Over the decades I've had to cut former friends loose. Usually it was painless. The painful one was a best friend for years who betrayed me because she was jealous. It was she who coined the term Anorexia Gloriosa. She used to eat with me because I never tried to force her to eat more than she chose.
Her favorite expression was, "I'll die before I'll let the doctors get my money." Of course, she died under an oxygen tank in a hospital. I attended her memorial service. It was the biggest denial party I've ever seen. Many of the attendees were there to perform, and could barely wait their turn.
I had a good friend of 15 years I had to let go. She started dating a guy 20 years younger, the kid was 19 and a white supremacist. She started talking about replacement theory and getting in trouble at her university job because she was rude to the Chinese students. I just couldn’t with the racism
Looking back, she was one of the “good” immigrants from Europe, and had a bit of an elitist streak. Very impatient with incompetence.... I still wonder about it
Maybe not the place but I recently had a friend who was texting and called a few times because he needed a place to "regroup". You see over the 25+ years that I have known him, he has never had a job. His retirement plan and main job at that time was caring for his ailing and aged grandparents so he was going to get their money. Their will stipulated that it would be divided among his brother and some cousins. I believe that that was a twist he did not see.
When that happened and his brother supposedly stole all the money, he was SOL because they sold the house they were living in. His roommate up and moved out and he couldn't afford the rising rent.
Found another person to take care of and then they passed away. That's been about 6-7 years and still no job apparently.
So he texted to tell me that and said that the family of the deceased roommate will give him $5000 only when he gets out. Red flag there along with the others. So, here he was, with no job, no family, no bank account even and a cat.
I read his text to my husband and we both said in unison, "We will never get him out of our house." Unless we want to give him more fuck you money to leave I guess.
Sadly I ghosted him. His final text was really a tour de force of accepting zero responsibility for his life at this juncture, entitlement for helping clean up at my wedding 22 years ago and other BS favors he did for me. NONE of which could ever equate to me housing and feeding him while he sponged off of us until we died. And the cat. I have 2 already and their relationship is tenuous at best. No way can I introduce another to the fold.
Sara, I really, really enjoyed reading your answer to this question. Your compassion and wisdom are a wonderful thing to see, and I think my blood pressure went down just reading it. Which is good. Thanks.
Was thinking about this recently after the election (my race). I had about 10 local friends who I thought were my friends big time and who promised to help. Never asked much—mainly I wanted to see if they’d come with me for an hour or two to waive and walk around, and hold signs on the day.
Sure—probably didn’t matter. But some people made an effort and some wouldn’t even send a text to say no.
I have people I thought were my friends and who I called and emailed and texted and who said “yes!” But nothing.
My husband was saying that one in particular—she promised time, she promised money, and she loved trotting me out as her friend the judge—responded to nothing in the last two months, and nothing since. He said to lose her number and I agree but it’s hard.
I get that people have lives, but I needed you this one time. I’m so thankful for the random friends who did hold a sign, and did call the next day—they weren’t even who I would have guessed, but they cared for me and I will remember.
At this point, I can be cordial though cold to someone I really don't want to associate with for a number of reasons. I've gotten good at grey rocking because frankly, people who agree with the views of or who associate with people who want me dead do not need any relevant details about my life.
One great thing about being me is that I have no object permanence when it comes to relationships. If I don't see you or talk to you daily, I lose complete track of you. Although, true, I do send out a text every four or five years to people I met in my teens. Family and friends are a nice concept, but just background noise for the most part.
The phrase I have heard is "social decay." Some people experience social decay with relationships, and others do not. It may or may not have something to do with neurodivergence, introverted vs extroverteded, or it may just be a personality quirk.
Someone who experiences social decay sees friendships and relationships as living plants that need to be watered and nurtured on a regular basis, or they will wither and die.
Someone who does not experience social decay sees relationships as static object like a beautiful vase, that simply has to be dusted off and it's good as new.
Two people who do not experience social decay will bump into each other, start chatting as if 5 years haven't passed, and go out for a coffee as if it was merely last Saturday since they'd last seen each other.
Two people who DO experience social decay will make it a point to check up on each other on a regular basis, even if it's just liking photos on Facebook or IG, or sending the occasional text message. They send birthday and Christmas cards like clockwork with a nice long letter.
Mismatched friendships, where one person experiences the decay and the other one does not, usually won't last for longer than the two of them are in a close living situation. Like room mates. Once they are no longer around each other daily and contact is lost, the person who experiences social decay will start to feel rejected, while the person who doesn't experience it may not even realize something is wrong!
