Lucy Alexander has written to bullies, teachers and parents, describing the torment her son Felix suffered. Photo / via Facebook
Lucy Alexander has written to bullies, teachers and parents, describing the torment her son Felix suffered. Photo / via Facebook
A grieving mother penned a heartbreaking open letter to the bullies who drove her teenage son to suspected suicide.
Felix Alexander, 17, died near his home in Worcester, in the United Kingdom, on April 27, after telling his parents he was going to school.
An inquest heard Felix died after suffering years of bullying. The torment started when he was just 10 years old.
Classmates at the £13,000-a-year ($23,000) King's School teased him because he was not allowed to play violent video game Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2.
He later became the victim of online trolls. One of the website's he was targeted on was Ask.fm, which has been linked to seven teenage deaths.
"His confidence and self-esteem had been eroded over a long period of time by the bullying behaviour he experienced in secondary education.
"It began with unkindness and social isolation and over the years, with the advent of social media, it became cruel and overwhelming.
"People who had never even met Felix were abusing him.
"He was however so badly damaged by the abuse, isolation and unkindness he had experienced, that he was unable to see just how many people truly cared for him."
Mrs Alexander, who is also mother to daughter Charlotte, 22, and son Ben, 21, said she wanted to "educate the bullies" so they can "see the effect they have on people".
"Teachers need to be aware of the dangers of bullying and I want more help to be available," she added.
Felix eventually moved to Pershore High School but the bullying continued. Photo / via Facebook
Felix was just 10 years old when he started being left out and excluded from social activities because he did not own Call of Duty, Mrs Alexander said.
She wrote: "He was 10 at the time, so why on earth would I let him play an 18-rated game that was full of violence?
"One child even called him a 'p***y' because he wasn't allowed to play it. It was really silly comments like that which started the whole thing.
"It spiralled from there and escalated into people who barely knew him joining in, and then he became Felix who everyone hated."
By the time he was 14, her son was also being abused online.
She wrote: "It was initially via the website Ask.fm and then it escalated with basically every social media platform you could imagine."
Mrs Alexander said the bullying was "poisonous" and Felix "couldn't see a way to be happy".
Appealing to parents, she said: "We don't like to think that our children could be responsible for being cruel to another child, but I have been shocked by the 'nice' kids who were responsible in part for Felix's anguish.
Felix was just 10 years old when he started being left out and excluded from social activities because he did not own Call of Duty. Photo / Supplied
"On several occasions we removed all form of social media from Felix as it was causing so much distress, but that just isolated him further."
On the morning Felix died she and husband Ratan, 55, suspected something was wrong as he hadn't arrived at school.
