When you least expect

About time I posted an update. I haven't disappeared, it's just that life has been a little hectic recently and I haven't had chance to sit down and write, but I need to this evening.

Firstly, thank you to all those who commented on my last post for your thoughts. They gave me a lot to think about and consider and it was good to see how things look from an outsider's perspective.

The update on what happened last time is pretty short. I have to confess to failing to confront T about her behaviour. I have no real excuse, other than the times I've seen her since have been for weekends away for specific events and there was no time that seemed right for trying to speak to her. I was worried about ruining the weekend for both of us. The fact that she just got completely back to normal also made it difficult. If someone is being nice to you, and fun to be with, and acting like a friend, how do you start a discussion about what she did? If she was still being off with me it would have made it easier.

So I said nothing that time, but I have earlier today sent her an email telling her a few home truths about how I feel about something that happened yesterday. The something is as follows.

A few weeks ago a friend of mine at my workplace booked concert tickets for me, her and T. T knew she was going to try to buy them and had agreed that she wanted a ticket. T and I then owed my work friend money for the tickets. I paid a couple of days later and I assumed that T would arrange to do the same, as she has my work friend's contact details.

A couple of weeks ago Work Friend's husband was laid off at work, with no notice and no final pay cheque, leaving them and their family to live off her not very large wage. Last week she asked me to chase up T for the money she owed, as her credit card bill was due. I texted T a reminder and got a reply saying the cheque was written and would be posted in the next couple of days. The text also included a comment that she was already thousands in debt.

A couple of days ago Work Friend asked me if the cheque had arrived (we assumed it was being sent to my home address). It hadn't. Work Friend isn't the sort to chase debts up this soon in normal circumstances, but at the moment she can't afford to just wait to be paid. So I had to chase up T again which I hated doing as she had mentioned in an email earlier in the day that she was overdrawn at the bank. I did say that if the cheque had go stuck in the post, I could pay for now, thinking this was way out or her if she was in financial trouble.

Her response to my chasing arrived yesterday and it really angered me and is what prompted me to be honest with her. Her email, and my reactions, basically went like this:

- the cheque is written but will bounce as she won't get paid till July (ok, she has just moved to a new job and is paid in arrears, but as she only left the last job last week she should not be struggling for money yet, how the hell is she so overdrawn?)
- she has had to take a pay cut to move to the new job
- she can put the cheque in the post but it will bounce (this really angered me - there is no point posting it if it will bounce so why bother saying she can post it?)
- she can go to the bank and get money from her other bank account, but not until Saturday (fair enough, her work is not near the bank)and she might not even be able to do it on Saturday as she has appointments (EXCUSE ME???? You have a debt to pay. The person you owe it to has asked for it. You should be making every effort to get the money to her. You cannot say you might not be able to get to the bank. You make damn sure
you get there and sort the money out).
- if it is vital that this gets sorted this afternoon then Work Friend and I will have to work out what needs to be done (first, I never said it needed sorting this afternoon, I said this week. Second, this suggests she can't pay this afternoon but she can pay tomorrow, which is not the case. And third, why the hell should we have to sort anything out between ourselves? This is not my debt, it is hers)

The general tone of the email was one of feeling sorry for herself and of not taking responsibility for her debt. There was no apology for not being able to pay and no sign of feeling bad about it. There was also no real acknowledgement of my offer to pay. I would have been mortified to be in her position, would have felt absolutely awful about it and would have found the money somehow.

I should point out that at this point I'm not sure that I'd told her about Work Friend's husband. However, that shouldn't make any difference. If someone asks you to pay a debt they are asking because they need the money and you pay them. My first instinct was to email back telling her to grow up and be responsible, but that would have felt as if I was being nasty, so my initial response was an email telling her she's not a failure, offering again to pay so that she owed me instead, and offering my thoughts and advice on her finances if she wanted. I also told her about Work Friend's husband so she knew why the money is needed. She is not at all happy with life this week and I didn't want to add to her unhappiness.

However, last night I couldn't stop thinking about her email, her seeming expectation that I should sort out her debt, and her apparent lack of concern over it. Her only worries seemed to be about her own life and finances, there was no thought about my Work Friend. I did give my Work Friend a cheque myself as I cannot let her be out of pocket and I have no idea when T will manage to sort out the money, but I hated being put in that position.

