Hives

Today I had a very good friend start a conversation with, "I was going to stop being friends with you."
I broke out in hives when she said those words, and instantly choked back tears.  The little voice in my head responded, "okay," but I didn't understand why she would think such an awful thing.

For the past two weeks my friend has been different, and I have been trying to figure out what happened, but I couldn't put my finger on it. I scoured over conversations to find if there was some detail that I was forgetting. I sent messages to no avail.  I tried to make plans, nothing.  Did I say something sarcastically that was interpreted wrong?  Did I forget plans?  Did I hug her husband too affectionately?  I couldn't think of a single thing I had done.

I asked her what was wrong and she shared the details of my transgressions (after two weeks of the cold shoulder).  As it turns out, she had misinterpreted some things and not talked to me about them.  Mostly, she admitted, it was all in her head.

In my head I saw another friend slipping away.
I saw her husband, someone I call my best friend, disappearing.
In my head, her beautiful children whom I love very much were being taken from me.

I cried for about an hour in the bathroom at work.  I was so blotchy and red that my co-workers were concerned.  I tried really hard to keep my sadness in, but I couldn't.

Today was one of those really bad days, the ones where nothing goes right, and things suddenly take a catastrophic turn for the worst.  I thought the time tested life pattern of loved ones abandoning me was happening again.

I cried at work, one of the worst places to cry.  I cried so hard I was sweating, and I almost threw up.  My friend and I are fine, but I can't shake the feeling from earlier, the worst feeling, the feeling I loathe more than most, the feeling of being expendable.  The human mind and body can take some pretty serious torment and become accustomed to some fairly grueling conditions, but the feeling of being tossed aside, that is something I will never adapt to.  Even just close calls, they hurt like the real thing.

Loving people can be hard, because you can't control how they love you in return, and I swear, that is one of the hardest things I have ever had to learn.