'Bullied because I was different'

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http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/education/6170758.stm

Last Updated: Wednesday, 22 November 2006, 14:40 GMT

'Bullied because I was different'

As the government launches a drive to tackle prejudice-led bullying,

Muggleton talks about how he was targeted because he was

different.

As someone with Asperger syndrome, acknowledges that

he " tends to show up on the social radar " .

He looks like any other 17-year-old but his condition makes it

difficult to make eye contact or read other social cues.

" The bullying started when I went into Year 2, so I must have been

six or seven.

" It probably doesn't sound much - I was just excluded more and more

from games in the playground and when I was invited to join in it

was only if I was the target, the object of fun.

" It may not sound much but when it happens every day it does get to

you.

" By the time I got to Year 5, I was depressed. In Year 7, when I was

11 or 12, I very quickly became very depressed and was put on anti-

depressants.

" That's when I first became suicidal.

" At primary school they didn't really do a huge amount to help. The

people doing the bullying were reprimanded once which did help for a

bit but it didn't stop it completely.

" The main trouble was that it wasn't the accepted definition of

bullying - there was no physical violence as such, no hitting or

punching, but it was constant.

" I think there's no doubt about it that I was picked on because I

have Asperger's. "

Shoved

" Although I wasn't diagnosed until I was 15 I am still someone who

will show up on the social radar as being different.

" But the fact that I wasn't diagnosed - and therefore wasn't

recognised as someone with special needs - shouldn't have made any

difference to how the school reacted.

" It was when I moved to secondary school that the bullying became

more physical.

" The school had really narrow corridors and when we moved between

lessons I was forever being shoved - occasionally kicked - and

always had name-calling.

" I would try and seek refuge in the library and the bullies would

come and deliberately annoy me.

" The school didn't do anything. I would talk to people about it but

nothing happened. "

Breakdown

" A teacher did once show me some pictures of pupils including some

of those who were tormenting me and ask me to pick them out. I did

but the file was just packed away.

" In Year 10 I had a nervous breakdown and developed a phobia of

school.

" There were attempts to reintegrate me into the school system but

eventually my psychiatrist decided that any more would do

irreparable damage so I finally left in the January of my Year 11,

just before my GCSEs.

" I managed to scrape a handful of Cs and Bs in my GCSEs and there's

no doubt my school experience affected my results.

" When I was at school I was on the verge of a panic attack for most

of the time so how could I possibly concentrate?

" In the September of what would have been my Year 12, I attended the

internet-based Satellite Virtual School and studied from home.

" It's a great system and threw me a lifeline but it isn't the same

as learning face-to-face. "

Degree hope

" So, after a year I did some research and found Farleigh Further

Education College near Bath - about 100 miles away from my home in

Guildford, Surrey.

" It's a residential college providing support to " Aspies " and I'm

doing my A-levels there now, with the fees paid by Surrey County

Council.

" Ideally I'd like to do a degree but my education has been so

damaged that I'm having to review my GCSEs as well as do my A-levels

and what happened at school has mentally scarred me.

" I think the main trouble schools have is that they pride themselves

on not having a bullying problem so they won't admit it and won't do

anything about it.

" I really think you need someone independent of the school that

people can go to, to speak to about bullying.

" Until schools acknowledge that it is a problem for them it will

never be tackled.

" A lot more needs to be done. Bullying really does destroy lives. "