When is it time to let go of a friendship?

I do have trouble with it! Its someone in another city as well (this was on chat) - and it has lead to me re-assessing.

Hey, Doc!

I can relate to what you're saying.

Give me a buzz if you'd like!

I'm curious to find out how other people approach this problem.
I've known this guy a year now and the first few months I had some good times but now I'm not sure how much I like him.
He can be okay but I feel like there's always some smug comment coming round the corner.
And I get that some of that stuff is meant as a joke, but it's not funny at all, and he has a tendency to say things that are genuinely insulting, joke or not.

Anyway, on to the dilemma. I just haven't been able to bring myself to answer this dude's last couple of text messages.
And I'm thinking maybe I should call him up to explain how I feel, but it's just so much easier to just stop contacting someone, though perhaps less honourable.
The dilemma is, I'm not sure how worthwhile it is to explain this stuff to him. I feel there's a large chance that these things I don't really like might just be ingrained personality characteristics that probably won't go away very easily.
What do you do in this situation?

What's the worst that can happen if you explain the problem to him?

i have some friends who will never respond to emails in a timely way. then out of the blue, 6–12 months later, i'll get some lengthy, heartfelt update on how they are doing/feeling. when i reply by similarly opening up and explaining how i am, it's curtains for another 6-12 months (or longer, maybe 2 years) before i get another update. should i just assume they are drunk when they choose to write me?

there are definitely some friendships of long standing that i just kind of figure are dormant now. it makes me sad sometimes but it's better just to make use of it.

make peace with it... i mean

haha

What's the worst that can happen if you explain the problem to him?

― cardamon, Thursday, June 6, 2013 12:12 AM (13 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

You are of course completely right.

Unfortunately I am the sort of person who is not good at confrontation.

The pathetic thing is, I actually did call him up a couple of months ago with the intention of telling him how I felt, but in the heat of the moment I couldn't do it and just found myself saying "yeah, I'll meet you at 8" etc. instead.
I guess I have a mental block about that sort of thing.

What's the best that would happen if you did explain the problem? Do you think he would change? Do you think he would understand? Do you think your friendship would restart on more equable lines?

If this is a friendship where you've "had some good times" but you're not mutually important to one another, what's the point in holding on?

There are friends in my life where, if something went wrong in the relationship, I'd bring it up as a point of discussion in the hope that things would change. But these are either very very close friendships, or quite shallow acquaintanceships where our mutual commitment is to having it remain easy and noncommittal. "State of the union" discussions about an everyday friendship are the kiss of death, you're bringing huge scrutiny to something that previously neither of you thought worth looking at. Many friendships aren't worth that kind of attention, and won't survive it -- and bringing up what's wrong with that person's attitude to the relationship becomes nothing more than an act of spite, an "i can't continue with this friendship because you are a person who is unreasonable". Telling someone else what is wrong with them is very rarely an honourable impulse.

If you want to hold on to the friendship, and you want the friendship to involve less of a behaviour you don't like, why not focus on cutting down on that behaviour in the moment?

C Sharp OTM. A year's not a particularly long friendship, I don't think you owe this guy an explanation really. Short term friendships come and go, I reckon the majority of adults with even a modicum of social adeptness accept this.

Also life is too short to hang around with people you don't really like out of politeness or whatever. It took me ages to realise this.

bump

this is not necessarily a clear cut thing is it

yeah. it's not at all clear cut. it can be a very difficult thing, and it can take a lot of time and reflection to know when is the 'right time'.

whenever this happens to me, there is never any discussion.

both of us are conflicted

sometimes a hiatus can answer a lot of questions...and a little distance can help you rediscover the thigns you sought in that person once you don't have your face pressed up so close to the glass, so to speak

if those things don't surface, then you know you can let it go

the past two weeks is the first time we've spoken since last year

so we've had a hiatus. multiple times.

i think everyone has their own threshold for what they are willing to put up with. if you find somebody's company taxing, you owe it to yourself to do something about that, whether that is leaving them for good or trying to resolve whatever issues you are having. it's always within your rights to just ditch somebody for reasons as simple as you don't enjoy being around them... unless they are like, your parents or someone. there is a higher threshold of annoyance there, i think, before you stop talking to them

hahaha

my parents own. this is about someone i've known since 2005. we've had troubles since 2005 but there's obviously a reason i'm posting itt instead of just DOING WHAT'S NECESSARY, to quote ra's al ghul

there's something there.

the first novella in will self's liver stages this thread's quandary in pretty chilling manner iirc

there's whole metaphor of filling a bucket with a hole in it, which I know is tired but I always think of it in these situations. sometimes it's muscle memory more than anything that keeps us in friendships long past the point where we are gettting anything beneficial out of it at all...you're so used to 'being' friends that you feel like that familiarity means something, so you just keep pouring the water into the holey bucket over and over and over. And maybe it was meaningful at one time in your life, but people can and do change. It's okay to stop and say, nope, this does not mean anything to me anymore. I have changed, the thing I seek in this friendship is no longer there. And you move on.

we evolve

veg so you're comfortable "moving on" or whatever? i don't seem to be good at that part

to me it's always, let's try again. let's try again. let's try again.

it's only something I learned after a long time of giving people a lot of chances. I'm pretty forgiving generally, and I tend to think the best of people. But I also tended to do that at the expense of my own happiness. Your own dissatisfaction is worthy of attention and focus, because you deserve to NOT feel that way if someone is constantly putting you in that position.

