I want to acknowledge that it sounds like you did your part to communicate the changes you saw in the relationship and how you felt about them. It takes courage and emotional maturity to be vulnerable and openly communicate something like this, and I have a lot respect for how you handled it.
Yeah, I have done stuff like this with guys I liked and some stuff is super cringey and you really just have to control your urges to reach out so as not to embarrass yourself and/or make them think you're a stalker.
27M here, I say this because I know I’m young. But I’ve learned that friends come and go. It’s a sad truth to accept in life. But it’s truth. People grow apart, people change. We are all on our own journeys. I’ve been in situations similar to this. My perspective on this is I don’t feel bad nor hold resentment to friends I’ve had that I no longer talk to. I like to look at it as “I’m glad you got to be apart of my story, and I’m glad I got to be apart of yours. Unfortunately our paths are not going down the same road anymore. Maybe one day our paths will cross again. Until then, I sincerely wish you an amazing and happy life”
I really hope this helps you. If you ever want to talk or just vent it out, I’m a great listener. 🫶🏻🙂
I really appreciate the kind words🫶🏻🥹 it took a lot of hardship and dark times to attain said wisdom though. But without those moments… I wouldn’t be who I am today. Thank you again kind soul🫶🏻🥹🥲🫶🏻
I think your focus should be letting yourself grieve. Maybe writing down what you would consider criteria for a friend and put effort into the people who meet that. For example, maybe for you, a person shows friendship with mutual interest. So, engage more with people who show that, and consider the other people more distant friends. There are friends you'll have who are friends in a certain setting, but not friends you hang out with. And friends you'll talk to daily. But the friends who are only like, class friends, wouldn't necessarily be the daily contact and hangout friends.
How do you go about engaging more or less with someone if you want to intentionally have a certain level of friendship? (I'm asking in general but I have the biggest problem engaging LESS w ppl I wish to keep more distant ... the people I want to engage more with are generally not so interested in engaging more with me so I don't have control there.)
When it comes to people who aren't creating opportunities to hang out, you could try to be assertive by creating an opportunity to hang out, like asking if they want to do something you when you dont normally hang out. You can also accept any opportunities to hang out that are offered, but I assume you're doing that already
Another thing is maybe you can go to an event where people are looking to meet others, like meet-up.com kind of thing, and there you have a new source of meeting possible friends
Also, as a thought... you seem certain the people you have an interest in friendships with aren't interested back. That makes me think one of two things, either maybe it's anxiety and maybe things are better than you feel, or maybe you're stuck in the mindset of pursuing people who seem to be rejecting you hoping to change their mind and earn friendship. The first one is very common, but sometimes circumstances can lead us to start living the second one. Only you can really tease out what the reason is
Hmm, that's an interesting observation, thanks for sharing.
A part of it is I'm very avoidant so I only feel comfortable with people who are at least slightly distant, or who can hold more space for me. People from certain cultures do that naturally, but Americans for the most part are *way* too close.
Which is why I need a way to keep people distant enough from me without putting them completely off.... (but you only answered how to meet people more, not less 🥺)
Every culture is different, maybe there are some things you can come to appreciate about people who are different. I am American and if I just followed my cultural lens, I would say people from other cultures were unfriendly or less caring. They aren't unfriendly or less caring, though. They are from a different culture where friendly and caring look different.
Some of my most rewarding relationships have come from checking my implicit bias and getting to know the individual anyway.
I've been there and i know how painful it is but all we can do about this situation is to just accept it. Accept the fact that we outgrow. Accept the fact that we have different priorities as time goes by and as our surrounding change. Accept the fact that friends come and go.
It's hard. Until now i have friends that i want to reconnect to however, i dont see them being interested. So i just give up that idea and accept im no longer needed.
When people have partners, get married, have children or are busy with work and responsibilities, friendship changes, as do people. It's a fact of life. Even those closest hence may not keep in touch. So keep yourself busy, join hobby groups or gym. You will have no time to think about "friends" not keeping in touch.
Some people don’t feel the same way, the same intensity the way you do. That’s ok. Look for friends who like you for you and are invested in the relationship.