Well, I have a bit of documented neurodivergence, so that may have something to do with it. Or maybe it was living in a school bus for a large chunk of my early childhood, not staying in one place for any length of time, followed by living in houses, not living in one place for any length of time. The past 14 years I've been back here is the longest stay in one county for me yet. And since it looks like my kids are planning on never getting jobs and becoming independent human beings, I'll probably stay here for another 14, to keep roofs over everyone's heads.
I like SP’s phrasing above: lack of relationship object-permanence. I don’t necessarily DISLIKE people, nor am I an introvert who does best in their own space. I’m capable of socializing and having and enjoying relationships with humans. But when someone walks out the door I might not think of them for a year, when I’d say “Hmm, I don’t think I’ve seen Joe for a while…” Then go another year before I considered contacting him.
Not sure what the conflict is in AAMTAAE's relationship with her former friend but if she can't completely disentangle, one approach may be to negotiate boundaries. My oldest sister and I (both leftists) had to do this with our middle brother and sister (both right wingers). We decided a few years ago that discussion of politics and religion are strictly off limits.
This has worked out quite well with very few breaches over the years. It may not be possible with someone who is truly a horrible person but in our case my right leaning siblings are generally decent people. We can share our love of food, children, nature, art, etc., and avoid the things that may foster resentment.
My friends from my teens and twenties who actually work in the restaurant and acting industries have somehow gone full MAGA. I don’t get it. Libertarian I could almost see that and they were big Bernie bros but now they are posting anti LGBTQ stuff from hard right sites. I’m thinking, aren’t most of your colleagues LGBTQ??
Funny how many Bernie Bros, who argued a lot like MAGA trolls back in the day, have now become Trump supporters. Almost like they are just unhappy with how their lives turned out and just want revenge on the establishment that they blame for their own bad choices
I certainly don't get it. If PAB isn't "the establishment" I don't know who is. His legions are the hard hat republicans who beat up on the "anti-establishment" hippies in the sixties and seventies ... We've been streaming "Stranger Things" and this surely is the upside-down.
My working theory is that something happens to people's brains in their forties that turns a huge chunk of them into selfish a-holes. And honestly, that's my more generous theory.
Because the other theory is that most people by that age encounter failure or their limits in one form or another, and the experience turns a lot of them into bitter, selfish a-holes. Same result, but one where they have a lot more agency and thus responsibility for the transformation.
My experience is different. I was a liberal in HS but all my peers (especially all the boys) were raging Reagan lovers...right wingers all, and they are foaming at the mouth tangerine taint lickers now...which is why I will never go to another class reunion. I'm class of '89.
It made us more likely to engage in criminal behaviour. And it made us dumber. Dumber people vote MAGA. That’s not just shit talking, there’s science behind that.
It doesn't cause political leanings, but it does cause problems like increased risk for aggression, lower IQ, and cognitive impairments.
This is a raw science paper, but it has a really good table with the metaanalysis of cognitive problems in people based on lead exposure at different ages. The younger your exposure, the worse the problems, and they last for life.
Lead was not banned from gasoline in cars in the US until 1996. My parents had to dump a bottle of tetraethyllead into each gas tank of their old '70s and '80s road boats because they still required leaded fuel.
One of my favorite shows is "The Venture Brothers", not least because one of its main overarching themes is failure and how people interact with it. We're not really raised to fail: in school it's literally the worst-case scenario, and in the professional world it comes with the threat of destitution and ostracism. But almost no one's life is an unbroken trajectory of successes, and eventually we all fail in some way. And since we're not prepared for it, in many cases it breaks people. From what I can tell, the Republican party is chock-full of people like that.
I was a precocious little smart-ass all through school, who somehow never figured out how to turn that into something marketable, so I had a history of jobs ranging from "just OK" to "awful".
I was talking with a much younger neighbor who assured me that I should not feel like a loser, and I was shocked, utterly shocked, and highly indignant.
I actually said, "How absolute DARE you! I am NOT a loser! I'm a FAILURE!!"
As a failed 40 something, I can 💯 say Dems fail too! I just have no interest in taking anyone else down or out w me, though it wouldn’t suck if yes we were taught how to lols fail better/ Weller and had some actual safety nets avoid destitution comes w a few failed life moments, regardless how Good our efforts, intentions & objectives were in trying not Be Suck be drag on others
I was rabidly supportive of Uncle Bernie when he was running as an independent for president. This little democratic-socialist was very enthusiastic but NEVER enthusiastic enough to dip my toes in liberturdlianism.
