"Breaking up" with a friend

i do know what you mean though, and i actually have a small problem with an old friend at the moment - we have grown so far apart over the years we have NOTHING in common anymore, and i mean nothing! yet still this person contacts me etc and tries to carry on as though we are still the best buddies we once were ( 20 years ago ).
im not sure how to go about breaking it off really, but then again we live a fair distance apart so it isnt too big an issue.

how on earth did you tell your friend you wanted to 'take a break' ??and how did you say you needed to end the friendship? did you just come out with it?

yes, its funny isnt it, how we rarely think about breaking up with friends the way we do with lovers...yet it may be even more difficult in some ways.

I've only totally ditched one female friend that I can think of - she was a mentalist and I used the classic dumping-by-avoidance-technique. Very rude.

I don't remember all the details and don't want to remember all the details, but it wasn't as though I just told him once and that was it. I discussde it with him to some extent, though my mind was made up so it wasn't much of a discussion. I know I was pretty direct about it. There had been a number of things he did which upset me a great deal. No matter how I explained why they upset me, he didn't understand; and because he didn't understand, he was not very inclined to stop doing the things that bothered me. (I'm not sure if it's worth discussing in such vague terms, but I don't feel like getting into all the details.)

It's not that he was so terrible, but our personalities ultimately rubbed up against each other in some very unfortunate ways.

actually sitting down with someone and saying "I don't want to be your friend anymore" - SuXoR. Why can't you just stop taking their calls and always be *busy* or *tired* if they ever ask you out anywhere?

It's true that it's a problem trying to provide emotional support to a friend who you are cutting off. They can use that, as my friend did, to a degree, as a way to drag things out. He was kind of bitter about it anyway: "Oh, so that was all the therapy I get from you, and now I'm on my own?"

should have been "when he was extremely ill"(!)

Day 2,
That day at recess we were lining up and i heard Cydni and Kristy say that they would kick me out of the lunch so that there friend Cherie could sit there, but i didn't care about that. So when we were at lunch Kristy and Cydni said a swearword(a cuss word) and i said don't say that but they kept on saying. Then they started to say it to me and i started to cry. Then i raised my hand and my old teacher Mr.Morton came over and i said can i switch tables and he said why and i said because Kristy and Cydni are being mean to me. Mr.Morton agreed with me. So then Cydni started to cry (BOO-HOO)and Mr.Mortan said what table do you want to sit at and i said with Amber S. Jillian S. Amber C. Amanda H. Adam M. and Hunter J. Mr.Mortan said go ahead. So i did.

Day 3,

Today May.14,2004. When we were at recess i write a letter to them, when they read it they cam e back over to me through down the letter and said that doesn't mke sence. So i said your a plastic. You should be on the movie Mean Girls. Then she went away. Now i'm telling the Principal.

P.S: KRISTY SARA AND CYDNI HOPE YOU ARE READY TO GET SUSPENDED. AND I HOPE YOU ARE EMBARRASSED. IAM GOIND TO TELL EVERYONE. CALL ME AT 301-392-9620 OR 301-399-3790.

-- Vic (Iodine99...), September 9th, 2003.

this seems increasingly necessary

don't leave me this way

I had this experience recently. My oldest friend - I knew him since I was ten, we shared a flat for a year at uni etc. But he's gone through this unpleasant change. Starting from getting really into the new atheist types, then into hard anti-Islam, (we've been to mosques together! Back in the anti Iraq war days we knew lots of Muslims), then he started with 'looney left' (we were both members of the Scottish socialist party!), feminazis, anti-Romani, insisting that minorities just want special treatment, complaining about the 'gay agenda' etc etc.

And it broke my heart - I blocked him, unfriended him - the outright racism of his spam from breitbart and co was something I didn't want to have to deal with. Once I blocked him I found out that most of the people I know were a month or so ahead of me. Which was curiously comforting - whatever had happened to him, lots of my old friends were still against that crap. I don't have the energy to argue with him - I wouldn't know here to start, so I had to cut him out of my life. He was always very suggestible, I suppose. Maybe that will be the key - someone with less problems and more patience than me might bring him back.

my god, yes

having a real hard time facing the friends I know who voted for Trump. I really did not understand how so many people could willingly look past all the bigotry and elect a man who they KNEW was lying to them at every turn. I don't know what to say to them right now.

