Am I being too hard on my friend, what would you people recommend

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

Alright. I have/had a female friend. Our friendship started in spring of 2002 when I started college. I was very insecure and had no idea what to expect as this was a major turning point in my life. Over the summer when we had a class together we started emailing and talking more often. I moved away in January of 2003 and we still talked via email and IM pretty much daily.

Then around fall of 2003 she told me she was in love with me. It was uncomfortable at first but I got used to it. I didn’t feel the same way and besides she is married so I have no desire to do anything with her even though her husband says he is ok with the idea. But alas, not for me. And yes this is relevant because she was obsessed with me and would send me all these sexually suggestive stuff. It made me uncomfortable but I got over it, still I’d rather not have had to deal with it. She is also obsessed with my brother. It doesn’t bother me per se it just makes me feel like an object sometimes. So we still talked and IM’d and we discuss personal issues like her dad’s death and my fear over my future and shame over my past, ie personal stuff. She was more or less the only friend I could really share stuff with.

Around December of 2003 alot of really bad things started happening to me, this was the 2nd worst period of my life and when I would write to her she would not respond. She was having her own troubles at the time so that is understandable but it still made me not really want to open up to her anymore because I didn’t know if I could rely on her being there. Spring of 2004 came around, most/all of my problems from winter were solved and I was overall better off than I was before but I didn’t really feel connected to her as much.

Around May she came over to my apartment and I asked her if she would be my friend if she weren’t attracted to me and she said ‘I don’t know’. You can’t penalize honesty but still, that was another nail in the coffin.

Around summer I start emailing her and she doesn’t email anymore. I tell her about personal issues and she doesn’t respond. I tell her I miss her and maybe she sends a short email back a few days later and that is it. I start to try to put her out of my life.

And then a few weeks ago she starts emailing me again and after 5 months of not IMing me and emailing sporadically she asks me if I want to talk on IM and she starts sending emails. Her husband is a slacker more or less. He is a college dropout, has no job a good deal of the time and spends alot of time playing poker and smoking pot with his friends who are just as unambitious as him and this bothers her. Her dad was the same way, her mom would earn money and the dad would stay at home. I on the other hand am working on a degree, might try for a masters, and come from a successful family where the dad was in the top 5% of wage earners and both my brothers are starting doctoral programs. So the dichotomy of her pot smoking college dropout husband vs. me who comes from an ‘ambitious’, academically accomplished family has her really hot for me now.

This really bothers me, because I feel like when I needed her to talk to about issues I was concerned with she wasn’t there but now that she is horny all of a sudden she shows up again. It reminds me of the song self esteem by Offspring. I feel like an object to her. And I feel like I can’t rely on her. I can trust her, just not rely on her.

At this point I think I just want to scrap the whole friendship. I can’t rely on her and her motives are too suspect for me to be comfortable talking about anything personal. We can still talk about superficial, topical stuff but I don’t want to discuss anything important or emotionally involved with her anymore.

What should I say to her? I don’t even know if I want to talk to her at all anymore. Shall I just ignore her or should I be blunt and say this stuff to her. I don’t want to make her feel guilty or try to change her; I just don’t want to be her friend anymore.

2

It sounds like a disfuntional relationship to me. That’s really not saying anything bad about her OR you. It’s just that sometimes people just grow apart.

If it were me I would just end it now and relilsh the good memories you have about the relationship.

I dealt with something similar myself.
I had ran into an old highschool friend of mine who I hadn’t seen in years. I mean me and this guy were the best of friends. But somehow over the years, we lost contact with each other. So when we ran into each other, we started hanging out again. Well it didn’t take us too long to realize that we’re two totally different people now and the bond we once had was gone.

We basically quit hanging out after that.

Wich leads me to the old saying “You can never go home again.”

3

Follow your instinct, mate: break it off as gently as possible. It’s not a healthy relationship.

Luck to you, whatever you decide to do. hugs

4

She sounds like trouble with a capital “T” to me. She seems to be a friend of convenience…but that’s just my opinion.

You know that you are not attracted to her in a way that would move your relationship to the next level. She’s not satisfied with just friendship. Game Over.

It’s time to part ways and remain a fond memory. It’s the healthiest thing for both of you.

5

Excuse me for asking, but what part of her relationship with you (at least since December 2003) could you call “friendship?”

She ignores you when you have problems, but wants you on-call for her.

She communicates with you in ways that make you “uncomfortable.”

She can’t tell you that she’d even be your friend if she wasn’t physically attracted to you.

And she also apparently is attracted to your brother.

Don’t just move on. Move away as fast as possible.

6

She is not all bad. She is not a malicious untrustworthy person or anything, just a bit selfish and she admits it herself. Besides I have bad sides too.