It can easily be confused with being selfish...but being concerned with your own wellbeing is not selfish. It's the one thing in the relationship that you actually have control over.

thanking you for all the text

friendships should work naturally, I don't know what this "try" crap is

you either are chill and work out small understandings and respect the other person or it's not a very good friendship

it's like trying to be into baloney sandwiches. maybe you had them as a kid and got tired, maybe you think they're gross, or maybe you're now a vegetarian. but trying a baloney sandwich every year or so probably is never going to change your opinion.

how much working on something should someone put up with then?

I guess it depends what the reason for drifting off may be. I have friends I see irregularly, but it's effortless and cool to talk to them when I do. I have other friends where I only really see them in certain sets of circumstances because I'm not really into some of the things they're into or we have different attitudes on things. If your differences are what comes out more than your similarities, stop hanging out.

ok ty

It's hard to say how much time to use, but I will say, especially in yr 20s, it becomes more common for people you are extremely close with to splinter from you. It really comes down to, do you value the time you spend with that friend, or does it cause you anguish every time you're in their presence? Are your differences relatively small, or far apart? Have you seen sustained improvement, or do you feel like things temporarily improve only for old habits to resurface again later?

I used to be the type that didn't want to let go of any close friendship, even those that were causing me frustration. Peers of mine were incredulous as to why I kept hanging with people who were putting me through agony, and I never had a good reason. Either I didn't want to face the guilt with telling them I didn't want to be their friend anymore, feared loneliness, etc.

And then, in my late 20s, it just started happening organically. One moved away to another state. Another, we just kind of got mutually disinterested with each other and both gradually stopped communicating. And one friend of mine, who I used to be extremely tight with, and spent most of my weekends hanging out with for 5 years, suddenly quit talking to me. He'd been annoying me with this privileged snobbery for years, I didn't like the way he treated his girlfriends, and things he did drove me insane, but I still hung out with him. One day we went to NYC and I'd had enough and told him off in front of his g/f in a restaurant for being rude to a waiter. After that, we saw each other exactly twice. I don't know that it was the only reason, but it was a dude who I spent hours of time hanging with for 5 years, and suddenly, we were out of each other's lives.

And I guess it was surprising that even though I did miss some of the good times we had, I really didn't miss having a guy that in our later years of hanging out, caused me extreme frustration, in my life anymore. I made new friends that filled his void quickly, who didn't have some of the character issues he did.

I guess it boils down to the, why have you both kept trying to remain friends? Is there any semblance of your old relationship still present, that you're trying to maintain? or does it seem more 'habitual', that you'd rather not let go of something that you've put a lot of effort into?

In any case, I do think when friendships split apart, it often just 'happens', rather than having some 'breakup' moment where you explicitly state "We're done as friends". I think if you get to the point where you're just tired of trying with this friend, you'll know it. I will say it's not a failure on either of your parts if it doesn't work out, because friendships end all of the time, especially as you get older. It sucks, but...tis a part of life.

Best of luck!

thanks for all that, neanderthal. i am not so good at the whole change thing. (see the buddhism thread) but i guess sometimes it's necessary. here though? ugh. we'll see

chance it ends any minute, but it's dragging on and it's not sure that's gonna happen

In any case, I do think when friendships split apart, it often just 'happens', rather than having some 'breakup' moment where you explicitly state "We're done as friends".

otm ime

and after this stage, realisation, w/e, i've had friendships come back in the same creeping way, sometimes years later.

"We're sorry you've had this experience. You blocked [REDACTED], so he/she can no longer:"

well that's that

this one's forever tho

thanks to all who replied to me here or elsewhere about this today.

may all of us remain ilxor pals for a long time

things change naturally, lots if not most of my closest and most common friends or drinking pals from 14 years ago are either living elsewhere, are no longer friends of mine due to drifting social tides, or i hardly see them. they've been replaced. the ones who remain during all those periods are the strong friends you need to hang on to. there's nothing wrong or necessarily even sad about friendships ending (or, less dramatically, fading.) it's happening all the time. mono no aware.

yeah thanks for that al. on the buddhism thread i've pointed out that i need to read more about change, because i fucking suck at dealing with it. i cannot "go with the flow" or whatever. i cannot keep up with the times.

i'm the same way fwiw. it's hard for me to set goals and move forward with stuff sometimes because secretly i just want things to stay the same. but that's not how life goes. things change with or without your consent.

I'm not great at it myself. But I learned in the last couple of years that familiarity doesn't always = good. Letting go of some things can make room in your life for new experiences/people who can add to the world you've built for yourself.

You don't have to throw everything away, and you aren't. You still have a lot of the things that make you you, and the hard, rough parts are made smooth with a little bit of time

I need some more friends, or to come up with a better friend schedule. I want to eat dinner and have a conversation tonight and I'm home alone.

this isn't something i've really encountered (except, notably, with my ex-wife, who was my best friend). like, sometimes ppl drift away because you're in different places/have different interests/kids or whatever, but i've never felt that the line must be drawn *heah*

that said, i am currently struggling with a very longtime friend who is totally good and generous to me personally and fine to be around, but holds some pretty fucked up beliefs, cheats on his wife, etc. i'm not sure how much i can or should compartmentalize that

things change with or without your consent.

otm

What, precisely, are we participating in here

This is the English department, darraghmac--not the Computer Science faculty.

So, I just blew her off to go out this weekend and she asks if I am going hiking. Ugh.

why, does she want to push you off a cliff or something?

lol.

sarahell, this is not a troll, actually.

http://i.imgur.com/zi7hd.gif

the friendship hex http://www.geeknaut.com/images/halloween_emoticons/witchpot_6VRF6P.gif?03609c

i'm hanging out with her on friday