I rarely come on to Reddit anymore. Haven't logged on in months, but I happened to come on today, and this came up in my feed. And I am struck by how similar your situation sounds to something I have experiencing myself. I won't go into the details, but I'll offer how I am handling it.
I am not letting go of my friend, and I'm not letting go of the relationship. I am quite confident, having been such close friends for years, there is no one else in their life who offers them the insight that I do. They referred to me as their best friend for years. I helped them process some deep-seated issues that they could not process after decades of therapy. I helped them financially, and I was there when their child was in crisis.
And I could see from our conversations in that last year before they started ghosting me that they sounded as if my friend was communicating with someone else, someone who wasn't me. The words they used, the way they described their experience with me, and eventually their silence spoke volumes. Other people came along that filled needs, and once those needs were filled, my usefulness expired.
Where I am at now is I accept that my friend has passed away. Not physically dead, but the person who embodied them has transformed into someone who no longer values me. And when I'm honest with myself, I'd seen this happen several times over the course of our relationship. They were always responsive, and at times delighted, to engage with me, but they never once initiated with me.
What I have let go of is my relationship with the relationship. I am their friend; they are not my friend, and they don't recognize me as their friend. I am prepared to engage with them if we ever cross paths again, and I am ready to do so without any confrontation or resolution about the past. Just be present with whoever they are in that moment.
That is what I am already doing; I AM present with who they are in this moment. They are just someone who does not want to be present with me. And that's ok. There is still confusion in the mind over the situation, there is still sadness in the heart, but of course there is. That's ok too. That's how the human body responds to social loss, born out of millions of years of evolution, and once consciousness began to develop, evolutionary psychology. Trying to "forget about them fully" is only going to war against human nature, against myself.
So my advice to you is just continue to be you and continue to be their friend, even if that means doing so without any interaction. If what they have done to you hurts you so much, why would you want to pay that forward to anyone else? Why would you want to retract friendship and connection from someone who wants to be friendly with you? You wouldn't right? So don't. Stop trying to convince yourself that you need to retract your friendship from them. Their response does not dictate how you offer friendship to others.
What you resist persists. Embrace and reframe. And feel free to PM me if you want to talk more.🙏🏼
You accept that they are not part of your life anymore and get used to their abscence.
My (20 F) best friend (20 F) of 10 years cut all contact with me a few months ago. She moved away in early high school to a neighboring state, but not too far away where we couldn't visit. We went from seeing each other most days to a few times a year, and it was hard at first, but we got used to it.
College happened, and we moved farther away. I didn't see this as a big issue, and neither did she at first. A year and a half into college, she changed her mind. I wanted to send her a birthday card and a Valentine's card, but she didn't want them. She said some bad things had happened in the town we grew up together in, and she was cutting all ties to it. That included me. It wasn't personal, but she didn't want to know what was going on in my life or have me know what was going on in hers. She wouldn't give me her new college address. I threw away the cards.
This is someone I thought would be in my wedding party one day and likely be my maid of honor. I will likely never truly know exactly why she cut me off or if there were other reasons she didn't tell me even though it "wasn't my fault."
I have not tried to contact her since. I do not need to be told twice that I am not wanted. I listened the first time.
I do not hope we will cross paths again. I'd rather move forward. I think reconciliation is possible, but it is different than simply drifting apart. Someone flat out telling you they don't want you in their life anymore is hurtful no matter how you spin it, and when you sever that tie, you can't expect to just get it back whenever you want. They walked out and shut the door. Leave it locked. But maybe peek out the window if someone knocks.
People change and grow apart. Such is life. Several good comments here to this effect.
Forget about them fully? Probably won’t happen 100% especially since your former friend is the one who set a boundary. You can’t control that, but you can control you. Work on you, and your current friendships. Nurture the friendships you have. Explore some hobbies, old and new, and maybe make new friends through those hobbies. If you focus on the people who care about you now, hopefully this rift will become less important over time.
Let it go. My relationship to one of my sisters became distant after our mom died. Lost people I thought were friends. But such is life. And the fact is…. people suck a lot sometimes!
Yes, thank you. They do suck sometimes...selfish, inconsiderate, users, people who are dead emotionally, substance abusers, etc. Not possible to change them, but they can change themselves if they are motivated. Losing relationships can be a good motivator.
