Bullying often triggers OCD (obsessive compulsive disorder) for victims because there is a lot of similarity between a bully and OCD. They both try to control the victim and make him/her do things against their wills. That is why OCD is sometimes known as the Enemy Within.

Question often comes up as to why do the bullies do the bullying? I have firsthand knowledge from at least one bully. In my first book “A Life Interrupted – the story of my battle with bullying and obsessive compulsive disorder” I describe an interesting face-to-face encounter I had in adult years with the worst bully from my school days. From my discussions with him I understood that one of the main reasons why he became a bully was because of the treatment he received at home. His home life was not pleasant at all and he felt controlled a lot of the times. Therefore, he felt the need to control others so he could feel important, something that he did not feel at home.

Later through my speeches around the country, I have come to meet a lot of bullies and victims of bullying – they all confirmed that “control” is one of the key factors. This feeling of being controlled can then easily get transformed into OCD. It tortures the victims in a very similar fashion. It makes the victims do things that they don’t really want to do. The only way the victims can get control of their OCD is to learn how to ignore this internal bully. That is what can be achieved through medication and therapy.

All employers have a responsibility towards their employees. Just because the employees get paid, it does not mean that they have to work in a hostile environment. There are many people out there who feel extremely stressed at work because of workplace bullying and harassment, and that in turn affects their personal lives. This has to stop.

That is why I wrote my book titled “How to stand up to workplace bullying and take on an unjust employer”. I wanted to make the point that the process of fighting back was not easy, but it was worth it. Whenever I put in a comment on my Facebook page or on Linkedin, I get comments from both directions. A lot of people support my views and believe in fighting back. But there are also many who seem to believe that it is not useful to fight back – they believe that either you tolerate the mistreatment and keep working in that same place or just quit and take another job.

I do realize that situations are not the same for everyone. For some people there truly isn’t any other alternative other than just tolerating the mistreatment. But I believe that if at all possible, it is important to fight back. Because that is the only way employers will learn that something needs to be done to keep employees satisfied. In my case, I did win a settlement, but more importantly I believe that the organization has learnt that it needed to do more to make sure this kind mistreatment does not occur in the future.

There is still not a lot of dedicated efforts put in by our society to prevent child sexual abuse. Somehow we still don’t seem to want to deal with this issue as a major priority. For example, I have talked with various school officials across the country, and I find that this is still not a high priority topic for school officials. This needs to change.

Last November, there was a major conference of school counselors in Kentucky. I was invited to present a couple of sessions at the conference as well as conduct a pre-conference workshop. My presentations were going to be on the topics of “long term impact of bullying” and “prevention of child sexual abuse” based on my first two books. The pre-conference workshop was going to be on prevention of child sexual abuse. It turned out that the workshop was cancelled because of lack of interest in the topic.

Also, out of my two presentations, the one on “prevention of child sexual abuse” had very few attendees. It became clear to me that most school counselors do not see this as an important topic. I do believe that schools do need to work hard to establish the fact that everyone, and especially school staff dealing with children on a daily basis, must be aware of all issues associated with prevention of child sexual abuse. Children often look at school counselors as trustworthy adults outside their immediate family. It is important for counselors to be aware of all the issues just in case a child shares something that could pose a risk to the child.

I have been noticing that more and more school officials are starting to understand and accept the fact that bullying can cause very serious long term mental health issues for the victims. However, things are still not changing fast enough in most schools. This is probably because most school staff likely believe that there can be serious impact but not for most victims. They need to focus on the fact that even one life affected is one too many.

It is very easy to step away from doing something about an issue as long as you believe that it really does not impact a lot of people. Therefore, if you believe that most victims of bullying do not end up with serious mental health issues, you would feel justified not to spend a lot of time and effort to find a solution to the problem. You don’t feel bad about ignoring the issue since you have convinced yourself that it does not impact most of the students.

However, the point is that it is an extremely serious problem as long as even one child is affected by it. A couple of years back I had spoken at a conference where the theme was “every child counts”. I think that is an excellent message that all school staff should take to heart. In my view, all school staff should remain focused on the fact that they must be able to create and maintain an environment where each and every child feels safe and protected. No child deserves to suffer from long term mental health issues because of a negative school environment. That is why it is critical that all school staff should be focused on making sure that there is no bullying whatsoever.

Organizations can do a lot of things to make sure there is no bullying or harassment in the workplace. However, it all comes down to the owner or the CEO placing a high priority on developing and maintaining a bully-free organization. If they are truly serious about it, then the next levels of management will do their best to follow through.

In larger companies the CEO establishes the priority by first hiring a professional Human Resources Director who has experience in appropriately managing bullying and harassment issues, and makes sure that the HR Director understands the priority placed on this matter. In the true account story I describe in my book “How to stand up to workplace bullying and take on an unjust employer”, there was an HR Director involved, but I don’t believe she had the appropriate experience to deal with these issues. It appeared to me that she would rather avoid these issues rather than having to deal with them. Eventually she got rid of me probably because she thought that would help the situation. Of course, I decided to fight back and won my case through union-led arbitration. I believe if there was a well experienced HR Director involved, then the situation would have been handled differently.

In smaller companies it is much harder because owners often do not have the funding to hire an HR Manager. However, even in smaller companies, if the owner makes it very clear that bullying and harassment in the workplace will not be tolerated, then that message often gets through to everyone. Nobody in a workplace wants to go against the priorities set by the owner.

