Hey. I'm upset. I've been upset for a long time. At a friend. Let me explain. I had a friend, "Michelle". She has a very strong personality. I put her emotions before mine. One time I made her upset and she cried for a few minutes. I apologized and then cried for an hour for making her upset. That made me uneasy about being honest with her about my feelings. Another time we planned to go clubbing in a few weeks. I originally said I would go, but I didn't want to go a few hours before we left. I told her, and she got mad at me. So I went, hid in the bathroom, and started crying until another friend came in looking for me. I told her I was sick and she took me home with Michelle. I kept apologizing to Michelle, saying I was sorry and I felt so bad. Her response was "it's okay, because everyone got to see me dance." That didn't make me feel better. Finally, last summer I sent her an email telling her how I felt, and how she stressed me out and needed space. She replied to the email saying that it was all my fault and if I was upset I should have said something. We've somewhat reconciled since then, but at a progressive dinner with our QSA, everyone was talking about Lady Gaga. I don't like her music, and as such I felt like everyone was judging me for not liking Lady Gaga. I felt ostracized, left out, put down, and horrible. I tried to tell Michelle about how everyone needed to calm down when they were learning that I didn't like her music. Michelle's response was, "They need to calm down? [Markio], YOU need to calm down!" And she gave me a look right after that hurt my heart. Since then, two months since the last incident, I've had trouble being around her, and I've cried multiple times, and I feel like I can't tell her how I feel because she won't listen. In the above examples when I've tried to tell her about how I felt, her responses have been, "It's okay, because I got what I wanted," or "it's YOUR fault for feeling that way," or "you need to calm down and I don't want to hear what you're trying to say." I don't know what to do, you guys. I'm worried that if I try to talk to her, she won't listen. And if I don't talk to her, I'll continue to feel so horrible inside. I also wanted to know if anyone had advice about how her feelings made me really upset in the first situation. She cried for a few minutes, but I cried for an hour with guilt. Is that bad? Why did I feel so guilty? Is she right in that it is my fault for never saying anything before? I'm so sick with grief. :tears:
This sounds like a toxic friendship. I think you should sit her down and have a serious conversation with her. She's being quite selfish; it sounds like she's not even considering your feelings. If you can't get through to her, I'd give her her space and drop the friendship. How long have you guys been friends?
If your crying for an hour for the simple reason you made someone "upset" for a few minutes, i think something is definitely very wrong. If this only happens with your friend Michelle, then try removing her from your life for awhile and see if that fixes the problem. You cant go on like this. When you get emotional its hard to make good choices, and one of these times something seriously bad could come of that. All your examples are very trivial, minor things your getting emotional about. Its not exactly normal to have a panic attack during a conversation about music taste like that. Definitely try and see if its just this girl that drives you off the wall. If not, you might want to try something else...
Thank you both for your different responses. To clarify on the situation, we became friends last year, during my freshman year of college, and she was one of the first people I ever came out to when I was at a LGBT-diversity-training-type event. She heard I didn't have friends, and decided to be my friend. Having no other friends, I devoted my time and efforts to just her, and received less support that I'd hoped for. This may mean that either she's somewhat fake with me, or that I expect too much from my friends, but probably a combination of these two. I think distance is a good idea, although I still feel hurt when I think of her. Which means that I would have to go out of my way to invest time in other groups. Which has me worried that I may repeat the same actions, where I "feel" vicariously through other people. Plus I just haven't seen my therapist for awhile, since it's holiday break and I'm alone with my thoughts.
Markio, I know how tough it can be. I find myself in the same vicarious situation many times(though only rarely break down/cry because of them). For me, it tends to usually boil down to the point of a fear of not being accepted or liked does boil down, and I think both of your examples show this(sometimes, however, especially with closer friends/family, it comes down to feeling like I let them down/needing to do what is best for them). You may have cried when she was mad at you because you didn't want to let her down, but what was the fear in letting her down? Were you afraid of her not being happy and thus disliking you? The same goes for the Lady Gaga discussion. Did you perhaps fear further mal-perception and disliking?
If I were to guess from the information you've provided, I'd say you are still coming to terms with being comfortable with yourself and who you are, and fundamentally loving yourself. This can have a lot to do with Catholic upbringing (most Catholics have a lot of guilt) and then, when you overlay being gay on top of that, and not being out to your parents, it becomes quite understandable. I'm sure you're already working on the issues of self-esteem with your therapist, but it might be worthwhile to spend a session or two exploring these experiences you've just described. I could imagine, for example, that if you don't have many friends, and someone befriends you, that you will naturally have a tendency to try to "mold" yourself to what that friend wants, and to do everything possible not to upset her, for fear of losing her friendship. But as Etoile has said, the friendship doesn't sound healthy. It actually sounds like it could be codependent in a very unhealthy way; Michelle likes having someone who she can control, and she (consciously or unconsciously) realized that befriending someone with few friends would give her a lot of "power" over you, while you, having few other good friends, would lean on her a lot. Both of these behaviors allow each of you to lean on the other in a way that perpetuates both of your issues. In your case, I might theorize that the fear of losing or offending her is tapping into a deep-seated fear that you aren't worthy of having good friends, and that is why you are having such exaggerated responses (crying for an hour) over an issue that for most others would be pretty trivial. You're an intelligent person with a lot of insight about yourself, so I think the insecurities are a temporary thing that are probably contributing to the lack of friends. Once you work through those insecurities and start feeling more confident about yourself, I think you'll find that you are able to attract more and better friends, and your relationships with your friends will also be healthier. And... you're on the money with your feelings about Lady Gaga, at least as far as I'm concerned
I don't know what to say, except thank you all a lot.(&&&) All your comments are affirming questions I've asked myself, and I think it does come down to "a deep-seated fear that [I'm] not worthy of having good friends." In the mean time I will continue to avoid close contact with Michelle, as it doesn't seem to do me any good, emotionally or socially.
