Friendship

“I am treating you as my friend asking you to share my present minuses in the hope I can ask you to share my future pluses.”  ~Katherine Mansfield

As most of you know, I use this blog as kind of a diary for me.  I am an incredibly open person, and there’s not much about myself that I don’t feel comfortable sharing.  I am good at keeping others secrets, but I really don’t have many secrets of my own.  I try to portray in this blog exactly how I feel, which includes the good, the bad and the, at times, ugly.  I don’t agree with people trying to sugar coat everything and trying to make their life appear perfect when it’s not.  I think that’s being insincere and fake.  I can understand how people that have blogs might not want the whole world knowing that they are having a hard time and might chose to only share that with close friends though.  However, that’s not how I work really.  Being overseas, I often don’t get to talk to my friends at home for weeks at a time.  We’re on completely different schedules, we all have busy lives and it’s hard to find the right time to call.  So I use this blog to keep them up to date on what’s going on in my life.

“The rule of friendship means there should be mutual sympathy between them, each supplying what the other lacks and trying to benefit the other, always using friendly and sincere words.”  ~ Cicero

My friends at home and in the States are amazing.  Although I rarely get to talk to them, if I truly NEED to talk to them, they are always available.  They are supportive and nonjudgmental and always make me feel better about whatever is bringing me down.  If I write a “downer” blog, these people truly know me and always send their love and encouragement and make me feel 10x’s better, even from across an ocean.  I realize that I have an amazing life and I am truly blessed in pretty much every area possible.  But that doesn’t mean that I don’t hit bumps in the road occasionally.  Usually those bumps in the road involve a separation from Mark.

The last time Mark was TDY, I had a really rough time.  Really rough.  I was miserable and I was trying to deal with emotions that I don’t really have to deal with unless Mark is gone, and I don’t have much practice with Mark being gone, so I’m still learning.  My unhappiness was reflected in my blog, and most of my friends were very supportive and helpful, which I truly appreciate. All of my friends, except for one.

One of my “friends” wrote me an email telling me I was depressed, had severe anxiety, was mentally unstable, was endangering my husbands life by talking to him about how I felt, and was providing an unhealthy environment for my daughter and I needed to get on medication.  Mind you, her only contact with me for the past few YEARS has been through my blog and on Facebook.  When I tried to talk to her about my point of view on it all she said something like “Well I can see we’re not going to agree on this so I’ll just un-friend you and stop reading your blog.”  …. ?  Okay…  I couldn’t imagine saying that to someone I thought was depressed and had severe anxiety, but obviously she and I are two very different people.

“Real friendship is shown in times of trouble; prosperity is full of friends.”  ~Euripides

I’m telling you all of this because Mark is going TDY again in November.  So fair warning, my blog posts MIGHT have a different tone next month, and if that’s going to bother you, instead of sending me hate-mail, just do me a favor and don’t read them.  I really think this time will be different than last time was though.  I have quite a few people here that I feel comfortable talking to now, Abbie goes to the babysitter twice a week so it’s not me and her 24/7 for 2+ weeks straight (which by the way, would probably put ANYONE over the edge), and I have LOTS of stuff to keep me busy, including the crud tournament!  But what I’m feeling is what I write, and that’s not going to change.

To those of you who have been amazing friends (you know who you are), I don’t know what I’d do without you!  I’m hoping to get to spend time with ALL of you when I’m home next year!  You guys are the best.  And to those of you that I don’t know in person, only though the blog-o-sphere, but have been supportive also, thank you!  Sometimes a kind word from a stranger is just what one needs!

~We need people in our lives with whom we can be as open as possible.  To have real conversation with people may seem like such a simple, obvious suggestion, but it involves courage and risk.”  ~Thomas Moore