I have a few friends that I would trust with my life and we talk all the time. The other day I was talking to one friend about stress and life and anxiety and stuff and we were on like the same page. I had to ask her about coming out to people we know cause its stressing me out but I need to do it so I wanted her input... I feel the need to talk to someone all the time about how I feel but I feel bad "bothering" her... She says a thousand times that I am not bothering her but I still feel bad... I just needed to write this somewhere. I feel so bad when I am talking about personal things to people (which I do not open up to people almost every). But why do I feel selfish or "full of myself" when I am just talking about personal issues with other people. I want to be open with people but I feel bad doing it
If she says It's not annoying, It may not be. Especially if you are there for her and listen to her. I open up about life stress to my best friend all the time....never had any issues. If anything, she'd be more upset if I DIDN'T do it, because she views it as a lack of trust/bonding in our friendship. However, opening up sometimes does become a burden but only in certain situations. If you don't balance out bad with good/happy conversations, someone can feel more like a therapist than. If you talk about your problems but turn away from your friends when they need you, that can be one sided and hurtful to the other party. If you learn balance, It's not an issue. We are just socialized to feel selfish doing this.
Hello Unknown737, I absolutely understand how you feel. I always feel that I'm a burden and annoyance to my friends, especially since I've been having recurring relationship problems lately. That's why I tend to keep to myself even though I really need to talk to someone. But I know that it isn't the best way to go since it slowly eats me up from the inside. I guess the best way is to think about your problems first before you decide to talk about it to someone else. If it's a fleeting kind of feeling that you can keep to yourself, you can skip out on telling your friend. But if it keeps bugging you and almost driving you crazy, it's better to let it out. So if your friends says that it's okay, it's a good thing to talk about your problems with your friend! But of course, like Creativemind said, there has to be a balance of happy and serious conversations. Don't forget to be there for each other in happy and tough times. Every relationship is a two way street, especially friendships. Best of luck!
Yes, if your friends say they are OK with it, take them at their word. Or else you could be a self-defeater, that is, your persistent asking if you are annoying could get to be annoying. That may sound flip, but I had a partner who destroyed our relationship by obsessing over whether anything was going wrong with it, when there wasn't. But the obsession killed it.
Everyone has different levels of tolerance for different things and different people. I know people that if you bring up a topic twice, they lose a gasket. And I know others that are completely un-phased by talking about the same stuff again and again. The best thing you can do is take your friend at their word and maybe just check in now and then to see if they still feel that way.