I liked Bernie too and would have voted for him not because he was antiestablishment but because he was liberal and not afraid to go full liberal in public.
Uncle Joe is a masterful diplomat and has taught Kamala Harris well.
America has been inordinately fortunate to have President Biden at the helm during several of the roughest, most frightening years America has thus far experienced in the 21st century. As I've mentioned here before it's almost enough to make me believe there might be an entity above that DOES care about us.
The Obama Administration Began in 2008. Paul Whelan was given a Bad Conduct Discharge in 2008. Why Did Joe Biden Order Obama To Send Paul Whelan to a Russian Prison A Decade Later?"
Over the decades I've had to cut former friends loose. Usually it was painless. The painful one was a best friend for years who betrayed me because she was jealous. It was she who coined the term Anorexia Gloriosa. She used to eat with me because I never tried to force her to eat more than she chose.
Her favorite expression was, "I'll die before I'll let the doctors get my money." Of course, she died under an oxygen tank in a hospital. I attended her memorial service. It was the biggest denial party I've ever seen. Many of the attendees were there to perform, and could barely wait their turn.
I had a good friend of 15 years I had to let go. She started dating a guy 20 years younger, the kid was 19 and a white supremacist. She started talking about replacement theory and getting in trouble at her university job because she was rude to the Chinese students. I just couldn’t with the racism
Being with someone romantically is supposed to bring out the best in one, right? *Sigh*
Looking back, she was one of the “good” immigrants from Europe, and had a bit of an elitist streak. Very impatient with incompetence.... I still wonder about it
Maybe not the place but I recently had a friend who was texting and called a few times because he needed a place to "regroup". You see over the 25+ years that I have known him, he has never had a job. His retirement plan and main job at that time was caring for his ailing and aged grandparents so he was going to get their money. Their will stipulated that it would be divided among his brother and some cousins. I believe that that was a twist he did not see.
When that happened and his brother supposedly stole all the money, he was SOL because they sold the house they were living in. His roommate up and moved out and he couldn't afford the rising rent.
Found another person to take care of and then they passed away. That's been about 6-7 years and still no job apparently.
So he texted to tell me that and said that the family of the deceased roommate will give him $5000 only when he gets out. Red flag there along with the others. So, here he was, with no job, no family, no bank account even and a cat.
I read his text to my husband and we both said in unison, "We will never get him out of our house." Unless we want to give him more fuck you money to leave I guess.
Sadly I ghosted him. His final text was really a tour de force of accepting zero responsibility for his life at this juncture, entitlement for helping clean up at my wedding 22 years ago and other BS favors he did for me. NONE of which could ever equate to me housing and feeding him while he sponged off of us until we died. And the cat. I have 2 already and their relationship is tenuous at best. No way can I introduce another to the fold.
Sara, I really, really enjoyed reading your answer to this question. Your compassion and wisdom are a wonderful thing to see, and I think my blood pressure went down just reading it. Which is good. Thanks.
Was thinking about this recently after the election (my race). I had about 10 local friends who I thought were my friends big time and who promised to help. Never asked much—mainly I wanted to see if they’d come with me for an hour or two to waive and walk around, and hold signs on the day.
Sure—probably didn’t matter. But some people made an effort and some wouldn’t even send a text to say no.
I have people I thought were my friends and who I called and emailed and texted and who said “yes!” But nothing.
My husband was saying that one in particular—she promised time, she promised money, and she loved trotting me out as her friend the judge—responded to nothing in the last two months, and nothing since. He said to lose her number and I agree but it’s hard.
I get that people have lives, but I needed you this one time. I’m so thankful for the random friends who did hold a sign, and did call the next day—they weren’t even who I would have guessed, but they cared for me and I will remember.
I do like this lede foto! That looks like a frank, friendly exchange of views!
At this point, I can be cordial though cold to someone I really don't want to associate with for a number of reasons. I've gotten good at grey rocking because frankly, people who agree with the views of or who associate with people who want me dead do not need any relevant details about my life.
Those Who Wish Me Dead by Michael Koryta.
Lyndsey Graham wrote a book called 'Disentangling from Emotionally Immature People ' ?
One great thing about being me is that I have no object permanence when it comes to relationships. If I don't see you or talk to you daily, I lose complete track of you. Although, true, I do send out a text every four or five years to people I met in my teens. Family and friends are a nice concept, but just background noise for the most part.