Sounds horrible. (xp)

my Dad and my older brother are both huge Breitbart guys. I don't really know what to say because I hate to argue with them, but in the end it boils down to a lot of "did you fact check this?" (to which the answer is always something like "well their 'facts' are always wrong"

I'm glad my father died before this past election cycle started -- it would have gotten ugly between us.

I don't really want to pour it on my father who is usually a good person but I do have a son who's half Mexican and I kinda feel like telling him, you voted to look the other way on people who want to delegitimize your grandson

eh, I'm not going to tell him that. but I don't feel like seeing him for another week.

Never really gave it much thought in the past but I've recently been hearing about a lot of racists hiding their views so well that they can have a black girlfriend or blend in with liberal friends. It's really creepy and I'm starting to suspect some of the trump voters I know online are like this. I previously wouldn't have thought this was that common at all but I guess that must be how so many people end up in a relationship with a complete monster. Expert liars.

this shit is the fucking worst

My list is long. Don't make me feel like I'm Pentangeli in The Godfather Part II (says Clemenza) when I try to get together, waiting in the lobby while you tell me how busy you are, and if I've got something on the go, take--or at least convincingly fake--an interest (if it's a book, you need a good excuse for why you didn't buy it).

If you can handle that, I'm very loyal. Otherwise--especially as I get older--I don't make the effort anymore.

going to rant about this a little bit but spare the uninterested the wallotext

this is so twisted that I don't even know if I can properly explain it - there's a lot more to it but it would take a book to pick apart. this person and I go way back (about 12-13 years), went through some really rough years together, but now we live far apart. I've visited her on both coasts. She's had her ups and downs but has been having more downs of late especially due to family stuff, whilst I've had a really exceptional 12 months or so. (The...ten years before that? Largely not so hot.)

A big part of my improvement is that I've made some decisions to shrink my life, spend more time with a smaller group of close friends, largely stick to a routine (work, volunteer, sleep, rinse and repeat) that I think I can keep up in perpetuity to stay strong and sane in preparation for whatever life is going to throw at me personally and at all of us, collectively. Because I know that things might be going well *right now* but it will not last forever, or probably even much longer. Meanwhile she's gotten more embroiled in really hard family shit that IS, I'm sure, extremely frustrating, but also has nothing to do with me.

Anyway, on two separate occasions this year, she's reached out specifically to ream me out about how I live my life and, in this last message I received a couple of days ago, to specifically say she no longer respected me. These messages contained caricatures of how I think and exist that have, to my experience, no resemblance to reality. How can you convince someone that they're mischaracterizing your own inner life?

I credit certain life and volunteer experiences for making me *incredibly patient* IRL (on the internet/ILX...not so much, I admit) but I confess that something broke in me and I very nearly replied with some variant of "get fucked" or "lose my number". I can't tell you just how out of character that urge was - it disturbed me tbh. Then I considered writing something long and reflective instead. Then I considered quite a few other options in between. But ultimately I realized the gulf between us is too vast now and no response will do anything but prolong the situation. When trust and faith in someone are lost, there are no words so well-curated that can restore it, and silence is the only rational (though not "good") course of action. I'm trying, working very hard, to tell myself that this is simply a thing that happens - people drift apart, life goes on. Maybe it'll sink in later or something. But now I'm just furious and feel so depressed and powerless. Again, just, fuck this so much.

oh lol I fucked that up, oh well, enjoy I guess

Sounds like deliberate bridge burning on her part. My first reaction would be to empathize with her based on whatever harrowing place she happens to be coming from at the moment, but it sounds like you've already done that. Past a certain point, the lashing out becomes gratuitous and can no longer be imputed to catharsis and/or circumstance, so if you feel like you're there already, I'd just phase her out little by little and maybe respond to her latest outburst with a curt message indicating you deem respect to be part and parcel of any healthy friendship. Either way, sorry to hear you're going through this. If it's any comfort, when I think back on the few times this has happened to me, whether tacitly or spectacularly, there is maybe one case where I wish things had played out differently, even though they likely couldn't have, if only for geographical reasons; all other instances are clear-cut morality tales ending in 'good riddance', so as messed up as it sounds, this may be something to look forward to…

Btw, feel free to 77 if you want to delve into the details.

