How to handle this?

I received the following email from a friend who just wore me down. Called me degrading names until I told her she was history if she did it again. Would call and was such a know it all, I would just sit there and listen. As you can tell from her email, she can be very jealous or nasty in her comments. Just wondering if I should tell her the truth or not respond. What would you do?


Hay how come I never hear from you? Have you gotten to rich and beautiful to keep in touch with the friends that knew you when. Or is it just me you have forgotten..........I remember a prayer you had years ago asking God for a friend and who walked in to the Broadway? Was that only for that moment? Just wondering what happened to our friendship. I have waited quietly for a long time and now just feel I should speak out.

Dianne, some friends are very possesive and I don't think that's right. Maybe you can find a way to talk and let her know nicely your concerns regarding "her friendship" and what you expect or not.

Friendships involve respect, trust, consideration, etc. The way I see it, if a person cannot respect me, he or she is not my friend.

I'm sure your response would've been different is she would've sent you a note or email saying she misses you, right?

If you're interested in keeping her as your friend, I'd say: address the issues. If you're not interested in her friendship, just let it go and don't sweat it. Some things are just not worth our effort and time. Others deserve it all.

Life is too short and precious. And we have only one chance to live! Smile and enjoy it!

Sounds like she has a chip on her shoulder. Why are women jealous of their friends? Can't we be happy for one another.

Don't return the chip attitude. Rise above and reply graciously. Let us know what happens.

I agree with Songbird. You need to decide if this person is worth the effort and you want her in your life. I let go of a friend because she became so toxic.

Some people cannot be happy for another's good fortune.

When she used the praying for a friend and how she showed up, I considered it a guilt trip, using God as the weapon.

Because I married a man who is successful, I suppose she thinks that this is the reason for blowing her off.

My ego wants to answer but in a loving way but then, that opens the door for more communication and I don't want that. Would any of you really want to know how irritating you might be to someone? I wouldn't. I would rather they just stayed away and bid me well.

She never grew as a woman. Never changed. And as Songbird mentioned, she was insanely possessive! Didn't like me to have other friends...ever!

Possessiveness in a friendship is a terrible trait. I don't consider it a true friendship,it's more like a control situation.

It is true that the roads we take in life take us to different places and the people who were by our sides at one time no longer 'fit'.

As you stated, she never grew as a woman.

See, I used to pull bad girlfriends into my life just like I pulled bad men. Therapy helped me with that and that was when I started noticing we didn't have much in common anymore.

Exactly.

To everything there is a season, and a time and purpose under Heaven -

This applies even to friendships.

Not every friendship is a lifelong keeper, and I have found that when God closes one door to a friendship, he always opens another door to an even better friendship that is intended to support his viewpoint of friendship which is to offer Support and promote Growth of EACH person in the friendship

Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their work:

If one falls down,
his friend can help him up.
But pity the man who falls
and has no one to help him up!

Ecclesiastes 4:9&10 (NIV)

You use steel to sharpen steel,
and one friend sharpens another.
Proverbs 27:17 (The Message)

Dianne this women threw a prayer from the past into your face showing how small and petty she actually is. My responce would be none at all. If you ignore this woman whom you no longer care to put up with, she will eventually go away. No responce is the best response and God Bless the delete button.....it helps get rid of all types of garbage.

Dianne, you don't need her. She has the traits of any abusive person: creating guilt trips, throwing things back in our face, dishonoring your success, disrespecting your space, insulting you, jealousy, and possessiveness. You would not keep an abusive man, so you have every right to end a friendship with an abusive woman. A friend who turned out to be toxic I ignored her calls and letters. In retrospect, I realized I should have given her the reasons for my need to distance myself from her. A decade later I developed a friendship with some one who was as toxic. She told me everything about me that irritated her, just like an unkind man would. When I realized this, I wrote her a letter telling her why I wanted to end the friendship. I don't know which way is the "right" way. Perhaps you could write a letter and not send it, just so that you have aired your feelings. During cancer, I had a bad fight with a good friend. We were both nasty. She said, "I've never seen you this way before." I said, "I never had cancer before." This friend and I were able to return to our real love for each other, and after surviving my cancer, I know we will survive anything. You deserve friends who support your success, not degrade it due to HER envy. Love and Light, Lynn

You're all right. She's always snooping around, looking for problems in my life, which I suppose, makes her feel better about her own life. I think I will write that letter and never send it. Thanks.

