Blame

Have any of you ever been tricked into saying something insensitive about someone because they were introduced to you by way of a casual comparison to your abuser? Then it turns out they were just a normal, non-pathological drug addict? Yeah me neither.

Backstory probably needed. OK. Here's what happened: my ex had this friend/roommate who got addicted to drugs and started stealing from his girlfriend and her friends (including my ex), hacking their bank accounts and impersonating them online — pretty bad stuff. How I learned about this: I was telling my ex about a traumatic experience I'd had with tech abuse (hacking, stalking). I left out the most traumatic parts, which might have been why he said, "oh, I used to know someone like that."

The friend/roommate OD'd last year. When it happened, I was supposed to console my ex. I couldn't. In my mind, this guy was the same as my abuser, and the weird, uncritical worship of him my ex appeared to exhibit was kind of gross to me. It reminded me of all those DFW/Richard Feynman stans. Only I guess the guy in question never assaulted or threatened anyone. I guess that's important. But then, why bring him up in the context of a conversation about MY trauma? Granted, I didn't mention my assault. But the idea seemed to be, hey, this happened to someone I know. I had no reason to think it would turn into, hey, you're not adequately mourning my manipulative dead friend, who was really troubled and immensely talented, what's wrong with you?

Tl;dr I have no idea what my life is right now