From your experience, when someone loses complete and total respect for you, is it ever possible to get that respect back?

[EzraIsShy76028]

From my experience, absolutely not. A certain past situation comes to mind.

So for a while I was a part of this friend group. It was a pretty good friend group while it lasted. There were 6 "regular" members counting myself, though some more people who would come every once in a while but not regularly. I was pretty close to all 5 regular members.

There was this guy who was the "leader" of the group. He was by far the most extroverted and would always organize events and hangouts, and was pretty much the driving force behind the group. Without him we'd barely hang out as a group.

So me and the leader were close, and he confided a lot of personal information in me.

There was one piece of information he used to tell me that ruined everything. So he would often complain about his girlfriend. About how she's often nice and caring and gives really great sex, but other times she's a bitch and starts arguments for no reason, and he can't decide if he loves her or hates her, but ultimately cares about her.

And she semi-regularly hung out with the group, so I was friends with her too.

Since I'm so dumb and oblivious, when me and her ran out of topics I actually TOLD her what my leader friend said about her. And she was like "thanks for letting me know, me and him will talk about it later."

Suddenly she broke up with him, and he absolutely blew up once he found out I was the reason.

He didn't explicitly kick me out of the group or anything, but whenever he would talk to me he would always sprinkle words like "dumbass" and "retard" in every single sentence. And it wasn't in a joking manner. It was more like "I have no respect for you, you're stupid and I'll treat you however the fuck I want." And he himself explicitly said so.

Eventually I left the group on my own because I was tired of being called a dumbass every 3 words.

I tried to patch things up with him. Doing his chores for him. Helping his family. Buying him gifts. But he would never budge.

[Oliverlogan263]

Hey, that's a heavy situation, man. Losing that level of respect from someone you were so close with definitely sounds like it really messed you up. And from what you're describing, it doesn't seem like you were ever able to fully regain that respect, no matter how much you tried to make it up to him.

That really sucks, and I can imagine it was super frustrating and hurtful to go through. When someone has that much contempt for you, it's almost impossible to come back from that, you know? The damage is just too deep.

I've never been in a situation that extreme myself, but I've definitely had times where I felt like I lost respect from friends or family members. And in my experience, it's one of the hardest things to try and rebuild. It takes a lot of time, effort, and genuine change on your part to even have a chance of regaining that trust and respect.

Even then, there's no guarantee it'll work. Some people are just so set in their negative perceptions of you that they won't budge, no matter what you do. And at a certain point, you gotta ask yourself if it's even worth the emotional toll to keep trying.

My advice would be to try not to beat yourself up too much over it. You made a mistake, but you didn't deserve to be treated that way, constantly belittled and disrespected. That's on him, not you.

Instead of dwelling on the past, focus on the relationships where you do feel respected and valued. Surround yourself with people who appreciate you for who you are. And use this experience to grow - learn from it, and be extra careful about who you confide in going forward.

I know it's not easy, but you can't let one toxic situation define you, man. You got this. Keep your head up, and know that you deserve so much better than that nonsense. Wishing you all the best, dude.

[EzraIsShy76028]

First of all, thank you so much for your thoughtful response to my post! I usually don't get very many, lol.

Anyway, yeah, it really fucked me up. And yup, I never regained his respect. We pretty much cut things off a long time ago at this point.

Yeah, frustrating and hurtful is right. I'd rather he just straight up told me "look bro after you did that we just can't be friends anymore, get the fuck out of my group" rather than being all passive aggressive about it by not kicking me out but also treating me like I'm subhuman the whole time.

While I was wrong to tell his girlfriend about that stuff, his reaction was disproportionate to the crime. It's like cutting off both of a guy's arms and one of his legs just because he stole a big expensive television from the store. He didn't need to go that far.

Yeah, losing respect from friends and family members is never easy. Time and effort a billion times, yes!

And yeah. Some people when they've made up their mind about someone they just NEVER change their perception. And it's unfortunately quite common. I don't think I've ever been able to change someone's perception.

And yeah. In general no use dwelling on stuff that's already happened.

That's all great advice! Thanks! But yeah. Basically surround myself with positive people. And be extremely careful who I open up to.

Yup, unfortunately life is very hard in general. But yeah. Can't let toxic memories control us forever. And thanks! I wish you the best as well with whatever you're currently doing!