You're my best friend

[anonymous]

The song that made me cry was by Queen, "You're my best friend"

I have a best friend right now, and this is good, but my best friend is moving away soon.
Your best friend is there for you, spending more time with you, and with my own children, than I am.

I'm not here, because I am taking care of the responsibility of supporting my family, and killing myself with stress, having a mental breakdown, just to get that done. At the end of the day, nobody says "Thank You" to me for what I do. And while I am cracking under the pressure, nobody says to me, "It's going to be okay."

When they say "You're my best friend" in the song, I assume they mean two people that have made a commitment to be there for each other, for comfort and reassurance, when life gets hard and things feel like too much to deal with.

I'm reaching out to everybody I know, right now, grasping for any kind of connection, reassurance. My best friend is moving away, and very soon I will be very much under constant aggravation at work, and it will be much worse--and I imagine this will not improve my emotional stability. And when I come home, I will be alone in my own home; because I know you deserve to be given all the space you need to work through your own issues.

I naively assumed that you would always be there for me, to be my “best friend” when I needed it. Meanwhile, it was something I was unwilling or unable to do for you, when you needed it. Nonetheless, I assumed you would always be there for me. And for this, I feel that I am the worst kind of hypocrite, calling out for help that I was never able to offer. But I could not know how to do something that was never done for me, in my own life.

There is a certain kind of kind of naiveté of a child, who believes that someone will be there to comfort them when they need it. I’ve always worried that our children don’t get enough of that comfort and reassurance, and the insecurity that this might breed within them, not ever having been reassured that they shouldn’t worry about everything, bear the burden of a thousand worries without a single thought given to how much terror a person can feel when facing the unknown and scary parts of life that they haven’t figured out yet, and maybe need a little help with. Nobody ever did that for me, and I grew up terrified of the unknown.

The song says, “You’re my best friend” –and that is a happy song, when you feel you have that. But when you feel that this is something you’ve had, and something you've ruined; this is not a happy song.

I've been so isolated in my own world of stress and worries that the only truly close relationships I think I have had over the past few years are with our children. Their trust that everything is always going to be okay is heartbreaking; and sadly I feel just as naively committed to the idea.

This is not intended to be a guilt trip; this is my experience--a waking nightmare that I am trying to fight my way through. If a song on the radio makes me cry--maybe it’s me overthinking this, but I won’t bother you with the details. In the state I’m in, I’m only making things worse. You’ve made that clear. Maybe this is what I deserve after everything I’ve done.

But writing this down helps me to understand, and posting it here can be construed as nothing less than a cry for help. In the whole world, maybe one kind stranger will say the right thing, to make me feel that comfort, that reassurance that "It's going to be okay," that I have never felt in my life.

[classicman]

Lot of this going around. Hang in there. It *will* be OK. IT may not be what you think it was going to be, but still ...

[sexobon]

It just goes to show ya, it's always something my little Roseanne Roseannadanna.

[glatt]

Classic knows what he's talking about

[DanaC]

I have no idea who this is, but I know it's one of us. Hang in there. And talk about it as much as you need to.

[limey]

Classic is right. Change is SO stressful, but it WILL be OK in the end. And Dana is right, too, you're one of us, and we're here for you.

[Trilby]

ditto what limey said.

I have no idea who you are either---but I can tell you one thing I know for sure: things change. Friends, family, jobs, children, houses, neighborhoods, luck, feelings; it all changes - those things and more.

You won't always feel this way. You need to find someway to handle the stress of NOW (I color, draw, journal, read and talking a walk in the park is remarkably restorative) paint, write wicked kick ass poetry, punch your pillow or buy some inexpensive dishes and smash them somewhere safe for you and others. And scream.

also write to us here b/c there's a whole lot of us hating this fucking January. Maybe the world SHOULD have ended 12-21-12 and we're just living in the nightmare of the aftermath of what should have been but wasn't (I blame the Christians for this)

[Trilby]

PS = best friends is a rare and unusual thing to have in adulthood. count yourself lucky you had the experience. I ran into one of my besties from 20 years ago and I couldn't stand her attitude. Her prissiness. Her- well, everything about her. made my skin crawl. people change; sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly...I'm not the same person I was when I got here to the Cellar. It WILL be okay. This too shall pass. and you need to let go and open your hand for the new thing to come into your life.

[Pico and ME]

Just FYI, every 15 days there is 30 minutes more of daylight out there. And Daylight Savings Time is coming soon. HANG TIGHT EVERYBODY!!!!!