So I emailed my friend E today with the whole story and her advice was once again that if she were me, she would be honest. And this time I finally followed her advice. I think the trigger was that T's behaviour is now affecting someone other than me. I spent my lunch hour and some time after work composing an email. I tried to be honest, but not unpleasant. I do care about her, but she does need to know how this email came across and how angry it made me.

I told her that it is her debt and that she is responsible for paying it, that I understand that money is tight, but she can't expect people to just wait until she is able to pay, and that her email came across as a bit dismissive. I told that I care about her but that I need to be honest with her otherwise I will dwell on this and end up even angrier. I fully expect to either be ignored or to receive an email ending the friendship. Funnily enough, when I was partway through writing the email, I got a short chatty message from her about something not particularly important. No mention of my email from yesterday, nothing at all about the money she owes.

She does need to grow up and be responsible. She was in a financial mess late last year but paid off her debts and set up a savings account and I thought all was well. However I don't think she understands the concept of living within her means. She has a full time job. She lives with her parents so doesn't have proper rent and bills to pay, just board money to her parents. She should have a reasonable amount of disposable income. She should not be thousands of pounds in debt.

I think that living with her parents is one of the reasons why she is in debt. If she can't pay her board, there are no consequences. She won't be at risk of losing her home. She won't have her electricity cut off. She won't be unable to put food on the table. She hasn't learnt how to be responsible with her money, that in the real world you can't buy endless CDs, concert tickets and clothes, you need to make sure you can afford them. She talks about only living once and that you should do things that you want to do rather than regret not doing them, which is a philosophy I tend to agree with, but not to the extent of putting myself into that much debt.

Pressing send on the email felt right. Yes, she has problems of her own, but that does not excuse her behavior. I was a little hesitant about doing it by email rather than in person, but I don't know that I could manage to say it all in person.

I await her response, or lack of.

Belle's comment raised an interesting point. Is T the one who has been using me? Well, as I said in my comment, I really don't think so. She has her issues and has had her problems over the past couple of years and that is what is prompting her behaviour, rather than her using me.

Though I don't feel I have been used, it is true to say that the friendship has been a bit lopsided in the last couple of years. She's been the one who was pretty much falling apart, she's been the one needing support, she's been the one who has needed to lean on me. I have had some family things going in recent months which she has been supportive about, and before all her problems began she supported me through some (less serious) problems of my own.

I know that at some point in the future if I need to lean on her she will be there for me. I guess the nature of friendship is that there are ups and downs, that there will be times where one person needs more from the other, and is perhaps less able to give, but it's likely that over the years roles will reverse and the person who was giving the support will become the one who needs it, and will be given it.

T did get back in touch with me a few days ago, via a short but perfectly friendly email. A couple of emails when back and forth between us, and we spoke on the phone a couple of days later. Without going into too much lengthy detail, things have been going very badly at the job she moved to a few months ago, and she has been feeling angry and upset. I think it was a combination of that and her lack of self esteem making her feel second best which triggered her use people comment to me. In our phone conversation the friendship felt as if it was back to "normal". The anger which was in her email was certainly no longer there.

I haven't seen her in person yet but when I do I think I do need to find a suitable moment to talk about her behaviour towards me. I understand her feelings about work and that sometimes she feels a need to disappear but I do wish she would tell me before just disappearing. And if the use people comment was because she felt insecure/jealous that I was planning something with another friend then she needs to learn to accept that I have other friends.

Well I decided it was best not to just turn up on T's parents' doorstep. I don't want to cause conflict between her and her mum. I did however take a train up to her town today. I texted her as I set off saying I was on my way and did she want to meet me for a coffee at one of our favourite coffee shops. No reply.

I arrived at the station hoping she might me there to meet me. She wasn't. I phoned her and got her voicemail and left a quick message saying I was headed to the coffee shop if she was free to join me but that it was ok if she couldn't. I almost set my phone not to show my number in the hope that she'd pick up and I'd get to speak to her, but decided that her not answering because she knew it was me was marginally better than her answering then putting the phone down when she realised it was me. I heard nothing from her. I sat in the coffee shop nursing a coffee for just over half an hour, took a slow walk back to the station, then let her know I was off home and that I hoped we could speak soon.