Simon I had what sounds like a comparable experience earlier this year, with a friend who was making unreasonable demands on me and (in frustration over what she perceived as my unavailability) lashed out at me. In response I wrote her something long and pissed off, but heartfelt, in an attempt to show her where she had it wrong and to guide her to reason—but, like you, never sent it. Instead I decided to say nothing and let it die on the vine.
But I couldn’t do it for very long—my own experience on the end of unwanted silence meant I had to say something. So I simply wrote that—that I had written something longer but decided it wouldn’t get through to her, and that I loved her but for the foreseeable future it seemed healthier to not have any contact.
We are just now—six months later—having some contact on what seem like fairer, more equitable terms, a fresh start minus a lot of bullshit.

thanks pom, rather than ranting any further I'll probably stick to my tried and true remedy: getting shitfaced doing drugs writing a letter to this person never to actually be sent while listening to "push it out" by the beta band over and over

xp

xp kinda what Pom said, except in my case I decided against protracting the “breakup” w/ short exchanges....

Hadrian, that's nice! circumstantially I basically have to leave this up to her, and at this point I would more or less demand an apology. (if the above summary doesn't seem like it calls for that, you're just gonna have to take my word for it.) I would love it if we could reconcile down the line but I suspect/fear pom's description of how things have gone down for them is much likelier.

See also this epic thread

When is it time to let go of a friendship?

wow, some old school ILX sass in there...

xp I guess if the ball’s in her court that makes things easier. Still, not fun. :(

I guess my rule of thumb would be: if you feel like you absolutely must say something back right now, which would be totally understandable, I'd just keep it diplomatic and to the point. Then I'd wait and see how she responds: if the animosity continues, fuck it, just stop responding, it's on her. If she apologizes, then you might be able to mend your friendship. If she offers silence, do the same in return (lol this almost sounds like game theory, except you're not the one who erupted unprovoked).

(actually, wrong thread, there's another but the name escapes me and "friend" in search isn't turning it up)

I tried diplomacy during an earlier exchange and it backfired badly, leading to the offending reply. it's off the table xp

Ok then tell her to fuck right off… in your head, and leave it at that (you can and should vent about it to your other friends tho).

telling someone you no longer respect them is an active act of emotional cruelty, even if you privately think it it's easy enough to withdraw without saying those words aloud

I think the end of friendships can be worse than a relationship break-up. Friendships can be just as significant or even more so, but as a culture we haven't really figured out a convention for how to do it and how it goes afterwards for the people involved

agreed on both points. one of the harder things for me to think about was whether or not she was aware of the impact of those words, or not, and which possibility was worse. of course I'll probably never actually know. oh well!!

I don’t really have any comments on your specific case, but I was just wondering if the reaming you out came as she had perceived you to have dropped her during a difficult time and this is why things exploded the way they did? Not excusing her behaviour, it just feels like was a step missing there and these things never come out of nowhere.

Breaking up with friends is hard! I’m talking like this example, rather than just drifting apart which is natural and sometimes welcome. I’ve had four incidences of these in my adult life, two male two female, and they were all shit. I specify the genders of the friends because there was commonality among them - my friendships with women are almost always more intense and involved than with men, so they know exactly how to hit you where it hurts if things go wrong. To do with intimacy, I think, but that’s for another thread.

that's a reasonable q gyac but alas not the case. (I sure wish it were because I'd have something straightforward to apologize for!) explaining how/why I know that would again be time-consuming and quite boring.

Yeah that’s fine, I believe you. It’s very hard because they know just where to get you. I suppose what you do next depends if you feel you need closure or you’re happy to just cut loose and disengage.

If things escalate, there's also the Old friends who've lost their mind thread

in this last message I received a couple of days ago, to specifically say she no longer respected me

Pretty sure I'd just react with a simple "Sorry to disappoint" message and walk away. Her actions seem spoiling fora fight which I'd avoid. These days I just think 'be agreeable or go away' basically with friends' behaviour.

In general I find silence to be the most pointed response to most affronts. As someone taught me long ago, the opposite of love isn't hate, it's ignorance.

In general I find silence to be the most pointed response to most affronts.

