How many friends have you fallen out with/cut out your life? (Or had it happen to you)

[elevenspowers]

I’m asking about friends because we choose those and we can’t choose family.

I had a childhood best friend, born two months apart, lived on the same street and our mums were best friends. She was however exceptionally snobby and I saw her cut out friends one by one, until it got to my turn. I guess because I didn’t live up to her standards anymore, I never got an explanation, she would just make excuses when I asked to meet up - so I stopped asking.

Then the friend I cut out was a compulsive liar. She used me a lot for money, lifts and then started lying about an illness. She told me she was in hospital when she was actually having her eyelashes done.

1. Both let me down via text that they weren't coming to my wedding with days to go. We'd been close friends (so I thought) for almost 20 years.

Both used covid as an excuse despite it being an outdoor wedding and them being out in a restaurant for one of their birthdays the week of the wedding.

Both waited until we'd paid for their meals etc (paid last minute because of restrictions)

Both knew we'd been very restricted numbers wise for the wedding because of covid.

Like others I have drifted apart from some friends over the years, just as much my own fault for not making the effort to keep in touch. I have never deliberately 'dropped' anyone or been cut off. Still friends with three girls I met at primary school - we are all mid 60s and live has taken us in very different directions but I class them all as close friends.

Just one, still makes me sad but she treated me terribly and have no desire to forgive. We are courteous when we see one another though.

3 actively, 1 that I think cut me out.

Was it because you were already married? I'm not sure many people care about that old rule (and there's always matron of honour anyway), but maybe her mind just went "bridesmaid shame it can't be sparkli luckily my uni friend is still eligible"?

One. About 18 years ago, was also neighbour. No idea why she suddenly didn't seem to want to go out or meet up as before. Racked my brains wondering what I'd said or done for her to pull away.

In the end I couldn't be bothered to continue wondering because I remembered over the years I'd known her she fell out with numerous friends and other neighbours and also work colleagues on a regular basis.

I think she was the problem, not me.

One who was meant to be coming to stay for a weeks holiday and didn’t bother to turn up as she’d got a better offer. Rang me up, was really rude. Contacted me a year later to pay for her holiday accommodation (I didn’t). I suspect some of that behaviour was actually her husbands fault , I’ve never actually met him and never would.
She was married in Australia when I was 8 months pregnant and complained I didn’t come.

im actually still FB friends and she’s turned from being very anti-religion to being super religious and a bit odd.

Loads.

Most I drifted apart from gradually either because they moved, I moved, they got boyfriends or we just made other friends.

Some I actually fell out with properly. I got a house with three other people after university in a city an hour away from my home town. I was friends with two, the other I only spoke to because she was friends with my friends. I couldn't really afford the house but I was hoping to get a job in that city so I thought living there would help. It didn't work out and I had a massive argument with them after they locked me out on purpose after I went out on a weeknight with some other friends. Haven't spoken to them since.

Sadly for me too many to count. When I was 21 I cut myself off from my school friends, I was suffering at the time with horrendous anxiety (and probably depression when I look back) and felt like it was the right thing as we were growing apart, at least that’s that I told myself.

By 28 my best friend decided she didn’t want me to be part of her life any longer. I made the mistake of telling her I thought she may be in a coercive controlling relationship and our friendship never recovered. I bitterly regret that now, and hope I was wrong.
A year or so later 2 of my close friends ghosted me when I had a baby, they were in a different phase of life.

Most recently I cut myself off from a group of mum mates I used to work with, just grew apart and felt I had less and less in common, no hard feelings.

I don’t have any friends now, just a few acquaintances. I don’t know what it says about me, I’m sure I’m part of the problem.

She did you a favour. They're fascinating to observe though on Facebook.

Been done to me loads. I think I am one of those people that can be easily forgotten about.
I've done it to one person who I should have told where to go years before. Total user, very selfish and I'm much happier they are out of my life now.

I was dropped without explanation by a guy I had become good friends with after meeting on a blind date. No romantic relationship but I felt he was like the brother I never had. After a few months he got a girlfriend (who I met) and then suddenly he stopped replying to texts and emails. I wrote say if I had offended him in some way I apologised. Never heard a word.
Another friend we fizzled out after she expected me to make the effort to travel to her - happy to do so when her kids were small but when I had kids a few years later it was never convenient for her to come to me. She also invited me to her 40th then uninvited me when I said my partner would not be able to come. We have reconnected now though.
I dropped a friend after she had an alcohol induced breakdown - for the first two years I supported her emotionally, helped her when the police got involved, visited her weekly in the psychiatric ward, helped her when meeting with doctors for her reviews... they released her and she basically stalked me (she had a partner). In the end I had to break all ties and block her.

One who lied constantly, and then spread gossip about me

Actively cut off three people, all of which were really quite horrible to me in their own ways (they didn’t know each other) - I suspect I’m a bit vulnerable to a certain type of person. Once I got some therapy and started respecting myself a bit more, I realised they needed to go. They were never going to change and I wasn’t strong enough to spell it all out to them, so it seemed easier to just cut them off. It’s been about 10 years since I made the first decision and I have never regretted it.

