How should I handle an ex friend who feels like he needs to bully me to raise his own self esteem? (We're adults)
How should I handle an ex friend who feels like he needs to bully me to raise his own self esteem? (We're adults)
I went to college with this guy 10 years ago and I considered him a friend up until this year. Something changed in him, and he constantly needs to put me down and I don't know how to handle it.
We're both 28, for reference.
Last year, he reported me to the college because I was doing students' homework for them for some extra cash. He said that what I was doing was depreciating his Diploma. I guess I get it, but what kind of friend would try to get me in trouble for something as harmless as doing people's homework? He didn't ask me to stop first or talk to me about it first, he just flat out reported me. Some friend.
Edit: I'm not saying what I did was not wrong. If he valued my friendship, he would have talked to me first. And I would have valued our friendship enough to stop.
I ended up dropping out of the program because of stress. He graduated this spring. I congratulated him and genuinely was happy for him. He then sends me this really childish text, bragging about how he graduated and I didn't. Here's a quote from part of the conversation. No joke, this is word for word:
"Hey [my name], just letting you know that I am an engineer now and you aren't. Also I just got hired at [his work] and am making $34 now just to start. There will be a party at [local bar] to celebrate my graduation. You should come. There will be resumes being taken, you should submit yours, because people like me always need assistants. Even though you are not an engineer by any means."
I thought, maybe he's being intentionally arrogant as a joke that I'm supposed to get. But that's not the case, this kind of talk continued for months. And he means it to be hurtful.
I couldn't take it anymore, so I blocked him on everything I could think of.
A little bit of background information, I recently started my own business making custom tools. This quote was a part of what he commented on my Instagram picture of one of my tools yesterday:
"You should stop posting these online, it's really embarrassing because your [tool name] is such a failure. I should redesign all of it for you because I'm actually an engineer at [company name] and have a lot more experience. I could actually do it right, unlike you. I just might help you if you ask me nicely."
Like, what the hell did I do to deserve that? I don't know why I let it even bother me because of how obviously immature he is being.
I didn't respond. I blocked him on Instagram too, but now he's trying to message me on LinkedIn. Blocked him there now too.
I'm still friends with his brother, so it's impossible for me to completely block him out from my life unfortunately.
I almost want to explain to him how narcissistic he is, and how his messages are an obvious cry of mental insecurity. I know that that would just be fueling the fire though, and would solve nothing.
He deserves to be put in his place. I don't know if that's possible though without me becoming just as petty as he is.
How should I handle this? He's bound to see me in the future, so there's no avoiding his bullshit.
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Is the sudden personality change as drastic as it reads?
Sudden switches like that could be a sign of a serious medical condition, mid 20s is I believe a common age for these things to kick in too.
I'd talk to the brother about it coming from an angle of concern.
I think I can almost remember the exact day that he shifted. We were talking about our previous girlfriends and he very openly bragged that he's slept with better looking women than I have (I'm not like that). He kept talking about it over and over that day, I could see he was getting a lot of enjoyment out of it.
Before this, he was a different person. Overall good morals, good friend for the most part, rarely put me down.
It was very sudden.
It was also about the time he started to drink really heavily, but that might not be directly related.
Maybe you were with someone he actually liked, and he thought you knew it. A stretch for sure, but it's a trigger for some.
Starting to drink really heavily is… well a key bit of information. I lost some friends years back when I got depressed. Didn’t even realize what I was doing, I just became an unfunny dick and thought I was the opposite. Didn’t realize what went wrong till I climbed back out of the depression. Still regret losing them as friends to this day.
Too much water under the bridge to talk to them again?
Yeah too long since and now too awkward. Not even sure how to get in touch with them.
Too bad. :(
rarely put me down.
But he did put you down. That's not a good friend. He was like this the whole time, but chose to mostly hold back. Now he's stopped.
Remove him from your life.
The alcohol is likely related. He might be insecure or something and projecting it on you, liquid courage probably makes him feel more comfortable being an asshole.
It was also about the time he started to drink really heavily, but that might not be directly related.
Oh... Well there you go! He's probably drunk when he posts those things. He probably thinks they're very witty and funny in a cool guy sort of way. He probably doesn't remember in the morning and then feels guilty when he sees them. Does he delete the posts the next day or two after saying them? If so, that's typical blackout drunk behavior.
Yes he has deleted Facebook messages he sent me on many occasions. Luckily I take screenshots.
That's probably the answer to the riddle then. He's a blackout drunk, and a mean one at that.
BTW, his arrogance about being an engineer right after graduating is laughable. As someone who has been a software engineer for 20 years now, I wouldn't consider him an engineer. I would consider him someone who potentially has the education to become an engineer. I'm still learning things every day after 20 years, and there are days that I feel like idk WTF I'm doing or how I deserve my job. By all accounts I'm good at what I do, but I still have a lot of shit to learn. His arrogance at accomplishing step 1 of a 30 year path is pathetic. It sounds like you're doing well for yourself, so just keep that up and write this guy off as a loss. If he keeps harassing you then get a restraining order.
Or some sort of personal issue as the cause. Maybe you slept with someone he liked, maybe you are someone he liked, could he have looked up to you and then in your eyes you came crashing down?