Well. That is excellent.
I mean, I already knew, from that clusterfuck with That Guy and a few experiences since — I’m going through one now, actually. I am clearly a shit judge of friendship, but knowing there’s science afoot doesn’t make it any less depressing.
Thanks, Internet. You are NOT my friend. At least I know that.
Sad Study Shows Most of Your Friends Don’t Actually Like You
Seems fitting for Groundhog Day, but with advance apologies to the few readers who emailed me to say I shouldn’t waste anymore time in this place…
This is the point in the That Guy cycle when I’m worried we’re not actually done — that I’ll let my guard down and then he’ll pop up somewhere. It’s been a discernible pattern, so much that I’m in a mental fighting stance every time I check any element of my digital existence.
I don’t think it’s going to happen this time. We weren’t exactly kind to each other. And he wasn’t trying to resurrect our friendship, which it turns out we never HAD. He was just finally confirming he’d been using my body and affection to make himself feel better, and that I was inadequate in both capacities. (Still a great feeling if you ever get the chance.)
Logistically, I don’t see how he COULD pop up. He can still see this page because it’s public (everybody wave!). I’m not changing that to avoid one person. (Unless it’s, like, Dexter.) But I don’t think he’s going to “like” anything after I gave him a bunch of shit about liking posts about my body or masturbation.
I think I’ve taken every other precaution, but I’m still a little on edge. When I stopped speaking to him last New Year’s, I don’t think a month passed thereafter where he didn’t remind me he was checking on me — a text, blog like, Facebook friend request (to my professional account), a LinkedIn profile view. But I probably said enough that he’ll avoid setting off that particular powder keg again.
And we’ll just save it for therapy that I still miss him. (Shut UP, I don’t KNOW. He told me I “claim dysfunction and use it to explain away being wrong,” so…yeah, dibs on that. I was crazy, I thought we were friends — I was wrong. I’m basically Clarissa right now.)
Oddly, I think I’ll relax about all this around Valentine’s Day, since that’ll be about 6 weeks. I’ll aim to spend that day finally unclenched, hopefully in more ways than one, with a movie, a glass of wine, my bombass lasagna, and an obscene quantity of really good chocolate. Ideally with a man under me as well, but I think it’ll be a decent day either way. Me and my Valentine “Serenity” — in all the ways. Shiny.
Wow. WordPress readers really love my anxiety, don’t they?
More years ago than I care to consider, there was a show called Married with Children that probably wouldn’t make it in today’s infinitely-more-PC TV landscape. I remember people being offended by it at the time, but it was the late ’80s/early ’90s and most people didn’t give a fuck.
So there was the dumb blonde bimbo daughter, Kelly (Christina Applegate). She’s more appealing than her sports-fan father, so she goes on a sports trivia show in his place. But she knows nothing about sports, so he fills her brain with trivia before the show, and for every sports fact she absorbs, a bit of basic life knowledge leaves her brain, rendering her dumbstruck (seen here) when asked to recall everyday knowledge.
That’s where I am right now. For every bit of bullshit my brain has encountered this week, I’ve lost knowledge and patience. This morning I stood in the shower with conditioner on my hair, and for just a second completely blanked on what the next step was. And I just snapped at my brother because he’s being a fucking asshole. (Though I do kind of love it when I finally give up on trying to be polite and just say what I’m thinking.)
Family issues, friend concerns, medication that’s ruining my appetite and dehydrating me, not sleeping, and additional things with That Guy, all in those 3 days of spiked blog stats… I’m out. I spent my workday NOT FUCKING WORKING, but rather ensnared in a texting clusterfuck with aforementioned brother.
Also, I know my friends love me and will listen to me, but I’m sick of being the Needy Friend — they’ve heard a LOT this week, I sent a goddamn list. (Subject line: “No advice needed; just FYI, everything is fucked.”) I’ve talked to friends, a therapist, my personal journal, and you people. I am tired of thinking and talking about my fucking feelings. I’m not even upset, per se — I just want to go home and sit there for a week or so and not talk to anyone or think about anything. Maybe just spend the whole week re-watching all of Grey’s Anatomy in my pajamas.
