Proving yourself with people from your past

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passionatebach
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03 May 2010, 12:10 pm

I had a recent situation in where a friend/acquaintance that I have known for 20 years came back into my life. The friendship with him has been kind of rocky over the years, not helped by his life circumstances and the 20 year off and and obsession that I have had with him.

One thing that I have noticed regarding our interaction is that I feel that I have to prove that I am a better person now, then the last time that met. I often have to mention everything that I am involved in, how my life has changed, etc. Part of the reason I think I do this is because of the obsession that I have had in past with him, he feels that I am getting to close and has rebuffed me in the past. In one way, I would like to let him know what I am doing today, on the other hand I feel that my interaction will lead down the above mentioned path.

Is anyone else guilty of doing this if you have an on again, off again friendship/relationship with somebody?



Chronos
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04 May 2010, 2:58 am

passionatebach wrote:
I had a recent situation in where a friend/acquaintance that I have known for 20 years came back into my life. The friendship with him has been kind of rocky over the years, not helped by his life circumstances and the 20 year off and and obsession that I have had with him.

One thing that I have noticed regarding our interaction is that I feel that I have to prove that I am a better person now, then the last time that met. I often have to mention everything that I am involved in, how my life has changed, etc. Part of the reason I think I do this is because of the obsession that I have had in past with him, he feels that I am getting to close and has rebuffed me in the past. In one way, I would like to let him know what I am doing today, on the other hand I feel that my interaction will lead down the above mentioned path.

Is anyone else guilty of doing this if you have an on again, off again friendship/relationship with somebody?


No.

But it does sound that keeping a bit of a distance would be best in this case.



zen_mistress
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04 May 2010, 4:57 am

I dont see that there is a need to prove yourself. Just meet up with him and tell him the things you are doing and involved in and how your life is now. If he sees you are happy he will realise you have moved on from being obsessed with him.


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passionatebach
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05 May 2010, 1:35 pm

I thank you for the responses. Part of my reason wanting to tell him these things is that we were close in late elementary school/ middle school. He basically lived with my family for a couple of years due to his homelife. But when I have tried to converse with him in the past, after awhile, I always get this "we can't be close friends anymore" lecture. That is not what I want, but just want him to know how my life is going.

Since the contact was the acceptance of a friend request over Facebook, I am more than likely going to take the advice of people at my church and just remain virtual friends with him, but not say much right now. If he responds to me, I will respond in kind. The people at church also told me, that there will more than likely be a time and place to correspond with him in the future that is more appropriate than out of the blue.

I have trying for acceptance and acknowledgment from this person for years so I don't want to upset the apple cart. One final piece of advice that the people at church also gave me is that there must of been something that tripped his trigger on my Facebook or in my life, or he wouldn't of added me as a FB friend.