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The original was posted on /r/relationships by /u/Beneficial_Ad_9579 on 2024-01-23 05:12:53+00:00.
I (27M), got into a pretty bad argument with my friend (also 27M) a few weeks ago. For the record, him and I have been friends for over 10 years, and I consider him one of my closest friends. However, when we get into arguments, they tend to get pretty bad. But none have been as bad as the one we had over the phone a few weeks ago, and it ended our friendship.
For some info before I get into it, I dealt with severe depression the last few years, and this caused me to get into a bad gaming addiction. I have really been trying to break it and pull my life together, which is why I can reach out to my close friends for help who I trust.
The phone call started off well. I know he has been going through some stuff too so I have been there for him, and we talked about some life stuff, etc. Then, I brought up the fact that I was trying to break my gaming addiction, and soon the conversation got a bit heated. This friend of mine can be patronizing and criticizing when it comes to life advice, and in these situations, sounds like my boss rather than a close friend.
At one point later in the conversation, he brought up how my weight (For the record I am 5'8'' and 205 lbs) is a huge detrimental factor on why I am have trouble finding a romantic partner. And how that losing a lot of weight would solve my issue of having trouble finding a girlfriend. Now, I don't know if he's right about this or not, but I really hope he is wrong. While I am not fit by any means, I am not a morbidly obese person either. All that being said, I know losing weight is a great goal, not only for your physical health but mental as well, so it's been something I am trying to work on more this year.
He also said "I am going to be honest with you, if I played as much video games as you do, I'd look like you". Now, I know he was trying to be bluntly honest and didn't have any bad intentions, but him saying this got on my nerves quite a bit, and honestly ruined my evening. At one point, he was also mentioning about how his 19 year old brother was a role model and was interning with the city(I was screaming inside myself mentally saying "Dude I don't give a fuck about your brother I am so sorry??"). I just found so much of this conversation to be of a shaming perspective from his end.
Afterwards, is where things got really bad. I am currently seeing a dietician who is great. Her practice is strictly against weight loss/calorie counting, but rather focuses the sessions on healthy lifestyle habits and a healthy relationship with food. When I told him this, he basically got very defensive and told me to give the name of the practice(which I did), and also the dietician's phone number. He wasn't believing what I was saying. When I told him that I would look her number up right now, he basically snapped saying "How do you not know her phone number??". Now, I am basically seething with rage internally. Not only is he accusing me of lying, but who the fuck memorizes phone numbers in 2024?
Right after, he asks me how I usually communicate with her in general. I told him that we do Telehealth appointments through email video links, in addition to phone calls. He responds saying "If you are bullshitting me right now I swear...". (directly accusing me of lying). At this point, my patience had reached my limit and I snapped. I told him "fuck off" directly on the phone, and he swiftly hung up on me. He then immediately removed and blocked me on all social media.
About a half hour later, he sent me an extremely gaslighting and guilt tripping voice message(where he was almost screaming) that was 6 minutes long. Saying things like "I am so tired of being your emotional punching bag!!", "You need to seek professional psychiatric help", "Why have the friends I have introduced you to don't want to keep up with you??", "I need to go to work tomorrow and pay my bills so I can be an adult and live my life!"
I am not going to leave anything out. Because of my depression, I have absolutely been a bit too much with relying on my friends as if they are therapists, so he is not entirely wrong with some of the things he is saying. I tend to talk about my personal issues more than I should with my closest friends, and that's absolutely something I need to work on(Also seeing a therapist for these issues, and she's been great!).
TLDR, I found him using a voice message like that as a defensive to be extremely unwarranted after that phone call. I had every right to be upset after the way he was talking to me on the phone, and he attacked me with a voice message like this after. This whole situation led to a massive argument and I am not sure how to move forward.