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IT'S HARD to believe it now - but bullies turned Joe Calzaghe's schooldays into a living hell.
Britain's longest reigning world boxing champion has battered 43 opponents. He has never been beaten in a professional ring.
Yet those warrior's eyes cloud with pain as he recalls those years of schoolboy suffering. He admits: "I was so low I hardly had the will to live.
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"People might think I'm tough but I was crying inside every morning when I went to school. It wasn't physical bullying I suffered, but the mental kind - the worst.
"There were a gang of maybe 30 kids who would be at me from the time I got to school. Name-calling, threats, laughing at me, just making me look and feel ******.
"Even the kids I thought were my friends turned against me. And the more I'd react to it the worse it got.
"When you're 14 or 15 years old, it makes you paranoid. I would just find a quiet place to hide away in the breaks. Sit there and hope I'd be left alone.
"To this day I don't know why it happened. Maybe the fact that I went to a comprehensive school four miles away from where I lived didn't help.
"I was already a Welsh schoolboy champion, but I was only a tiny tot - just 5st 10lb. That didn't help either.
"My schoolwork suffered. I went from being a bright pupil to a kid who lost interest. That's how it gets you.
"And I would never tell my parents. I guess girls might talk about it but boys just suffer in silence. ******, really. But that's how it was.
"Kids can be so cruel, especially when you get a gang of them. They just think it's a joke to terrorise one boy.
"It all just seemed to peter out in the final year I was in school. I suddenly grew a lot bigger and the other kids backed off.
"But the damage had been done. It was too late to catch up with all that studying I had missed. I left with nothing but my boxing skills. I was lucky. I've become a world champion and have a comfortable lifestyle. But it could so easily have wrecked my whole life."
It is a stark, graphic illustration from Calzaghe of the bullying and resultant suffering that still afflicts millions of children throughout the country.
Joe grew up in the Welsh valleys - a place he still loves - but the problem is endemic, in tough inner-city schools or leafy suburbia. It is why the WBO super-middleweight champion has pledged it will never happen to his two sons. And why he is a supporter of Childline, the charity set up to help vulnerable children in danger or distress.
"I was astonished to hear 1.5million kids had rung their lines since they started - and the vast majority were suffering bullying at school," he said.
"It's so sad to think it is their only respite. I don't know why I never told my mum or dad - it wasn't as if they didn't care for me. I just couldn't bring myself to do it."
Up to 4,500 children call Child-Line every day because they need someone to talk to - and only half get through - but Calzaghe is determined his two lads, Joe Jnr and Connor, will never suffer in the same way.
"I encourage them to know they can tell me anything. If they have a problem, I've told them to come to me. I want to be like a friend as well as a father," he said. "I bottled it all up. I don't want them to go through what I did.
"They're great kids, they go to good schools and I can see how happy they are. But I know anything can happen."
It may seem a paradox that a man who excels at what can be a brutal sport wants to help children who are in emotional turmoil.
Would Calzaghe let his own kids fight? "Boxing is a fantastic sport. It can also be so cruel," he says.
"My older son Joe is 13 and I have encouraged him to come to the gym. Just to learn to defend himself and get fit.
"He's pretty good. But I don't really want him to fight. I would never stop him if he really wanted to, but I wouldn't push him either.
"I don't think he could be a fighter because he has a comfortable lifestyle. When I was young, we were poor. We never starved but there was no money left over.
"My first punchbag was a rolled-up carpet - it was all we could afford. You have to come from that sort of background to make it in boxing.
"If you don't have that hunger and desire, you'll never put up with all that training, that dedication.
"It's the hardest life there is."
IT'S HARD to believe it now - but bullies turned Joe Calzaghe's schooldays into a living hell.
Britain's longest reigning world boxing champion has battered 43 opponents. He has never been beaten in a professional ring.
Yet those warrior's eyes cloud with pain as he recalls those years of schoolboy suffering. He admits: "I was so low I hardly had the will to live.
Advertisement
"People might think I'm tough but I was crying inside every morning when I went to school. It wasn't physical bullying I suffered, but the mental kind - the worst.
"There were a gang of maybe 30 kids who would be at me from the time I got to school. Name-calling, threats, laughing at me, just making me look and feel ******.
"Even the kids I thought were my friends turned against me. And the more I'd react to it the worse it got.
"When you're 14 or 15 years old, it makes you paranoid. I would just find a quiet place to hide away in the breaks. Sit there and hope I'd be left alone.
"To this day I don't know why it happened. Maybe the fact that I went to a comprehensive school four miles away from where I lived didn't help.
"I was already a Welsh schoolboy champion, but I was only a tiny tot - just 5st 10lb. That didn't help either.
"My schoolwork suffered. I went from being a bright pupil to a kid who lost interest. That's how it gets you.
"And I would never tell my parents. I guess girls might talk about it but boys just suffer in silence. ******, really. But that's how it was.
"Kids can be so cruel, especially when you get a gang of them. They just think it's a joke to terrorise one boy.
"It all just seemed to peter out in the final year I was in school. I suddenly grew a lot bigger and the other kids backed off.
"But the damage had been done. It was too late to catch up with all that studying I had missed. I left with nothing but my boxing skills. I was lucky. I've become a world champion and have a comfortable lifestyle. But it could so easily have wrecked my whole life."
It is a stark, graphic illustration from Calzaghe of the bullying and resultant suffering that still afflicts millions of children throughout the country.
Joe grew up in the Welsh valleys - a place he still loves - but the problem is endemic, in tough inner-city schools or leafy suburbia. It is why the WBO super-middleweight champion has pledged it will never happen to his two sons. And why he is a supporter of Childline, the charity set up to help vulnerable children in danger or distress.
"I was astonished to hear 1.5million kids had rung their lines since they started - and the vast majority were suffering bullying at school," he said.
"It's so sad to think it is their only respite. I don't know why I never told my mum or dad - it wasn't as if they didn't care for me. I just couldn't bring myself to do it."
Up to 4,500 children call Child-Line every day because they need someone to talk to - and only half get through - but Calzaghe is determined his two lads, Joe Jnr and Connor, will never suffer in the same way.
"I encourage them to know they can tell me anything. If they have a problem, I've told them to come to me. I want to be like a friend as well as a father," he said. "I bottled it all up. I don't want them to go through what I did.
"They're great kids, they go to good schools and I can see how happy they are. But I know anything can happen."
It may seem a paradox that a man who excels at what can be a brutal sport wants to help children who are in emotional turmoil.
Would Calzaghe let his own kids fight? "Boxing is a fantastic sport. It can also be so cruel," he says.
"My older son Joe is 13 and I have encouraged him to come to the gym. Just to learn to defend himself and get fit.
"He's pretty good. But I don't really want him to fight. I would never stop him if he really wanted to, but I wouldn't push him either.
"I don't think he could be a fighter because he has a comfortable lifestyle. When I was young, we were poor. We never starved but there was no money left over.
"My first punchbag was a rolled-up carpet - it was all we could afford. You have to come from that sort of background to make it in boxing.
"If you don't have that hunger and desire, you'll never put up with all that training, that dedication.
"It's the hardest life there is."
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