Anxiety over Past Action

LegacyUser

This thread will probably read like it is about a group of 16 year old girls but we are all actually in our early twenties...

Anyway, I have/had two friends, let's call them Sarah and Molly. Sarah and Molly were friends for years before I got to know them several years ago. Sarah and I ended up going to the same college, but different courses/years so we really barely saw each other, only occasionally. We weren't that good of friends, we were both more so friends with Molly but would sometimes meet up, chats on the phone, nights out etc.

Sarah and Molly began having disagreements several months ago. My friend Molly is probably the most loyal and devoted friend you could ask for, but like all people, she has her flaws. These flaws used to grate on Sarah, such as being late, sometimes unconsciously being inconsiderate etc so Sarah would rant about Molly to me. Sarah was also a bit jealous of Molly because Molly is quite good looking.

Anyway, Sarah went through a period of, what I can only describe, as hating Molly. She even got drunk one night and told Molly's cousin that she thinks she hates Molly. She would complain a lot about her to me.

So I hadn't spent much time with Molly until she came to visit our county for Sarah's birthday. She bent over backwards for Sarah, bought her an amazing gift, bought her drink for her, did her make up for her birthday. I was a bit taken aback, Sarah had complained so much about her and made Molly feel so bad about herself that she was giving so much to Sarah, to little appreciation.

I got pretty pissed off seeing what truly a good friend Molly was being to the ungrateful Sarah so when the drinks started flowing I told Molly the things sarah had been saying about her to myself. Of course, in hindsight I know now I should have talked to Sarah about it myself, told her that I saw that Molly is being a good friend and it is her own jealousy skewering things. I know Molly has her flaws but Sarah was exaggerating things because of her feelings, rather than Molly's actions.

Molly waited until the next day and confronted Sarah. Sarah admitted she had been terrible, spent months grovelling and they are now friends again.

Since the whole incident has happened I think about it every day, throughout the day. I have slight anxiety problems and this is petrol to the fire... I know I shouldn't have told Molly the way I did, I should have talked to Sarah after witnessing what a good friend Molly actually is. I know I handled the whole thing terribly.

Sarah isn't friends with me anymore, she hates me. Molly says she is glad I told her because she was made feel like she was a terrible person for so long by Sarah but I really feel terrible. I feel so anxious, I feel like I am a really bad person for just blurting something like this out.

I haven't talked to Sarah since really, it went from her telling me that she feels so guilty about everything, to saying that I over stepped the mark.

I don't know anymore. I don't know what to do but I can't handle this anxiety and guilt every day. It has been several months.

Flippyfloppy

I'd wager that you haven't spoken to anyone about this yet? It's good to talk, have you got other friends or family members you can chat to about this? If your anxiety is really bad you could consider hooking up with your college counsellor for a session or two, it will be completely confidential.

I really don't think you did anything wrong. You were just annoyed and rightfully so. It could have ended worse, the whole trio may have broken up. You're still friends with the nice one , and the other one doesn't sound worth your time. As for whether you handled it correctly, sure, you could have spoken to the bitchy one first, but she sounds like the type who would have covered her tracks in case ie made out that you were ranting about Molly just in case you ever said anything.

Have you got other friends apart from these girls?

jopax

I think you just need to forgive yourself and stop beating yourself up.
You done what you thought was right at the time.
You cannot control or change what other people do or think.
Use this as a lesson about the dynamics of peoples relationships, maybe don't open yourself up anymore even if its well intentioned.
Try to expand your circle of friends and with time this episode in your life will fade.

Rubberchikken

This Sarah doesn't sound like too much of a loss. Yeah you could have handled things better, but what happened happened, and tbh you should just move on.
For your own sake try to expand your friendship circle.

Good luck

thefeatheredcat

Sounds like Sarah was using you a bit as a sound board to mouth off every matter of disagreement she had with Molly, a mutual friend and mutual topic of conversation between you and Sarah.

From my view, I think you did those girls a favour... they are friends now, even if they fell out for a while, but they sorted things out. They may have even discussed aspects of their friendship that had never been discussed and you gave them that opportunity... chances are they would have fallen out anyway because both of them would have held in how they felt for so long - Sarah in particular - that it would have come tumbling out anyway and perhaps a bigger, worse falling out that would have resulted in never being friends again and both not wanting to make a move at fixing the friendship. It's possible given your ages that the friendship between Sarah and Molly just would have either petered out naturally as each person changing or just might have lost touch. Another plus is that you all will have gained experience from this in dealing with friendships and how to cope with things better if confronted with similar situations again.

