You were wise to avoid involving yourself in his obsession with this woman. Since you're asking opinions here, mine is that you should walk away from this person as quickly as possible. I would guess at some point after you've done this, he will try and loop you back in to his drama at some point. When that time comes, I'd avoid allowing him back in to your life ever again. It sounds like he has manipulated you and others in the past, and instead of a real, healthy relationship, you have had (and inadvertently supported) a very toxic friendship. He is still manipulating you in the sense that you are still concerned and trying to occasionally reach out to him, yet he never validated or accepted how you feel over his previous actions, and his attempt to drag you into a very unhealthy, dangerous, and potentially illegal situation. You should never feel guilty about your feelings.
Trying to manipulate you into feeling a certain way or doing something you don’t want to do; stressing you out; demanding too much, without giving anything back, or recognizing his actions were inappropriate; and then cutting you off like he did, are all very toxic signs of someone who is not truly your friend.
Despite whatever illness your friend may have, and despite his problems-- he sounds either severely depressed, or has some type of personality disorder or both--it is not your responsibility to carry the friendship. Nor should you ever feel bad about how he makes you feel.
I was involved years ago in an incredibly terrific relationship. At least until it wasn't. I fell madly in love with a woman whom I thought was the love of my life. She was a former model, was well educated, and had a solid career in Marketing and Advertising (albeit she had just started a new job when I met her).
It turns out however, that she had a severe manic depressive disorder; as well as a very strong borderline and also narcissistic personality disorders. At various times in her past, she had even been hospitalized. Our entire relationship was begun, and developed over a period of about 10 months when she was either relatively stable, or had been experiencing lengthy periods of mania. It all came crashing down the night before Thanksgiving about 20 years ago. In the course of about an 8 hour period, she walked in to work, quit her job as a marketing executive, immediately left and went to a local strip club-- where she got a job as a stripper, and actually started stripping later that evening. She had moved in with me about 4 months prior, and when she didn’t return home from work and I still hadn't heard from her around 8 pm, I started to get concerned. I started calling her friends, and none of them had heard from her; until I reached a girl from her office who told me she had come in to work that morning, and cussed out her boss and walked out. Her other friends were also worried. One of her friends finally reached her, and she called me frantic because she had called her friend and told her she got a job as a stripper earlier that day, and was going to bring a customer over to her friend’s house to party. Naturally, her friend called me right away. I got to her friends house before she did, and she pulled up--- high as a kite on meth; with some old, loser dude following her in his car from the strip club. It was like I was living in a nightmare. Her friend said, "I was so happy she had found you, because she can get like this sometimes. Please don’t leave her, she needs you!" WTF??
Over the next several months, I watched her continue to slip away, and fight me on every turn to help her. Turns out her family had given up trying to help her long before I had got into the picture. And after the Thanksgiving incident happened she threatened to kill herself nearly every day for about a month, and then would beg me and her friends for help. But anyone who has tried to help someone with severe borderline personality disorder can tell you, it can be emotionally exhausting at times. Usually, the persons they feel closest to become the target for lies, manipulations, and rage. It was literally like watching a movie about someone possessed. In one moment they are themselves, and begging for help—the next they are telling you how much they hate you, and spitting in your face. In fact there is a book called “I Hate You, Don’t Leave Me” that explains this nasty disorder, and the dismal prognosis for long term recovery. Back then there weren’t many treatment options that really worked. Thankfully, things have changed quite a bit now in the last 20 years or so, I’m told. Back then many therapists refused to see patients with BPD; and a psychiatrist friend of mine tells me it is still by far one of the most difficult pyschiatric disorders to treat. During this time I had one psychiatrist tell me to run as fast I could away from her. He told me, “You aren’t married; you don’t have kids with her…save yourself”.
I helped her get into a hospital, and even lied for her so that she could keep her job and be welcomed back. She was in intensive therapy, and I as with her every step of the way. Even when it became clear her friends were starting to abandon her. I was determined to help her. After all, I was in love with her. But emotionally, it was killing me. The day after she got out of the hospital, we went home and made love. She cried about how grateful she was that I had been there for her to help her, and that she felt better than she had in months. That she felt normal again. And she begged me to never leave her. The next morning she went shopping with her best friend, and told her friend she had to use the restroom at a mall they’d gone too. She left her friend there, and she called me three days later, crying her eyes out, after having been on a three day high at a crack house. Until that day, she’d never done crack in her life.
I told you ALL of that to tell you this…My adoptive father said something profound at one point after the crack episode that saved me from being sucked completely down into the abyss. After listening to me go on for like three hours one day about all of her problems and how unfair it was that she was dealing with this, and just how much things would be “back to normal” if ONLY she stuck to her therapy, or ONLY if she took her meds like she was supposed to, he paused and said, “Tempus, you’re trying to rationalize with an irrational mind. She is not capable right now, and may never be, of being who you thought she was.” Sadly, he was right.
After the crack episode, I had had enough. She moved in with one of her girlfriends and then told me she was going to go back to the strip club, because I was forcing her to do that. Sure, okay. And she did for about a year or so. She called me about two years later one night, drunk, telling me she missed me and missed the great sex we had. She was working in marketing again, and had quit stripping; and asked if I wanted to come over to her new apartment, and be with her. I wished her well, but declined.
About every 5 or 6 years, I hear from her or one of her friends. Usually, a simple shout out via text around the holidays. About three years ago, I had heard she had gotten married and had become a yoga instructor, and was doing really well; physically and otherwise. She’d even opened her own studio. Last year, one of her old friends told me she’d apparently cheated on her husband, had gotten divorced and closed her yoga studio. She just stopped going to work.
The point of this novella is (sorry, as an author it just spills out sometimes like this), while you may care about your friend, it’s not your responsibility to always be there for him, especially when he takes you for granted. As much as it sucks, you can’t allow your desire to be there for him to be manipulated, especially when he doesn’t care or know how to be a real friend. You are better off without him in your life.
To paraphrase from some friends of mine...
(ignore the context)
Thank your stars you're not that way
Turn your back and walk away
Don't even pause and ask them why
Turn around and say goodbye
All that you can do is wish them well
All that you can do is wish them well...