To find this friend frustrating, or maybe I'm expecting too much?

[BrickSnake]

First of all she is a highly extroverted personality, I am likely more introverted, she's always seemed very happy to have me as a friend/colleague.
We worked together for around a year, I left briefly then returned and she was always saying oh I miss you, can't wait for you to come back, you're such a lovely person etc. And I felt valued by her.

We used to talk almost daily. I know it's natural that when you often leave jobs you don't stay in touch as much, I've had enough jobs to know how it is.

She used to send a lot of messages but I accepted it was just who she was, what I mean is that she could send 20 whatsapps in a row, like it could be slightly irritating but I was happy she wanted to talk to me a lot.

We used to talk a lot on Teams at work too. However things have changed and for some reason she will cut conversations off halfway through. Like she'll just stop replying.. I don't reply instantly most of the time nor do I expect anyone else to, but I'll have asked a question or whatever then 10 days later still no reply.

The other day I messaged on Teams just asking hi how are you. Ftr I can sometimes take a few hours to reply on Teams depending on how busy work is. She replied oh hi nice to hear from you bla bla, and then after 2 messages she said, sorry but im wayy too busy to talk to you right now with work so I'll talk to you soon.

That was 10 days ago. These things happen I guess, I'm feeling a bit fragile atm in general so it's not helping. However I guess it's annoying how she used to think it was ok to send 50 messages at once and now frequently just ignores me or tells me she's too busy. Best to just leave it really aren't I? I'm finding friendships can be quite transient.

It's not just online either. She was excited about me coming back to our office yet no longer suggests lunch or anything either. Fwiw we work in a low paid AO role, we don't have to work outside of our working hours, we are far from snowed under with work.

I think you're taking it too personally, she may genuinely be very busy and could be feeling stressed and run down.

It's more that how she feels It's ok to bombard me with messages when it suits her, I had 35 once on WhatsApp.
Now most messages I send get ignored even though I barely send them , or I get brushed off, there's no in between. Everyone is busy but I know what our job is and the workload is the same every day, it's quite a doss job almost.

The next time she feels it's ok to bombard me when she wants to vent, I'm tempted to either ignore or reply 'sorry but I'm wayy too busy for you'. I know that's petty but whatever.

She sounds superficial and dramatic. I’d back off if I were you.

Sounds exactly like someone I was close with. Suddenly got bored with me.. probably her personality to be super intense, draw you in then move on. She might be messaging heavily with another friend instead. I would advise back off and don't take it personally if possible.

Did you ever tell her you didn't like being bombarded with messages?

I have found that people who talk too much or message too much are often selfish, so they see no problem in ignoring your messages yet expecting you to read a barrage of messages daily. To me it's a red flag when somebody is messaging you that much.
It's possible she found somebody else to bombard with texts and no longers needs you, in which case count yourself lucky.

That's my feeling too, that's she's probably found somebody else to bore with her incessant texting.

It was weird, I don't know if this makes any sense but so she'd send 20 separate WhatsApp messages, and I'd try to reply in sort of a big paragraph rather than lots of seperate messages.

Then she'd choose one thing in my response to reply to and only that, wouldn't reply to anything else. Just random

I didn't, I just sort of accepted it as who she was because she was nice, but maybe I should've.

A lot of people like that love the thrill of making new friends so when someone new comes along they focus on them. Also she might be genuinely busy. When I’m quiet I’ll chat loads to colleagues on teams and WhatsApp but when I’m super busy it can take days before I respond.

I'm not bothered about people taking days to respond, but she's not doing that, she's cutting off every conversation.

Ugh. That would be irritating.
What part of her personality do you find likeable really? She sounds rather tiresome.
I know you felt valued because she kept saying she missed you and how lovely you are, but that isn't enough for a friendship. It sound like perhaps she love-bombs people so she can use them to vent to, then drops then when she has a new person to use.

Might be best to do it going forward. Make your boundaries clear and don't put up with behaviour you don't like, that may lower your expectations and save disappointment.
I'm shit at texting friends back, I just don't have the headspace sometimes. My friends can be the same though but whenever one of us is going through a hard time we can put in that extra effort to be there for each other.

I think that messaging styles can vary substantially from person to person:

‘God I am exhausted today. Was up in the night and the boiling weather didn’t help. How are you?’

becomes

‘Sorry hun’

‘Exhausted today, lolz’

‘Up in the night’

‘Too hot to sleep’

‘Whats’ up lol 😜’

All in separate WhatsApp messages!

Also, in fairness, people from all walks of life have varying levels of literacy. It might be that she literally cannot process a big block of text so just picks out one thing and responds to that.

I don’t know… I am a fairly loyal friend so once I properly like you, you are kinda stuck with me!

If you like her, stick with her, but accept that she has some limitations.

It sounds like you have very different communication preferences and that's ok. But you might not be compatible.

I can also see a post she could be writing to mumsnet about a work colleague who she thought was great but often didn't reply to her messages, and that she told the colleague how much she was looking forward to working together but the colleague never said anything like that and never made any effort to organise a catch up....

What would you call her communication style exactly?

And no, that's absolutely not what happened but ok. I've done nothing like that...

This ^.
I think you got sucked into her rather frenetic and apparently lovable style
Now she's a bit bored with you and it feels sad that the bubbly love has gone
FYI ....it wasn't love it was love bombing and she's not a friend she's an acquaintance with a strange personality

I remember when one of my cats went missing, this friend just said 'Sorry but I don't think she'll be coming back' without any evidence whatsoever ..
I thought that was quite a nasty thing to say, and luckily the cat did return.

Intense! (it wouldn't be for me)

Seems like she could be the type of person who shares her feelings out loud a lot and prefers to message quickly in a conversational style. Just based on what you've said you like to put in more thought to your messages, don't think it a priority to reply quickly and perhaps less expressive about your feelings. Neither approach is wrong, but I could see that she could interpret your approach as being stand offish and like you don't want to be friends.

But regardless sounds like maybe you don't like her that much... You took her at her word that she liked you, and are now reeling from the change in vibes.

You have a better read of the situation as we're just random people online, but my two pence input would be that once you process the sense of rejection you'll realise that you would have found her friendship draining and you're best out of it

I do like her. I reply in a timely manner but I said I understand not everyone does.
I always try and arrange stuff with her and invite her to lunch and so on

she feels It's ok to bombard me with messages when it suits her,

Yeah but you accepted this behaviour, encouraged it, enjoyed it? continued to reply, interact etc.

You didn't at any time put in place any boundaries or correct her behaviour- perhaps by saying nice to hear from you bla bla.... sorry but im wayy too busy to talk to you right now with work so I'll talk to you soon.

You cant moan just because she doesn't act the way you do. She isnt you.

I'd say that lots of short messages is the norm for WA. You then use the slide feature to reply to individual ones. You never do what you did and leave things that you aren't keen on, then want the other person to owe you, because you've put up with things.
Instead of being petty, just communicate properly. I'd say part of the issue is how you are handling friendships.

Well yes, because back then she actually spoke to me and didn't cut off every interaction. I couldn't forsee that.
And it's not about expecting someone to act the way I do, obviously..