TLDR: My best friend hurt me, and I responded by trying to control him and being toxic. I don't want to hurt others- how do I change?
There's a lot of backstory between me (20M) and my best friend "George" (25M). The very condensed version is that we've known each other since we were both kids, and went from being regular friends to best friends over the past four years.
Some context: My parents were emotionally neglectful/occasionally physically abusive. My mother had major undiagnosed mental illnesses and is an emotionally immature narcissist. My father’s favorite tools were anger, blame, distance, and control. Now that I'm an adult they express regret, but growing up every day my environment was unstable and I was powerless. Unsurprisingly I have major trust issues, control issues, anxiety and a pathological avoidance of vulnerability.
I keep everyone at arm's length. I've known our mutual friends for 7 years now and I still hesitate to tell them basic biographical details. I'm a chronic cynic that judges before empathizing and I hate admitting I was incorrect or imperfect. Basically I can be a real fucking asshole.
George is the total opposite. He is genuinely a really sweet and compassionate person. He's a talented, earnest, optimistic, and creative guy. He cries when cats die on television. We used to have a wonderful and mutually fulfilling friendship- but there are clear reasons why it broke down. Where I respond to conflict by clamping down and clawing, George tries to avoid it at all costs. He hates disappointing people and making decisions. He's quite passive, and can get taken advantage of because he assumes he's in the wrong.
I think I was one of those people taking advantage of him.
Two years ago, I fell in love with him and, against all my instincts to run and hide and leave, confessed. I tried to be honest- I wanted to confess, get the No for closure, and then get over it as fast as possible. Most negative feelings I try to identify the root source and fix as fast as possible.
George didn't say no. He said "maybe, I don't know", "let's wait and see", and "I've thought about it before". This sparked two years of me repeatedly trying to broach the subject, getting mixed signals, failing to move on, and then resenting him for being the subject of feelings I couldn't control. Over the past year and a half our friendship festered. I begged him, many times, to work on things with me. The tension/dysfunction/distance only grew. There were several major life events I asked him for some support with and he ignored. I became desperate, jealous, and demanding. I got mean. His response for most of this was some version of "But nothing's wrong", "I don't see why you're so upset", and "I don't know, can't you just figure it out?".
Finally I broke down and forced him to have the Please Just Say You're Not Into Me Instead Of Stringing Me Along With Scraps talk, and he admitted he'd known the whole time I was still into him, but hadn't been honest because making decisions frightened him. We apologized to each other and committed ourselves to becoming better people and better friends. Things were tentative, but improving, up until he started dating someone.
The new partner is someone I was intensely insecure about being replaced by, which doesn't help things. George broke the news to me a few weeks after the Please I Need Closure talk, expecting me to be happy, and I just exploded on him. I panicked massively about being forced into a "your feelings are worthless, get over them on my timeline and be happy" situation like in my childhood. I berated him over text for hours with the purpose of making him hurt, to get even. He was stunned and guilty about how he'd hurt me and said he wanted to know what I needed from him to feel safe.
The issue is the things I need to feel safe aren't- rational. I grew up in an environment where I constantly needed to appease people who had tyrannical control of my life. I felt threatened, and unsafe, and instead of trying to find an outlet for emotional regulation in myself, I dumped it all on him. I didn't trust him, I didn't believe him, I didn't even respect him, but I demanded he prove himself to me again and again until I felt like he was safe again. I chose to act from anger and distrust. I tried to control him and mold him. I became the tyrant.
And he tried, he has been trying, he agreed to try things my way, despite being fundamentally different people, and has been for the past half year, but it's not working, because at the end of the day the only person that can fill my black hole is me. He hurt me, deeply, but being hurt doesn't justify how I tried to control him. I kept telling him I wanted him to disagree with me and challenge me and be honest with me, but I wasn't creating an environment where he felt safe to speak up. I think I was really toxic. I want to escape my parents' pitfalls, but I ended up echoing the exact same patterns of abuse. I treated him unfairly. I was wrong. He told me he was scared of me.
We're taking a break from knowing each other. I'm taking a long break from socializing to focus on my issues. He's completely burnt out and needs space. We might try casual acquaintanceship eventually, but his bottom line is that he can't be friends with someone who doesn't trust him or believe him. I agree.
Ultimately I would rather him be happy. I want us both to be happy. If he'd told me that a different friend was treating him like I had I would have told him immediately to be kind to himself and get rid of that person. I don't know if I can be someone that trusts others, believes in unconditional love, maybe not for a long time- probably not for years. I have to tear down and rebuild all my foundations. It is my responsibility to be better whether or not he forgives me.
But where the fuck do I go from here? There's blogs on how to interrupt anxious patterns, books about codependency, attachment styles and emotional neglect, worksheets on Feeling your Feelings. All kinds of resources about taking back your life and refusing victimhood and asserting your boundaries and reclaiming your needs. But what happens if – what if my needs are bad? What if my wants are unhealthy? How do I stop being a miserable, angry person that enacts misery on others? I want to feel safe, but not at the cost of hurting the people I care about. What does safe even look like if my safe is harmful?
I've been reading Why Does He Do That by Lundy Bancroft. It's terrifying how much I recognize- things that were done to me that I enact in turn. If you have any advice, resources, books, videos, anything, please tell me. I don't have anyone outside of the internet to consult. Thank you for reading this far.