How To Deal With And Stop Backstabbers

It can hurt to feel betrayed by a friend. This act of betrayal is often referred to as “backstabbing” and the people who do it are “backstabbers.”

Betraying someone’s trust is serious business and you do not have to let someone hurt you or take advantage of you. In the worst extreme you may decide not to be that person’s friend but you might decide to confront the situation.

Examples of Betrayal

One example of betrayal is someone who talks behind your back, especially to another best friend of yours. This often is done either out of innocent venting and your friend is too afraid to confront you directly or it is done to hurt you and make trouble for you.

It could be done without thinking but it also could be done intentionally, as a way to divide you and your other friend out of jealously. This is not the only kind of backstabbing though.

Other types of backstabbing would be “stealing” your boyfriend, or if you are a guy, “stealing” your girlfriend. A good friend would not try to interfere with or break you up with your girlfriend or boyfriend.

An additional type of backstabbing may be having friends plot against you to ruin you. This goes along with gossiping and talking behind your back. Maybe they even spread gossip around the entire school, find a way to embarrass you, vandalize your property, or steal from you.

Dealing with Backstabbers

There are a number of ways to deal with backstabbing. However some of the best pieces of advice for learning how to get rid of backstabbers are shown below:

Choose your battles. If you let back-talk get to you every time you hear someone said something about you, your homework or other chores or other activities would never get done. Choose your battles carefully and if it was not a huge offense such as a friend vented about you to another friend not meaning to hurt you just let it go.

Find out the truth. Before you make rash judgments based on what others say your friend did to you find out the truth. Talk to your friend that you suspect could have backstabbed you or gossiped about you.

Ask questions such as, “It’s it true that you said…??” This would usually open up the door for an honest discussion and possibly your friend will apologize.

Ignore the person who backstabs. It is not as much of an issue if it is someone you do not like or never was friends with anyway. Your priority in this case would be to do what you can to preserve and repair your current friendships and ignore the “bad apple.”

Forgive. As in the case of a more minor offense you and your friend can forgive one another. You can set boundaries and hope that it does not happen again and hopefully return to the friendship you had previously, doing the things you always used to do together.

Find new friends in the worst-case scenario. This is a situation in which you know your friend was really not your friend. They may repeatedly have gossiped about you or they may try to sabotage every opportunity you have to meet or get to know a new date, or whatever.

This person may always go to great-and evil-lengths to get their way and gain the most popularity. Get rid of them! They were never friends in the first place, and find new friends!