I let her get away

Lately my mood’s been pretty good, a little up and down, but decent. Despite that, I still made an appointment to go see my counsellor Liz next week. Now that the intake is over, I’m sort of curious and excited to really get down and try to figure out the root causes of all my insecurities and self-confidence issues. I don’t even know where I’m going to start, but as long as some good comes out of it, I’m still pumped. Part of me is still a little wary going into it though; I suppose it’s the fear of the unknown of what she’ll say or recommend, but fuck it, I’m going anyway.

I think I mentioned in passing that part of my anxiety of this whole counselling experience was over a friend of mine from the past. It’ll make sense in a second, but my biggest fear doing this is that I’m going to be diagnosed with depression, or passed onto a specialist for some deep digging into my problems.  Anyway, Britney and I met back in science class back in the 9^th grade. We really hit it off, we both felt really comfortable joking around with each other, we had a lot of common interests, and well...our personalities just clicked. At the highest point in our friendship, we used to talk to each other every day, had little inside jokes with each other, picked out the perfect Christmas gifts for each other and did stupid things like sing at the top of our lungs in the car along with each other. Now, I swear I’m not making this up, but like Lindsay, she had feelings for me that she made apparent a couple times throughout our friendship. And like Lindsay, thinking back on it now, I had (still have?) feelings for her too and I really should have gone for it, but there was a *little* secret, that I disguised in the “I like being friends” excuse that held me back. We eventually got past all that though, and always became best friends again. 

It was about grade 11 that she finally got the courage to tell me that she had been diagnosed with depression and was on medication for it. Britney had always been a bit emo and moody, but to hear that there was a professional diagnosis for it all was still a bit of a shock. Even though, I still supported her by listening, talking and being the same goofy guy I was with her before all this happened. I supported her for a good two years through some pretty dark periods, which over time got to be extremely taxing on me emotionally. About three years ago, there was one poignant conversation that I had with her where she asked me to tell her some of my own problems and I told her I had none (false, but I ignored them so they felt like they weren’t there) and she got really upset and accused me of not being open with her and told me how she felt guilty about unloading all my problems on to me and was angry how I couldn’t do the same to her even though we were so close. It was about then that I decided that she needed some space and time to cool off, so I slowly talked to her less and less...an avoidance technique on my part perhaps? Neither of us ever really made an effort to rebuild our friendship after that, and fast forward to today, we’re still friends and we see each other once every month or so, but our friendship is nowhere near the high point it was 5 years ago. 

One of our inside jokes...

What scares me is that I see her during that conversation in a lot of what I’m saying and how I’m behaving with Lindsay, and I’m worried that that’s going to carry over to any of my other friends or family I tell the truth to. I know what Britney’s problems did to me and how I reacted, and I would never wish that sort of burden on any of my friends and family. My buddy Brian is one I’m a little afraid of this happening to, since he too was friends with Britney and experienced things first hand, and he saw how frustrated and upset I got in dealing with her in the later years. I’m pretty sure he still resents her a little for what happened and how she behaved, so I’m not sure how he’s going to react to how I’m feeling right now. But at the same time, I know talking is the only way I’m going to get better and get over my issues. And I know how I feel now about my relationship with Britney, that she was a really close friend, and that her friendship was worth helping her tough times, although I had one lapse and let her go like that. Hopefully I’m not wrong in assuming that I’m worth just as much to my best friends and family and they’ll be willing to do the same for me without the slip-up. Seriously, I’m vowing to myself now that if I ever get into a relationship/situation like I did with Britney, that I will never give up on them or let them get away like I did with Britney. In hindsight, letting our friendship go like that was probably the biggest mistake of my life so far. I don’t think I’ve ever been that close to someone at any point of my life, from the beginning up until now. I’m just so disappointed with myself that I let something so good get away just because I couldn’t say or even acknowledge what I was feeling at the time, I just ended up running away from my problems. 

 

Maybe talking in counselling won’t be so tricky after all...

-Matt