Collegiate Bullying - My Story

*Warning - quotes have profanity

In August 2017, at age 19, I transferred to the University of Colorado Boulder. Moving into my first
apartment with a friend from high school and two unknown roommates seemed like an exciting step into
the adult world. Little did I know that bullying doesn’t stop after 12th grade, and that this would be one
of the hardest things I have ever endured. This adult experience that I was so excited for quickly turned
into a nightmare.

I signed the lease for one bedroom with high school friends. The leasing office  assigned two roommates
to us, with the promise that, “WE WILL ROOMMATE MATCH!” As it turned out, they matched me
with my exact opposite.

The apartment was two bedrooms, two bathrooms, with a shared living space for the four tenants. A
measly 810 square feet, it offered just 202.5 square feet per person. Or 162 square feet, if you count a boyfriend living there illegally.

I moved into the apartment, met one of the other girls, and thought, “This is going to be a great year.” I
was wrong. I met the last girl, and immediately disliked her. We were complete opposites. She was loud,
dramatic and mean. At 22 years old, she was also three years older than the rest of us.  When we
mentioned that she said, “Yeah, I specifically requested to live with younger girls because girls my age
are bitchy.” I learned by the end of the year, that it wasn’t all other girls her age were bitchy. Just her.

From what I could gather from her stories on that first day, in every new group of girls she lived with,
she picked one to have a problem with.  In our new apartment, I ended up becoming that girl. My new
roommate and I were very different. She smoked and drank, I didn’t. She partied, I didn’t. I am Christian,
she is atheist. In her eyes, I was a goody-two-shoes who looked down on her.

Many people assume that bullying doesn’t continue after high school graduation. But in fact,  my story is
just one of millions of cases of collegiate bullying. One study from Indiana State University found that 15
percent of college students report being bullied. Bullying does not stop after 12th grade. Bullying occurs
throughout college, workplaces, and even the rest of adulthood.  

Everything that went wrong in this girl’s life, she blamed on me. Her water filter pitcher broke. It was me.
Piles of dishes were in the sink. It was me. Someone called the cops on her dog. It was me. According to
her, it was all me. In reality, none of it was me.

This roommate would say mean things about me to her friends and my other roommates, calling me a
“hoe,” “a bitch” or worse, knowing that I could hear from my bedroom. She would leave mean notes and
signs for me in the kitchen and living room.  “I am not your mother, clean up after yourself,” one read.
Another said, “Throw away your shit, hoe.” My initial, emotion-driven was to retaliate with my own
notes. However, after talking to my mom and praying about it, I realized that was the exact opposite of
what I needed to do.

For every passive-aggressive act, I turned the other cheek. For every mean thing she did, I did something
nice. This was the only way I was going to be able to get through this bullying. When she left me the
“throw away your shit hoe” note on a broken vacuum, I left a care package in front of her door because
she was sick. When she finished screaming to her boyfriend about me and left, I left her a birthday card
and stuffed animal in front of her door. She, in turn, put the stuffed animal back on the counter, tore up
the birthday card, arranged it in front of the animal, and wrote on the torn-up card the words, “Fuck you
bitch.”

Sometimes, though, I failed: one time, she kept her unwashed clothing in the washing machine for over
four days so that I couldn’t wash my clothes. I asked her if she could do her laundry or take the clothes
out. She told me that I didn’t own the washing machine. I slipped up from my kindness approach and told
her the washing machine wasn’t a laundry hamper to store dirty clothes in. It was for washing them. Oops.

There are several lessons I learned from this experience. First of all, bullying never goes away, even in
adulthood. Second of all, retaliating never makes the situation better. It will only make it worse. Third of
all, trying to love someone who strives to make your life miserable is one of the hardest, but also one of
the greatest things a person can do in the face of bullying. By loving the bully and being kind to them,
you start to take away the power they desire to have over you. Kindness is the key to cruelty. Although
my feelings were constantly hurt, because of this kindness, my life was less full of hate, and thereby more
full of love and peace.

Growing up as a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, a children’s song taught me
to "Love one another as Jesus loves you. Try to show kindness in all that you do. Be gentle and loving
in deed and in thought, For these are the things Jesus taught." This is how I managed to get through a year
of bullying from a college roommate. I now strive to live my life with more love and kindness. Treating
others with love and kindness has brought me an abundance of peace and happiness that I did not have
before.

Sarah Lemon