Bad Phone Call

The name I learned for this is the "extinction burst". She will be quiet for a bit and then rage HARDER than ever before, before giving up and you never hear from her again.

I don't like to ride them...I like to lead them and work with them. I worked with therapy horses so mainly it was learning how to work with the horse and the rider together...leading them...because the students were children. I just love to feed and groom horses, and hang around with them.

I was set up to do holistic horse training with an Arabian horse I was quite fond of. She had PTSD herself...having lost her baby to coyotes minutes after birth. But the problem was...her owner was a very difficult woman. She wanted a lot of money from me...to pay for the training sessions etc. I mean it wasn't my horse. I was just volunteering. (If I had the money I would have bought that horse off her. I mean why did she allow that horse to give birth outside when there were coyotes around? Never understood that.)


I love Arabians and mustangs...just being around them. I like being on eye level with horses. Talking to them, feeding them, watching their behavior. I just love that. So I have never been into riding because I really like being on eye level with horses.

I loved horses as a kid and always wanted to ride and work with them...and I did go to horse camp and all that jazz, but I found as an adult that working with, rehabbing, and training dogs was the right kind of therapy for me. Although chatting with OE on here, I have learned there is a lot of overlap!

Wow...I have never heard of that! I need to look that up.

Well, it's been 50 years and she keeps coming back but this time it is over for me. I kind of wonder what is going to happen because I am now getting the impression that she and her husband are no longer on speaking terms. I mean how can you live in a house and you and your spouse aren't sleeping in the same bed, eating at the same table, or on speaking terms? How can that last? I fear something bad is going to happen and I don't want to be around for it.

Yes, here's a good definition: Extinction Burst | SpringerLink

YES, and they go on a rage rant hoping you will somehow see it/hear it and they may rant to your own family even.

My sister was so bad that way and she literally USED my parents to punish me. It got so I could not pick up the phone or hear her voice without getting severely triggered. When I would not go to her house so she could instruct me because I genuinely did not feel safe, she put my mother in a home and refused to tell me where my mother was. I searched everywhere and I tried to call around and the people would not let me know if my mother was a patient or not. So I had to get in my car and drive around. When my brother asked where my mother was she would not tell him either insisting she did not want me to know.

I finally found my mother and I wanted to go see her, I cried and cried with relief just knowing where she was. My husband went with me and the people were nice and said "oh she will love having a visitor, she doesn't get any visitors". So my sister LIED about being there for her. Yet, when I finally saw her she lit up and was happy to see me an I was so glad she was not drugged out like other patients I saw in my search. While I was standing there talking to her my mother suddenly looked very upset and said "Watch out there is a very angry person coming right at us". I turned around and it was my older sister and she was so angry and negative she upset everyone in the dinning room. I did not react (they want you to react, it gives them relevance) and I just kept looking at my mother calmly and told her I loved her but had to get home to feed my ponies, my mother remembered my ponies. I stayed calm and my husband and I slowly made our way up the hall and next thing I know my sister was coming at me in a rage and pushed open a door and said "get out!, you get out! you can't be here you are not allowed!!", real mean and loud and one of the staff had to say something and told us to take it outside, I did not do anything.

I had to call my lawyer and my lawyer set up a meeting and when she met my sister after the meeting my lawyer said "wow your sister is a mean nasty witch and I would LOVE to take that Btch to court". My lawyer hates my sister, calls her a selfish, mean abusive bully. I went to visit my mother once and my sister hovered and stalked and stood and gossiped with the women at the desk. I genuinely did not feel safe walking out to my car alone. My sister literally stalked and there was nothing I could do about it.

Someone once said "well, she would not scare me" and you know what? That kind of comment was not very nice never seeing how horrible a person my sister can be. It made me feel invalidated like I was being called a wimp. Her behavior is so bad it's down right embarrassing to say she is my sister. People who have been nice, tried to help me all have that same look on their face after meeting her that look of OMG and for men it's worse because they all say they literally want to punch her she is so bad.

