Friend trying to drive wedge

[countrygirl]

Hello,

Am here to vent about the latest issue with one of my remaining NPD friends.   

First, yesterday was a day from hell.  One of those blanking cluster days when one thing after another went wrong.  My friend knew this too. 

This morning, I told her about some grumpy behavior on my husband's part.   I needed him to help me with something, and he did it with ill will.  I just needed to vent about it with a friend.  Well, my friend went ballistic!  She started cursing at my husband, saying it was misogynistic behavior (it wasn't), etc. In fact, she said that I should kick him out!!!  I would only tell someone that if her husband had been physically and/or emotionally violent, or had cheated on her, or had substance abuse problems  which they weren't addressing, etc.  In other words, something really bad.  If I told any of my friends to throw their partners out because they had been reluctant to help them with something, I would be telling everyone to ditch their partners!  I pointed out to her that he had been very helpful since I've been laid up, and that this was just one little incident.

Then, when I tried to change the subject, she angrily said, "I'm sorry!  I'm so angry about your husband that I'm going to go."  I told her that I had been really stressed out yesterday by all that had gone wrong, and had just needed to vent a little.  (I always listen to her problems.)  Then she said she was going to go vote and that we would talk later.  I was thinking that maybe once she got out and about she would calm down, and that then she would call, but no, that did not happen.  Now, I must confess, that I am having to restrain myself from calling her, in an effort to normalize everything.  But that is an impulse which I must resist, because how she treated me was not normal.

I spoke with another friend later in the day, who said her husband had often done the same thing, and who advised me NOT to call the NPD back. 

I just wish that I didn't have this impulse to make it "all better."

[notrightinthehead]

What a bewildering behaviour! Does not sound like you can expect to get emotional support from that friend. You might  move her from the friends to the  acquaintances list.

[countrygirl]

Hi notrightinthehead,

If you asked her, this friend would say I was her best friend!  Really makes you wonder, doesn't it?

Another friend tried to say that this woman was only angry "on by behalf."  But that wasn't it at all.  I wasn't especially angry at my husband, just a little annoyed. 

Well, so far, I have succeeded in my effort not to try to make things right.  It is humiliating that my first impulse is to try to gloss things over, when I wasn't the one who did anything wrong.  But that is what I was raised to do with my parents, so it still feels natural to me.   

[notrightinthehead]

It's possible to be angry on someone else's behalf. I have felt that way. But it was your turn to vent and her turn to listen and support. Not to vent herself.

[countrygirl]

Hi notrightinthehead,

I know what you mean.  I have felt angry on someone else's behalf too.  But my NPD friend was yelling AT me!  She has done this before when I have vented about problems.  I hate to say this, because it shows I am repeating a pattern, but my mother treated me the same way.  She would even become angry when I would get sick when I was a kid.  I think Ns sometimes become angry when faced with another's problems because:  1. They want all the attention, and 2. They know they're supposed to display some empathy.  Of course this ties in with what you said about it being my turn to vent!

[notrightinthehead]

Does not sound like she respects you, nor is she a supportive friend.

[countrygirl]

Hi notrightinthehead,

She respects me in some ways, but not enough.  Just as she supports me in some ways, but again not enough.   This friend can be a warm person "when she wants to be," but she does not have a great deal of patience. 

[clara]

Ohhhh...coutrygirl, I am well familiar with this behavior in my (now recently returned) NPD "friend."  I couldn't say anything remotely negative about my husband or other friends or family without him projecting all of his negative traits onto them, accusing them of doing something like what he would do.  He would exaggerate his "anger on my behalf" to the point where, even during that time I didn't know he was NPD, I recognized it as weird and inappropriate.  But I think driving the wedge is part of their agenda.  They want us to respond to and listen to them so they're more easily able to manipulate us.  Non-PD support systems threaten them, because those people might be able to point out what the PD is doing to you.  So the goal of the PD can be to get us to question our relationships, which in turn benefits them, even if its only because we're now responding to their feelings on the matter.   Something that really has nothing to do with them, they're capable of making about themselves (because see how you focused on this person's anger and how it affected you?!) 

Keep in mind that they're acting while over-reacting!

[SomethingElse]

I am so sorry your friend is not being a good friend right now. Unfortunately I dont know your friend full time like you do? If a person is consistently a good friend, than they would call you eventually to apologize for having some kind of outburst on their part. I know that this is what good friends do. They give themselves time to cool off and then they call back or visit and apologize. Good luck with your friend. And, I dont mean to sound trite, but there are a lot of wonderful new friends to be made out there. And this is coming from an introvert. 

[countrygirl]

Hi SomethingElse,

I just saw your reply.   Thank you!   Yes, indeed, there are lots of wonderful people out there.  It is sometimes easy to forget this, when dealing with someone not so wonderful who is still part of your life.  The friend about whom I was writing is a longterm friend, but she is a difficult person, and I am too tolerant of bad behavior.  One reason I post here is that writing about these situations helps clarify things for me, and the feedback helps validate what I'm feeling, and/or reminds me--as your post did--that "it doesn't have to be this way."