The Great Divorce by @mrsflinger
Sure, I know CS Lewis wrote some crap about the division of the church and BLAHBLADYBLAH. But that wasn’t about ME.
And people? IT IS ALWAYS ABOUT ME.
I’ve recently become part of a divorced couple. Not with Mr. Flinger, no no, we’ll kill each other before we try to split our assets, both of them, but with a group friend. It was a somewhat dysfunctional family, sure, with her and I as the two on opposite sides of most deep topics, but the children have spent the past three years growing up together (which constitutes 90% of their short lives thus far) and the group has endured babies, miscarriages, cancer and other life-altering news.
And then? It just fell apart.
Apparently because of me.
I won’t delve in to stupid details, all of which you’ll be getting from my view (see truth #1: IT IS ALL ABOUT ME) but the short version is that one fourth of the group decided she couldn’t be around me and I took it personally and cried a lot and we are left to split our assets.
Both of them.
The children don’t understand. “Why can’t I see my friend anymore? We don’t ever play with them anymore. Why? Can I draw her a picture?” I try to tell her it’s not her fault. “They’re just really busy.” But I feel a guilt and a pain knowing a truth, a stupid ridiculous truth: we’ve been divorced.
It hurts, I won’t lie.
It’s awkward now, the other two ladies left to try to be friends with us both. It’s hard for them to be in the middle. We talk about holidays, how will we share the group? One weekend at my house, one at hers. It’s Jr. High. It’s a crazy replay of life 23 years ago. It’s a painful projection of how horrible life would be if someone you loved stop loving you back.
It sucks.
Have you dealt with a friend divorce? How? When? Was there a wake of children in the mess? Other friends? Mutual hangouts?
I don’t really know what to do, honestly. I’ve always moved often enough to never face a long friendship coming to an end.
And the children! MY GOD THE CHILDREN.
I find myself begging, “Can’t we just get along enough to let the children be together? Comon.”
I don’t know if we can. I hope we can be amiable, but it takes two. And right now my divorce attorney is talking to her attorney and I don’t know where this all goes later.
But god, I hope it goes soon.
Divorce sucks. However it is.
19 Responses to “The Great Divorce by @mrsflinger”
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Author: Mrs. Flinger
@kaisermommy celebrates THIRTY
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Yes, I totally have. My friend of 10 years or so decided she wasn’t going to talk to me anymore. When we are are the same functions, we ignore eachother completely. We’ve even sat down at the same table and not looked at one another. It’s ridiculous. And sad.
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This has happened to me…and my son and my friends’ son were close. Very close from the time they were babies…and she recently decided to not let her son come to my son’s 11th birthday party. He’s heartbroken, but I guess that’s life. I wish she could find a way for the boys to still be friends…but sometimes kids have to learn life’s hard lessons way too early.
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I totally understand. 2 of my closest friends stopped talking/texting/emailing me in October. They are friends with the entire group of peeps I was friends with. I haven’t talked to any of them since October. NONE of them will call me or text me or freakin’ Facebook me. It’s been 4 months. I’m ok now, but at first it really sucked. Who am I kidding, it still SUCKS. They were my entire friend community. Now I spend a lot of time with family and trying to find new friends. It’s so high school, I need to get over it and move on.
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Wow, with friends like that, who needs enemas?
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Sigh. Yes, I’ve been there. Although I guess I was lucky because it didn’t involve my kid’s feelings getting hurt too. But it sucked nonetheless.
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It’s happened to me a couple of times, and it never hurts any less. And I still, to this day, don’t know why it happened in either case. But I now also believe that, when these things happen, life’s too short…meaning, if they were true friends, they would do everything in their power to make it work.
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yeah, it’s happened to me alright. I decided that I just couldn’t deal with her drama anymore. But, I do try to see if her kids and mine can hang out through her husband. Our daughters grew up together and I would HATE to see them not speaking because of us.
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Oh, that has happened to me more than once with my best friend. Her daughter and my oldest daughter have been best friends since second grade. We have always let them play together no matter what our situation was. On again/off again. Whatever. It’s not their fault and they shouldn’t be held accountable.
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Funny how the closer you get to someone the greater the divide once something goes awry. Even worse, more than likely both parties are uncomfortable and would prefer the issue to be resolved but don’t know how or want to initiate.