Part of me is wondering whether my voicemail should have been more "emotional", apologising for hurting her, telling her I was missing her and asking if we can sort things out, but I would have felt odd and perhaps a bit needy leaving that as a message. She may of course have been busy, she may be not in the mood for not answering her phone to anybody. But whatever the reason for her lack of response today, the fact remains that I have heard nothing from her since last Monday.

I now have no idea what, if anything, to do next. I have various options spinning around my head, but all have drawbacks.

I could do nothing and just wait for her to be ready to get back in touch with me. This has worked previously when she has been avoiding contact, but those times she wasn't talking to me because of issues going on in her own life. This time she is angry at something I have said so it may be different. Plus I am not sure I can just wait it out.

I could contact her to say I understand she needs time with no contact from me and that I will give her space and am here when she is ready to speak to me again. This still seems a bit open ended.

I could tell her how much I miss her, how I want to be able to talk to her again, to have long, hilarious phone chats with her, that I am sorry, and that I want her friendship. I have though tried this before and I ended up feeling more hurt and getting angry with her because I was still being ignored despite baring all my emotions and telling her how much I cared.

I could be brutal, which is the option I think my friend E would prefer I took. Her take on things was that I have the patience of a saint. I do feel that my patience is wearing a little thin and occasionally this week I have felt like emailing her to tell her how much what she said hurts, how she can't just say that out of the blue then disappear, that if I was using her I would not have stuck by her and supported her through everything that has happened to her over the past year or three, that I am tired of her going AWOL on me every few months, that I find it more and more stressful each time she does it, that I am not unbreakable as she seems to think I am (she always marvels at how strong I seem when there are all sorts of issues going on with my family).

But I worry that that would hurt her and that it seems put all the blame on her. Am I justified in losing patience with her? Should I put some of the blame on myself?

Hopefully she will get back in touch over the next few days. If not I really don't know what to do for the best. And if she does get back in touch I am not sure I can just go back to being friends without discussing what happened. I also might need to tell her that I can't cope with her disappearing regularly. We'll see what this week brings.

My friend T seems to have fallen out with me and stopped talking to me because I told her I probably couldn't go to a concert with her. I haven't heard from her since Monday and I don't know what to do about it.

The full story is this. It goes on a bit so feel free to ignore, I just feel a need to write it all down. T and I go to a lot of gigs together. It's what we "do" and what we are known for among my friends and hers. We went to a concert a few weeks ago and had a brilliant time, so much so that we booked to see the same artist later this year at a venue a flight away from where we live. We also booked the flight.

We have quite few concerts arranged for the coming months. We (in our separate homes) watched something on TV over the weekend about one of the bands we're due to see and it really whetted our appetites. After watching, T tried to track down tickets for another venue for this band and thought she found some good ones, I asked where she'd found them.

Next day she emailed me sounded pretty excited to say she'd found some really good tickets on an ebay type site, more than face value but not extortionately priced, and said she was thinking how great it would be to go.

I had overnight thought about whether I would want to go and whether I could go, and realised I have hardly any free weekends between now and August. I need to fit in meeting up with an old friend (actually my longest standing friend - I've know her since we were 5) sometime in one of those weekends, and the weekend of this new concert was one that Oldest Friend had mentioned she was probably free.

I replied to T saying I didn't think I could commit at the moment to another weekend away, as I needed to organise seeing Oldest Friend and that weekend was a possible date for the meet up. I did say if I ended up being free that weekend I would let her know (the concert tickets are not likely to sell out over the next couple of weeks). I went off to a meeting at work and returned to find an email from T telling me not to bother and saying that I have no idea how I appear to use people. She also made a comment that she was sure it would have been a different story if it was one of my favourite bands.

I felt sick and almost burst into tears at my desk. It really hurt that she would be that cold, short and angry with me. I replied immediately saying I had no idea I came across that way and asking her why she thought that. I apologised that my email may have seemed a bit abrupt (I was not having the best of days at work and was in a hurry to get to a meeting when I wrote it). She didn't reply.

