keep negative people out of my life

I am part of an extensive online community, where I’ve also hosted several popular discussion groups for the past five years.

I have very clear rules concerning the group’s overall etiquette and posting rules for local events and such. However, I’ve had people, who of course don’t read the rules, or seem to think that they don’t apply to them.

I used to send them each a message, explaining what they did wrong, but it ate up so much of my time and stressed me out; especially when some of them just got pissy anyway.

So I decided to stop pampering them and actually follow my own rules, which stated that offenders risk getting deleted, or banned, without notification. It certainly has helped my stress level and probably taught a few people that the rules DO matter, at least in my groups.

However, I’ve been having to deal with a bit of an asshole guy; whom I’ve also met in real life. He’s quite the egomaniac, and all the things he does seem only to pander to his self-aggrandizement. I’ve let him post events on my group; however, he never followed the formatting rules – so I’d correct or fix it for him.

Then he’d start promoting his own personal website in the link, rather than posting the event info properly.

Anyways, I got really sick of it and the whole situation. I did my best to be impartial in the community, and gave him more than enough fair chances, but he is proving to be too much of an egotistical asshole. So I banned him from my discussion group!

I’m sure that he will try to find some way to try to complain that he is being denied the right to promote his events, but my group rules also state that I run the group my way and won’t tolerate shit-disturbers.

So, despite the fact that I’m sure he’ll try to bitch about it to others, I’m glad of finally taking this action. I don’t owe him anything and in fact, I gave him way more leeway than I have for others – so he’s already way past due.

So I received a message from “B” totally out of the blue. He was the extremely needy “emotional vampire – victim” that used to be a part of my life, but that I decided to part ways with. At the end, he drained so much energy out of me, as I tried to be a supportive friend, and simply ended up feeling used and misled.

He said that he had been going through some of his old stuff and found one of my old letters (from 2 years ago), in which I had clearly stated that I no longer wanted to be in contact with him and for him to return my belongings.

Well, apparently it reminded him of me and he said that he hesitated to contact me (because I clearly had stated that IF it was to happen, I would be the one to initiate it). Apparently he is totally unclear on that concept – duh!

So he says that he still wants to be friends, still cares for me, etc. etc. He should have thought of that when he had been acting like an asshole back then! It’s not like he is actually apologizing for his actions either.

He says “But I will not re-enter your life if it cause you pain, grief or discomfort”. Well in that case, it would have been better if he had actually respected my wishes of not being contacted, like I had so very clearly stated at the time.

This whole thing obviously can still get me quite upset.

I was born in the Year of the Dragon, and I’m a true Dragon in that I’m not one to easily forget or forgive such actions in one that I believed to be a friend, and to whom I was being super supportive at the time (to my own discomfort). I did not appreciate being taken for granted, nor for going around behind my back, and pretending like these things didn’t happen.

Anyways, I will simply file this episode away and continue to keep that chapter of my life closed. I’ve definitely moved on since then, have many new friends and a new love in my life, and I have no need to go dredging up things that only stress me out and no longer do any good for my mental health.

I must admit that I have been doing quite good about keeping negative people out of my life these past several months.

I think that perhaps when you make room for more positive, happy people in your life (such as my new boyfriend), then there doesn’t seem to be any room left for the negative to dwell.

And if there is any negativity, my Sweetheart is particularly good at making me just ignore and push it out of my life; as I realize it is a waste of my energies and that I’d rather be doing more positive things with my life.

My older brother had to fight in the courts to gain custody of his son from the mother. She was a “Fetal Alcohol” child herself, that turned into an alcoholic and drug-addicted person with harmful behaviours that was seriously messing up her kids. She had three children, all from separate fathers.

I never thought that being a parent would be the one thing that would help my brother turn around his life; but having a small child rely on him for everything seemed to change him for the better. He still has lots of characteristics that bother me, which is why I have a hard time being around him, but I can now handle him in small doses. I am proud, however, of how he has turned out as a father.

So, it was rather strange to be contacted by one of the older brothers (let’s call him “J”); especially since this is one of the older kids who had mentally and physically abused my nephew, with the help of a really deranged neighbourhood kid.

This person “J” sent me a friendship request on Facebook last summer. I’ve been ignoring him, but he contacted me again by FB mail the other day, wanting to be in contact with his little brother. I certainly don’t feel comfortable by the situation and don’t want to enable it either. I’m sure that it will bring up nothing but bad memories for my young nephew, something that took years for him to get over.

So I decided to forward the email communications from “J”, to my own brother to let him know of the situation. I’ve asked him if he would like me to respond in any manner, or if I can go ahead and simply block this guy from contacting me on Facebook.

We’ll see how it turns out, but I simply hope to be able to block him—any kid that would abuse his little brother in that way, when he was only a toddler, does NOT deserve any sort of second or third chance. He’s had his chances before and hasn’t changed.

This past weekend, I received a text from “B” out of the blue, very late on Saturday night. The weird thing is that I had just been thinking about the situation only about a half hour before.

The text basically stated that he was prepared to return the precious item that belonged to me, at my convenience but also stating that he will be out of town most of May. (So it’s actually not really at my convenience, but rather around his schedule…)

The unusual timing got me thinking and on a hunch I texted my old boyfriend/buddy the next morning and asked him if he had anything to do with it. (I suspected that they might both have been in attendance at the same party.) I remember how he often used to pick up on my feelings and we’d often call each other when the other one was thinking of each other—we used to joke how we “heard” the other thinking of us.

So when I asked if he had “nudged” B, he replied: “Just a tad… Happy Easter!” Hehehehe… he might no longer be my boyfriend, but he’s still a great friend and it’s stuff like this that proves it!

