Band-Aid

I don’t know when it was that I developed the APD. When it was that I retreated back into myself and refused to ever put myself out there for others to hurt.
Maybe it was when my mom left me at the age of 3? And never had much to do with my life after that?
I saw her maybe twice a year if it was a good year. This year, I didn’t even get a Christmas present, but rather a Christmas call that I couldn’t take because I was in roaming at my family’s place.

Maybe it was when my Best Friend of all time, my ‘Soul Sister’ of sorts, dumped me. I like to think I’m no longer bitter, I like to think that it doesn’t sting my heart a little every time I think about her, or her words that, or what has transpired since to make such a great friendship so DOA.

But I am all of those things I like to think that I’m not. I hurt when I think about her, it stings my heart just to remember. And I hate it. I hate that after all this time, I still remember how we traveled the treacherous road that is High School together, and started becoming who we are today together.

I remember when we met in Band in 9th grade.. Neither of us particularly like playing flute, therefore we weren’t all that great at it. We sat together at the last chairs… and talked, and joked, and generally enjoyed each other’s company. I remember the first night I spent the night over at her house. She told me how the year before, she’d spent every Friday night with her family, starting with grocery shopping with her mom, and then sitting around watching a dumb movie or two. And as a High School freshman, there is nothing more embarrassing than spending that much time with your family. I mean, you love them, but spending that much time with them? Generally goes unmentioned.

We quickly became like sisters, spending many nights together, having fun, laughing and being stupid. She wasn’t allowed to date until she was 16, and desperately hated this. I couldn’t get a boyfriend, with my skinny (skiiinny) body, and shy temperament. We were both lonely, and shared our secrets with each other. Clung to each other, instead of boys.

We grew older, our group grew into a group of 4, but we stayed closer than the others. When neither of us had a date for 10th grade Prom, like both of our friends had, we spent the night together and had more fun that we’d had before. We were motivated to not let the lack of a date to Prom get us down. We went to church with each other the next morning. Of anyone I knew, she was my motivation for being a ‘Good Christian’. She, in my mind, was the model of great Christianity, and I was inspired by her faithfulness and consistency.

The next year, I suppose I grew into my shape a little more, more guys started noticing me. I started talking to a few of them, then I entered into what I call my “Promiscuous Phase”. I lost my virginity to a guy I didn’t even like, I did things that I wasn’t proud of at the time, and still am not particularly proud of, but I don’t regret them. I was sick of living a ’safe’ life, and living by the rules; I wanted to learn my own lessons, and wanted to make my own mistakes. I spent my Junior year spring with a guy that I kind of can’t stand, and barely couldn’t at the time; a guy who didn’t respect me, because I didn’t respect myself. I spent and entire summer with Mr. Heart-Break, drinking and making risky mistakes, and then learning from them.

That spring, on a track team trip back home, in the dark, I made out (heavily) with guy I can’t stand. My friend heard I was being a slut, and said, “Come up here. Now”

Now, bear in mind, she was my best friend. My confidant, and I’d told her nothing about what’d I’d really been up to. This was the first time she’d encountered this behavior from me, and she was flabbergasted.

I told her that I was having fun, doing my own thing. She said that what I was doing was wrong, and I went back to making out.

We remained good friends, her silently tolerating my behavior. Until summer, when she went off to Crazy-Christian-Brainwash you-Camp. She was supposed to spend a huge majority of the summer there because she was a counselor, and I knew I was going to miss her terribly. I had planned on sending her mail, so she could have something to look forward too. I planned on visiting her when it was okay for visitors to go out there. It was going to be one lonely summer.

Then a week after she’d arrived, and I hadn’t heard from her at all, I received a call. I was so excited to hear from her, but she didn’t sound as enthused. She told me that being there made her realize that she can’t be friends with me any more. She couldn’t be friends with people that don’t support her beliefs and help her grow. She couldn’t be friends with me. She said that when I wanted to “come back to Jesus”, that she’d be there waiting for me.

So, she dumped me, just like that. Dumped our friendship, our sincere, mutual respect for each other, right down the drain. As if it’d meant nothing.

I sat in my room after talking to her stunned. How could she do this? How could she just pretend like we hadn’t been friends for years, and just forget us as sisters, as best friends, and turn us into nothing.

I was hurt, deeply. But I wasn’t going to let it slow my fun down. I mean, she said that when I wanted to come back, I could. So, I figured I’d get it out of my system, have a great summer and then get back into things when school started back up.

And I did. I got my heart broken that summer, and I didn’t have a best friend to talk to about it with. I didn’t have some to gush to, I didn’t have someone to help wipe my tears away, because she told me she couldn’t (didn’t want to) be a part of my life.

