Niveo’s letter against bullying: “My wounds are still open and alive”

Who is bullied? often talks about it when everything is now a distant memory, I have chosen to share my wounds with you, even though they are still open and alive. Fear, a sense of humiliation and shame prevent us from asking for help and indulge that feeling of strength that makes those on the other side feel invincible.

My name is Niveo, I’m a singer-songwriter and in my latest song, Despite youI wanted to tell what happens when we do the right thing and choose ourselvesbut today another person will speak. Let me introduce you to Marco.

I remember little of my childhood, even though I often retrace it through family photo albums. I have always been a sunny and smiling child, well-liked and loved. I have a brother who is 4 years older than me and all I wanted to do was spend time with him. Yet it was with him that I first learned the painful aspect of loneliness. I was outgoing and affectionate, he was introverted and rejecting. A fairly common situation between siblings, yet it was very important to me to feel accepted by him, because at that moment he represented exactly the person I wanted to become: strong, intelligent and skilled in everything.

I went from asking him to play and hang out with him to sitting quietly next to him and watching him play video games. And before I even knew it, we ended up barely talking to each other anymore.

As a teenager, over-sensitivity probably made me the perfect person to bully. Plus, I was 1.52 m tall until the first year of high school.. My voice also took a long time to develop and among the deep ones of my schoolmates mine stood out because it was shrill and high-pitched. My peers labeled me with offensive nicknames. I naively thought it was their way of joking with me, I was still mentally too young to understand that those phrases and gestures were full of malice and the desire to mock me. The anonymous messages in which they threatened to beat me, however, remained unmistakable. as much as those breathless moments after being grabbed by the neck for having responded differently from what the bully on duty wanted.

As I grew up I became aware of the wickedness that surrounds us and of the wickedness that I have suffered, but only recently have I gained the clarity that makes me say today that no one should ever feel offended by certain words. At the time I was overwhelmed by the wickedness with which those things were said to me and I began to withdraw into myself and no longer speak to my parents as before. I rationed my words.

From the age of 9, I hid in what was my only safe haven, the internet. I idealized my life with my favorite YouTubers: they were the friends and brothers I wanted so much. I wrote on Facebook to CiccioGamer89 that I loved him so much, that he was like a brother to me. On the Internet everything was easier, I didn’t have to worry about what people thought of me, I was free to give all the affection I wanted through messages and comments and I never really felt alone. Even as I grew up, I continued to prefer staying at home to going out and risking meeting one of those groups of kids who bullied me.

At 13 I received my first PC as a gift, thanks to which, in addition to starting to sing along to karaoke bases, I made my first online friends. I had a group of about ten people with whom I played every night. With them I didn’t need to hide my voice, in fact, it was the only thing they knew about me. I wasn’t even ashamed to sing, a feeling that I had never felt before.

In real life, as I got older, I started to behave differently depending on the people around me. I had conformed to boys completely different from me, with them I changed the way I spoke and dressed. I even started going to the gym to put on muscles and no longer look like the usual child. So – I thought – maybe I would be treated like any other boy my age. Fortunately I soon understood that by doing so I was feeding my sense of inadequacy.

My current group of friends was formed during my junior year of high school. They watched me grow up, they knew the child I was and the boy I was becoming. When I shared with them my desire to wear nail polish, the response I got was “you already look faggot the way you dress, no nail polish, never wear it”. Even though I knew there was no malice in their intentions, I admit I was disappointed and hurt by that way of thinking.

Yes, I had my own way of dressing. But instead of feeling unique, I felt wrong because everything that was different was constantly denigrated. Even a teacher said to me, “Does this seem like the way to dress to come to school?”. I simply put on overalls.

I feel a little angry at the idea that I was able to overcome some of these insecurities of mine only after my appearance on TV in Friends of Maria de Filippi. There are thousands of kids out there who have gained self-esteem and won their battles on their own in a more genuine way, without needing the applause of the audience. This letter of mine is mainly addressed to those who are still fighting their battle against bullying on a daily basis.

To this day Marco carries with him a constant sense of inadequacy. He struggles to feel completely at ease when he interacts with his peers. He lives with the constant feeling that someone could make fun of him at any moment. He knows very well that to combat the aftermath of the bullying he has suffered, he will have to choose himself above all else. Sometimes it is not easy, but it will become so. Despite everything.