I need to vent a bit so I'm tagging this under "things that help" since this is my morning moment of therapy. :) So do take everything hereafter with a grain of salt.
Last night a friend of mine left me a voice mail where she sounded upset to me. So I texted her saying I cared. This morning I bought her coffee, and on the way to work I asked her if it was only her school closure that upset her. Her response was anger and frustration pointed at me (which I am not supposed to take personally) because of my text, because she says my caring was about me not her, and because if she wanted to talk she'd tell me.
This caring for people when they don't want to be cared about is something that I've been actually working hard on. I get that I wasn't using my head when I texted her that I cared because my head knows she is a person who doesn't like care. Problem was I was using my heart and it's a bit flighty sometimes.
I've been trying to pay attention to my motives and actually I have been trying to care less for people (at least in action). I realize there is no use in saying "I should have" but... I should have just asked a question or said "It sounds like you are in a sucky mood". Something else. But we were both tired and it was first thing in the morning.
With all of that said though, I quit. In fact I had quit on this friendship months ago but she didn't even notice. It was her voice mail that sounded upset to me that caused me to re-engage. A mistake to be sure. I don't call her to hang out.
Her second serge of anger at me came when I said to her "We just haven't been talking as much lately so I wanted you to know that if you needed to you could talk to me." She thinks we haven't been talking because she's been out of town for a week. I think we haven't been talking for months. Like since September! Have I said I quit yet? I do. This morning her venting even though I'm not to take it personally made me all teary and I would have cried if I hadn't been in the car. I'm done with that. No one else in my life makes me cry. And I will take her advice and realize it's not personal. Who cares if she can't notice I haven't been her friend since September.
2 comments:
not worth it. you need healthy relationships. obviously that is not one of them. i think you said it best yourself this morning, you need to be friends with people who talk.
-b
THAT was just whack. Why do I feel like there's something more beneath this... like that bit about working on caring less... what's that about? I don't understand.
I support you in leaving abusive and hurtful relationships. I don't think I would want any kind of friendship with someone who told me not to take our relationship and interactions "personally."
But back to that other part... can you explain why you would work on caring less?
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