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Anyone lose friends from being sick all the time?

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Posted 3/18/2011 7:18 AM (GMT 0)
I thought I was over the whole losing a friend ordeal and went out to try to make more friends. Boy, was that a big mistake. At first, it was good. I had known one friend since school and the other I had just met. We reconnected and started talking and hanging out....when I was able. I was very "up front" with them and told them how sick I was and how I can be bedridden for weeks at a time. I also shared with them what had happened with other friends who had abandoned me. They BOTH told me that they would NEVER do that to me. That should have been a red flag right there, LOL. Well, to make a long story short, it crumbled to the ground. They slowly stopped asking me to go places and made excuses everytime I asked them to go somewhere. I just don't get why people do this to others? I thought being upfront and honest would help, but it didn't. I was so very hurt and torn by all of this because my wounds were not even healed from the last two friends that did that to me. UGH! I do have alot of friends, and I find that the only ones that care and keep asking me to go places, are the ones that are going through something similiar or have a loved one that is going through it. Everyone else leaves me high and dry. Sometimes, I truly hate this disease. I have learned who my true friends are though and that is a plus.

Anyone else go through this?

Posted 3/18/2011 8:23 AM (GMT 0)
yESSSSSSSSSS I HAVE ONE FRIEND...everyone else has split, so i figure they were only good time friends...and not even family gives a darn...the only really true friend is Jesus and that is who has brought me thru this so far. i have learned that all you really have is yourself and HIM AND THAT IS ENOUGH FOR NOW. the heck with everyone else, who needs them. be strong and true to yourself, and just wait when they need you they will suddenly remember........Oh yeah i did that to this person. yes i am bitter for i have going thru this many years. god bless and be strong!
Posted 3/18/2011 11:12 AM (GMT 0)
I lost some about a year into my illness.

However, the way I looked at it was, I then knew who my true friends were, and did not need the others like I thought I did!

Posted 3/18/2011 12:23 PM (GMT 0)
OMG have you hit the nail on the head! This is probably the hardest part of the illness for me. I feel abandoned by all of my friends, except one, and constantly blame myself. I have had incidents of rage around them but it was usually overreacting to them being rude which is why I blame myself. If I had handled the situation better, maybe ... But anyway I have learned that people really just think about themselves first. They don't want to hear other people's problems. They have their own. I had one friend in particular who I kind of introduced to a bunch of friends that I hung around with for a while and now she is best friends with all of them and the few times they do include me, all they talk about is things they went to that I wasn't invited to. Very very rude if you ask me. So yesterday while they were all at a St. Patrick's Day BBQ, I stayed home and for the first time, didn't feel left out. I gardened, shopped, went to lunch with my son home from college and my mind didn't race all day worrying about what I missed. I have FINALLY accepted that I don't fit in and they don't want to hear my problems. Amen. The quicker I accept that and move on, the better I will feel, the more I will smile and the quicker I will heal.
Posted 3/18/2011 6:30 PM (GMT 0)
I just fired my cranial sacral therapist for being so arrogant about my condition. I had sent her a link about this neurally mediated hypotension thing and she never bothered to read it. she does not really practice massage on a full time basis. I asked her to do this. she is only 39 yrs old but thinks she discovered america by pretending not to be aware of anything that goes on where ever she is. I first noticed that by my second treatment my legs were falling out from under me after she did some other long treatment on my kidneys.

so there goes that "friendship" . Here is the real kicker. she kept bugging me to do a photoshoot with her neighbor because I am so "interesting" looking. What the heck kind of a thing is that to put on anyone.

I can barley get dressed in the morning. And when I do I am a wrinkled mess. (I make linen clothing and I never iron anything.!!)

I live in a small town and found I have to keep my relations very brief and at a distance. I never ask anyone for help. I come out on my good days and otherwise stay alone. I didn't even call my own family for St Patty's day.

This disease has made any relations impossible for me. I really don't even want a doctor unless they have lyme themselves. I am so sick of people acting like I need to be more ZEN about the whole thing when non of them even have a Zen practice and I have spent years in and around Zen centers.

It is hard ,Cajun and that is why I really treasure THIS family here and when ever a newbee comes on board I home they feel they have come home too.

by the way,,,Happy Belated St. Patty's day!
Posted 3/18/2011 6:50 PM (GMT 0)
I'm over it.

