Dear Prudence,
I’ve had a long-term childhood best friend. We’ve been friends since we were elementary school-aged, and given many of the personal challenges in her life, she progressed into being an undeniably toxic friend through most of our high school, college years, and a bit beyond.
Much of this stemmed from her jealousy over my family’s ample financial resources (she didn’t grow up poor by any means, but didn’t have many of the extravagances that I did). She engaged in stereotypical toxic behavior such as one-upmanship, gossiping, rumor spreading, discussing fluctuations in my weight, forming cliques and excluding me, boyfriend stealing, etc. I was a bit sheltered and didn’t have the emotional intelligence and confidence to deal with it very well at the time.
We are now in our mid- to late-thirties, and are married. We both have achieved many wonderful things in our life and she married a man whose finances are in line with what she’s always wanted. He’s allowed for her to have many of the extravagances she’s always craved, so that has perhaps settled some of her jealousy issues. Through our later adult years, I think she came to realize on some level that so much of her behavior toward me as a child wasn’t fair and she’s demonstrated remarkably generous gestures toward me (both emotional and financial) that have indicated she values our friendship deeply. I think she’s gone to therapy to address some of her issues, although I think there are still very many unaddressed issues lurking beneath the surface that I hope she’s still working to tackle. In the meantime, I’ve become better with boundary setting.
My issue is that I still feel a lot of deep shame around how I let her treat me growing up and am angry at myself for not cutting her off and giving her a piece of my mind when the time was right. Even though we’re still “very close friends,” (I was maid of honor at her wedding, she threw my baby shower, etc.), I find myself harboring deep anger and upset toward her and the faintest indication of a slight or toxicity. I know I should confront her directly when these things happen, but they’re usually minor and it’s only after many small slights that I realize she’s stepping back into some borderline toxic territory or taking me and our friendship for granted again. I don’t always feel emotionally safe in this friendship, but I can’t tell whether that’s due to my oversensitivity about the past. I have moments where I want to throw away this friendship, but then reconsider given our long history. Also, when our friendship is on track, it’s fun and satisfying. Do you feel this friendship is worth salvaging or is it time to distance myself once and for all?
—Confused Friend