THIRTIES-Childhood Friends

“We have three types of friends in life. 

Friends for a reason.
 Friends for a season. 
  Friends for a lifetime.”

-Unknown 

     Besides living in limbo land about my marriage, husband, and new life, I created struggles with a childhood friend who happened to my neighbor. We had both purchased homes out in San Elijo Hills; or what I like to call, “The Stepford Wife Community.” It was out in the middle of what seemed like nowhere. My childhood friend had been my “best friend” from 7th-9th grade, and ended up marrying her High School sweetheart. He was the one who I “felt” had replaced me while attending Catholic school our freshman year in high school. In that same year, my friend and her boyfriend became quite religious; often addicted to their good opinion, I felt like I could never measure up. 

     Many years later, we became close again. To put our friendship lightly, she was NOT meeting my models since moving to San Diego. I like to say, “MY models,” because we all have a right to our ways of seeing things. The suffering begins when we become addicted to our models. My “right versus wrong” mentality; and in my perception, her self righteousness, collided like going head to head with Tonya Harding in a boxing ring. During this time as their neighbor, I created the illusion of feeling stuck in the “friendship.” I was obsessed with what seemed to me as her lack of authenticity, distracting myself from taking responsibility for MY self righteousness and lack of authenticity. I had the “she did it first” and the “if you judge me then I will judge you back” programming which never works. Her husband and my husband were not getting along either, making our time together in hell one big disaster. The hardest part was that I bought into what seemed like her “dismissive” and “better than” behavior because I had subconsciously deemed myself as unloveable. When we consciously or subconsciously tell ourselves that we are not enough, the Universe will continually give us opportunities to prove our minds “right.” We then have the chance to move through and say yes to the pain, giving us the strength to create oneness, regardless of what anyone says or does. When we claim who we truly are, we can choose to move on in a more loving way. 

"Whether or not you are willing to say yes is not what makes you loveable. Being willing to say yes simply allows you to enjoy the truth that you are loveable."

     My hardest challenge (and addiction) was that we had known each other since elementary school and had similar friends (particularly, OUR bestie in Laguna Niguel). In those years, my bestie was my savior (or God), and the three of us never seemed to be a healthy trio, even in our high school days. I was determined that being in our thirties and “adults” would make a difference. Again, I was up for yet another lesson. Call me stubborn, I wanted to make these friendships WORK! 

     My bestie in Laguna Niguel became my everything. Tanja had become a mother and doing her “mom group” thing back on the Central Coast. I was married and in a place where people were raising their kids, drank wine on mom’s night out, and talked about which burping cloth to buy. I was NOT pregnant; and lucky for me, my friend from Laguna was way passed the baby stage. We would talk on the phone on my forty-five minute drive to work  and on my way home. Besides being my best friend, she became my counselor, decorator, party giver, and in a way...my mom. On the weekends, we would decorate our houses during the day and party with our husbands at night, tickling arms on Sunday as we recovered from our hangovers. I had an absolute blast. If she was a man, I would have married her. But...I became dependent. In looking back, I absolutely know that I was not given more than I could manage, and God gave me a dedicated soul. Healthy relationship or not, I will be eternally grateful to her for helping me through that time. Co-neediness, no matter how seemingly attractive, never works. Nothing outside of ourselves ever does. No matter how much I cared for these childhood friends, they could never give me what I needed. My spirit was just beginning to whisper that I needed to GO IN and take care of me.