Friend didn't want me to talk to her about my upsetting personal stuff

[Sparklybutold]

Friend staying for the weekend. I experienced an extremely toxic and abusive childhood filled with suicide, murder, severe mental illness, premature death, all forms of abuse, the list goes on. This is a relatively new friendship so we are getting to know each other so naturally stuff about my childhood comes up. Later on in the day when the conversation swayed that way again she commented along the lines how my stories are just so sad - I asked whether she preferred I stopped, she said yes - I did. I was left feeling hurt, confused, invalidated but also kinda empathised. The stories are awful and just so sad, so much so that part of me switches off from them and I struggle to believe they're actually true. Alot of my experiences are also filled with shame and I was silenced so much, so to then be silenced again because it's too much?

This experience makes me question how can I be close with this person if she can't tolerate the not so nice parts of me? Is this reasonable? I couldn't imagine switching someone off like this?

That was a very unkind way to phrase it when the OP is obviously not feeling great but yes, rather than being angry with her it's worth considering that maybe the friend is struggling too, and is at the limit of what she can cope with.

U get it op. People are jumping on the op here as if she us purposefully dumping stuff.read the thread she never said that not that she was going for advice or support.she simply talk I g of their lives and so her own past enters that.and it's about how-to not share for eg your 6 year old selfbeing abused if your mates taking about you st 6 years old!they are sharing their pasts.
So many people don't share.i tho k it's brave you do op. YOU are not to blame for your past.
And I get it,when people seem to steer away or chuck it back or act insensitive of it,even unknowingly,it makes you shrink inside.want to curl away.and it perpetuates the secrecy/shamed feelings of abuse you had to live with for so long.your body and brain still reacting in the same way because it's been hurt that way for so long before.and that's going to take time and compassion for new pathways to be set.
I think she could have gone about it differently.this is your life poor her for finding if so sad.
And you shouldn't have to sensor it.
People can't hack it.especuallu the British.it's too much.hush. keep it in we don't talk about things like that.have a cup of tea.avoid issues.gloss over hard stuff.its part of the reason why get into trouble so often here.we avoid avoid.
Maybe the start of friendships you could have some lines in place.for your own sanity if nothing else.so you can protect yourself and see if this person can be there enough.
Because also yes we don't know what people are going through on their own stuff.
But in this situ it did sound like she was being a little bit no no hides behind hands don't tell me nastiness.well shithappens and we all need to support those who survive it.which you bloody you have op. But some people just can't.there are many of us that can though!.
So always here to hear anything you need to say ok.always.
And remember your first emotional response will be to be shamed.this is on going response from your abuse.where there wasn't a sage space for you to scream for help.or made to feel that way be people blocking you from doing that.
Try to breathe through the response.you are safe now and have people to talk to ok.many who can and would willingly hold space for what you need to say.

It's interesting to me that there seems to be this idea that there are trauma victims who want to hide from trauma to cope and their need trump those who don't need to hide and indeed want to speak about it.

It's difficult for sure but it implies a pecking order. And I kind of get it, those victims uncomfortable speaking about trauma are the ones who haven't come to terms with it. There seems to be a presumption that if you can speak freely about something you have made peace with it. I'm not sure how discouraging people speaking about trauma is congruent with that understanding though.

It also implies a default position, thay is that normally it shouldnt be spoken about.

I think this definitely needs a wider societal conversation.

It it’s not your new friends job to validate your trauma at all. She is perfectly entitled to put up boundaries and say that she does not want to listen to and provide emotional supppet for your complex trauma. That is healthy for her to do.

it doesn’t sound like she mocked you or said it was your fault or anything awful. She just said that she was not able to play a role which seems to be to you mostly therapeutic.

your rage is misplaced and Inappropriate and what needs to be resolved

I also used to do this and over share and have these trauma focused friendships. It didn’t really help me. Im I’m a much. Water place and have recently made a lovely new friend and hasn’t even mentioned my family estrangement etc. it’s lovely - it means I get to have a lovely relaxing f friendship. And if long term she becomes a close friend and I do need emotional support and some point it may be appropriate to ask her for it. But it’s certainly not appropriate on a first weekend.

you are not defined by your trauma OP. And that is a good thing. You can have relationships that are nothing to do with it.

All of this, perfectly put @TedMullins (I wish I could find a friend group like that!)

I’m sorry your friend has made you feel like this OP, I would feel the same in your position. A friendship is for sharing highs and lows imo not just being surface level.

I don't know what OP said but people really need to get over the idea that any talk of trauma is therapeutic. Trauma was Tuesday in my house growing up. Looking at this thread it was a lot of people's Tuesdays. I don't need support, I just reserve the right to speak honestly (and often with humour) about my own life when it comes up.