Being in my 20s... before Lyme I would party 8 days a week and had alot of friends. When I first got sick I tried to pretend I was fine and it makes you socially awkward. I realized its better to just lay low and let your real friends come to you. I stopped trying to explain myself to people who will never understand. And disappearing all together isn't necessarily a bad thing... it makes people think youre mysterious and doing cool stuff... even though youre just sitting at home feeding your cats.

-MysteryLyme
Posted 3/18/2011 10:41 PM (GMT 0)
yes. Most people (even your so called true friends) can only handle so much of this illness and when you aren't "fun" anymore they tend to move on. I have lost some very close friends to this illness and some ok friends too. But, I have also learned that they were not true friends of mine. I still have some of my closest friends and they understand that I can't always go out and do things but they come over and we still have a lot of fun together. I may only have a few close friends now but I have a great family and a daughter who is my world and that makes up for the ones I lost along the way.

It's a hard life lesson but a good one.

Posted 3/19/2011 6:39 AM (GMT 0)

You guys are sooo right! I have been having such a hard with that part of this HORRIBLE illness. Ive been sick since I was 12 and have lost all of my friends except for 2. And even with them it always makes me feel so pathetic because I am always chasing after them and texting them and calling them it makes me feel like a loser you know? I used to be popular and have friends but I had to be homeschooled for 8-12th grade and it was  hard to keep friends but I did manage to have some great ones, but after they went to college it changed. And now all my peers and "friends" are seniors in college and theyre liveing their lives and thats fine but it hurts s much when they  are so okay with forgetting you you know? Like my parents get so excited when one of my friends comes over that they consider her family but one time i caught her texting to one of her college friends that she was at her sick friends house, the one with the family, whatever that means. That hurt me more then I can say and I have not forgotten it. She only comes over like twice a year and I know it is because she feels sorry for a poor pathetic lymie. Like sometimes I text her and she doesnt even answer. Then I'll say look I really need a friend and then shell answer.  It is just so hard to go through this being a 21 year old girl. My birthday is next Saturday and I fell so incredibly ALONE. My Dad is pretty bad with my illness seeing as Ive been sick for 9 years so he works all the time but my Mom is great and spends time with me and has become a friend of sorts but sometimes it feels worse to be so lonely that your mom has to hang out with you ya know? It just sucks like Ive never been to a club or out for that matter because this stupid illness keeps me homebound if not bedridden at times. I am just freaking out like Im turning 22 years old and I have nothing and no one. But you said it, I have God and my Angels and They keep me company all the time. But it is still hard. And I live in kind of a small town so there are no places for me to meet people my age and no support groups for lyme. It is so good that somebody started this topic because it is such a HUGE part of being chronically ill. I just dont know what to do, It is so lonely. So lonely that it hurts. Thanks for listening.

Posted 3/19/2011 9:45 AM (GMT 0)
My God, I'm gonna be 56 next month. I couldn't imagine going through this at 21. Even though I suspect that I have been infected since grade school and lost my mind as a teen so did the standard party scene with all the drugs that was the thing to do back then. Friends is so important for everyone. Now I feel like I actually scare people. I can' even finish a sentence half the time and ramble from one thing to the next and I am a very bitter angry person. I spent all night up with a fire going outside my apartment for the big full moon while the entire town was up at the lake for pot luck. I just don't have the energy for other people. I feel like I can read minds and see through everyone and I don't like that because it is just me projecting my insanity.

I made my prayer with the full moon to ask for acceptance. I'm tired of chasing all the cures and trying to figure out what this latest symptom means or even worse what I do find about conditions that have been going on for years now. I am on info and sense overload. I really wish I never found out I had the lyme.

I was better off when I was just trying to deal with hep c and liver condition.
Posted 3/19/2011 1:18 PM (GMT 0)
I used to be really PO'd about it but I am better now...most days anyways...

I have definitely lost friends. ANd it blows my mind. Even before this last 5 years I would NEVER have dropped a friend for being sick! I just can't even wrap my brain around it!

Yet, I have been dropped by at least 3 friends, one I get, but the other 2???? Really?

What I have found most interesting is that my old running friends have been the most supportive. Maybe because as trail runners they know this could have just as easily been them, AND several have had Lyme(caught it right away, treatment and cure in a year or less) and they know how much it sucks. THEY are the ONLY ones who email, etc along with a friend from HS and a new friend I connected with recently(who has a heart condition so she can relate on some level)


Really disappointing. I have even made posts about reconizing who my real friends are and how I hope NOONE ever gets abandoned should they ever become sick...nothing.

