What can I do to avoid letting my jealousy ruin my enjoyment of my friends this summer?

Grieve here (and I feel you are very justified in your reactions to a really nasty medical issue).

We will be thrilled to listen to you whinge, moan, keen and rend your clothes.

Also give yourself an escape hatch when you hang out with your friends. If after a certain interval, you need to get away…do just that. “See you tonight, guys. I have to feed my love birds now.”

Oh, don’t I already! I’m surprised you guys haven’t kicked me out yet! I sure do appreciate it.

This is a good idea – having a way out if I need to take it. Now I just need to obtain some love birds that need regular feeding…

It happened. You can’t unhappen it. Think of it as your own college curriculum. What did you learn? I’ll bet you learned an awful lot. I mean, what did you get from fluther? Surely your learned at least one thing here?

This is true. I’ve learned. I’ve just not had fun while doing it! Fluther has been great for me.

Mostly I keep telling myself that I’m going to get my own four years of college, just a bit late. So I’m not really losing anything here. I just feel like I’m missing out a whole lot right now. I guess I’ll get my laugh during my senior year when I’m still all safe and warm in my ivory tower and they’re out in the real world trying to find jobs, haha.

Oh, Sweetie, the level of frustration must be making you nuts! We are here when you need to get away. There may be times you want to “hear all about” their stuff, and times you can’t abide it. I have absolutely no helpful advice for you but know that the crap you’ve gone through has growed you way up, and even a rough emotional hour or two is something you can say“Well, it ain’t surgery!” about.

Believe it or not they didn’t do so many things.

If they are your friends then be happy for them.

First of all, the pedant in me questions whether what you feel is “jealousy” or “envy”. I think it’s the latter, but a case could be made for the former.

In any case, it’s okay to be a bit envious. It’s a certain amount of envy, after all, that drives us to compete to make ourselves and our organizations, thoughts and ‘things’ better than others’ and better than our earlier attempts. And one presumes that your physical being has been improved in some way with the medical issues that you’ve (hopefully) recovered from.

So accept that, live with it, don’t try to deny it, and continue with your recovery… and have a great summer. (We’ll all be at work… and envious.)

@JilltheTooth For real. Part of me thinks I’m going to be able to handle anything after this. The other part of me thinks that I’ve used my illness as an excuse for not taking any risks for so long that I’m going to be a useless lump of meat without that crutch, but I’m trying to suppress that part of me.

@Hibernate I’m sure I’ve idealized college quite a bit, but they’ve definitely done a lot of new things! We went to a middle-of-nowhere high school and lived very sheltered lives – they’ve gotten to break out of that, and I’m still sitting here! I’m happy for them, but I can’t help the flawed human part of me for being jealous.

Look on the possible upside. You’ve gained a year (or more) of maturity and you’ll be better prepared to be an adult. I went right from high school to college and spent the first few years raising hell and not being that good of a student.

Um, @Mariah , the flawed human part of you is that which requires all these surgeries, not your normal emotional reactions! And you haven’t used your illness to avoid taking risks, you’ve been risking a helluva lot to become healthy. Get it straight, or I’ll have to come over there and smack ya!!!
And @Adirondackwannabe has it so right. I bet you’ll appreciate college way more than I did, which is not a bad thing, believe me.

@WasCy Oof. What’s the difference again? I thought jealousy was wanting what others had, and envy is wanting what they have and not wanting them to be able to have it too. If that’s the case, this isn’t envy! I want them to get to go to college, I just want to go as well. :(
I think I’m going through the most difficult part right now, where I can’t really see any improvement from the surgery yet, I’m sitting here stressing out about whether or not it’s going to “fix” me, and I’ve essentially given up a year of my life to have it done. I think things will indeed get easier once I can see the (hopefully very improved) end result of all the misery.

@Adirondackwannabe This is true! This past fall, I didn’t have a lot of the life skills I needed for college, yet. I’m not sure I do now, either, but I can’t have gotten worse, right?

@JilltheTooth Oh thank you dear, I need an embarrassing amount of affirmation sometimes. Please don’t smack me!

Speaking of towers, why not throw yourself a “Rescue Rapunzel” coming out party this summer?

Oh, OK, you officially live in a “smack free” zone…

@Mariah here is the difference between envy and jealousy in a nutshell.

@WasCy Okay! I am indeed envious. Thanks for the clarification.