The saying is true,"misery loves company" that's why I ditched my toxic friend. The better my life became the worse she acted.

It sounds like you have a good solution. Writing the letter will let you say what you want and purge your anger but not sending it will not play into her hands.

Dianne,write the letter and don't send it. But be prepared for the next email.

Lynn, I appreciate your honesty. Maybe it was my Catholic upbringing, but I have a hard time cutting people out of my life. Your words made me realize it's okay to do so. Thank you.

Hi Dotsie, I grew up Catholic too, and I'm still in recovery. I don't think that shaped my notion that I could end relationships. It's within the last decade that I became able to pick and choose my friends, versus the other way around. I do think that the people we meet make an impression for eternity. That does not mean we have to be with them when the time has come that a relationship has gone bad. It wouldn't be healthy, would it? Love and Light, Lynn

Dianne -

I agree with these smart ladies -- write the letter for YOU -- ignore the email.

Throwing a prayer in your face is abusive and an attempt to "guilt you" back into her life -- she has stepped over the boundaries -- people like that wont understand an explaination anyway -- they'll just twist it around to fit their needs

If she emails again - post it and we'll offer suggestions on where to go from there -- but for now -- I'm sure you have better things to do ;-)

Want me to send Luwanda (Bubba and Earl's first cousin, removed several times) to pay her visit?

It would be no prob...just let me know.

JJ

JJ, you're too funny. I think I'm over this person and her stupid email. I let it simmer on a back burner for a few days and decided I'm not going to respond to her snide message, not even in love. It's time for her to move on and her email pretty well shows me she has run through other friends just like she did with me and must be needing to come back to me...starting all over again. Full circle girlfriend usage or something like that.

I too had a friendship go south on me all because I was dating a person who from a different culture. The grandmother of this family passed and they rented me her place after I had separated from my first marriage. When they found out I was seeing someone who wasn't white enough for them they came to the house and
had me remove my personal belongings right then and there. Then sent me a very nasty letter afterwards about my pick of men to date.
Many of my friends wanted me to sue them for the eviction, take it to the media and so on.
I totally ignored them. My feelings were what goes around comes around. Guess what, it did!
The husband fell off their roof about a year later and died. The girlfriend was divorced with 2 years from her perfect little marriage. I haven't heard a word about them in years and they simply don't exsist in my world anymore. Me, I married that man and have a wonderful marriage of 14 years. Of course right now I do have that stepson problem that many of you know about, but that too shall pass.
Diane, I would write the letter to vent it out and not send it. Then let sleeping dogs lie.
Also say another prayer...
Let Go...Let God
Perhaps writing the letter in this forum may be a great way to help you make the right decision.
Hope that I have been able to help you as others here have helped me.
Mary

Maybe it's my age. But I have no patience anymore for people who try to "guilt trip" you into being their friend (or boyfriend).

True friends, when the winds of life blow, are willing to sway with you through both the stormy days and the calm ones.

Just my two cents...

Whirlwind

WW, it might be age related but I think it's just we're old enough now to have:

Been there
Done that
Seen that, too.

We don't fall for guilt trips any more because we recognize them for what they are; they stink!

That's one of the criteria I use to help me decide. If I feel like someone's trying to shame me or guilt me into doing something - then I'll say NO automatically - regardless.....
If I want to I will; if I don't, I won't. If you try to 'trip' me into anything - - then for sure I won't!!
My 2 cents.

Whirlwind and Unique....AMEN to that, at any age..

I'm very sorry you have gone through this with your friend. Has she made contact with you recently? It's very interesting for me to hear this kind of story from your side of the fence because, I have not received any other insight into a personal situation that, in some ways, is similar.

