Cousin Central has a new look. Let me know what you think.

After reading this post, in combination with what I posted Thursday, ya'll probably are going to think I'm full of gloom-and-doom. I'm really not, but this is such an excellent place to get feedback that I can't help myself from venting.

How do you know when a friendship is over for good?

I've had a friendship that's really been struggling for the last 12 to 18 months. A few weeks ago, after a particularly nice evening with this friend, I told myself that I was going to let go of the resentment I had toward her and try to resurrect our friendship. Today, I received an e-mail from her that is making me second-guess my decision to extend the olive branch. I feel like she's interested in being friends for a specific purpose only, and I'm not cool with that. I refuse to let someone use me.

Maybe having a conversation to clear the air would help. But honestly, I'm having a tough time figuring out how to be diplomatic and cool-headed when I'm pretty damn angry. My pot of anger has boiled over, so to speak. I've also come to the conclusion that maybe we don't even have a friendship to save anymore. If that's true, how sad.

I guess if I've learned anything from this mess, it's that I should've confronted her the first time she hurt me. Interestingly enough, that happened 4th of July weekend last year. I didn't do anything because I thought it was an isolated incident that was the result of poor communication. Unfortunately, that one incident has snowballed into several, and my hurt has only intensified.

In this situation, what does "being the bigger person" mean? Confronting her? Forgiving her and moving on? I'm at a loss. We have a lot of mutual friends, so I don't want to have a big, awkward falling out that makes everyone uncomfortable.

I'm confuzzled. I haven't faced a situation like this since high school. I know how immature I was then, so I don't think that's a great example of how to conduct myself. :)