Am I going insane or coming back from there?

[cjsmith]

Ever get to the point when you really want to talk to a person about something and you realize he doesn't want to hear about it? Ever want support from someone and realize that he's got faaaaaaar more important things on his mind than hearing about YOUR life and what's going on with YOU? That point where you suddenly wake up and see something you later feel like you should have known for years?

I have some stress about the whole interview/job-offer situation, and I am realizing that one person I really thought I could talk to about it is in this category. There is absolutely no way he wants to hear about this right now. It's the last thing he'd care about. Oh, he might be polite and hear me out before changing the subject -- or he might not. But he wouldn't ask questions or offer advice or basically care.

This is the second realization in, oh, a few months. I clued in about another long-time friend a while back. This one is situational, temporary; the previous one is less striking but chronic.

They hurt, in the moment; I'm stung, and I feel angry. But then I start to wonder about all sorts of related things. Can anything give me the "right" to a particular person's friendship or support? Am I simply expecting too much? If not, am I a bad judge of people? Do I do for others the things I wished others would do for me? Am I seeing things that aren't there, and would these folks happily be supportive?

I honestly don't know. Maybe I'm going insane. But maybe it's the other way round: could be I was delusional before and now I'm more aware. I can't tell.

Comments

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Sometimes i get insights about people where I suddenly understand stuff like this. This thing, or "he's always so hostile about X because Y," or "it doesn't matter how you phrase it, she's always going to do X."

Yes! It can really help to have some of these insights, too. When I hear that my mother was considering doing [foo] and she got viciously attacked for it over the dinner table, it helps to realize that the attacker got burned badly once by doing [almost-foo]. My mother was able to respond calmly without counterattacking, and I'm able to not be mad at the person for attacking my mom. :-)

And sometimes things change over time, too

Right. People aren't static. Sometimes it's confusing when I think I get close to understanding and then *boom* things are all different, but it's the way we are. I bet your jaw dropped to the floor when you heard that from your dad!