BEL MOONEY: Why do friends ditch me and cut all ties after I have offered them help?

Dear Bell,

I wonder if you can help. I am young, confident and successful with a happy family life, a nice family and a lovely husband.

However, I keep choosing friends who have problems. I’m asked to give all the help I can – and then when I’ve reached my goal, I’m dumped.

It’s a pattern. One of my friends – an alcoholic – had affairs and did terrible things to her partner. The friendship had become all-encompassing when she threatened suicide.

I stayed with her and gave up so much of my time talking to her, picking her up from her house at her request (more than an hour from mine) letting her and her dogs stay at my house etc. I tried her to persuade her emotionally abusive partner, but she wouldn’t leave.

I finally told her that I was still there for her, but that I couldn’t hear her talk about him anymore because their cycle of toxic behavior had been going on for over a year.

After that conversation, she told me she no longer wanted to be my bridesmaid and we haven’t spoken since.

Another friend was written off ten days before her wedding. She would call daily and send pages of emails between the two of them. They would split up and then reunite. We spent time together, but then she withdrew. Once she didn’t need me anymore, there were no crosswords, I was just unfriended.

Another old friend called me every day to chat for ages. But I had stopped arranging a meeting because she always canceled at the last minute due to fear. I still tried my best to talk or text every day.

One day she scolded me. I asked why. She told me I wasn’t giving enough support to one of her problems. Now I seem to be in the same pattern with someone else.

These women say I’m like a sister and that my support means everything. They use me as an unpaid therapist. Why do they drop me when they feel better?

dina

It’s really sad to read that you feel let down by your girlfriends when you try your best to be supportive and helpful.

The “pattern” you describe is interesting and I wonder if you’ve always been attracted to people who seem vulnerable in different ways.

In your longer letter you reveal that you were bullied at school and (later) by some family members. You’re making the point that all this made you seem hard on the outside, though you’re soft on the inside.

Perhaps it also made you sensitive to the needs of those who remind you how vulnerable you once were.

After surviving the bullying to build a successful and happy life (which you describe with pride, joy and gratitude), you probably also feel an obligation to “give back” when you hear the misery of friends who seem less fortunate.

So what could go wrong?

First, I think you have to take on a rather harsh truth, which is that when people have exposed their innermost selves to a friend, they can sometimes regret it later.

When you receive their trust, you put yourself in a position of power, who can blame you if the mood changes. A friend might wake up one day and wonder, ‘Did I really tell her all that? Did I really give out my secrets? Oh, shudder. . . I wish she didn’t know so much about me.’

You can resent the person who made you grateful for a while, but then feel uncomfortably tied to them.

From that thought, it is a small step towards detachment, so that you no longer have to see the face that witnessed your bitter tears.

Then there is the question of how help is given.

You see, it’s easy for your generous time and lavish advice to fall into nearly omniscient instruction—and one more short step to the kind helper who feels irritation when advice isn’t followed.

I suspect something like this is going on. You cannot be blamed for this in any way. I want you to realize that it is possible for thoughtful comfort and support to strike the wrong note.

Unfortunately, the time may come when the friend-in-a-bad way thinks, “How can you understand that your life is so damn perfect?”

What is there to do?

Stop giving too much – not expecting too much in return. You can be supportive and generous without letting the boyfriend’s problems overwhelm your life. After all, you have a family of your own to take care of.

I feel so guilty about family quarrels

Dear Bell,

I divorced my ex-husband 15 years ago and remarried four years ago.

My children are adults with significant problems. My daughter has had two psychotic breakdowns and I had to take care of her and my granddaughter.

She now lives nearby after her husband couldn’t handle it. He won’t be moving to go with her, but will visit every week, which she says is fine. I act as the safety net.

My son is on the autistic spectrum and lives very close by in a flat that I pay for – my current husband couldn’t handle him. I am over 70 and work full time – including weekends to pay off an old tax debt.