Anon...looks like you are doing some hard soul-searching. That can be good, until you let it turn on you. Everyone is allowed to forgive themselves! Do it, learn from it...and then move on. Things get better.

eta : sorry by my pat reply, Im in a blunt mood today. I hope this works out for you in the end....

[Griff]

This time of year seems more bruising, somehow. Sometimes when its like this its best to do something charitable after taking time to recognize a need in someone else.

[Clodfobble]

It's nowhere near as painful as what you're going through, but I've been struggling recently with the loss of an old best friend as well. She took me on as a teenager and made me who I am today, no exaggeration. She was the matron of honor at my wedding, and one of only two best friends I've ever had. But over the last several years she has made it pretty clear that she has moved on, and I have had a very hard time accepting that. In this, Mr. Clod has been the voice of reason for me, so I'll just have to channel him since I'm not so good at embracing the following yet myself:

Do you have friends now? You do. (I have only a guess about who you are, but still I know for certain that you have friends, because you are here.)

Are you holding onto the friend, or the idea of the friend, the person she used to be?

Isn't it true that actually, that memory-friend has been gone for a long time?

Would it be fair to say that, by trying to hold on to her, you might as well be asking a completely different person to play her part--akin to going to a funeral and asking the deceased's sister to pretend to be her, for your sake?

And if you are prepared to ask a completely different person to play her part... couldn't the role be taken on by a new friend, after all?


Anyway, just some stuff that's been percolating in my own mind, I hope none of it sounds too harsh. Like classic said, it may not be (will almost never be, in fact) what you thought it was going to be, but still, it will be okay. And like Trilby said, you won't always feel this way. And like Tony said in another thread, depression lies. This too shall pass, maybe like a giant fucking kidney stone, but it shall pass.

[Sundae]

My bestie moved to Kenya. I still miss her.
And she's nowhere I can't track her down now (they no longer own the restaurant.)

Miss that bitch like oxygen, even though we haven't spoken for nesrly five years. Or more. Not gonna count, would hurt too much. She got me through some cold hard times, was beautiful and funny.

Emma Geary I miss you.
In the vague hope she vanity searches one day.

[limey]

Originally Posted by Clodfobble

It's nowhere near as painful as what you're going through, but I've been struggling recently with the loss of an old best friend as well. She took me on as a teenager and made me who I am today, no exaggeration. She was the matron of honor at my wedding, and one of only two best friends I've ever had. But over the last several years she has made it pretty clear that she has moved on, and I have had a very hard time accepting that. In this, Mr. Clod has been the voice of reason for me, so I'll just have to channel him since I'm not so good at embracing the following yet myself:

Do you have friends now? You do. (I have only a guess about who you are, but still I know for certain that you have friends, because you are here.)

Are you holding onto the friend, or the idea of the friend, the person she used to be?

Isn't it true that actually, that memory-friend has been gone for a long time?

Would it be fair to say that, by trying to hold on to her, you might as well be asking a completely different person to play her part--akin to going to a funeral and asking the deceased's sister to pretend to be her, for your sake?

And if you are prepared to ask a completely different person to play her part... couldn't the role be taken on by a new friend, after all?


Anyway, just some stuff that's been percolating in my own mind...

Clod, these words are very helpful to me. As I posted in another thread I, too, have lost the woman I thought of as my best friend, my chosen sister. She moved away about a year ago and for the first time in forty years I do not know where she is. No Christmas card from her and her family. Gone.
We went through a lot together, and it hurts that she's gone. But I have to accept that. All relationships require the voluntary engagement of those in them. Anon, you are in the same boat as Clod and myself, and Sundae. We have to accept the loss, mourn and move on.

[orthodoc]

Change is hard, but it can bring better things. I hope you feel the warmth and support here. Hang in there.

[Pico and ME]

The woman, who I thought was my best friend, isn't talking to me at all anymore, and after two attempts, I have stopped trying to communicate with her. She is my brother's wife and the both of them have seemed to have cut me, and my Mom , out of their lives. This happened this summer after I got into a tiff with my brother and then, later the same day, my Mom decided to tell my three brothers that she is willing her house to me. Andy and Isa were the only ones greatly upset by her decision. We havent heard from them since.

I am now both sad and angry, but for the first month I was wracked with guilt and kept trying to convince myself to apologize for the whole mess. However, that would have just recycled the old script that I have played with them for years. So I didnt.

Sometime down the road, we may talk again.