I think people think they are invincible...until it happens to them.
Posted 3/19/2011 2:03 PM (GMT 0)
I have definitely lost some friends.  One in particular who was my so called "best friend."   She called me for the first time in weeks last night...just to talk about a position that she wanted at work and someone else who was wanting the same position, blah blah blah.  After she went on about herself she asked me how I was doing.  When I started telling her about the appointment with the LLMD and all the test results, she suddenly had to go.  Said she would call back and never did.  Its funny, because I never would have thought of all people, she would abandon me. 

If my friends are sick I always go out of the way to do what I can and to make sure that they are ok and let them know I am here if they need me.  I just cant see why you would want to abandon someone when they need you the most.  Thank GOD for my wonderful hubby who is always there for me. 

You guys are great and Im glad to know Im not alone!!

L

Posted 3/19/2011 4:46 PM (GMT 0)
I think sometimes the most important part is keeping it all to ourselves and only opening up to those that understand and for me that is my husband and this forum. I try very hard as I know people just don't want to hear it. But with not being able to drink, not feeling like "partying", not being able to exercise, not having the energy and just plain not feeling great makes it extremely hard to fit in and I am in my 40s. However, I have had to force myself to grin and bear the abandonment of friends as I continue to see them at school functions etc. They all think I am nuts, hypochondriac and bitter for some unknown reason. They just don't get it or just don't care and I have to accept that. As hard as it may be, and for a long time I tried and tried and tried, it just doesn't work. So onward I go being the crazy, sick one who has more compassion than all of them put together but not having gone through it, I guess I can't expect them "to get it."
Posted 3/19/2011 9:37 PM (GMT 0)
Ya know what I always think, too is that these people who have 'dumped' us would not be able to survive if faced with dealing with what we do. I can think of a few people who would not know what hit them if they ahd to deal with what I go through...I hope they never do, of course but....

I had one of the friends who has stuck by say to me recently after a nasty bout of the flu "I thought of you al week while I was sick...I don't know how you do it feeling that way. I was only sick for a week and you feel that way ALL the time!" She got it.

Posted 3/21/2011 2:18 PM (GMT 0)
I too miss having friends.
Posted 3/21/2011 3:00 PM (GMT 0)
  I've always kinda been a loner. I have a daughter who is 27 and she is my friend. But......she has a life. I was never afraid to be alone before I got sick, and now that I am sick I feel so alone. Even when there are people around. It's like nobody understands my walk. I've really only told a few close friends that I have Lyme disease and coinfections.I have lost 28 lbs since getting sick, so people do ask questions....they just don't ubderstand the word Chronic! It is a lonely world !  
Posted 3/21/2011 7:02 PM (GMT 0)
This seems to be a problem, not just with Lyme, but with other chronic conditions too. People who haven't been through it don't understand it, FULL STOP.

Sometimes I think in order to learn compassion, you first have to have experience suffering.
Posted 3/21/2011 8:34 PM (GMT 0)
It definitely is true. I was sick from high school on until well after college until it was caught. Lost a good number of friends who I'm still friendly with but I'm definitely outside the circle now. I do have a few friends who are incredible and I feel blessed to have them. Also lost what was probably the love of my life to side effects of untreated lyme, though how she dealt with it for 7 years is beyond me. Like someone else said most people just cant comprehend how bad it can be unless they've gone through it.
Posted 3/22/2011 4:09 PM (GMT 0)
Having had this dreaded 'disease' for most of my life hasn't made it any better as far as having friends goes. I have made & lost most of my so-called friends. I have a 28 yr old daughter as my best friend as well, but like Clem's Mom has said -she has a life as well.

So I retreated into myself- no way I can lose myself as a friend, right? smilewinkgrin Well, okay I can get pretty pi$$ed off at myself, but I can't really walk away from myself!!!

