A lot of times I have been labeled as being extremely "jealous" (even the word feels yucky to type!) but I would like to shed some new light on this. This is truly the ugly part of having favorites because I do, at times, feel "off the chart" feelings of fear, panic and possessiveness. I become the personified jealousy monster - the big, green, ugly villain with one eye and slimy goop arms, leaving a trail of sticky yuck behind me wherever I go.
This is not the kind of "jealousy" you feel about your friend's new car or house. It's really unfair that I have to use the same word to describe it because I believe the way I am using this word now has an entirely different context. It is not the same feeling you feel when you want something someone else has -rather, it is an overwhelming fear and panic, an anger over imagined or perceived betrayal.
Imagine the most extreme emotion you've ever felt in your whole life - the most crazy, fierce, off-the charts time that you were passionately happy, angry, sad, etc. Picture that moment. Do you have the moment? Get the exact moment in your mind! Now take that emotion and multiple it by 10. That's how strongly I feel almost every emotion every day. That's why there is so much bouncing around between extremes, because I am constantly trying to allow myself to feel my emotions while also greatly limit them. I am constantly trying to over-correct my feelings to make them "normal." I understand that I am off the charts. I am trying to get back on the charts. Even a "10" would feel calm to me.
Remember the BPD Lenses? Let's put them on. Here's what the view looks like:
My friends don't really know me or love me. They might think they love me but if they actually knew all of me, they wouldn't like me. Once they get to know me better, they will reject me. Anyone I love will leave me as soon as I feel safe and comfortable with them. My friends don't actually like being with me, they find me annoying and dramatic but they put up with me because they don't want to hurt my feelings. They feel I am a chore to hang out with. They will get tired of me and I will be rejected at any moment.
My brain already "knows" I will be rejected so it is looking for any moment to prove what it already believes to be true. When this filter is on your brain and a friend spends special time with someone else, your brain automatically fills in the blanks that you are being abandoned. This is not a conscious thought process - when the BPD lenses are on, this happens without even being aware.
I don't know if you've ever felt abandonment- true real abandonment, being truly alone. It is not like sitting alone in church or like when your husband takes a long vacation. It's not like a pain that you know will go away with time, it's an all-encompassing pain that you believe will never end. Abandonment is when
you wake up and everyone in the world is dead and it's only you alive. You get in your car and there is nobody on any street, not one animal or car moving. All is silent and deserted. You drive to a store and you only hear the hum of the lights because not one single person is there. You run frantically through the isles screaming for anyone but your noises echo from the ceiling in the empty building. You look desperately in the parking lot, scanning for any movement of anything - a person, an animal, anything - but all is completely still. You feel a sinking feeling in the pit of your stomach. You call someone, eager to hear someone -anyone- and it goes straight to voicemail. You call another person and another and another but no one answers. Your body begins to physically panic and your brain feels like it's going mad. You try to swallow but all your saliva feels stuck in your throat. You scream as loud as you can but your screams echo in the sky and no one can hear you because no one is there. Your body feels hollow and EMPTY. Dread overwhelms you and covers you from your head to your toes. There is no one there - you are completely alone.
I have felt this before, a lot of times. When a favorite person leaves, I feel this way every single day all day long, sometimes for months at a time. The feeling is more intense then I can even describe.
That's why I say this is not "just jealously" that we should "pray about." It is so much more intense than simply "needing attention" or feeling "the loss of a friendship." When a friend might possibly reject me, I am so so so afraid that I will have to feel this feeling of abandonment again. That feeling is worse than any other pain I can ever explain. The panic and emptiness is more overwhelming to my body than any physical torture I could ever imagine. I would do ANYTHING to never feel that feeling again. I avoid it at all costs. When my brain calculates there is a slight possible risk that a favorite friend might leave me, I feel thrown into a terrorized hysteria that I might have to go through that abandoned feeling again and I work to frantically avoid it.
It's like life is everyone living in the ocean together and everyone else is swimming fine, but you have drowned before so when you see a wave coming you can't ever tell if it is going to drown you again or not, so you automatically panic at every single wave. (which makes life exhausting because there are a lot of waves!)
When I feel "jealous" it is difficult to react normally and calmly because the pain it triggers is so intense. I work really really hard to accept the facts, to believe what people have told me is true, and I work excruciatingly hard to not overreact. But it is not easy and it is not automatic. My brain calculates "perceived risk" and fights me at every turn.
I have heard for twenty years what people tell me: People can love more than one person at a time. People can have multiple friends. Friends can hang out with other people and even be really close to them and yet still be close to you.
It's so hard for me to believe that is the truth because it is not the truth in my brain! In my brain, I take my love away from one person to give it to someone else. My brain is singular focused. In my sinful shaded heart, when I don't spend time with someone it's because I am purposefully rejecting them. That makes it difficult to accept that others are not doing the same to me.
I tell myself that what I feel is not the truth. I tell myself that my brain is scared of that empty hollow feeling and that is why I am being a psychotic green possessive monster. I tell myself that people can love more than one person at a time and my friends do love me and they are allowed to have as many close friends as they want. I try to convince myself they are not rejecting me or punishing me by showing love to another person. It is difficult to accept these statements as facts since my mind doesn't operate the same. I am working to believe this is the truth in my hearts of hearts but for now I am satisfied when I can even pretend it's true and not overreact.
This singular focus brain makes having favorites a "bad" thing when the friendship ends. When a favorite friendship ends, my life is in a state of emergency for an agonizingly long time. I feel that feeling of abandonment every moment I am awake. I feel an overwhelming emptiness like I am walking around without any internal organs. I believe that I might never smile or laugh ever again.
Each new favorite friendship I value more than the last and each new loss makes me believe I won't live through it. Each ending of a favorite person friendship brings a wave of suicidal thoughts and the belief that life can never feel complete again because no matter where I go or who I meet, there will always be an empty space where that person used to be.
It still feels this way. Honestly, I still miss my favorite boss who became my best friend and that was two and a half years ago! I still do feel an empty space where she used to be. I still do miss my favorite work friend in Tennessee who giggled with me non stop for eight hours straight every day. Each new favorite friend has something so diverse and exceptional to offer and each time, my brain tells me I will never ever have a friend exactly like this again. And that's not a lie - I will never have a friend exactly like that again - but there will be other friends! My brain argues back that I don't want any other friends, I only want that one particular friend. The passion with which I feel that I only want that one particular friend is what causes the problem.
But I am trying. I am not trying to not have a favorite, but I am trying to believe the truth about their motivations. I am trying to diversify my investments more. I am trying to remember that each new favorite friend brings a new light into my life, teaches me new things, and grows me in special ways. I want to remember how many wonderful people are in my life this year that I did not even know last year. When a friendship ends, I want to remember that in a few years I will have beautiful new friends and while they don't replace the empty spaces of the old, they somehow always create new spaces they fill.
I am thankful for the good, I still need to work through the bad, and I will try to change the ugly.
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