Trigger warning: ⚠️ body image/mental health/s*icidal ideation…nothing very graphic, just briefly mentioned, that’s not what this post is about, there is quite a bit about body image/talk though that could be very triggering to some, I would suggest not reading it if you’re someone with serious body image issues because it’s nothing positive or inspiring and is not even my experience, just me mentioning someone else’s experience with it

Censored words are in case I share on FB where we can get our accounts suspended or because the words can be triggering for someone with trauma history.

If I could go back, do it again, I’d be someone you could call friend, please, please believe that I’m sorry. 🖤

It’s a confession session!

This is one of the more unpleasant things about me most people don’t know about. I am APPALLED with myself for this.

I’m embarrassed to admit this, but I feel I want to put it “out there” for some sense of something, not sure if it’s to cleanse my conscience or whatever. Lol It is something that nags me on occasion. It’s something that was wrong on so many levels or in so many aspects. It’s something that I wish never happened and I feel guilty about when I think of it. It’s only when I think of it, not a general thing, and I don’t think of it a lot. But unfortunately I still have much of this fake relationship in writing online. I haven’t looked at our conversations for years after we ended our friendship and rarely thought about it. But one day a few years ago, I went back and skimmed through our old conversations and was APPALLED with myself. There have been occasions shortly after I revisited our conversations where it kept me up all night. After this, this experience has stuck with me and resurfaces in my mind now & again. I forgot so much of what I did til I read our messages. I cringe so hard.

Once something is out there, it’s out there. I wish I could delete the whole thing, the whole relationship and all evidence of it, not because it’s unpleasant or unkind or whatever but because it’s so fake and was never real. I don’t mind that my cruel messages are still out there because I felt that all sincerely when I wrote and sent it. The cruelty was real. But the fake stuff I wish was gone. Lol She told me she kept everything, screencaptures and all, of my cruel messages, and that she would keep it forever to remember what kind of person I am. I don’t think I would say I was a cruel person. But I did choose to be cruel in the moments I was. What I regret more though is the fakeness. The false flattery, the empty I love you’s, I need you’s, the meaningless gifts, the whole show I put on for ten years…

Don’t fear the enemy who att*cks you, but the fake friend who hugs you.

I was that fake friend.

I’m embarrassed about who I chose to be back then. But it was ages ago. It was 10+ years ago, and I was 20 something years young.

I recently was looking at writing prompts while in a creative mood, and one was to share something that could make us look like a bad person or something unpleasant/unkind we once did.

I thought of many years ago when I was in a ten year long ongoing frenemy situation with a girl I met as a teenager.

When I met her, I currently had no real friendships. I had kids to talk to at lunch in school and chat online with, once in a while walk around with after school. But they were casual friends, not really general friends or anything of substance, and never anything that carried out of the context of school. I longed for a real friend. I did have good friends for a while and loved them, but we had very different lifestyles, and I felt we were incompatible. At fifteen years old I chose to stop being an active friend to them. We talked online once in a while and saw each other around, giving each other hugs here and there, still, but no longer hung out in person. They were into drugs and criminal activity (but were the kindest people you could ever meet), I wasn’t into all that and just felt our friendship wasn’t going to really work out. I never judged them or anything, just couldn’t be involved with that. I was into watching movies and going to restaurants and shopping, playing board games and cards. My friends were into alcohol, other drugs, stealing, breaking into soda machines, cutting school, sneaking out at night, being delinquents….I did not care, but I couldn’t relate.

