poop.

DAMN IT, YOU GUYS, I WOULD'VE WON!! :(

The story thus far...

So. Quite a few things have happened since my last real post. A few of the biggest "turning point" moments were:

• Somehow, my dumbass self slipped and confessed to DHB about how, yes, I still feel uncomfortable around his other friend, and yes, ideally I would still like to be around him as much as possible. And I did it in the worst way, sobbing to him hysterically at 11PM in my dorm lounge. Seriously, when did I become so embarrassing? Though, interestingly enough, he's been a lot more accommodating than I expected now that he knows how I feel. Not that I don't feel guilty when he says things like, "[My other friend] probably won't stay, so you should sleep over." I guess it makes me feel like I'm making myself into some jealous mistress who slinks around behind the wife's back or something. But in the end, I'm happy that he's acknowledging the situation and doing something about it. As selfish as it is, this is what I really wanted, after all.
• I had my first session with my counselor last Tuesday, and it was much more helpful (and enjoyable) than I expected it to be. I like talking about my feelings, anyway, so the connection between my counselor & I clicked in almost immediately. Her end comments were that she felt "encouraged" because I seem "self-aware" and I can probably get through this issue alone, but just need a few pushes in the right direction. She also said that it was encouraging that DHB responded in a positive way when I confessed to him, and that he seems really invested in maintaining his friendships with others. (Which is def. true and something I need to work on...) She recommended I make a conscious effort to spend time with DHB, even if the circumstances aren't ideal for me, and to let our friendship change and grow by keeping an open mind. And just hearing all that really helped relieve my stress.
• ......And she said that my feelings for DHB, particularly my need to be around him all the time when he's in my vicinity and my desire for him to feel similarly towards me, has at least a tinge of romance to it. Not that that wasn't something I already kind of knew. Damn it.

A few things of somewhat lesser importance:

• Urrghh, I really need to study more. I've been slipping academically, which at this point means that my grade average is about a B/B+ that desperately needs to be bumped up to an A- by the end of the semester. :/
• Yesterday, I spent the whole afternoon helping my friend with his side-project talk show. His crew all left for fall break/had unexpected emergencies, so I had to do most everything in their place, which included manning the camera. It turned out being a much more fun experience than I had expected, and my camera work was apparently much better than expected, too. :P
• So. I drank alcohol for the first time on Tuesday night. It was completely spontaneous and only with a couple friends... and it was only a half a bottle of Smirnoff Ice, so it's not like it did shit. Next time, we'll be bringing out the bottle of coconut-flavored hard alcohol, which should be... interesting.

EDIT: Oh, and I mentioned off-hand last year that DHB gets touchy-feely when he's tipsy, and Jesus, I was NOT kidding. @_@;;

I made this:

And the clay wasn't even properly centered. :3

Life or something like it.

So. I've done more thinking on my situation and (I hope) I have things more or less figured out. I was pretty much on the verge of "letting go" of my friendship with DHB... until I realized how foolish it would be for me to let this friendship fall apart. I don't want to be that person who constantly pushes others away for "getting too close" or who simply *cannot* open herself up to other people without becoming 100% possessive of them. If I don't fix this now, then who's to say that this situation won't be replicated in my future relationships?

It's not like I'll be stuck in this situation forever. One day, DHB & I won't be in college anymore. And maybe by that point, I'll have gotten over all my emotional baggage and will be able to be around him without feeling jealous of his other female friends all the time. But if I ruin things now, there's no chance of that happening, no future for our friendship. And I don't think I could ever forgive myself for that. Esp. since I do have a tendency to just let people slip by.

So basically, I'm just trying to suck it up the best I can. Not that figuring things out have necessarily rid me of my problems. Since deciding on this:

1) Was invited to a late-night study party by an upperclassmen friend... except he also invited DHB and his other friend, which triggered my DON'T WANT reaction. Told DHB to go without me and to cover for me somehow, but at the last minute, my upperclassmen friend guilted me into going by pulling the old, "But I made these brownies for you!" So I walked across campus through the effing rain to get to this guy's apartment, pretty pissed off by the time I arrived for various rational and irrational reasons. I gave DHB (and only DHB) the cold shoulder b/c I felt like I could just start screaming at him at any second. (Though I do believe he was the only one who noticed how off I was, anyway.) So at first, he just sort of stayed out of my way and things were super awkward, but after a little more than an hour passed by and I was still talking around rather than to him, he sat next to me and rested his head on my shoulder. Of course, he did this only after his other friend left, since there's no way he would've done something nearly that affectionate if she had been around. But since I'm the BIGGEST, MOST SELF-DESTRUCTIVE DUMBASS EVER, I was contented anyway. ;__;

2) Did a small favor for "the other friend" last night. It really wasn't a big deal, but it still made me want to headdesk. Esp. since the first thing she did after my favor was turn to DHB and say, "Now the two of us have matching lanterns!" Good job, me, you really are as foolishly kind as everyone says you are. OTL

But I figure this is all part of the "moving on" process. One day, I won't feel bad when DHB and his friend make in-jokes that I'm not in on, and when I see them together, I will no longer have an intense desire to turn and walk in the opposite direction. (Or actually do so and feel pathetic afterwards. --;;) I might know what I want to do now, but actually going through with it is still difficult. I'll probably continue to have my occasional rants, until all of you facepalm every time you read my life posts and think, "Bell, you are so contradictory. Why can't you just be happy, you stupid whore!!"

It's funny. I've always thought of myself as being so mature, but times like these always remind me of how much more growing up I have to do.

