Anxiety after ending unhealthy friendship

Hello all. I am motivated to post here by my anxieties regarding a recent fallout w/a friend. We had been best friends for 23 years (since the age of 7) w/periods of not speaking here and there. I was her only friend besides her mother and cousin. Over the past decade I have changed drastically in positive ways. I have a very successful career and I travel the world. I'm happily married and we live a very comfortable lifestyle. She has a job making minimum wage, is a high school drop out and is EXTREMELY manipulative and a chameleon. She goes through periods of extreme paranoia and delusions. She keeps her boyfriend from being around other women if she can help it. She would make excuses as to why I was not to come inside her home when he was there. Her cousin is beautiful and she is insanely jealous of her. She would go to elaborate lengths to keep her away from her boyfriend. She even tried to manipulate her into cutting her long hair because she was jealous of it. She is OBSESSED with other women...women she sees out shopping, online...sizing them up like crazy. Hates other women. I realized a few months back that I was enabling her behavior. I had to take a good hard look in the mirror...I hated how she talked so horribly about other people, but I laughed it off and sometimes contributed. Shame on me...truthfully I was a willing participant to an extent. I feel so bad about that. She would create fake Facebook accounts to stalk people (mostly women) that she was jealous of/curious about. She is not a confrontational person, she obsesses over people and does things behind their back. I noticed over the past year she was starting to become obsessed with me...taking on my characteristics...copying everything about me that she could. I was very disturbed by this. I confronted her and she accused me of doing the same to her. It was very upsetting because I knew I was partly to blame after enabling her for as long as I did. I felt better and more positive without her in my life. Well a couple weeks ago my husband received a friend request from an attractive woman who claimed to have attended the same school as him. After looking at the profile I suspected it was my ex friend, as she would do this to other people. The person behind this profile was even going as far as adding other people that attended the school, adding sexy photos, and checking into places by his former school. I was not fooled. I reported it to Facebook, and it was in fact a fake profile and was deleted. I'm almost positive it was her. It really upset me to think she would do that. And now I'm becoming paranoid myself about what she could do to harass me. She knows every mistake I have ever made, has many emails from me and photos of me that are far less than flattering and could be very damaging to my career and personal life. I am very upset at myself for having been involved with such a person for so long. And now fear she could come back to haunt me. I do apologize for such a long post, I guess that's what happens when anxiety does the typing! Any advice would be so much appreciated.

She's toxic block her from everything.

a couple weeks ago my husband received a friend request from an attractive woman who claimed to have attended the same school as him. I reported it to Facebook, and it was in fact a fake profile and was deleted.

I'm sorry you are going through this : ( You have good reason to end this friendship. I would do as Wiseman2 suggested and block her from everything. I'm not trying to scare you but I would start documenting things she does to you and your husband.

Are you well established in your career? Are most of the photos she has from your teens and early twenties? I know many friends who are managers will overlook things done in teens/early twenties as people are still learning about life and how things are done.

Thanks to you both for such a quick reply! I will start documenting her actions toward us. I am well established in my career. The photos she has are mostly from early twenties as well as some from recently. Nothing sexual or illegal, mostly would be just humiliating as they are of me behaving ridiculously (I have a pretty goofy and sick sense of humor). As far as the emails, they r mostly from the last 7 years and they mainly consist of personal conversations between us. Very very personal topics were discussed.

Although she has shown how creepy she can be, don't live in fear.

Nothing sexual or illegal, mostly would be just humiliating as they are of me behaving ridiculously

Wiseman thank you so much. I've been telling myself that, but it feels good to hear from someone else. I'm working on it

If you're really worried that she may try to blackmail or stalk you, you could be proactive and go talk to an attorney about what you can do to prevent that or pull her up short. Getting ahead of things now might be the best way to go about it, but let's face it, you do need to be shed of this woman. She has had issues for a long time and you can no longer deal with them.

If it were me I'd find a lawyer in my area who handles issues like stalking, blackmail etc. and just go talk to them and potentially have them on retainer in the event you need to legally take action against her.

Just blocking her and refusing to ever be pulled into anything may very well just be enough. If it's more likely it's just silly things keep in mind most people have gone through a silly phase or done things as young people and kids. And anyone who knows you would likely be more alarmed at her stalking you than anything they might see of your youthful past.

Anyways that's where I'd start. Yes, she was totally toxic though and you are right to have ended the friendship. No doubt about that, good for you.

If you're really worried that she may try to blackmail or stalk you, you could be proactive and go talk to an attorney about what you can do to prevent that or pull her up short. Getting ahead of things now might be the best way to go about it, but let's face it, you do need to be shed of this woman. She has had issues for a long time and you can no longer deal with them.

 

If it were me I'd find a lawyer in my area who handles issues like stalking, blackmail etc. and just go talk to them and potentially have them on retainer in the event you need to legally take action against her.

 

Just blocking her and refusing to ever be pulled into anything may very well just be enough. If it's more likely it's just silly things keep in mind most people have gone through a silly phase or done things as young people and kids. And anyone who knows you would likely be more alarmed at her stalking you than anything they might see of your youthful past.

 

Anyways that's where I'd start. Yes, she was totally toxic though and you are right to have ended the friendship. No doubt about that, good for you.

Thank you so much for the advice. She is definitely a toxic person. I'm thankful to finally have her out of my life for good. I'll be looking into having a lawyer just in case!