Are you me? I feel like you’re me. I’ve never seen me and you in the same room…
The phrase I have heard is "social decay." Some people experience social decay with relationships, and others do not. It may or may not have something to do with neurodivergence, introverted vs extroverteded, or it may just be a personality quirk.
Someone who experiences social decay sees friendships and relationships as living plants that need to be watered and nurtured on a regular basis, or they will wither and die.
Someone who does not experience social decay sees relationships as static object like a beautiful vase, that simply has to be dusted off and it's good as new.
Two people who do not experience social decay will bump into each other, start chatting as if 5 years haven't passed, and go out for a coffee as if it was merely last Saturday since they'd last seen each other.
Two people who DO experience social decay will make it a point to check up on each other on a regular basis, even if it's just liking photos on Facebook or IG, or sending the occasional text message. They send birthday and Christmas cards like clockwork with a nice long letter.
Mismatched friendships, where one person experiences the decay and the other one does not, usually won't last for longer than the two of them are in a close living situation. Like room mates. Once they are no longer around each other daily and contact is lost, the person who experiences social decay will start to feel rejected, while the person who doesn't experience it may not even realize something is wrong!
Well, I have a bit of documented neurodivergence, so that may have something to do with it. Or maybe it was living in a school bus for a large chunk of my early childhood, not staying in one place for any length of time, followed by living in houses, not living in one place for any length of time. The past 14 years I've been back here is the longest stay in one county for me yet. And since it looks like my kids are planning on never getting jobs and becoming independent human beings, I'll probably stay here for another 14, to keep roofs over everyone's heads.
If it wasn’t for Mrs. 🦡🍄🐍 keeping us connected to people I’d likely have no personal relationships at all.
God, you too?
I like SP’s phrasing above: lack of relationship object-permanence. I don’t necessarily DISLIKE people, nor am I an introvert who does best in their own space. I’m capable of socializing and having and enjoying relationships with humans. But when someone walks out the door I might not think of them for a year, when I’d say “Hmm, I don’t think I’ve seen Joe for a while…” Then go another year before I considered contacting him.
Not sure what the conflict is in AAMTAAE's relationship with her former friend but if she can't completely disentangle, one approach may be to negotiate boundaries. My oldest sister and I (both leftists) had to do this with our middle brother and sister (both right wingers). We decided a few years ago that discussion of politics and religion are strictly off limits.
This has worked out quite well with very few breaches over the years. It may not be possible with someone who is truly a horrible person but in our case my right leaning siblings are generally decent people. We can share our love of food, children, nature, art, etc., and avoid the things that may foster resentment.
My sisters and I practice this too as our political views are so wildly divergent but we love each other and focus on that, and that, alone.
Forget friendship -- I want a divorce from our current reality.
💯
We are hacking the Simulation from the inside...that's what this sea change means! Keep it up, Ducks!
💗🤩💗🤩💗🤩💗🤩💗🤩🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏
We are confit for duty!
Mmm, duck confit.
My friends from my teens and twenties who actually work in the restaurant and acting industries have somehow gone full MAGA. I don’t get it. Libertarian I could almost see that and they were big Bernie bros but now they are posting anti LGBTQ stuff from hard right sites. I’m thinking, aren’t most of your colleagues LGBTQ??
Funny how many Bernie Bros, who argued a lot like MAGA trolls back in the day, have now become Trump supporters. Almost like they are just unhappy with how their lives turned out and just want revenge on the establishment that they blame for their own bad choices
It makes you wonder if they ever believed in anything, or just wanted to burn shit down for the lolz.
Hmmmmm
I certainly don't get it. If PAB isn't "the establishment" I don't know who is. His legions are the hard hat republicans who beat up on the "anti-establishment" hippies in the sixties and seventies ... We've been streaming "Stranger Things" and this surely is the upside-down.
My working theory is that something happens to people's brains in their forties that turns a huge chunk of them into selfish a-holes. And honestly, that's my more generous theory.
Because the other theory is that most people by that age encounter failure or their limits in one form or another, and the experience turns a lot of them into bitter, selfish a-holes. Same result, but one where they have a lot more agency and thus responsibility for the transformation.
Yeah, I don't know how else to account for a good chunk of Gen X, who were decent back in our 20s but now have gone MAGA cultist.
It doesn't make sense.
Weak minds, I guess.
