Hello,
I relocated for work 4 years ago with my partner. I made a few friends in work but my closest friend was a girl I met in training. She did not work in my office so I only saw her when we arranged to meet. We became very good friends, texting every day practically, which is not something I do with my lifelong friends but I think this is common for her in her friendships.
For the past 3-6 months I feel like she has been distancing herself from me. Ending conversations, and only talking about topics that can be viewed as “small talk”. She refuses to now meet me during our lunch breaks yet tells me about all the other people she meets. She says she is only available to meet in the evenings which causes me an expense to have to drive all the time to where she lives and evening meals out when before we would eat our packed lunch together so no cost. However I have been doing this when she is available (now only every few months).
I can’t think what I have done wrong other than trivial disagreements over minor stuff. The disagreements were fleeting and never heated. Things like she believes we shouldn’t try and reduce plastic whereas I said well we don’t want animals dying in the oceans. To me it was trivial and conversations like that have only happened a couple of times. I wouldn’t think it was worth ending a friendship over. Perhaps it’s not even that and I’m clutching at straws.
The issue now is that rather than cut me out, she continues to contact me but it feels like she regularly puts me on mute (something I know she does with other people), and the conversations feel so superficial and weird. A few time’s she has come to my office in the past couple of weeks to speak to a different colleague and essentially blanked me, save for a half wave and no eye contact. No “how was your Christmas” etc. Then sends me a text about meeting in a few months time.
So I just don’t know how to behave. It would be easier if she just cut me out! Instead I’m having to pretend I don’t notice her rude behaviour/ behaviour change, and can’t call her out on it for fear she would just say it’s all in my head.
I have never had a friend treat me like this and have a lot of lifelong friends, whereas I believe she may have done this to others and I was aware she also put a HR complaint in about a girl she used to be very close to.
The clincher is she was a really good friend to me when my ex cheated. She looked after me, let me stay at her house, ensured I ate etc. I couldn’t have got through that time without her. And the loss of this friendship makes me feel so sad wondering what on Earth I have done. I don’t see how things could ever go back to normal though and if they did could I even trust her.
I need to know how should I proceed?