Your friend sounds like she has no clue as to why you've withdrawn your friendship and is trying different tactics to get a response out of you. Wrong though it may be how she has conducted herself, she's scraping the barrel. Pretty soon, she will give up but I'd like to bet, that despite how she's hurt you, she's now feeling hurt herself and completely bewildered as to why you're no longer communicating with her.

I know another respondant said it's not nice hearing unpleasant things about yourself, so telling your friend of how she has incurred your displeasure is unwise. On the other hand, how is your friend supposed to learn from this if she has no idea what she has done/said wrong? Friends, ideally, should be able to address issues with each other with the goal of helping each other to become their best selves. Ignoring people, I feel, is counter productive and only creates unnecessary pain.

I am speaking from experience. Six years into a friendship, my friend drastically reduced responding to my communications. I’m talking like what was a letter a month, plus emails, IMs and text messages, went down to a letter a year and nothing else.

Concerned, I asked if something was wrong = silence.
I asked again = more silence.
I asked again = Denial that anything was wrong then subsequent silence.
More communications from myself = silence.
I asked again if something was wrong = Denial and annoyance that I asked the question more than once (like I should have known from the silence that everything was ok - ??? - actions speak louder than words).
I tried giving her space = silence.
I tried regular contact but was always afraid she felt I was harassing her = silence.

Yes, I've taken the hint that she no longer wants a friendship. Silence - what a cowardly way to go about it? Not only that, she has no intention of resolving what was wrong because she doesn't even want to discuss it, perhaps afraid of confrontation?

I have absolutely no idea what I have done/said to cause her to withdraw from our friendship. It's sad that she hasn't given me the opportunity to correct whatever wrong I've caused her and, in the least to apoligise and be sincere about it.

I have wanted to ask her, finally, if she wants me to stop communicating with her. I see there's no point anymore in my asking what's wrong since silence is her only response. I know she wants me to ‘go away quietly’ but, at the same time, I need her to tell me that. I don’t mind-read by default.

I'm deeply hurt that our friendship has ended like this and I've got to come to terms with its ending without understanding why. That is very difficult.

I miss her.

Thank you for reading.
Itza

Itza, you present some very valid points. I've not heard from her since the email mentioned above. I know, from previous conversations with her, that I'm not the only one who stopped communicating with her. Others dropped her as well. Maybe I should explain but I'm not certain I want to bring back this supposed friendship. She was always trying to get me to ask my husband to invest in one of her many money making schemes and when I did call her during my visits back home, I'd ask her to lunch and she would insist that I didn't bring my daughters with me. Nope, now that I write this, I don't think I'm going to respond. I'll just let sleeping dogs lie. But I do appreciate your thoughts.

Every situation is different. My own kid sister whom I stuck by all of her life and gave money to and helped put through school stopped talking to me and and wouldn't even answer phone calls, letters or even the door when I drove up to Colorado to see her and find out the problem was....I left and haven't seen or heard from her for years now. She was a spoiled selfish child and she stopped talking to or seeing my mother years earlier. I would not go along with that nonsense and told her she was wrong. No matter what our mother said or did, she was our mother and deserved obedience and respect no matter how old we were. I truly believe and live that and I think she took it to mean I was against her. Stupid and useless all this pettyness but looks like its going to be this way no matter what. Itza sometimes its so hard to just walk away but like in Diannes case and mine, its the best thing to do.

I have known those types of people and sometimes it seems as if they are striking out from the pain of loneliness. They seem to be forcing everyone away from them, and yet they also seem desperately lonely. Loneliness can be so painful as to lead to desperation and desperate people cannot be trusted.

Still, most times I must refuse to allow myself to be abused for the loneliness they have inflicted upon themselves. Sometimes they come to their senses. Sometimes not.
smile

If people were backing away from you, wouldn't you begin to inwardly question that maybe it was you? If she had sent me a nice email asking me what was wrong I would have probably just continued having some kind of relationship with her but like most of our phone conversations, she was insulting. I think life is just too short to spend time with insulting, know it all people.

quote:

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Originally posted by Dianne:
Others dropped her as well.

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I wonder if she's noticed? Also, if she's troubled by it enought to start asking question? Until then, I guess no-one can tell her because she wouldn't be ready to listen.

Itza