The Concerned Stranger

[lillibet]

This has happened to me several times and it came up at dinner tonight: someone that you don't know well--or perhaps at all--is having a crisis moment and grabs onto you as the person who can get them through it, and then associates you with that terrible moment such that the experience creates more distance between you rather than less.

Anyone know a name for that phenomenon?

Comments

[lillibet.livejournal.com]

I guess I'm thinking of times when it goes from wherever it started to active avoidance and discomfort in my presence. I'd say that's happened 3 or 4 times to me, though fortunately not since the immediate post-college years.