The Summer of Losing Friends

In June, I was shocked to learn one of my friends, who was kooky and I had to pace myself hanging out with her, but still a friend of 9 yrs, was abusing her son. There is no feeling like seeing a person you had breakfast with 2 weeks earlier on the news, wearing orange in a courtroom. Well, guess I lost a friend. Even a kooky friend is a friend. She was a member of my small group of humans I was comfortable around. A rare thing. It’s sad. 100 times more sad about her kids. Already over the friendship part. It’s easy when they are a criminal, I guess. No one saw that coming, though. You think you’d remember red flags, but there were none.

My July story is significantly more crazy. Sit back for a tale. My friend, but not friend, that my husband sold a car to and hooked us up for a playdate last year, and it’s been bat shit crazy ever since, is a friend that I didn’t want and couldn’t shake off. She was nice, I just wasn’t feeling it. She was. She professed her love for me on the 2nd playdate. I should’ve run for the damn hills.

A quick history to catch you up: Our 1st 2 hangouts, totally normal. Slowly, she’d start telling me about herself, how her and her husband met at AA, which I didn’t judge. They’ve been sober and that’s great. She shared she is on stuff for depression and anxiety. Hey, I was at the time too. She shared a huge cocktail of things she was on and I was like, “Whoa, leave some mystery, girl.” It wasn’t long before she texted me on a weekend asking if I had any pain pills. I didn’t, but if I did, I would’ve said no. Soon after, I took her to the pool and she snuck in a fucking bush to smoke smoke cigarette on the pool property. That was when I realized this girl is nuts. What followed during the year was phone calls where she makes no sense, talked slurred, and whispered for me to not tell her husband she took a pill for her headache. Yup, pain pills. Excellent. My husband set me up with an addict.

The last time we were together, she invited us to dinner. I didn’t want to go, I had been sort of avoiding her, but I’m nice and I can’t say no. We went, it wasn’t bad. Her family is nice, even if she’s batty. A week before we went, though, she called me to plan the meal, and she made no sense. We must have had the same conversation loop 3 times. But I couldn’t back out. Because I’m weak. I did this to myself. Lol.

2 wks after dinner there, I got a call from her at 3pm. I very reluctantly answered. She was talking crazy and blurted out, “Can you do me a favor?”

As a rule of thumb, when it comes to crazy people, you never say YES, you say, “What do you need?” Don’t commit until you know it’s not all effed up.

She was taking gibberish and said, “I’m going to hand the phone to the police.”

Oh God. Why did I answer the phone?

The cop asks if I know her, and says that she is very impaired and not making sense, her kids are in the car with her. She hit a bunch of curbs and the car behind her called 911 and followed her. Her eyes are showing she’s under the influence of something, she says a prescription medicine. Could I come down there so they can release her to me so she doesn’t get arrested and her kids taken to children’s services?

I said to the cop that I had all my kids with me and I only have one seat in my car, so how can I help her and her 2 kids get home? He kept saying if I can just show up then they can have someone who makes sense there to help out and they can get her a taxi. I said fine but I think he knew it was the last thing I wanted to do. How does this girl who I’ve hung out with 5 or so times, have me as her emergency call? Geez.

I purposely took all 3 kids. I could’ve left the boys, freeing up 3 seats, but I didn’t want to get stuck into the dramatic situation that I absolutely knew was going to happen. Before you think that was an asshole move on my part, it was, but it saved me.

I get there and these adorable cops who looked totally stressed out came over to my car asking me all kinds of questions. And I’m telling them I don’t know her THAT well, and I can’t believe I got called, but they said she didn’t have anyone to call. Sure. They said if I didn’t come, she would’ve got arrested, and that’s literally the ONLY reason I went.

She argued that I could take her and the kids home. They told her I can’t because I have one seat free, and she walked to my car and looked inside, counting my seats, because she didn’t believe them. She said she could go in the trunk. They told her to call a taxi or Uber, and she insisted she had to call her Dr first. They went back and forth about her hanging up and calling a taxi first. She was totally out of it, slurring, and making zero sense. She said she has to get to her appointment, for pills for her arm.

So, they called her a taxi. They came to me and said, “You can leave, we are sorry you had to come out with the kids.”

I said, “If it’s ok, I’ll hang out until the taxi comes. It’s fine.”

Stupid stupid stupid.

As soon as the the taxi came, the cops left. She came to my window and said, “Ok, I want you to follow me in the taxi, and then you can drive me back here to get my car. You can’t tell my husband this. He can’t know! I have to get that car back before 5. It’s not my car, it’s my Dad’s car. The cops are jerks, I hit ONE curb and they pulled me over, saying I’m under the influence. I’m FINE. I missed my meds and that’s why I’m talking funny but I’M FINE. And I have a LISP, so I sound drunk.” (That’s one hell of a lisp then, sister, because you can’t form a sentence.)

My boys are in awe listening to this. Even they knew she was not in any condition to be in a car with kids. She was swearing in front of them and everything.

I told her I can’t bring her back because I don’t have room for 3 in the car. She said she and her son would go in the hatchback. She needs to get the car back and not get found out.

It took her 30 minutes to get her stuff, 2 cars seats and kids into the taxi. 30 minutes. Everything moved at a snail’s pace. And I helped! This poor taxi driver! She stopped halfway, while her baby cried, to smoke a cigarrette. Omg. Then! Then!!!!!!! She said I need to pee and she peed behind car! My car was not up against anything you guys! It was in the center of an apartment complex parking lot, by people’s windows, and the street, and she peed behind my car. Sweet Jesus.