At sixteen years old, a casual acquaintance of mine introduced me to her new friend. We instantly clicked and became good friends. She was funny, outgoing, bubbly…and she was a “good girl” like me, never touched alcohol or a cigarette or cut school or anything. She loved clothes and makeup and shopping like me. We were almost identical in personality except she was outgoing and bubbly while I was quiet and reserved. She also cursed while I did not. She said things like hell and sh!t and damn and called other girls b!tches and s*uts (I began to do this just to impress her, and it felt so unnatural and wrong to me). She wouldn’t say f*ck though. She was religious and pro-life, she knew I’m an atheist and judged me for it. I did not use the word “atheist” back then but did not believe in the whole god stuff. She judged me for not going to church and not praying. To her, I began to pretend like I did believe in it to a point, so she wouldn’t think less of me. As adults, I pretended to be pro-life so she would think more of me. She did eventually have kids but at one point was told she may never because of health conditions and weight problems that could affect her heart and stuff. She said it wasn’t ok that women who are lucky enough to be able to have kids can just “k!ll them.” I pretended to agree. I would sign up for Pro-life stuff and make pro-life arguments to impress her, she said my debating skills for any topic absolutely amazed her, and she couldn’t imagine being that good at debating and writing. (I have been told this by teachers and professors and others all life long, so I believed her) She said sexual activity outside of marriage is wrong and judged women for it. She said it goes against “god.” I disagreed with her on all this but just played along. She wasn’t homophobic or racist so there’s that. Lol She liked girls too.

At sixteen years old, we quickly became best friends and already after only a couple weeks of knowing each other said we would be close friends forever, never losing touch. We made plans for a future together. I remember us sitting on a bus together planning on taking each other out to celebrate when we got our first grownup jobs, she planned to have me in her wedding as her bridesmaid or maid of honor with her sister (I never planned to get married but told her she would be my maid of honor if I did along with my sister) and to tell me first when she had her first kiss. We even planned to be roommates in the future. At this point I genuinely believed we were friends.

We hung out together for hours after school and took the bus home together everyday. We had the same sense of humor and interests. We met up on the weekends, often with other girls, going to movies and shopping malls. I loved it and felt like I finally had a true friend, someone I could relate to. I loved our sister-like friendship. Something about her always rubbed me the wrong way though, something I couldn’t quite put my finger on. I was able to just brush it off for a while because she was a lot of fun, and I could call her friend. But there was a resentment brewing beneath the surface. She was extremely judgmental and jealous just in general.

After not very long, I began to see some red flags but ignored them. My mom noticed before I consciously did. She told me the girl wasn’t a true friend. But she was my closest friend and so much like me, I wanted to overlook anything wrong she did. She was so fun. And she’s the one who held our whole friend group together. We were all friends but more friends with her, she was the “leader.” (I have had a few friend groups like this, and unfortunately if we have a falling out with the “leader,” the rest tend to take that person’s side. ) The problem was, I wasn’t genuinely overlooking the red flags, I was taking notice and secretly harboring resentment. I wasn’t genuinely letting it slide but tucking it away and keeping inventory.

That resentment began to seep into my words and actions and gestures and saturating my motives, in discreet but still destructive ways. Gradually, it molded me into someone else when I was interacting with her, someone who looked like me but wasn’t. Even in the encounters where we just talked about our mundane day or whatever mood we were in, even in my most honest moments, there was an underlying fakeness, a secret agenda. Even my truths were laced with deceit, fabrication. I saw it all as I looked back through our years worth of conversations. No one else would notice, but I know. I saw the show-offy underpinnings, the secret selfish agenda, the exaggeration, the shock value…Even when everything I said was true, none of it was really true. It wasn’t genuine.

She struggled with body image and low self esteem while I did not. Her body was her biggest insecurity. And I think this is why our friendship ultimately did not work out. I noticed how her attitude relating to me would change for a while if I wore a short shirt while we were out together or if I wore short shorts during girls movie nights. She would tell me as adults not to ever be alone in a room with her husband and not to ever hug him (her husband never looked at me that way, and I am not into men{she did not know this back then, I never told anyone til many years later}, even if I was I wouldn’t go for a man who is already taken, I chose to sink low back then, but even I wouldn’t sink that level of low lol). One day the girls and me were in the kitchen with her man while she was in the living room, the girls all walked into the living room while I stayed helping with food in the kitchen (before she told me not to be alone with him), and she ran so fast into the kitchen and escorted me into the living room. She would ask how I got my body to look like it did. I wasn’t sure exactly what she meant. I never did anything, it just looked that way naturally. She wore loose large clothes trying to cover her body and said she felt unsexy in clothes like that but that she felt very self conscious if she wore more revealing or tight clothing. She was also very jealous of my long hair. Her hair wouldn’t grow longer than her shoulders or it did but looked unhealthy or something and had to be cut. Basically she couldn’t have hair much longer than her shoulders and wanted it very long. She frequently told me I don’t know how lucky I am to be able to show my whole body in pictures and have hair almost to my hips.

