Held wishes bullies would stop, but they don’t

by Dennis Dalman

editor@thenewsleaders.com

All that 10-year-old Tom Held wants is to be treated as if he matters, so that other kids don’t just stand there and do nothing when he is bullied – or just as bad, join in the taunts and laughter.

The teasing started when he was a kindergartner.

A heartbreaking home-made video featuring Held has gone viral on Internet with close to 30,000 views in the past month. In the video, Held sits wordlessly on a couch, looks into the camera and holds a stack of papers, which he “peels” off one by one, each page with large typed words on it that, page by page, reveal what the boy has had to endure.

Held, a Sartell fifth-grader, suffers from attention-deficit disorder and Tourette’s syndrome, which causes involuntary tics and twitches. Despite those disabilities, however, he is a straight-A student and a very kind and gentle friend to those who know and love him. Trouble is, some kids do not seem to want to know him; they’d rather make fun of him, laugh at him, leave him sitting alone in a room.

The pages of printed phrases he shows viewers in his video tell a story that is both terrifying and sad beyond description.

“Because I look different, I get pushed, kicked, shoved, punched.”

“I was stabbed with a pencil in the arm.”

“Things are thrown at me.”

“I get lied about.”

“I get called really mean names.”

“Teased about the way I talk, look, run, eat.”

“Ganged up on.”

“It happens every day, all day long.”

What did Held do to deserve the hellish abuse? That’s what he would like to know. His pages share his confusion about what forces could provoke such torment. He’s been told to “toughen up” and not to tell his parents. He’s been told to “just ignore it.”

“I ask what I did to cause the bullying. I was just there and was just being me.”

“I don’t want to go to school anymore.”

“Most of the time I wish I didn’t exist.”

“I just want to be treated like I matter.”

“Others stand around and do nothing or laugh.”

“I want to feel safe.”

The abuse, Held said, happens when no teachers are around to witness it, although once the principal was nearby when kids were bullying him.

“That time, they (the kids) got into big trouble,” he said.

Tom is the son of Tim and Leah Held. He has a brother, Ryan, 8; and a sister, Sophie, 7.

The family has been hit with a double whammy – not only the bullying of Tom but the ongoing medical problems of Tim. After cutting his toe at a water park last summer, he has had to undergo 22 surgeries in an effort to stop a viciously stubborn invasive bacteria that kept infecting the bones in his right leg – a leg that had to be amputated bit by bit as the bacteria turned septic and kept re-infecting the leg.

Held and his father recently told their stories to the Sartell-St. Stephen Newsleader and also during a video interview on WJON-Radio by reporter Kelly Cordes. She praised and honored Tom for his courage, giving him an award and gifts that included a “hug” Teddy Bear that he can share with other kids who may be bullied.

Many a night, when his son was not in the room, Tim Held would break down and cry about the stories of taunting his son would share with him. School teachers and administrators have tried very hard to solve the problem, Held said.

“But I realize there’s only so much they can do,” he added. “Their hands are kind of tied.”

The real solution, Held firmly believes, starts at home.

“It’s got to start and end at home,” he said, adding parents and families must teach one another to engender respect for all people, and that includes – of course – all students.

That is why Tom Held and others have started an anti-bullying effort they call H.E.R.O., which stands for “Helping Everyone Respect Others.”

The raise-awareness program will debut on Facebook soon once details are finalized. Its organizers hope to have its messages included in regular meetings at schools. H.E.R.O. participants hope to have others share their stories of bullying or being bullied so people will understand how the cruel behavior can damage young people emotionally for a lifetime. It can also cause more drastic outcomes, as all too many devastating occurrences of violence and suicide have shown.

“If school kids could only know what a sweet kid Tom is and how forgiving he is,” Tom’s father said. “But the teasing is still happening. The other day nobody would let Tom sit with them in the Commons (area) in the school. It’s tough to send him to school. The good news is he does have some friends.”

Tom Held loves outdoor activities such as baseball, football and biking.

The Sartell-St. Stephen Newsleader will do an update about Tom and the H.O.P.E. program once it’s up and running.