Couch 231: Live Long and Prosper!

I don't know about that. My ex had at least two friends cut him off. One I know what happened, but the other I can only surmise. I got cut off in the process, so guilt by association I guess. Still kind of hurt.

I also don't know that this is the case. Dr. T told me today that he'd received a very similar friendship-ending message from a male friend at one point.

I just read something about this. It said that men can sustain a friendship with infrequent contact, whereas women may tend to require more contact and to cut off a relationship if their demand is not fulfilled on their timetable.

Kitty-whipped! J/K. Still i find this scenario difficult to imagine. It would mean a man had to... care?

Ive had more than my share of friendships ended, with men and women. I finally figured out i am a pretty horrible person, or at least i was. I was out of control. I was my mother without her redeeming qualities - which is DANG scary, IMO. But now that i dont have her to a) fall back on b) influence me c) blame(? Nah, i can always blame her!), i am slowly becoming a more reliable friend.

Not so much a fiancee, though.

I have not had a friendship end that way. I have ended therapeutic relationships that way.

Well, P still hasn't responded to my email from yesterday which I ended by asking if I would be able to come back if I took a break. I don't know what to think. Maybe he hasn't read it. Maybe he has but I've annoyed him so he's putting off responding. Maybe he's read it but feels like I've set a trap for him and he needs to be careful with his response. Maybe he's thinking "good riddance". We're supposed to meet tomorrow and he usually emails with a time, although some times it's not until Sat. morning that he gets around to emailing me. I really hate this uncertainty. Maybe I was rash when I sent the email in the first place.

Uh... gotta be able to walk n run before you can crawl or roll over? see what i did there...

I don't know. I mean, yes, that definitely applies to my H with some of his friends. But I also have some friends that I only communicate with occasionally, yet we remain friends. One, who I've been friends with since middle school, we have sort of a running joke (pre-pandemic) about how we'd get together for dinner, then say we need to do that quarterly, then...not see each other for a year. But then when we'd meet up, it wasn't like much time had gone by. I last saw her on a Zoom call for my birthday in January, so I guess I have till this January to make plans! I should reach out to her though.

Ugh, I'm sorry. Maybe he wants to talk about it tomorrow? But still, he could respond and say "Can we talk about this tomorrow?"

I sincerely doubt he's thinking "good riddance."

Thanks, and yes I have. It hurts, especially if you never get any sort of closure, which I didn't.
Oh man, I hope it eases up or you go to urgent care.
Well, that is...weird.
Ugh. I'm sorry. Does he usually respond to your e-mails? How long does he usually take to respond?

I don't think I have had a friendship end that way. And I am perfectly fine seeing someone every few years. We get together, have a good time, and then don't see or talk to each other for a couple of years. My mother could do that as well. She had some friends she would see or talk to daily and some she would see every few years -she had a great time with both.

Somewhere between C and D.

Ah, but did he post it on Facebook?

Some kind of reverse voodoo? Sending blessings through an effigy of your car?

@stopdog:

Is there no legal principle or precedent that it cannot be a crime to "aid and abet" an action that is not itself a crime?

That or having my plate to give to the police for a safety check?

If ex-T had my plate to give to the cops when she terminated me... there probably would have been a police chase all the way back to my house.

Regarding ending friendships:

I have friends I talk to (almost) daily via texting or similar and other friends that I talk to as little as once a year or even less. I think I like both groups, it's just different relationships you form. For my best friend, I probably know his cat has died before anyone else, with the ones I talk to once a year I sometimes am not even sure whether they are in a relationship, what their job is again... but we share views, opinions, parts of education, we have plenty to talk about and enjoy each others company.

The same is true for my partner. Some friends he talks to a lot, others almost never. But both groups do get attention when wanted.

I think it also differs for the two groups how the friendships fall apart. For the one where I don't meet them a lot, with some people I don't feel like connecting and they don't seem to either and we never talk again, mostly because we have grown apart. But if they'd contact me, probably I'd hang out with them again at least to give it a try.
For the other group of friends, it's usually some kind of larger disagreement that ends the friendship. My partner has just had this happen recently with one of his best friends. Usually it seems to happen when there has been a big event in one parties life and this has changed their opinion on the friend. I've never had one of those people just ghost me, there's usually either a fight or a very clear statement.

Regarding the blocking behavior of the forum:
It'd be quite hard to implement a ban on all posts for a forum. It's a back and forth discussion, so if suddenly half the posts disappear because there's quotes or they are from users that blocked you, that can ruin the whole thread, it will be barely understandable if a conversation happens. To not show any threads where a user that blocked you posted would also be over the top.

What would be easy and probably useful to implement would be to disallow access to the profile of a user that blocked you. So you can't click on their name and go through all their posts. This would mean that the only way to see posts would be to actively search for them. That might be worth a suggestion?

That is the same as in real life, in my opinion. If I end a friendship with somebody and then constantly try to stay close to the former friend to hear what they say - maybe about me, maybe not - to their other friends, that sounds like pretty weird behavior to me... but if you happen to work together and you don't like somebody or you end a friendship, they will still be part of some of the conversations that you have at work.

He did not! Well, I assume. In part because Dr. T doesn't use Facebook.

I would have assumed for a safety check. I'd also feel weird giving a T my license plate number. They would already know my "work address" though (what they asked Kit for) because I work from home.

Losing a game is not a crime, but throwing a game is? So, no.

Had an obligation coffee date with my mom’s cousin this morning (she lives close to the town where I just moved) and of course now she wants me to come over and have dinner with her and her husband who is very vocal about a series of political beliefs I find pretty intolerable. Sigh. I’ve never been able to say ‘no’ to these kinds of family things but this one might have to be the first.

Hugs all around to those who need/want.

Urgent care too many people waiting, at least the one nearest me. I don't fancy sitting in there around coughing people for 2+ hours even though I'm fully vaccinated. I'm going to take my chances and wait for the ENT on Tuesday. At least, unless my ear starts feeling worse. It's ok right now laying it on a hot water bottle.

Artie - if you have a history of these, you might want to try an online dr. I use one for UTI's, that is thru my health insurance, so they have access to all my records.

Oh, and I got my first mindful souls subscription box today! I love everything in it. I hope future boxes are as good or better! My favorite piece is the amethyst pendant (on the right). I likely won't subscribe for very long, but it will be fun for while I'm working 10+ hours overtime per week anyway! (Looking like though the end of the year now, and then January is overtime anyway, so I'll probably just keep it through January.)

Oh, that looks like some really nice stuff! Thanks for sharing!