I have a friend I've known since we were at school together as teenagers, we're mid 40s now so we've known each other 30 years.
We don't stay in close contact - she's not a whatsapper or a facebooker but we tend to catch up maybe once or twice a year. Usually send birthday cards.
Anyway we chatted early 2021 on the phone, it was mid pandemic then still. She talked to me about how she had had issues with alcohol and had been sober now for a year or two. I found that very interesting as I've had various dalliances with sobriety etc and I guess some periods of problem drinking myself.
Anyway, I visited her autumn 2021, we had a lovely day. We spoke about her sobriety and some other heavy subjects (relating to both her family and mine, it was very equal sharing of heavy stuff, remember we have known each other a very long time and both know each other's families).
I was curious about her sobriety and said well done and how brilliantly she had done, I think I asked her if she did it all by herself. She was a bit cagey and said she "had help."
I asked her more about it and it turns out she joined AA. I was really interested in this and asked her lots about it. She got us to pick up our (takeaway) coffee cups up and leave the cafe we were in and said "I'll tell you outside" she talked a bit about AA, I had some questions about how does the sponsor thing work etc, I've always been interested as it seems a bit mysterious to me and it's something I'd considered in the past when struggling with drinking myself.
The then basically said she is not allowed to talk about it, that you can't talk about AA unless you are in it. I had genuinely not realised that this was the case but dropped the subject once she explained.
Long story short, she's ghosted me ever since. I've left phone messages, she doesn't send a birthday card any more and she doesn't read my whatsapp messages (although she's always been flaky on that score).
I can't think of anything else we spoke about that day that was remotely touchy or controversial (and I genuinely didn't realise the rules around AA when I was asking initially). She was quite open about therapy she's had and told me all about that, she's a very open person so I don't think she felt she revealed too much.
AIBU to wonder if the AA thing is the reason she has suddenly and mysteriously dropped me?
I know it could be anything but I've googled it since and lots of people say AA is almost like a cult?!