She would look at me in disgust when I wore short shirts or shorts and then make remarks about something not looking good on me, a certain color not being my color or an accessory not looking right. Back then, belly chains were a thing, thin chains that would go around the abdomen and hang down a little bit, with like a cute butterfly or heart or flower charm almost like a necklace but around the waist. I wore those with belly shirts, and was told by her they don’t look right on me. She tried to wear one, but it wouldn’t fit around her waist. So she tried to make me think they weren’t good on me. It did not work and only provoked resentment in me for her. But I suppressed it because I wanted her as my friend. I also had my bellybutton pierced at sixteen years old, and she told me I did not have the personality for that and that people would get the wrong idea of me. She said only a certain kind of girl had a belly ring, and I wasn’t that kind of girl. In school and when we would hang out right after school, she would only see me in my school uniform. But on the weekends and evenings if we hung out, I wore my regular clothes and stuff, and it would trigger her. My mom said she was super jealous of me just by what I told my mom. I never believed my mom til I saw years later. With my intuition, I knew something wasn’t right though, all along. She wasn’t a friend.

If I would tell her something unkind someone said to/about me, she would say “Well she has a right to her opinion/can say whatever she wants.” Not long after we first met as teenagers, we brought Christmas cards/gifts to school for each of our friends. She gave them each one except me then claimed to have forgotten to get me a gift or write me a card. She pretended to feel guilty and kept saying sorry. I kept saying it was ok. I believed her back then but years later realized the truth after stuff like that continued to happen frequently through the years. I was disappointed back then but not angry. It’s not that I wanted a gift or card but disappointed that she wasn’t thinking of me. I remember the feeling, a feeling of her not caring about me enough to remember but caring about all our other friends. None of the others were left out, and we were even closer to each other than to them, she always said she felt closest to me than anyone, even closer than her actual sister. As adults she told her husband everything important first then me second then everyone else, even her own family found stuff out after me. I would have felt so honored, but my intuition told me something just wasn’t right all along, and I ignored it. An honest mistake is ok, it happens, and in some cases it truly doesn’t mean someone doesn’t care, someone can slip and leave someone out, I probably could. But she intended for me to have this feeling. And that is a big red flag. When a friend or family member intentionally tries to make someone seem unloved, not cared for, abandoned, forgotten, that is a big red flag. That was probably the first red flag. And I did not see it. I totally believed she meant well. In fact, I actually felt sorry for her because I truly believed she felt guilty and sorry, and I thought my card and gift to her probably added to that guilt.

She wouldn’t let me in pictures when we all took pictures together. She would stand in back of the other girls and not let me in at all. She would tell me she was embarrassed by her appearance/weight especially when people saw us together. As adults, she shared many of her wedding pictures online, and I was in none of the ones she shared. The only wedding pictures of hers I was in were ones that family/friends of hers shared. There was a group photo of us all hugging that someone took with her phone, then she asked me to take one of her and the girls all hugging, basically the same photo but with me not in it. That’s the one she shared on her own account, the one I took, without me in it. She wrote something about being thankful for her best girls and thanking them for being a part of her big day, tagged them all in it, leaving me out. There were also pictures of her hugging each of her closest friends/sister/sisters in law, individually, and she put each picture on except the one with her and me hugging. I was not one of the bridesmaids, just received a very last minute invitation as an afterthought. So it makes sense that some pictures would just be the girls who were in the wedding. But not one picture had me in it even pictures with others who were not in the wedding. (And I graduated college that year and spent all my cash gifts n gift cards to me by family as graduation gifts on her and her man, bought them house gifts, bought her jewelry, and gave them cash because they were poor, they would have me paying for all the food ordered during hangouts at their house, n my money would go missing out of my handbag during sleepovers and even at mutual friends’ houses, but that never happened at the mutual friends’ houses when she wasn’t there)