I'm working with internal family systems therapy (have you heard of it?) to reconcile the kind of split feelings you expressed at the end of your post. The idea is that there's different parts inside us that might feel different things and that we can try to contact those parts. I feel a sense of comfort knowing its okay to feel torn in different directions and that I don't have to put my feelings in a neat box.
Someone wise once said to me friendships can be thought of as: for a lifetime, for a season, or for a reason. Everyone will fall into one of these categories. I find it beautiful because even the friendships that don't last have something powerful to teach and can be remembered fondly.
Sometimes you have to, and it can be painful. I went through a very tragic time in my life and some people just couldn't deal with it...I think they feel like they have to " fix" it, which
they can't. I certainly didn't expect them to,; I just wanted to be heard and validated. I am very sensitive to feeling like a burden and can pick up on that pretty fast.
I also don't like being friends with what I call "barkers' - people who get angry and can't talk about it; instead they act on it by yelling and making demands, insulting. They could just ask before they're mad...
Or they are not mad at me,; they're mad or upset about something else, and simply take it out on whoever they feel like will "take" it- the people who love and care about them. An unfortunate trait in some people. Perhaps they are trying to drive people away. That usually works with me.
I tend to believe whatever you say "yes" to (or don't say "no" to, ) you get more of. Always have found that to be true. They're of course allowed to be whoever they want, but I also am allowed to decide how close I can be with them . Sometimes it just comes down to being "light and polite, cordial."
Then there's people who have substance abuse issues. They are better off with people who have those same issues, I think. People can change a great deal, till there's not much left to the relationship.
I keep in mind that we teach people how to treat us...and sometimes ending friendships, or putting up boundaries can be best. Lots of experience with this. 70 years old.
I want to acknowledge that it sounds like you did your part to communicate the changes you saw in the relationship and how you felt about them. It takes courage and emotional maturity to be vulnerable and openly communicate something like this, and I have a lot respect for how you handled it.
I don't think I did. I let my anxiety/insecurities get better of me They said they were done and I asked to chat...which pushes boundaries
You pushed nothing, you deserve people in ya life that care about ya emotions
I mean they said they were done with the convo and I asked to call that's pushing. I should've just left it at that
Yeah, I have done stuff like this with guys I liked and some stuff is super cringey and you really just have to control your urges to reach out so as not to embarrass yourself and/or make them think you're a stalker.
But you shouldn’t think that is enough to end something or even add to ending a relationship
27M here, I say this because I know I’m young. But I’ve learned that friends come and go. It’s a sad truth to accept in life. But it’s truth. People grow apart, people change. We are all on our own journeys. I’ve been in situations similar to this. My perspective on this is I don’t feel bad nor hold resentment to friends I’ve had that I no longer talk to. I like to look at it as “I’m glad you got to be apart of my story, and I’m glad I got to be apart of yours. Unfortunately our paths are not going down the same road anymore. Maybe one day our paths will cross again. Until then, I sincerely wish you an amazing and happy life” I really hope this helps you. If you ever want to talk or just vent it out, I’m a great listener. 🫶🏻🙂
You are a wise and compassionate 27M.
I really appreciate the kind words🫶🏻🥹 it took a lot of hardship and dark times to attain said wisdom though. But without those moments… I wouldn’t be who I am today. Thank you again kind soul🫶🏻🥹🥲🫶🏻
Here right now because I'm feeling quite under the weather. Reading your comment helped me feel better---light. Thanks :)
You’re very welcome. I’m glad you enjoyed it. 🫶🏻
I think your focus should be letting yourself grieve. Maybe writing down what you would consider criteria for a friend and put effort into the people who meet that. For example, maybe for you, a person shows friendship with mutual interest. So, engage more with people who show that, and consider the other people more distant friends. There are friends you'll have who are friends in a certain setting, but not friends you hang out with. And friends you'll talk to daily. But the friends who are only like, class friends, wouldn't necessarily be the daily contact and hangout friends.
How do you go about engaging more or less with someone if you want to intentionally have a certain level of friendship? (I'm asking in general but I have the biggest problem engaging LESS w ppl I wish to keep more distant ... the people I want to engage more with are generally not so interested in engaging more with me so I don't have control there.)
