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Nov. 25th, 2018 02:31 pm
Break Week: Thank You 1000 words
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murielleLJ IDOL PRESENTS: LITERARY PRIZE FIGHT
Break Week: Thank You
A Tale of Two Calls
About a month ago I returned a call from someone I had been avoiding for about a year. I met this woman almost two decades ago and we’ve had a difficult, on and off…acquaintanceship…ever since. Over the years I tried to be a friend to her, but nothing I ever did for her, gave her, or said to her ever seemed to be what she wanted or needed, or help with her constant stream of problems, dilemmas, and crises. No matter what I suggested, or did, it rarely worked out and it was usually because, “you got it all wrong,” or someone I’d asked on her behalf was an “idiot who didn’t know anything” about whatever it was.
Our contact, because of health issues (hers and mine) has been mostly by phone. The calls follow a predictable pattern: the perfunctory inquiry about my health and then hours of her problems, her past, her pain. When I get off the phone I’m exhausted. I’m shaking. I can’t function and have been bedridden for days. I dread talking to her. When I do I feel as if my life is being sucked out of me. We don’t have conversations. There’s no give and take. It’s all one-sided, it’s all about her. It’s always the same.
Countless times I’ve explained I simply don’t have the energy to talk to her for more than thirty minutes. I’ve told her how her calls affect me. I’ve asked her not to go over every slight and wound she has endured from infancy onward because it’s a waste of time and energy--for both of us. There’s nothing anyone can do about the past! But to absolutely no avail. Almost two decades and nothing has changed.
For the past month or so while I’ve been calling her on Sundays to check up on her, encourage and try to help her through her latest crisis, my health has nosedived. Apart from writing for Idol, I’ve accomplished nothing. And I’m furious with myself.
I’m not angry with her because I don’t for a minute believe she can help herself. And I feel immensely sorry for her. Throughout the course of her life she has driven away almost everyone who has ever been her friend, and according to her, her family will no longer talk to her.
She lies. She’s manipulative, playing people against one another. And lately, knowing how much my faith means to me, she’s been using it to keep me on the phone, when I’m exhausted and have expressed the need to go, by asking me about God.
I’ve tried being detached, sympathetic, caring, loving, supportive. I’ve even tried tough love. But there doesn’t seem to be an approach that makes any difference, because she is who she is, she is what she is, whatever that is.
When I spoke with her last Sunday I explained that I’d been very ill all week and could not talk long, and managed to keep the call to under an hour. She’d mentioned that she phoned a prayer line but lost the number, so after the call, I looked it up online and left it on her voicemail. She called back to thank me. (Why did I pick up?) It was almost another full hour before I was finally able to get her to stop talking and let me go.
Another woman, a friend I’ve known for forty years, is in town and we talked on the phone for about two hours Thursday afternoon. Although I needed a short nap after we hung up, when I got up I was able to do things I haven’t been able to do for four weeks.
When I talk to my friend I am energized!
We made plans to spend a day together next week, and though I know I will be exhausted afterward, I’m good with that. It’s a trade-off I relish. I know she’ll be watching and listening, and if she hears fatigue in my voice, or sees it in my demeanor she’ll tell me it’s time to sit down or go home. She’s done it before. She does it because we love and care about one another. It’s a friendship. It’s mutual. It’s balanced. It’s real.
I feel some regret, even guilt, about the decision I’ve come to in the last few days. However, it occurred to me that I have the right, perhaps the duty, to protect myself from something, or someone, harming me.
In the past when it’s all just got to be too much for me, I’ve distanced myself from her. But, after some significant time, I have always let her back in my life. And it’s always the same. The cycle of abuse of my time and my energy and consequently my health goes on without a hitch or a hiccup. It never changes because she never changes.
I realized that there are things I have to do in my life, and things I want to do, and when she’s part of my life I am unable to do them. And I realized that I have more than a little culpability in this. I have let it go on with some relatively minor interruptions for almost two decades knowing how detrimental it is to my health. That is on me.
So…I’m giving myself the week off, and when I next speak with her I will tell her that while she has my profound sympathy and though I wish her the very best life she can have I won’t be a part of it anymore.
Talking with my dear friend on Thursday highlighted everything for me, neon-bright. The drastic contrast between both phone conversations made it impossible to ignore and when I see her on Wednesday I’m going to tell her how she helped me see the truth. I’m going to tell her how highly I value her friendship, and her.
I’m going to say, thank you!
AN: Concrit very welcome!
Break Week: Thank You
A Tale of Two Calls
About a month ago I returned a call from someone I had been avoiding for about a year. I met this woman almost two decades ago and we’ve had a difficult, on and off…acquaintanceship…ever since. Over the years I tried to be a friend to her, but nothing I ever did for her, gave her, or said to her ever seemed to be what she wanted or needed, or help with her constant stream of problems, dilemmas, and crises. No matter what I suggested, or did, it rarely worked out and it was usually because, “you got it all wrong,” or someone I’d asked on her behalf was an “idiot who didn’t know anything” about whatever it was.
