on never knowing when to end a friendship

22 Jan, 2024

So much for a blog post a week! Dropped the ball on that one right out of the gate, I guess.

The issue has been that there's been one thing at the forefront of my mind & wherever I sat down to write, it was the only thing that I could write about. I think this is largely due to the fact that I've felt so incredibly guilty about the myriad of emotions I've been experiencing, leading to a cycle of never-ending rumination.

I couldn't stop thinking about how I was feeling, but couldn't bring myself to write it all down, either.

But for the first time in a very long time, I was able to talk to another friend about the situation. It's been so cathartic, to find out I'm not alone in how I'm feeling.

• • • •

The situation is: I have been struggling to know when to step back from (or maybe end?) a friendship. Perhaps this sounds silly to some people - that I would be agonizing over what to do - but there are layers in this circumstance that make it hard for me to make clean-cut decisions.

I've know this person for more than a decade and there was a point in my life where we considered one another best friends. But over the last few years, I've felt more and more like I'm asked to give and give and give with no reciprocity.

Here is where the guilt starts to flood in.

In my perfect world, friendship isn't about reciprocity, necessarily. Or, I guess, it is - but not in a way where I would be keeping count of it. I think a friendship should be something where each party gets something positive from the other person. It doesn't have to be a perfect balance, in my mind - different people need different things - but there should be a level of feeling "happy" or "supported" or "understood" that is achieved overall.

(I'm bad at explaining this. Maybe why I've put off talking about it for so long.)

All this to say: the last few years, increasingly, I feel like this friend wants me to jump through hoops for their wellbeing, but even the bare minimum is rarely returned to me. They hardly ever ask about my life and when I do bring it up, it's a short (varyingingly interested) response before the conversation is turned back around to them. They want constant reassurance and feedback, but a wrong answer will net you either a sharp or frosty response (and it feels like all of my responses are wrong, these days). Sometimes, they're just unkind to me and the other people in the friend group for no reason at all (that I can determine).

• • • •

This friend has had a rough go of it in the past few years and I know they also struggle with depression. I understand that. It's why I've let so much slide off of me for so long, but now there's bigger issues shadowing over this friend and I know I should step up and be a good support system but I'm just so fucking tired. I've acted as a pillar for this person in the past when I was drowning myself. And they never noticed or cared and when I set the boundary of saying, "Hey, I can't be your entire support system, I'm struggling to hold all of my own stuff and yours," (at the instruction of my last therapist), they were so upset.

And I get it. I do. It's awful to be rebuffed when you're hurting, but these periods of acting as a pillar never end. And I'm never given a reprieve unless I ask for it. And then I'm the one in the wrong, for not being able to hold everything.

God, I feel like a terrible friend for it. I do.

But I also can't be up late every night, across months and years, checking to make sure this friend isn't spiraling in my text messages. I can't let every cutting remark slide off because "they're just hurting right now."

I've let things slide for so long, at this point. I've cried about this friendship more than any other relationship in my entire damn life - just trying to figure out how to protect myself emotionally and still be there for them.

My new therapist says we all need boundaries and time to rest - that we can't constantly be on call for other people. My therapist also says some people have a tendency to give and some people tend to take and you have to make sure you don't sway too far one way or another; that maybe I sway too much to giving and this friend sways too much to taking, and that I need to learn to center myself better.

• • • •

I do feel "on call" for this friend. And when I'm not perfectly attentive, they come back suddenly, asking if I'm okay (now, since I'm not at their beck and call) and saying they feel like I've pulled away.

And the conversation pretends, for a little bit, to be about me - "Eve, I've noticed you seemed more anxious (funny, you never ask me about what's going on in my life that might make me that way); you don't answer my phone calls much anymore (I hear a hint of reproach); I feel like we're growing apart."

I can't choke up the words, "We have."

I think, for a few, solitary moments, about blurting everything out. Saying, "I feel like you only care about me when you think I'll let you say and do whatever and I'll just keep crawling back." But the conversation has shifted back away from me again.

I feel like I was given a momentary light in a dark room, before it was taken away again. The room feels darker than ever.

I don't say anything real or true.

Just sit there, after the call ends, and think about the people in my life who actually do ask after me and feel like they mean it - turn those examples over in my head and try to figure out if I'm just being over dramatic or if there really is a difference; if I'm making something out of nothing.

I think about if I even could say anything real without all of it coming out in the most awful, torrential, world-ending way. I feel sick and sad and resentful and numb. I don't feel like myself. I don't like the way this makes me feel. I'm scared of how that might manifest, if I open the door on all of this hurt I've built up. I don't want to hurt this person, and I know a lot of what I want to say likely would. Maybe that's why I haven't said anything.

I can only see one possible ending, if I do.

• • • •

I don't know where the line is of deciding what I'll tolerate - what I'll allow - just because I know this friend is hurting.

I go through long periods of depression, and I'm so fucking anxious, I sometimes wish I could exist in a void just so I could get a moment of peace.

I'm in no way perfect. Sometimes, I'm a bad friend. My fears keep me separate from other people. But I don't think I treat my friends the way this person treats me.

In my perfect world, I can be an unflinching support system. But I'm just one person. And this friend is so fucking mean when they're hurting. The axe comes down on me, and because I'm a chump, I always come back, after.

• • • •

Am I just selfish? How do I know? I talked with another friend - someone else close to this person - and they feel the same way.¹ I didn't know. I've been so scared to talk about this with anyone in the relationship bubble, for fear of sounding awful.

I've had friends outside of the relationship tell me for years that this friendship isn't healthy - that it's unequal, that I'm letting this person walk all over me. But I wondered if it was how I told the story, or the fact that the people I told didn't know the other person very well. Of course they're going to side with me, I thought. They don't have a wider perspective on this - just my view on it. And I would try, then, to tell it from a secondary point of view, but aren't we all unreliable narrators, despite our best efforts?

I have such a fear of realizing one day in the future that I was callous and selfish - that maybe I've told the story in my favor, or twisted the narrative - and it makes it hard to believe when people say they think my feelings are understandable.

Am I making any sense?

I just...don't know what to do here. I'm still one of the main people in this person's life. They would never forgive me if they knew I felt this way, so it's not a conversation that can be had. And, anyway, the conversations that have been had in the past did nothing, really. So, even if this was a case where I felt like a productive conversation could be hashed out, it always comes back to the same result.

I feel stuck. I feel scared. I feel so fucking sad.

I love this friend, but these days...I feel like I don't know them. I feel so far removed from them. I hardly know what to talk to them about anymore. Every conversation ends up coming back to them, either way.

I sound like an asshole again.

• • • •

I think some people are good at knowing when a friendship has run its course, but I've never been good at trusting my instincts. I'm so often wrong about many, many things.

What cutoff point do I set for myself?

Is it fair if it's a line that I've let be crossed many times in the past?

I want my relationships to feel fulfilling - to feel like they're good for both parties; that we help each other and make each other better.

I want to be a good friend.

I'm just not sure I know how, sometimes.

Good luck out there,
Eve

• • • • • • • •

#bugbears #personal #ramblings #reveries