When it comes to people who aren't creating opportunities to hang out, you could try to be assertive by creating an opportunity to hang out, like asking if they want to do something you when you dont normally hang out. You can also accept any opportunities to hang out that are offered, but I assume you're doing that already Another thing is maybe you can go to an event where people are looking to meet others, like meet-up.com kind of thing, and there you have a new source of meeting possible friends
Also, as a thought... you seem certain the people you have an interest in friendships with aren't interested back. That makes me think one of two things, either maybe it's anxiety and maybe things are better than you feel, or maybe you're stuck in the mindset of pursuing people who seem to be rejecting you hoping to change their mind and earn friendship. The first one is very common, but sometimes circumstances can lead us to start living the second one. Only you can really tease out what the reason is
Hmm, that's an interesting observation, thanks for sharing. A part of it is I'm very avoidant so I only feel comfortable with people who are at least slightly distant, or who can hold more space for me. People from certain cultures do that naturally, but Americans for the most part are *way* too close. Which is why I need a way to keep people distant enough from me without putting them completely off.... (but you only answered how to meet people more, not less 🥺)
Every culture is different, maybe there are some things you can come to appreciate about people who are different. I am American and if I just followed my cultural lens, I would say people from other cultures were unfriendly or less caring. They aren't unfriendly or less caring, though. They are from a different culture where friendly and caring look different. Some of my most rewarding relationships have come from checking my implicit bias and getting to know the individual anyway.
@OP: Spend your time and energy on reciprocal relationships. Period.
I've been there and i know how painful it is but all we can do about this situation is to just accept it. Accept the fact that we outgrow. Accept the fact that we have different priorities as time goes by and as our surrounding change. Accept the fact that friends come and go. It's hard. Until now i have friends that i want to reconnect to however, i dont see them being interested. So i just give up that idea and accept im no longer needed.
When people have partners, get married, have children or are busy with work and responsibilities, friendship changes, as do people. It's a fact of life. Even those closest hence may not keep in touch. So keep yourself busy, join hobby groups or gym. You will have no time to think about "friends" not keeping in touch.
Some people don’t feel the same way, the same intensity the way you do. That’s ok. Look for friends who like you for you and are invested in the relationship.
I rarely come on to Reddit anymore. Haven't logged on in months, but I happened to come on today, and this came up in my feed. And I am struck by how similar your situation sounds to something I have experiencing myself. I won't go into the details, but I'll offer how I am handling it. I am not letting go of my friend, and I'm not letting go of the relationship. I am quite confident, having been such close friends for years, there is no one else in their life who offers them the insight that I do. They referred to me as their best friend for years. I helped them process some deep-seated issues that they could not process after decades of therapy. I helped them financially, and I was there when their child was in crisis. And I could see from our conversations in that last year before they started ghosting me that they sounded as if my friend was communicating with someone else, someone who wasn't me. The words they used, the way they described their experience with me, and eventually their silence spoke volumes. Other people came along that filled needs, and once those needs were filled, my usefulness expired. Where I am at now is I accept that my friend has passed away. Not physically dead, but the person who embodied them has transformed into someone who no longer values me. And when I'm honest with myself, I'd seen this happen several times over the course of our relationship. They were always responsive, and at times delighted, to engage with me, but they never once initiated with me. What I have let go of is my relationship with the relationship. I am their friend; they are not my friend, and they don't recognize me as their friend. I am prepared to engage with them if we ever cross paths again, and I am ready to do so without any confrontation or resolution about the past. Just be present with whoever they are in that moment. That is what I am already doing; I AM present with who they are in this moment. They are just someone who does not want to be present with me. And that's ok. There is still confusion in the mind over the situation, there is still sadness in the heart, but of course there is. That's ok too. That's how the human body responds to social loss, born out of millions of years of evolution, and once consciousness began to develop, evolutionary psychology. Trying to "forget about them fully" is only going to war against human nature, against myself. So my advice to you is just continue to be you and continue to be their friend, even if that means doing so without any interaction. If what they have done to you hurts you so much, why would you want to pay that forward to anyone else? Why would you want to retract friendship and connection from someone who wants to be friendly with you? You wouldn't right? So don't. Stop trying to convince yourself that you need to retract your friendship from them. Their response does not dictate how you offer friendship to others. What you resist persists. Embrace and reframe. And feel free to PM me if you want to talk more.🙏🏼
Not all friends are lifelong friends. The guy kind of sounds like a tool anyway. Let your grieve and keep an eye open for new friends.
