Anyway, the coven of people who scapegoated me were once a sweet little group of friends who would never have betrayed each other, nor spoken ill of each other out of earshot. Or in, for that matter. One of the things I loved about our little friend group was that, by and large, I was the one who pulled us all together. I was very proud of that fact.
Since the initial event, though, I have been reflecting on how I connect with other women and make friends. It has made me scratch my head a bit and wonder if I should listen to my inner voice when building friendships. You see, what I have ultimately concluded is that our solid, happy group of four or five friends was infiltrated by one additional new "friend" who was inordinately toxic.
But I also recognize we weren't perfect, either. We each have our own "things" we do that might get on another person's nerves. But all the times past, we could each recognize this and also recognize that the friendships themselves were the reason we occasionally encountered our friends' less favorable habits or tendencies. I often kept my mouth shut with my two friends who were the couple in the group. They each had habits that were difficult to take sometimes and often were downright rude. But I cared about them, and they also had qualities I loved, as I loved them. So, I overlooked the relatively minor irritations.
And, along the way, we added the last member of our little group. There were difficulties from the very beginning. The wife in my friend couple became offended by the dynamic between her husband and the newest friend when, early on, the three of them went out one evening. After this, the wife-friend would roll her eyes, and even sometimes beg off plans if they included the newest friend. I heard about the frustrations felt by the wife-friend for months.
Then, besides this incident, the newest friend was constantly offering to do things for the group which forced us to rely on her, only to beg off and leave us in the lurch at the last minute. She often canceled plans, which was also challenging. That was a practice none of us had ever undertaken, as we honored our plans, always. It was just unthinkable to cancel.
As I reflect, those little changes in the understood terms of our mutual friendship were probably the beginning of the bigger plan, and the beginning of fractures. I am not a manipulative person, and I struggle to understand the mind of a person who has ill will at heart, but I do understand that those people are out there. Time has honed my analysis of how things went so badly wrong, and I have come to believe that the newest friend, the toxic one, goes through her life needing to meddle in, undo, and wreak havoc in the lives of those around her.
I know that she is a sad and miserable person. I observed her turning green at her realization that somebody around her was getting good news that she, herself, was not. Even while trying to be a good friend to her, I observed how much time she spent feeling sorry for her own situation, in spite of not making great choices when any sort of windfall came her way. She was angry about her dire financial situation; about her disappointing love life; and about her health, which was poor. And of course, I and the other friends were concerned for her and her health issues, but she did not take great care of herself.
Then, there was the crown jewel in my circle of friends. She was the friend who knew everything about my life; and I hers. This was a friend I earned with blood, sweat, and tears. There is so very much love and loss in that statement that I can't unpack it here, but I know that I gave of myself as her friend even when it was very hard to do. In this past year, we had really come into our own in a relationship that was what (I think) all women hope to have, which is a friend who you know will be at your bedside when you die, or you at hers.
The summer of this past year wore on, and life kept taking bites out of me, I, myself, was worn down to less than my friends were used to seeing. I could feel it happening but felt almost powerless to stop it. I was in a confusing love relationship that was keeping me off-balance. I was wrapping up a brutal divorce from a man who has taken pleasure in torturing me for 13 years. I was advised, mid-summer, that my entire real estate portfolio was going to have to be sold to finalize the divorce. A portfolio of real estate I acquired to fund my retirement. This last news devastated me.
By Fall, I was struggling to even find who I once felt I was... I was rather lost. I still made plans with my friends and went out and did things, but I was often not fully present. And I think that my weak moment was the last piece of the puzzle for the toxic friend. My other friends were aware of all of these huge hits to my psyche, but they may not have recognized how deeply impacted I was by the weight of everything at once.
Somehow, discord between the group crept in. I was completely unaware of it. In part, I was unaware because of my own pain and the burdens life was piling on, and, in part, I was still operating on the long-established standards of our friendship, and one of those standards was that if there is a grievance, we just go to that person. I had no idea that somehow, all my friends had somehow been coaxed or manipulated into talking to the toxic newest friend. And she was, it seems, on a power trip.
In the end, we all showed our weakest selves. Certainly, for different reasons, but if I were to guess, I would still say that, for me, and for my oldest, dearest friend, our weakest selves came out because of the traumas of that year, and more to the point, the recent traumas she and I were both coping with. The husband-wife couple? Well, he just went along with whatever she determined she expected. I don't believe he had much in the way of complaints. She was perhaps reacting to her often-seen angry side, which was brutal and merciless. Her complaints were so stored up that I knew that an issue that was supposed to have been put to rest six months prior became part of the discussion.
And the toxic newest friend? She never even had any complaints. This is the irony, and to me stands out as the clear evidence that she was the one orchestrating the scapegoating. She had some hastily cobbled together hot-button words, but they amounted to one small statement that was never substantiated. It was her ruse; the red herring she lobbed into my cherished friend group, just to watch how the damage would unfold.
I am not sure what the toxic friend thought she wanted out of all this, but it certainly wasn't friendship. Although the group briefly "hung out" and did things together, it was more for show, to make sure I could see they were having fun without me. That game lasted about two or three weeks. Now, after three months, the group has all but disbanded, a friend group no more. As my friend-to-the-end put it the last time we were all in one place, I was "the glue holding them together."
The husband-wife friends live right across the street from me but work very hard to let me know they want nothing to do with me. It's sad. But it's her choice. And the long-cherished friend I thought I would always be able to trust? Also gone. I think she is working through her own pain. She, too, is divorcing, and dealing with a recent DUI, and plenty of other baggage. I knew it and wanted to be there for her as she went through it, but I know that the toxic friend and, well, life in general probably clouded her vision and decision-making on that. She knows I keep the door open, but it's never been me who holds a grudge. I am a forgiver when it comes to the people I love.
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