After a while, the other part of the threesome moved a few hours away for a job and though we spoke a lot at first, after a while I was out of sight and out of mind. I started to see things on Facebook that would perplex me. She would come to town and not bother to mention it. She would go out with mutual friends and I’d see pictures with her tagged in them. The worst was when I asked her what she was doing for her birthday because I wanted to treat her to dinner. She told me that she was spending it with family, but maybe we could go to dinner the following day. The following day came and went. I called her several times and left messages. She said she’d fallen asleep. That evening, I was on my Facebook page looking around and what do I see? Pictures from her “family” birthday celebration with none other than the “other third” in attendance. Although I tried not to let it bother me, it did. It felt like a slap in the face. First I was confused, then I was angry, then I was hurt. Still, I said nothing.
A few months later, she and I were talking on the phone. She was telling me about her new job, and she mentioned how busy she had been. I remember thinking that she couldn’t have been too incredibly busy; after all she’d been to town several times and had gone places with mutual friends, but hadn’t bothered with me in months. I wanted to call her out on it, but didn’t; thinking it wasn’t my place to question her activities. She could do what she wanted. I was upset about it, but as usual, I just stuffed it down deep and left it there. Another couple of weeks went by and she called to ask me a question that left me in awe at the sheer nerve of the request. She asked me to give her a baby shower. With every ounce of my being I wanted to say no, but I didn’t. I heard myself agreeing before I could believe what I was saying!
After the call was over, I remember sitting there trying to rationalize it to myself. Why me? Well, the other third was out of the country again. Was that it? Always trying to see the good in people, I decided she must not have anyone else she felt comfortable asking. She had family that was more than capable, but for whatever reason she didn’t seem to want to ask them to do it. During the time I was busy planning her baby shower, buying invitations, making up games, purchasing decorations and making party favors, I would speak to her once in a while. The conversations were usually about her shower and a little bit of small talk. The day of the shower came and everything went well, although I felt really uncomfortable. I didn’t know why; we’d been friends for years, but something just felt off. A week or so after the shower I finally figured it out…
…next…Frenemies part 2
soul posts 
I always find it interesting how hard it is to call people out on their abuse of us. I’ve never really been be able to do it.
It was something I had to not only learn, but practice as well. It’s still not something I find easy to do; however, being the empaths we are,often we can find ourselves surrounded by people who drain our energy. Unless we say something, they will continue to do so and take advantage of our propensity to want to make people happy. I dealt with this kind of thing from the same group of people for over 7 years. It’s not something that comes easily for me either, obviously. LOL