Thirteen-year-old Rachel Ehmke’s parents thought she was dealing with the bullying at school right up until they found she had committed suicide. She suffered a “bullying campaign” from girls at school that went on for months. They called her a “slut” and defaced her books. She had never even kissed a boy, and now she never will.

You do not have to stay in a school where you are being bullied. There are other options. Try an online school or if you have several schools in your area check into a transfer. Don’t take no as an answer, either. Tell them if you can’t get that transfer, you will begin homeschooling and go to the news. Read more about the many free online schools here.

Rachel reportedly pleaded with her father not to mention the bullying to school officials, for fear of worsening the situation. A note that her parents found after her death read, “I’m fine = I wish I could tell you how I really feel,” alongside a picture of a broken heart. The 13-year-old seventh grader in Mantorville, Minn., died April 29, 2012, after hanging herself at her home. The months leading up to the tragedy were a whirlwind of peer abuse instances, her parents say.

Two days before Rachel’s death, an anonymous text was sent to other students at the school, KARE reports. “It was pretty explicit. Something to the effect of that Rachel was a slut and to get her to leave the Kasson-Mantorville School, forward this to everyone you know,” parent Chris Flannery told the station.

“We thought she was dealing with it and the school thought she was dealing with it,” said her father, Rick Ehmke, who said Rachel and a friend had been eating lunch in a locker room to get away from her bullies.

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