You will at one point or another experience a toxic friendship. I'm not referring to that friend that might make use of association and so-called peer pressure to lead you to drugs or something because you should know better. You might not even consider the person I am talking about because this person could be your best friend and for better or worse you're obsessed and depressed with each other, as Maroon 5 put it. This is another one of those unpleasant articles that took me forever to write because I found it uncomfortable to think about. It will be a difficult read if you're going through something similar. If you feel like you don't want to hear the whys, hows and hardships then rather check the article with pictures of the Reese's Peanut Butter Cupcakes I made (click here) it's much nicer than this. [Insert big cyber hug] to the friend that motivated me to finish this so that I could tell you things will be okay eventually and I'm here for you.
I'm going to call your friend "Person X", like "Chemical X" but not quite. You were fast friends in the beginning of your friendship. There wasn't a "I just think that we are going to be friends" moment when you met; you never realised that person was going to be in your life for a long time, you just started to live accordingly. Person X subsequently becomes your best friend.
If you happen to glance back at your friendship you'll find that it was composed of really good times and some painfully horrible moments. Whenever you cried because of Chemical X, sorry Person X, you felt your friendship mutate. You always tried to sort things out and would put up with a lot of "radiation". According to Adele, whenever you thought about leaving you'd feel your heart burst and bleed and you'd repeat like a broken tune to forever excuse their intentions. You'd live for the good times and hope that one day Person X = Person Considerate or even just Person Realise When You're Hurting Me.
You can stop here if you want because I'm going to generalise.
You will either:
a) Go onto dating Person X and then marry Person X, if you can.
b) Make a choice to leave and stick with it.
c) Let time and/or distance take its course and fade out of the friendship.
I will not bother with people who do a) because they chose the easy way out. They chose a future filled with cycles of continual hurt and an unhealthy obsession. They block off friends because they radiate bad energy with the same constant sadness and anger. They change for the worse, perhaps into Mojo Jojo, and Person X stays the same. They never thought to work for the change they long for.
I like c) but my focus is on b). You decide to leave after much thought - do not make an angry decision - and have gotten past the stage of the connecting your head knowledge to your heart. You will be unprepared for the sadness that precedes your leaving announcement. You tell Person X and a crushing wave of sadness, anger and wanting to go back will hit you all at once. The sadness was already present and amplifies. The anger presents itself because you will be angry at yourself for taking so long to leave.
This probably takes a week to subside if you:
- Allow yourself to feel the range emotions (don't pretend you're not hurt when you clearly are)
- Write down lists of why you wouldn't go back and keep re-reading them
- Go cold turkey on Person X and annihilate contact with them (yes, annihilate, social networks and cellphone numbers are included)
- Sad pop music, yes, it's that sad (here's a playlist)
The bottom line is change is hard. Things will get better and you can hold onto that while things are not okay. As time passes you'll still think of them occasionally, most of the sadness will be gone and you'll have come to peace with yourself. You will start to experience relief at not repeating the motions over and over again.
I say go forth and meet new people. There are 3 billion other people in the world (3 billion = 7 billion - kids and old people), Person X isn't the only person you will click with. It will be hard to meet people in the beginning but keep trying.
You will both change. Perhaps you leaving is the wake-up call Person X needed to change but don't leave with the intention of getting them to do things differently so that you can come running back. I hope you've left because you're taking a stand for your happiness and a stand against bad treatment. Do you realise that you can never be mistreated after this? This will probably be the one of the hardest things you will have to do in your life because this "break-up" ranks pretty high on the scale of "1 to Adele". One day you'll look at Person X as just somebody that you used to know and everything will finally be alright.
 |
| If you can see under the heart you might catch a glimpse of the horror that was supposed to make up the original article. Oh? You can't? Too bad! You're getting the edit. |
I'm going to call your friend "Person X", like "Chemical X" but not quite. You were fast friends in the beginning of your friendship. There wasn't a "I just think that we are going to be friends" moment when you met; you never realised that person was going to be in your life for a long time, you just started to live accordingly. Person X subsequently becomes your best friend.
If you happen to glance back at your friendship you'll find that it was composed of really good times and some painfully horrible moments. Whenever you cried because of Chemical X, sorry Person X, you felt your friendship mutate. You always tried to sort things out and would put up with a lot of "radiation". According to Adele, whenever you thought about leaving you'd feel your heart burst and bleed and you'd repeat like a broken tune to forever excuse their intentions. You'd live for the good times and hope that one day Person X = Person Considerate or even just Person Realise When You're Hurting Me.
You can stop here if you want because I'm going to generalise.
You will either:
a) Go onto dating Person X and then marry Person X, if you can.
b) Make a choice to leave and stick with it.
c) Let time and/or distance take its course and fade out of the friendship.
I will not bother with people who do a) because they chose the easy way out. They chose a future filled with cycles of continual hurt and an unhealthy obsession. They block off friends because they radiate bad energy with the same constant sadness and anger. They change for the worse, perhaps into Mojo Jojo, and Person X stays the same. They never thought to work for the change they long for.
 |
| Chris Brown and Rihanna are back together in 2012. I took that information like a punch to the eye. |
I like c) but my focus is on b). You decide to leave after much thought - do not make an angry decision - and have gotten past the stage of the connecting your head knowledge to your heart. You will be unprepared for the sadness that precedes your leaving announcement. You tell Person X and a crushing wave of sadness, anger and wanting to go back will hit you all at once. The sadness was already present and amplifies. The anger presents itself because you will be angry at yourself for taking so long to leave.
This probably takes a week to subside if you:
- Allow yourself to feel the range emotions (don't pretend you're not hurt when you clearly are)
- Write down lists of why you wouldn't go back and keep re-reading them
- Go cold turkey on Person X and annihilate contact with them (yes, annihilate, social networks and cellphone numbers are included)
- Sad pop music, yes, it's that sad (here's a playlist)
The bottom line is change is hard. Things will get better and you can hold onto that while things are not okay. As time passes you'll still think of them occasionally, most of the sadness will be gone and you'll have come to peace with yourself. You will start to experience relief at not repeating the motions over and over again.
I say go forth and meet new people. There are 3 billion other people in the world (3 billion = 7 billion - kids and old people), Person X isn't the only person you will click with. It will be hard to meet people in the beginning but keep trying.
You will both change. Perhaps you leaving is the wake-up call Person X needed to change but don't leave with the intention of getting them to do things differently so that you can come running back. I hope you've left because you're taking a stand for your happiness and a stand against bad treatment. Do you realise that you can never be mistreated after this? This will probably be the one of the hardest things you will have to do in your life because this "break-up" ranks pretty high on the scale of "1 to Adele". One day you'll look at Person X as just somebody that you used to know and everything will finally be alright.
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