still mad

[2eclipse]

i'm still mad at my friend.
i love her. we have been friends since we were 12. that is a long time.
but i want reparation.
i want her to apologize for hurting me and acting like my abusive ex-fiance.
i want her to tell me she understand that bitching me out for 20 minutes after i've acknowledged my bad judgment is not okay and humbly ask my forgiveness.

i'm not going to get it.
i'm still so angry i want to staple her to something uncomfortable until she can tell me exactly why i'm so hurt by what she did.

i wrote her an e-mail and didn't send it. i know better than to trust myself right now. it is a rough draft and she will get it only after i've cleared it of landmines (with the help of others).

my question for ya'll in the meantime is: what do you do when you're angry like this with a friend/sister/brother? how do you purge your anger? what do you do when you're pretty sure you're 80% right, but your habit is to stick up for yourself only 20%? what do you do when waiting for time to take care of it doesn't feel like enough?

Comments

[mirage897.livejournal.com]

Writting nasty emails and then never sending helps me a little. I think I like mostly to vent to other people. LJ can be helpful if I feel that people are reading my entries and considering them appropriately.

I used to have a *really* bad habit of badgering people if my feelings were really hurt after they apologized. It was so annoying. It took me a while but I just had to learn to keep my feelings in check once somebody said they were sorry. I mean, how much more can they do in most instances? I guess I learned if I was still upset after the apology I needed to get myself out of the situation and vent to someone else or some way else (such as writting but not sending the aforementioned nasty-grams)

[2eclipse.livejournal.com]

how did you overcome this tendency in yourself?

[mirage897.livejournal.com]

I first had to realize how destructive it could be, particuarly in my romantic relationshiops which were more tentative generally when I was younger.

Then I had to get over this kind of "extreme honesty is best" tendency I had inside myself. I was never into being just rude and hidding it under a veil of extreme honesty but as I said when I was upset with someone I let them know again...and again...and again until I had vented all of my frustration. I had to realize that true honesty doesn't work like that and doesn't involve dumping on people.

Once I came to those realizations I just had to learn to bite the bullet when I was upset and say it one time and then walk away. It wasn't easy to change 8 years ago and it still isn't easy now but like most good habits they get easier the more you do them.

Sorry for the longwinded answer.

[ashoe.livejournal.com]

"Once I came to those realizations I just had to learn to bite the bullet when I was upset and say it one time and then walk away. It wasn't easy to change 8 years ago and it still isn't easy now but like most good habits they get easier the more you do them."

I almost always go by the 'least said, soonest mended' method, but every now and again, if someone does something I find truly upsetting, I'll bite that bullet and say "Hi. I'm mad. Here is why."

I've only had to do it twice in the last few years, but both times it's gotten very positive results. Direct works - but oh, it's so stressful!