Every time me and my friend meet up to talk after work someone he knows shows up. He leaves me, whether I’m right beside him, in his car, etc. He doesn’t come back until the ones working decide they need to go fearing they’d get introuble. I can’t talk to his friends. They give me an odd vibe, I’ve tried to talk with them but they don’t seem to like me. I’m an idiot when I talk so now I just shut myself up.
He comes back and apologizes, “are you mad at me because I left you?” Of fucking course I am.. But I didn’t say it.. I just thought it. I feel like I’m just being treated as someone who’s only convenient for him until someone else comes along.. It hurts so bad.. But as I look over what happened.. Do I really deserve to be mad at him? Or am I just over reacting again…?
Also what made me mad yesterday was that he kept acting so cocky saying he had people to back him up if he got fired. He acts like if he gets introuble he can get out of it just because he’s friends with the store manager. Even though this isn’t anything relevant to the title I thought I would add this into my rant. It helps a bit.. But not fully.
He told me he wants to meet up with me today but I don’t want to.. Not after yesterday..
1 comment
I can relate. At work, I have become the doormat everyone dumps last-minute, unexpected emergency shifts on. I have stayed late so often that yesterday my boss just assumed it was fine to leave me hanging for one-and-a-half hours.
The other day I actually did speak up. I threw a minor tantrum about how sick I was of a lot of things at work. I usually feel embarassed after doing something like that, but this time, I felt good. I realised that yes, I did believe what I said, and maybe it was right to say it.
Later I spoke to my mother, who also told me to stand up for myself more.
I realised I am a people-pleaser. I want to keep on the good side of others, and avoid conflict like the plague, because otherwise I am convinced they will abandon me. Or maybe I am just scared of the conflict itself.
At this late point in life (age 32), I have realised that that is a really ineffective way of living. If you don’t speak your own truth, people won’t necessarily know it, and they may misunderstand you, or even exploit you when they realise you will go along with pretty much anything.
You ask if you deserve to be angry. I think it is more relevant to note that you ARE (or were) angry, and that is reason enough to speak up.
It is ten times better to calmly tell your friend that you cannot seem to get along with his other friends, so in future, the two of you should meet up in a way where he doesn’t leave you hanging to hang with them, than it is to placate him and silently curse his behaviour. And if he cannot accept that, fine, you are better off parting ways maybe.