 2 at my wedding!

Isn't she presh??! And WAY too cute and sweet to ever do anything mean!! Right?! Well not according to her. (p.s. gotta love that 80's master headpiece! even though it was '91... Some of us hung on to the 80's.) Britni has grown into a wonderful young lady, and is currently on an 11 month missionary journey around the world, doing daring things that few of us would do! You can join in on that adventure via her blog at http://britnibersin.theworldrace.org/. She has raised quite a chunk of change and still has quite a chunk to go to finish out her 11 months! It's a good cause. This is her now as the fabulous missionary that she is:

If you get inspired by her journey, feel free to contribute by giving online at the above website.

BACK TO the Mean Girl Story!

I love her story because she gives us a rare glimpse into the mind and motivations that mean behavior often stems from. I believe if girls can hear her story and understand her perspective, they will either 1) take a look at their own behavior or 2) have a better understanding of how to deal with girls who may be acting this way towards them!

So let's get to PART ONE of her story...(it's too long for one blog post.)

Fyi, this took place at a private Christian school. 6th grade.

"Middle School. Oh dear sweet middle school. So full of innocence, right? Maybe not as much as you'd like to think. Most pre-teens won't be out drinking on the weekends or visiting the backseat of a car with their "boyfriend/girlfriend", but that doesn't mean there isn't a battle to be fought! For me, and for most, it would be the fight for popularity. What would you do for the top spot on the A-list of your social sphere? We will leave that an unanswered question for now. Not so sure we would all want to confess that one out loud. I'll admit, however, that I was willing to risk others' reputations over my own. The possibilities truly were endless. Remember that law about reaping and sowing? Well this is one of those stories. I started off in 6th grade already emotionally torn up. My parents were in the process of an ugly divorce and I didn't handle it well. Abandoned is a good word to describe how I felt. I am not sure I understood the full extent of the emotions I was dealing with, but I certainly knew they were there. I always saw them (the emotions) manifest through my actions toward others. I truly wasn't a mean spirited person, I was just hurting and immature. I did find an outlet for a period of time through cheerleading. I quickly bonded with a group of girls who were alot like me; outgoing, adventurous and in need of attention. And boy, did we LOVE attention. We often sought it at the expense of others. We did things like de-panting girls in gym class and mocking kids during chapel praise and worship. Harmless things, like throwing gum in girls hair and laughing when they didn't notice. That's harmless, right? We spread vicious rumors about the people we didn't like and found entertainment in watching it spread like wildfire. We never thought about the way that it actually made people feel. We were just looking for a response from our peers. Now, I've got to step back for a moment because I feel I am painting a bad picture for the cheerleaders out there. We weren't all like that. There were actually a few that knew who they were and didn't stoop to our level. One in particular was a really good friend of mine. I will call her Ellie. I greatly admired this girl because she stood her ground and didn't let our influence get to her. Unfortunately, I didn't know how to respect that. I often blew her off to hang around my mean friends. I wasn't intentionally rude to Ellie. I really did love her as a person. I think it was just hard for me to be around her because her standard convicted my own behavior. I was also confused at what a real friend was. I thought that since she didn't want to do all the things I did, she thought she was better than me. True friends, in my mind, were supposed to do all things together; good and bad. I was really split over my different groups of friends. In response, I split my time and maybe even my personality to some degree. I would hang out with the "cheer girls" at school and all related activities, and I'd hang out with Ellie when no one else was around. I really couldn't find a way to fit these two parts of my life together. I am not sure I will ever know the extent of the damage I caused Ellie, but I'm thankful she stuck around anyway. Midway through our 7th grade cheer season, everything changed...A new girl decided to join the squad..."

And now...you will have to wait for tomorrow to find out what big change happened!! SIGH!!! Not fair, I know...Stay tuned. it's a good one, full of drama.

Insights so far...
1. she hurt others because of her own pain
2. she didn't consider herself a mean person, just did things without thinking with similar girls.
3. she looked up to Ellie who was different, but she didn't understand how to deal with it.
4. Ellie probably felt confused and blown off by Britni's behavior, but it didn't mean that Britni didn't love her. Britni wanted to keep Ellie in her life, but didn't know how to be both kinds of people at once.
5. Britni misunderstood true friendship.

Lots more coming up on girl issues. (The new facebook layout has made viewing so much more difficult! Agreed?) So "Like" our page 5 Things on Facebook to get all the updates, or subscribe by email at http://www.5things.us/ to get every post!