I feel like lately I have just been using people up and spitting them out, even unintentionally. But I also feel like, I don't know, maybe I'm being hard on myself and I'm just blaming myself for everything, as usual, and having been going through a really tough time lately.

About a year ago, my dad helped me move from where I lived out of state to the state he lives, in fact just a few blocks away. He bought a condo that I could rent from him, and said that one day the condo would be mine (he meant like through his will). I was on disability at the time. Well, my father and I had a falling out, without going into too many details, it was because I wouldn't let him control every aspect of my life while he tried to FORCE me to get well -- getting better from depression and PTSD, and SI'ing at the time...not something you can force, but he thought he could.

So I moved out of his condo into another rental. And he was pissed that I continued to rent a condo in the same complex (which was really not his business), and he cut me off. I tried many times to explain to him my illness and that I didn't want things to be this way, but he refused to listen. So there was one bridge burned, and a major one. A family member, a parent, who will no longer be there for their child, who is going through the toughest time of their life.

So then, I ended up going into a lawsuit about my service dog, which I ultimately won and got a settlement. But part of the settlement was that I had to move out of my condo. I cleaned the place spic and span, but unfortunately there were a couple of damages, that I asked my landlord to take out of my deposit. He was pretty pissed at this at the time, thinking that I should have paid to have the damages fixed myself...but to be honest, I knew this guy had already spent my deposit and that I would never get it back, which is why I asked him to use my deposit to fix the damages. Otherwise I'd be out the money to fix the damages and never see my deposit because he'd never have it to pay back to me. We were on the outs for a while but now when I see him, because I'm still friends with my neighbors who live there, he's very sweet and doesn't complain and seems to be over it. I felt like maybe I had burned that bridge, but he's kind of crazy himself, with untreated bipolar and other anxiety issues that really make him hard to deal with when he goes on the rampage. So maybe that's not really a burned bridge. He's a user and he used me, and I just wouldn't let him use me even more, and he was upset with me for a time, but we seem to be cool now. He always gives me a kiss when he sees me.

The next place I moved to I only stayed a few months because I got a job in another city and had to move almost right after signing the lease! Bummer! Lol, but I hired some guys to help me move and I have done really right by them. They're friends but I knew they were strapped for cash so I said I'd pay them, and they showed up and were happy to help for the cash. They helped me move in and move out when I had to move again.

So anyways on to the next bridge burned...the ex-roommate situation that I most recently posted about, in which I paid a substantial sum to rent a room, got treated like ****, and ended up moving out mid month even though I had paid rent through the end of the month. It was a temporary situation, and my friend was really helping me out so I could start my new job in the new town while I got out from under the old apartment in old city and found a new place in new city. Well, I figured out after maybe a month and a half that I could have rented a small efficiency for cheaper and temporarily and not had to deal with ***** roommate, but I digress. She was cold and rude to me from the beginning. She complained, after I moved, that she "had done nothing but clean up after me for three months" which is not true at all. I know that I did not help with chores as much as I should have, but I largely felt like a guest in that place and her cold demeanor and *****y attitude made me feel afraid from asking what she needed me to do, because she would always come back with some passive aggressive insult. Anyways, I wrote at some length about that in another thread, but my point is I feel like I had a good friend in a new city (although I grew up in this city and I have lots of high school friends and family here) that I burned a bridge with because what, I didn't vacuum enough? I don't know, that seems like ******** to me, but nevertheless I lost a friend, and really multiple new friends I had made through her, basically a friend group subset, because the situation didn't work out. I don't know how I'm supposed to make that situation right.

With my dad, there's not much I can do. He's part of the reason I have PTSD and depression anyways, from the childhood abuse and neglect. His treatment of me when he tried to "help" me ended up being a continuation of that abuse. I have tried to reconnect with him since going back to work, and I think, maybe, we're slowly on the way to healing. Except that, even with healing, I have realized I can never have the relationship I would like from him because he's just, well, an asshole. So yeah, my dad is an asshole and it's just something I have to deal with.

My old landlord...well, I think he's over the fact that he didn't get to use me and basically steal from me more than he already did, lol. He's always very happy to see me, and gives me a kiss. And I feel like if he ever needed help moving or whatever that, as a friend, I'd be there for him, because he was there for me. I don't feel like it's a burned bridge but it was a disagreement that's old and we're both over it.

My friend/ex-roommie: yeah, bridge burned to a crisp. But I also don't feel like I was the one who did all the burning. When she started getting pissed that I wasn't helping out more, the only thing I knew was that she was acting cold and rude towards me. She didn't ask for help. When I first moved in, she had specifically said that she vacuums once a week and didn't need any help doing that. After I'd been there a couple of weeks she emailed me with a few items that she'd like help with, which I tried to keep an eye on. But if it wasn't enough, shouldn't she have just said, I need you to do more. You aren't doing this enough? If she's the one having the problem, then isn't it her responsibility to speak up and say so in way that's not passive aggressive and constructive? So I feel like she's the one who burned the bridge, not me. I have said numerous times that just because we didn't work out as roommates, and have different lifestyle habits, does not mean that we can't still enjoy each other's friendship, but she does not think this way.

Have I just been using people up and spitting them out? Logically, I don't feel like this is true. Logically, I feel like I have been though the toughest year of my life and what has shown to me is that some people have been understanding and tried to help and some people have decided they can't understand or won't understand or won't acknowledge what I'm going through and have just bailed. And I know lots of people have been through this. Emotionally, I feel like everything is my fault and if I could have only done this or done that, then my father would love me, my friend would still like me, etc. But I also know, logically, that I can't make people like me or love me. And I know that doing this or that was impossible and may still be impossible for me because of my level of depression and ptsd and agoraphobia.

On one hand I feel like this awful person who did an awful thing to my father and my friend. On the other hand, I feel like a person who has been to hell and back and had a father and friend who both failed to understand the magnitude of my illnesses and wanted me to act like a totally healthy person when I could not, and this was just not right of them.

I don't know. I could use some encouragement.

Seesaw