I. on the other hand, keep getting more liberal as I age. I'm 53 and much more liberal than I was in my 20s.
My experience is different. I was a liberal in HS but all my peers (especially all the boys) were raging Reagan lovers...right wingers all, and they are foaming at the mouth tangerine taint lickers now...which is why I will never go to another class reunion. I'm class of '89.
Ditto. I was never conservative but certainly much more centrist in my misspent youth. Now I’m a full-on socialist.
Gen X took the worst of lead poisoning, which might be a factor here. It certainly did the Boomers no favors.
I think it’s going to be a big factor in dementia levels in our generation too. Class of ‘92 here.
Is there evidence that lead poisoning leads you politically right rather than politically left?
It made us more likely to engage in criminal behaviour. And it made us dumber. Dumber people vote MAGA. That’s not just shit talking, there’s science behind that.
It doesn't cause political leanings, but it does cause problems like increased risk for aggression, lower IQ, and cognitive impairments.
This is a raw science paper, but it has a really good table with the metaanalysis of cognitive problems in people based on lead exposure at different ages. The younger your exposure, the worse the problems, and they last for life.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7912619/
Lead was not banned from gasoline in cars in the US until 1996. My parents had to dump a bottle of tetraethyllead into each gas tank of their old '70s and '80s road boats because they still required leaded fuel.
Ugh. I didn't even consider that. :/
You didn't have to eat it, you breathed it from all the lead in the gas.
Based on the ones that I know, it’s the second one.
One of my favorite shows is "The Venture Brothers", not least because one of its main overarching themes is failure and how people interact with it. We're not really raised to fail: in school it's literally the worst-case scenario, and in the professional world it comes with the threat of destitution and ostracism. But almost no one's life is an unbroken trajectory of successes, and eventually we all fail in some way. And since we're not prepared for it, in many cases it breaks people. From what I can tell, the Republican party is chock-full of people like that.
Haw.
I was a precocious little smart-ass all through school, who somehow never figured out how to turn that into something marketable, so I had a history of jobs ranging from "just OK" to "awful".
I was talking with a much younger neighbor who assured me that I should not feel like a loser, and I was shocked, utterly shocked, and highly indignant.
I actually said, "How absolute DARE you! I am NOT a loser! I'm a FAILURE!!"
`
I still don't know how I feel about that.
As a failed 40 something, I can 💯 say Dems fail too! I just have no interest in taking anyone else down or out w me, though it wouldn’t suck if yes we were taught how to lols fail better/ Weller and had some actual safety nets avoid destitution comes w a few failed life moments, regardless how Good our efforts, intentions & objectives were in trying not Be Suck be drag on others
I think that's the key difference between us and them: we don't let failure make us into worse people.
💗🙏
I was rabidly supportive of Uncle Bernie when he was running as an independent for president. This little democratic-socialist was very enthusiastic but NEVER enthusiastic enough to dip my toes in liberturdlianism.
I liked Bernie too and would have voted for him not because he was antiestablishment but because he was liberal and not afraid to go full liberal in public.
OT: You may have heard this, but four prisoners held in Russia were just released.
These include Paul Whelan, Evan Gershkovich, Alsu Kurmasheva, and Vladimir Kara-Murza.
This brings to a total of 16 the individuals held unjustly in Russia whose release has been obtained by the Biden - Harris administration.
https://www.bbc.com/news/live/ck7gwe808yet
💗TY sharing Good News birb!
A thamk!
Uncle Joe is a masterful diplomat and has taught Kamala Harris well.
America has been inordinately fortunate to have President Biden at the helm during several of the roughest, most frightening years America has thus far experienced in the 21st century. As I've mentioned here before it's almost enough to make me believe there might be an entity above that DOES care about us.
💗
Yes. Their names are Kamala and Joe.
🤩
Yeah, huge news. Biden ti speak about it soon.
It's not often easy, and not often kind
Did you ever have to make up your mind?
❤️🩹
OT - Guess the WSJ can stop attacking Biden for not getting Evan back from Russia now
Now they'll moan about the terms of the deal.
Oh, they will find something else before the end of the day.
Siobhan Hughes will have a big exclusive about Harris with McCarthy and Mike Johnson as independent sources
Probably in the next hour.
The Obama Administration Began in 2008. Paul Whelan was given a Bad Conduct Discharge in 2008. Why Did Joe Biden Order Obama To Send Paul Whelan to a Russian Prison A Decade Later?"
Whoah-oh, congratulations, this is your friendship divorce.
"Can't buy a thrill"