I did not see this in a compassionate understanding way, I made it about me. That she wasn’t including ME, that she was being a terrible friend to ME, that I was left out, poor ME. I do think it’s toxic to a friendship how she handled it, she could have communicated and straight up said she’s sorry but too self conscious to share pics of us together. Even if she did though, I probably wouldn’t have handled it well and still felt abandoned and excluded and angry. If I had a friend who did this today, I still would see it as toxic and cannot say for sure if it would put a strain on our friendship. It would look like she cares more about image than friendship. But I would understand to a point and not make it all about me. I wouldn’t passive aggressively post pictures of me in skinny jeans with low cut shirts and captions like “Thin girl with big boobs” just to get at her like I did back then. I would consciously try to feel compassion more than resentment even if I chose to distance or I would communicate and say how it affects me and our friendship and see if we could work it out or have to distance or even if I could just s u c k it up and still be close friends but with proper communication. I can see both sides, it has to be really challenging to have such low body image and be around women they see as much prettier. But it also s u c k s to be on the other side and not be included by someone supposed to be our friend all because of jealousy, image, and appearance. There is an adult way to handle it, and communication and boundaries are crucial. The problem by that point though was that I already stopped liking her ages ago, our friendship wasn’t worth salvaging. All these little things added up and culminated to me having no positive feelings for her at all, just wanting her to allay some lifelong insecurity, like when someone doesn’t love someone but loves the idea of them or their relationship with them.

She frequently told me that I was the “hott one” of the group and that she wished she had my body and my confidence. I would reassure her she was beautiful just the way she was. One Summer day at seventeen years old, a group of us girls were clothes shopping and trying on clothes in the changing room, we would all come out and show each other what the clothes looked like on us. There was this really skimpy outfit we all liked, made really tight and small, a one piece outfit with the back exposed and boobs showing a bit and cooch!e cutter shorts. I don’t completely remember it but something like that. She said this outfit won’t fit any of us so don’t even try. She said none of us had the body for it. We tried it anyway except for her. It couldn’t fit any of them in any size but did fit me, and I did in fact have the body for it(still do). I came out and showed them it on me. They all said it looked really good on me. But she said I looked like a s*ut and that people would get “the wrong idea” and that I shouldn’t buy it. So I put it back. After that, I noticed more subtle remarks she would say to/about me that were meant to get at me but could easily be brushed off as a joke or as her trying to “help” me. I always let them slide. She made remarks frequently that I look like a wh*re in my clothes and make-up (this worsened as we became adults) and that no wonder men flirt with me everywhere, that I seemed like I was “asking for it.”

Whenever we knew/met a man who liked me, she told me it’s only because I look like I easily put out. She constantly told me I should “cover up” and not post pictures with my full body showing. She claimed it was for my own good. She would also tell me she wished she could dress like me and not feel self conscious. One day she did wear tight revealing clothes, and her own mom told her she did not have the body for it and shouldn’t dress like that. It made her feel even more low about her body.

She made comments that my hair was ratty looking, that my nail polish was always cracked and I was in desperate need of a manicure… If I would get a manicure or fix my hair up or anything, she would make a remark like “Finally” or “I see you finally decided to fix yourself up…” Then follow up with something like “You know I’m only playing” or “Just saying. Our friendship is strong enough so I can be honest when it’s needed.” I totally agree that true friends should be able to be honest when necessary even if it’s not pleasant or is awkward, and I can totally take a real joke. But this wasn’t like that. It was intended to undermine my self confidence and make me self conscious or think I don’t look presentable to others. This may seem obvious like why still be her friend, but it was done in a subtle way thrown in with a bunch of “I love you so much like a sister, you’re my closest friend, I tell you everything more than anyone else…” Sometimes I would stop contacting her for a while when I was really ticked off, and she would send me a bunch of messages all day saying please don’t be mad at her. So I would write back that I wasn’t angry, just busy.

