Another Life Lost

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Lisa Welsh

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By Lisa D. Welsh
wwww.CHEERMaD.com
This week a young man, a sophomore in high school in Florida, hung himself. He was a cheerleader at his school and because of that activity, mass speculation ran rampant on social media that he was bullied into committing suicide. I didn’t know him or the circumstances but to do something so drastic, he was certainly hurting about something and decided on a permanent solution to a temporary problem.
As a parent, I am devastated for this young man and his family. I wrote about a similar situation in January when Jeffrey P. Fehr, another male cheerleader, took his own life on New Year’s.
The first finalist in the “Certifiably CHEERMaD” contest was McKully Meek who wrote:

I am a male cheerleader for NEO Allstars in Canton, Ohio. My mom is the biggest supporter of what my sister and I love to do.
As a male cheerleader I get a lot of slack for what I love, my mom defends me to the end and embraces what I love.

From Left to Right: Rachel, Julie Bolten of Cheer for a Cause and Cat Haley. Rachel and Cat are Jr. Ambassadors for Cheer for a Cause and The Cheerleading Agency which promote leadership in academics and community. Cat is also an Nfinity "Legend" who, having graduated from high school in Maine will cheer for Stingray's Orange near her college next year.
There’s been a growing rally against bullying in general and in cheering in particular this year. Julie Bolten, a cheer mom who created the organization “Cheer For a Cause” has been planning on further developing her “Bully Free Zone” campaign with a cheer industry led, anti-cyber-bullying initiative to kick off June 1.
I don’t know if everyone is bullied but I know I was and my kids have been too. My husband can’t recall being bullied and, having the benefit of an older, much bigger brother, may just been one of the few who was spared.
But I’ll never forget the day it came to my attention that Becky was being bullied at school.

Becky and I, about the time this story happened.
She was in the fifth grade and left the house for school absolutely glowing. She had carefully picked out her wardrobe: jeans and a nice fitting top (not the baggy sweatshirt she had been wearing lately), had taken the extra time to “do” her hair several different ways before deciding on wearing a headband and had asked permission to wear a pair of hoop earrings that I thought teetered on the edge of good taste because of how big they were. I let her wear them around the house but at school…?
“Come on Mom, all the other girls do,” she pleaded.
By the way she had taken care with the rest of her look that morning, something in me said “O.K.”
I probably remember how great she looked leaving the house because of the way she looked when she came home: disheveled was the best word for it. At first glance, her headband was gone and her hair a mess. After a closer look, I saw that the hoop earrings were gone too.
“I don’t want to talk about it,” was the only thing she said as she ran up the stairs and slammed the door to her room.
While I might give-in to the occasional wardrobe request, I’m not one to leave things alone when I know my kid is hurting. And was she ever hurting now.
She cried as she told me how the day before one of her classmates, someone she had been close with when they were younger, had invited Becky to sit with her at lunch “tomorrow.” But when Becky came and took the empty spot at the cafeteria table, one of the other girls said “Who do you think you are? That’s Katie’s seat.” Her “friend” didn’t say anything and just looked down at her food as Katie appeared to claim her seat.

Coach Becky, now coach and a great example for other kids, like Nori. Becky's team was recently named the highest ranked mini Level 1 in the country when it won the USASF's International All Levels Virtual Grand Championship.
Katie was another former friend who attended birthday parties and sleepovers when they were younger but who had since become the leader of the “cool” kids. Becky must have been absent the day this group was established but that was O.K. with me. Other parents had talked about the changes in Katie, the dalliances with smoking, drinking and boys. The moms like me who had looked after Katie after her mother died when our kids were in kindergarten had fallen away, not having any real authority in her care, and her father had been numbing himself with alcohol for years.
I felt bad for Katie but it didn’t give her the right to mouth off at Becky, leading the other girls to taunt her into tears and leave the lunch room altogether.
I’m no expert, but it’s been my experience that people who hurt, hurt other people. I told Becky that, I knew she was hurting but, “This too shall pass.” I also told her that somehow the kids who were “cool” in middle school fall away (or burn out) in high school.
And that’s just what happened.
As time went on, Becky was cheering all the time; either practicing or competing on weekends and didn’t seem to care about what the cool kids were doing. We were fortunate that she was too busy (or tired) to get into drinking or drugs.
The other day, Becky told me that she wanted to get a tattoo with the words This too shall pass in my handwriting “because that’s what you always said to me whenever something really bad happened and it got me through.” At almost 20-years old, she doesn’t need my permission to get a tattoo and I admit I’m not a fan. But I was moved to tears and honored that she’d remembered.

But if you or anyone you know don’t think you can wait, please tell an adult your trust and check out the following BULLYING RESOURCES y recommended by Cheer For a Cause:
1. The U.S. Government has an excellent resource at http://www.stopbullying.gov.
2. The Trevor Project, at http://www.thetrevorproject.org, is the leading national organization, providing crisis and suicide prevention services to lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and questioning (LGBTQ) youth.
3. There is also a great page on facebook focused on the cheer and dance world at “Bullying is Nothing to Cheer About”, http://www.facebook.com/bullyingisnothingtocheerabout.
 
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