7

Sure you can. Any friend who says to me “Lizard, in my personal opinion, you are an ugly and stupid son of a bitch,” is not going to be my friend much longer. :smiley:

But as to the subject of the OP, I agree with kunilou. She sounds selfish and a user. She was in an open marriage and wanted to sleep with you, and became aggressive about it. (The unwanted suggestive messages are the female version of sexual harassment. Since she knew your position, they are also unclassy and tasteless.) She says her husband is a loser, and shows great interest in you, who are clearly much more on track. She reminds me of a line in the movie Vanity Fair about the protaganist: “I had thought her a mere social climber, but now I see she is a mountaineer.”

Don’t ever trust this woman again. If you ever get lonely and desperate, think of it this way: She’s not bothering to treat her marriage/husband with any respect. How do you think she’d treat any relationship with YOU when you’re not around?

8

There are relationships that are about friendship, and there are relationships that are about sex. Sounds to me like you have one of the latter. Since you’re interested in friendship but not interested in the sexual aspect, and she’s the reverse, obviously one of you needs to drop it.

9

Think about what you want from your friends, what you expect, just in general, your friends to be described as.

If sexually agressive toward unwilling parties, selfish, and uncaring is on your list of “How My Friends Are Described” then chat with her when she’s around and don’t sweat it when she’s not. She’s a flake, but your friend, accept her and move on.

If not, then she’s not your friend. Seriously, accept that and move on.

Now just stop associating with her. Don’t respond to her e-mails, if you must respond to her IMs, just keep it casual and non committal and find something else you have to do every time she makes it sexual.

Or you could go my way and tell her you don’t want to associate with her anymore. (I hate being brushed off, I’d rather just know what’s up, but my way of handling things is not always the easiest way. It is, however, very clear.)

Personally, I’d walk. Assholes drain life essence. Good people fulfill it.

10

You do know it is easy to find internet friends you can talk to. Take us, the SDMB. We are your friends. I personally would like you to know if you would like to have someone to talk to in IM or email, I won’t sexually harrass you and I can give some good advice.

I was in the position you are in once. The man was interested in me and I was not, but he would not let it go. We had made friends because we had divorce and money problems. He became depressed and eventually suicidal. He had clung to me to a point where it had made me uncomfortable. When he talked of suicide I had to make a decision. Do I stay friends with him and keep on rejecting him or do I just reject him altogether and get out of his life? My decision was to get out of his life altogether. To me, suicide is a mental health problem that I am not qualified to deal with. Not only that, I did not want to be the catalyst for his demise. This was something I could not help him with. So I told him I did not want to speak to him anymore because of his persistance. That he should seek therapy and figure out how to get his life together. I blocked him from my buddy lists and from my emails. This way I could not be made to feel guilty.

I know this sounds cruel. But for someone to put that responsibility onto someone else is also cruel. Especially when I was also in a bad situation that I was handling by working 2 jobs, doing the best I could for my children who were suffering and by perservering day by day. We even had the same back problems.

I have seen him recently. I took him off my blocked list and hoped he would see me. He did and we met once more. He was moving 1500 miles away and was doing well. He told me what I did was a wakeup call for him. He has since Immed me and shown me pictures of his beautiful, now grown daughter and her future husband. Also a picture of the grooms mother, whom he is going to propose to on Christmas day. I was so happy for him I had tears in my eyes.

Sometimes the best thing you can do for someone, is to let them go.

11

My advice, since you asked;

When people show you who they really are it’s your job to see.

12

Sooooooooo…lemme get this straight.
My life essence drains out of my asshole…and good people will fill it back up??? :o

:smiley:

13

Ghanima quote “My life essence drains out of my asshole”
So THAT"S where it is…

14

Weird. Now that i’ve put all that down on digital paper and can read my own thoughts she does look alot worse than she has ever looked before. I thought I was overreacting.

I am cutting things off with her I just don’t want to never respond to her again w/o any explanation. I’d rather at least be blunt about it. What should I say.

15

Personally, I’ve found the best way to let someone know I want to cut things off is to cut things off.

If you somehow feel you’re backed into a corner and HAVE to say something (and, again, I ask “why?”) I’d suggest something along the lines of “I just don’t feel that we want this relationship to go in the same direction. I think it’s better that we stop before one of us gets hurt.”

16

I had to write an email once to a manipulative person. Once out of my life (he moved away) I saw that he had taken over my life.

It wasn’t easy, but it’s the best thing I’ve ever done for myself.

17

Truer words have never been typed. :slight_smile:

18

It just seems kind of juvenile to cut off contact 100% without an explanation. But I don’t know if I want to give an explanation.

19

You don’t necessarily owe her an explanation. So don’t think of it as an obligation.

Then again, it’s a nice thing to do, for most of us. Just lay it on the line, in plain, simple facts. Avoid accusations.

IE : “I’m uncomfortable with our relationship as it exists”, not “You make me uncomfortable.”

Above all, make sure the text of the message indicates the level of finality you feel. If you want it done with, now and forever, leave no hint of future contact.

It may seem cold, or uncaring to her - but that’s fine.

20

That’s the second sexually suggestive comment of yours that has caught my attention. Hail and well met.