"You're garbage", "stupid", "a failure". Mansi Poddar's school bullies were some of her own teachers. She asks educators out there to lift students up when they fail, not tear them down.
TW: Suicidal thoughts, bullying.
TW: Suicidal thoughts, bullying.
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00:00Dear teachers, today I talk to you as a child psychotherapist and mother.
00:07My earliest memories of school are from class 2, when my class teacher would make me stand
00:12next to the dustbin and call me garbage because I couldn't recite the times table and that
00:17too from anxiety.
00:19My class 3 Hindi teacher who would pick on me for my skin color and tell me your fair
00:24skin won't run your life because I was an academic failure.
00:29My class 6 teacher who would call me dumb and stupid in front of 45 girls and tell me
00:37I would never be an academic success.
00:41That continued on for a few years.
00:44My class 7 teacher who decided to stand me in front of a class of 45 girls again and
00:50tell me that children like me grow up to be drug addicts, go to jail and are useless for
00:57society.
00:58I stood there absolutely mute and frozen and then she proceeded to warn every parent in
01:05a parent-teacher meeting to keep their kid away from academic failures like me because
01:11we might encourage their kids to not focus on studying.
01:14I remember the day my mom came home from that parent-teacher meeting and I remember my horror,
01:21shame and guilt when my mom told me that she felt embarrassed and in pain after seeing
01:28how other parents looked at her and judged her for being Mansi's mother.
01:34These are a few of the bullying experiences I faced from teachers and then there were
01:39bullying experiences from students.
01:43Yes, I was obese, not sporty, not good at any extracurricular and I was told I was a
01:50nightmare of teachers and parents alike but I was a child, a child that was being bullied,
01:59molested and had no voice, a child scared of her own shadow, a child few saw and even
02:06less acknowledged because you know why?
02:10Because the world belongs to toppers, to cool kids, to sporty kids, to kids who have potential
02:16to go on to be head girls and head boys, to beautiful popular kids.
02:22Me, I was nothing in this war zone that I call school.
02:26In class 9, the bullying from students and teachers finally broke my mind and I had a
02:31nervous breakdown in front of my entire class.
02:34I remember having kids laugh at me, some froze up, some left the classroom and some simply
02:41rolled in laughter.
02:42All I wished for was to die that day and I do wonder, I wonder why I didn't kill myself
02:49or maybe my way of surviving was to eat or maybe live a little, who knows?
02:57Or maybe my obsessive reading of fairy tales and books because you know what?
03:01I belong there.
03:02I was safe there in that world and these are two needs of every single child.
03:08Dear teachers, all children want is a teacher like my class 9 teacher who held my hand
03:15after my public breakdown, emptied out the classroom so I wouldn't be shamed and told
03:21me that you have the best smile I have ever seen, my first and only compliment.
03:27And like my class 1 teacher who saw me for what I was, quiet, shy and sensitive, who
03:35would call me in front of the class and acknowledge me by my name.
03:41And as I tell you this, I can recall that feeling of joy, of gratitude, that elation
03:46that a 7-year-old would feel for being seen.
03:50Dear teachers, your words make our minds, your actions define our personalities.
03:56You can be a war zone or a zen zone.
03:59You have more power than you know.
04:02I'm 40, but every insult and every word of kindness stays with me.
04:10You matter.
04:11Your presence matters.
04:13How you treat us can change our destinies.
04:17After my class 9 teacher's words, I knew I mattered.
04:21Something shifted.
04:22Something changed for me.
04:23That little bit of compassion, kindness and empathy, the emptying of that classroom to
04:29talk to me, changed how I viewed the world, changed how I viewed myself.
04:33I hated myself a little bit less.
04:36I knew I mattered a little bit more.
04:40And most importantly, after that day, I knew that I would devote my life to making the
04:46world the way she made me feel.
04:49Today, as a parent, I watch my kids thrive.
04:52They love school.
04:53They love their teachers.
04:54And I've always wondered why.
04:56Why do they love learning?
04:57Why do they love going to school?
05:00It's because the teachers treat them as children, not as potential head girls, toppers, sports
05:07people or future successes or famous college grads.
05:13They offer them compassion, kindness, empathy.
05:15They understand them.
05:17They talk to these kids.
05:19They guide them with gentleness.
05:21They have playfulness.
05:22They in fact guide us with gentleness.
05:26They have acceptance of the child.
05:28They discipline but do not punish.
05:31Remember, your presence can make a child who is being raped, molested or living in a domestically
05:37abusive home feel safe, feel heard.
05:41You have the power to give children like me a voice and a safe space.
05:46Most of you are overworked and exhausted and possibly don't have the bandwidth to show
05:52up for children in this way.
05:55But a small smile, a small gesture like my class 9 teacher might remain with that child
06:03forever like it did with me and can change children like me for life.
06:10Thank you for the work that you do and for all the teachers that have shown me kindness.
06:15You changed my life and you changed many lives through me.