I support my son who has no other means to support himself and he pays his way through a college course in the hope that he can get a job. He is a fantastic musician, but earns only a minimal amount of money.

I am consumed with guilt about my children. I divorced their father because I was exhausted from being the sole earner and caregiver for all three – he is also on the autistic spectrum.

We are still friendly and I keep an eye on him and help where necessary. But I’m plagued with the feeling that I should have kept the family together.

At that time it had become impossible for my son and ex-husband to be under the same roof.

So because I’m still taking care of everyone and my marriage is on the back burner, I’m unhappy, tired and exhausted and life seems like a daily grind. Is there any way I can improve things?

LORRAINE

You sound like a woman who has worked hard all her life, been a rock to her troubled family and is now utterly dog-tired, body, mind and soul. Yet the subject line of your email is simply “Fault.”

So despite doing so much for others for so many years, you still put all the blame for your exhaustion on a painful decision you made 15 years ago — that is, to end your first marriage.

You make everything your own fault. Isn’t this the story of countless women everywhere?

But let’s list the other adults in this very sad family story – the men who left you alone.

The people who may have helped you carry your burdens in various ways. Your first husband couldn’t bear the autistic son who needed him.

You say ‘it had become impossible for them to be under the same roof’, but whose fault was that? Your son must have been quite young; your husband was the adult – albeit with his own problem. Now you tell me that you look after him as well as the two grown children you share.

Then there was your daughter’s husband, who couldn’t handle her psychological problems. I sympathize unconditionally with those who find themselves in that situation and no one should underestimate the pressure of a caregiver.

Still, he was able to step back and visit once a week—while constantly on duty. He should do everything possible to support his wife and daughter.

Finally, your current husband, who has been around for four years, found it impossible to live with his stepson – and now he gives you little or no support.

He might say it’s you who put the marriage on the back burner, which is unfair to him.

It must be hard to maintain a marriage with a devoted mother whose emotional energy is absorbed by two grown children with serious needs.

The problem with taking care of everyone is that you can (almost) turn yourself into a martyr who deserves her fate. It is clear that you need care and free time of your own – and the most important thing is that you recognize that.

I admire you very much – but do not believe that you have to sacrifice your life and marriage for your son and daughter. Can’t you get away with your man for a few days to talk things through, remember why you loved each other in the first place, and face the future with combined strength?

And finally… My brush with a bitter, jealous troll

It’s been a few weeks since the nasty email came in, in response to my article about what meeting our late queen can mean for people, published two days after her death.

My reaction was not hurt but utter surprise that any random man would email such a vitriol for no reason at all.

Oh my, it was a beauty. Gillies W called my column ‘nagging’ and mocked my ‘beautiful existence’.

He grinned, “Your sweet, sweet, dead grandmother smiled at you, and no doubt your dead dog lay faithfully at your feet.”

Then continued: ‘You try to portray your foolish life as someone dancing among the rosebuds – who would have ever thought you were able to give advice to troubled people? You are clearly delusional.

“I think your last name is misspelled; it actually starts with the letter L, not M. Book a private therapy session with Max Pemberton – I have no doubt you can afford it.”

It doesn’t take a professional as experienced as our peerless Dr. Max to spot the envy in that last sentence, right?

But what about the needless resentment of referring to my beloved death? And could someone who has read my column (as well as other articles) for the past 15 years possibly be so biased/misguided/willfully blind that they can accuse me of trying to create an illusion of a perfect life? On the contrary.

My God! Your heart can break and people like Gillies W dance for joy and stomp it in the mud. How I feel for the real public figures (and I’m not) who deal with that sort of thing day in, day out.

Plus, we all know the damage it can do to those who have suddenly gained some sort of fame through reality TV (for example) and are ill-equipped for the appalling ferocity of social media trolls.

I just wonder what deep misfortune causes the need to hurt. How awful it must be to see such a pitifully bitter face in the mirror every day.