Before our senior years started back up, I really tried to be a ‘good Christian’. I really tried, and I thought I’d succeeded. I felt a ‘change’ in me, and when I felt I was ready enough to meet her expectations, I emailed her. Told her that I felt I’d ‘come back’, that I truly felt changed, and that if she and I would like to talk, that’d be cool.

She emailed me back saying, “Well, you say that you’re back to Church and all that, but I don’t know that I can believe you. You’ll have to prove it to me.”

I have never wanted to punch someone as much as I wanted to punch her right then and there. Who in the HELL was SHE to judge ME?! Who was she to act superior to me. I told her I had changed, that I’d come back to the church, why wouldn’t she believe me?! And, by the way, isn’t it ..you know…NOT the job of anyone but ‘God’ to pass judgment on others? Because, doesn’t it say somewhere in the bible that only he can see that into their hearts?

I was so appalled, so thoroughly disgusted that I knew I didn’t want to have anything to do with her ever again. I gave her back all of her stuff that I had, and told myself that I’d never have such a hypocritical bitch as my friend.

It was a hard senior year, all of my friends throughout high school were all like she’d been. They didn’t want anything to do with me, and therefore I wasn’t going to surround myself with them.

I had one friend my entire senior year. And even her, I couldn’t stand. She wasn’t very smart, she wasn’t very giving as friends go, she was manipulative and selfish. But she was all I had. I reasoned that as long as I could make it through my senior year, I’d never have to talk to any of them again.

The next spring, the semester before Graduation, I was in a class with a guy who was best friends with B’s brother.
This will kind of be difficult to explain, but B had recently become an Atheist, and he was talking to his brother about it. His brother had talked to his friend, and he in turn talked to me. It was all one be 6 degrees of separation of questioning the existence of a god.

There were other things that went into play that made me question. J, my ex-best friend, had been such a source of all things good and Christian, and here, she’d not only let me down, but felt justified to do so. My dad was a big Christian, and he’d trusted that ‘God’ would provide for him, for us, but then I was the one working 30 hours a week while going to school. It was all a huge domino effect that led to me questioning everything I’d ever learned.

I don’t want anyone to think that I decided to become an atheist because of her, or even because of my dad. The fact of the matter remains that they all led me to question my beliefs, and I didn’t come out a believer on the other side. Their behavior had very little to do with the outcome.
I was happy that I was no longer racked with guilt that somehow her decision was my fault. I was no longer regretful for what I’d done the summer before, because everyone makes mistakes, but if you’re a good friend you’re going to wait patiently for me to come back to my senses. You can’t stop me from making the mistake, but you can love me after I’ve learned from it.

And I did, I learned more from my ‘Promiscuous phase’ than I ever expected to.

I wish APD was something you could conceivably trace back to a certain starting point, and maybe if you’re educated in that area you can, but I can’t say for sure what started the APD in my mind. Maybe J had something to do with that, maybe she had nothing to do with it at all.

All I know is that losing her, seeing her for who she really is, has made me a smarter, stronger person. I now don’t have any patience for people who tell me I’m doing the wrong thing, and I won’t let them.
If you’re my friend, you love me for who I am; if you’re not, then you don’t have a whole lot of business hanging around.
I love who I’ve become, I love my life now, and I think she had a lot to do with that, no matter in what direct or indirect way.

I met with her before she left for college in California, and I told her that I was an Atheist now, after almost a year and a half of not talking. She was shocked. Literally, her mouth was hanging open. She apologized, she felt guilty. And I told her that, No. There’s no need to apologize now. I was happy, I felt like I’m the better person, and I couldn’t be happier with where I was. I think this shocked her even more.

We still talk, we still occasionally exchanged polite, but forced (at least on my part), words. I still hurt from losing someone that meant so much to me, but I don’t regret anything that I did. I don’t think she can say the same. Today, writing is my temporary band-aid. Helping me soothe, if for a short while, the pain of losing a great friendship.
But at the same time knowing that I am so much better off, I’m so much healthier now. And I’m healing slowly, trying to break out of the walls that losing her caused me to build.

I have to tell the truth, I’m nervous to post this. I know a lot of you don’t agree with my beliefs, and I know that it is inevitable that posting this will alienate some. But it’s never been who I am to tippy-toe around a subject or situation just because it might make some uncomfortable.
I am happy with who I am, and even though some people might not like who I am, I think it’s the prerogative of a happy, mature adult to be who they are, unabashedly.

So, that’s what I’m doing.