My phone rings and it triggers me now, I hear her voice I get triggered. I wish the therapist I have now could see her so he knows what these images I have in my head he is helping me to process with his emdr type therapy.

I know all about how awful you can feel experiencing this kind of toxic presence. She ripped of her mask and it's the most ugliest monster I have ever met my entire life. Even the judge can't stand her. She fills the room with negativity.

I could fill your thread with so many bad things she has done. Yet, don't want to hyjack your thread. I don't want negative people in my life, I am all done with that. When people say, "but it's you family, family comes first"? NO, absolutely NOT. I have my brother, he has been so nice to me in this mess, he has seen how badly she treats me, he hates her too. My brother said, "she is a narcissist and they are like running into a nasty briar bush".

Oh my. They live together but are not on speaking terms, don’t eat and don’t sleep together. Pretty much roommates. It must be very stress inducing. If this ends in divorce, she’d likely try to contact you again to rant about her husband non stop.

Going by her behaviors who really knows, which one of them is abusive. Maybe she is abusing him or is driving him so crazy that he prefers to withdraw and not engage . That’s how these people operate, drive others crazy and then complain about how people react.

Stay strong if she starts to come around and act like this again

[QUOTE=divine1966;6816484]Oh my. They live together but are not on speaking terms, don’t eat and don’t sleep together. Pretty much roommates. It must be very stress inducing. If this ends in divorce, she’d likely try to contact you again to rant about her husband non stop.

Going by her behaviors who really knows, which one of them is abusive. Maybe she is abusing him or is driving him so crazy that he prefers to withdraw and not engage . That’s how these people operate, drive others crazy and then complain about how people react.



Well, I have no idea how it will end. I think this complete separation is fairly recent. And yes, I did start to pull away because I didn't want to triangulate and that is another reason she got angry with me. She thinks I should side with her. But I have known her husband longer than her...have never seen him rage or speak violently or anything like that. What if he is the victim? I actually like him...he has given me no cause not to.

I don't think they want to be divorced. They don't want all that goes with that including being financially strapped. They would have to sell their home.

I am really done.

Family or not we don't have to have narcissists in our life. It is lovely to say family is family and family comes first...but after a certain age, perhaps, we can determine who we want to have adult relationships with. I let go of two siblings...no contact...and I have two siblings I still talk to and it works fine.

I guess I am going to have to go NO CONTACT.

It now seems that this person has been a fake friend. It is crazy. With normal people...if a friendship isn't working you let go. You don't keep on...being fake.


I guess this is the confusing part...especially because this person always remembered my birthday, sends cards and gifts every holiday. From the outside it looked like a normal friendship.


But the things she said...made it seem she despised me. Weird. Hard to wrap my head around.


I am going to go NO CONTACT.

I may have problems in my life but one thing I don't have is disrespect. My son respects me and the siblings I have contact with respect me. All my other relationships within the community are based on mutual respect.

No contact might be the best way in these situations.

Well, I have seen people go along with certain formalities and social etiquettes and yet be VERY toxic and dysfunctional and down right dishonest and manipulative. Actually, narcissists take pride in how they can embrace social etiquettes fooling so many into thinking they are some "good guy/ gal". So many present to the public as being respectible and capable of trust and upstanding. What comes to mind is Matt Lauer who sure fooled so many that were literally SHOCKED when his dark side was finally exposed. Same with Scott Peterson that killed his pregnant wife, his wifes family felt he was much too nice a guy to do anything to harm her. Plenty of scenarios where people where shocked by how horrible someone was and would say, OMG, he always seemed so friendly, kind, and upstanding.

In this situation with this friend, it can be VERY hard to know who is the victim and who is the abuser. HOWEVER, given her husband is an alcoholic and entertainer, it's very possible she really is a trapped victim. I think of Katie Couric who was so dumbfounded, considered Matt a close "safe" friend and confidant. She could not even comment for a very long time.

No more to be said.

I understand. It was uncalled for.

Things with my brother are fine...although we have only been texting (short) not phone calls. It's okay. I don't know what is going on with him but he knows he can confide in me.

