MANILA, Philippines -- Dear Chico and Delamar... Friends always run to me when they need someone to talk to. Maybe because I give good advices, or perhaps because I just know how to listen, but I never reject a friend’s plea for a sympathetic ear. Mary, for one, would always call me to tell me about her affair. But the stories have become so regular (and so repetitious!) that I have grown tired of it. Mary is married and she knows that she is just being taking advantage of her. But she does not listen to my advices, she just needs someone to vent her stories to!

There came a point that I would already hide from her I would not answer her calls and text messages. But after a day or two of totally ignoring her, I would feel guilty because I would concoct scenarios in my mind, that my Mary might spiral down into deeper depression and might kill herself. Then I would start calling her so I could be the reliable friend again - and the cycle goes on and on and on.

The problem with me is that I feel guilty a lot. My other friend told me not to be because I have my own life to live. But what if crazy Mary does something to herself during the time that I have made myself scarce for her? Should I stay being a friend, disregarding my growing negative feelings towards her, or should I just totally leave the friendship, which is most of the time, a good friendship? — Greta

Chico says… This strikes a very resonant chord with me. I really think being the nice, polite Filipinos that we are, sometimes we blur the thin line between obligation and abuse.

My personal meter stick when it comes to helping out others is this: give only what you can. It sounds simple, but in a society that was weaned on sacrifice and selflessness and martyrdom, we sometimes tend to give what we can no longer afford to lose.

Let me put it this way, if you have 10 kids, and you have only 10 apples to feed them, and then a friend comes along asking for an apple to feed her kid, what would you do? If you have 10 kids and 11 apples, then the right thing to do is to give her the surplus fruit. But if giving her the fruit will entail one of your own children starving as a result, I say your duty to sustain your child exceeds your duty to help out your friend. It's not being heartless, it's being practical. I say, for as long as you can afford to help out, then by all means do so! But don't give to the point that you start to suffer as much as the one you're helping. So just replace the apples with emotional investment, and you can apply the same principle to your friends who need you as an emotional crutch.

If you can afford to lend her a sympathetic ear every time she needs it, then why not? If you can tolerate her repetitive cycle of doing the same thing over and over again then complaining about it, then listen away. But if it's starting to take its toll on you, you have every right to withdraw the attention and nurturing that she craves from you.

This sort of emotional leeching is unhealthy in the long run, and it's no joke. People in social welfare or guidance counselors or lawyers or any occupation that deals with listening to problems over and over again have been proven to have suffered hazardous effects on their health. Besides, you've already listened to her and gave her your two cents on the matter. If she does the same thing again, it's safe to assume she can already surmise what you will say. So she doesn't really need counsel, what she needs is an audience.

Like I said, give only what you can afford to lose, be it time or attention or emotional investment. Inasmuch as you want to help her out, you have every right, some would even say duty, to look out for number one.

(Chico and Delle welcome your letters. Write to: youth@mb.com.ph or fax through 527-7511. Listen to the Dynamic Duo Monday to Saturday, 6 a.m. to 9 a.m. over Monster Radio RX 93.1)