Introducing “Biffle or Beezy,” AfterEllen’s new friendship column for your bosom buddy brawls and chum challenges. In each installment, we’ll field questions to determine if your friend is a biffle (best friend) or beezy (b*tch).
How do I deal with my BFF that’s missing ever since she got a GF? It’s not even like she’s forgotten that she has friends, more the fact that our friendship consisted of mostly going to clubs and hooking up with girls. I think my friend’s disappearance is mostly due to her girlfriend’s insecurities, but she’s a sweet girl. I found new friends and stopped trying, but see my BFF struggling. I know I could convince her to be single, but don’t know if she’d be happier. What should I do?
Dear wanton homewrecker,
Poor baby, I-and most of our readers-100% relate. In fact, I can’t think of a friend who didn’t at least partially disappear when she got a girlfriend. First off, I’d like to take this moment to correct your (common) misperception: that you can break up your friend and her girlfriend. This is 100% not true. You could almost certainly cause problems between your ex biffle and her tragic girlfriend, but you could not break them up. If you tried, all you’d do is make them hate you.
You see, your bestie and her insecure girlfriend are locked together in codependency, and therefore probably spend most of their free time bickering about stupid shit that couples bicker about. By meddling in their affairs, all you’d do is provide an easy scapegoat for all their problems: you. You’d actually end up bringing them closer together, because they’d join forces against she who does not understand their unique, special, and timeless love. Also you’d look like a total asshole for trying to break up your friend’s relationship.
Relationships are, by nature, a deeply codependent institution, in which we trade the autonomy of being a single entity to the comfort of being half of a couple. When your biffle was single, her role as “best friend” was the most important role in her life. Now that she’s in a relationship, her role as “girlfriend” is the most important role, and you are-to be brutally honest-no longer a high priority. Hideous? Yes. But also inevitable. Humanity is disgusting like that. You can accept and try to work with your new, lowlier role, or you can let the friendship fall to the wayside. At least until your friend breaks up and is then suddenly super interested in spending time with you.
Verdict: While I understand the sentiment, if you try to break your friend’s relationship up, you will be a beezy. She’s gone to the dark side. Accept and move on, or embrace the third wheel role, because the only way you’re going to spend lots of time with that ex-bestie is if her insecure girlfriend is around.
Chloe, what are your tips on how to get over a girlfriend who treats you like shit, because she believes you will leave her like everybody else despite the fact that you would not? She says she loves me, and I know she does. I love her immensely, as well, but this is killing me. Figuratively. The stress is giving me immense stomach pains that cripple me.-sad beezy
Dear Sad Beezy,
1. You are very young. You are not being killed by sorrow. You think you are, but you aren’t.
2. You girlfriend doesn’t treat you like shit because she has abandonment issues. She treats you like shit because she can. You take it. You make it ok for her to treat you like shit.
3. You’re going to love a lot of people. She’s just one. It’s important that you know that, because legit everyone thinks at some point they WILL NEVER LOVE AGAIN and ARE DYING FROM HEARTBREAK but you won’t. If it makes you feel any better, legit everyone has gone through what you are going through right now. So you aren’t alone, but you’re also not the only one with such vast emotional depths that you want to die when a significant other treats you like shit. You will get through this, because everyone does, but it’s really important that you put this in perspective. The world is HUGE full of people with a fuck ton of problem and your problem is an extremely common one. This is life. It can be super shitty. There is no cure for the general shittiness of life.
4. Instead of moping around about your romance-induced indigestion, go to the damn doctor. Or a shrink. You don’t know how to deal with this situation so instead of asking me, person on internet who writes and therefore knows nothing useful, go get professional help.
5. This part you’re really going to hate. But you did ask. Right now, you have the mentality of the victim. You are putting yourself and your happiness entirely in the hands of someone who treats you terribly. That is stupid. That is not taking your life into your own hands. That is legit handing off your life to someone YOU KNOW MAKES YOU MISERABLE. Get yourself together. Go do something productive. WORK. Work really hard and make money and decorate your apartment and buy cuter clothes and get what you want yourself because no one else will give it to you, especially some mean, young girl. Fix your problems, live with your problems, but don’t waste your life moaning about them.
Verdict: You are a sad Beezy and need to transform into a biffle ASAP. Get out of your messed up relationship, go to a doctor, get a hobby, and stop being so destructive and self indulgent. Harsh? Yes. But true. Snap out of it. NOW.
Do YOU have friendship questions for “Biffle or Beezy”? Email them to[email protected], tweet @howtrite, or ask on Tumblr.
