The Icky Feeling of Being Manipulated

Do you know what I'm talking about? That icky feeling in the pit of your stomach after you've been manipulated and lied to and fallen into the trap of deceptive and manipulative teenagers?

Oh sure, I should stop myself right there and be more understanding and patient of their special needs and how they don't always understand the truth and how they get their facts mixed up and maybe they weren't really lying but..... yeah, yeah, I know that.

But this entry isn't about them, it's about me.

you know that feeling? Where you get caught doing exactly what they want you to do because they set it up that way? Where you walk right into a trap and then feel foolish at the end.

Today it had to do with computer passwords and how they had been shared and the master manipulator got exactly what he wanted. He got someone in trouble, made himself look innocent, and made me feel icky. Bottom line is, he was guilty the whole way through. Maybe not of the offense itself (sharing the password) but of all kinds of minor infractions that led up to the big discovery on my part.

He told his brother that I threatened to kick him out of the house if he didn't tell me something, which couldn't be farther from the truth. Now of course, he said he was just kiding.

Icky. Living in a world where I could be told the truth would and wasn't consistently being manipulated would be so nice. Dream ..... dream dream dream dream.... dream....