@BarnacleBill Maybe my brain isn’t working but I’m not getting it! I hope I don’t sound like a damsel in distress here. Too much self-pity will do that to you, I guess.

@Mariah : Basically, you’re just sick and tired of being sick and tired. That’s OK, you’ve been through a lot and we get it. I haven’t heard real self-pity from you yet.

I have nothing to add to the people who already said your feelings are perfectly natural and you’ve probably gained a whole load of appreciation for things other people take for granted except… BRAVA! for being self-aware enough to recognize that you may have feelings of envy and CHEERS! for your continuing recovery.

@JilltheTooth Indeed I am. I’m always glad to hear I haven’t driven my fellow jellies off the deep end, yet – I do worry about it.

Thank you @Blueroses. Every bit of encouragement really means the world to me right now.

I just wanted to thank you for posting the question. My niece is going through a similar situation. She was in a car accident several months ago, which did some really serious, as well as some permanent, damage. She is currently missing her college graduation and will have to go back to finish when she is able. I know that she is emotionally suffering, much like you must be.

The responses above have offered some wonderful advice. I hope that between these comments and your willingness to share your concerns, you are able to prepare for any onset of emotions that might ensue. It certainly appears that you are on the right track.

@Pied_Pfeffer Oh goodness! My heart goes out to your niece, how awful. I hope she heals up quickly and doesn’t have much permanent damage.

Yes, I have gotten some good advice. I think between altering my perception of the situation as much as possible, and maybe a little communication with my friends about the issue (they are good friends and will understand) I will be fine. Thanks all.

That’s why I like this place. Good luck to all of you.

That sounds like a good plan. It might also be helpful to consider it as an opportunity to learn from their experiences as preparation. There was a lot of insightful information provided from the friends from our high school who returned for the summer after their first year in college.

And thanks for your kind sentiments for my niece. She’s on the mend. I’m just concerned about her going through this period of missing graduation and how it will impact her emotionally.

at a ratio of 1 to 6 billion souls in various parts of the planet having various sorts of fun and learning experiences, I would say there’s a pretty good chance you’re missing out on a whole lot more than what your 20 or so close friends will have time to tell you about. Each of them have missed out on a world of good too.

What you’ve got here is an opportunity to learn from a handful of close friends. It’s a lot of fun to tell a story and have someone be proud of you. Ask questions, be open, take in as much as you can. They’ll love you for it and you’re the only soul who can contribute your friendship in this way.

If your head explodes, I’ll take full responsibility. Ultimately, I think you’ll gain from this experience. Be there for people in their time of excitement is almost as good as being for them in their time of need. Have a giving attitude about this. It’s the greatest thing you can do for them.

The first year of college I was totally fumbling around. You may not believe this, but going through what you did this past year will give you a head start when you go back to school.

Try to listen to your friends’ stories with good grace. Leave when you have had enough. I think you will do fine. Your friends are still your friends.

Yu have done the most difficult part her already by acknowledging your feelings.

Your situation is a little bit like women who are experiencing infertility when all around them friends and relatives are having babies. It hurts like hell, but you still need to be around these nice folks and at least pretend to feel joyful for them.

And like @gailcalled said, you can express your pain and hurt to all of us here on Fluther, so you don’t have to vent your pain to these friends. If you have one school friend, in particular that you are especially close to, you could gently confide to that one person that you are having a little bit of difficulty with the situation and you hope that she will understand if you occasionally have to leave early, or not participate in the social activities because it is quite painful for you to hear about what you have missed. If this person is a good friend, she will quietly and discreetly pass this info along to some of the other friends, to try to be sympathetic and not throw up their joy in your face.

I don’t think that you should avoid these friends, though, because if you do it once or twice, it might become a habit. Then you would end up losing all of these fine folks in the long run. Just think too, that if you do join in with these folks, you can ask a lot of questions about what it was like, what to avoid, what should you absolutely do when you get the opportunity to go to college.

These friends will be a good source of information for you so that you can make the most out of your first year of college when you eventually get to go. You have the opportunity to avoid some of the pitfalls while at the same time getting first hand information on what things worked well for them and where to get the best information, the best off campus burger etc. Use your friends for your benefit. Use us Fluther friends when you need to cry and kvetch and feel sorry for yourself. We don’t mind one little bit : )