OP, I understand why you are feeling as you do, my childhood was similar, although I have never known anyone murdered, and that sounds awful. I am so sorry. You have a lot to carry. When I was younger I think I looked for people I could share the details of my childhood with but then something happened (another trauma) and I ended up with severe C-ptsd. It has changed me, I cannot cope with a lot in life, if/when someone starts to share major trauma I shut down. It's not really a choice (Although it could be argued everything in life is a choice - people have said this to me). The problem for me is I know how painful it is, It can feel like being drowned. It's an over-reaction and it is an unfortunate one because I feel limited. I am in my 4th year of counselling and may need it for the rest of my life. I am looking into alternatives like EMDR for example, but I am nervous of being worse. Anyway, just to say that you are maybe just not compatible with your friend at the moment, for whatever reason, she may have her own trauma that is unexamined or she may have had a healthy childhood and just doesn't want to examine the dark side of life because she doesn't want to (and she should be free to do this), you would have been compatible with me ten years ago, but not now. I don't think either of us (or your friend) has anything to feel shameful about, and you're not being silenced. I'm sorry but your friend is exerting her boundaries not silencing you, you are free to talk about you to other people.

I asked whether she preferred I stopped, she said yes - I did.

She didn't shut you down. You invited her to put a stop to that line of conversation and she accepted.

You are entitled to have boundaries, and so is she. She did nothing wrong.

i sort of understand OP. I have been through serious trauma and I have just stopped talking to people about it, other than people whose job it is to understand and not judge. I don’t tell friends.

it does feel like there is this huge part of me hidden from people. But I found people just couldn’t really understand ( how could they?) and their responses made me feel worse.

i think I realised that what was ‘normal’ for me was not for them. It was deeply abnormal and deeply outside of what they could grasp or process.

@Miffee well sure and people are perfectly entitled to say that they are not comfortable listening to it. And that doesn’t in and of itself make them a bad person.

but for my the thing here is that op sees the trauma as herself and herself not being accepted. She is entirely separate for the trauma and she can have healthy relationships which it is not a big part of - especially at the intital stages of a relationship.

i don’t think I’m explaining it well - it for me it seems like the op feels like these awful things that other people did are a part of her and someone needs to “accept” and have detailed knowledge of all these things to be her firmed. My pint is that there are whole parts of the ok that have nothing to do with the trauma - or that have incorporated the trauma but are not solely defined by it. And it can be liberating to develop a friendship where those other parts are the forefront.

my personal experience is that for so many years I was so struggling with my trauma that it was the focus of all my friendships. I am a lot more resolved. Is and it’s wonderful discovering I can have friends Davila that aren’t Ll about it - and some of these friendships have developed into ones where I now can share stuff when I need to. And others haven’t - but they’ve still been enjoyable and pleasant.

I know how it feels to be shut down by friends, but I have also experienced not wanting to hear somebody's past. It's a tough one. I do not want to lose my friends so I take the clues on board. I do have a friend who has a similar experience with her mother though, so thankfully we are free to talk about things that hurt us. With each other.

I’ve been your friend and I didn’t respond honestly when asked if I would prefer her to stop. I have been kept awake to 4am on a school night by her rants over her childhood trauma more often than I can say, for years.

Despite expensive therapy, she would then ring me, come to my house straight after her session was over and use me to carry on, for hours and hours.

She has stayed in the living room while I do the kids’ bedtime, impatiently waiting for me to come downstairs so she can start off again on how appalling her caregivers were and how unsafe she felt and showing me her journals of her feelings and asking my opinion, then arguing with it if I’m dumb enough to say anything other than I don’t know and how sorry I am that she was let down by the people who should have protected her.

I dread seeing her. I no longer invite her to my house as DH doesn’t want the DCs to hear any of it and it’s like a tap you can’t turn off. I feel so much sympathy for her but I can’t do anything except allow myself to be used as someone to offload to, but she drinks all the way through these rants then ends up screaming at me like it’s all my fault, how I don’t understand, what do I know. I used to think that if I met her out somewhere she would have to modify it but she gets so drunk she doesn’t so I have reduced how much I see her. She won’t change, she won’t get better, if she was going to be able to process her feeling she’d have done it by now as she’s in her 50s. I am working my way to lowering the frequency of our contact slowly as I don’t want to cut her off but I can’t take it any more.

@Onandupw so true. It's not the OP that's not being accepted by her friend. I hope she can separate this out. It's the verbal detailing of things from her past that other people did to her. That is very different from a friend not accepting YOU @Sparklybutold

My mum did the same to me. The same stories over and over again and new ones. I burst into tears when I was pregnant in my thirties and told her it's just too much for me.

It's the only time in my life I've ever put that boundary up with anyone. I felt so cruel doing it. I have listened and still listen to my mum's trauma and problems to this day.

I can't ever imagine doing what your friend did OP. After one conversation about it. I really do understand your feelings about your friend putting that boundary up. I would never ever do that and have only ever done that once with my mum. So many people are suicidal in this world, we have to try to listen in. But I understand I have the emotional resilience to deal with whatever I hear or I'm somehow able to detach myself a bit from it. Your friend doesn't have that perhaps.

