So I spent most of my morning attending my own crucifixion. Oh, wait...actually it was a counseling session with one of my friends who is starting to finish up a lengthy rehab stay. But you woulda thought it was the former and not the latter. First some background, I met this friend during my Catholic school years and his older brother is my my sister's partner. I'm much closer to his brother now but back in those days I was probably equally close to both of them. Their relationship as brothers has never been very good and their difficult upbringing didn't help (detailed here). I swear they didn't say more than two words to each other in school, I didn't even know they were related until a year after we met. I once asked him why they didn't get along and he said he felt like his brother had never really stepped up into the role of big brother and he resented him for that. I didn't probe any further but read between the lines and realized he looked at me as a big brother figure.
Flash forward to my accident, which hit him very hard and kinda sent him scrambling for awhile. Because of all I was going through, I no longer fell into the role of being the advice guy or wanting to help the people I loved with their problems. Frankly, I didn't care about anyone else's problems during that time. Then came the 'dark ages' and my not wanting to deal with anybody I loved cuz they were all giving the same lecture about my bad habits. The two of us didn't speak much during most of this time but I think his reason for not talking to me was that I'd fallen from grace in his eyes. Pre-accident I'd always been able to help him, always been able to fix his mistakes and he had this idealized image of me as some sort os Superman figure. And then I wasn't. And then he got into some horrible stuff and we had a very bad falling out about a year ago and have spoken sporadically since then. So, on some level, I do understand his anger towards me and I admit I've made some mistakes here but I don't think I am the reason for all of his problems.
That brings us to today and our session and my going in believing it was going to be something that helps him in his recovery. (Apparently his counselor was also under this impression cuz dude was shocked when it turned into an all-out argument.) It went from a casual, almost friendly environment to him accusing me of having abandoned him and not caring about him anymore. None of which is true but I wasn't really surprised to hear him place the blame on me. Long story short, voices were raised, names were called, feathers were ruffled and I walked out rather than listen to him talk about everything I've ever done wrong in my life, which has little to do with what landed him in rehab. I don't need him pointing out the mistakes I've made in my own life, I know them and I've dealt with them and moved past them. And now, having calmed down considerably from this morning's events, I'm just sad. I truly do want him to get better and move on from all the negativity in his past. And I'd hoped he was already well on his way to that but I guess not. So if he wants to talk again, like adults with no blame being hurled, then I'm up for that. But until then I guess we don't have a place in each other's lives. And that sucks.