Silence is the way to go in 95% of instances, but always keep "Get fucked, lose my number" in your pocket just in case.

In my case I have a hard time with both of these. They both seem vindictive and designed to inflict pain, which seems...pointless?

Personally I have too much firsthand experience knowing how painful silence can be—much worse than any argument or chewing out where at least some information is being conveyed. I've tried to learn over the years to "break up" gently, briefly, and respectfully. Obv that's not always easy, esp when you have been fucked over...but it's also, ultimately, something you can take pride in and something that will stick with that person when it comes to reflecting on stuff later.

I write that in the understanding that Simon is talking about a longtime friend, not someone he just met recently and hasn't invested anything in

From about 21-36 my closest friend was K. We were in each others weddings and hung out very frequently. Out friendship ended in 2014 and we haven't spoken since then. The only way we're connected now is on LinkedIn. He views my profile often. Very early on in our friendship K introduced me to his best friend J. We were also close. I saw J and I have been connected on social media since my friendship with K ended and have exchanged infrequent messages but have only spoken about K once right after the friendship dissolved. I saw J last night for the first time since 2015. It was so so nice but since J and K are inextricable in my mind it was this huge elephant in the room. I also realised how much I miss them both and just got very sad afterwards. Idk I guess the friendship ended in an abrupt and strange way and I don't think that I will ever get closure/answers so it's just sad. I wish there was a way to get over it process it but I don't know that there is. I miss my friend.

sorry, e. crazy it’s been that long. totally get the mixed feelings seeing j must have brought up.

I’m sorry about that.

Are all three of you in the same area?

yeah there is that sadness that can just eat at you ... i was gonna say "if you let it" ... though sometimes you just don't have the ability to choose.

I have something similar - a former housemate who I was close to for the first year or so that I lived in the house. I noticed we were hanging out less as time went on, but figured this was part of coming out of the pandemic and trying to spend time with people outside of our pandemic pod.

But since she moved out almost two years ago, she's brushed off any attempts I've made to keep the friendship going, though it's clear that she's stayed friends with the other two housemates individually. I see her every so often when she drops her dog off so we can dogsit, and she's perfectly polite and normal, but then she does things like ignore my invitation to my birthday party but give thoughtful birthday gifts to the other housemates. I wish I could just cut this person out of my life completely, but the house connection means I'm periodically reminded that someone got to know me and then decided I was the least likeable of my housemates.

Not similar, I guess, in that my friendship was of much shorter duration. Just in the way that I get reminded of it by mutual friends.

Anyway, I'm sorry, that really sucks and I didn't mean to hijack the thread with my own nagging worries.

No, it's ok. I think this kind of thing sucks regardless of how long you know the person.

CAD - Right, me neither.

RC - No, not at all. We did all live in New England from 2000-2015 but then J moved to Michigan and I think K moved away but back to MA. I'M in London. I'm actually touched that J reached out despite knowing it would likely be a bit weird for both of us and I guess I just have to be ok being sad about the whole thing.

Can’t you patch things up with K? If he’s peeking at your LinkedIn then you must be on his mind, too.

I’m on a break with one of my oldest/dearest friends rn. We still like each others IG posts and stuff, love each other, she’s just been driving me crazy and so I asked for a break, we don’t text anymore and I don’t make plans with her when I’m in town. It’s great. I love her but I think this break is super good for us both

At this point in life, I’m just aiming to maintain friendships with people who demonstrably want to continue to be friends with me - and have less time and patience and energy for mysteries. I wish everyone well, though!

as someone who has been the "ghost" friend and feels a lot of shame, embarassment and fear about it: I can assure you that this is a Them issue not a You issue. All the ways I've been socially unkind to people were a result of muddled thinking - depression, anxiety, etc. Not being able to or not feeling able to communicate. I'd like to reconnect with some of the people I gracelessly abandoned a decade ago when I was in the depths of poor mental health but what right do I have to intrude on people's lives and attempt to explain (not justify) some awful behaviour? Even the kindest people who would be open and responsive to it, I wouldn't deserve their kindness, and as time passes and people change it wouldn't be the same.

