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My friend and I recently went on a three-day backpacking trip together, which involved several sections of alpine terrain. She’s afraid of lightning to the point where she perseverates about it, even though the risk of being hit by lightning is extremely small. There’s a reason that “you’re more likely to be hit by lightning” is a common phrase. I promised that we would do everything we could to be below the treeline in the afternoons, when storms tend to come in. The weather ended up being overcast but not stormy for the first two days, which was too bad because we couldn’t really take in the views.
On our last morning, we slept in, and when we woke up the weather was nicer than it had been the whole time. It seemed like a waste to have come all that way and then hurry back when everything was perfect, so she agreed to add on an extra short hike up to a view point before we started back to the trailhead. It was only two miles so it shouldn’t have added more than an hour or so to our hiking for the day.
She kept pulling out her phone while we were hiking to check the time, which irritated me, because one of my pet peeves is people looking at their phones when we’re trying to be present together. Because I was irritated, I was distracted, and we ended up missing a turn and going on a longer route. This led to us being caught in a brief thunderstorm and she freaked out. It passed in about 15 minutes and we were fine. I tried to explain to her that by obsessing over bad weather, she had actually caused us to be caught in bad weather, and if she could try to let her fears go, we would have a much better time. This was a mistake on my part, because she wasn’t in the mood for feedback. She’s mad at me for getting lost, and I’m annoyed because I think she owes me an apology, too. How do we get past this?
What do you think your friend should apologize for? I’m serious; take a moment and think about what you’re expecting, and what would feel fair. Should she apologize for saying that being high on a mountain in stormy weather would make her panic, and then panicking when that exact thing happened? Should she apologize for agreeing to an extra hike on the condition that it was short, then being worried when it stretched longer? Should she apologize for the fact that you blamed her for the missed turn, when it sounds like you were the one who made an error? Sure, she was checking her phone, and that can be totally annoying. If you plan more backpacking trips together, you can have a conversation about how phone-checking in nature stresses you out, and maybe ask if she could check a watch instead. But it would be just as reasonable for her to ask you to try to get over your phone hangup, because traveling together is about compromise, and in the scheme of things, glancing at a phone is not that big of a deal. If that were your biggest challenge when hiking together, I’d say you were a very compatible pair.
I don’t think your friend should be mad at you for missing the turn. Part of the unspoken agreement of having outdoor adventures with pals is that you’re going to try your best, but mistakes happen, and you’ll deal with whatever situations arise together. But I think that by framing her anger as being about the missed turn, you’re creating a red herring; you’re using that to downplay the very real other things that I suspect she’s more annoyed about, like the fact that—by the sound of it—you pressured her to go on an alpine hike later in the day than she was comfortable with, and then held her responsible for a turn that you yourself missed. I’ll add that, while it does sound like your friend struggles with a fear of lightning, her logic isn’t actually wrong. Getting struck by lightning may be extremely rare, but when you’re in a high place without shelter during an electrical storm, you’re putting yourself in the proximate occasion of a big zap.
As for the fact that your friend wasn’t in the mood for feedback, I’m not surprised. You were hardly offering her a caring, compassionate insight that might make her life better. You were basically saying, “Here’s what I don’t like about you. Here’s what you should change about yourself for me.”
So, speaking of feedback, here’s my advice for you: instead of waiting for your friend to apologize, try apologizing first. After all, you’re having a conflict with someone you care about, and apologizing first is a surefire way to de-escalate; it shows that you’re more invested in repairing the friendship than in protecting your own ego. If you come forward and say something like, “Hey, I’m really sorry that I took my irritation out on you, and blamed you for getting caught in the storm. That wasn’t fair, and it wasn’t true. The truth is, I was just frustrated, because I care about you having a good time, and the whole reason I wanted to add the hike on the last day was so that our trip could end on a good note. It’s important to me for you to feel like I have your back,” you’re making an opening for her to respond with honesty and compassion, too. (Of course, don’t offer an apology that’s not true; she’ll see through it, and feel demeaned. But if you sit with your feelings, and try to figure out what went wrong, I wouldn’t be surprised if you came up with something along those lines.)