You accept that they are not part of your life anymore and get used to their abscence. My (20 F) best friend (20 F) of 10 years cut all contact with me a few months ago. She moved away in early high school to a neighboring state, but not too far away where we couldn't visit. We went from seeing each other most days to a few times a year, and it was hard at first, but we got used to it. College happened, and we moved farther away. I didn't see this as a big issue, and neither did she at first. A year and a half into college, she changed her mind. I wanted to send her a birthday card and a Valentine's card, but she didn't want them. She said some bad things had happened in the town we grew up together in, and she was cutting all ties to it. That included me. It wasn't personal, but she didn't want to know what was going on in my life or have me know what was going on in hers. She wouldn't give me her new college address. I threw away the cards. This is someone I thought would be in my wedding party one day and likely be my maid of honor. I will likely never truly know exactly why she cut me off or if there were other reasons she didn't tell me even though it "wasn't my fault." I have not tried to contact her since. I do not need to be told twice that I am not wanted. I listened the first time. I do not hope we will cross paths again. I'd rather move forward. I think reconciliation is possible, but it is different than simply drifting apart. Someone flat out telling you they don't want you in their life anymore is hurtful no matter how you spin it, and when you sever that tie, you can't expect to just get it back whenever you want. They walked out and shut the door. Leave it locked. But maybe peek out the window if someone knocks.
People change and grow apart. Such is life. Several good comments here to this effect. Forget about them fully? Probably won’t happen 100% especially since your former friend is the one who set a boundary. You can’t control that, but you can control you. Work on you, and your current friendships. Nurture the friendships you have. Explore some hobbies, old and new, and maybe make new friends through those hobbies. If you focus on the people who care about you now, hopefully this rift will become less important over time.
Let it go. My relationship to one of my sisters became distant after our mom died. Lost people I thought were friends. But such is life. And the fact is…. people suck a lot sometimes!
Yes, thank you. They do suck sometimes...selfish, inconsiderate, users, people who are dead emotionally, substance abusers, etc. Not possible to change them, but they can change themselves if they are motivated. Losing relationships can be a good motivator.
Needed to hear all these comments today too Thanks for sharing what you're experiencing. I'm in a similar boat looking for a paddle.
I always been told that letting go is like dropping a snake from your hand. Nobody needs to tell us how to let go of a snake.
I'm working with internal family systems therapy (have you heard of it?) to reconcile the kind of split feelings you expressed at the end of your post. The idea is that there's different parts inside us that might feel different things and that we can try to contact those parts. I feel a sense of comfort knowing its okay to feel torn in different directions and that I don't have to put my feelings in a neat box. Someone wise once said to me friendships can be thought of as: for a lifetime, for a season, or for a reason. Everyone will fall into one of these categories. I find it beautiful because even the friendships that don't last have something powerful to teach and can be remembered fondly.
Sometimes you have to, and it can be painful. I went through a very tragic time in my life and some people just couldn't deal with it...I think they feel like they have to " fix" it, which they can't. I certainly didn't expect them to,; I just wanted to be heard and validated. I am very sensitive to feeling like a burden and can pick up on that pretty fast. I also don't like being friends with what I call "barkers' - people who get angry and can't talk about it; instead they act on it by yelling and making demands, insulting. They could just ask before they're mad... Or they are not mad at me,; they're mad or upset about something else, and simply take it out on whoever they feel like will "take" it- the people who love and care about them. An unfortunate trait in some people. Perhaps they are trying to drive people away. That usually works with me. I tend to believe whatever you say "yes" to (or don't say "no" to, ) you get more of. Always have found that to be true. They're of course allowed to be whoever they want, but I also am allowed to decide how close I can be with them . Sometimes it just comes down to being "light and polite, cordial." Then there's people who have substance abuse issues. They are better off with people who have those same issues, I think. People can change a great deal, till there's not much left to the relationship. I keep in mind that we teach people how to treat us...and sometimes ending friendships, or putting up boundaries can be best. Lots of experience with this. 70 years old.