Superficiality? No, Thank You!

Recently, a close long-time email friend deleted me. This made me very angry because we had been very close, and in touch almost every day. Towards the “end” of the friendship I found out that this person had undergone years of treatment for drug abuse, sex/porn addiction, and had years of unsuccessful therapy for abandonment issues. I didn’t mind him telling me this, and I didn’t mind if he had addiction issues.   But what really put me off, was finding out how he managed his addiction/abuse issues after the fact. I became aware of it, just before the friendship was rudely terminated, when he began to speak about enmeshment issues. Being a tolerant person, I expected that he felt the friendship was a little beyond the comfort zone, and he would like to “withdraw” a bit. He didn’t. He wanted to completely terminate the friendship, which he proceeded to do, with little explanation.  After the fact I discovered that he really does like becoming enmeshed to the point where his friend feels like they have a close friendship. He did this with diligence. But in order to control it, he simply puts an artificial expiration date on the friendship. That’s right! He looks at the calendar, and thinks to himself, “Okay, this has gone on long enough…  I don’t want to get too involved, because I might be abused or become abusive, or who knows what! Time to go, before it gets obsessive!”  In other words, his way of managing his addiction to run through life and clean out his collection of used-up friends like someone throwing away old frozen TV dinners from the freezer every six months. His management program consists of considering friendships like a form of consumer goods.  At the moment, he is becoming enmeshed with people engaged in his new hobby, and when their “time is up” on his invisible schedule, he will discard them as “used” just like anyone else. What really makes me angry is the lack of rational explanation, and the audacity of telling me, that I have to “learn to let go”. Let go? If he were in arm’s reach, I would kick his arse in! I don’t have a problem letting go of someone who considers friends a superficial consumer product with an expiration date!  I told him so in an angry letter, which was rewarded, not with an explanation or an apology, but an accusation that I was being abusive?  Excuse me? Abusive? Because I express that I am very irate that I feel abused. That friendships mean nothing to him, except a momentary form of entertainment. That I feel angry, because instead of creating better communication and limits to a friendship, to make in more compatible, he finds it much easier to manage his life by dumping people like waste products?  Of course he is a victim of one too many twelve-step support groups, who have taught him that enmeshment is not good. (He chose to interpret the lesson as enmeshment longer than six months is not good). He gave me the parting advice to join a support group, and get therapy to “work on my anger issues, and learn how to become less abusive”. Naturally this infuriated me. I need to go to the same groups like he did, so that I too, could become just as superficial and abusive as he was? To learn how to manage my life by controlling the period of time I enmeshed, before I tear up the railroad tracks, and anonymously move out of sight?  Superficiality? NO THANK YOU! There can be limits to friendships, but when I think of that, I am not specifically thinking of time limits. And I still believe in people to the point where I believe if you really are friends you can negotiate. Friends fight sometimes, and have disagreements. And sometimes they don’t talk to each other for awhile. But the key to lasting friendship - I believe – is communication, not control.  I know some people would advise me to let go of my anger; to let go of my disappointment; to let go of my will to control this person, and stop trying to abuse him.  Sorry, I see it more soberly. I am angry about being treated like this. It doesn’t matter how many Melodie Beattie slogans you toss my away about validating my feelings, or taking responsibility for my feelings. It’s not a validation or a responsibility issue. I feel insulted and hurt – plain and simple. And it is all hinged on the irresponsible behavior of someone who regards people as a consumption product.   MENTAL NOTE TO MYSELF: Beware of people who have repeated one too many twelve-step programs (unsuccessfully) and learned all of the slogans to employee for rationalizing their own abusive behavior.