I am a person with loooooooooooooots of friends. In fact, I don’t even believe in the concept of having a lot of friends, but just one best friend. As I have mentioned in an earlier post, I have a number of best friends, who are the best in one way or the other and complement each other. But of all these friends, only a couple of them know that as friendly a person that I am, I have a tendency to drive away the closest of them sometimes or rather run away from them.

I had always thought this was an abnormal feeling where I get tense when someone shows that he cares for me. It does not mean that I resent any level of affection from my friends. But somehow, when someone very close to me tries to protect me or make me happy by doing something for me, I react very very strongly. I’m not “fiercely independent” or anything. But I have in most ways been independent all my life, that I can’t have someone tell me or act like “You don’t do anything. I’m here. I’ll do everything for you.” If I need something, I will obviously ask.

A very close friend getting concerned about me might be something very natural. I appreciate the concern, provided the person does not come and tell me that. At least not in a way that I don’t know what is good for me and what is not. Even worse, I can’t stand someone trying to tell me what I want, especially with petty things like whether I want an AC or non-AC room when I stay somewhere or whether I want to travel in a general compartment or AC compartment. I don’t think there is any reason for one to feel “She doesn’t know what she wants.” I believe that a 25 year old girl (or woman?) should be mature enough to understand what is safe and how things are to be done. It is, in fact, primarily the girl’s concern. So people have to understand that a decision made will be made, keeping in consideration all the factors.

And last, but most important, sometimes when I get the feeling that I have become way too part of the routine for a friend, I get scared. The moment I become a habit or routine to someone I start thinking “Why is it a rule that we have to talk for this much time everyday mandatorily? What if I’m not there tomorrow?” And that thought really bugs me. Somehow, I don’t really want to be too important for anyone. And the more someone expects love and care from me, the more I find it difficult to live up to the expectations.

The best of friends are the ones who never even think “He/she hasn’t called me in N number of days.” Although every relation involves some work to be done on it and efforts put in to maintain it, the best of friends never really have to count days and get depressed just because they did not talk for two days. I have a couple of friends who I talk to sometimes, maybe once a month or sometimes even less frequently. But whenever I’ve wanted to talk to a friend, they were the first ones I would call and the same was their case as well.

For the friend, it is a brutal act from my side mostly because all he does is be good. But probably I can’t stand too much of goodness. Again I don’t know if it is because I crave for space in any relation, whether it is with my family or my friends. But whatever it is, the fact remains that I get suffocated when showered with love and care. I prefer these in subtle ways. And when I get suffocated my first instinct is to flee, which I believe is a horrible thing to do. Therefore now I have started to tone myself down a lot because I know that for the love I am given, I have no right to hurt the other by being rude and keeping a distance. Instead I have started talking it out with them the moment I feel the suffocation so that they understand I am getting “claustrophobic”. I would not say I’ve become an angel overnight or anything. But yeah, I’m definitely trying not to flee and screw up some wonderful friendships, but stay on to make them work.

And thank God! The very few with whom I’ve felt this have been close enough to understand my weird behavior and still remain my best friends. If you guys are reading this, I hope you understand what I have been trying to tell you all the while and I am really very sorry if I have hurt you in the process of being honest. I know I am not the best when it comes to proper communication, but I just wanted you to know that you are still very very important to me. Thanks for staying by. 🙂

Also published on Medium.