A guy friend I have often refers to me as a dog. He says it when I’m telling a story of me being “aggressive” (like standing up for myself at work). It makes me really really angry. I’ve told him before to not call me that.

He recently said it again the other night. I said STOP CALLING ME A DOG. Right after it left his mouth.

He said sorry and apologized. Through out the night another friend was bringing it up, defending me and calling this friend misogynistic (which it was). I was playing into this as it felt like it was easing the tension but I think it was causing him to feel shame maybe.

Towards the end of the night the friend snapped and said “IM BEING GASLIT, I SAID SORRY I DONT REMEMBER EVER SAYING THAT TO YOU BEFORE, JUST DROP IT” then he started pounding his fists on the table and stood up and kept going “I CARE ABOUT YOU IM NOT THE TYPE OF PERSON TO SAY THINGS LIKE THAT I DONT KNOW IF YOURE JOKING BUT KNOCK IT OFF THIS SHOULD BE DISCUSSED IN PRIVATE I DONT LIKE BEING ACCOSTED IN FRONT OF EVERYONE. SOMETIMES I FLY OFF THE HANDLE, LIKE I DID THE OTHER NIGHT WITH MY BROTHER (he spit on his brothers face out of frustration) BUT DONT PUSH ME”

And I stood up and said “we can discuss that at another time, but you do and have called me a dog and I don’t like being called that in front of people either. I am going home now” and I left

It felt pretty triggering and I’m just wondering if I did anything wrong? I have cptsd and this triggered an episode and I’m feeling a lot of stress about it and feeling sick. Episodes make me feel unsafe and it’s hard for me to rationally think about the situation. Basically, am I the asshole and do you think I could do anything different? What would you do moving forward?

A friend messaged me afterwards saying she had a talk with him and that we should all meet to talk about boundaries moving forward.