When your lack of empathy astounds the people around you. UPDATE P17

[WillyNilly]

As for details being "off", please keep in mind I am getting the info filtered through eric and then DH.  After a few beers.  Estimations could be rounded up or down, timewise. I am not sure.

Also Kelly did have a phone.  I dont know why she didnt call for help. Other than eric was out of town and she didn't want to call an ambulance. She must have had her reasons.

I don't know who'd I call either if my DD wasn't available.  I wouldn't call 911 for a broken bone and wouldn't have a number for any park type patrol.  I'd hate to call a friend to drive out and then try to find me on a park trail.

That's what I was thinking.  If my dh was at work, who would I call?  I don't have family near by and what call another friend? But I would end up calling the park ranger office hoping someone was manning the phones.

That is something to think about before going someplace - who would you call if something happened? If your SO isn't available then having that backup number would be a very good thing. Having a phone with you is useless if you don't have a number to call.

I would absolutely call 911 for a broken bone.  911 isn't just for life or death.

True, but ambulance rides are not cheap.

Seriously! A $500+ 911 call would not be my first, second or even third call!

[Rohanna]

Which is why helping your buddy out is even more important.

[Zilla]

Which is why helping your buddy out is even more important.

Bingo.  I too wouldn't call 911.  At that time she did not know it was a broken bone and could have been just a bad sprain.  At most I would do is call the non emergency line for the park rangers to see if they can assist.

[Outdoor Girl]

If I was going running with three friends, I wouldn't even consider the need to have someone to call on the phone.  Three people should be more than enough to get me back to my car should something happen.

Because of Stacy's actions - specifically lying about what happened to Kelly - Kelly had no support at all.  If Stacy that told the cool kids what really happened, I'm sure they would have gone back to help.

I think the jury is out on whether or not Stacy should have left Kelly alone but there is no doubt that her actions afterwords were reprehensible.

[LeveeWoman]

An ambulance is cheaper than being mugged or s*xually assaulted.

[Minmom3]

An ambulance is cheaper than being mugged or s*xually assaulted.

Lower potential for being fatal too!  Not unheard of, and apparently HAPPENING at that park, hence the posted warnings, for muggings and rapes to go horribly south and for the victim to go to the morgue. 

Stacy broke the buddy rule, and for that she should get her hand slapped pretty hard.  But then she lied about it, and IMO, that's why she deserves to be dumped as a friend.  Somebody that selfish, and that self righteous in her justification for her behavior isn't a friend, even if she used to be one.  I feel for Kelly.  This is way more painful than a polite Fade Out.  She's been used and abused by Stacy.

[Hmmmmm]

As for details being "off", please keep in mind I am getting the info filtered through eric and then DH.  After a few beers.  Estimations could be rounded up or down, timewise. I am not sure.

Also Kelly did have a phone.  I dont know why she didnt call for help. Other than eric was out of town and she didn't want to call an ambulance. She must have had her reasons.

I don't know who'd I call either if my DD wasn't available.  I wouldn't call 911 for a broken bone and wouldn't have a number for any park type patrol.  I'd hate to call a friend to drive out and then try to find me on a park trail.

That's what I was thinking.  If my dh was at work, who would I call?  I don't have family near by and what call another friend? But I would end up calling the park ranger office hoping someone was manning the phones.

That is something to think about before going someplace - who would you call if something happened? If your SO isn't available then having that backup number would be a very good thing. Having a phone with you is useless if you don't have a number to call.

In this case I would have believed my support system of running with a friend would be my emergency contact.  But yes if alone, I would have a plan on who to contact.

[Corvid]

I haven't read the entire thread, so I'm not sure if this has been said or not.

I don't think the issue is with what happened on the trail.  Yes, Kelly was injured, but did not ask Stacy to stay with her, nor did she mention she was injured.  That's been established.

However, if I were Stacy and I found out later that Kelly was indeed injured, my response wouldn't be to be ANGRY at her.  I'd be apologetic for leaving her, and maybe I'd ask, "Why didn't you say something?  I wouldn't have gone on if I knew you were hurt!"

I wouldn't be trying to blow the entire thing off, I wouldn't be calling Kelly's husband to try and talk some sense into her, and I wouldn't be constantly defensive and trying to shift blame around to assuage my own guilty conscience, because deep down, I'd feel like a jerk for having left my injured friend.  Of course, these are all assumptions.  I am not Stacy.  I wasn't in the situation myself and I cannot speak for anyone else.

So, in short, I think the issue isn't so much what happened on the running path, so much as the way Stacy handled it afterward.

