Okay - so for some background (and its kind of a long story so sorry)
I have been friends with this guy (referred to as L) since Sophomore year in college (2001). I met him through a girlfriend of his (now ex) and after a brief period of me thinking we were going to date, we remained friends. Through the years we've been close - when I graduated and moved back to NJ I traveled every other weekend to hang with him and my other guy friends and when I moved to MD, I moved in with him.
Now, he's a very manipulative person. My therapist best friend classifies him as having narcissistic personality disorder. He just likes to manipulate people to amuse himself, whether its getting girls to take off their shirts, or whatever (and yeah, that happened to me). He also cheated on his girlfriend with me for a spell, but only my close girl friends know that - none of the guys do.
Due to some issues, we let his sister live with us for free - she paid utilities, but we were told she couldn't afford rent. I then found out she was making $400/day in tips (which is what her rent would be - only $400)- when we approached him about her paying - the answer was no, she had other priorities - this was okay b/c there was an end to her staying with us - August 1st. August 1st came and went and she wouldn't move out (didn't realize she had to, and had no where else to go and wouldn't move back with her grandma). August 19th my mom died. It was unexpected (for me) and just....sucked...He didn't come to the funeral. He went to a bar crawl with his girlfriend in Delaware. He had known my parents for 7 years and they had been very good to him - my dad got him a job when he needed it, and my mom was always very welcoming to him when he stayed at our house.
After the funeral, etc and I got home - we had a house meeting about renewing the lease. We asked everyone if they wanted to renew. We said yes. We ALL said yes. A few days after the meeting, I found out from other friends that he had been looking for a place for months and had lied to use - he was moving out and was leaving us in the lurch without much notice to find another roommate or pay penalties for moving out of our house.
He moved out in October and we've barely spoken to him since. I mean I've seen him 2 times since he's moved out - the first time to turn in the key, second time he came out in February, hardly spoke to him.
My best girl friends hate him and have for years. 2 have only met him once or twice, the other was roommates of his ex girlfriend and hates him on her own. The guys kind of just ignore him. He doesn't talk to them, they hardly talk to him, its kind of like if he's around he's around (and he's not).
Today he sends me an email - the gist - why are you so angry with me? You ignore my chats (from the king of avoidance) and if you don't ignore me on the forums (we have our own that we built) you are very snide - what gives.
My dilemma - I could a) write him a very long and detailed email about how/why I can't stand the sight of him or the mention of his name or b) just ignore it.
I really like a - but I have to see him Saturday. We're all meeting up in NYC for 4th of July - I don't want him there, but I'm 1/17. I also don't think I could handle his responses to some of the things I say - I can't take mean-ness, and I tend to believe whatever negative thing is said about me. I'm really a sweet person, I swear, but once you cross me, that's it, there's no going back and I can spew venom at the drop of a hat.
I had this friend (note: past tense) that wouldn't talk to me for a months. Then, out of the blue, she'd IM yelling at me that I didn't care about her or our friendship. I meant so much to her, but she didn't mean anything to me... yada yada. One day she Imed me, and I left the room to take cookies out of the oven - and she freaked out on me so badly for the delay in response like 5 of my other friends got invilved adn stopped speaking to her because of it. She emailed me a year or so ago after a year of not speaking to me claiming I never kept in touch with her. I emailed her back, she never replied.
Bottom line: It was too much drama. In my opinion - you shouldn't be friends with someone who you can't trust, and does nothing but cause you drama. As you said, he's very manipulative. Anything mean he says to you is a result of him being manipulative and trying to hurt you. Don't give into it. Be polite and respond so you remain the bigger person, but tell him - as kindly as you can - to p*ss off.
Ugh. How people get off treating others like that is beyond me.
First, kudos to you because it seems like it's been a long process for you to realize this d*bag's true colors and finally get his bad vibes out of your life.
If it were me, I'd probably just ignore him, figuring he'll eventually get the message. You certainly don't owe him an explanation...for a normal individual, his misbehavior is self-evident. I find that engaging with people like that just drags me to a place I don't want to be.
If you feel like you need to address it in some way before July 4, is there a middle ground? Like, not a long detailed manifesto of all his failures to be a sympathetic human being, but just a cool, detached dismissal? "I can't be around you and I don't owe you an explanation" or "I'm not holding a grudge but I just can't be friends with you anymore" and "I don't want to fight over the holiday and if you try to push the matter I will not reply"...just throwing some ideas out there.
I DO want to tell him to eff off. More than anything. The snide part of me just wanted to respond with "If I thought you actually cared about the details, I'd actually explain my feelings, but you don't care, so I'll just say you're not worth my time." But really, there's no satisfaction in that for me.
