I’ve come to some painful realizations the past few days. I’m discovering a pattern with people in my life that paints a pretty ugly picture of me. I hate seeing it, but I know that shining the light on the ugly will help it to shrivel up and die. The thing is, I’ve had a history of relationships with friends that has pretty consistently looked like this: friend is someone in need or a weak personality type; I come along and rescue and/or dominate this person. Each situation looks slightly different because all relationships are unique, but the underlying pattern is there and can’t be denied.

The even more painful piece of this discovery is that the pattern started with my sister. I was always the wise, older sister who she looked up to. She was never assertive, never spoke her mind, always backed down to me and always deferred to whatever I said. If I told her to go get me a drink or something to eat, she did. I was a major control freak and wanted her to do exactly as I said at all times - and for the most part she did. Then when she went to college, she suddenly changed. She grew a backbone and started standing up to me and refusing to do as I told, disagreeing with me and just generally being her own person. I HATED IT!!!!!!!! That was the beginning of our relationship falling apart and a huge distance developing between us. For years I’ve blamed her for why our relationship isn’t that great and now I’m realizing I have a big part in it, too.

There’s a close friend who was just the latest in my string of rescues who is growing stronger and changing into someone who doesn’t need to be rescued any longer. I’m finding myself less and less attracted to her. There are other factors at play in this relationship deteriorating, but I know the fact that I no longer have as much control over her is a big part of my distance.

Intellectually I know that I don’t have control over people - in my mind there is only one who has all power, and it’s not me. Somehow, though, I continue to act on old beliefs. I sure hope after achieving some growth in this area that I’ll start attracting people who don’t need to be rescued.

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