I don't see what you should feel guilty about because I think you have done them a favour and all ended up well, but I actually feel more worried about you in that you were kind of used as a go-between rather than Sarah dealing with her issues with Molly directly which is what she should have done.... the way I see it Sarah should be feeling guilty about putting you in that position in the first place. And if she has gone from feeling guilty to saying you were in the wrong and had over stepped the mark, then that is BS because she is just trying to shift guilt and blame she feels about it from herself onto you. You are Molly's friend too, and I probably would have felt that she had a right to know how her name was being made mud to anything with ears and time to listen to it. At this stage it is irrelevant that you told Molly what Sarah had said, because Sarah could also have been mouthing off about Molly to other people, friends of hers in college who could also have said the same things to Molly on meeting her and taken aback too that after all the things she had said, Molly turned out not to be the monster as described. However Sarah is assigning you the blame, when really she already knows she is the one to blame because it was her behaviour in the first place that created the situation and put someone else in a difficult position where clearly you felt Molly was undeserving of the bashing she was being given.

I think you need to realise that the guilt you are feeling is not your guilt, the blame you feel is not yours either. In your mind you need to hand back that guilt and blame back to Sarah. Forgive yourself for your role, dissolve the guilt and blame you feel and don't feel angry at what happened at Sarah or Molly, at yourself because it will do nothing but make you feel worse.

Have you had counselling for your anxieties in general, and have you spoken to a professional in dealing with what you are feeling? If not, then perhaps you should consider direct help with dealing with anxiety before it gets further out on control, from obsessive thinking on one issue, to more drastic negative behaviours.

LegacyUser

Thank you everyone for your replies. It is so heartwarming to think that people that don't even know me would take time out of their day to send back replies. I really, really appreciate it.

Since reading your replies I feel like a weight has lifted! I am someone who feels guilty about things very easily but you're right, Sally created the situation in the first place by saying those things and though I blurted it out in a hasty/drunken fashion, the end results are that they are better friends now.

I really dislike the feeling of having someone hate me though. Should I ever try contact Sally again? I just feel like it would be so awkward to see her around. We do live in different counties now but I hate the fact that I have someone disliking me so much and thinking that I am completely and utterly in the wrong. Should I just leave it? I know we weren't the closest friends in the world beforehand but I don't like having bad relations with someone...

I was thinking of maybe showing her this thread? But I don't know...

The Princess Bride

sosososoanxious wrote: »

We weren't that good of friends, we were both more so friends with Molly but would sometimes meet up, chats on the phone, nights out etc.

Sarah isn't friends with me anymore, she hates me. .......
It has been several months.

Nothing you can do or say will make people like or dislike you-that is a given in life.
Just be you and be true to you- stay loyal to the friends who deserve your friendship.

I'd imagine that most people know a "Sarah"- she's the personwho bad mouths X to you and probably badmouths you to X - and likewise with other people too.
I think you've had a lucky escape with her.
She sounds like hard work, tbh-everybody deserves genuinely nice friends-not moany, two faced ones.

You say you weren't that close anyway?
Plus, if you live in different counties, chances are, you'll not see her again-certainly not often anyway.
People like her usually burn their bridges with a lot of folk as the years go by.
Smile and try to move on-you deserve better friends.

Redser87

I feel for you OP, it's horrible to have something like that nagging at you. Forgive the armchair diagnosis, but it sounds to me like what you really want is closure, rather than actually getting Sarah to like you (again). Unfortunately, I find it unlikely that Sarah herself is going to provide that. You know your own know best, but I feel that showing her this thread could open a whole new can of worms - which you would then need closure for!! We will all come across a Sarah at some point in our lives, and if you can learn one thing from this, maybe make it that others will not always provide us with what we need in a situation, and we have to gather the strength and courage from within ourselves to provide it to ourselves.
I sound like a self-help book but seriously, do yourself the favour of moving on and making new, better friends.

thefeatheredcat

She probably doesn't hate you as much as you would think and convince yourself of.

I think you should just leave it. If you did try and contact her, she might not reply. And you might feel like you have not got your point across or have it acknowledged in any way that gives you assurances that she doesn't hate you, doesn't dislike you and that you're no longer at odds with her. That could all further make you even more anxious if she makes a decision to ignore communication from you and re-enforce the idea that she hates you and make you feel powerless in changing her mind about you in anything you do and make you feel even worse over all about the entire situation. And if she did respond to you, it may or may not be a positive response. I think you should also ask yourself: if the situation was reversed that Sarah blurted out something to Molly that was told in confidence (not necessarily bitchy remarks, but something that you wanted kept between ye), you know yourself you probably would forgive and forget, but the question is, would you see Sarah wearing her guilt, beating herself up over it long after the situation has been resolved, going to lengths to contact you to make sure you don't think the worst of her? I would at a guess say, probably not.

What you can do is focus instead on dealing with your anxieties, and dealing with the guilt you feel and learning to have better control over your guilt rather than letting guilt control you and behaviour (such as overthinking an incident to an obsession) in allowing yourself to understand that there are situations where you may not always be the person to blame and the one to feel guilt over them. I would also think that you should deal with feeling of being at odds with people, it's ok to not be liked by everyone and some people will just dislike you for no particular reason and accepting that you can't control or influence people liking/disliking/hating you, and to understand that some situations may make you feel worthy of being hated, that you project your feeling of deserving of being hated as being gospel truth of another person's perception of you, when they may not have such a strong feeling about you as hate, but rather indifference.