I've also been "ghosted" by some other people in the past few years. I don't know why and I could drive myself demented trying to figure it out but unless they directly tell me I never will know why. It's fine. It's sad - I miss those people - but also, I just think about the times we did enjoy together with fondness and nostalgia, and feel thankful I had those times instead of being upset about potential times that have never and will never exist.

I'm just aiming to maintain friendships with people who demonstrably want to continue to be friends with me

this is the most important thing - taking comfort in what I have rather than ruminating over things I could never guarantee.

“Friends are warmer than gold when you're old,
And keeping them is harder than you might suppose”

A little cringy to say, but this song was a gentle nudge last week to start putting back into a friendship that had drifted apart despite both of us saying we didn’t want that to happen. Things went down, both of us were hurt, been a good year of not talking multiple times a week like we used to, but things are starting to come back together and I’m really glad

Thanks, boxedjoy. And H.P., that’s too true. The best friendships I still have have lasted for years, and in pretty much every case there have been some bumps, hurt feelings, ebbs and flows.

Otm. In the last year I recently reconnected with someone who was a very close friend from my teens into my 30s, then we semi-deliberately lost touch for 10 years. I was initially really nervous about reconnecting – the shame and embarrassment of feeling like I had been a bad friend by losing touch – but we picked it up right where we left off and I could instantly tell that they felt the same way and, like me, was just thrilled to reconnect. We live in different cities now and have very different lives, so its not a day-to-day, text-all-the-time friendship or anything. But just knowing that there are no hard feelings and that it can be like old times when we do see each other is such a restorative joy. Ebb & flow.

At this point in life, I’m just aiming to maintain friendships with people who demonstrably want to continue to be friends with me - and have less time and patience and energy for mysteries.

Its such a relief to be in my 40s and have friendships with people who are upfront about reinforcing/reciprocating friendship and are not too cool to exchange words like “I love hanging out with you, thanks for being my friend, we are friends,” etc. It’s wild to look back on my 20s and think about how much energy I poured into mysterious, stressful friendships with people who I socialized with constantly while somehow simultaneously always being off-balance about the status of our friendship, how close we were, whether we were “really” friends, etc.

These days in a lot of my middle-aged friendships I definitely sense an unspoken (sometimes spoken outright) awareness that its hard to make & keep friends as you age, a thankfulness that the effort which goes into maintaining an adult friendship is being rewarded. Its nice.

that was really lovely to read. though i'm only 26 i feel like i relate a lot to what you said. it's felt like i'm running out of friends as i progress through my twenties and it's heartening to think that some of these lost connections might not be lost forever (though for many of them they should probably stay that way)

in the last couple of months i've had both a difficult friend breakup and a weird reconnection. this june i went to the US to see a childhood friend i'd last seen over five years ago. long story short, it was incredibly sad and disillusioning - he was so awful to be around that i find myself wondering how it took me this long to notice. i guess talking to someone over the phone once a fortnight or so is different to spending two solid weeks with someone. after i came home i didn't message him for a month and the last interaction we had was me telling him why, for reasons A B C, i don't wanna talk to him right now. i know it's gonna be final but i dunno whether to give him some kind of final closure on the matter.

the other thing is a friend i haven't spoken to in 3 years - we had a big ugly falling-out because she was in a bad place and said some really horrible shit about my gf. she got back in touch and we had a phone call last week, and it was lovely, but she didn't apologise at all for what happened 3 years ago and i feel i'd be doing a disservice to my gf if i don't call her out on it

Funnily enough I was at my sister’s wedding and ran into a girl I went to school with who I hadn’t talked to in years (nothing personal, I emigrated). We had a great chat and exchanged numbers and it was really nice. I actually texted her the next day cos I was like, I would have felt a bit awkward if you hadn’t come over, because it just had been so long. Anyway, we have plans to meet up the next time I’m home.

I think my twenties was a lot more volatile, both due to moving around and untreated stuff. I’m pretty happy with the friends I have now. Ever since I was a small child I’ve always preferred a smaller amount of close friends than tons of people I’m not close to.

The only thing they never tell you when you get into your thirties and arguably your twenties is the sheer amount of work you need to go to keep up with people. Don’t get me wrong, it’s worth it. But there’s a reason it’s very easy to fade away like I had.

Thanks everyone. I really do appreciate the advice and stories. I wish we had just drifted or there was some way to extend an olive branch here but it's a weird situation.