Our contact, because of health issues (hers and mine) has been mostly by phone. The calls follow a predictable pattern: the perfunctory inquiry about my health and then hours of her problems, her past, her pain. When I get off the phone I’m exhausted. I’m shaking. I can’t function and have been bedridden for days. I dread talking to her. When I do I feel as if my life is being sucked out of me. We don’t have conversations. There’s no give and take. It’s all one-sided, it’s all about her. It’s always the same.
Countless times I’ve explained I simply don’t have the energy to talk to her for more than thirty minutes. I’ve told her how her calls affect me. I’ve asked her not to go over every slight and wound she has endured from infancy onward because it’s a waste of time and energy--for both of us. There’s nothing anyone can do about the past! But to absolutely no avail. Almost two decades and nothing has changed.
For the past month or so while I’ve been calling her on Sundays to check up on her, encourage and try to help her through her latest crisis, my health has nosedived. Apart from writing for Idol, I’ve accomplished nothing. And I’m furious with myself.
I’m not angry with her because I don’t for a minute believe she can help herself. And I feel immensely sorry for her. Throughout the course of her life she has driven away almost everyone who has ever been her friend, and according to her, her family will no longer talk to her.
She lies. She’s manipulative, playing people against one another. And lately, knowing how much my faith means to me, she’s been using it to keep me on the phone, when I’m exhausted and have expressed the need to go, by asking me about God.
I’ve tried being detached, sympathetic, caring, loving, supportive. I’ve even tried tough love. But there doesn’t seem to be an approach that makes any difference, because she is who she is, she is what she is, whatever that is.
When I spoke with her last Sunday I explained that I’d been very ill all week and could not talk long, and managed to keep the call to under an hour. She’d mentioned that she phoned a prayer line but lost the number, so after the call, I looked it up online and left it on her voicemail. She called back to thank me. (Why did I pick up?) It was almost another full hour before I was finally able to get her to stop talking and let me go.
Another woman, a friend I’ve known for forty years, is in town and we talked on the phone for about two hours Thursday afternoon. Although I needed a short nap after we hung up, when I got up I was able to do things I haven’t been able to do for four weeks.
When I talk to my friend I am energized!
We made plans to spend a day together next week, and though I know I will be exhausted afterward, I’m good with that. It’s a trade-off I relish. I know she’ll be watching and listening, and if she hears fatigue in my voice, or sees it in my demeanor she’ll tell me it’s time to sit down or go home. She’s done it before. She does it because we love and care about one another. It’s a friendship. It’s mutual. It’s balanced. It’s real.
I feel some regret, even guilt, about the decision I’ve come to in the last few days. However, it occurred to me that I have the right, perhaps the duty, to protect myself from something, or someone, harming me.
In the past when it’s all just got to be too much for me, I’ve distanced myself from her. But, after some significant time, I have always let her back in my life. And it’s always the same. The cycle of abuse of my time and my energy and consequently my health goes on without a hitch or a hiccup. It never changes because she never changes.
I realized that there are things I have to do in my life, and things I want to do, and when she’s part of my life I am unable to do them. And I realized that I have more than a little culpability in this. I have let it go on with some relatively minor interruptions for almost two decades knowing how detrimental it is to my health. That is on me.
So…I’m giving myself the week off, and when I next speak with her I will tell her that while she has my profound sympathy and though I wish her the very best life she can have I won’t be a part of it anymore.
Talking with my dear friend on Thursday highlighted everything for me, neon-bright. The drastic contrast between both phone conversations made it impossible to ignore and when I see her on Wednesday I’m going to tell her how she helped me see the truth. I’m going to tell her how highly I value her friendship, and her.
I’m going to say, thank you!
AN: Concrit very welcome!
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no subject
Thank you so much for reading and commenting! :-)
no subject
There was no _you_ in that relationship. It was all about her, and her desire to unload her misery on anyone who would listen to her (you, thanks to your kindness!). And worse yet, for hours? Good grief!
The time on the phone is clearly tiring after a certain point, but mainly it's the emotional exhaustion of having this person wear you down into the ground with her unhappiness and negativity. You don't owe that to anyone, especially someone who offers absolutely nothing back and has never cared to.
Thank goodness you DO have friends who love and appreciate you. :)
no subject
And thank you so much for stopping by and reading and taking the time to comment.
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no subject
He manages to talk to even ~me for tens of minutes when it is I who picks up the phone, and I am just my parents daughter. Luckily, I don't have their qualms about telling him directly that I am busy, after several minutes of un-pleasantries.
On point of ConCrit: when you introduce your second friend, then go back and forth talking about the two, it gets slightly confusing. I would introduce them by name, or just by a letter (my friend A., my other friend B.) to avoid this.
no subject
Thank you so much for going back and commenting on this post. It means so much!
no subject
I did have the joy of sharing this entry with my other friend, the one whom I've known for forty years.
Again, thank you so much for commenting!