Best Friends Forever - Irene S. Levine [54]
An excess of envy makes for an uncomfortable relationship because you can’t be open and share your successes. If you do, you run the risk of making your friend feel worse. Each of us wants our friends to take pride in our accomplishments but this isn’t always the case. Some women turn sour or become backstabbers when it seems like their friend has more money, a better job, a bigger house, a richer family life, a slimmer figure, a more supportive mate, or has more girlfriends. Or it may be a case where a toxic friend is only content with a relationship that makes her feel superior. Why does this happen? Chalk it up to insecurity. Some women need to feel important by looking down on other women, even if they don’t realize this about themselves.
Lori, 22, was best friends with Tara for several years. “Tara was always considered popular and cool and I was the follower-type,” says Lori. When the two women left their private school for the public school system, Tara couldn’t stand that their roles had reversed and her friend now seemed to be on a higher rung of the social ladder. Lori had a larger social circle, was more outgoing, became a leader, and was better liked than Tara, who was an outsider, a loner rejected by their classmates. “She got mad and ended our friendship on the computer by starting a fight about type fonts,” says Lori. “We haven’t spoken since.” Obviously, the real upset wasn’t about fonts; it had more to do with envy.
Another woman, age 25, described how her friend, whom she met in high school, began to put her down and compete with her over everything—from clothes to guys. “When I got into my dream college, instead of being happy for me, she told other people that I didn’t deserve it,” she says. “She went so far as giving me wrong advice so she could sit back and watch me squirm,” she adds. When the woman eventually began to recognize this dysfunctional pattern, she knew that she had to end the relationship.
6 : GUESS WHAT ? IT REALLY ISN’T A FRIENDSHIP
The term frenemy, or sometimes friendenemy, has been used to describe people who are ostensibly your friends but who primarily are there to take advantage of what you can do for them. This is often the case when a friend is filled with ambivalence and jealousy. Such one-sided friendships tend to have short half-lives because they are so inherently painful and unsatisfying. Sometimes, money or jealousy is the root of these friendship evils.
Alyson, who is 31, says that her friend Nikki drives her nuts at times. “I’m not completely sure that she is a ‘close friend.’ Sometimes, she uses me for certain people I know. At the same time, she has been very kind,” she says. She realizes that Nikki can be negative and toxic, but when she’s not being snippy, she’s interesting and original. It’s hard for Alyson to let her hair down completely because she’s never sure about how Nikki will respond.
It bears repeating that a toxic friendship can take many forms. A friendship that is toxic to one person may not be toxic to another. And a friendship can be bad for you without necessarily meaning that the other woman is a bad person.
To spot a toxic friendship, you need to objectively look at your friend’s behaviors and your own, assess the problem, and determine whether it can be remedied. Sometimes this is hard to do and women dismiss the warnings and offers of help from other friends and family who are able to view the situation more dispassionately.
CHAPTER 6
FRIENDSHIPS IN FLUX
“Old friends is always best, ’less you can catch a new one that’s fit to make an old one out of.”
—SARAH ORNE JEWETT
Friendships are inherently dynamic. Friends—even best friends—find themselves in different orbits as their lives change. One woman gets engaged and then married while the other remains single, potentially creating a strain on their relationship from either end. Two women may both be single, but only one has the