The part that I didn't get into is that from the get-go K had some feelings for me that were beyond friends. He told me and others this. It was never an issue just sort of like a known thing that really wasn't a big deal. The end of the friendship came after something in his life happened that had absolutely nothing to do with me but did involve a woman. The directive to stop speaking came from either a therapist or his wife and I'm certain it had to do with those muddled feelings. Before telling me we couldn't speak for "a while" he made a point of saying I had not done anything wrong and that he wasn't mad at me but that he had been told this had to be done so unless something changes and he reaches out to me there isn't anything I can do.

I think it's made even harder by the fact that I have also never had a lot of close friends. I have a lot of acquaintances but he was one of maybe 5 people that I consider true friends and who really know me which made the loss just so big.

This weekend I finally gave in and sent a text to former friend saying I had valued our friendship and hope I didn't do anything to end it and lmk if you want to catch up sometime. Got no answer, so I guess that's the answer.

The trigger for this was my housemates having a conversation where one of them was just heading off to have tea with former friend, and the other had met up with her the day before. I think it's an ADHD thing, where I just can't handle being that closely reminded that someone doesn't like me. Like it sends me into a total middle-school emotional meltdown state. I've avoided being in that state for years through a super unhealthy general policy of not dating very much (there are other reasons for that, but it's true that even being rejected by people I don't like hurts a lot) and backing off from friendships at the first hint of a chill. But none of that works when it's where I live.

So even though I knew my housemate was having a super rough week and she needed this day out and she'd done nothing wrong and I'd unloaded to her about the whole situation before and I shouldn't do it again - I did. And ruined her enjoyment of a perfectly nice time with her friend. And now I'm really pissed at myself. And this is probably something I should take to therapy rather than ilx, but thanks for letting me unload it.

It's weird to have an emotional trigger point that's so out of my control. Like, most things I can pretty much handle, and I don't cry a lot, but being left out of things is such an utterly reliable trigger for tears, depression, self-pity, etc., and I don't know how to manage it when the trigger keeps showing up where I live. Other than move, I suppose.

Its such a relief to be in my 40s and have friendships with people who are upfront about reinforcing/reciprocating friendship and are not too cool to exchange words like “I love hanging out with you, thanks for being my friend, we are friends,” etc. It’s wild to look back on my 20s and think about how much energy I poured into mysterious, stressful friendships with people who I socialized with constantly while somehow simultaneously always being off-balance about the status of our friendship, how close we were, whether we were “really” friends, etc.

I'm feeling this. In the last 15 years I've gotten more comfortable expressing how much I love seeing my friends, and I've gotten them into reciprocating.

loving your posts, all

@ ENBB, ahhhhhh that IS a thing. I remember a decade ago, a grown-adult friend of mine spent an afternoon sobbing into my shirt, because his best friend had been told (by her husband, by her therapist, by their couples therapist) that this "best friendship" was too much of a threat to "her marriage", that it was making her husband too-insecure for it to continue, and so she explained to my grown-adult friend that their friendship had to end. My friend was DEVASTATED, I have never seen anyone so shattered.

At age 26/27 I had an "emotional affair" with a wonderful man. We just, like, fell in love with each other, and we weren't gonna leave our respective boyfriends or anything, we just had this crazy immediate "finally! you're here!" rapport. We e-mailed every day, sent gifts via mail once a week, chatted on the phone constantly. Even at the time, I could tell this was a life-upending new friendship. It lasted about two months before my boyfriend sat me down and said "I don't like this" and so it, well, didn't end, but definitely diluted. Now this wonderful man and I e-mail maybe once a year, that's it.

