Sometimes I wonder if I'm being hypocritical towards this friend of mine. We used to be quite close, if not the best of friends. It all started some years ago in uni days and in most cases, it's about a guy. Ok, it's not the conventional "fighting over a man" thing, but it's more about me feeling being cheated by her.
How shall I tell this story? Basically, I fell in love with this guy. She became sort of like someone that I confided in about this (for almost half a year) and she admitted she sometimes did try to bring us together. Then one fine day, she confessed to me that she also liked the person and each time she tried to "create opportunities" for us or heard me talk about him, she felt painful. What is this!? Did she expect me to be grateful, to feel guilty or something? I was totally stunned. What hurt me most was this was my best friend (then) and she lied to me, or rather hid from me. I don't mind if she told me she liked him too from the beginning (he was indeed quite attractive...think quite a no. of gals liked him), probably we might both laugh about it, discuss it like sisters or something and I'll probably not talk so much about him too, but she had to hide it from me & then throw this bomb at me. Was this a tactic or something? And what's more, she told her mum about all these. Yah, she told me that she told her mum everything and about me too? About this common interest in a guy too? Now I wonder what her mum thinks of me...did she see me as the one who was "obstructing" her daughter or gloating now? Her mother quite pamper her as she's the only child. I don't know. I lost my trust in this friend. I did not want to confide in her anymore.
It took me a while to start to 'forgive' her, a few months to get over the shock & confusion first. This was when I told GOD that I would take one semester of celibacy when I would focus on Him alone & all other things will have to wait. It was also a time which I decided to let go of this guy becoz I knew it was not healthy...I believed it was becoming a bondage to me. If GOD intended him to be with me, he will but if not, I should let it go. When I told GOD this, I felt the blade severe this bondage.
So as things moved on, in that semester, there was 1 day that I called her, I think was to meet her for lunch or something. We were staying in the hostel then & I've already slowly recovered from that shock & decided to be good friends with her...after all, I thought that friends are more impt. Somehow, she sounded weird to me & strangely I seemed to have the sixth sense that he was there with her. She sounded hesistant & told me she would call me later. I knew at that moment that they were together (they really only just got together). (Hmm...got powerful 6th sense...maybe GOD was purposely making me call at that time) Why did she need to hide from me...again! Later, when she called, I asked her, was he there just now, so that she had to confess.
Finally, 1 day, at the end of my celibacy, I decided it was time to "tan pan" with her, to tell her all about this. Basically, I told her how I felt from that time and that she was forgiven, but that the matter was not forgotten. How do I forget betrayal? Unless I lost my memory; these are events. Will she continue to be so?
I have no more feelings for the guy now (got over it after a year) and they are married now anyway. He's totally out of the picture. But from that fateful day of her "confession", I knew something was lost. There will always be something between us (a mistrust?) and I won't be able to confide in her fully ever again. It made me decide not to trust anyone too fully next time, to not confide so easily in others. Only GOD is the best confidante.
About being hypocritical, I sometimes wonder if I'm forcing myself to remind myself that I've forgiven her. I wonder too if I've really accepted her as being my good friend still (I admit that she will never be a best friend again). I have this conflict within me on whether I've truly forgiven her or not, or is it like The Corrs' song Forgiven, not Forgotten. Am I putting on an act in front of her & others? Am I so superficial, so hypocritical? I still feel awkward sometimes and I remember all these, but when I do, I do not know if it still hurts or am I already numbed. I wonder if she knows.
Fortunately, I still have a friend now whom I know I can trust. She is my only best friend. To be fair, I also have some other good friends that are reliable. I thank GOD for them.
9 years ago
Ok I don't know why blogs' comments are getting spammed!!
ReplyDeleteI guess in life, we meet with all sorts of pple. Somehow as we grow up, and a lot of pple have walked into our lives, a lot of times the ones we trust/love the most are ironically, the ones who hurt us the most. I try to tell myself that this is what life is about, and not let it all get to me. I hate that I have to be the one to suffer the silence and pretend everything is ok when I am crying inside from the hurt that these pple have inflicted on me because I can only cry to myself and still put up a smiley front to everyone else because that is what they expect from me. This is what I tell myself, so I try not to think about it so much. It's definitely hard.. but it is worth a try.
Maybe at some point, my heart dies. Maybe after too much pain, the nerve endings will numb and there will be no more pain.
Yah, why got spam...deleted it.
ReplyDeleteWell, I guess they can only hurt us when they are close to us. If they don't matter, whatever they do won't affect us.
I thought that as I've dealt with it & confronted it, I would be free from it totally. I don't "cry" over it now (I believe I've let it go), but it's just that there is a mistrust in her or even in people now (the "once bitten, twice shy" theory). I guess it's not meant to be forgotten as it's one of life's lessons & I "grew" a bit from it whether in life's experience or spiritually. It's only that these memories come back from time to time (or whenever I see her) & I ask myself questions & try to re-assess our friendship each time.
I ask myself if I'm forcing myself to remain good friends with her or appear to be (hypocrisy), or have I "downgraded" her to be my good friend of least importance (which I think it probably is as I have to be in contact with her due to church stuff), or simply just a friend whom I've known for quite long and well and who is someone whom I have a "professional" relationship with.
I guess I was angry/hurt not so much becoz she hid the fact from me, but becoz in my perspective, she sort of like "played" the "sacrificial" role to me secretly, then suddenly revealed it, which seemed like she was trying to make me feel guilty, which probably wasn't (I hope) what she wanted to do, but it just felt this way...I know she can be tactless sometimes.
To(wards) CO
ReplyDeleteGone are the days,
of trust forged true,
For from the beginning,
there was no truth.
Was it a ploy
or plain stupidity?
Was it tactlessness
or just her nature?
I do not know,
nor do I care to know,
A broken trust
that hath turned filth.