Liam’s mother, Deirdre Fell-O’Brien, first became suspicious when her generally happy son began to lose interest in the things he loves. He even told his mother that he no longer wanted his cell phone.
After that, he stopped hanging out with his friends and playing football. What’s even more disturbing is that Liam has stopped eating so much. When she confronts her son about the change in his behavior, he bursts into tears as he explains to his mother how his football teammates bullied him.
Liam’s mother, Deirdre Fell-O’Brien, wrote about her son’s experience in a blog for Northwell.
“A group of boys decided my son was ‘sucked in’ and didn’t believe it had to be the football team. There was shoving and kicking. They used terrible language and the They called obscene words. They told him it was nothing. It should kill. They were ruthless in their cruelty. I asked how many times they had done this to him. He looked into my eyes and says, “Every day, mom.”
One of the symptoms of Liam’s depression was his lack of appetite. The situation got so bad that the poor child was hospitalized so he could get the nutrients he needed through a feeding tube.
Deirdre said Liam’s school and the bullies’ parents refused to accept any responsibility or liability. So I took to social media to post Liam’s story, and to his surprise, his post went viral. Husam has received unprecedented support from people around the world. The #WeStandWithLiam hashtag quickly became popular and people everywhere reached out to show their support.
After receiving internal treatment for 10 weeks, Liam felt well enough to return home and resume his life. He was even able to go back to school and start playing football again.