It's my experience/opinion that people, generally, kinda stop maturing (on an emotional level) around age 27, we hit age 27 and then we stay 27 for the rest of our lives; emotionally, that is. Everything else starts to change/fall apart, we get fatter, we buy houses and have kids, we get mental health issues or physical health issues, but we stay 27. My entire life since (actual) age 27 has been appalled at the slow but unstoppable shedding of friendships, people drifting, my life going from "I'm going to an art opening, then meeting a friend for dinner, then going to a gig, then having a nightcap afterward" to "I leave the house once every couple weeks" and "I sometimes go days without texting anybody/receiving any texts", which is the way things are at 44. But my 27 year old brain is just like, "what the FUCK, what is HAPPENING, where's the PARTY AT, where are my FRIENDS AT?" It's very, very weird

man James Murphy was right after all

I mentioned that severed friendship last week

Ironically enough, we reconnected the day after I made that post. She said she missed me and that things were better. It was a complicated situation, she was doing IVF at age 45 and it made every interaction so focused on her BabyQuest. Any time I was having a bad day? "well, I've had three miscarriages this year!" The awesomeness of this pursuit and how it took over her entire life and our entire friendship became exhausting. Not to mention: she is already a mom, and I am personally unwillingly-childless, so, like... "can we talk about anything else? no? fine."

She's set aside the IVF and her dreams of family expansion and she apologised and I told her there was no need, I was informed well-enough about the insane things IVF does to your hormonal balance, that it is supposed to turn you into a Holy Warrior For Baby, and I wasn't mad, I just kinda needed for her to do it separately, and we could reconnect once "it worked" or "it didn't work and she'd decided to stop trying". We're back on the sharing memes and chit-chat, gossip about men, it's nice to have my friend back. I wish the IVF had worked :( ah well

“But my 27 year old brain is just like, "what the FUCK, what is HAPPENING, where's the PARTY AT, where are my FRIENDS AT?" It's very, very weird”

This is true. I’m 46 and even though I know I’m 46 there are still Friday and Saturday nights when I think “shouldn’t we all be out there partying, or trying to find the party?”

I also sometimes seem to vacillate between “too social” and “too much of a hermit” mood-wise.

FGTI - Yes, that's p much exactly what I think happened and exactly how I reacted though now it's 10 years on and still so upsetting. It's just weird. The friend that I met up with having a kid, my mom dying, and so many other things all things that have happened that I wish we could talk about etc. Just so weird. Also, I didn't want to go too much into it on a non-77 board but, given what happened in his life immediately preceding this, it makes a lot of sense. :/ Oh well.

Does K harbor romantic feelings for you

Lily, from what you're describing your feelings are very understandable. It's normal to want to feel comfortable in your own home and to seek to put right anything you may have done wrong.

If the other roommates are being tactless in front of you it is hurtful but there is also a whole wide world of people out there that would want and value your friendship.

I hope you won't be too hard on yourself.

Thank you, felicity. That's so kind.

I did end up hearing back from the former friend (who is also a former housemate, not sure if I mentioned that). She confirmed that she found our friendship "challenging" and drifted away from me on purpose. She offered to elaborate but I don't think I could handle that right now; I'm really struggling not to go into a depression spiral as it is. Since the friendship started to fracture toward the end of the pandemic, my guess is that I was too dependent on her during the pandemic when we were locked down together.

It's hard for me to tell if my roommates are being tactless. From their pov it is perfectly normal for them to still be friends with her, and I am the weird emotional person making them feel bad about something that is not their fault. The fact that I so thoroughly alienated a good person makes me inclined to think that I am probably doing something wrong here too.

But thank you for telling me that this maybe isn't all my fault. I needed the perspective. This house has been a huge part of my life for the past four years, but it's not the entire world, and it's good to be reminded of that.

LD - Fwiw I find the idea of people being mad at me of not liking me almost unbearable so I understand and that would upset me too. I also think if I were the flatmates I wouldn't never utter their name but I prob would choose when to talk about them carefully etc.

LG - yeah I posted about it a little upthread.

Sorry - that wasn't very clear. I was trying to say that if I were one of your roommates I wouldn't pretend the former friend didn't exist but I would likely be a little careful about when they came up in conversation. It doesn't sound like they're being very considerate.

Well, to be fair, one of them didn't know. There have been two years of former friend acting perfectly pleasant to me when we meet in person, inviting me whenever she hosts a brunch or something for the group, but avoiding meeting up one on one, while hanging out separately with the other two. So one of them knew I felt ghosted but thought I was imagining it and doing it to myself by being oversensitive. And the other one had no idea and assumed we were all still friends.

The one I had talked to about it does try to avoid mentioning when she hangs out with this person, but it generally gets back to me eventually. And in this case, she was asked directly - she couldn't really avoid answering.