Arg, this is getting annoying. My closest friend and confidant has been stressing me out lately. A bit of background to start: the guy counts for 50% of the people in my city who actually know of my mood disorder, and he's the one who usually passes for the better listener. (Not that I like imposing tales of my BD on people.)

What's irking me is that he's been acting hyper-critical of people lately. Before it used to be he's just joke about bad drivers and cultural faux-pas with me, but now he's been pushing that to racist, fascist and sexist levels. To make matters worse, he now gets hyper-defensive if you try to challenge him on any of these points, usually beginning his arguments with: "in the animal kingdom..." or "according to natural selection...".

Then it hit a breaking point. This friend of mine has managed to lose about 50 lbs since the end of spring, and all our friends are nice and happy for him. That said, our one mutual buddy made the mistake of jokingly addressing him as 'fatty' the other week. We were in good company, and everyone knew that this buddy of ours just said it as a playful way of acknowledging my friend's hard work, but my friend apparently took it very personally. He claims that our buddy said it as a means of suppressing his Will and asserting dominance over him (as in, on an alpha-male level). From my perspective, this is a flat-out paranoid thing to think. The buddy of ours has only ever been a loyal friend, and there is no alpha-male/sexual dimension playing in to this at all. I never even see either of these guys chasing women.

Well, the way it's worked out, the buddy of ours has no clue he's even in conflict with my friend (he calls my friend regularly to get him out of the house, and my friend just brushes him off with an excuse), and my friend has forbidden me from trying to patch things up. (I've got ideas of how.) Before he's always trusted me to say the right things for him when he was feeling too introverted to pipe up. And even if he has always been opinionated, he's known me and my ethical convictions for 10 years, and I no point would I have ever laughed along with him at obese people just to stroke his ego.

It just doesn't make sense. He was such a timid, well-to-do guy before the last month. The only change that I can think of in his life is the loss of weight via diet.

Has anyone here experienced something to this effect? Any input is welcome.