So, after mulling it over, I’ll be texting B back, telling him that since it took him 3 months to even recognize his responsibility in returning my property to me, that it is my desire for it to be mailed back to me immediately.

I get the sneaking suspicion that B was hoping to use it as “ransom” and arrange to be able to visit me in order to bring it back, and of course he’d want to present all his excuses, justification, etc. at the same time.

And after a phone call to one of my other best friends who was at the party where the “nudging” occured and saw/heard what happened, it seems I was right about him wanting to still meet with me and making excuses about the whole situation to my ex-boyfriend.

I’m not going to let B maneuver me into that kind of situation. It will simply stress me for nothing and get me upset for weeks; just as I’m getting it out of my system. The situation is over and done with; and nothing will change by hashing it all over again.

Apparently B “still wants to be friends”, but after all that has happened and how he went about things, I’m really not in the mood to be around him or to have anything to do with him for months, if not years.

I’m heading out to the big theme party tonight and I am seriously hoping that “B” is not going to be there. I really don’t want to have to deal with any of that…

I’ve warned some of my friends that will be there with me that I don’t want to deal with him, so they can help act as “shields”, if necessary. Some of them are male friends, so they should be able to be a bit more forceful and not let me have to get involved in any sort of discussion with him.

If he does show up and does try to approach me, I’ll do my best to simply say that I am there to enjoy myself with my friends and NOT to discuss these things or even to be reminded of them.

I’m hoping he’ll get the hint, but either’s he’s dumber than I thought or he’s clueless because he still seems to think he’s done nothing wrong in all of this and that his actions were ok.

I only hope I can go out and just enjoy myself for a change and not have to worry about him or any other negative people tonight. Hopefully by surrounding myself with good and positive friends, it should turn out to be a decent evening out…

Sorry for my rambling, this probably won’t make much sense to any of you—I guess it’s more to get it out of my system…

Well, it has come to my attention that “B” was indeed being deceptive in his actions in a number of ways. After the break in our friendship, I had sent a letter where I mentioned (amongst other things) that he was obviously “seeking more male energy” (he’s bisexual) than my friendship and he denied it saying “that was not it”.

I now see in one of his online blogs that he is indeed hanging around with two men extremely closely. One of them is “E”, the sneaky bastard mentioned in one of my previous notes. The other is someone he had hung around before, but is now having sexual experiences with.

So much for the “not seeking male energy” defence he had tried to assume. He was blatantly lying, even if he can’t see it for himself. At least if he had been honest that it was something he was missing and wanted to do, then I could have released him from his servitude and be done with it. It’s this obvious bullshit from him that continues to piss me off and which is why I really rather not have anything to do with him for the long term.

And to top it all off, he mentioned in one of his texts that he has always “loved me” but that there had always been someone else there, and mentioned my previous boyfriends. Ugh. He knows that I never, ever thought of him in in a sexual manner—so the fact that he brought it up just totally squicks me!

So, the worst part is that he will probably also be at a big theme party that I am also planning on attending this Saturday, and I’m not looking forward to seeing him. But I plan on attending with other friends, so I hope to just avoid him. If he approaches me; I’ll just explain briefly and as tersely/politely that I came to the party to enjoy myself, not to discuss or be reminded of such matters.

He had invited me (via Facebook) to a belated BDay party of his that very same evening, a few hours earlier. I’ve declined, stating “previous obligations”.

Those “obligations” are with my “best friend/sister” and as we had planned on going shopping and getting ready (doing our makeup, getting dressed-up, etc.) for the night’s big theme party. We so rarely get to go out and it’s been such a long time that we wanted to make a very special day of it. And she’s always been there for me during the past 20+ years, whether we lived just down the road from each other, or across the country—so I’d obviously rather spend time with someone positive in my life than a sneaky lying so-called “friend”.

There is an acquaintance (E) I met a few months ago, via a friend of mine (B). Despite initial uneasiness, I figured that he must be okay if he was a friend of B, however recent events have shown that both B & E have been quite deceptive. In fact, certain statements from E have shown that he has either been lying to me, or misrepresenting himself to B (someone who is supposed to be one of his best friends).

So my initial instinct has been proved right and I really don’t feel comfortable having anything to do with this person (E). Worst of all, I can’t even mention or explain this to B, as he is sure to just think I am attacking his friend.

So, I’ve simply decided to minimize any further contact with E. I received a text message from him recently that he wanted to talk with me and “to be my friend”. I waited a few days and then texted back politely that I was too tied up with family & business matters and that I had to concentrate on those but thanks for the concern.

I don’t want to be nasty or rude, because that might have further repercussions, but wanted to politely turn him down. So far I haven’t heard from him, so that’s a good sign.

It was a bit of a stressful situation; but I think I handled it well, was polite and dealt with it in a way that makes me feel better about keeping people like this out of my life as much as possible, especially with all that is happening now.

(I’m proud of how I handled this, because the dark part of me just wanted to tell him to f*ck off and leave me alone because he’s a lying sneaky bastard.)

I took a big step this week towards keeping these negative people out of my life.

On Facebook, I removed the ability for them to see my statuses and I removed the from my newsfeed. I would like to remove them altogether; but at this point, that would just cause more problems than it is worth.

I’m hoping that my not being reminded of them on a daily basis that it might lessen my stress level.

I’m also keeping my communications with them to a minimum. Some of them I simply won’t talk on the phone with right now; I simply ignore them when I notice them calling on my cell and let them leave a message. The most they might get from me is a brief text message or FB message—just enough to keep them off my back and from being too nosy if I “disappeared” outright.