I was afraid to tell her to her face that I cannot bring her back, because she was just so insistent, so I followed the taxi a minute, then pulled into a church parking lot and messaged her this:

“I am so sorry. And I know you are going to be pissed, but I cannot take you back to your car. I don’t think you are ok to drive it back home especially with the kids. I came to help so you didn’t end up in a police station but I can’t in good conscience help you get behind the wheel of that car again after they pulled you over. You could get into even more trouble or a wreck. I’m sorry.”

That was a very hard message to send, but I could not help her get back into her car. Ugh. Worst day. My kids got a lesson today. A few of them. Drugs are not cool, and doing the right thing is very hard and may end a friendship (which I am fine with).

She’s since messaged me a bunch of times and called. She said she’s not mad but begged me not to tell her husband. And she let me know that she’s not impaired in any way, but she isn’t mad I thought so.

Gee, thanks. She was, and is, and I can’t deal with this shit. Her husband should know, but I’m not getting hooked into this one more inch.

I took my kids swimming the next day for 4 hrs, and the text meltdown that occurred while I wasn’t around my phone was insane. This girl went from “I love you” to “are you avoiding me?” To “Why aren’t you taking my call?” To “I respect you and love you and I’m not mad I just need to ask a question” to “did you tell my husband, because I feel this is between us, and don’t tell your husband ok?” To “Ok fine I get the point.”

Hurting someone’s feelings is pretty much the absolute worst thing for me, and that’s why I let people shit on me all the time and say nothing. Just the simple act of ignoring these messages is creating such stress, but I was doing it anyway. But it was hard and I felt lousy.

2 days of calls and texts and trying to make me feel guilty and I finally broke and sent this to her in hopes this is forever done:

“***, you asked me to lie and cover for you, you asked your son to lie about being in a taxi, you tried to get me to get you back to the car that police deemed you unfit to drive, they were going to arrest you and take the kids to children’s services if I didn’t come to help you. They told me that. That’s why I came, to help you not get arrested and your kids from being scared by all of this. You are going way out of your way to cover up what happened, which leads me to believe you know you fucked up big time. When you called me that night, you made absolutely no sense for 45 minutes and could barely talk. And that’s not the first phone call we’ve had where you sounded on drugs or meds or whatever. You have a problem, I worry about your kids so much, so yes I’m done. My kids were exposed to you making no sense sounding messed up. Friends don’t lie and cover up stuff, and hatch plans to ride in the trunk to get a car back to avoid getting caught making a big mistake. The phone call we had before having dinner at your house you were whispering to me to not tell *** about some med you took because you didn’t feel good, and you were talking gibberish the whole call. I don’t want to deal with people like that. Get help and don’t bother replying.”

When I sent my text to end all texts, as I assumed it did not end all texts, but it did end all of mine. I said what I had to say. She wrote me text after text telling me her side of the story, and it was all lies. I was there! She lied about almost everything she told me, like she didn’t remember one thing I witnessed or heard. She said all she was was dizzy. Then, she said she told her husband everyhing, and she hopes this doesn’t end our friendship. I’m sorry, but it does actually.

I had my husband read all of them, many, when he got home, just so he’s on the same page as me. He really wanted to talk to her husband, because he seems Iike a really nice guy, and he said if it was his kids, he would want to know. I didn’t really want him to, but she is in la-la land and flat out lied and denied everything I said I witnessed, and she’s clearly a pathological liar and abusing her meds.

My husband met him real quick after work, and brought it up to him, saying I helped her with the situation. He had NO clue I helped her. No clue cops were involved. No clue she took a taxi. Her 5 yr old son lied for her and said they went to her Dr appointment. He asked where the car was and she said she didn’t know. She wouldn’t tell him how she got home. She didn’t make sense, so he literally had to take the little info she gave and go find the car. He knew nothing. She lied to me the entire time. She lied to him the entire time. He’s so upset. He said he’s known she’s abusing her pills and told her she can’t drive with the kids at all. That very day, she told her DO not drive. He said she lies ALL the time and manipulates. He said it has gotten worse, and my husband agreed a year ago she was not like this but has gotten worse. He asked us to be praying firm him because he’s been wanting to leave and this just makes everything worse.

I was actually feeling bad, like I screwed her over and possibly blew things out of proportion, but I didn’t. It was so much worse.

She texted me her parents hate him and he’s mean, and he said her parents love him and they have a great relationship. The entire thing was a lie.

Wow. I can honestly say I’ve never dealt with a person like this before. She finally texted me a “I didn’t want him invloved,” but also wished me well, and my family in a kind way. It was weird. She did this to herself and lied to everyone. I’m honestly trying to keep her kids alive.

Of course, that wasn’t the end. I got a barrage of texts saying, “This isn’t fair to the kids, they are friends!”

At this point I finally figured out how to block her number. It’s been silent ever since. I unfriended her on Facebook so she can’t be insane on my page, and she knew within minutes I did it. There’s no way to know unless you try to find a person. Stalker!

So that’s 2 friends down. Who will go bat shit crazy in August? Who knows! I’m not hoping for a trifecta.

My neighbor comes over a lot and tells me ridiculous stories that happen to her and I was proud to host her the other night to my epic tale of disaster in friendship.

)
    Things I'd tell a therapist if I had one

    Written by

    Because it's expensive, so I'm laying on your couch instead.