I also agree with Mystery Lyme:
"...I realized its better to just lay low and let your real friends come to you. I stopped trying to explain myself to people who will never understand. And disappearing all together isn't necessarily a bad thing... it makes people think youre mysterious and doing cool stuff... even though youre just sitting at home feeding your cats."

cool - giggle!!
Posted 3/22/2011 4:20 PM (GMT 0)
Well said Traveler, you are your own best friend. I am working on trying to like me for me. I have always been really hard on myself. Working too hard to please others. Now that I am sick, it is kinda like it's my turn.I feel really guilty though. Like i used to help my daughter work on her townhouse, and now,I can just offer advice. I feel like a loser. My husband is paying someone to edge and mulch all of our gardens this year. I always prided myself that I could do 7 pickup trucks full of mulch myself, it saved alot of money. GUILT.....I can't handle it. It is 51 here and damp right now....where was I????? Out sealing our Ipe wood porch. I can't stop and rest, and my Dr. said i am my own worst enemy. i am hindering my healing process pushing myself too hard. Oh crap, old habits die hard!
Posted 3/23/2011 1:27 AM (GMT 0)
Hang in there, Clem's Mom!!
It is your turn!!! Just keep on trying to quit beating yourself up so much! It will happen, but it takes taking a day at a time & there are a lot of us Lymies that have a lot of trouble doing that... me included!!

I was down right ashamed that I didn't have a garden going last summer when my Mom came for my youngest sons' wedding - but I worked through it. I too have been a hard worker, working outside most of my life. This 'disease' is so very devastating!!!

That's part of the reason I am now part of the 'Lymie Mod Squad'- I couldn't just sit still!! It has allowed me to give where I feel the need is the greatest.

Just don't give up on trying to not beat yourself up!
Posted 3/23/2011 6:15 PM (GMT 0)
I think sometimes it's good to educate people about this disease, but often times it doesn't matter since they still will have their own biases and, perhaps fears, of what this disease is all about.

Anyway, if you ever want to share with your friends the symptoms this disease mimics, this is a good website to refer them to. It shows that there are 300 medical conditions that mimics Lyme Disease. Lyme Disease, as you well know, is known as the Great Imitator.

Not that it will change anyone's mind, but still, it's good to have as a reference to show your friends, educate your GP, or just to have for your own benefit. It's from, Bryan Rosner, which I know not everyone is a fan of, but the important thing is that the facts on this page are right on. So, for that reason I have posted this link here for you to use as a future reference in the event that you might find it helpful.

lymebook.com/blog/testing-diagnosis/misdiagnosed-diagnosis-mimics-great-imitator/

Gary

Post Edited By Moderator (Traveler) : 3/24/2011 8:45:12 AM (GMT-6)

Posted 3/23/2011 10:37 PM (GMT 0)
Yep im on that train with ya'll.......Getting so close to jumping I can taste it.
Posted 3/24/2011 2:47 PM (GMT 0)
Hey Gary, I hope you don't mind, the only thing I did was make the link you posted a hyper-link to make it a little easier to get to, as I believe it to be a good tool - as you said.

Thank you for posting that!! I'm going to print off a couple of copies to carry around, since the people that I meet that are in need of this kind of info are those that I meet 'on the street'.
Posted 3/24/2011 4:54 PM (GMT 0)
Yes to all of your posts especially the islandgirl1, you said Jesus and Me that's about it. I lost friends too that didn't understand where the party girl went, loud outrageous that was me, full of laughs. I read all you posts and it makes me sad, but just as the old friends left new ones can come into your life, believe it. I haven't met any new ones yet, I'm waiting. I want the right people to come in my life, where a friendship is easy. Where it is a  a two way street not a sign that says one way. Our illness no matter how long it's been it's really only a second or minute to GOD, hears and he understands. We can make it. But believe it or not I don't tell people I have lyme's because all I read and hear is it's a clinical diagonosis so I don't think people really take it serious. I barely say I have UC, I just say "gut issues" and leave it at that. I don't want to be that person who complains or whines to people, I just never did. I never like to turn a conversation to me, look at me, look what I have, feel sorry for me, It's a turn off. I want to be strong. I try to say if I have to say anything at all, I'm getting better ever day. It sucks, I've had it a long time, but I know through the Grace of GOD I will be healed....in his time....not mine.

 

Posted 3/25/2011 5:14 AM (GMT 0)
Wow! I am so saddened to see how many of you go through this. I've learned that the only friends I can make, are with people who are going through something similiar. I think from now on, or until I start feeling better, I will just stick to the friends I have now, who understand, and my family. I had to drop those two friends and it hurt pretty bad but I was tired of them not understanding and pretty much not caring about me.
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