Can You Help Me Help My Friend?

[ilovetoday]

This is a little long but I feel I need to get across what has happened.

In high school I was in a small group of friends who I thought the world of each one and I felt like the link between everyone somehow, by senior year I didnt have a best friend each five in our group felt as though in different ways they were my best friend.

One girl -I will name Em, she was funny and outgoing in some ways when she was in the comfort zone of our group, or in her favourite subjects like drama and music. Then outside of that she lacked in confidence-as most of us do in high school-not very sure of what we are doing and who we are. Her mother was not particularly nice to her and neither was her older brother. In fact in our group we all picked on each other- thats just the way we were, teased each other in what we thought was harmless fun, and I was the ringleader in a way.

After school everyone got into their own stuff and Em was one who called a lot-I stayed in contact pretty closely with everyone but they didnt stay in contact with each other hardly at all. I tried to encourage her to move to uni with me-she didnt acheive high grades at school but you didnt need to for the course that she wanted to do Drama teaching. She started getting interested but she kept holding back. I didnt want to shove her into anything she didnt want to do.

I came back on uni break and we went to a theme park for the day with another girl from the group and she kept trying to steal my sunglasses. I stopped her when i noticed they disapeared into her bag and told her to give them back. She was never like this at school. always generous and we always shouted each other lunch.

While I was back at uni she tried to get my other friends boyfriends number and was really insistent on it even though she had only met him once and she had other guys approaching her that she wouldnt have a bar of. This never happened at high school either.

That is where I thought she crossed the line and stopped making the effort to talk to her. That was not something friends do. Then I began to wonder who she hung out with and I realised that she lives with her mum and brother who are very devalueing towards her, her mum tells her that she is only good to work in a supermarket store-which she does with her mum. She hasnt got her licence and she never answers the phone for anyone of all our friends.

My other friend that I just got in contact with told me she moved down with her for a week but stayed in her house the whole week and then decided to move home.

I managed to get her this morning on the phone and we talked for a while until my phone went dead.

I live an hour and a half drive away and I decided to make her life change- even though she is the only one to change it herself, I think it cannot hurt if I go down and take her out and do stuff bit by bit so not to scare her off- i have invited her out many times but she will never come. I know what it is like to be such low confidence but I want to help her.

I am going to drive down every thursday- make a habit of dropping in and talking and letting her know she is important to me(doing girls stuff, encourage to write down goals, talk good gossip, talk about success stories). Then ask if she will join me because I dont want to go (to dinner or shopping) alone. I was thinking maybe leaving my car at her house and catching the bus everywhere so she realises how simple it is, then maybe work on getting her to meet me at places, and start talking about my own confidence issues-not targetting her directly but letting her know she is not alone in a round about way then take that talk into stuff I am working at to help improve my self esteem.

I know she has such low self esteem this might take a very long time considereing i am only available to do this on one two days at max-and the price of petrol for a regular drive is high.

Does anyone else have suggestions?
On ways to approach her on talking about herself or maybe dont approach her she will come out when she wants to?
Or even ideas for doing new activites-pushing the boudaries on where we go and what we do (on a budget for now)
Or ideas to do in her house to begin with.


I know I can take her to my own mum and dads house because they know the situation and they will build her confidence. they like her. And work on inviting her down to visit my older sister who lives in the middle of the capital city here. just to push her boundaries step by step.

[ilovetoday]

omg that is one very long post

[moriez]

First of all my hat of to you for your kindness towards her. Thats rare. A thing that comes to mind is do you think she wants this? Your "help"? I guess you can always try but dont push it. Did you ask yourself what you are trying to achieve or prove for yourself by helping her?

Now, as for suggestions Id say, take it real easy and naturally. Go for a walk (always a pleasure in Australia), a drink, a movie, some food. You can do that lots of times. Check out what she likes to do, how she spends her time. Figure out if spending time together doesnt drain you or her too much. Ultimately you might want to try to talk her into counseling. Cant beat decent professional help.

Well, just a couple of things that came to mind. Goodluck.