Hibernation is a good thing…
So, I pissed off a friend of mine. A good friend. It’s ironic, actually–the very thing that pissed her off was me doing my best to alleviate any concern on her part for me and it totally–TOTALLY–backfired. I’ll go into the details, but let me start with the lesson I learned from this: Hibernation is a good thing. When you’re depressed and sad and hanging on by a thread, avoid everyone.
So, being depressed always makes me want to just stay home and sleep. I try to avoid everyone. But, I also recognize avoiding everyone and staying shut in is part of the problem. It’s a downward spiral. I know nobody wants to hang around a morose person, but at the same time, avoiding everyone when I’m morose makes me feel even more sad and alone. Usually, the fact I care for my friends more than I care for myself overrides my impulse to associate with people; but, the fact is that you can’t avoid your friends all the time unless you want to destroy friendships, which I don’t. My solution is to walk a fine line of contact and avoidance and when in contact do my best to put on a happy face. I tend to joke around a lot. Perhaps too much. It’s a defense mechanism and I know it.
I’ve spent a huge amount of energy trying to cover up the fact I feel like the life is being squeezed out of me from the inside out over the past few months. I’ve said this before–I can’t find a better way to describe it–I’m exhausted. Everything seems like it takes all my energy and effort. I’ve always considered myself a great friend. I do my best to take care of my friendships. It’s the one thing in my life that has always came easily to me–it’s been effortless–until lately. Now, even some of my friendships are faltering–and I’ll take the blame. I’m losing control, there, too.
This bit of introspection and realization comes from an email sent to me this morning by a friend. She said she was angry and hurt by some things I said and did in early Oct. I’ve called her several times since Oct, but she didn’t return my calls. On the one hand, over the past decade since I’ve known her, I do call her several times before finally hearing back from her. She’s busy and travels a great deal so ordinarily I wouldn’t attribute the lack of response to anything other than her hectic schedule. But, I had a weird feeling this time–I don’t even know why.
She was incredibly ill from a spider bite a few months ago. She’s lucky to be alive. She said that it will take a few months for the toxins to work their way out of her body–and she’s a tiny little thing so I know it’s even worse for her, which has to do with the subject of this blog entry.
One of the things she wasn’t happy about was me giving her grief about finding out she’d been sick for weeks and in the hospital several times in the form of a bulk email. She claims I’m one of her closest friends. She *is* one of my closest friends. The contact I have with her is so infrequent, that I just can’t apologize for being upset hearing about something so significant via a bulk email. I understand that it’s impossible to email everyone with all the gory details; but I would have done that for my *closest* friends. And, to be truthful, it wasn’t even that I heard about it via email–it was that I heard about it a month after it happened. I guess, the bottom line is if it walks, talks, and quacks like a duck…and I just don’t feel like a closest friend when I hear about a life threatening illness in a bulk email weeks after it happened. I suppose I was insensitive about giving her grief when she was sick. I should have worked out better timing–but, as I mentioned, it takes a lot of effort to work this stuff out and I’m exhausted.
I had a reason to be in the same city as my friend about a month after the spider bite. I was ecstatic when she asked me to stay with her and take care of her. I was really happy that she needed me. I had invited her to attend the conference with me several months before. I had also told her that I was much more interested in spending time with her than going to the conference and that I’d bail on the conference to spend time with her. She said that she would try to come if she felt up to it. When I arrived, I sent a text–a brief text–just to let her know I was in town. I didn’t want to put any pressure on her to see me at her house or for her to come. I just wanted her to know I was there and available if she felt up to it. I checked in via text a few times. She interpreted these texts to be terse and rude.
When we did talk on the phone, I spoke about the conference. My intent was to let her know it was going to be fun since I had told her a few weeks prior that I wanted to bail on the conference to spend time with her. I didn’t want her to feel pressure to spend time with me since she felt ill. She interpreted this as me pressuring her into coming to the conference when she didn’t feel well.
At the same time, I told her I really didn’t want to stay at the hotel. Again, my intent was to try to be compassionate about her needs. She had told me she wanted me to stay with her and take care of her. I wanted her to know that I *wanted* and preferred being with her; but, at the same time, I was trying to be careful not to put pressure on her to do anything. I wanted her to be able to make whatever decision she wanted without pressure from me.
I utterly and completely failed.
As far as friends and illnesses or hard events go, I always feel like an imbecile in circumstances like these. I don’t know what to do–my friend’s in pain and needing help, and I am utterly powerless to do anything. For a control freak it’s frustrating. For a friend it’s terrifying. My response was to joke and try and be upbeat for two reasons: 1) It’s how I try to hide my problems from my friends (and especially since I’m in a bad emotional state these days and it’s the last thing she needed to deal with); 2) It’s the only thing I feel like I can do–try to cheer them up. This wasn’t successful–my friend interpreted this as not caring and being unfeeling.
Again, utter failure.
She said she was angry and hurt. She told me I was uncaring. Unfeeling. She said she was having a hard time seeing my “positive intent” but was getting there. She said she wasn’t ready to talk to me. She said she didn’t want to get rid of me.
Well, now I’m pissed. I’m exhausted and I’m pissed. I’ve waited for communication for weeks after initiating communication several times without question and always assumed positive intent. I’ve heard her talk of texting her friends daily, while I have very infrequent communication–and I’ve assumed positive intent. Now, it’s an effort for her to assume positive intent on my part when had she bothered calling me or emailing me over the past few weeks to ask me what the hell was up she would have known it was mostly all positive intent. And, she’s not ready to talk to me. I feel the same way. I could have told her what was in this blog but I’m not sure it’s worth the effort I’m so tired.
I really am grateful for my friends. They’re the last thing in my life that I hold on to–the last thing I’m proud of. But, I really am exhausted…I’m going to hibernate for awhile.
