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

[sunnydale47.livejournal.com]

Like Bill, I haven't been reading LJ at all for a couple of weeks, for a variety of reasons -- some very good reasons, and a couple of lousy ones. But be that as it may I came back to find this post, and I want to respond even though I haven't read the prior ones yet. I'm sorry I haven't been around for any of those.

I think we've all been through that with friends -- I know I sure have. But while you don't have the right to have support from a particular person, you certainly do have a right to expect it from a very close friend. As the song says, that's what friends are for.

Has this been a mutually supportive friendship in the past? Is it more than a friendship? Is this person going through something in his own life that reduces the amount of energy he has to deal with difficult situations?

Have you asked for support? Men are notoriously poor at realizing things like that. Their orientation is not support, but fixing the problem. Often, if they can't solve it for you, they tune out because they feel there's nothing at all they can do ... just being supportive often doesn't occur to them. You might have to say something on the order of "I don't expect -- or even want -- you to solve this problem for me. But I would like you to listen and just be supportive of me while I try to solve it."

If you haven't said anything like that, try it. If you have, and he's still unable, unwilling or uninterested in being there for you, then perhaps your relationship with this person has problems that you didn't realize are there. When you have your new job and things have settled down, you might want to have a conversation and explore the issues. Sadly, friends -- even very close friends -- do sometimes drift apart, and sometimes friendships -- even long term ones -- need to be ended.

I had a friend since my early teens who was my oldest (in longevity) friend. But she became less and less supportive, and by the time we were in our late 30s, I didn't feel any positive vibes from her at all. We lived a couple of hundred miles apart, so we didn't see each other much, but we were still friends until finally there was an incident where I felt she was being so disresectful and discourteous to me that I realized it the friendship was in negative territory, costing me more than I was getting out of it, and that it was time to end it. It was very painful, but I did. I still think about her once in awhile, but I've had twenty years now to reflect on it, and I'm very sure I made the right choice.

I'm not suggesting that's what you should do! What my friend did went far beyond not being supportive -- it actually undermined me. I'm only saying that friendships do wane for one reason or another, and that if you've been clear about what you want from him and he doesn't seem interested in providing it, then it might be time to have a talk about what you each expect from each other.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

The acute one has indeed been supportive in the past, and yeah, he's going through (I could be uncharitable and say he has created, it would be spot-on but unkind) some drama of his own right now. Needing/wanting support of his own, of course. That's pretty much the entirety of my whiney-feeling in this post: I want support right now and the timing's bad. Poor Me.

The long-term one... I'm realizing, the more I read these comments and think about what friendship means to me, that I want to remain friends with this person but at a less close level. It's simply been imbalanced for a long time. So I'll reach out a little less, instigate getting together a little less, and leave it at that.

I'm also seeing places where the imbalance might be going the other way. I'll make an effort to call or e-mail those people to set up a lunch or ask how they're doing.