The Girl Who Owned Nothing

Preface:  Most of the names, places, and details in this post have been changed, or omitted, to protect the identities of those portrayed.  These obfuscations do not materially impact the story.  This post also introduces the use of green font, which will be utilized to denote when a particular sentence is pure sarcasm.  There have been issues with some readers taking everything I write literally, so this should assist in clearing that up.

Over the years, I've encountered just about every personality type and disorder one can, but recently I ran across someone whose actions made it clear they were messed up, but in way I just couldn't put my finger on.  I was friends with this person for a period earlier this year.  Fadwa was highly educated, cute, and an international traveler, according to her Match profile.  We traded a few notes before my better judgment took over; I told her I wouldn't date her because she was separated.  If you've read my post on the topic, you'll understand why.  She was disappointed and initially tried to convince me to reverse my decision.  That wasn't happening, so we agreed to be friends.  Fadwa shared that 20 years ago, she emigrated from a middle eastern country, was Muslim, and a virgin when she married her husband.  She said she could probably use some friendly assistance navigating the world of online dating, considering her lack of life experience.  I agreed to offer the insight I'd gathered over the past several years.

She would share 'snapshots' of the various men she was communicating with and ask my opinion on each.  Most weren't accompanied by enough information to offer much insight, but a few were quite clearly ones to stay away from, in my experience.  One who became a source of friction between Fadwa and myself was Nick.  She shared how Nick was smart, successful, witty, etc. which made him sound like a good match for her.  Then she shared that Nick was a recovering alcoholic.  Danger, Will Robinson!  She said he was six years sober and did yoga, running, and a few other athletic endeavors to assist in maintaining his sobriety.  I warned her that she'd do best to steer clear of a former addict (having experience with this, myself) and that his sobriety seemed fragile, considering all the work he was putting into propping it up.  She chose to ignore my input and went out with him anyway.

At some point, our friendship expanded to include benefits.  She wanted to experience all the sexual freedom and pleasure she'd been missing, having only ever been with a man who sometimes wouldn't even get his clothes off before finishing.  I made the offer and she accepted.  And yes, this is germane to the story.

On either their first or second date, Nick flaked.  I don't recall where the photo was (house, phone, etc.) but Nick saw one of Fadwa and her hubby together, it freaked him out, and he disappeared, saying he couldn't take seeing her with another man.  At that point, I more strongly advised her to put him out of her mind and said, very specifically, that he seemed to be on the verge of a relapse.  Freaking out at the thought of someone you're interested with another is screwy to begin with, but after two dates?  That's just scary.  She told me she really liked him and still wanted to see him.

Long story short, she went to visit him one Saturday night, and he was drunk.  Wow, what a shock! No one saw that coming!  But he convinced her that he had just started and this was his first relapse.  Sure, because an addict would never lie about something like this.  I did my best to make Fadwa realize this guy couldn't be trusted.  That addicts will lie their asses off to everyone; I sent her a ton of source material to back up what I was saying.  She was convinced otherwise, repeatedly telling me 'he's always been honest with me'.  Of course he has....  She wanted to help him get sober in the hopes they could date again.  Ladies and gentleman, I give you the height of naivete.

To be clear, I'm not unsympathetic to her situation.  Having feelings for someone who isn't healthy for you or emotionally equipped for a relationship sucks.  In fact, I can empathize, because despite my best efforts, I still have feelings for the woman I've mentioned in previous posts, whose abandonment issues destroyed our relationship.  It's not just your rational and emotional sides duking it out on this particular issue.  Logic says 'we care about each other, we're both available, and neither of us are in prison, so we should be together!'  But you can't and attempting to wrap your head around that can be maddening.  In any case, the strong feelings Fadwa had were out of place, after three dates.

