Hi Anita,

I apologize this is so delayed – I haven’t been on here in a while! I am doing much better since we last talked. Thank you for asking. How have you been?

Thank you Anita! I think this was a great way to test how much I’ve grown. A year ago, I would have kept arguing with her and list out all the proof that goes against things she said to me or accused me of, but I was able to walk away calmly from the conversation without feeling like I needed to do that. That’s honestly a big step for me.

My parents, especially my dad, have always been hard workers. They tried their best from a young age to raise my sisters and I to be independent and not have to rely on anyone to help us through life. My dad was the more strict parent and would come down hard on us anytime we didn’t do great in school or were experiencing social problems. His initial reaction/comment anytime I tried to talk to him about something that happened, he would always start with “what did you do/say to them to make them do that to you?” So I always felt like I was the reason for everything that goes wrong. I would feel guilty about all of it so I would apologize for things even beyond my control and that I know I wasn’t responsible for. My boyfriend didn’t sleep well or is having a bad work day? I would always tell him I’m sorry and he always responds “why are you sorry? It’s not your fault nor are you the reason it happened.” I guess I just never learned another way to express empathy without apologizing. I feel this stems back my my childhood events concerning my parents, but I’d like to learn from it and find better ways to build the self-esteem I never had.

Good Morning, Anita. I wanted to reach out to you again for some guidance and advice. Amanda and I had a couple discussions since I last posted here. The first conversation involved me explaining why I enforced my boundaries in the first place and how upset I get when she makes me feel guilty and mean for putting myself first more often. I let her know that I pick up on her energy and demeanor changing completely whenever I do this or take more than an hour to respond to her. She said she understood and to that I reminded her she could text me anytime she wanted and I would respond back the moment I could and if I have the capacity to. That response sparked another discussion the following day. Amanda proceeded to tell me that I make her feel annoying, overwhelming… I don’t make her feel loved, supported, or encouraged. I make her feel like garbage because I can’t make her a high priority like she makes me. I told her I appreciate her honesty and that I’m sorry my boundaries created these feelings within her. I reminded her that I expressed similar emotions whenever I engage in acts of self-care and that her energy changes. I told her that I feel because I make her feel a similar way to how she makes me feel makes me conclude that we have become toxic for each other and that she has had a toxic impact on me. I apologized that I created this problem because I made myself too available and accessible from the start of our friendship so I take some of the blame for why she’s been feeling this way once I started creating space. Her response to that was “Ok, I’m toxic now. Cool. Cool. I wish you the best.” I didn’t respond to that, but a few hours later she sent another text stating she forgives me even though I blamed her for all of this and made her think she was to blame for the distance between us. I honestly felt a little gaslighted by that response. I also did not respond to this. Because I never placed all the blame on her.

With all that said, the point of me reaching out to you again Anita is because her comments upset me. I feel guilty and feel like I was in the wrong. Was I actually toxic and perhaps gaslighting her too? Her comments bother me because she claims (in the last message she sent) that she respected me and my boundaries and allowed me to be my true self. I guess I struggle with distinguishing the difference between healthy boundaries and toxic ones. I know I need to take better care of myself and my soul. I just need some guidance if I went about this all wrong and sabotaged this friendship. I don’t want to make this mistake with other friends, especially the friends I haven’t crossed paths with yet. I want to be better and to do better, but Amanda really made me feel like I wasn’t being my best self. I’m curious to hear your thoughts.

Hi Anita, that also makes sense and was not something I considered previously. I truly appreciate your perspective!

I do have a different texting relationship with her compared to every other friend. Because I don’t see her in person except for those two occasions, I have more in-depth and novel-like conversations with her. Because I have the ability to see my boyfriend and other friends any time I please, we reserve any in-depth conversations for when we get together. I will be honest with you Anita, some days I just don’t have the energy or emotional capacity to engage in a meaningful conversation like that. I could give a 4 hour window with her, but wouldn’t this defeat the purpose of my boundary to begin with? I feel like this may still have me feeling burnt out and frustrated. resentful even because I’m not truly given any space to recharge. I can still try giving a shorter window of time compared to a day or two and see if that satisfies her without me removing my boundaries entirely.

Hi Anita, I don’t like to hear that my actions upset others that I care deeply about. Those are never my intentions so it hurts me to hear when I’ve done that to someone. So it makes me question if I’m doing the right thing or not so that’s when I start to feel guilty or toxic. I’m conflicted mainly in this scenario because none of my other friends have an issue with this – in fact, all my friends take social media and texting breaks more often than I do. I think the difference might be that even when we don’t text often, we can call and ask each other to come over or go out and do something together. I don’t have that option with Amanda since she is a 7-8 hour drive away. When I mentioned we are being toxic to each other, I am taking it that my boundaries are coming off toxic based on her definition of what I’m doing. Other than this issue, she is a good person and makes me feel supported and good about myself. Only when I input these boundaries does this bring out another side to her which makes me wonder if I’m going about my boundaries all wrong.

Hi nycartist, thank you for responding! I think Amanda expects a lot from me because she is able to make herself available to me every day at any time even though she has a husband and kids – I do not have as much responsibility as her as far as the kids part goes. I’m not sure how she was before I came into the picture, but I do know she doesn’t have a lot of friends so she puts our friendship on a pedestal – she admits that she does that and gets selfish with me because she values me a lot, but it comes off as needy at times. She’s the only friend I have that gets upset if I don’t text back for one day. She’ll turn to social media and post things and then treat me differently. I try to make myself available to her and she tries to take advantage of that I think. I think you’re right about the friendship still being new, but it’s hard for me to keep repeating myself and my reasons for needing to have a day or two without texting her without her getting upset and making me feel bad.

Thank you everyone for the responses – I appreciate it! I took all of your advice in different pieces. I had the talk with him and firmly expressed how I feel and where I stand, and if it can’t grow into something more, then I need to walk away. He would still keep contact with me so I blocked him on everything. He mostly engaged with me over snapchat text so I blocked him on there. And then he texted me recently… I repeated the same conversation we’ve already had two times before and he wasn’t acknowledging my feelings. He was only focused on the sex. So I guess Michelle was right – I mean, I felt an emotional connection to him and I know the feelings were real and genuine because it still hurts. But as for him, it was just sex. If he even cares about me in any way, he needs to work on being more open with his thoughts and feelings. Who knows, maybe he really does care because why else would he keep coming back? You can have great sex with almost anyone so why come back when you have more options now and even before? He probably realizes I was the only one who treated him with love and respect and care. Either way, I’m trying to stop reading into these messages and “signals”. I’m sick of feeling this way and i know the right person will not have me thinking the thoughts I currently have now. So again, thank you all! Hopefully I’ll never have to vent about this again and learn from my feelings going forward.