Does it sound like I have experience in the matter? I do.
Good luck!
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Oh yeah, the friend divorce. This I know well and recently. There weren’t any kids involved, but it hurts enough as it is.
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Ugh. I have had a once-close friend just stop talking to me. I can guess why, but I wish she’d had the balls to tell me instead of failing to respond to my messages. ;(
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I think we’ve all had those divorces and…they suck. I went through one last year with kids involved. At the time, Cam was really upset, but now she’s almost forgotten them (the beauty of her still being young). I still have things of hers and vice versa and I’m sure we’ll exchange them one day, but it makes me sad.
What’s worse is that it’s not the only friend divorce I’ve been through in the last few years. *sigh*
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You know where I stand on this one. And yes, there is another side to the story. Pity that some folks are unwilling to come to the mediation table. How about redirecting with some sassy East Coast pen pals? Or do kids just skip straight to Skype these days?
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Yes. I divorced a college friend, but remained very close with the other three girls in our Gang of 5. There are occasional efforts to get the group back together, but after close to 15 years I’m over it. I don’t even remember the specifics of what led me to finally break things off with her. But I do remember that in the end she turned out to be a horrible friend, so I was better off without her. Still am. I hope you get things worked out with your situation, though. That sounds super awkward.
@charmedimsure
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I went through this about 4 years ago with my oldest friend in the world. We met in high school and, as we got older, she moved to the right as fast and as far as I moved to the left.
We made our differences into some interesting discussions, but she could never stop trying to convert me. To her politics. To her faith.
I ignored her preachy forwards from her church pastor. The sappy Religious miracle urban legends went to my laptop’s trash can. Just water off a duck’s back.
Then, in the last presidential campaign, I drew the line. I would not stand by as she and her husband harassed me with emails full of ignorance and stupidity. I didn’t care if they didn’t like my candidate. I respected thir right to their opinions and the power of their votes. But I didn’t appreciate the mean-spiritedness and gate these “Christians” dumped on me week after week.
I told them that, for every email they sent me assailing my candidate, I would make a donation IN THEIR HONOR to my candidate of choice.
That stopped it and I haven’t so much as had a birthday or Christmas card since.
Fortunately, we lived far enough and our kids were far enough in age that they’ll never remember this friend. However, we’ve had some awkwardness with friends since my divorce. The kids now see certain friends with mommy and others when they’re with their dad.
Is it possible for the kids to co-mingle at a communal event/ activity where you and the former friend can avoid each other?
You’re right. There’s no escaping jr. high.
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My son had two best friends all the way through preschool. Suddenly at the end of the last year of preschool, one of the moms started cutting everyone off. Avoiding play dates, saying they couldn’t make it to birthday parties, etc. Then they didn’t register their son at for kindergarten at the same school (our school has preschool, kindie and elementary).
They live just down the road from us. Our boys were best friends for two years. I also have no clue what to tell him when he asks over and over again why he can’t play with his friend. It is heartbreaking and seems petty.
Sigh.
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Oh yes. Did this a little over a year ago. It was painful. And it was hard. Thankfully the kids were young and had tons of other friends. It was just hard for me to having to start all over and to deal with the awkwardness of mutual friends. I chose not to talk about it; she chose to talk about it…to everyone. Like another reader said, it was very high school. Anyway, have been rebuilding the girlfriend network, and now it’s not so bad. One thing it does do is make you be very, very cautious about who trust around your kids. Yeah, divorces always suck.
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What suckage. I have two friends who did this to each other about 3 years ago. There was always the three of us, ever since high school, now I am friends with both of them they are totally divorced. So I just don’t invite either of them to most events…so I don’t have to choose. Sucks. I’m sorry for your loss. Well, really, since I think you are the BEES KNEES, it’s HER loss.
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Absolutely, and it feels like your fault, when really? It probably isn’t. I had a good blogging friend, we were close, and she went apeshit on me and that was that. We are done. So.
My best friend from high school dumped three of us a few years back. I hadn’t seen her in years, but we did talk once in a while. She hasn’t been in touch with any of her friends from school. And at first, you wonder, what did I do?
But you know what? It gets easier. If you did it, sometimes, people forgive. And sometimes they don’t. You have to just move on.
I think you’re awesome. And you can still totally lick me, baby!
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