At some point, Nick was temporarily put on the back burner and a new cast of characters came into play, one of whom became the straw that broke the camel's back for me.  She wasn't terribly interested in most of the men, save one who looked good on paper.  I shall call him Gomez.  She pursued meeting Gomez but noticed what she thought were a few red flags, and solicited my input.  For the sake of brevity, I'll just say he was attempting to 'couple' himself to her before they'd even met.  I told her those were signs of either intimacy or abandonment issues.  I warned her to be cautious, which seemed to motivate her to interact with him with him further.  Gomez revealed a great deal about his past to Fadwa, which she then shared with me.  This guy's history could have been included in a textbook for abandonment issues.  Mother died, father remarried, new wife didn't like son so son was shipped off to live with family in Europe, previous significant other died, the list goes on.  I practically yelled at her to stay away from this guy; to learn not make the same mistake I had.  Seriously, if there's one thing I've got a ton of experience on, it's abandonment issues.

Throughout this period, conversations between Fadwa and I had become increasingly tense.  I openly shared my frustration that she continued to make poor dating choices, despite having my guidance to prevent her from doing so.  I pointed out that in every instance, what I'd said to her had been spot on, and listed them off one by one.  I'd correctly called out Nick as being fragile and predicted his relapse.  Before that, I'd provided input on how her mental well being had been impacted by an emotionally abusive husband and that she should break off contact with him.  That he was continuing to manipulate her.  Her therapist told her the exact same things as I did; that, she took seriously.  But she repeatedly ignored my input.  It doesn't take much of an imagination to realize this dynamic became incredibly frustrating to me.  It even felt a bit insulting.

She told me she listened to my advice, but made her own decisions.  I have to admit her response grated on me a bit because she just didn't get it.  What I offered wasn't advice; advice implies an opinion.  You ask for advice on whether the green dress or the blue one looks better on you.  Whether you should study engineering or marketing.  What I was offering was informed guidance that comes from possessing vastly greater life experience than her as well as my knowledge of human behavior.  As parallel example, I'm not a certified mechanic but have wrenched on almost every car I've owned.  So, I know a few things about them.  Enough to be able to recognize that if a wheel has two lug nuts missing and the others having one thread of engagement, said wheel will fall off.  That outcome is almost a certainty and well beyond the level of opinion.

The conclusion of every one of these exchanges was always the same.  Fadwa would push her bad choices off on others.  Things were left 'in God's hands' or it didn't matter because fate had already determined her path.  My personal favorite was her saying she'd pray for guidance.  I'd scream at her that I'd already given her great fucking guidance if she'd open her ears.  That I was fairly certain God would want her to use the fucking brain he'd given her.  But she wouldn't be the one driving; God needed to take the wheel.  If you've read my religion post, you know that's something I consider to be beyond ignorant.  And thus the title for this entry.  She'd make one bad decision after another and pawn it off elsewhere.  She owned nothing.

I recall the crux of the last few conversations we had.  She told me she was in love with Nick.  Sure, that's emotionally healthy after a few dates.  The last conversation we had ended with her considering dating Gomez again.  I'd had about enough of her acting like a child, so my warning at the time was only half-hearted. Besides, I'd said it all before and she never listened.  The last words I heard from her were 'but I do like a smart man', referring to why Gomez was attractive to her.  I know they were the last words because I hung up on her after she said them.  I'd had enough and cut ties with her.

But the story, and the theme, don't end there.  I'd apparently mentioned her (well disguised, of course) in a previous entry and she sent me a less than pleasant note demanding I remove the reference.  Of course, I always do what I'm told by people who ignore my advice.  I'm certain she'll throw a major fit after reading this post.  Anyway, included in the email was this gem:

I don't want to be friends with you. I feel much happier now that I am not in a fwb relationship as it is against my nature and interest. 

First of all, it seems she didn't quite get my not having anything to do with her for a month meant our friendship was over.  More importantly, without context, one could infer that I'd manipulated this chaste and virtuous woman into being fwb's.  Clearly I'd done an excellent job at it because she would regularly ask if she could come over for extra benefits, over and above the nights we'd planned.  (In the interest of good taste, I'll skip describing the less than virtuous things she wanted me to do to her.)  But yet another decision that she couldn't take responsibility for and wanted to pawn off elsewhere.  And that's why she'll forever be known as the girl who owned nothing.