I don't take criticism or rejection well, do you?

[Changing4Best]

Yes, that is one of the many things I plan to work on. I don't take anger well. Even some of the replies in this thread have upset me, because they came across angry, even though the person was trying to help me. I could see that last, but I felt and anger and it still hurt. I had to sleep on it before I replied for that reason. I have never taken anger well.

 

[Nessa7]

Do you feel like you have friends and support at the Senior Center?

 

[Changing4Best]

Do you feel like you have friends and support at the Senior Center?

Barely. I have maybe 1-2 friends left, since I spoke out against the bully about a month ago. Everyone else, including everyone else that works there, has either sided with the bully or his friends or my boss. The only other person who I know for sure is on my side and is my friend is the other person who got bullied and who spoke out against it to the Senior Center Director. Then there is my client. He seems friendly. No one else really seems to be as warm or as friendly as they used to be, before all this trouble started, before I spoke out against the bullying and the bully.

 

[Deleted member 541]

I wonder if this guy is really a bully, or just someone that likes to be a jokester, and get attention by doing so. Bullies usually are really mean, they will say awful things and threaten you if you don’t do what they say. They are verbally abusive, physically abusive and emotionally abusive. They hit, punch and kick the shit out of a person. They threaten you with physical abuse.

I wonder if you are mistaking him just being a rude joker that does it for attention, instead of being a bully????

 

[Changing4Best]

His "jokes" are mean spirited and nasty. I don't see that a bully has to be what you have said. It does not have to be physical for it to be bullying. In the book "BULLYING AMONG OLDER ADULTS" by Robin P. Bonifas PhD M.S.W., she does not describe the elderly bullies as persons who physically abuse, no, she describes them as persons who persistently behave negatively toward certain individuals or groups of individuals (I have paraphrased her definition here). She says it can be physical, but does not usually manifest that way. She documented a lot of different cases of bullying in the elder communities that she surveyed all across our country and most of them were not physical in nature.

However, they were all mean spirited and nasty and rude, oh yes, very much so! And that is what this guy is, not only to me, but to others also. He is into name calling, making people uncomfortable with his off-color humor and descriptions of his ex-wife and ex-girlfriends that should not be discussed in mixed company. He also gets angry at things that he has no business getting angry and nasty about. I'm talking high volume, anger here that is totally uncalled for.

 

[Deleted member 12723]

Bullies usually are really mean, they will say awful things and threaten you if you don’t do what they say. They are verbally abusive, physically abusive and emotionally abusive. They hit, punch and kick the shit out of a person. They threaten you with physical abuse.

This is the definition of a bully that I stand by. Mean spirited is not bullying behaviour or we would all be bullies, so based on the authority of this one author you are defining him as a bully? I sure hope that you do not ever meet up with a real bully.

 

[Changing4Best]

Here is Merriam Webster's definition:

Definition of BULLY

The "especially one who is habitually cruel, insulting," part is what I have been referring to. And he has been threatening to me and others too, of course.

 

[Deleted member 12723]

he has been threatening to me and others too, of course.

Thank you for the definition. What has this bully threatened you with or about? I guess this part is not clear to me at all.

 

[Nessa7]

Barely. I have maybe 1-2 friends left, since I spoke out against the bully about a month ago. Every...

Is the Senior Center set up in a way that would let you and your client do something fun with just the two of you or with only one or two other people? If you're feeling alone or isolated, that is going to make it harder to deal with the bully, especially when you're depressed. It seems accurate to say that you aren't getting support from the people that should be supporting you. It's unfortunate that your boss isn't going to do anything on your behalf. That doesn't mean that there aren't other people that would not reject you if you tried to spend time with them.

I remember @SheilaKathy mentioning in earlier threads that this man would make sexual comments about her and towards her friend, who expressed that it made him uncomfortable. I guess a semantic argument could be made that he is not a bully, but it feels very minimizing to brush off sexual harassment because there isn't a physical component.

 

[Changing4Best]

I'm UNWATCHING this thread, as I don't want to carry on with this conversation further at this time. Please let it go. I understand that some of you want to help and I am grateful for that. However at this time I am going to try to handle this whole situation in therapy alone. I don't wish to discuss it further here. If I discuss it at all on the Forum, I will do so in my Trauma Diary. It is in the TRAUMA DIARIES section. Thanks for your understanding in this matter, everyone.