Crap.  I meant to save the other post for later, but absent-mindedly hit
"send now" instead.  What a brain.  The word "unremarkable" was used to
describe my MRI.  I thought that just meant that I didn't have MS.

Here's the story.  I'm not in the mood to try to write well this day, so bear
with me please.  I very much would like to vent about this if you don't mind.


An old friend waltzes into my life after several years of no contact.  We had
grown apart, as friends often do, with no malice intended.  We just got into
different stuff after we were teenagers.  It happens -- no big deal.

Now though, Betty is different.  Betty is gimp, and gimp is Betty.  Betty
needs help.

Don't ever let anyone in your house after they've given any -- any at all --
indication that they regard you as a lessor, or that they know what's best
for any other human being.  I had my clues, and I choose to ignore them.

In one way or another, she manages to make trophies out of all her "friends."
 She's told me things about our mutual friends that I don't believe they
would want me to know.  It's always about how she has been their personal
savior too, and how they would never survive if it hadn't been for her.
She's held up members of her own family for this purpose.  She has exploited
them in ways that they would not be happy with either, if they knew.

Actually, they all do know.  I've seen how they handle it.  They patronize
her, and find her behavior only slightly annoying, perhaps even amusing.  I
do not.

I'm thinking about how she has helped me in personal -- the most personal --
ways, and I can't help but wonder how she has displayed me to others.  Is she
telling people about how her mighty greatness has helped me in the bathroom?
I must conclude that she has.  I don't know why I assumed that she would keep
that information as sacred, when so much else that is sacred to others has
been revealed to me.  I know a lot about our mutual friends, and I know
perfectly well that they would not have shared such things with me.

Perhaps then, I should not feel guilty for talking about her here.  I have
kept silent to a large degree, but why should I do that?  Why should you not
know about her?  Moreover, the big picture demands that I come forward with
this example.

Because this was a friendship of nearly thirty years, I choose to ignore the
warning signs -- major warning signs -- because I knew that I could handle
her.  I could; I was right.  What I didn't count on though, was the
psychological or collateral damage that she would cause in the long run.

Our families go to the same church.  Well, my family is me, but her parents
go there.  This church is so small that we're practically wearing each
other's underwear.  I felt that there were a number of delicate factors to
consider.  I have the utmost respect for her parents, and for good reasons.
In fact, I love them.  I must consider more important things now than feeling
cozy comfy with my loved ones.  After all, they have done nothing that I can
see to correct their daughter's behavior.  They may not see it now, but I
feel sorry for them when they are a little older. She is already trying to
decide for them in some ways now.

I didn't count on this raped feeling, and I'm only now realizing how bad the
collateral damage is going to be, in terms of mutual friendships with other
people, as well as church (I will not discuss the church aspect further).  I
will tell you that before she began to "help" me, she spoke to me as an
equal.  She now speaks to me as though I were a child.  I want to put my fist
through a wall right this minute thinking about the voice she uses to talk to
me now, and her damnable and maddening condescension.

Her arrogance had become so astounding that I almost couldn't even tolerate
our last few conversations.  We had a great Christmas together, but you know
what?  Even as recently as then I thought I could keep strong arming her "I
know what's best for you" attitude.  I saw that she really wanted to help me,
and I really need help to get my house into shape so that I can take care of
it myself.  That isn't what she's been doing, however.  She did what she
wanted to do.  Check this out:

She would come over on certain weekend days, to help me.  She'd want to wash
whatever dishes were in the sink and things like that.  I would repeatedly
tell her that I had a maid coming in the following Monday to do those things.
 She would always say the same thing:  "Well, I'll do this and they can
concentrate on something else."

The maids (two of them come at a time) are not conversant in English, and I
don't speak Spanish.  They end up doing less through no fault of her own. I
say nothing.  It's not fair to them, to yank them away from routines that
they are familiar and comfortable with -- that I am comfortable with.  They
come and do their thing.  When they're finished they leave.  The system is
good for employer and employee, and I don't want it tampered with.

