Is your Best Friend Ruining Your Life?

If your bestie makes you feel utterly drained and angry each time, there’s a possibility that she might be having a negative impact on your life. Priya Chaphekar helps you deal with the rotten apples.

When 28-year-old Mouli Banerjee started hanging out with her new boyfriend in college, she found herself growing more and more uncomfortable in her seemingly perfect relationship with her best friend. “When you fall in love, you happen to unknowingly sideline your best friend. But I tried my best to include her in our plans, lest she feel lonely. But things got out of hand when she began self-inviting herself to movies and dinner dates. She even started pinging my boyfriend in the middle of the night. It was only then that I put my foot down and asked her to back off. She turned my romantic dream into a nightmare,” laments Mouli.

At some point in our lives, we all have friends who have tried to mess with our bliss. Dr Shefali Batra, psychiatrist and cognitive therapist, founder of Mindframes and co-founder of InnerHour, refers to such friends as ‘frenemies’. “These so-called best friends suck our positivity; they are self-centred, jealous, attention-seeking, stubborn, big-headed, bossy, fussy, resentful, gossipy, harsh, not so empathic, somewhat inconsistent, sometimes jealous, judgemental and particularly unhappy,” she points out. According to Dr Batra, the definition and perception of friendship has drastically changed over a period of time. “Social media has brought us so close to each other that we can pick and choose a new best friend every day. Any two people who share a similar brand of alcohol and gossip and hate for others turn into BFFs. Gone are the days when we understood the care, companionship and compassion of true friendship,” she adds.

Learning the hard way
Meenaz Amreliwala, creative producer, Bombay Berlin Film Production, met her best friend at an impressionable age of 17. “I think she suffered from borderline depression. In the beginning she appeared to be a super cool, fun-loving personality, but things begin to changethree months into our friendship. Before she happened, I was happy, brimming with optimism. But her presence brought in a lot of pain and negativity. I turned suicidal. Under her hypnotic influence, I began finding faults in everything. It took me almost a year to realise that. She took the cake in making mountains out of molehills, in terms of minor family issues, friendship, love life, education and career. Being with her, I was convinced that this world was a bad place to live in. She tried hard to hold me back and refused to let me take risks—be it experimenting with new jobs or meeting new people. However, she was always there for me no matter what. On several occasions she also proved to be kind hearted. I started facing issues with my family because I was never happy and blamed them for everything bad that had happened in my life. She wasn’t a bad person, but a pessimist of an extreme type,” narrates Meenaz.

So did she break up with her best friend or dragged along? “One day I decided to go and spend sometime in the mountains alone, away from everybody. I needed a perspective, and wanted to reflect about the change in my attitude towards life. I penned down the changes in me since my first bout of hopelessness. Of course I was upset about the whole revelation. But, instead of distancing myself from her, I was determined to change the way I saw the world and also uplift her, help her see life differently. To my surprise, our relationship has grown stronger over the years,” she recounts.

Take it with a grain of salt
A true friend will always dish out her opinions without imposing them on you. Seventeen-year-old Samantha Mathew had put on more than five kilos after her board exams. But her best friend mocked her when she went cycling and running in the morning in order to get back in shape. “Throughout the year, I immersed myself in studies. It was only when I was looking at my old Instagram pictures that I realised I had to do something to shed those extra pounds. I began posting updates about the calories burnt on Facebook to gather motivation from friends. While everyone applauded my progress, my best friend body-shamed me and advised me not to work out outdoors. I politely told her to keep her opinion to herself and respect mine. Her take didn’t bother me as long as I knew I was on the right track,” she states.

If you’re quick to ward off any advice that doesn’t agree with you, it’ll stop coming your way. Says Dr Batra, “It’s crucial to identify the worthiness of a person. First, build your self-respect and stand up for yourself. Because when you stand up for yourself, the world will stand up for you. If your friends are pushing you down, be mature enough to tell them what is bothering you. Remember that openness and communication is the hallmark of true friendship. If your best friend is a true friend, she’ll certainly appreciate your honesty; but if she fails to take things positively, make sure you don’t lose hope. By definition, a friend is honest but not rude, open but not sarcastic, makes meaningful statements but not hard and resentful. Friends can have opinions, but they don’t have to be fussy; they can say what they feel, but they don’t have to be inconsistent. Know the difference between your friends and enemies and safeguard yourself. If you’re right as a person, you’ll always find the right people.”

The good and the bad
Thirty-one-year-old content writer Purva Khole was really close to her so-called good friend for a while.
“I knew her for almost a decade. Like all best friends,
I would share the smallest things with her. She liked to advise or rather force her opinions on me because she thought I did not know what’s good for me. She made sure she created this whole aura that she was being over protective about me, and got extremely possessive if |I made new friends or met new people. At first, I thought it was plain insecurity about losing your friend to someone, but soon found that she would get upset if I hung out with my friends. I got irritated when she did not like my boyfriend while I was one of the strongest pillars in her love story. She then acted distant and cut off suddenly after sending a nasty message. Initially,
I was miserable because she was one of my closest friends in the city, but I was confident that I had not done anything to deserve this behaviour. I decided to block her from chat to protect myself from getting hurt. After a while she did get back in touch with me, I decided to let go and exchanged pleasantries, but decided to never let anyone take charge of my life again,” narrates Purva.

Dr Kashissh A. Chhabriaa, counselling psychologist, psychotherapist, motivational speaker and life coach is of the opinion that toxic people usually through a lot in life themselves. “These are two-faced people who are nice to you outwardly, but they’re not good people within. The best way to identify such people is by trusting your own instincts. If something is not feeling right, it isn’t. There’s a set of people that is so consumed by a sense of negativity that will eat into your positive aura. Move away from such company, listen to some good music. See how you feel. Do you feel more relaxed?” questions Dr Chhabriaa. She suggests not depending on the opinion of a second person. “Learn to take responsibility for your own actions. Sometimes, even your spouse, who you consider as your best friend, may misguide you. But in any case, you shouldn’t give up. You’ll notice the fear gradually diminishing and a growing sense of freedom within yourself to face things the way they are,” she adds.