One of the points I try to make during all my presentations is that every adult has the responsibility to do something to protect a child from possible sexual abuse, if a red flag is detected. Of course, the family members and close friends have the main responsibility, but even ordinary citizens need to keep their ears and eyes open for possible warning signs.

Many adults seem to have the tendency to ignore red flags – they feel like they can’t worry about every little thing. They also feel that if they are getting concerned about every possible red flag, then they are being too paranoid. Well, the point I am trying to make is that there is nothing like being too paranoid when it comes to protection of children against possible sexual abuse. We always need to keep in mind that even one episode of sexual abuse can cause significant damage for the victim.

My request is for every adult to have a sense of urgency about this matter. If we see a possible red flag and if we follow through and check it out with the assistance of other systems/family members, there is no harm done. If it turns out that there was nothing to worry, then that is fine – it will still be a job well done. As I mentioned in my book “Father Figure – my mission to prevent child sexual abuse”, I went the extra mile to make sure two young girls were protected. It took a lot of patience and perseverance, but I feel it was all worth it. I hope others will do the same if they come across any possible red flags.

Many bullies in the schools do not really know what kind of long term impacts they are causing for the victims. They are often told that “bullying is bad – it is not an acceptable behavior in the school. There will be punishment if the bullying continues”. I think the results will be far better if the school officials made sure that the bullies truly understood the long term impact bullying can have on the victims.

Telling them that it is not an acceptable behavior and even handing out some punishment might be a short term solution, but I believe those things do not bring about long term change. Those steps can act as deterrents for a while, but sooner or later the bully gets back to his or her old tricks. That is why it is important to do something that can create a long term change. And based on the feedback I have received over the years from my presentations, I do believe that it is possible to help them make some permanent changes.

First of all, the bullies really need to understand what kind of long term negative impact bullying can have on victims. Most of the school bullies are not aware of this. They think it’s all for some harmless fun at the expense of others. But they don’t really understand that it is not at all “harmless” like they think it is. If they had a good understanding of the life-long devastating impact it can bring to the victims, most bullies will stop continuing the mistreatment. Also, it is really important to work with the parents of the bullies. If the bullies can have a reasonable home life, their actions while at school will be more positive.

I continue to believe that it is important for victims of workplace bullying to stand up and fight against it. Most organizations would at least have someone in management who would be willing to listen to you and do something about it. If not, then there are government organizations that one can go to for assistance in these matters.

Most employees within the Human Resource departments across the country are now well trained in dealing with the issues of bullying and harassment in the workplace. They know that it can be a significant issue for the company if reports of bullying and harassment are not handled properly. Most HR personnel are now well trained in establishing processes and procedures to handle complaints of this nature. In fact I have heard about cases where specific employees were told that they might be fired if their behavior did not change.

However, in smaller companies the situation can be very different. First of all, many small companies cannot afford to have an HR department. And when they do have one, it is not always managed by a trained HR professional. In the story in my book titled “How to stand up to workplace bullying and take on an unjust employer”, the organization I had my problems with had an HR department, but I don’t believe the director had a lot of experience in these matters. I needed to work with my employee union and the Minnesota Department of Human Rights to get some resolution.

When it comes to prevention of child sexual abuse, we have to realize that it is totally up to the adults to protect the children. Children are innocent and cannot be expected to take care of themselves in these complex situations. That is why it is of utmost importance for caregivers to keep a constant eye open for possible red flags.

Children are trusting individuals – they have no reason not to trust someone unless that person has been mean and/or insensitive to them. If a person is nice and sensitive to a child, he/she will likely have no problem in developing a trusting relationship with a child. Most predators know this well and are typically very good at developing trusting relationships with unsuspecting children. It is up to the adults to keep a close eye on all the people coming in close contact with the children to make sure the children are not at risk.

That is one of main points I try to make in my book “Father Figure – my mission to prevent child sexual abuse”. For example, a single mother starting to date a new person, should not introduce the person immediately to her children. She should take adequate amount of time to get to know the person well before slowly introducing her children to him. She should continue to keep an eye out to make sure the children are safe when they are in close contact with this person. Over time it will be clear if that person is trustworthy or not. You can of course never be 100% sure, but giving some time to get to know the person well can often minimizes the risk significantly.

As the New Year rolls in, we need to make a firm resolution to continue our efforts to prevent bullying in our schools across the country. There are still many schools out there where bullying continues to be a problem. We simply cannot afford to allow the devastating long term impact it can have on victims.

If you want to stop something you would need to place a high priority on it and put in dedicated efforts in achieving success. Many schools do identify bullying prevention as one of their key objectives, but they don’t really place a high enough priority on this issue. Many schools have programs in place, but they don’t often follow up on identified issues and therefore bullying still continues.

Children become aware very quickly if the school staff is serious about something. If the school staff truly wanted to stop bullying in their schools, I believe most students will get the message and adjust their behaviors accordingly. I believe that school staff are still not taking full responsibility in trying to eradicate bullying. And I think that is because of the fact that many school staff members do not fully understand the possible long term negative impact on victims of bullying. That is the reason why school staff need to be trained properly to be able to understand what bullying can do to victims over the rest of their lives.