Agreed.  Whatever happened on the trail, whether selfishness or miscommunication or whatever, the proof in the pudding is Stacy's behavior afterwards.  Even if we assume there's some misunderstanding about what Stacy said to the other two runners and set that aside, surely the appropriate response to the injured friend you left behind is an abject apology rather blowing off what happened and annoyance that your friend is a bit miffed with you.

[Last_Dance]

An ambulance is cheaper than being mugged or s*xually assaulted.

True, though I know exactly what's to blame in this situation: the whole "making a scene is absolutely the worst thing you could do" idea we all got pounded into us.
Perhaps Kelly would have called an ambulance if she hadn't run into the park employee, perhaps she wouldn't have. Perhaps the pain didn't let her think clearly - no offence meant to Kelly, I know thinking under pressure is extremely hard and I envy everyone who can do that from the bottom of my heart. 


Call me evil-minded, but I wouldn't be surprised if, between the time Stacy left Kelly behind and the time she caught up with The Cool Girls, Stacy realized she could use Kelly's absence to make herself look better.

"Oh, look, the experienced runner got tired and gave up already while poor, feeble little me has enough force of will to see the run through. See, she wasn't really hanging back because of me! I'm so much better than her already!"

I'm not saying that's what she thought, but...it would explain the lie.

OP said Stacy was sort sort of distant with Kelly after they started running with The Cool Girls - isn't it possible that Stacy was jealous of her? That she started seeing Kelly as competition for The Cool Girls' attention?
The three of them already have a genuine love for running in common, they're all more experienced than her...

I know, I know: speculation and we haven't got a shred of evidence from OP's story. It's just a thought.
However, it has been said it's probably not the first time Stacy brushed Kelly off for her own, selfish reasons. I'd also look back at her actions whenever she had been jealous of someone else. 
Again, just a thought.

[baglady]

There is a lot of 20/20 hindsight going on in this thread. That's not a criticism -- it's human nature. OP has said she got the story third-hand. If it played out exactly as OP tells it, then yes, Stacy's behavior is reprehensible. But there could have been some details lost in the re-re-telling. Maybe Stacy *did* ask "Are you OK?" and Kelly responded something like "Dunno ... I think so ... " and Stacy took that as her cue to keep going.

Some injuries hurt like the dickens when they happen but turn out not to be serious (e.g., a scraped knee). Others don't involve a lot of pain at first -- someone mentioned an adrenaline rush at the time of trauma -- but the severity and the pain set in later. I can vouch for the latter scenario, having fallen down a flight of stairs in July and being "just a little shaken up" at the time ... the pain and swelling and bruising came in the next few hours.

I'm not defending Stacy, and I think Kelly should at the very least put the friendship in a temporary time-out ... but I do think there may be some pieces missing from the story through no fault of the OP's.

[wolfie]

That is something to think about before going someplace - who would you call if something happened? If your SO isn't available then having that backup number would be a very good thing. Having a phone with you is useless if you don't have a number to call.

In this case I would have believed my support system of running with a friend would be my emergency contact.  But yes if alone, I would have a plan on who to contact.

I agree with you - I would have thought that my buddy would be my help. But now I am thinking of other, worst case scenarios - like say you and your buddy fall and neither can help the other. Or your buddy falls and you can't help them (say they fell down an embankment and you can't get down to them safely). Or you carpool and get back to the car and discover it won't start and noone else is around. It might just be a good idea to get a number of someone outside the situation to call - just in case. This is totally and completely outside the situation posted here - it just made me think that I don't think of these types of things - I fall into the trap of thinking that I just need to have my cell phone on me and forget about the "I need someone to call" part.

[thedudeabides]

There is a lot of 20/20 hindsight going on in this thread. That's not a criticism -- it's human nature. OP has said she got the story third-hand. If it played out exactly as OP tells it, then yes, Stacy's behavior is reprehensible. But there could have been some details lost in the re-re-telling. Maybe Stacy *did* ask "Are you OK?" and Kelly responded something like "Dunno ... I think so ... " and Stacy took that as her cue to keep going.

Some injuries hurt like the dickens when they happen but turn out not to be serious (e.g., a scraped knee). Others don't involve a lot of pain at first -- someone mentioned an adrenaline rush at the time of trauma -- but the severity and the pain set in later. I can vouch for the latter scenario, having fallen down a flight of stairs in July and being "just a little shaken up" at the time ... the pain and swelling and bruising came in the next few hours.

I'm not defending Stacy, and I think Kelly should at the very least put the friendship in a temporary time-out ... but I do think there may be some pieces missing from the story through no fault of the OP's.