I’ve lost 3 friends

1. She got pregnant and as I didn’t want children she cut me out of her life near enough immediately after announcing the pregnancy and surrounded herself with other mums, that really hurt as we were close and I cared very much for her and the baby.
2. a friendship of over 15 just drifted apart, very sad but we no longer had common ground and it was hard work towards the end, there was no goodbye or official end we just never spoke during Covid and that’s carried on
3. a close friend used me for money and used my photo without my permission as a dating profile, I have absolutely no idea why other than I think she was annoyed with me for ending the friendship and I assume she wanted the profile to somehow get back to my husband that I was online dating, i complained to the online dating website and had it removed ( her adult daughter was my bridesmaid told me everything and showed me my profile)

All 3 have felt like some kind of grief to me though , whether that’s the feeling of closure or sadness, I have some wonderful people around me now but I don’t think I’ll ever forgot those 3. We were so close and all were prominent guests at my wedding so on the wedding photos and there for me in tough and good times,( as I was with them) it’s hard knowing they are out there but not communicating anymore, the friendships ended for a reason but I still think of them on their birthdays or anniversaries etc…

I haven't really fallen out with or cut off friends but over the pandemic which coincided with quite a few difficult family problems I have become more and more insular and less keen to be sociable. I can't be bothered with fairweather types and also have to spend more time with family members which I used to find hard bit have grown to like more.

I wish I had more time for friends. For the few who are really decent. I work really hard in term time and have barely any free time, when it gets to the holidays I feel like most friends have forgotten me.

We had been super close and I can’t tell you the massive amount of support DH and I had given her over several things, including the breakdown in her first marriage.
if she had rang and said she wasn’t coming I would have been relieved. Just not turning up (and me making loads of preparations) just unforgivable.

None. I'm 45

I have a wide variety of friends. Some very close, long term, some new. I tend to pick up new friends in the stages of life (my school, uni, travelling, various jobs, motherhood, nursery, kids school, kids sports clubs) and keep them as life moves on. I feel lucky.

I know someone who is the opposite and I have lost track of how many friends she has fallen out with. She picks up a new friend, becomes almost obsessive, best friends very quickly, then there is some drama and she cuts them whilst spending A LOT of time talking about it to others. It must be exhausting.

It’s only happened to me twice.
One was my best friend from school - she let me read her diary (why!!) and she’d basically slagged me off for ages. She got back in contact a few years later and we met up a few times but in the end I let it drift as we didn’t have much in common and the friendship was based on nostalgia.

I was also ghosted by a good friend from Uni - I still don’t know why!! It upset me for ages as we’d been through so much together.

I do have mutuals who have fallen out with each other too which can make things very awkward!!

i v rarely end friendships although have lost touch w loads of people, but it’s more due to circumstance - children growing up, people moving away etc.

quite a few but mostly without any ill feelings from my side. Some because they treated people badly and I didn’t want to be part of it, some because I could see where their choices were leading and I knew I couldn’t support them through the drama without it really affecting others. I’m happy with the friends I have and wish those others well.

Only 2 I have actively cut out.

1 was like a sister but she sided with my abusive exh when we split and was feeding him info about where I was living and what I was doing.

2nd had some mental health issues but became incredibly abusive towards me, started lying about things other friends were supposed to have said to isolate me from them.

Have drifted apart from many ove rthe years due to moving around.

This (except I'm older than 42)

A few but by far the most painful was my best friend of 10+ years. We’d been inseparable for all our lives, since before we were in primary school - did everything together. It was really intense super close friendship that I think was suffocating and that’s what killed it. When I say we did everything together, knew everything about each other, would defend each other above everyone else, we would be our weirdest most authentic selves with one another… it doesn’t come close to explaining how close we were. I have a lot of regrets. I think it was the single most important relationship of my life honestly. In hindsight I was incredibly toxic towards the end and so was the friendship so I’m not surprised how it went. It ended when we went to college and she started drifting away with other friends. I couldn’t handle it, overreacted out of fear and we fell out. I was a dick who couldn’t handle things were changing and tried to hold on to something that had reached that point. That’s 20 years ago now ha and it still hurts worse than any breakup I’ve ever had! Absolutely my fault though, and absolutely she was right to do it. I still have her on SM have seen her get married and argh. It’s hard to know it really was for the best but still feel the abstract pain of it still so far on!

One I considered my BFF. Whom I did everything for and more. The final drop was my mom lending her money and instead of paying my mom back when she could, she bought a laptop. It was the one time my mom said to me: is this a real friendship? I had to call her to get the money back and she was offended. Looking back I always offered to help when she was down (I even bought her a plane ticket so she could visit me in London) but I can't remember her ever having done something really nice for me.
The other one was a friend as well as a colleague. This one hurt the most because I became an outcast in our group of friends without so much as a word. It was even more difficult because I went through a very difficult time roughly around the same time so had basically no support. When she called after a few months to invite me to her birthday I said no and got a new number.
Another one I was good buddies with for a long time but then I had a cup of coffee with her and found myself thinking we really had nothing to say. I couldn't leave fast enough and it was mutual.
The other one had a DP who shouted at her in the middle of a very busy upscale restaurant in front of everybody on her birthday. He was a cokehead and I told her she deserved better: she ghosted me.

Really? I’d say it’s quite common.

In my situation where my friend was clearly a user and lying about absolutely every single thing imaginable (including her health) and I saw her do it to other people to. She once text me to ask what I was doing - assumed she wanted to hang out but no she wanted a lift to go pick up weed.

so yeah … I don’t need that kind of toxic shit in my life.