So yeah. I’m currently at a Bundy Brain grade 4. I’m gonna pull a reverse Kimmy Schmidt and put my ass into the doomsday bunker.
I’m done with 10-page letters, but this was still nice to read. (From Elizabeth Gilbert’s Facebook page.)
(Sidebar: “And YOU had rambled on for 18 pages…FRONT AND BACK!”)
I know New Years is an arbitrary construct, and that my issues will still be my issues come January 1.
But I’m carrying over enough real problems, so I want to rid my psyche of as much clutter as I can before the new year begins. Plus, I wrote this a while back, and I just want it out of my head. I’ve spent much of this year cleaning house (literally and figuratively), and I want my tabula as rasa as possible.
So here we go. It’s long, so if you don’t feel like reading: a friendship is over and I’m processing the ensuing Feels.
I mentioned this briefly before, but I fell for someone earlier this year. (Which made the residual feelings for my ex even more confusing, but that’s not today’s story.)
I wasn’t in LOVE, but I was definitely in that consuming, heady infatuation of being into someone new. I hadn’t felt that way in a long time (since my ex), to have everything click. And he brought out a lot of aspects of my personality (good and bad, but passionate either way) I either didn’t know or had forgotten I had.
I thought it could’ve been something good, and that it was mutual, and no one could convince me otherwise.
Until the guy convinced me otherwise. He doesn’t even want us to be friends, which I never expected.
I have some quixotic notions of what might be “the real problem,” but it’s hard to delude myself. I considered him one of my best friends, and now he’s not. Which is fine. In any relationship, even a friendship, if one person wants less, that’s the path you take. The person who wants more either has to adjust or move on. I’ve been on both sides of this. And I’m not blaming him — I could’ve handled things better.
But it feels shitty. It’s like a breakup, but not. It’s fine, though. If we can’t even make a friendship work, chances are a romantic relationship would’ve ended badly. Of course, getting to sleep with him probably would’ve helped. Maybe I wouldn’t have been so How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days if I’d ever, uh, HAD the guy.
But, um… our “friendship” did include several instances of intimacy. Not intercourse, but intimacy. (Or what *I* considered intimacy; I don’t know how he saw it. He made me climax, so…felt pretty intimate.) And it wasn’t like I was trying to distract myself like I was with those other assclowns I tried dating. I offered this guy my body because I liked him, because I trusted him, and he knew it. So now it just feels slutty and cheap and naive — like anything we’d shared even as friends was meaningless, like I completely misjudged him and myself.
I told him I thought it was just about sex, that I could’ve been anyone, and he acted offended and said, “How do I prove to you that’s not true?” My response was, “Time, trust, and friendship.” Aaaand then he stopped talking to me.
So all it would take to prove he cares about me beyond sex was to…care about me beyond sex, and I’m not worth even that. He’d rather have me out of his life than make any effort to keep me in it. He’s giving me the “time,” but the “trust and friendship” bits were kind of important. Just time leaves me to operate on my own thoughts and presumptions, and he knew me well enough to know that wouldn’t end well.
During the last conversation we had, he said he has a habit of establishing groundwork in friendships and then maintaining them intermittently whenever paths cross. Which…is bullshit. This isn’t Serendipity, fuckbake — we don’t even live near each other. Our paths are never going to cross unless we make them.
One of the last things I said to him was that he’d made me feel meaningless and insignificant, and he never responded — signs of a rock-solid friendship foundation, right? Sure, let’s catch up sometime over coffee! This is some lifelong Beaches-level shit we have here. When we get the “BFF” necklace, which half do you want?
But it’s fine. (I know, “Say ‘fine’ again.”) I’ve gotten over worse. I’m GETTING over worse. This too shall pass, que sera sera… Your platitude here.
More importantly, I am far too awesome to be a Stage 5 Clinger. I’m not seeking friendship or anything else where it’s not wanted.
Mercifully, they’ve been fewer and farther between lately, but my brain still has blips of “My world is not going to be right unless this person is a bigger part of it.”
*deep breath* My world is as it should be. If my relationships with people are meant to change, they will. All I can do is let them know, and I did. The rest is up to the universe (well, and to the people, obviously).
Fuck this, I have shit to do. Keep doing your thing, Time.
Smug Singleton 