On a better note:

• My friend's Asian Awareness Club got approved, which should help keep me busy.
• Have been re-connecting with friends who I didn't do so great a job keeping in touch with last semester.
• Will be throwing on the wheel for the first time in a year tomorrow. :3
• And... I decided to start seeing a counselor on campus. Which makes me feel almost ashamed, since I was raised to believe that I can get through my problems on my own. But this is an issue that I would rather discuss with people uninvolved rather than with friends (which would just complicate things, at this point), so I decided to swallow my pride and just do it. Hopefully it will help. :)

Friendship sucks.

Now that I've gotten your attention...

To start from the beginning: this has to do with DHB, and yes, I'm going to finally spill the beans as to what I've been wangsting about since April. To people who are not yet familiar with the soap opera that is DHB and I, DHB is my ex(?)-crush and (sort of) best friend at college. I use "sort of" because that's pretty much how it is right now.

Since the very beginning, DHB had one other person who was pretty much his "other best friend" at college. In fact, it was the two of them who hung out with each other all the time at the start of our freshmen year, until I wedged my way in, and for a little while, DHB started spending more time with me. And for the longest time, her presence didn't bother me at all.

But for reasons I still can't fully discern, some time last spring, that began to change. DHB started spending a little less time with me and a little more time with his other friend, and when I noticed it, I was really upset by it. And I didn't really understand why. (Mind you, this other friend of his lived in the same hall as me, which made things worse for a whole truckload of reasons.) All this continued, and got worse and worse, until the last week of classes, which is when I had a total breakdown and cried to DHB for an hour about how my crazy jealous tendencies were turning me into a wreck, and how much I cared about him, and how uncomfortable and anxious I felt when all three of us were together. As terrible as this sounds, I think part of the reason why I told him all this was out of the expectation that he would react to it in some way, like he would start spending more time with me again or something. But nothing ended up changing.

So the distance allowed me to get over DHB a little over the summer, and I started this school year with the expectation of being a lot more emotionally stable. But one of the first things I learned when I got back on campus was that DHB's dorm was right next to his other friend's, but across the campus from mine. And at first, I was somewhat indifferent. But after a couple weeks of this, I couldn't help but feel bothered that the two of us hardly saw each other anymore. We basically only saw each other in passing for maybe half the week, and only for a couple hours a day for the other half of the week. He also hardly called me or texted me. It was just such a difference from last year, when we spent at least five hours around each other every single day. And of course, he spent a lot of time with his much nearer friend.

About a week ago, I had basically convinced myself that DHB (finally?) replaced me with his other friend. He clearly doesn't need me around as long as he has his other friend to do shit with him, I would think. DHB would often describe something he did with his other friend, then say half-hearted things like, "I thought of asking you to come along too, but then I remembered that you live across campus now." But I just KNEW that if his other friend was on my side of campus, he would probably make much greater efforts to cross campus to get to us. But since it was "just" me, he didn't feel as compelled to do so. So I came to the conclusion that I... just wasn't as important to him as I assumed I was.

So as you can see, I was VERY BITTER. Not that I could ever actually express my bitterness to him b/c A) I hardly saw him so there was little opportunity to, B) he's so damn nice to me that I never have the heart to bitch at him about how much he's killing me and C) I recognize that none of this is actually his fault. This is way more my issue than his; I was the one who assumed that he needed me more than he actually does and it's not like I can force to him to care about me more.

Of course, right when I started to accept the idea of my angsting about this in solitude, DHB suddenly started hanging out with me more often. And then he started acting more the way he did last year--as in, he started hugging me often again and stuff like that. And then I somehow ended up sleeping over in his room last Friday night. And spent all of yesterday with him. Not that I'm not happy about all this (he DOES care after all!), but... what the fuck. I can't help but think this entire situation is horribly unfair.

I mean, he KNOWS that I feel weird around his other friend, but refuses to acknowledge it. So he gets all confused when I say that I don't want to watch Amazing Race with him or that I don't want to eat dinner with him today, and my brain is like, HELLO THERE'S A HIGH POSSIBILITY THAT YOUR OTHER FRIEND WILL BE THERE, WHY CAN'T YOU UNDERSTAND THESE THINGS. And he feels perfectly okay hugging me and being all touchy-feely when I'm around my other guy friends, but when his other girl friends are around, he's suddenly a lot more reserved. HMMM. Ironically, a little while ago when the two of us were walking, he said something about how I was using my charisma to physically pull him over to my side of the campus against his will. (Not that it was strong enough, since he ended up walking back to his dorm anyway. =_=;) And I was like, you have got to be kidding me. I'm the one who continues to hang out with him and go along with maybe 90% of his requests, even though I know it will most likely end up with me feeling at least a little jealous and miserable at some point. If anyone is getting pulled, it's definitely me.

Damn it. It's all so grim. If I don't spend time with him, I'll feel lonely and end up sad. If I spend time with him, his other friends will eventually show up and tell me about how they all went to so-and-so earlier that day, and the two of us hung out until 4am sunday night, and tell Bell about what happened to the two of us in the lounge yesterday, and I can't believe you haven't told Bell THAT story yet. And I'll be reminded of how temporary and marginal my one-on-one time with DHB really is and end up sad. I mean, how fucked up is this? I'll end up sad no matter what.

But in spite of all my bitching... what I still wish for most of all is for things to go back to how they were before. I miss him, but I'm too stubborn and afraid of getting hurt to actually act on that feeling. I can't say why, but... it really hurts to hear him explicitly acknowledge the situation and say things like, "Last year I hung out with Bell all the time, but now that I live south, I hang out with [my other friend] all the time." Not that that wasn't obvious. But even if nothing has really changed between us and we generally act the same way around each other as we did last year, I don't feel like I'm his best friend anymore. And I miss that feeling.