Honestly, even if Kelly did think she was fine and Stacy thought she was good to go back alone, there's not really a way to explain away the most heinous of Stacy's behavior, which was everything she did after the fact, at least not that I can see.

[KenveeB]

There is a lot of 20/20 hindsight going on in this thread. That's not a criticism -- it's human nature. OP has said she got the story third-hand. If it played out exactly as OP tells it, then yes, Stacy's behavior is reprehensible. But there could have been some details lost in the re-re-telling. Maybe Stacy *did* ask "Are you OK?" and Kelly responded something like "Dunno ... I think so ... " and Stacy took that as her cue to keep going.

Some injuries hurt like the dickens when they happen but turn out not to be serious (e.g., a scraped knee). Others don't involve a lot of pain at first -- someone mentioned an adrenaline rush at the time of trauma -- but the severity and the pain set in later. I can vouch for the latter scenario, having fallen down a flight of stairs in July and being "just a little shaken up" at the time ... the pain and swelling and bruising came in the next few hours.

I'm not defending Stacy, and I think Kelly should at the very least put the friendship in a temporary time-out ... but I do think there may be some pieces missing from the story through no fault of the OP's.

I can see that happening, with Stacy and even Kelly at first not necessarily knowing how serious it is and Stacy going on. But she wouldn't have lied about it afterward, she wouldn't have been angry at Kelly later for not meeting them, she wouldn't be harassing Kelly after the face, and she would have been falling all over herself apologizing! So I can't reconcile Stacy making an honest mistake with her later behavior, though it might be okay in other circumstances.

[baglady]

There is a lot of 20/20 hindsight going on in this thread. That's not a criticism -- it's human nature. OP has said she got the story third-hand. If it played out exactly as OP tells it, then yes, Stacy's behavior is reprehensible. But there could have been some details lost in the re-re-telling. Maybe Stacy *did* ask "Are you OK?" and Kelly responded something like "Dunno ... I think so ... " and Stacy took that as her cue to keep going.

Some injuries hurt like the dickens when they happen but turn out not to be serious (e.g., a scraped knee). Others don't involve a lot of pain at first -- someone mentioned an adrenaline rush at the time of trauma -- but the severity and the pain set in later. I can vouch for the latter scenario, having fallen down a flight of stairs in July and being "just a little shaken up" at the time ... the pain and swelling and bruising came in the next few hours.

I'm not defending Stacy, and I think Kelly should at the very least put the friendship in a temporary time-out ... but I do think there may be some pieces missing from the story through no fault of the OP's.

I can see that happening, with Stacy and even Kelly at first not necessarily knowing how serious it is and Stacy going on. But she wouldn't have lied about it afterward, she wouldn't have been angry at Kelly later for not meeting them, she wouldn't be harassing Kelly after the face, and she would have been falling all over herself apologizing! So I can't reconcile Stacy making an honest mistake with her later behavior, though it might be okay in other circumstances.

You and thedude are absolutely right. I was mainly focusing on the events on the trail, not the aftermath. I'm with you that her subsequent behavior was unacceptable.

[bloo]

There is a lot of 20/20 hindsight going on in this thread. That's not a criticism -- it's human nature. OP has said she got the story third-hand. If it played out exactly as OP tells it, then yes, Stacy's behavior is reprehensible. But there could have been some details lost in the re-re-telling. Maybe Stacy *did* ask "Are you OK?" and Kelly responded something like "Dunno ... I think so ... " and Stacy took that as her cue to keep going.

Some injuries hurt like the dickens when they happen but turn out not to be serious (e.g., a scraped knee). Others don't involve a lot of pain at first -- someone mentioned an adrenaline rush at the time of trauma -- but the severity and the pain set in later. I can vouch for the latter scenario, having fallen down a flight of stairs in July and being "just a little shaken up" at the time ... the pain and swelling and bruising came in the next few hours.

I'm not defending Stacy, and I think Kelly should at the very least put the friendship in a temporary time-out ... but I do think there may be some pieces missing from the story through no fault of the OP's.

OP did clarify with updates with some of the missing pieces throughout this thread. Kelly did not ask Stacy to stay. She didn't think she had to.

See below. Along with her subsequent heinous behavior, my conclusion is Stacy cares pretty much only about Stacy.

Sorry.  To clarify, Kelly didn't directly ask Stacy, please stay behind and help me.  My impression was she didn't think she would have to after saying she was in a lot of pain. Maybe that was her mistake assuming Stacy would take that as a cue to help.