When I was only 11 years old, I met this group of people online that later befriended me. They made me laugh and smile and It just felt right to talk to them, specifically this one person who I’ll call F. F was supposedly the “leader” of the friend group. Whatever he wanted to do, he did. Over time I got closer with them, and they noticed that too. One day they began to start talking about inappropriate jokes around when I was only in 5th grade, in which they knew. They’d talk about their bodies, sex, men and woman parts, etc. I felt uncomfortable about it but never told them as the entire group would laugh it off. They also began to talk about their lives at home and make up sob stories for us to pity them. Specifically, F did. He would always message me privately to trauma dump, not even asking how I felt about it. F got so used to privately messaging me that he would tell me everything about himself. May I mind you F was 17 at the time and he would tell me how he had sex with these people, and he would make up fake scenarios about himself for me to pity him. It got so bad to the point where he used to threaten to kill himself, leaving suicide notes and leaving me on silent for about 10-20 minutes. He then would respond back using emotions and saying something along the lines of, “It didn’t work that time but next time it will. :/” This relationship genuinely screwed up my mental health. I started to isolate myself and not talk to anyone but him and the rest of the group. I stopped eating for a long period of time because he stopped eating. I didn’t talk to any of my old friends from school and went online for school because he insisted. I did everything he did because it meant we could relate, and it meant that maybe I wouldn’t lose him. One day he private messaged me saying that he likes me but immediately deleted the message. He would begin to lead me on at such a young age. (I was 12 at the time he started to hint he liked me.) He’d often flirt with me; tell me he’d love to date me but then find someone else and flirt with them right in front of me. I once confessed I felt the same as we had built this close relationship, and I never really knew what love was as I’ve isolated myself for so long. He knew that for so long and used it against me. He used me like a puppet. When he felt left out or as no one came for him, he’d pull on my strings and flirt with me and talk about his day. When someone else noticed him, he’d throw me away. Somedays he would message me saying he wants to show me something and I go ahead and say sure as I trusted him. He’d then send images of nsfw that he looked up or these disgusting videos that are graphic. He’d repeat this with all his friends every day. By the time I turned 13, I was able to go back to an actual school and opening myself more. I met these wonderful people, and I wasn’t online often. F noticed this and decided that when I was in my most vulnerable state of the year, (my niece had recently passed, and I was grieving still.) He chose to create an alternative account and message me stating, “Hello. This is F’s friend; I haven’t seen him in days. He left a letter and I believe it’s a suicide note. There’s rope hung on the ceiling…” In short, he convinced me that he committed suicide. He was offline for about 2 weeks, not telling me any information. This absolutely broke me. I went back to isolating myself for at least a week and ignored all my school friend messages. The week after that, he finally messaged me back saying. “Welp, it didn’t work. Sorry, lol. ;-;” At that point, I felt so betrayed and deceived. I finally lost it and decided that the friendship needed to come to an end. The scary apart about leaving was that he knew my address, he knew my family, he knew my name, he knew almost everything about me. It took me about 4 months to decide one night that it needed to end. I woke up early in the morning and wrote him a letter saying this was goodbye and I’m over this shit. I immediately deleted my account, blocked him on all websites and messages and just sat there. That was terrifying to do and its haunted me still to this day. I never told anyone about the fact all of this happened in the span of about 2-3 years. The friendship was extremely toxic, but I groomed into believing it was normal and I was the problematic one. I’m sorry if this is extremely long to read but I needed to say it. I hope whoever may be reading this and in the same situation I was in will be able to escape and find peace. Love you!
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