Little Boy Kills Himself Due To Bullying

I partially blame the parents for this

Photo by Marina Abrosimova on Unsplash

So, just to be clear — I waited to write this and I am not mentioning the child’s name nor providing any links to the news article BECAUSE I do NOT want the parents to see this and thereby add to their pain. The death of a child is a devastating thing and the last thing I want is to add to their grief. If you know of the child in question (though I am trying to keep details minimal) please leave them alone unless you can simply show compassion and kindness right now. They don’t need more pain.

That being said — I don’t want more children to die.

I am not going to talk about counseling, teacher training, crisis intervention or other topics that I’ve seen a lot of articles about — there are professionals and more experienced people who have written those and who know more about those areas.

But one thing I do know about — how parents protect their children. At least, how my parents protected me.

In the first grade, my father confronted a boy who was picking on me. He saw this happen. He didn’t try to have a dialog with the child, or call the boy’s father to discuss a solution. His face turned red, he was obviously outraged, and he confronted the boy straight on. He did not strike the child but he made it very…