Married to your Saboteur
By Mary Jo Rapini. Posted on .
Whether it’s beginning a new diet, a new job or going back to school, the people you may count on the most may show you a less than supportive side. No matter what these fake friends say, they are not your friends. They are people who came into your life to compete with you and drag you back, so they can move forward feeling good when they compare themselves to you.
These fake friends are not afraid of your success. They are afraid that your success will make them look like a failure. They are self-centered so they cannot think very far past themselves. You may have experienced this with diets, financial plans, and even moving. Those most afraid of failing will be the worst with your potential success.
Let’s say, for example, that you decide to get your budget under control. The behaviors you enlist to accomplish this goal may terrify your deeply in debt fake friend. Since they cannot admit this, your fake friend may talk about how cheap you are because you no longer want to go out to dinner, or they may say in front of you and others that you have changed and have become more self-centered. You being sensitive may misread this, and begin to reflect on it. This is where the fake friend does the most damage. They want to influence you in a manner where you believe them and doubt yourself. It may be difficult not to, because you are thinking, “Well, they are my friend.” Stop the thought process there…they are NOT your friend. They are your saboteur.
This type of incident is played out all of the time in the weight loss community. I see it with my Bariatric patients who have weight loss surgery, only to be sabotaged by their fake friends. My obese patients may have felt worthless for so long that they began believing their friends were the people who accepted them. Many of the people who accepted them were fake friends. They were the ones actually sabotaging every effort my patients made toward successful weight loss. The loss of fake friends is so common after weight loss surgery that part of my evaluation for potential surgical weight loss patients is reminding them of what the saboteurs look like in their life. It is difficult when you find out that you sleep with your saboteur. Husbands and wives are not immune to feeling like a failure when their spouse achieves their goal, whether it is weight loss or achieving success in another area of life.
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When you identify your saboteur or fake friend, it is important that you know how to deal with them, without sacrificing your goals. Below are suggestions, but my first and most highly recommended suggestion is to be upfront and direct about what you are seeing. A fake friend is just that, whether you sleep with them or only see them once a week for coffee. They need to know you do not appreciate their behavior and you see it clearly.
