Walk On Podcast Episode 74 : Fake Friends

Fake friends are like a puncture wound. Remove the screwdriver from your thigh and you might cause more damage—but leave it in and that shit’s never gonna heal. Also, you probably need professional help to really recover cuz, baby, that shit is rough.

Toxic friendships are one of those universal situations that most people experience at one time or another in their lives. They are so common in people who are assigned and socialized “female” that it has become a stereotype for women to not like their “friends” at all. When something is so pervasive that it starts to feel like a naturally occurring phenomenon, it feels impossible to unpack, to correct, and to heal.

Toxic people all seem to read from the same playbook. Things start off heavy on the flattery, fast with the commitment, affection, near constant communication, they quickly become an overwhelming presence. Then comes withdrawal which lays the groundwork for a trauma bond—love-bombing combined with discarding, bread-crumbing, intermittent abandonment, hoovering, gossip, triangulation, gaslighting. It all becomes a delicate dance designed to keep a victim addicted to the approval, the attention, the conditional affection of this seemingly all-powerful puppet master.

Think of Regina George from the 2004 Tina Fey classic Mean Girls. Regina doesn’t have a single genuine connection throughout the entire film. She has minions. She has victims. She has sources of what is called “narcissistic supply”—ranked hierarchically based on who gives her the most valuable energy based on things like social status, loyalty, attention, love, or even sex (in the case of her boyfriend and side-piece). She is a tyrant who rules with an iron fist. She is more feared than liked, but either way it leads to a kind of celebrity status in her school and in her every day life. Even her parents seem to fear her. Being close to her offers a kind of popularity by osmosis, but like Icarus and the sun, get too close to Regina, and you’re probably going to get burned. Anyone who cares about her is subject to brutal discard, ridicule, and gossip. She doesn’t seem capable of vulnerability, loyalty, or love. We come to learn she is insecure, lonely, and, deep down, quite sad.

Have you ever had a friend like that? Obviously Regina George is beefed up and exaggerated for entertainment purposes, but I have certainly known my fair share of toxic friends that shared many of her traits and most people who have dealt with complex-ptsd fueled codependency can probably say the same.

When you grow up in an abusive, demanding, withholding household as a child, you never learn what a healthy relationship looks like. It takes a long time and a lot of conscious work to untangle healthy love from toxic love. This untangling often comes at the price of experiencing unhealthy relationships enough times that you learn what red flags to watch out for—but there is some re-wounding that happens, unfortunately. CPTSD can cause us to ignore red flags that a healthier person would know to steer clear of.

I remember in some of my most toxic relationships, I felt really special. I felt like the ‘mean girl’ whisperer. I was the only person who could get close to these tough, harsh, forked-tongued, chaotic women with emotional walls of steel. I was the exception to the rule. I was the one who was safe from their ridicule, their bullying, I was the only person they really liked and respected. Until I realized I wasn’t.

You see, toxic people try it with everyone. Anyone who has boundaries, who is turned off by their abrasiveness, who doesn’t fall for their flattery, who sees through the persona and finds them disingenuous is deemed unfit for pursuit. They are looking for someone who is attracted to the power they possess, someone who feels the need to earn their place beside them, someone who feels unworthy of them, someone without boundaries, who is down to clown*.

* become totally enmeshed

A series of conscious or unconscious tests commences wherein-which maybe they throw you a backhanded compliment and see what you do with it. Maybe they play a game where they abandon you to see how you respond (do you ““ReSpEcT their need for space”” or do you indulge them and chase them?). Either way they hold your actions over your head for future control. “Remember when you didn’t respect my space?!” Orrr “How could you not fight for me?!” Maybe they demand you choose them over an opportunity or another friendship or relationship or even your own damn well being. The harder you work to keep them, the more fit you are to be their Gretchen Wieners friend.

At my most codependent, I found myself really going to bat for these Fake Friends (I had many over the course of my teens and 20’s). They would try to steal my partners, I would sweep it under the rug. They would belittle my achievements, I would take that to mean my achievements weren’t that great and I would set out to do better. They would make fun of my weight, I would eat less. They would offend everyone we knew, I would do damage control or defend them. They would start drama, I would finish it. I was like Olivia Pope to these egregious fucking assholes— constantly cleaning up their messes. (I literally once cleaned up a girl’s apartment she had moved out of after she straight-up bailed for better plans (I had never lived there!!!!!) while one of her friends/roommates stood over me (not helping) while making fun of me for being a professional maid at the time “the way you’re bent over scrubbing that tub* reminded me you do this for a living!” (Please don’t judge me, baby needed therapy BAD!!!!)

*the tub was disgusting

I look back and my heart breaks for younger me, especially in the moments of deep pain that lead to clarity. Like all the times a mutual friend would come to me to tell me something horrible my ‘best friend’ had said about me. Or, long after the friendship was over, all the good, kind people who I got close to who told me they never gave me a chance because of the company I kept. Or all the smear campaigns that were run on me where nothing I ever said in confidence, in the trust of the sanctuary of that friendship, was ever held sacred—not my trauma, not my fears, not even my skills or talents, not my insecurities, not my secrets. All of it was fair game and laid bare for anyone who would listen. Boy, howdy, the lies that were told on me which ruined my life as a knew it in those moments!! I had careers destroyed, relationships destroyed. That’s not even to mention the deep abandonment of all the times I would really need my friend to step-up for me in some small measure of the ways that I had for them time and again and was rejected or left hanging. The eye rolls when I was upset, the constant scrutiny and criticism, the harsh vibe they projected out that I was annoying and a burden. The slow, simmering resentment if I happened to garner some attention or do something well. The passive aggressive silent treatment for days or weeks or months if, unbeknownst to me, I stepped out of line. The guilt trips, the betrayals, the emotional turmoil. The constant making fun of me. The hours of listening to them talk about the same asinine bullshit hour upon hour and, when it was my turn to talk, the absolute lack of interest. The drama!!!!

One day, it started to dawn on me that, to quote Tyler Perry, “I could do bad all by myself.” With no energy and a strong desire for no one to want anything from me, I withdrew. I faced my subconscious fear of being alone by letting myself be alone. In that time of hibernation, I considered, for the first time ever, what I actually wanted and needed in a friendship. I integrated the lessons I’d learned about that I didn’t want. I found my boundaries and I began laying them. I started taking it slow and getting to know people before I enmeshed with them. I stopped enmeshing all together. I walked away from anyone who clearly meant me harm. I blocked, deleted, unfriended, unfollowed. I welcomed in reciprocal, healthy love of all kinds. I had less friends, but the ones I had were of the highest caliber—honest, autonomous, loving people who had no ulterior motive but to love and be loved by me. It changed everything.

You deserve love. You deserve reciprocity. You deserve respect. You deserve safety. You deserve it all. Don’t sell yourself short. Listen here // watch here.

Happy healing.

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