There is the strong chance that if I send him an email airing my grievances (the main one beings a) he's a liar b) he was supposed to be one of my best friends and abandoned me completely and maliciously after my mom died) he will NOT show up for dinner on Saturday. While I don't want to see him, I'll feel guilty. A lot of our group doesn't have an issue with him b/c they don't know how deep is evil goes and I don't want resentment being brought upon me.
I dunno. I'm going to think it over while running tonight and see. You are probably right - a simple "I don't want to associate with you" may be the best course of action
Last edited by stellarosa27; 07-01-2009 at 09:08 AM.
Plus, he might just take any long email and share it, post it, whatever, taking parts out of context. You said he's evil. Don't give him ammo. Which he'll be looking for if he feels attacked or embarrassed or dismissed.
Plus, he might just take any long email and share it, post it, whatever, taking parts out of context. You said he's evil. Don't give him ammo. Which he'll be looking for if he feels attacked or embarrassed or dismissed.
All of our friends know the situation and know his manipulative nature. If he did that, they wouldn't believe anything that came out of his mouth.
I think you were given some very sound advice here on how to deal with him. Kuddos for the room full of chicks with some serious class!!
Your therapist friend sounds right on with her description and here's the angst of dealing with people like that... if you engage with him, respond to him, it'll give him satisfaction. The fact that after all you've done, after all he's put through, that you took time out of your day to send him a correspondence will give him satisfaction.
I agree with the other ladies in here, be poliet but firm and if he tries to iniate contact again or pushes the "but why not?" on you, IGNORE him.
If he is that manipulative, any email you send will be taken out of context or manipulated against you.
Take your rage out at the gym! As for him, I wouldn't even dignify him with a response. If you run into him, don't confront him, and don't get sucked into a discussion about what happened. Be civil, with one-syllable answers, and don't stay in his company. If people ask you what is going on, you just can say that you guys aren't seeing eye to eye right now, and leave it at that.
This drama is distracting you from life, and with people like this, you'll NEVER get them to see the error of their ways nor acknowledge their bad behaviour. Instead, you'll chase the anger dragon and just drag yourself down in the process. And HE'LL be happy, knowing he's winning the manipulation battle. If others don't see him for who he is, that will be their problem. They'll learn, soon enough, or they just won't care. And you can't MAKE them understand or care, either. So breathe, let it go, and take it out at the gym. WAY more productive.
Walk away...and if he's going to be at some party where no one wants him, don't go. Come up with plan C. and you all meet somewhere else. Sorry he was a crappy friend and you invested so much time hanging onto something that wasn't there, but it's time to move on and remember him as a dumb mistake you made once.
"If I thought you actually cared about the details, I'd actually explain my feelings, but you don't care, so I'll just say you're not worth my time."
Don't even bother with that... that whole thought there would just prove to him that you're still kind of in his web since you'd want to explain if you thought he'd care.
He's not WORTH that.
My vote is for a response email, but keep it cool, calm, and detached. Explain to him in a quick summary your reasons (his behavior in the house, his lousy friendship, and his betrayal after your mom's death) and then proceed to explain to him that it is your last response to him, EVER (so please don't try anymore, because they will be ignored), and if you're both in the same company together that you WILL ignore him as much as decently possible (and be civil otherwise) and you hope he does the same.
I went through something similar with a good guy friend of mine recently. We'd been friends for about 2 years, and FwB as well, but when I moved away and he got a girlfriend he stopped picking up his phone for MONTHS. I moved back, he apologized, said I was his best friend, & we picked up where we left off... i.e. party buddies, phone buddies, FwB, etc.... then he proceeds to try and drunkenly molest my sister at a party when he knows I can look the other way with any other chick.... except my sister. And believe me, any other chick encompasses a lot.... he was a total man whore. There's a line somewhere, with any friend, that they just don't cross. My sister was that, and he'd known it since the beginning. EVERYONE knows how protective I am of her... and when she told me how he got physically over strong with her... I literally almost hunted him down with an AK47. He tried to come to my work, saying he couldn't understand why I was ignoring him (playing stupid, basically), called me about 20 times, left me message after text after message.... but I just wasn't having it. So I did what I said above... and I haven't heard from him since.
Good luck chica!
Last edited by starfishkitty; 07-01-2009 at 12:13 PM.
My vote is for a response email, but keep it cool, calm, and detached. Explain to him in a quick summary your reasons (his behavior in the house, his lousy friendship, and his betrayal after your mom's death) and then proceed to explain to him that it is your last response to him, EVER (so please don't try anymore, because they will be ignored), and if you're both in the same company together that you WILL ignore him as much as decently possible (and be civil otherwise) and you hope he does the same.
I like this approach, but even going back and mentioning the things he did, even in brief summary, makes me nervous as it gives him fodder for rebuttal. If you go this route, I would block his email afterwards and if he still manages to contact you, don't even read it.
Rant. !!!!!
