Quote:
Originally Posted by Sannah
This is everyday, normal self care. Everyone needs to do this through out their lives. It is no one else's responsibility to maintain your boundaries. No one else could possibly do this job for you. This is your job.
Why don't you want to do it?
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You are absolutely right, and this is where I struggle. For some reason, when someone tries to cross one of my boundaries, I cower. I get this yucky feeling in the pit of my stomach and a tightness in the middle of my chest, and I lock up. It's such an automatic reaction that I struggle with pushing through it in order to react in a healthy way (like, enforcing boundaries).
*sigh*
I have so much work to do.
I made it more clear to my friend about having to have a balance. She seems to understand, but I'm unsure of whether or not that means that she will respect my boundaries.
We have an event on Saturday that we haven't finished prepping for. I am paying for childcare while attending the event, so I only have a certain amount of time to be away. Each time I've suggested that we focus on prepping, other things happen. It's really her thing, not mine - I'm just a member willing to help out....but I expressed my concern about how little we've accomplished in preparing for the event.
She said that some members of the group were planning to come over on Friday night and we would do it then....I told her I was glad that people were getting together so that we could be more prepared. I told her that I wouldn't be there on Friday night. Since I spent all last weekend without my daughter - and will be spending much of this weekend without her - I am planning to spend quality time with her on Friday night.
She said, "Oh, you can bring her"....
I'm not.
She's mentioned that I'm her new BFF now, that she's suffering from MUE-withdrawal, that everybody enjoys me being around, and because I live around the corner, she's so excited about our friendship....
As much as I want to hang out with them, get stuff done for the event and enjoy myself, I cannot sacrifice my daughter. That was the mistake I made in the last close friendship I had. Bringing my daughter along was not a healthy thing for her.
I am going to her house for a couple hours today while my daughter is in school to see what we can accomplish. I'm going to work towards being direct with her, perhaps letting her in on some of my concerns and what I'm going through.
I'm just so torn about it all.