My Best Friend

My best friend is closer to me then family. My husband likes to call her his second wife, but in reality she is more like my second husband. She has done more for me, that is ever required from friendship. A few years back she moved to San Diego and there was never a doubt in our minds that our friendship would never changed. And it hadn’t. She has been with me from the first miscarriage, IVF, and losing the twins. When I knew something was going wrong with the twins, she was the first person I called from the hospital. Though I asked her not to come, she was on a plane. I had lost the first baby that night, but she arrived the next day. She helped me shower, she was my advocate with the nurse (Cheeks and I tend to not like to bother people), she changed me, combed out my hair, called friends etc… I had gotten an infection around 11pm the night before giving birth to the second baby; my husband left the hospital in the middle of the night to pick her up from my house. I always wanted her to be in the room with me while I was giving birth, I never thought she would have to witness this. I was bleeding a lot; I mean clumps of blood clots. She cleaned up the mess. I threw up for houses and she held the ‘puke cup” for me.

In SD she met and fell for a navy officer. He is wonderful and I am so happy for her (even though now she won’t be coming home). The same time I found out I was pregnant, she found out that he was going on deployment to the Middle East for 6 months. She was having a very hard time with it. She isn’t exactly military wife material. But…we had the excitement of the babies (one of which would be her godchild) and I would be there for her. She had me to complain to, cry to, etc… Him leaving was definitely one of the hardest things she has had to go through, she was filled with fear and loneliness. So I had to step up and be there for her like she has been for me for so many years.

Here is the problem. I can’t do it. I screen her calls. I know she is mostly calling for me; she is still being this wonderful friend. I feel as if I am abandoning her (and unlike myself she doesn’t have a strong support system). She is the second most important person in the world to me and all I want to do is let her know how much I care, how grateful for all she had done. But the whole thing feels so draining to me. And to be clear, she is NOT putting anything on me, she isn’t asking me for anything, she isn’t leaning on me, she just wants to shoot the shit. Knowing her as I do, she has no expectations either. This is all me. I feel guilty, I feel as if I can never repay her, and mostly I feel as if she can see right through me. I guess that is the honest thing, I am so not myself and she knows it (my husband can’t even come close to her insight). It is so friggen unbelievable how this one crappy event has completely altered everything about myself and the relationships I value. UGH!