Next day I texted her to tell her I'd put a cheque in the post to pay my half of our latest concert booking. Her reply just said OK, and that I could have the recently bought tickets and to let me know what name to change her plane ticket to (she knows my other friends aren't really into concerts so I don't know who she thought I might get to go with me). I texted that I didn't want to go with anyone but her and that I was still confused about what she'd said about using people, and asked if we could at least talk. I have heard nothing from her since.

I have told my Best Friend and another friend the story and both have said to just leave her, not contact her and she will forget this and get back in touch. This isn't the first time she has stopped talking to me and on previous occasions she has indeed got back in touch eventually. The other times however she hasn't accused me of using people. It hurts to be accused of that and I spent most of the day she said it trying to work out what I'd done. Best Friend however reassured me that I am not using T and that she is overreacting. She pointed out that I am entitled to say no to invitations and that T doesn't own me.

T does have very low self esteem and I wonder if it was me saying I needed to arrange seeing Oldest Friend before I could commit to the concert is what angered her. Did she feel like she was second best? I do know that none of my other friends would have reacted like that to what I said.

If she does get back in touch I am not sure a simple sorry will be enough this time, I think we would need to talk about why she said what she did. And if she doesn't get back in touch then we have the practical problem of a whole lot of concerts booked together and we will need to sort out what will happen to the tickets.

I have to confess that there is a part of me which wants to email her to tell her exactly how this has made me feel and to remind her that someone who was using her would not have given her the support I have given her over the past year or two.

If I don't hear from her in the next week I will need to decide what to do as our next concert is soon. Do I continue to ignore her and just accept missing the concert (which we've both really been looking forward to)? Do I contact her to ask if she wants to go to the concert? Do I ask her to please just talk to me? And what if she continues to ignore me?

A quick update on eharmony. Of the many guys I sent questions to, four of them actually replied and sent questions of their own.

With two of them I responded to their questions straight away as I liked their answers. One of them I closed immediately as his answer to my question about the need for time for personal reflection in a relationship was the one which said he basically doesn't need any. I may have no relationship experience, but I know how I am in my friendships and in how I interact with people generally and I do need time to myself and I think I would feel suffocated if I spent every minute of every day outside work with one other person.

As for the 4th guy, I have just sent my answers to him after debating for a while over what to do. His personal reflection answer was also erring on the side of not needing much, but slightly less so that the first guy. I like his profile more so have carried on communicating. I couldn't give up completely on having personal time to myself, but I could compromise a little for someone who was right in other ways, and I hope the right person for me could do the same.

Of the first two matches who I have sent responses to, I have exchanged Must haves and can't stands with both of them, and one (I'll call him the Younger Man, because he is indeed younger than me) has sent open ended questions.

A few guys have sent me questions and ice breakers but I haven't found any of them particularly interesting or attractive. At least some of the ones I'm interested in seem to be interested back, which does give me some confidence that I come across as someone worth getting to know.

I have just spent several minutes looking at someone's eHarmony profile trying to work out whether he is being serious or not. I am sure the look of puzzlement/disbelief/confusion/amusement on my face was an absolute picture.

This guy has sent me questions so I checked his profile. His "name one thing you are passionate about" lists numerous items (not a problem, most people give more than one), one of which was he is an unpublished writer with a fear of being ostracised by society if he writes his thoughts down. That sounded a little odd but we all have our quirks so I read on.

The most influential person in his life has been himself. Ok, so he's very self confident.

Next, the one thing he wishes people would notice about him. He does start by acknowledging that it will sound like he is boasting, then goes on to say that women always fail to see that he is far better than most men. He says that they don't see that they will have a much better family life with him and that they fail to see beyond his racial stereotype. And almost as an afterthought he states that he comes from a superior breed (naturally selected) and hence "our offspring will do very well".

I stopped reading at this point to have a bit of a "What??? Did he really write that???" moment. I then carried on and wasn't surprised to find the rest of his profile in the same vein.

The things he can't live without included food and sex and sharing his life with someone deserving. So should I feel privileged that he seems to think I might be deserving???

The first things people notice about him are his public school accent and his confidence and assertiveness. Well, yes, I can imagine his confidence would be noticeable to say the least.

