Detoxing Life

When you've been around the sun enough times, you start to notice patterns. If you're the kind of person who considers one's only life, you probably notice them in your own behavior. I certainly have begun to.

Recently, my relationship with my best friend has blown up in my face. After being inseparable for a couple years, a single incident ballooned into a seething mass of text messaged blaming me for everything from the death of Christ to the election of Trump. To which, my emotional response was to shut down and walk away.

Its not unknown to me that my friend has been quite toxic for sometime. Having faced some personal hardships over the past couple years, they turned inward with guilt and self-loathing. I have forgiven much of their behavior for sometime, but there is a limit, and when the overblown and unwarranted blame and recriminations were directed full force at me, I decided it was time to let of the friendship.

To be honest, I've felt for sometime the friendship was one sided. They were getting more out of it than I was. I was supportive and understanding and consistent in as their life spiraled out of control. While they... Well, they spiraled out of control. I was there source of stability, and I got very little in return, except this feeling of nobility for being that source when everyone else around them was everything but.

Then I began to see the bigger picture. This is something I do. Something I've done for as long as I can recall. I pick up strays. They always seem to fun, exciting, interesting people and we become great friends, or lovers (the first ones I can clearly identify where early girlfriends) and over time their neuroses come out until the  relationship become toxic and I bail.

I feel guilty about bailing, after all, we have history. More importantly, I've allowed them to become dependent on me, they count on me. I'm also an enabler. My constant forgiveness of their flaws allows them to justify their behaviors. I make them worse.

I've done this my whole life. Its a pattern that takes years to play out sometimes, so it can be hard to recognize, but now I have. I'm not really sure how to stop it, since I don't really see the signs early on, but I'm aware now.

As much as I feel guilty about leaving these people behind, I have to accept that in the end they are hurting me. They drain me, the abuse me, they take me for granted, and they occupy a place in my life that could better be filled with healthy relationships.

I like to think I never completely cut anyone out of my life, that if they got better, maybe some therapy or something, I would welcome them back. But the truth is, I don't know, because either none have exercised their demons or those who have hold a grudge against me for leaving or for being their enabler and simply don't want me around. Either way, these breaks seem to last (I'm not dead, and I'm eternally hopeful that I'm wrong, so I say "seem to".)

Now that it is done, I hope to fill the void left by healthier reciprocal relationships. I'll let you know how that goes.