Not Even Impending Death Can End Bitter Feelings
I have issues with forgiveness.
Imagine you have an friend who goes back almost 20 years. After some time apart, you run into each other… and it’s clear she’s having a hard time. You and your well-meaning husband help this friend get into a house nearby and for awhile, things are fun. But after a while, she oversteps normal boundaries… like just walking in whenever she wants to, and not returning your house key. You even come in from work and find her in your house, folding your laundry!
You expected no repayment for favors done, including a lot of home repair by your husband. But you didn’t expect more demands and little gratitude. And you didn’t expect, on top of everything else, that your friend also tried to seduce your spouse.
Imagine the feeling of betrayal. Maybe you don’t have to. This person is your last straw. You have been taken advantage of enough.
So now, each time you drive by this woman’s house you think hateful thoughts. You wish she would just go away. You regret helping her. You enjoy seeing her alone, without friends, paying some guy to cut her grass. You are petty, full of vengeful feelings that you cannot let go. You think about forgiveness, but know you can’t do it. After all, you were used, manipulated, taken for a fool. How can you forgive what she did? Screw her.
Then one day you are driving by her house and see a moving van. At last, you think! Thank God. But, things don’t seem quite right. People are coming and going. Strangers are taking her van away. Then a mutual acquaintance lets you in on the scoop: your former friend has inoperable brain cancer.
She is dying, staying with family. Waiting on the end to come.
What are you supposed to think? Are you overwhelmed with nostalgia, as if nothing happened? Do you instantly forgive everything? Do you rush to her side with tears and declarations of friendship?
Do you feel guilty, because you wished this on her? You wanted her to go away. And now when you drive by her house, it is empty. Wish granted. She is gone.
Or do you even care? Is she a different person now that she is sick? Do you think she regrets losing your friendship, or losing her free ride? Did she ever even care about you, or did she just want a shot at your man? How does her dying change anything?
This is not a story. This is my true dilemma. I have searched my heart, combed through my memories and I still feel nothing. I want to, but I can’t. That is the thing that disturbs me most.
http://ocdiva.wordpress.com/2008/05/26/wishing-her-dead/
November 27, 2007 at 10:19 am
People make mistakes. Large ones. Huge ones. Whether you give them a second chance is purely up to you. Does it matter that things turned badly for her? It might to her. She might realize the mistake she made; she might not. Either way, my advice to you would be to let the hate go in your heart. To what end do you hold it? What’s to gain by it?
I understand that you went out of your way for her and felt betrayed. From the sound of it, that was the end of the relationship. So, let it go. Don’t regret what you did; you did the right thing. Instead pity that she’s not a good enough person to have realized what she threw away.
November 27, 2007 at 7:57 pm
I know that you are right. I am going to end up with cancer myself if I don’t chill out. It bothers me how callous I actually am. I have the same problem with my abusive father. I don’t carry it around with me, but I can’t just “let it go…” Maybe it’s just a wall I’ve put up so nothing hurts.