She would frequently host girls nights out, sleepovers, movie nights all kinds of stuff with girls we both knew and not tell me til it was over then act like she forgot. Just like with the Christmas card in high school. It carried into adulthood. Sometimes this would trigger depressive episodes in me. Her and her husband were big horror fans, like me. I saw a horror movie back then that is not very well known but really good. Don’t remember it now. I knew they would love it and sent them it in the mail as a surprise gift for their wedding anniversary. She sent me a thank you message, and we mentioned how we’ll get together and watch it even though I already saw it. We loved watching movies together and commenting on what we were watching throughout the movie. Next thing I’m getting messages about a girls movie night where the girls got together to watch the movie I bought her, and it was so fun. Without me. Rubbing it in how much fun they had and how much they loved it. There were a few occasions I bought them a movie or let them borrow mine (back when dvd’s were a thing) and they had movie night at their house watching those movies without me. I frequently mentioned that I would love to be part of their get togethers more often and was always told I would be invited to the next one. And wasn’t. I admit that this is something that still affects me now, emotionally. It can be difficult sometimes not to internalize it, particularly because I have had this happen at different stages of life with different friend groups, even as an almost middle aged adult. It’s not about me personally, just how people are, it’s unfortunately common, bullying, ghosting, breadcrumbing, exclusion, at all ages. But it can be easy to take personally. I’m not perfect, myself. I haven’t been the perfect friend. But I’m not someone who is generally toxic and don’t do anything that warrants this.

When I went to college, the other girls still saw each other frequently. We lived close enough that I could have easily met up with them. But she wouldn’t invite me then would call me and tell me all about the fun they were having together. She knew I had an insecurity about being excluded and stuff because it happened to me as a younger teenager by other girls (this is what triggered the initial onset of my depressive disorder). When I first went to college I had no new friends yet so it was important to me to keep in touch with her. She rarely called me or responded to my messages/phone calls to her. Eventually I got new friends who were actually friends, not fakes. But I still wanted her because she was my longest friend and the closest I had to a childhood friend, also I always wished I had a sister-like friend. Most of my new friends were men, which is still enough to fulfill my social desires/needs, I just wished I had a best girl too. I had women friends, just not exactly like that. I have had this insecurity about wanting a friend since we were kids. I thought that would make me more whole and mean I’m more loved. So even though I loved my newer friends and knew she wasn’t a real friend, she could fulfill something in me that they couldn’t. And my new friends all had childhood friends they still kept in touch with. I felt excluded like I wanted one too. I was the only one in our friend group who had no real friends outside that group. So I tried to force a friendship with her that just wasn’t.

Through the years, after high school, sometimes we would see each other frequently and sometimes not much at all. But we never lost contact completely. I was the one reaching out to her much more frequently, and she would say she was so glad to be back in touch after months or sometimes almost a year. She knew about my insecurity about feeling I need an old friend since we were young and would rub it in that her and the other girls we were friends with still see each other frequently since high school and are like a group of sisters. She knew this would just k!ll me inside. They were not in on this with her, she’s just like the one who kept the friendship group together. We were all more friends with her than each other, and most of the hang outs were hosted by her and her husband at their house. Her husband also had nothing to do with it. He was very quiet, meek, socially awkward, introverted, she “wore the pants” in the relationship, and he just went along with everything. I always knew me being excluded and all the remarks and insults and all were all her, not any of them. None of them saw it like I did. Sometimes they even asked me why I wasn’t at some of the friend gatherings. Or they would ask me if I was going to one coming up that I never even knew about and would tell them I wasn’t asked to go, and they would say “You never told Kim,” and she would say something like “oh I’m sorry, I forgot, of course you’re invited!”

I developed resentment for her through the years. It was building up all along, but I just ignored it. I wanted the image of a sister-like friendship since childhood/adolescence. Our friendship became even more passive aggressive on both our parts. We mostly kept in touch by e-mail and phone through the years, but eventually I decided to find her on social media and contact her after almost a year of not seeing/talking to each other except a phone call/hang out here and there. I sent her a message on FB saying something like remember me, we used to be friends. I was saying it in a passive aggressive way but in a way that could also come off as me being friendly and playful.

I remembered her years ago saying she needed to be needed by a man and friends. So I pretended to need her, pretended she was all I had, just because I wanted a girl friend since we were young. Even though I currently had true friends. I did not have a long-term friend or a sister-like friend and tried to force her to be both. Not “force” like control her, she went along with it, just tried to force something that just wasn’t real.

