AIBU to go NC with friend?

[ToastMama]

Wise folks of Mumsnet, I need some help. I've been avoiding an old friend for quite some time now in the hope she'll give up on me and write the friendship off. Cowardly, I know, but the alternative would be to confront her with the reasons I'd like to cut contact and that would only serve to further hurt her feelings.

"Amy" and I were close friends at school, but she's always been very intense. Lots of little notes, constantly instigating 'in' jokes, emails, texts etc etc... It's just a bit much. That alone would be enough of a reason for me to distance myself a bit from someone, but she's also got a taste for the dramatics. There was a mix up lie about her Dad having cancer, an "evil" stepmother, a manipulative mother, boyfriend left her because he "couldn't handle" the rare brain disorder that she has, only for them to be engaged weeks later - and now her father has cut her off completely because he doesn't approve of the marriage. There's nothing that I can call outright bullshit on, but there's just something missing...

AIBU to want to cut contact? She's an old friend, and if the brain disorder is genuine she's extremely unwell. But I just feel like I'm being lied to constantly, and simply can't handle meeting up for another coffee where I'm treated like a sounding board for all her drama.

Is it kinder to keep ghosting her, or should I bite the bullet and let her know why I'd prefer we let the friendship go? She's not a horrible person, she just has some serious issues. This is hideous.

Let it gooooooooooooooooo

The fact that you're agonising over this makes you a better person than I am.

I have ditched two old friends because their dramas and hystrionics became extremely boring and arduous. Utlimately I felt I couldn't have a sincere and honest friendship with someone who preferred to 'sex up' their lives for a good story than to just be straight about stuff. I didn't feel too dreadful about it in the end. The way I look at it, would I want someone to reluctantly be friends with me out of a sense of duty? No thanks.

This does mean I have few friends (and incidentally most of them male as they seem, generalising obviously, less prone to this behaviour), but the ones I have are diamonds. Quality over quantity I say.

00100001 proper snort! 😂

If your meet-ups are basically just the two of you, and her bending your ear for the entire period about her troubles, then whether the troubles are real or not you've got into a rut that offers you precious little.

Is this intensity the only kind of friendship she will do? Will she do group socialising? Is she fun when she does?

If not, then drop her. Tell her you are under stress or unwell or whatever and unable to continue being the support she expects you to be, or something like that.

001 Properly laughed at that!

OP - yip, move on and let her go. Though I'm a big chicken and wouldn't tell her why simply because it would lead to hurt.

I've dropped people for less! So no ynbu.
Yes friendships are give and take but also not a chore and this sounds like hard work.

Okay well I'm pleased I'm not BU, thank you. I'm just feeling so awful about upsetting her with the reasons why I'm avoiding meeting up. I really hoped she'd have got the message by now, I would have done! I'm going to have to say something aren't I. Gahhhh.