[jsr76]

I have this friend,whom I shall call "D". I met D several years ago. In that time,we had our ups and downs as friends sometimes do. She was always such a bright,positive,outgoing person. Lately though,her attitude has changed. It's like everything is hopeless,nothing is good enough. I don't know if she has undiagnosed emotional/mental problems or what,but talking to her now is just such a draining experience. I can not think of one conversation she and I have had over the last month that did not involve at least one instance of "I hate my life. I wish I was dead. There's no point in living,"

As previously stated,D and I have been friends several years. During that time at various intervals,we toyed with the idea of maybe being...more than friends,let's say. But for whatever reason,it just never seemed to work out. It would always get to a point where either she would push me away or vice versa. Finally,I just decided no more. I can't do this. As friends we are great,but anything else is not in the cards.

One night in October,D and I were talking. She starts telling me that her landlord is thinking about converting all his properties into multi-unit apartments or something to that effect. Her lease was up and he said she could stay if she needed to,but the rent would be higher the next time around. Right now,she's not in the best shape financially so that wasn't going to happen. Then she starts in with this stuff about wishing I would come stay with her,this,that and the other,but I could tell she meant something different. I didn't fall into the trap. I reminded her what happened every time we tried that and then OMG,it was like the biggest drama bomb going off.

Apparently,D feels like I am the be-all,end-all of men. Nobody will ever be as good as I am,is how she puts it. I don't know what I did to encourage that feeling in her,but I'm sorry I ever did. For the next three hours all I got to hear about was her broken heart,how lonely and miserable she was,how tired she was of trying to be strong. As bad as all that sounds,it got worse,ladies and gentleman. D goes on to tell me in April she is planning to move back to Florida. Not by herself,her sister-in-law is going too. But when she gets there,D has no one she can stay with except a miserable,two-bit,ex-con,POS ex-husband. And she says she's planning to have him kill her so she won't have to go on living and in pain. Her exact words were,"it's not suicide if it's at someone else's hand," That's a pretty dark thing to say,coming from someone who claims to be a Christian.

From what I was told about her ex,he's on parole after doing 35 months for drug convictions and assault;the assault charge came after he beat his last wife with the butt of a gun when he caught her messing around. It would be nothing for him to go back,D told me. So now her plan is to sleep with somebody she knows he will get really PO'd about and then he will beat her until she doesn't recover and that will be the end of her misery.

Nobody knows about this except me. She hasn't told her family,other friends,no one. Why she feels this should be my burden to deal with I don't know. I tried talking her out of it,but nothing I said would change her mind. I tried contacting the police where she lives (I live in one state,she lives in another) to see about a welfare check or something like that,but for all I know they just ignored me.

Things were finally turning around in my life. I was doing okay financially,I had met someone and was trying to make that happen,my health was doing okay. Then this happened and the whole rug was pulled out from under me. It's been this way ever since. I even suggested maybe she should talk with someone like a therapist,counselor,psychiatrist,etc. but she won't. I just feel like I'm stuck between a rock and a hard place. I don't want her to just give up on life,but I also have a chance to get my life where I want it. If I cave and go to D,I'd be unhappy and throwing away everything I'm working towards. If I continue to live my life where I am,she's going to go ahead with this crazy plan of hers.

[sideblinded]

It is admirable that you do still care about her welfare but it sounds like to me that you would be better off going your own direction as you cannot control her actions or stop her from moving where she is going to move. As far as her ex killing her, that is speculation and if I were you I would try to move on and take good care of your own self and stay positive if you can. This sounds like a guilt trip being put on you and you deserve better. You tried to help from a different state. You really don't know if what she says is true so please be easy on yourself and please don't feel responsible for her actions as you did not cause her to act the way she is or will act. Blessings and take care.

[Bill3]

Search emotional blackmail.

[JJBX]

Jeez, I am so sorry that you are having these issues with your friend. To me, this sounds like what someone with Borderline Personality Disorder would do. Being rejected is hard, and it sounds like she is using emotional blackmail to force you into a romantic love scenario. To be honest though, the timing of her bringing uo a relationship seems to imply that she really just wanted to use you as a way of getting out of her own financial troubles. You were smart not to take that bait.

It is hard and maybe you should tell someone in her family about what she said to you. My gut instinct is to not take it seriously as it just sounds to me like emotional blackmail, but I think her family would know her much better and would have a little more sway in convincing her to go to therapy or something. It's really tough because I honestly don't know what you should do in this case. I think the only thing that you could do is tell her family and hope for the best. I thin encouraging her to see a therapist is probably as much as you can do outside of that.

[jsr76]

Thanks,sideblinded. I think so too. She's always telling me I need to get out more. But when I do,when I tell her about meeting people socially then somehow,I'm the bad guy. Not sure about the borderline personality thing,JJBX,but it could be possible. One of the last conversations I had with her,she was telling me about her son throwing a fit because of some missing MP3 player. All I said was,"I guess because I've grown up I don't feel the need for every electronic doo-dad that comes out," Then she responds with this line of horse plop about me growing up but not growing wiser,how I only go after girls who don't love me for me. I thought,"Okay. Where did that just come from?" Then she jumps to something else totally unrelated. She starts telling me about why she became a Christian. She asked me if I knew what the book of Enoch was. I didn't really,except that it was omitted from every printing of the bible in history. She lays down this story about seeing pieces of it and how some guy supposedly found it and took pictures of it,but when he tried to tell others they basically ridiculed him and he eventually died in an auto accident that may not have been an accident. So,yeah. That night was a real trip.

She has had a hard life,I will admit. Things nobody should have to go through. Physical and verbal abuse from an early age,sexually assaulted at one point in her life,a couple of broken marriages. But I've known people who went through the same and didn't even come close to saying half the stuff she does. It's like every day is some new page out of a crazy,mixed up storybook.