I want to die Heartbreaking words of girl, 8, after being tormented by bullies at school
A GIRL of eight left a heartbreaking note at the foot of her bed which begged: ‘Please help me stop getting bullied.’
Millie O’Neill was so upset about the alleged verbal and physical abuse by other children at her school that she told her mother Naomi: ‘I want to die.’
Mrs O’Neill, 28, had sought counselling for Millie after she stopped sleeping and tried to self-harm because of the alleged bullying.
But the mother- of-two said she had felt compelled to share the note on social media to reassure Millie she wasn’t alone. Every time the note is shared, Mrs O’Neill tells her daughter she has gained a new friend.
Mrs O’Neill discovered the note last week and said she ‘died inside’ when she read it. Millie wrote: ‘I am sad because I think it is not fair, because they just keep on bullying me and the way it makes me feel.
‘Not one kid in the world should feel the way I feel when I get bullied. It makes me sad, I feel different, weird, not important, angry, dumb and hurt. There is a lot more but I don’t want to write it.’
On the reverse it carried a desperate cry for help: ‘Please help me stop getting bullied.’
By then, Millie’s family claim, she had suffered several years of abuse and had been referred to childhood mental health services. Millie began to scratch herself and make herself sick because she was so afraid of going to lessons.
Mrs O’Neill said she complained to staff at Lister Junior School, in Liverpool, and the child responsible was eventually disciplined. However, she claims the alleged bullying carried on and accused the school of not taking it seriously.
Referring to the note, Mrs O’Neill said: ‘I went to make her bed and I found the note at the bottom. I couldn’t believe it. You could tell it’s been written in a rush as if she’s panick-
‘I couldn’t believe it’
ing, she usually has beautiful handwriting. It was as though she just couldn’t face school.
‘I sat asked her what was wrong and she told me about the bullying. She just said, “I want to die”. You don’t expect to hear things like that from an eight-year-old girl.’
Mrs O’Neill, who also has a younger daughter, has taken both girls out of the school and is looking for an alternative.
Simon King, headmaster at the school, said he was ‘shocked, saddened and really concerned about the note’.
‘We take bullying extremely seriously and although there have been a couple of minor disagreements with her classmates since she joined us in September 2016, they have always been sorted out amicably,’ he said.