What did anyone do about it? Absolutely nothing. You remained a shy person, not mixing well with new people.
What happens today? Tests are done. You are observed. Your parents worry that you might have x, y or z. Where did the shyness come from? Is it hereditary?
In my case I found making friends one of the hardest things to do. I was far happier with my head in a book or playing on my Atari games console/BBC B/Atari ST/PC as I grew up. Did I want to make friends? No, not really.
I had a couple of very close friends at primary school. I was happy and enjoyed school. I did well and moved onto Grammar School - without my close friends.
Does making new friends get harder as you get older? I say it does. Nearly 20 people from my primary school went with me to secondary school, but none of them were my close friends. They split us amongst the 6 new classes so that we didn't stick together as a group. It was supposed to help us make new friends. Did this help me? No way. By now I am scared. I am slow to get into the new classroom on the first day and find the other 2 girls from primary school had sat together, and I don't blame them. You would think that a Grammar School would be full of like minded individuals who were there for the study and not to become bitches of the century. It seems I was wrong there.
I went through the first 3 years of senior school without a true friend. I was always the third member of a group. And whoever said "three's a crowd" was so damn right. It just doesn't work. In each year I was in a different three. The other two would meet up after school and at weekends and I wouldn't get invited. Why? Was I that freaky? I was called names and laughed at.
Why is it all the bitches are good at sport? I was hopeless at sport and so ridiculed constantly. I was last to be picked for teams. This to me was some form of psychological bullying. They were saying to me that I was useless and they were never going to be friends with me. So there I was guaranteed to be excluded from the "it crowd" for the rest of my school days. Being good at maths or chemistry just wasn't cool.
It was only when we moved into the fourth year - current year 10 - that I finally fell into a friendship that has lasted 25 years and is still going strong. She had been through the same sorts of things at senior school and always been on the outside of a group. She had been persecuted and called names that you would think 14 year olds knew nothing about back then.
I know this is part of growing up, but are children allowed the same naivety that we were 30 years ago? Would it have helped either of us to have been called "autistic" or have "aspergers syndrome"? Probably not.
Does it help now? As a parent, it answers questions, but does it really benefit the child. I hope so. Will it help them make new friends? I doubt it.
BASHFUL
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