Recently, my friend’s daughter has launched a seek and destroy campaign against him. She’s pulled up facts (and rumors) from his past and attempted to make people believe they’re current activities (i.e. heroin addiction! among other crap).  She’s another self-absorbed controller unleashing her special brand of evil into the world.

Of course, this friend of mine, feels devastated and hurt. He sits firmly in “what-ifs” and “where did I go wrongs”. He knows she is a toxin in his life; he left her butt in her home state at her mama’s last week. She is pissed. He is working on sending her stuff. I am so proud of him.

The past month or so has been difficult for me to deal with. Although I see clearly from a detached distance the horror that young woman was brewing, I had to work very hard to clearly see MY reality with this man. He shows no signs of drug abuse, he has never taken advantage of me, he’s gentle with animals, he’s honest about his feelings. Yet, when his BOSS (who the daughter also called) tells me he’s a liar who is planning on selling his daughter’s car (to purchase more heroin?), is heading off from his sister’s funeral to gamble the money he stole from his daughter, and is the biggest most convincing liar on the face of the planet, I have to admit that I was jarred.

I almost trusted someone else over myself.

I slowed down my thinking. I slowed down my heart. And I called my friend.

I heard his completely sober voice, and KNEW. The stories surrounding him were fictitious at best, evil at worst. He was truthful. He was the man I thought I knew.

There was no one to validate this for me but ME. And for once, my own information, my own gut feeling, was enough. After years of believing my ex (on a very deep level) that I couldn’t see the forest for the trees, I discovered that belief to be fallacy.

I’m learning to trust myself, and I feel really good about that.