[OnyxCougar]

Originally Posted by jane_says

Onyx, after doing some thinking, I realize that I shouldn't have been so harsh with you. I still mean everything I directed toward your friend and her situation. However, in recalling many of my "friends" over the years, and one in particular, I know how it can be to feel like you need to defend someone when everyone else in downing him or her. I have housed, gone to court with, bailed out, fed, fought and fought over, you name it - one friend in particular. For years - we were very close friends since 3rd grade. I still love this guy dearly, but after so many years I realized that he's now an adult (we're 29) and it's time for him to fend for himself. It's been very painful for me to distance myself from him. I love him dearly and miss him badly. But the self-destructiveness and inadvertent destruction of everyone close to him wasn't worth it anymore. I no longer answer the phone for him. I am still friends with his brother, although not as close as K and I once were.

It's hard to cut off friends who screw up their lives. But sometimes, no matter how sad the story, the happy and/or healthy ending never comes. We can't help people who continually set themselves up to fail and it sounds like that's what your friend has done. You can't save someone who doesn't want to be saved, regardless of their protests to the contrary - you can't force someone to behave decently.

I am truly sorry if what I said came across as a personal attack on you. I empathize with your situation. I just don't condone your friend's behavior, just like the behavior of my own friend.

I do appreciate the apology, and I was starting to feel rather attacked there, but I've taken a deep breath and I'm better now.

There was a time when I fucked up my life so bad that I had to stay with friends, and had those friends not stood by me, things could have turned out alot differently, for the worse.

I don't make apologizes for her, and I let her make her own mistakes. I can't help her financially right now, but what I can do is encourage her to make better decisions, maybe come up with things she hadn't thought of (and one of the reasons I posted here was to see what things *I* hadn't thought of).

Fact is, it's a shitty situation brought on by poor choices. Again, something we already know. And she *wants* to until the rope Jim, that's exactly the point. She has a rope to untie. And as her friend, I cannot stand around and let her dangle. Yeah, her choices sucked. But you live and you learn. As long as she learns from it, I'll be there standing by her. I'm not going to abandon her when she needs me most.

We all make mistakes. Some are bigger than others. Not everyone will make the same ones.

Does that mean she doesn't deserve a second chance?