This has been weighing on me for days, and I’m hoping to get some outside perspective. I (32F) met a woman (mid-40s) in the summer of 2024 while attending a drug and alcohol rehab program. My program overlapped with her trauma program. I was there for alcohol addiction; she was there dealing with the aftermath of a traumatic and messy divorce that, as I later found out, led to her driving off a cliff and ending up in a psych ward.

Despite being in different programs, we connected. After rehab, we stayed in touch—mostly check-in texts every couple of weeks. She lives10 hours away, so it wasn’t super frequent. In November, around the anniversary of my mother’s death, she came to my city to reunite with another friend from our time in treatment. She hinted that affording a hotel was tough, and without much thought, I offered my guest room for the weekend.

From the moment she arrived, something felt off. She was jittery, withdrawn, and seemed overwhelmed. She was visiting to meet a therapist recommended by our mutual friend, and it became clear she was going through a lot mentally. But in hindsight, I started realizing she’d been displaying strange behaviors from the start.

There were subtle control tactics—like guilt-tripping me into responding if I hadn’t replied for a few days. I live a busy life: full-time job, managing my own business, running workshops, and staying focused on my sobriety. I admit there were times I didn’t reply because I felt emotionally distant from our friendship. I didn’t have the capacity.

At one point, after maybe 3 weeks of me not replying, she texted something like, “If you don’t respond, I’m going to worry. Please let me know you’re okay.” I was sober and doing well, and she knew that. But I replied anyway, out of guilt. We ended up talking, and that’s when she confirmed her trip and I offered my place again.

I was genuinely excited—sobriety had left me isolated from a lot of old friends, and it felt good to have another woman around. I even planned a few little outings for us, but she wasn’t really present. On a walk, she talked about being paranoid—about her ex-husband, her kids’ motives, stuff I won’t get into for her privacy. But it was clear she was unstable.

Her personality was... complicated. Kind, but pushy. Empathetic on the surface, but often dismissive in subtle ways. For example, I opened up about struggling with social anxiety and how I wasn’t ready to attend AA meetings. Still, she kept pushing. When I said I felt strong in my sobriety, she insisted that we go to a meeting together. At the time, I felt grateful. But looking back, it felt like she was ignoring my boundaries.

That weekend, I did go to an AA meeting with her, even though it made me uncomfortable. I felt pressured. Three weeks after that visit, I relapsed.

To be clear, I’m not blaming her for the relapse. It wasn’t because of her. But that visit started a cascade of events. My husband assumed I’d had a breakthrough and expected me to start attending meetings regularly. When I told him I wasn’t ready, it led to fights—fights that lasted for weeks. I started feeling like I wasn’t doing enough, even though before all that, I was doing really well: therapy, work, sobriety, health.

In the middle of all this, I reached out to my stepdad around Christmas. He’s deep in active addiction, and reconnecting was a huge misstep. But I was spiraling, convinced I wasn’t healing “enough,” and trying to do more to fix myself.

Then came the breaking point.

A couple months ago, she and I were back in that awkward cycle—missed calls, slow replies, her texting again. I mentioned I might take a solo road trip. She immediately got excited and said she was planning to visit the same area (a town between us), and suggested we meet up. In the moment, I agreed. A girls’ trip sounded fun: hotel stay, face masks, a night swim.

But a weird feeling started to settle in.

Originally, I wanted this trip for me. I’ve been completely burnt out. I needed time alone. No schedules, no coordination. So I canceled. Told her I couldn’t swing it. I felt bad and tried to re-plan something later, but she understandably responded with frustration—said she’d canceled her dog sitter, her babysitter, etc. I apologized, and she ghosted me for four weeks.

During that time, I relapsed again. I’ve had three relapses in four months, and I’ve been emotionally unstable—panic attacks, irritability, exhaustion. Then she sends me her usual check-in text. And I’m just... done. I decide to block her.

I don’t need someone in my life who causes me anxiety and guilt just by existing in my text inbox. We don’t talk deeply. She has no social media, no email, so everything is via text—and very one-sided. I’d find myself nervous just to check if she’d messaged me.

And then, last week, it happened.

I’m taking an afternoon nap—exhausted after work—when my husband wakes me up, shaking my leg. I’m groggy, disoriented. He’s saying something over and over that I can’t process until I finally repeat it: “Mary’s here.”

I sit up. “What do you mean Mary’s here?” I’m confused, annoyed, still half-asleep. He says, “She’s in our house. Right now. Downstairs.”

I lose it. Not yelling, just stunned and pissed. He backs off, realizing I’m not okay with this. I hear him telling her I was sleeping. She’s excited, giggling, asking for me.

I go downstairs with the fakest smile I’ve ever worn.

She’s standing there, beaming, arms open for a hug. I play along. Ask why she’s here. She says she’s driving back home and stopped in my city with a friend—wants to grab dinner before the drive. She invites me.

I try to politely dodge, but she pushes again. I eventually say, firmly, “No, I don’t think I’ll be joining you.” She got the message. She asked to use the bathroom and before she turned to leave gave me one more hug and awkwardly fumbled to open my door and left.

Now it’s been a few days, and I’m still in shock. I unblocked her number incase she decided to send a "Happy to see you" text, but i haven't heard from her since.

I’m convinced she realized I had blocked her. She would have tried calling me with hearing an audio of "this number has been disconnected, and the day she came i received random hang-up calls (which I now think were her from different numbers). She must have gone through old texts or her map history to find my address. And she showed up—ten hours away—to prove that even though I blocked her, she still had access to my life.

It feels like a control move. A boundary breach. A total violation.

So... am I paranoid? Or was this messed up? I honestly don’t know if I’m justified, but I feel justified. There’s more context I could add, but this is the gist of it.