At that point, the ball is in your friend’s court, and I hope she’ll respond with similar grace. Depending on how the conversation goes, you might decide that it’s better to take a break from backpacking together, at least for a little while. But now that you’re off the mountain, and far from the threat of lightning, you’ll probably both start feeling better quickly. That’s part of the nature of backcountry trips: you go, you learn, you change. I know you would both do things differently in the future—and I hope that you get that chance.
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On our last morning, we slept in, and when we woke up the weather was nicer than it had been the whole time. It seemed like a waste to have come all that way and then hurry back when everything was perfect, so she agreed to add on an extra short hike up to a view point before we started back to the trailhead. It was only two miles so it shouldn’t have added more than an hour or so to our hiking for the day.
She kept pulling out her phone while we were hiking to check the time, which irritated me, because one of my pet peeves is people looking at their phones when we’re trying to be present together. Because I was irritated, I was distracted, and we ended up missing a turn and going on a longer route. This led to us being caught in a brief thunderstorm and she freaked out. It passed in about 15 minutes and we were fine. I tried to explain to her that by obsessing over bad weather, she had actually caused us to be caught in bad weather, and if she could try to let her fears go, we would have a much better time. This was a mistake on my part, because she wasn’t in the mood for feedback. She’s mad at me for getting lost, and I’m annoyed because I think she owes me an apology, too. How do we get past this?
What do you think your friend should apologize for? I’m serious; take a moment and think about what you’re expecting, and what would feel fair. Should she apologize for saying that being high on a mountain in stormy weather would make her panic, and then panicking when that exact thing happened? Should she apologize for agreeing to an extra hike on the condition that it was short, then being worried when it stretched longer? Should she apologize for the fact that you blamed her for the missed turn, when it sounds like you were the one who made an error? Sure, she was checking her phone, and that can be totally annoying. If you plan more backpacking trips together, you can have a conversation about how phone-checking in nature stresses you out, and maybe ask if she could check a watch instead. But it would be just as reasonable for her to ask you to try to get over your phone hangup, because traveling together is about compromise, and in the scheme of things, glancing at a phone is not that big of a deal. If that were your biggest challenge when hiking together, I’d say you were a very compatible pair.
I don’t think your friend should be mad at you for missing the turn. Part of the unspoken agreement of having outdoor adventures with pals is that you’re going to try your best, but mistakes happen, and you’ll deal with whatever situations arise together. But I think that by framing her anger as being about the missed turn, you’re creating a red herring; you’re using that to downplay the very real other things that I suspect she’s more annoyed about, like the fact that—by the sound of it—you pressured her to go on an alpine hike later in the day than she was comfortable with, and then held her responsible for a turn that you yourself missed. I’ll add that, while it does sound like your friend struggles with a fear of lightning, her logic isn’t actually wrong. Getting struck by lightning may be extremely rare, but when you’re in a high place without shelter during an electrical storm, you’re putting yourself in the proximate occasion of a big zap.
As for the fact that your friend wasn’t in the mood for feedback, I’m not surprised. You were hardly offering her a caring, compassionate insight that might make her life better. You were basically saying, “Here’s what I don’t like about you. Here’s what you should change about yourself for me.”
So, speaking of feedback, here’s my advice for you: instead of waiting for your friend to apologize, try apologizing first. After all, you’re having a conflict with someone you care about, and apologizing first is a surefire way to de-escalate; it shows that you’re more invested in repairing the friendship than in protecting your own ego. If you come forward and say something like, “Hey, I’m really sorry that I took my irritation out on you, and blamed you for getting caught in the storm. That wasn’t fair, and it wasn’t true. The truth is, I was just frustrated, because I care about you having a good time, and the whole reason I wanted to add the hike on the last day was so that our trip could end on a good note. It’s important to me for you to feel like I have your back,” you’re making an opening for her to respond with honesty and compassion, too. (Of course, don’t offer an apology that’s not true; she’ll see through it, and feel demeaned. But if you sit with your feelings, and try to figure out what went wrong, I wouldn’t be surprised if you came up with something along those lines.)
