Managing friendships

[Coffee08]

I’d love to hear people’s thoughts.
My son has a friend in his class who he’s been friends with since babies, they are both now 10 years old and are also neighbours. Me and my DH have become good friends with the boys parents through the friendship our sons have, we sometimes go out the 4 of us, have BBQs together. Their style of parenting is quite different to ours but this has never been an issue, they give their son a lot of freedom (within the boundaries of a small community) and he’s quite streetwise compared to our son, who is more sheltered and naive.
Over the course of a few months I’ve noticed the 2 boys friendship shift a little. Their son ignores our son when other children are around, he picks him up and drops him when it suits and can be unkind. My DS even says that he likes him when it’s just the 2 of them, but his friend becomes obnoxious when others are around, especially older kids.
I had to message the boys mum/my friend about an incident to make her aware, she got very defensive, basically told me my son isn’t telling the truth and now it all just feels a bit weird and awkward.
I’ve had to tell my son that this boy isn’t being a good friend, true friends are kind to you regardless of who else is around. My son now no longer plays out and the boy has stopped knocking. Luckily my DS has other friends and we keep him busy with clubs/hobbies. I also know that my child isn’t an angel, but there definitely feels a weird power imbalance in their friendship and my DS is definitely not the “alpha”. I guess I feel sad about it, maybe it stirs up old feelings of mine from when I was a child being left out?
I’m not sure what I’m hoping from putting this message out. Thanks for reading :)

Hi there.
i don’t have much advice, but wanted to offer some support, as this sounds hard.

i remember when my son was around that age, and friendships became a bit tricker.

I gave him same advice as you have, that good friends are kind to us and don’t treat us badly.

my son drifted from some friendships that weren’t working well anymore at this age, and he did go on to find a nice new bunch of kids to spend time with. These friends were more similar to my son, who like you was a bit more ‘sheltered’ and a gentle soul.

I think in some ways, it’s all helpful life experience (albeit painful at the time) .
we won’t all get along, people change and friendships change with that.

if I were you I would reassure your son that sometimes people/ friendships change, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t a great friend and good person etc.

Im sure you are already doing this, I just say this as I recall my son feeling a bit insecure, thinking he had done something wrong , when he had a similar situation.

Your son has done the right thing. He's learning to respect himself and assert himself. Well done to him! It's fine to be sad about this friendship but don't muddy the waters by making ds think he's done anything wrong. There's nothing left to say