I just joined the grouop 2-nite.How do you move out and away from childhood friends whom you are in a codependent relationship with? I have a friend who, this is strange but true, I have hated being friends with for almost as long as I can remember-she is my best friend. What kind of relationship is that? It is extremely damaging and it is not a friendship. But oddly enough she and I have been friends our entire lives-literally. I have always hated being the one who listens to her stories about how hard her life is, but I have always been the "strong one" I get so mad -to the point of throwing the phone across the room-when I can finally get off the phone with her because she talks incessantly! i do not know how to say no to her-I have never been able to. My friends, parents and even my past boyfriends (as well as current one) have always thought this relationship as strange. I would always hear "then why are you friends with her?" To which I would respond-"I don't know" or you don't understand. And for so MANY YEARS I thought that one day I am going to stand up to her and quit listening and supporting her when she has drama (she ALWAYS has drama) or just end our friendship. But now it is so hard to because its like she is someone who know me so well, because noone does because I have moved to another state. But, for the past 6 months our friendship has been almost completely one-sided. She has been going through a divorce and while I want to support her, she has no consideration for my time and our conversations are ALWAYS about what is going on with her. It may sound like I'm being selfish and an unsupportive friend and for the longest time I thought I was, but I realized the other day that I hate our friendship! I hate feeling runover every other day by her. I get so mad when she won't take my advice and I can never get a word in edge-wise. But isn't that what friends do-stick it out the thick and the thin? Well I can't. She has no idea I feel this way and I don't know how to tell her. It's like I feel like I'm not myself around her because I have to bottle all of my emotion inside because she is the focus of everything because she has all the problems! But other times we have fun together and I am so comfortable around her because we've known each other for so long that a lot of the reservations I have with other friends aren't there with her; It's like she can hold it over me that "she knows me so well" which she says a lot when we're together after she can predict some reaction that I just had. But inside I'm like-do you really? And then, inevitably, whenever we get together and have a good time with hours or the next day she'll call with something like--"Guess what? I asked Mark if he loved me and if he could remember why he married me and he couldn't tell me, and then I told him to get the "f" out of the house." etc...the conversation will go on for usually another hour when I never have the time or the emotional wherewithal to listen or support.She would call me almost every time she and her husband would get into a fight-they were married five years. And NO MATTER what I was doing-I would listen to her. Half of our conversations would start with "we got into it again" mind you they were all verbal arguments-not physically abusive. And usually they were things she didn't need to be telling me, and she always starts our phone conversations as: You wil never guess what just happened. Never I mean in the past 10 years never has she been considerate of my feelings. It's this horrible addictive relationship! I think if I kindly confront her about it then she'll point out some of my weaknesses/flaws and it will go nowhere. I've thought about writing her a letter, but I'm so comfortable around her that this might be wierd. But, literally if I try to talk to her I may not be able to get a word in at all. She would call me almost every time she and her husband would get into a fight-they were married five years. And NO MATTER what I was doing-I would listen to her. Half of our conversations would start with "we got into it again" mind you they were all verbal arguments-not physically abusive. And usually they were things she didn't need to be telling me, and she always starts our phone conversations as: You wil never guess what just happened. Never I mean in the past 10 years never has she been considerate of my feelings. I mean (this is stupid) but I remember when we were like 10 and I would ALWAYS play or do things the way she wanted and I would complain to my mom for days how much I hated it, but I kept being friends with her...I don't know why. In high school when I had boyfriends she would make me feel bad...complaining that she never had a boyfriend and I was always the pretty one. She would have OBSESSIONS over boys, and when she would get her heart broken I would get in her car and drive and she would just sob and play songs and always be like...I just can't believe it (I don't even think she knows my heartbreaks in high school because we always focused on her) In college I did the whole sorority thing and she got married. I had my fair share of problems in college-panic attack, anxiety, depression causing me to drop out of school for a semester after a friend died in a car accident and my boyfriend went into the military. But even while these things happened I remember listening to her fights and her woes with her husband and her job etc.. like I had to be there for her when I was having a really hard time. It's this dysfunctional way of having a friend and I didn't realize it until someone said to me..."how is it friendship when you are miserable all the time? Do you get satisfaction from tryin to fix her, because you can't" This is really long, but this is my little situation. I don't know what I'm going to do. I feel like a huge push over.