Day 71 - Missing, Needing, Wanting My Girlfriends

Some folks choose to walk with me on my journey and others choose to walk away. I am sitting here today missing an old friend. We were friends for forty years and shared just about everything that was going on in each other's lives. Once she was married, we spent decades being a long drive or a flight away from each other. But that didn't stop us from being the best of buddies. We saw each other a couple of times a year and always made time for each other to get together, but it always seemed too short. Then, her hubby was transferred to the town where I was living and we had the chance to be in-town buddies. We both had high and happy expectations for what that would mean, but life had some other ideas in mind. Between one thing and another we drifted apart and the friendship became strained.

I never thought that what we were going through would end our friendship, but it did. Within just a year or so of her moving to town, things in my life got crazy, well make that crazier than usual. And she, of course, had her transitions to deal with and her own stuff to manage. We talked a lot about what each of us was going through. Maybe we each talked a bit more than we listened, or maybe our lives had really gone in different directions. I don't know. I just know that for me, life was really hard and complicated that one year. It started with the horror of  September 11 (I live in northern NJ), then my Dad's passing just two months later. I was meeting the needs of both my daughters (one of whom was back home after we removed her from a group home that just wasn't working out) as well as nurturing and enjoying a budding, but challenging, relationship with a man I eventually married. Add to that a recent divorce as well as the pressures of owning a business and geez. It just seemed like a lot. That year was intense and it was the next winter that I was diagnosed with fibro and I just wasn't the same anymore. I'm sure there are things I should have done differently, and I am not saying that I am without fault in the weakening of our friendship. That doesn't mean I don't miss my old friend.

I miss her friendship but I know I could never go back to it. Sometimes what's done is done. I sent a Christmas card last year and I wrote that we wish so many people a Merry Christmas, it doesn't seem right not to extend those wishes to you and your hubby this Christmas. I didn't hear a word back. That's what makes me really sad, that our decades of sharing and supporting and laughing with each other ended with such a thud. I know things could have faded away even if I didn't have fibro, but I do believe that all of the canceled dinners and get-togethers and all the plans that never materialized contributed to its end. I know that she was as excited as I was to be living near each other, but sometimes the expectation of how things will be doesn't match the reality and that's tough to accept. My life living with fibro is different than it used to be and I have a number of friends who have just faded away. I miss the dinners out with the girls or the times we just got together over a cup of tea. I miss having parties and company and I miss being the kind of friend that can do something on a moment's notice. If I want to have good friends I have to be a good friend. In my head and heart, I'm there, and very soon, the rest of me will be there, too.