I haven't heard from my former friend. I unfriended her on Facebook. She popped up on my Pinterest timeline...although I am confused as to whether or not she was commenting on someone else's post. I don't exactly know how that works on Pinterest...but I blocked her there. I also blocked her on Instagram. She was following me on the last two although I wasn't following her...I don't really use social media that much.

I am still feeling really traumatized by her attack. I guess maybe she was offended because I said I didn't want to be in the middle between her and her husband. It is always so difficult in marriages-gone-bad when friends are forced to take sides. I guess I wish she had just ended the friendship without a lot of negativity and bad feelings. It is really going to take time for me to heal from this. After all, this was a very long friendship.

Truth be told I probably won't get that close to females in the future. I haven't met many female friends in the last few years. Sure, gal pals to go out for coffee or Sunday brunch...but not a real true blue kind of friend. Who knows?, maybe I will be surprised.

I did meet a lovely younger women in my apartment complex and we shared a lot of great conversations while hanging out in the lobby after collecting our mail. But she and her husband moved and we didn't exchange addresses before she left. I also grew quite fond of my next door neighbors, a married couple, but he became ill and they moved to be nearer to his doctor. They left me little farewell gifts on my doorstep...but they moved far away. This is kind of how apartment living is...a lot of moving in and moving out.

I will keep trying...

It sound like you did the best thing for you. You don't need that kind of negative in your life.

Here is a good moral for this long story. So when this witch of a friend took her broom and flew off (I like witches, actually, but not bad ones!) - anyway - she left a space to be filled.

So I recently connected with another old friend from the past and found I had a true blue friend! We talked on the phone yesterday for about two hours...and laughed and it was such a warm reunion. Her grown daughter also got on the phone...and I had memories of her as a sweet little girl with long dark hair, in a white dress, stuffing her face with strawberries from the garden!


Negative energy binds you up like barbed wire. When you get free...what a relief.


My church has been doing really great outreach and I have talked to a few wonderful women there. I am looking forward to meeting them face-to-face in the future.

I still feel angry and sad about this friend who was so mean to me. She was my very oldest friend...the one whom I shared the most memories with. But here is the truth...she does not work on her problems. And it shows.

Everyone who comes on Psych Central is dedicated to working on their problems. And this shows too. Psych Central members work very hard on their lives, in their relationships, at their work, and with personal development. No one is perfect. But the best medicine is "progress along the path."

One of the last things I said to my negative friend is that she needs to go to Alanon. This is an organization for family and friends of an alcoholic. She is in an abusive marriage (it wasn't always so but with his drinking it has become so)...and she is harming herself by letting his warped personality (warped from the drinking) poison her. I speak from experience. I went to Alanon because I had alcoholism in my family of origin, both family members and in-laws...and it was poisoning my life. I loved the community of Alanon and I gained valuable skills there. If you work hard at the Alanon program you get skills you can use for life...not just with people who have addictions...but with others as well, such as those with narcissistic personality disorder. Thankfully most my family members have either resolved or are working on their addiction problems. Others who did not stop drinking...ended up dead. It's as simple as that.

Because of Alanon eventually I detached from anyone with an addiction problem. I truly think my friend MUST MUST MUST act in an interventionist way with her husband. I know this man. He has a good heart, but he is wounded. He needs the community of AA. Right now he is just isolated with his bottle in front of the TV. Well, this is where many many alcoholics end up, at rock bottom, totally isolated. AND...THIS STORY IS A RERUN. His father was an alcoholic.

I can say without a doubt that I love these two people...my friend and her husband. I have known them forever. We all grew up together. I know their families. I have a very, very long history of loving them. But now I will do it from afar. Detach with love, that is what I am doing.

Just remember...a person with a drinking problem or an addiction isn't really doing it alone. They are affecting everyone around them...and the poison just flows out.

“Detach with love”. This is an excellent message.

There is online support for al Alanon and AA during pandemics. But they’d have to want to seek help. You are right. Until then all we can do is detach.