“Guys only like you for one thing. I’m talking about the area between your belly button and your chin.”

When I was in the seventh grade, a close friend of mine told me this. I was one of the first girls in my class to fill out a bra, and beginning in sixth grade I got a lot of comments about it. I thought it was funny, and admittedly liked the attention, so I played along.

I didn’t think that one was funny.

I’m sure that when it happened, I got a “what the hell did you just say?” look on my face, told him to shut up and strolled back over to my friends’ lunch table. I didn’t mention it to any of them because that’s just how the guys talked and that’s how things were and I needed to get over it.

Spoiler alert: I didn’t get over it.

I still remember the way his voice sounded when he said it. I remember wondering if he was right. I remember wondering if that was a good thing or a bad thing. I remember deciding that it was bad and that it was my fault.

Fast-forward a few months. There’s this guy in my English class who's kind of a jerk, but has never really been that bad to me, and I sit beside him, so I may as well say hi each afternoon when I come in. The bell rings, I make the quick walk from math to English, walk in and say, “Hey, (I’ll leave out his name), what’s up?”

I guess he was having a bad day, because he whipped around in that seat and half-said-half-yelled, “You know what, Elly? You’re fat and stupid and annoying and nobody likes you, so why don’t you just shut up?”

Let me tell you, that one hurt. Or, more appropriately, those ones hurt. These were some of the things I spent the most time agonizing over: my appearance, my academics and what people thought of me. Talk about three birds with one stone.

The guy who told me that my chest was the most important part of me is still a pretty good friend of mine. We disagree on a lot of things, but it’s always great to grab a coffee and catch up when we’re home for breaks. He’s a good guy. I can’t help it, though; there’s something in the back of my mind that will never forgive him for validating my insecurities when what I needed most was to be told I was more than a cup size.

The guy who snapped at me in class is not, and never was, a friend. After that day, I stopped saying hello when I walked into the room. I no longer tried to defend him when his name came up in gossip. In less than five seconds, any respect I had for him had been shredded and chucked out the window.

If you asked me what the difference between the two is, I honestly couldn’t tell you. Maybe it’s because Guy #2 wasn’t even really on my radar until middle school, whereas Guy #1 had been a close friend since pre-k. In a way, that makes it hurt a little more; when he said I carried my worth in my chest, he knew what he was talking about. He’d been around since age three and had attended every birthday party, pool party and family get-together I could remember. He knew what about me was likable and dislikable and apparently could find only one thing to put in the “pros” column.

Regardless of which upsets me more today, both happened, and both stuck with me. For the rest of middle school, and still today, I am hesitant to assume that male attention is attracted solely by my bubbly personality (especially because I am now in a relationship, and, therefore, am not seeking the attention in the first place). I am simultaneously quick to decide that there’s no way someone could find me attractive because the *list of 30+ things wrong with my body pops into my head*. Then I remember that I talk too loudly and too much and that’s annoying and I can’t bring up this certain subject but I also need to be able to keep a conversation going because otherwise they’ll think I’m boring and –

You get the point.

I’m sure some of that is just part of who I am. A little insecure about most things, a lotta insecure about some things. I am pretty confident, however, in the culpability of incidents like the two I described above in planting this seed of self-doubt inside me and nurturing it into the monster it is today. So please, even if it seems harmless, or you’re having a crappy day, or whatever the reason is, watch what you say to your peers. Even if you don’t remember it, they might, and it can be a way bigger deal than you thought.