I acted like someone I wasn’t with her. I used language/words/cursing/phrases that I don’t naturally use and acted so clingy and needy just to keep her as my friend and impress her. I have many old conversations with her that a while ago I read through after not talking to her in years and throughout reading I would think “Da fuq did I write?, Da fuq did I just read?” 😆 I cannot believe how fake I was just to get someone I did not even like to like me. I trash talked all my true friends to her, trash talked my family, my coworkers back then (she did the same with hers), everyone I knew, just to make it look like she was all I had. I told her any problems I had and often exaggerated them to look needy. But at the same second I wanted her to be super jealous of me. So I also often would rub stuff in to try to make her jealous. When I would see her post about hating her body and wanting to lose weight, I would post pics of myself right after in a short tight dress or swimsuit. One night she posted that she ate too much and felt so bloated and ugly and was getting ready for bed, I told her she was so beautiful (I was faking the kindness and was secretly taking great satisfaction in her ordeal, I suspect she knew the truth, we knew what each other did), and then after she went to bed, I got all dolled up and posted a picture of me in a little black dress with stiletto heels so it would be the first thing she saw when she woke up in the morning, I knew her biggest insecurity was her body like she knew my biggest insecurity was not having a true long-term girl-friend). She did stuff like this to me too. She would frequently post about her group of girls who were like sisters and her childhood best friend she doesn’t know what she would do without and how often they all see each other. I knew them all and was rarely invited. One day I posted about an argument with my mom, and she posted about the amazing day she had hanging out with her mom. Another day I posted that I wished I had an IPhone but did not have the money. Next thing she was posting how much she loves her iphone and how she uses it all day to text her best girls, who also all had one, who are like sisters. So I took pics of myself in a bra and tight low pants and posted them. 😆 We knew exactly what each other was doing. One day I told her my closest friend other than her was on vacation and I was in a depressed lonely mood (this was true), and she said something like aww I’m always here for you, I love you so much like a sister. Then later that day all the girls were together for movie and game night all loving each other like sisters, and I wasn’t invited. So I asked my dad for his credit card to go shopping and posted something like “Going shopping with Daddy’s credit card” and then posted all pictures of me in my skimpy new clothes & heels for her to see. She commented on some of the pictures with her subtle insults saying my hair can use a comb or be careful because men will love those s*utty clothes. And next thing I had trolls (her using different accounts) calling me an ugly s*ut and stuff.

We would write statuses about each other but act like it wasn’t about each other, we both knew it was though. I would write about “this jealous b!tch who is so jealous she can’t see straight,” and she would write about this “stup!d stuck up b!tch who thinks she’s something,” or we would write about fake friends. Then we would ask each other “Is this about me?” Then our responses would be something like “Omg, no! It’s not about you! Omg, I love you like a sister, you’re the best friend I have…! How could you think it’s about you?! It’s just some girl at work.” 🤣

She also did creepy things online, making fake accounts and sending strange e-mails under different addresses, there was this thing back then to play a joke on people where it looks like a different e-mail address/phone number sent an e-mail/text, but for some reason the person’s real e-mail address/phone number would show up at the end, it made no sense since the point was to pretend someone else sent it. They never said that would happen. My sister tried to play a silly joke on me before, and I knew it was her because her real contact info showed up. My sister never knew that would happen. My sister and me would receive strange texts and e-mails with links to spam and viruses by an unknown number/e-mail address, but the friend’s real e-mail/phone number/name would show at the bottom, she never knew this would happen. I would also get strange messages by people online I’m sure were her. She would use names very similar to hers. I was always getting trolled and called a s*ut on my pictures by people who talked how she did, with names similar to hers. Sometimes she as herself would argue back with them saying “Stop talking to my friend like that!” Then ask me in person if I saw her defending me online. Lol She would even remember the names of the strange people trolling me when I wouldn’t even remember. One day in person, I said I have two new trolls now, and she automatically knew their names, both of which had the same/similar initials/names as her name. She also made an anonymous Twitter account to trash talk her family and friends. She used a fake name and told my sister what name she used. It was a name with her real initials. Just like the trolls on my account.

