I had a best friend in college. But now we are no longer friends. It’s been over 10 years now but every now and then something will trigger the memory of it.
We went our separate ways after college. She moved out of the country and I got married. We were still friends then. She got pregnant and had to move back home. We were still friends then. She left home and moved to the same state as me. We were still friends then. But then she moved directly across the street from me and that is where our problems began.
She didn’t have a car so I helped her move, I drove her to her birthing classes every week which was in another state because she didn’t want to deliver in a hospital but a birthing home, I acted as her partner in the birthing classes because the father was not around, she got a job near where I worked so I drove and dropped her off and picked her up every day for her job, I gave her the keys to my apartment so she could do her laundry and borrow what she needed to borrow. And yet as we spent so much time together we completely drifted apart. She sorely missed the country that she had to leave, she missed the baby’s father and always defended him about what a great guy he was and a great father he was and just told me I didn’t understand. And that was true, I didn’t understand and I was tired of hearing about how awesome he was because frankly, if he’s that awesome, why the hell was I doing everything that he should have been doing? But most of all I felt unappreciated and completely used. The baby father and maybe others got the praise and credit. I never even got a thank you from her. She started shutting me out and so I did the same (or maybe it was the other way around). She had the keys to my house but would only come in when I wasn’t home.
Years later I heard that she said that I had deserted her. In one sense that was very true, I had given up on her long before I stopped helping her. For some odd reason she kept asking me for help and I kept saying yes, as if out of a want of being needed, yet we were complete strangers after a few short months and it had all fallen apart already.
When I moved to another state it was a great escape. A breather from that friendship that was so suffocating. I had never confronted her about all my issues and she didn’t either as I’m sure she had plenty of issues with me. We were too immature and would rather avoid conflict.
It felt damn good being in my self-righteous state because I was extremely hurt and felt justified for the ways I was feeling. And yet God was saying to me, if I was doing these things from a superior point of view and looking down on her and judging her then it was me that needed to change, not her. I didn’t understand where she was coming from and after a while I didn’t even try to understand her. Because it was all about me and what I did for her and how she hurt me. And again He spoke to me, if I was finding my self-worth in feeling appreciated by her then it was me that needed to change and not her. It was a bitter pill for me to swallow… but necessary in finding and giving forgiveness. And closure.
I feel the need to blog 