A
female
age
30-35,
anonymous
writes:Me and my best friend have been friends for out entire lives! Shes the person i can talk to about anything well could, shes knows me knows me my secrets and in turn i know hers Its just this past 6 months, she has been very distant not really replying to texts ignoring calls trying her to get her to do something was like a battle! For about 4 months i just ignored it. Then i started noticing it even more. She has boyfriend whos ok i suppose i know they hurt each other cheat on each other and i no like he reads the texts i send her which are quite personal to me which really annoys me but i dont think he does that all the time, my other friend think its him why shes being so ignorant. But in my eyes she a strong person and would let him tell her i dont know. Anyway i text her and basically said whats going on why you being so distant and her texts back wasn't very nice and i said you don't really care do you and she basically didnt say much and said she wasn't going to apologise for something she hasn't done on purpose?! To me thats really like she doesn't care at all!! Shes just found out shes pregnant and shes keeping it. Personally i think is the wrong but thats not for me to say anyway. So now i just don't know what to do? Do i keep trying to contact her and like basically beg for her to be my friend which i dont think i should? Or just let it be? Feel like im not being there while she pregnant which makes me feel bad! but she was not there for me in the past 6 months. When she found out he cheated on her for 4th time she was ringing my phone like mad!and i was there! It feels like I'm losing such a big part of my life?we both don't have a lot of friends we never have cos we know what girls are like! My boyfriend doesn't even like her because of way she treats me! Im starting to feel pretty lonely. Thoughts people please?
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reader, anonymous, writes (11 June 2014): OP just tell her it's okay and not to worry about the text stuff. Let this go. How often she texts etc. is not worth falling out over so fix the falling out part and just make up if you know what I mean. Tell her there's no problem, it was a petty thing to argue over and everything is fine, be nice and polite and stuff.
Get rid of this as a big deal, ease her mind and don't let this carry on like this, then just accept the distance and start going your own way. You don't lose her, you don't ignore her or start deliberately being bitter or anything, just stop making that much of an effort and accept that she won't either.
Just lower your expectations of how close you are with her as her life is drifting in the opposite direction.
Just don't let the friendship end by fighting over this, people do drift off in different directions in life. I've had tonnes of very close friends just drift away, but I can meet them years later and we're still just as close. We can pick up those friendships any time we like if our lives become more conducive to it.
The danger here for you, OP, is that you demand more than she can give, which you might well be doing now, and it causes bitterness and ruins things completely.
By letting this become this much of a big deal you risk losing her, if you can draw a line under this incident, get back on good terms and accept that she can't give you the time and effort she used to and you go spread your emotional needs with other friends and your boyfriend instead then it'll all be okay.
It sounds to me, OP that you're one of these people who has one best friend you tell everything to. One friend above them all and you have invested all your emotions into her in that respect. That's called putting all your eggs in one basket and as you can see it causes trouble if life takes them even slightly away from you. You rely too much on that person.
I'm mid-30's, I have 13 best friends. 13 people I can literally tell anything to, all my deepest darkest secrets because I've been friends with most of them about 16+ years. Three of them I've only been friend with 6 years yet in that time I've been able to develop that closeness. How? Because I accept when their life drift's away and I don't force anything. I can develop that closeness with others instead by taking the time to spend time with the people who are available.
My wife is one of those best friends too. I have one who now lives in the States, we're best friends since 1995, but we haven't spent all our time together since then he's drifted off plenty of times and we haven't spoken in years. He recently came back on holiday and met up and we're still as close as ever.
OP I have 13 people in my life, outside of family, that I can turn to about anything, borrow money, a couch to sleep on, some advice about something deeply troubling, comfort when I lose someone dear to me etc.
I have never once had the problem that you have now because I understand that life separates you from those you love sometimes but as long as you can handle that happening with grace and turn to your other friends, they'll never truly be gone if you know what I mean.
Ask yourself, OP, in the grand scheme of life is this something really worth fighting over? Is this issue really worth losing her for good over? Because that's a possibility here. It's not, so just fix this and start developing your other friendships, start spreading your emotional connections to people out. If one friend becomes less available start spending time and getting closer to another friend.
A
female
reader, CindyCares  +, writes (10 June 2014):
 Move on, OP, don't cling. Cerberus is right, friends come and go. SOME of them stay with you all your life, and some others are transitional friends, people you feel close to or share interests with or have fun with for a certain period of your life and then either one just loses interest or drifts apart for some reason, or for no reason at all. They were transitional friends, they were meant to accompany you just for part of your path, once they have fulfilled this role in your life, or viceversa, you sort of naturally part ways ( which is not the same as saying you are using them or they are using you- just that they weren't meant to be forever, like many things people and situations in life ).
It does not even mean that you have to make a point of ignoring her, or being rude to her, or cutting her off completely , you can still be civil, even companionable to each other , if the occasion arises without pushing. Just, stop having emotional expectations on her, she has outgrown you, there are more pressing things for her now than cultivating your friendship , if you strive for tha I think you'll get frustrated and disappointed. Just go with the flow, and try to make new friends of course.
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reader, anonymous, writes (10 June 2014): Then finally you admit you've seen it coming for a long-time. So put it all to rest. Move on. Apparently she has already.
