I am still hurt 10 years later - Help me let this go

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About 10 years ago, I moved into my home and threw a housewarming party a few months later. Though my party was not completely ignored, I had several people let me down. I know I am holding a grudge and I am trying to let it go. However, it is haunting me today.

1. The first group was people who I worked with where I invited the whole company, but all of them snubbed the invitation while they seemed to be there for each other's celebrations. Especially the boss.

2. The second was a friend who promised to help me set things up but was engaged at the time and decided to buy her wedding gown. The major reason was that she was jealous of me. Anyway, she showed afterward with her fiance and another friend and didn't stay that long or seem like she wanted to be there. When I asked her if she was mad at me, she said that her fiancee wanted to leave and she needed to pay her dad back for the dress.

When I confronted her for breaking that promise, and it was "I wanted to be with my fiancee as I nearly lost him over a fight last week."

How do you let something like this go? It's a long time ago.

Last edited by Summer_Twilight on 23 Aug 2020, 10:06 am, edited 1 time in total.

Accept it. Stay quiet yet hold on to the people who didn't let you down - be good to those who "didn't" let you down. Don't be mean to those who let you down - just write them off. This has been my own personal mantra for the last 45 years.

I am truly sorry, but you will have to learn to live with it.  No amount of platitudes and warm, fuzzy clichés can remove the damage done by faithless friends.  I should know, as I am still dealing with being abandoned by almost everyone I loved 32 years ago (half of my life).  You will have to accept that it happened, look around and realize that what happened ten years ago is not happening right now.

You might do well to also accept that other people have different priorities than your own, and that some of those priorities may seem greater to them than being with you.

I understand how you feel about this. It is hurtful when people go out of their way to attend other people's invitations but don't bother to attend your invitation. How can one not take that personally?

It takes a lot of spoons (energy) to hold onto those slights, which invariably happen to everyone many times over a lifetime.

I don't have enough spoons to hang onto it all. I decided to use my spoons for other things in my life, things that make my life better. The more spoons I devoted to making my life better, and the fewer spoons wasted on what other people did or did not do, made a huge change in my life.

The best way to let it go is to improve your life by socializing more and forming positive relationships with other people which will help you forget about it. The more positive life experiences you have, the less you'll think about the negative things that happened to you.

Thanks, I am still very hurt at what these people pulled on me and none of them even seem to care that they hurt me or really thought about my feelings. None of them said, "I'm sorry."

1. At my old job, none of them got me gifts or anything while they bent over backward for another co-worker, who was getting married a few weeks later. I didn't go to his wedding because of how he had just treated me. Actually, I was very hesitant to attend anything of theirs again.

2. That friend's actions really upset me as she broke her promise. However, we have not been friends for several years and not over that. Rather, we didn't like each other and eventually ended up in conflict. Not only was she jealous of me, but she is also conceited and self-absorbed. She had pulled other things on me that made me mad.



I have been working on letting this woman go because I realize what a jerk she really was. Though she says she is sorry for treating me poorly, it is always about her and never how she was not nice. "I was going through a rough time and I pretended to be someone that I was not and blah, blah,blah."

Fnord:
I agree that other people have other and bigger priorities and I understand that this friend did. Still, she should not have made that promise to me. Also, she had all the time in the world to buy that dress as it was a little more than 5 months ago.

Also, I was a bride's maid at her wedding and she seemed to expect me to bend over backward for her wedding while she did nothing for me.

I know this feeling. It's not about actually expecting a gift for the sake of having something you didn't have to pay for, it's about principle and thought. In other words, it's not about the gift itself, but more about the social connection and thought. So that is why it's so hurtful when people don't give you a gift when it's the right event to be given a gift.
I remember when this girl worked with me (she doesn't work there any more), one of the guys there would go out and get a McDonald's or chips or pizzas or Chinese or whatever, and bring it into work - only for himself, her and one other guy, (and not on their break) while I was working away and didn't even get a look-in. I'm not saying I was expecting them to feed me or anything, but it would have been nice just to be asked if I wanted a leftover or something, as they often didn't eat it all (I would go into the break room and see all the leftovers in the bin). The girl would just throw her equipment down and say, "oh, my dinner's here, be back soon". Then I'd see them sitting in the warm, chatting and laughing together and tucking into their food. I don't know if the thought for others ever entered their heads or if they were just leaving me out of purpose because they didn't like me, but they were lucky that I kept quiet and didn't tell the boss.

The day that girl left was the best day of my life, as I was getting sick of her getting so much attention and treats, even though she was a mouthy, whiny, grumpy, selfish, thoughtless b***h.

Most people have a strong need to be accepted or feel close to people which is why rejection can cause painful emotions. When something is important, such as an unmet need, your mind will keep reminding you of it until that need is met.

Exactly this.

Thank you so much for helping me understand why those situations still hurt me.

1. I would like a few female friends who I can bond with and we are there for each other - She bought my housewarming gifts at Christmas time which I still love and use.
2. In the work situation, I wanted to same respect and admiration that my co-workers gave each other. What made it harder was that the CEO also has an autistic son along with this being a work program for people with disabilities. She acknowledged everyone else and bought them nice presents but me. She didn't care that my feelings were hurt, in fact, she was pretty heartless

Joe90, as for your situation, it doesn't sound like that woman was very pleasant to be around. It also sounds like she could have been manipulative and could have been using those guys for things.

She wasn't a very pleasant person, but what got to me the most was how everyone flocked to her like she was some sort of goddess. She was only 20, while we were all older, but one of the guys was willing to date her behind his girlfriend's back, and when she dumped him he got so sad that he almost committed suicide but had to force himself not to because of his kids. I mean, he is a good-looking, muscular, popular, outgoing guy with little children and a beautiful girlfriend (I've seen pictures of her), so I just couldn't understand why he was going to commit suicide over this. Whatever power this 20-year-old has over people, it's freaking powerful.

She is definitely someone that you would want to avoid as she not only nasty, but she is also controlling, self-absorbed and a user.

The people at my old job were nasty too, and there was a woman just like the housewarming party. She lied all the time, jerked people around, and would use us. She used me to help with her wedding but refused to help me with my housewarming party and did not show up or follow through. When I asked about her where she was, she lied about everything. She eventually dumped me and started lying about and making fun of me behind my back. She also even told those people how much she hated me. She eventually quit which was the happiest day of my life because she was so mean.

It's always such a relief when they leave.

I endured working with this girl for 1 and a half years, until she got fired for being tested positive on a random drug test.
What made it even better was that a really nice person has taken her place and really likes me as a friend.
But one of the other workers is retiring next year and I kept fretting about the company rehiring this girl, as she's now a mum to a baby and probably will want an evening job again (which is what my job is). I did write a thread on WP about my concerns but all the answers implied that people who have been fired can still be rehired in the future.
But when I told my boss about my concerns, he said that the company will never rehire someone who they have fired for drugs. So that put my mind at ease.

That's good and I hope you meet someone new who is nice.


Anyway, after I found out this woman had been bullying me, it was the beginning of the end for her. She did other things too that were not appropriate. In fact, she nearly got fired for it. However, she quit not long after and was rude. She walked in one morning, told the CFO, and walked out again without any sincere goodbyes. I was happy because being in the same room with her made it hard for me to breath or move. My other coworkers were mad at her.

Ahh ... I see ... have you ever googled the word "Bridezilla"?  You'll find lots of stories about narcissistic women who falsely believe that being brides gives them complete authority over their minions and serfs, and that it completely absolves them of all blame for their hurt feelings.

Now I completely sympathize with you.