I'd been infuriated by that since the first time she did it, but I am only
now getting it through my head that she was doing nothing more -- nothing
more -- than interfering with the management of MY home, in order to do
something that made her feel good.

She has often come to see me at my worst physical state.  On one such
occasion, she exploited my vulnerable position to lecture me -- LECTURE ME --
about taking in a bird temporarily as a favor to someone else.  She has
lectured me about Bundy too.  Bundy is my blue and gold macaw.  In the
lecture about how it was a bad idea for me to be baby sitting, she reminded
me of the Bundy lecture she had given me eight months before.  She said it
was eight months.  I guess she keeps perfect track of the dates of her
lectures which -- in and of itself -- is a disturbing thing to ponder.

She has lectured me about disability rights.  She's the one, in fact, who
said I was being unfair to society.  That was the last conversation we will
ever have.  That last week she was so incredibly and unbelievably arrogant,
that I am still seething.  Knowing what I know, I still fell right into it.

Here's the dangerous aspect of playing in the same sandbox with a do gooder
like this.  That last week was the week that I had decided I'd had enough of
her egotistical overbearing nature.  I started telling her no, point blank,
period, no.  I had been dropping hints ever since the beginning about how one
doesn't comment on the quality of another person's life in a way that suggest
that the outsider is in a position to decide that.  She threw that quality of
life term around a number of times, and always in that way.  I always bit my
tongue, but always managed to say something in general about how quality of
life is decided by the individual, autonomy and self determination -- all
those important things.  All the things that ought to be second nature
understanding to any United States citizen never once hit home...never once.

This so-called friendship is now nothing but oppressive.

But standing up to such a person can get you in a bit of hot water, don't you
know.  The lessor never dares such a thing, and if he does, he must be
slapped down immediately. That's what she tried to do and she was damned fast
about it.  I mean she countered with the verbal hand of discipline so quickly
that I was amazed at her talent for the art form.  The other feeling was that
of having been raped.  That went back to the bird lecture, when she exploited
me in a physically vulnerable state.  She picked the time!  She had the
lecture planned!

She had been pondering this, mind you.  Damn, I feel raped.  Date raped, in a
manner of speaking.

Then, THEN, after she got me going (make sense), after she had me wound up
like a top and angry as hell, she suggested that I see a psychiatrist to deal
with my anger.

May I coin a phrase to describe this as the "Nurse Ratched Syndrome?"  That's
the tactic.  If I don't comply with the oppressor, I need psychiatric help.
Oh no.  No, no, no.

She must win.  She must have her trophy.  Here's the kicker though: Where was
she going to stop?  She had crossed every polite line I had drawn to date.  A
person who intentionally pushes your buttons, and then suggests that you need
psychiatric help to deal with your noncompliant response is a very dangerous
person.  I don't like the cunning involved in this manipulation either.  All
that all of this suggests scares the hell out of me.

How far would such a person go in order to reassure herself and others that
she was right?  How far would such a person go to get you on their trophy
wall?  If they can't do it one way, will they do it another?

I didn't wait long enough to find out. She's out of the picture.  She hasn't
called me, despite the fact that she said she would "call me in one week."
That, of course, was to give me time to think about my "transgressions."  It
was thick in her voice.

She doesn't want to call me now.  She may realize that she has tampered with
the wrong person, I don't know.  The last time we talked was two and a half
weeks ago.

She has tampered with the wrong person though.  I let this go on and on
because of the other factors I mentioned, but I've made a decision about
those things too.  I will never again let myself be in a position that
compels me to pull my punches.

I'll give her credit.  She got a hellova lot farther in than anyone else
would have.  Usually, once somebody has pulled a stunt like that with me, I
get them out of the picture fast.  She just got in the back door, that's all.
 That door is closed tight now though.

What can I say?  I let it happen.  Still, this was rape.  No, it was worse
than being raped-- way worse.

Betty