CurlySue
Brilliant_Rock
- Joined
- Apr 8, 2009
- Messages
- 792
OK, ladies... I need your wisdom. I apologize in advance for the length of this.
Backstory - one of my closest friends is getting married this fall. I''ve known her for over 15 years. She''s an incredible woman - brilliant, beautiful, fit, witty, spunky... I just love her to pieces and admire her in many ways. She got engaged this past winter to a man she dated for over 7 years (and lived with for 6 of them). She is in her early 30s, he is almost 40. Their relationship has been VERY rocky, primarily b/c of how long it took for them to get engaged (technically, that was the symptom and not the cause of the issues, but you get the idea). Throughout their rocky periods, I learned A LOT about the "dark side" of their relationship. There were periods of time when she admitted she was losing her self-esteem, she threatened to leave (but never did), etc. My perception of their relationship is that there have been more lows than highs.
Anyway - they got engaged. She was happy. Wedding planning ensued. Etc., etc.
She hasn''t been sharing a ton of wedding details via email (which is our primary mode of communication these days), so I decided to call her to catch up and see how things were going. I asked her if she was excited.
She said, "Not really... I mean, real life has been sort of getting in the way. You know, relationship stress and stuff like that." Then she shares a story about how her FI has been reacting to some aspects of the planning (which ANGERED me greatly but I said nothing)... and then she says, "I promised myself I wasn''t going to do this. I said I wasn''t going to talk about how things weren''t going well between us, because people wouldn''t be excited about the wedding."
Ugh.
I didn''t really know how to respond - on one hand, she opened the door to talk about what was going on, but on the other hand, I could genuinely sense she wanted to avoid it. So I let it go. I rationalized it away for her, because it seemed right in the moment - I said I understood how all the planning can get stressful and I was sure that''s all it is. The conversation went on and that was that.
But - I am just distraught at what I heard in her voice and the way she responded. There was no joy. I could hear the stress in her voice. I know this girl. I think there is something much deeper going on, and I''m worried about her.
I''m thinking I should reach back out to her to let her know I''m here if she wants to talk more about what''s going on with them.
But my fear in calling back is that, well, we have rehashed all of their past issues a zillion times over the past seven years. I''m fairly confident she knows what she''s signing up for, and I''m not sure that us talking more about their issues is going to do much good, other than giving her a place to vent. And I don''t want to make her feel bad - she herself said she still wanted people to be excited about the wedding. I feel like if I reach out to her, she''ll be embarrassed and will regret saying anything to me in our other phone call.
So my question is this...
If you were her - would you want me to call back to see if she wanted to talk about what''s going on? Or would you want me to let it go?
Backstory - one of my closest friends is getting married this fall. I''ve known her for over 15 years. She''s an incredible woman - brilliant, beautiful, fit, witty, spunky... I just love her to pieces and admire her in many ways. She got engaged this past winter to a man she dated for over 7 years (and lived with for 6 of them). She is in her early 30s, he is almost 40. Their relationship has been VERY rocky, primarily b/c of how long it took for them to get engaged (technically, that was the symptom and not the cause of the issues, but you get the idea). Throughout their rocky periods, I learned A LOT about the "dark side" of their relationship. There were periods of time when she admitted she was losing her self-esteem, she threatened to leave (but never did), etc. My perception of their relationship is that there have been more lows than highs.
Anyway - they got engaged. She was happy. Wedding planning ensued. Etc., etc.
She hasn''t been sharing a ton of wedding details via email (which is our primary mode of communication these days), so I decided to call her to catch up and see how things were going. I asked her if she was excited.
She said, "Not really... I mean, real life has been sort of getting in the way. You know, relationship stress and stuff like that." Then she shares a story about how her FI has been reacting to some aspects of the planning (which ANGERED me greatly but I said nothing)... and then she says, "I promised myself I wasn''t going to do this. I said I wasn''t going to talk about how things weren''t going well between us, because people wouldn''t be excited about the wedding."
Ugh.
I didn''t really know how to respond - on one hand, she opened the door to talk about what was going on, but on the other hand, I could genuinely sense she wanted to avoid it. So I let it go. I rationalized it away for her, because it seemed right in the moment - I said I understood how all the planning can get stressful and I was sure that''s all it is. The conversation went on and that was that.
But - I am just distraught at what I heard in her voice and the way she responded. There was no joy. I could hear the stress in her voice. I know this girl. I think there is something much deeper going on, and I''m worried about her.
I''m thinking I should reach back out to her to let her know I''m here if she wants to talk more about what''s going on with them.
But my fear in calling back is that, well, we have rehashed all of their past issues a zillion times over the past seven years. I''m fairly confident she knows what she''s signing up for, and I''m not sure that us talking more about their issues is going to do much good, other than giving her a place to vent. And I don''t want to make her feel bad - she herself said she still wanted people to be excited about the wedding. I feel like if I reach out to her, she''ll be embarrassed and will regret saying anything to me in our other phone call.
So my question is this...
If you were her - would you want me to call back to see if she wanted to talk about what''s going on? Or would you want me to let it go?
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