I Feel Guilty for Being Grateful on My Friend’s Cheshbon!     

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My friend has a very challenging life. Of course, there’s no competition when it comes to hardships, and no one has a monopoly on suffering, but whatever nisyonos I have pale in comparison to what she endures on a regular basis. She has a family, baruch Hashem, but each pregnancy was high risk and for every child she has, there were several miscarriages.

Due to an accident, her husband suffers from physical and emotional ailments that prevent him from working. She works two jobs, takes care of her home singlehandedly, barely has time to come up for air, but doesn’t begin to make ends meet. One child struggles socially, another has a physical limitation, a third has a learning issue. The list goes on, with many issues spilling over to create new ones; she often feels like she’s playing with one of those bopping toys — push one head down, another head pops up.

Through it all, my friend tries to remain a positive, put-together, respectable, happy person — which she naturally is — and not wear her challenges on her shirtsleeve. I’m her oldest friend, and because she isn’t comfortable sharing her struggles with her neighbors, I, who lives in another state, am one of the few people who know the truth. I’ve become a sounding board to whom she can vent when things are really rough.

Lately, I see that this dynamic has become hard for her. We’ll be shmoozing, things will begin to pour out, and after a half-hour she’ll say, “See, again, I just cried to you, and I have no idea what’s going on by you. Next time we’re only talking about you!” or, “I’m always the one crying to you, why are you always just listening? Don’t you ever have a hard day? You never call me to talk about things, and I feel like such a baby, I always complain to you…”