I think when you become friends, began dating and knowing people you will be around often (work, friends, etc.) that one of your first acts should be to give a list to the other your side effects. Openly and honestly.

You can do the “Hi I am Sam, I’m a Virgo, I am a bit OCD, I hate it when you fold napkins the wrong way in fact, when we are preparing for people to come over if they aren’t folded right I may have a breakdown and end up in the state hospital again. I love unicorns and puppies and I put mustard on my popcorn.”

See? Simple! Hahahahaha

Ok I know it isn’t that easy but you can tell people about yourself.

I understand that you don’t want to give away all of your crazy up front, no need to run them off, but it is fair to tell people about you. For example, say if you spend a lot of time together in any capacity that you’re on medication for seizures, heart issues, because you sometimes here the dust mites chattering away. Those are kind of important things to share if you are sharing chunks of time with someone. What if you have a reaction or need medical attention with your friend? This is crucial information to share.

Later you can tell them about how you don’t always answer your phone or how you only go out every 3rd day. Again not sharing all the oddities right away but building up to it. That is fine as long as it doesn’t involve say body parts stored in the freezer or a fetish for hurting others.

We all have oddities and things we do that may annoy, irritate or frighten others depending on what it is. And by frighten I mean that it could be something small or something pretty big that you need to get out there.

People have patterns. You can only “pretend” to be a certain way for so long unless you’re like that chick in that book/movie “Gone Girl” or that dude in “The Talented Mr. Ripley” or “Catch Me if you can”.

Not that there aren’t  people out there like that but to me that’s more extreme. I have met quite a few people that are very adept at “hiding” parts of who they really are. They can be quite persuasive and manipulative. It’s a fascinating thing to watch and scary at the same time.

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If someone you become friends with suddenly becomes a close talker and a bit too much into your personal life, you have to look back and see that the signs were there, she was just refraining from being her true to not scare you off. Can you live with that as a friend? Do you approach her about it? Do you slowly back away and disappear?

I handled this with the “heyyyyy friend, you are all up in my personal space. I like you and respect you but you need to understand my life is mine and I will share a lot with you but you don’t need to research or “assume” things because you will most likely be wrong and make me mad. Ask me. If it’s too personal I will tell you as much and we can move on.” And yes, I am still friends with this person!

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What if you’ve been friends with someone and suddenly the don’t seem to answer the phone as much as they once did? You still hang out but the whole answering the phone when you call doesn’t happen as much. They still call you occasionally to make sure plans are in place (after you’ve left messages) but they just don’t take your calls. Do you get mad or confront and/or accept it?

I am seriously referring to several of my super close inner group of friends. The truth is we all love each other and hate to talk on the phones at times. Not that we won’t go for a marathon or sometimes just 5 minutes. I just Asked if I had done anything wrong and when we talked, we realized that we had grown in our relationships and didn’t feel the Need to talk all the time.

Of course we still do talk, more so now that we aren’t living in the same state for some, but still not as much as some people feel people need to talk or it makes them not “friends”. **I don’t have/know of too many folks like this because I get irritated with the phone in general & if you feel like I have to talk to you every few hours or we aren’t being what you deem “friends” then you will have a problem with me! The only person that gets that much attention is the boy because he is mine and even then I tell him “mommy needs some time away from it all for just a few minutes” (and that usually leaves me hiding in the bathroom for only 10-15 minutes if he is distracted by playing or watching a movie!).

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Or you’ve been friends with someone and known each other a while. When you were younger you maybe drank together, and as you aged you went through stages of partying and both seemed to come out alive and ok. Then you notice they are drinking or on something because they are acting like they did when you partied together “back in the day” but this is no longer “back in the day” and you’re older and have responsibilities. Do you ignore it, accept it, confront them? Do you decide they aren’t worth it because “they know better”? Do you judge?

I can say I have done all of the above. And yes, there have been some regrets I admit.

In various stages of our lives we don’t always make the best decisions and then again sometimes it is for the best but may not feel like it them.

I know that I always talked to my friends before I did anything “rash”, well at least after about the age of 20! Before then I just didn’t understand people as well and what I could, would and could not tolerate.

I wish everyone well but I am sorry I can’t go down that rabbit hole with you. Sometimes some journeys are meant to go on alone. If you are very, very lucky you may get to see them again on this journey of life!

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What about the friends you make and some life event shakes you both up and you realize you have nothing more in common anymore but the time you have known each other?

You have years of being around this “friend” but nothing else anymore as this event has shown you the glaring differences in the core of who you both are.

And you realize, all along you saw the signs, the side effects. You Knew the words on the warning labels yet you chose to ignore them because you truly felt this friend was worth it.

That they would be there with you for the zombie apocalypse.

When the time came and the world as you know if fell apart, you both let each other down in some ways.

You never expected them to fall so far and when you confronted them, they tore you apart emotionally because they knew they couldn’t take away the core of the true you and that made them jealous because maybe, just maybe you were a stronger person than they were.

And if we are honest you are a bit less selfish than they were.

But you, in your ways of the thoughts of the universe, thought that just because they didn’t want to list their “side effects” to you out loud; that it was understood you both Knew and that you acknowledged it but also had expectations of them being Human and admitting their shortcomings as you admitted yours to them.

It didn’t happen.

You never know how things will end up. Maybe the spin around the sun will make you friends once more and maybe they will become someone you once knew.

So if we could just be honest and share the not so pretty side effects/warning labels about ourselves with each other, it would just make things so much easier, ya know?! It couldn’t hurt much!

What do I know? I’m just a chick that enjoys blogging about the thoughts in her head!

Have a Fabulously Graceless Sunday My Friends!

Fly your freak flag proudly!