At that point, the ball is in your friend’s court, and I hope she’ll respond with similar grace. Depending on how the conversation goes, you might decide that it’s better to take a break from backpacking together, at least for a little while. But now that you’re off the mountain, and far from the threat of lightning, you’ll probably both start feeling better quickly. That’s part of the nature of backcountry trips: you go, you learn, you change. I know you would both do things differently in the future—and I hope that you get that chance.
Link
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And the next morning or afternoon or whenever Nita is starting to think that maybe, just maybe, Kit had a point, so she asks her mother for advice. Specifically, she asks what her mother would do if she got into an argument with a friend because that friend was stubbornly wrong and refused to admit he was wrong and stupid and wrong but all the same you graciously have decided you want to move past that (I mean, she phrased it better, but that's the question), and then is a bit stymied when her mother's response is "I'd apologize immediately, no question."
I think of that argument a lot when reading this sort of advice column question or post at AITA. If it's a dumb argument, and you really care about the relationship, and you are at least a little in the wrong and you know it - why aren't you apologizing? Or at least considering it? Do the words "I'm sorry" cost you actual money?
Nita was a lot less wrong in that argument than the OP is in this one, if you're curious. JFC, they were hiking during a thunderstorm. Either your friend's fear is an irrational phobia, in which case you need to be more sensitive, or it's not, but either way, "when thunder roars, get indoors". Hundreds of people are struck by lightning in the USA every year, and probably all of them are outside when it happens. The only reason the odds are low overall is because most people don't go hiking in thunderstorms!
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I think they might well be best off hiking with other people. Or hiking somewhere without thunderstorms. LW wants views. Friend wants caution. Neither is likely to change, which means they're not really happy with any compromise.
My other advice is, if friend was LW's boss, or child, or safety inspector, they probably would manage to be accommodating. They should try to care as much about friend's fears for friendship sake.
I realise I assumed LW was also a woman and that this argument was a one-off. If LW steamrollers friend a lot, that's a worse pattern to become aware of and fix...
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Boss or safety inspector, yes; child—particularly dependent minor child—probably not. (“Quit being such a baby! And put that thing away before I take it away!”)
Overbearance punches down.
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One of my coworkers goes hiking a lot on weekends. The number of times she's said "oh the weather forecast changed at the last minute, so we didn't go" is a lot. Hiking is dangerous!
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This was weirdly validating for me about a situation that happened a few years ago that I'm apparently still a little hurt by.
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These are not similar situations.
LW is supposed to give their friend grace for:
* Friend checking their phone during the side hike
* Being upset that LW’s carelessness got them lost during a stressful situation
Friend is supposed to give LW grace for:
* Pressuring them into taking on a risk that LW knew they were phobic about
* Getting pissy about the friend trying to control their anxiety by checking the passing time to see when it would be over
* Extending the amount of time that the friend had to suffer by not paying attention to the trail
* Causing the friend a panic attack by putting the friend into exactly the situation that the friend is phobic about
* Blaming the resultant stress on the friend not trying harder
It’s nonsense that the friend would be responding with “similar grace” if they choose to apologize. There’s no equivalency here; the friend forgiving LW’s ableist actions would be forgiving FAR more than LW has. As far as I’m concerned the friend has nothing at all to apologize for, whereas LW needs some education about how phobias work and needs to have a long, hard look at their own bullshit.
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2. Getting struck by lightning is, generally over your life, a very low risk. Getting struck by lighting when ABOVE THE TREELINE DURING A THUNDERSTORM is stupidly high risk!!! I am not lighting phobic and I wouldn't hike again with somebody who was insisting that wasn't worth worrying about either!!!!
3. Taking a wrong turn, on a hike, when you know it's your fault, and you're already worried about whether your partners wants to be there, and then something happens that puts you in serious danger, is a stressful place to be. Give *yourself* the grace to admit that you blamed her because you were stressed and not responding well, and apologize to her. And also admit that she was right about the thunderstorm risk, if you ever want to hike with her again.