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reader, anonymous, writes (10 June 2014): This is verified as being by the original poster of the questionWere both actually in are early 20s! Quite mature for are age actually big full time and stuff. And the pregnant is not an issue its not about her being pregnant and she been like this long before she ever found out she was! So to be honest that is not an excuse! But anyway thank you
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reader, anonymous, writes (10 June 2014): She's being a little crazy right now. She's around 18 and pregnant!!! Imagine what she's going through with her parents! Everybody is on her case. I'm not making excuses; but your issue seems small compared to the mess she's in right now.
She just might not be thinking much about you!
You confronted her; naturally she's going to go off on you. She's really stressed out. How friendly would you feel when you've made one mistake after another, and you end up pregnant? Her life is a mess, and your complaints might seem a bit trivial right now.
Back away and just move on with your life. You've tried, but she isn't really behaving like a rational person.
Everyone is forgetting she is pregnant, and she is going to be very emotional, irritable, and moody; because of her hormones; plus she is under a lot of stress.
Leave her alone!
If she's going to be mean and bitchy to her very best friend who cares about her; let her find out what it feels like to miss you. She's just not thinking straight right now.
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reader, anonymous, writes (10 June 2014): This is verified as being by the original poster of the questionCerebrus yeah i think your right! Its very difficult. I just received a text saying she thinks im being ridiculous and blowing it out of proportion just because she hasnt sent a few texts, we shouldnt not talking over something's so stupid and sometime people have things going on! And she js might of forget but its just silly to fall out? Which isn't what i said to her anyway its not about the texts,its about asking how i am now and again, how work, making effort to do things which i did say to her and all she thinks it is because of not getting texts back! and ino she pregnant at and thats a lot to handle but this was happening before she even found out she was so that is nothing to do with it! Now i dont know what to again! Its so irratating! Anymore advice please?
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reader, anonymous, writes (9 June 2014): Friends come and go, OP, and it doesn't matter how long you are friends sometimes they take a path in life which is different to yours.
OP instead of being confrontational about this or letting her be confrontational just let her go.
I mean seriously, look at the mess she's in, look at the decisions she's making. Throwing away her friendship by only using you to comfort her when he cheats is not exactly what a good friend does. So while she's incapable of being a good friend and even gets defensive when you ask her about it, you need to let it go, and you need to stop letting her use you for comfort too.
I've had friends like her, go through some very tough times by being a complete fool in a relationship and I just let them off and did other stuff. I got messages before about a cheating partner and just said "dump them and if not then you have no right to complain to me about them, I don't want to get involved in shit you can change and keep letting happen". That didn't go down too well but I didn't care, I will not let my friendships be one sided affairs where I'm used as an emotional crutch that enables a person to keep making the same mistakes. I'm still friends with that person, we're actually closer than ever and he understands why I did that, he had to bottom out before he would do anything to change his situation and he understands that while he was being an emotional leech he wasn't any kind of real friend at all anyway.
OP you need to emotionally detach yourself from this girl and start developing some of your other friendships instead. You'll learn the lesson in life that if people aren't willing to make the effort with you or they have a life that's too busy for you then you need to not take that personally and just let them go. There's nothing to say you'll lose her forever but you will if you keep trying to force this. Because you have a limit, OP, if you can't let go and you keep fighting this then you'll reach that limit and feel so hurt/used/abused by her that you'll never want anything to do with her again.
You see one of the most important, utterly vital, things in friendships is protecting yourself from the mistakes of your friends.
I had one who got into drug dealing. He started small and then started getting into big quantities and a bad crowd. He never stopped being a good guy but he was just useless as a friend and making bad decisions that could have had a negative impact on my life so I distanced myself from him, physically and emotionally. The worst thing I could have done is try and fight it, try and get him to maintain the friendship the way he used to. It would have been futile and it would have meant we would reached a point of no return.
So just stop making the effort, make that with your other friends and don't let it bother you so much, once she's in some way come to her senses she can be a friend again. but do not be her emotional crutch. If she comes running to you again after he cheats on her the fifth time tell her to dump him or shut up about it. Let her know you'll help her with a break up but to keep you out of her relationship, if she tries to pull the "real friend" crap remind her of something you went through recently which she wasn't bothered to help you with, or remind her that the only times she contacts you lately are because she needs help and you're worn out from it.
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reader, anonymous, writes (9 June 2014): You're both growing-up and starting to go your own ways.
You were trying to compete with the time she was spending with her boyfriend. She is making some bad choices; and may have been too embarrassed to talk about it. So she avoided you.
If she wants to remain friends; she has to make the effort and reciprocate. She ignores you, because she may not feel as close as you once were. If she is now pregnant; she may be ashamed, and afraid you will judge her.
You should visit, and stop trying to use text messaging as your main means of contact and communication. It's impersonal. As you have discovered; anyone could be reading your private messages. Her boyfriend was obviously a major influence on her; and may have intercepted many of your messages to her. He wanted to isolate her from her support systems; and in order to control her, he had to separate you. It doesn't mean she is weak, only that she became too emotionally-dependent on him; and centered her life around their relationship.
Over time, you both became heavily reliant on social media and messaging. That allowed you two to drift apart.
However; she is becoming a woman ahead of schedule. Right now, girl-talk may not be as easy to share as it once was. Her life is now more personal and private to her.
Take the time to drop by and have a talk. Don't expect things to always be as they were; because you are both changing. You are friends, but very different people. You are no longer schoolgirls, and your lives are moving in different directions. Your habits and values are different.
Try making some new friends. Give her a little time to deal with her issues. There are some things people don't wish to share with friends, and they are entitled to their privacy.
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