We constantly make excuses for insensitive behaviour because it's coming from someone we love. If it were easy, we would say goodbye to any relationship in our life that wasn't a two-way street.
The problem is, it's not that easy to call someone out or tell them you're no longer going to stick around while they continue their selfish ways.
I once had coffee with a of friend and she was telling me off a old university friend who she ran into over a year ago. The friend was going through a hard divorce and child custody settlement, and my friend advised she was there for phone calls over 3 hours, when her friend was crying anytime of day.
But every time my friend contacted her to meet up, for their children to play or just socialise - the friend was never available. The predominant part of the phone calls my friend felt dumped on, and not appreciated. By the end f the call my friend felt her mood change and felt emotionally drained.
I asked her, if she asked certain questions to herself regarding the friendship.
Does your friend support you in similar ways?
Do conversations ever divert to general things or enquires about your well being?
Are they very on sided?
Is this how you treat her?
She smiled and knew all the other to those questions!! We all at time sometimes need to ask ourselves these questions, not focus so much on how the other person treats us, but more on how we want to be treated, if friendship isn't mutual give and take on both parts where mutual respect, support is the ground work. Why waste the time!!
It takes lots of self-love to walk away from a friend you've known all your life, or a partner who you love, because you know you're hurting yourself by keeping them around.
From personal experience, I had one friend who I was in the middle of telling a personal story when I heard a lot of noise in the background on her part. I stopped talking when I heard her talking to someone else. When she got back on the phone, she didn't even acknowledge that I was in the middle of my story. She didn't apologize because I don't believe she was even aware I was telling her a story before her interruption. It made me really sad. It made me feel even worse when she said, "Yes, yes that's great, ." In the middle of my story.
For a moment, it hurt my feelings. Just for a moment. Then I became upset at myself. I realized this is how she's always been.
Relationships cannot be one-sided. It's unhealthy and feelings get hurt. I have found myself many times in a one-sided relationship, and I was always the person who would offer and never receive. I would present my friendship to them and the other person would gladly take it, but never reciprocate.
I've always considered myself to be a nice person, but sometimes people take advantage of that. I think it's necessary to say goodbye to those kinds of people. There is nothing wrong with ending a relationship that is one-sided.
This message is for all of the sensitive people who don't want to hurt anyone's feelings. The ones who always put others before themselves. Don't ever stop being kind. Your kindness is part of what people love about you and it makes you who you are. But don't let anyone interpret your kindness as a weakness. Those people are the ones we need to say goodbye to.
Saying to a fake friend: Why this is not wrong
Recognize that you deserve friends and partners who care as much about your feelings as you do theirs. There is nothing wrong with saying no to hanging out with people who never do the things you want to do. There is nothing wrong with loving yourself enough to recognize that you shouldn't keep the company of those fake friends who don't give you love back. Love yourself enough to say goodbye and walk away. Easier said than done; I know.
But we should love ourselves enough to recognize we deserve friends and partners who are as invested in our feelings as we are in theirs.