But I think it's incredibly cruel to just say ' yes please change the subject '. I would have maybe given some context if I really couldn't handle it. ' I really appreciate you're sharing who you are with me. I'm finding this really difficult emotionally to deal with, as I'm feeling a little fragile ok myself at the moment and it's triggering me to feel worse. I'm so sorry for what you've been through, maybe we can talk about it again another time.' May have been more appropriate. Of course people on here will say, she owes you no explanation and nothing - no one ever does apparently. But I think it would have been a bit kinder and maybe would have left you less upset. Am I right ?

However I have found this thread fascinating. I find it fascinating that you can be completely ' out of order ' by simply sharing something with someone. But there is definitely some truth in that we should be more careful about how we offload our trauma. At the same time, I've had a couple of friends commit suicide and I would have given anything for them to offload some of their trauma on me, before they took that decision. Maybe if more people were able to take on a bit of others trauma and listen, there wouldn't be so many suicides. Perhaps we all need therapy / help in helping each other when needed.

What would you do if your friend came to you and told you they wanted to die ? ' sorry I find this triggering, can we talk about something else now? ' is not the right response.

It's entirely dependent on the situation. There is no hard and fast rule. People are entitled to do what they want. It can still make them an arsehole.

You're not really imaginatively entering into her point of view at all are you. New friend comes for what she thinks will be a fun and relaxing weekend, and instead is used as a sounding board by someone who sulks when she sets up perfectly reasonable boundaries. Other people are not in this world to have our issues dumped on them. That's not what friendship is for. It sounds really heavy and one-sided. I would feel bullied and used in this situation. For years I used to tolerate being the sounding board for people who liked to replay trauma and all it does is cause depression in the person being dumped on. Good for her for having boundaries.

You deserve proper support for what has happened to you, proper guidance and professional, therapeutic responses. Mates can't offer any version of this.

Why not enjoy the actual weekend - do things together that make both of you happy? Allow friendship to be a break from revisiting trauma not an extension of it.

You invited a new friend to your home for the weekend and then dumped all this on her.

You asked her if she would like you to stop ( so you obviously knew she was upset or was finding it hard) and she said yes.

She did nothing wrong. She is not a friend you have known for years. You don’t invite someone for the weekend and then tell them the worst parts of your childhood. You have no idea what she has been through herself.

Now you want her out of your house because she would prefer not to hear all those horrific things on a weekend away?

YABVVU

You haven't been her friend because OP didn't do any of the things you are describing.

Can you not read?

I am so sorry forwhat you have been through.
Re your friend you say she had tears in her eyes. As your friend and someone who cares about you it was too much for her at that moment. Some people really 'feel' way too much and it can overwhelm them and they can't switch off and carry sadness around with them from things they have even read about strangers in the news. It can be really intense for them so please try not to take it personally. Your friend clearly cares loads about you.

I just read the OP again as I was confused about the accusations of her "dumping" her trauma.

The OP implied she shared some of her background as context to a story once then nearly did again before stopping at her friends reaction.

The fact people are equating this with dumping, incessantly oversharing, ranting etc is bizarre. You all need to get a grip.

What would you do if your friend came to you and told you they wanted to die ? ' sorry I find this triggering, can we talk about something else now? ' is not the right response. @hothotsumm

No friend would respond like that though, of course then they'd want to help. But the OP has her therapist As I've got to know my friends better, they and I have organically spoken more about past traumas. Expecting a new friend to want to hear all about it seems a bit much from the OP.

She's not silencing you - she's just not able to cope with the trauma of the content you're talking about.

It's very unfair to expect a relatively new friend to cope with that, and I say this gently, as I have a horrific childhood too.

I suspect you're over-sharing, and the best thing you can do if you respect her feelings, is to focus on having an enjoyable, positive time and chat about other things.

Fwiw, I don't think it's all that healthy or necessary to be talking about your trauma with her. Again, I say that kindly, as I'm definitely guilty of over-sharing in the past I didn't realise how it can really affect the other person.

Hi op. Hope you're feeling more settled today.

I had a very traumatic abusive childhood. I'm having therapy again atm.

I have actually been in your friends position where someone was opening up to me about something that had happened to them. At the time I hadn't addressed my own trauma or had therapy etc. it triggered me terribly and I became very upset and had to walk away. I wonder if your friend may have found it upsetting for similar reasons.

YABU. You asked her if she'd rather you stopped and she said yes. It was clearly upsetting for her.
"I just want her out of my house" is a complete over reaction to her setting boundaries which she is perfectly entitled to do so.
I guarantee she also wants to leave.
Please head back to therapy. I'm sorry for what you've been through, but you're being incredible unfair.

There's is also a chance it's triggering for her and she's been through a lot too, which she doesn't want to talk about.