His answer to some additional information he wants matches to know declares that she shouldn't make any assumptions about him until we have meet at least twice, and concludes with "Its an awful shame on all you good women out there that i am still single".

Oh, and he also spelt sharing as shearing and achieving as archiving. Which was obviously the dealbreaker for me and the only reason I just pressed archive this match despite him being so much better than most men ;)

I have concluded that he has either joined up to have a laugh, or there really are men out there who think like that. Luckily I am communicating with a couple of fairly normal sounding guys so it's not a complete disaster on the online dating front, but more of that once I've recovered from reading all about Mr Super Confident.

After G/W's gentle push at me (thank you G/W) to keep hoping and walking because good things are just around the corner, I have given myself a push and spent the last couple of hours ploughing through my eHarmony matches. I haven't made much of a dent in them and did at one point wish for an archive all function, or at least the chance to multi select a few matches and archive those. I was going to try to archive all matches older than a couple of months to give myself a manageable number to actually read properly, but I soon realised that would have taken me days so decided to just look through the newer matches and ignore the older ones.

I ended up archiving a fair few of the newer matches. Some sounded like interesting people but not interesting to me, some had such sparse profiles that there was no way to tell if I'd want to get to know them, one rattled on about "symbiotic relationships" which seemed a bit highbrow for an online dating profile and some were just plain odd. Once guy, in answer to the "list 3 things you are thankful for question" said this (and it was all in upper case):
FAIR RENUMARATION (his spelling error)
BEAUTY
HONESTY
Well I am thankful I am fairly paid but it seems an odd thing to put on a list like that. It is good that people are honest, but does he mean he is thankful that honesty exists, that he is honest, that others are honest?? And beauty - his? Women's? Another guy put "handsome" as one of his. One assumes he is thankful that he is handsome. He went straight onto the archived list...

I did send questions to a few guys who seemed interesting and appealed to me so we shall wait and see what happens. I will attempt to keep up with my matches this time and try not to get too disheartened when people don't reply. I will also attempt to post about progress or lack of so if I start sounding like giving up again please give me another push. There is nobody in real life who seems interested in me or who I have a spark with, so online dating seems to be the way to go at the moment.

Long time, no post. There's been no particular reason for the lack of blogging, I just haven't really felt in the mood to write. I have been keeping up with me favourite blogs, though haven't managed to do much commenting either.

So, a few updates. T hasn't really moved on much. On the surface she mostly appears okay, is functioning normally, and has cut back a lot on alcohol (she was drinking daily). But she says she is still in love with the idiot guy and described him at one point as an addiction.

A couple of times I have felt our friendship has been threatened by how she feels. Once, she said I sounded disapproving in a phone conversation with her of her wish to stay friends with him, and said if I couldn't support her we might have to talk about whether we could remain friends. We got past that, and on another occasion after she had said she didn't think she could cope with how she felt much longer, I suggested she see her doctor and get referred to a psychologist (which she was referred to a year or two ago for self esteem issues, but because of an admin error never had an appointment). She texted "Goodbye" to me, saying that a doctor can't fix everything and can't stop you loving someone. She went AWOL on me for a week or two then sent a text which said simply "sorry". She occasionally mentions how awful she still feels but I haven't had to play counsellor too much since then, so I think maybe she is aware of how draining I was finding it. She did send me a lovely note at Christmas thanking me for keeping her going and it was nice to know she appreciates me. Despite everything we have had some really fun times over the past few months, when hopefully she has managed to forget him briefly and enjoy herself.

As for me, there have been no more dates. I am still a member of eHarmony but rather inactive. I have hundreds of matches I haven't even looked at. I got really fed up with sending men questions and not hearing back from any of them. Surely one of them at some point has to find me interesting? And I don't think I have been attracted to a single man who has sent me questions. Some are much older than me, others have been really overweight, which I really don't find attractive, others just sound plain boring.

I feel as if I have reached the point where I just can't be bothered. I haven't cried about being single for a long time. I'm not sure I've even felt particularly sad. But I'm not really happy and content with it either. I just don't really seem to feel anything. Have I become really hard? Have I lost the ability to feel sadness about something that I have been sad about for years? I still fantasise about what it would be like to be in a relationship which I think means I still want to be in one, so why am I am not pushing myself to do something about it?