Hoovered by an Ex-Friend This Week

I got hoovered by this one ex-narc college friend last week.  When I woke up about the narcissistic abuse of my family, I woke up about the abuse of some other parties. I ended several previous "friendships". She was one who was a workaholic and choose her career over everything else. It was strange because we really had nothing in common anymore. Even value wise, she was opposite of me. This was a spiritual division too as well as a running from narcissist's division as well. I answered the phone by mistake.  I have Caller ID to screen calls but did not recognize the number right away.

What was interesting to me is I was not bound up in the usual ball of guilt, I just told her, it is best we both move on and I cannot trust her and got myself off the phone. She told me "But I miss you". She said some other weird stuff I won't go into here, but let me just say my worse suspicions are being shored up. Inside I thought, "You already had your chance, and second chance and third." 

Someone who will betray you around other people even strangers on Facebook, is someone you can never trust again.  Some relationships, they will treat you different one on one, instead of when other people are around. One red flag all ACONs should watch for, is if someone makes you feel devalued in front of other people run like hell! You probably have a narcissist on your hands.

 I realized she saw herself slumming with the likes of me. She comes out of an extremely wealthy family--her father is a multi-millionaire, and their connections have helped her in her career.  Just like my family, nepotism served them to great ends but it was interesting to notice who benefited and who did not.  Narcissists do not have bonds of love or true friendship with you. For years I would have told you I believed this person cared about me and I did her, while I was in the fog.

She betrayed me during some of the toughest times of my going no contact with my family and betrayed me over my adoption search. It is strange to me that she would find me so desperate that I would be go running back to her, it's been 18 months since I cut ties.

There's other immense trust issues as she became a flying monkey via proxy, seeming to defend my family who she only met once or twice when I was in college at every turn. I know the friendship died for this one reason to me, I went no contact with my narcissists and she has stayed in contact with a family she told me for years was abusive to her. I changed in ways she could never comprehend and in some of that change was ways I changed in what I would put up with. I also realized a lot of the vulnerability she showed me was completely feigned.

We met in college and were long distance for years. I actually had not seen her in person since 1993 and as time progressed I got a clue, she never was going to visit me even with the ability to do so, and I lacked the funds and health for the travel from my side.  There was one point where I said, we should see each other, it's been so long, "Come for a visit!" and she told me I should be able to Greyhound it for three days which I knew even one day was impossible. This reminded me of the time my brother told me, he would come visit if I sent him a thousand dollars. Normal people who do feel love and connection for one another, do want to see each other.  For some health, and money problems make travel impossible.  There are close internet friendships where people have never seen each other in person but this was a warning sign as well.

After I was away from my family, I realized how much she made me feel like THEY DID.

We talked on the phone several times a week for years, pouring out troubles and talking about life to each other. It is strange to me sometimes that I have such a new view of since I spent years talking about personal things with this ex-friend but there were red flags long ago. Sometimes she would call me 8 times in a day if she was upset or needed help with something. She seemed to think because I was disabled, I was supposed to serve as the "on call" counselor.

Now I can make the mistake of talking about too many problems to friends so I was very forgiving of this, but in the last few years, I was getting physically worn out and found myself sometimes ignoring the phone. As I got older and sicker, she seemed to minimize my health problems and would tell me she had horrific health problems but I always came to this point, "Well if you can still work, you're not that bad off."

She would complain and talk about her job. I felt weird because I hadn't worked in years and she was skyrocketing with promotion after promotion even though she told me on the phone everyday she was about to be fired. I could not relate to her work problems.  Her words and attitudes were of feigned vulnerability and bosses ready to strike her down while her actions and results were of a hard-bitten careerist and one who never failed to get a promotion or a dollar.

Looking back I find it strange she confided things in me but I did not know yet about the concept of narcissistic supply. I remember telling her there are more things to life then just work and jobs more then a few times. Today I seek to avoid workaholics, the type of life I have and what I value does not match theirs.  I do believe my family set me up to seek after cold success oriented people, after all success was everything to my family even though their worlds definitely did not mesh with a woman who has been disabled for 20 years.

I no longer wanted to take crumbs from people who really did not care about me. It did hurt a lot facing facts, that with my family, they never truly loved or cared about me. Facing this fact, took some years of processing. I still have asked "Why?"

I do see my family and the treatment I was trained to take, as the reason I was in this friendship I ended too. In other words, my mother and her co-narcissists set me up for a negative pseudo friendship where I was just worthy to be there, for someone who barely noticed my real existence. That's why I never got any visits. That's why the friendship was false, I was just the "Lazy Boy" in the corner as the above meme states. So when she called me, I felt that resignation. Discovering the truth about this friendship was very difficult. Sometimes I have asked myself, "How was I so blind?" You think even of the lost years spent on families who don't love or care about you but it can feel the same of false friends too.