Hi,
Will try and keep this short and to the point...!!
6 months ago a friend of mine had a rather difficult relationship break up with her partner of 9 years. She went to pieces and was signed off work for just over a month with depression because she was finding it difficult to cope with the loss of the relationship. She walked out on him. Within days of her leaving, it transpired that he'd already found somebody else online. He has subsequently married this other woman within 6 months of breaking up with my friend.
For the last 6 months, my friend has been calling me nearly 2 /3 times a day to chat - namely about her pain and her loss with the relationship. I've listened to her over and over again and have also stayed with her on a few occasions to help get her through. From this, our friendship became closer as she confided so much in me. Whilst I love my friend to bits, I do have to confess that at times I found myself beginning to feel emotionally drained as we were going over and over the same stories/situations with her ex over and over again. I never told her this and continued to support her. I think now that I possibly gave too much of myself to her situation and didn't leave any reserves for myself. In truth, I had a very difficult relationship break up myself 3.5 years ago and at times I felt like I was reliving the trauma of mine.
My friend is now doing really well, but I now feel some of her comments she has started to make and situations I find myself in, have made me question the sincerity of our friendship and whether actually she just "used" me to help her get through that difficult period in her life. I feel awful saying this and disloyal, but I am now having a rather tough time and have tried to talk to her and she cuts me short on the phone and doesn't let me finish and things like "right, is that it?" I actually feel a little let down because I thought friends were suppose to support each other.
She now keeps telling me how wonderful and amazing she looks and how everybody from her dentist to her hairdresser tells her she looks great. Pleased for her after the few months, but we recently went away for a few days together and she would say that all the guys would be checking her out. I started to feel invisible and the comments started chipping away at my confidence. Things like - you shouldn't wear those colours, they don't do anything for you to the way I do my make up. Last weekend there was a knock on her door and her very good looking neighbour was on her doorstep (he's single). It was just as though I was invisible. I answered the door - I've met him before - and he saw her and said how amazing she looked. He then proceeded - in front of me - to ask her out to some event on Sunday, he then invited the dog and the conversation continued. As a complete after thought, just as he was leaving he then turned around and said "oh, and you can come too if you want." Maybe I am being ridiculously sensitive here, but he didnt make eye contact with me once and I get invited after the dog???!!! She then had a date the following day (as did I) and he said to her that she would be snapped up on the date as she could bowl any guy over and he was certainly bowled over by her...
We'd both signed up for internet dating - I've been doing it a lot longer. She had some interest from this guy and then gave him the number of the cottage that we were staying at. The first night we were there, I was banished to the kitchen for over 2 hours whilst she chatted away to him on the phone. I couldnt' believe it. I thought it was really rude as the night before when we were at the hotel, she spent over an hour talking to him then. So we both had our dates on the Saturday - mine was a complete disaster, the guy couldn't even make eye contact, but hers was a success. I cant help but feel jealous and a litte envious because now I've started comparing myself to this friend and feeling ugly and invisible in comparison to her. I know this is all new and exciting, but we had plans to go out and do things on Saturday, but she's cancelled on me in favour of this guy taking her out. To be honest, I feel used.
Maybe I am over reacting, but teh fact that I am not in a good place anyway now myself - I just dont feel my frirend is there for me and I also feel that she doesn't want to know now that I've served my purpose and she's potentialy moved on. I have tried to tell her how I feel, but she's now become really secretive about this new guy and their relationship.
I don't know, maybe it's me.