We would write some very messed up things to each other, she would write that she’s getting ready to cut herself with her razor blade, and I would write that I’m getting ready to drink bleach. We were messed up lol I admit it gives me a good laugh thinking back 😂

We had a falling out in the end and stopped communicating for good. I sent her the most vicious insults I possibly could come up with, drawing on her deepest insecurities and worst fears, including that her husband was going to leave her for a more beautiful woman (this was her biggest fear of all, she was obsessed with it, she told me she couldn’t stand summer because all the women were out in revealing clothes and she knew he saw).

I said something like get off your @$$ once in a while and take a walk to somewhere other than the fridge (she frequently complained that all she did was sit on her sofa all day and eat and get bigger and bigger)…and a bunch of other toxic stuff, it was mostly just regurgitation of her own criticism of herself. It’s a vicious thing for a woman to take another woman’s insecurities that she shares with her and throw it in her face later. This was very uncharacteristic of me and not something I have ever done again. We tried to drag each other down as low as we could take each other. And maybe one of us won. Maybe one of us was lower in the end than the other. Maybe one of us was sitting around lonely and depressed feeling like a loser who who has no real friends, a loser who always gets excluded because of being unworthy of sisterly love, and maybe one of us was sitting around self loathing feeling like an ugly hag whose husband is going to leave for another woman, a more beautiful woman. And maybe today, there are remnants of those insecurities lingering about, hovering in the distant corners of our minds, tucked away, just waiting to resurface at any given moment. Yay us, we succeeded. And what did we accomplish? What did that make us? A wonderful amazing person because one of us made the other feel like an unworthy friendless, loveless loser and one of us made the other feel like a hideous slob?

A rat is a rat is a rat.

I only did all this because of what she did first. But there is no justification. A better person wouldn’t have done what I did. A more evolved person would have proacted, would have communicated or distanced and set healthy boundaries, not reacted by sinking even lower. I held the philosophy “When she goes low, I go lower.” An emotionally healthy, emotionally intelligent, mature, well rounded, honest person would not have done that. A true safe person would have been true and safe even in that situation, not allow someone else’s actions to influence who they choose to be. My youth contributed but was no justification. Today, I am not that girl. Since then, I have had other friends who have done similar things to me, and I had the chance to react like I did back then. But I chose not to.

All the years of resentment that were building up all along that I kept bottled up exploded and overflowed. A while later she came back and tried to get back in touch, but I ignored her.

After cutting her off for good, my mental health became so much better. While it was going on, I did not realize the extent to which it was affecting me having her in my world, not just what she was doing but my reaction to it. It was unhealthy me pretending to be something I’m not, trying to always make her jealous, trying to always put on a show for her. The whole thing was just toxic. I began having less depressed moods and became happier overall after ending contact with her. She convinced most of our mutual friends to unfriend me also.

Every once in a while through the years, even now, something happens that really seems like her. Someone tries to hack my accounts or sends me weird messages. Stranger women who I can tell are fake write to me on all my pictures and stuff and friend request me. They’re all the same kind of women, conventionally beautiful, dress in revealing clothing, don’t have many FB friends or much content. I just have a sense that it’s her, using photos of other people, and know she did do stuff like that before. I’m surprised that she’s still playing games at nearly forty years old and with kids of her own now.

I think she really did love me, but her jealousy and mental health problems got in the way. I was only like that because of how she was to me first, but I think I was even more fake than her. I couldn’t stand her, just wanted the image of that friendship. I was even fake sometimes with other people if I knew she was watching, just so she would be impressed or whatever. I think she really wanted me as a friend but did not know how to show it. I was 20 something years old back then, still old enough to know better, but my youth influenced me to act that way.

It’s definitely not something I would do again. I could not imagine having that toxic relationship now or being that toxic to others and myself. Ten years of that nonsense. Wasn’t worth it. I’m embarrassed about how I acted.

I no longer have resentment for her and hope she’s doing well in life, but I wouldn’t be her friend again or respond if she ever messaged me. It was never a genuine friendship. It was built on insecurity and fakeness and neediness and clinginess. It wasn’t a friendship gone wrong but never one at all. Even if we are both all grown up now and much more mature and would never do that again, I have no interest in her. I just think that all is better left in the past.

The trouble with the rat race is that even if you win, you’re still a rat.

I hope you are having a beautiful day or night wherever in the world you are!

Xoxo Kim 💕