Ghosted by friend of 35 years

[Blip]

I've been ghosted by a close friend of 35 years for no reason that is apparent to me. This happened 3 months ago.
After having a few messages ignored, I did reach out to ask why in November but was left as unread.

It's clear from her Facebook posts that nothing awful has happened in her life to stop her being in touch so obviously she just doesn't want to be.

I've now accepted that the friendship is over and that at this point I wouldn't want it back anyway as it's been so painful to go through. My friend isn't local but we had long phonecalls most weeks.

It's taking me a long time though to get over it. I still think about it every day, usually more than once a day, and today I actually cried about it. I am having counselling at the moment so I do have support. Does anyone have any advice as to how to lessen the painful feelings or is it simply a matter of more time required?

The three years since early 2020 have been bizarre, either not seeing people at all or relationships becoming very intense. It sounds like your friend might be depressed @Blip . The more isolated one gets the more we can push people away.

I met up with a much loved old friend recently and counted that it had been seven years! No fall out, just life.

I phoned another long term friend a few years ago and the convo was so odd, left me wondering what I'd done wrong. It took ages to pluck up courage and call her again. It turned out her marriage had been breaking down. By the second call, years later, things were resolved, ie divorce etc. I felt sad that she couldn't share that with me at the time but she must have felt overwhelmed with shame and uncertainty and I'm not in her inner circle.

Where my female relationships have broken down it tends to be mutual ghosting - we both sense something is off. It is very sad and I wish it wouldn't happen.

Society puts so much emphasis on the spousal relationship, but other ones are important too. It may be for the best that your friend gets on with her here and now life rather than holding on for a long distance friendship from way back when.

Sorry it has been so hard on you both.

tothelefttotheleft Thanks. No, I'm fine without her. I've got a lovely family (hers use her all the time)

“I can see this being quite hurtful from her perspective. You had a long distance friendship where you had long phonecalls every week; yet given an opportunity to actually see her in person, she wasn’t your priority. So in her eyes, she’s good enough when you’re bored at home and want a natter but otherwise disposable. Add to that that she’s long-term single and the reason for you not wanting to see her when you were close by was not wanting to be apart your DH and that’s going to be a little extra sting. If I’m visiting my old home town but know I have no time for meeting up with my old friends who still live there, I just don’t tell them I’ll be in town. Telling somebody you’ll be in their area and then in the next breath telling them you have no time to see them seems a bit unkind.

With the “action versus intention” gaze I mentioned in my earlier post, your perspective is obviously that you were completely reasonable because this was rare and special time with your DH and you obviously didn’t intend to hurt her or make her feel unimportant. What she sees though is just what she perceives is your action of casting her aside.”

This. I don’t think there’s any particular mystery here and I think you have been rather insensitive to her. In fact, I think you were a tad disingenuous in your earlier posts in suggesting there was nothing you’d done to warrant her hurt behaviour. You say she’s incredibly important to you but if that were true, you would surely have made time to see her when you visited her neck of the woods. Naturally you prioritise your DH but you’re with him all the time - when you’re physically near her would have been the time to prioritise her, at least for a few hours surely. I think that’s particularly the case where you have your family unit around you and she doesn’t.

We all make mistakes - I certainly do, God knows - and I have hurt and let down friends and needed their forgiveness. I don’t think what you did warrants ending your relationship for all time and I hope she will let you both move on. Perhaps you could make a trip there soon - make more of an effort to put this right than just sending a few messages or making phone calls so she realises she truly is important to you.

It's fair to say that I do prioritise my DH and my DD over my friend, as much as I love her, and that priority is not likely to change. She has no partner and no DC so is in a different situation. I guess the relationship lacks balance in that respect and maybe this is why she has had enough

There is your answer.

Even when you had the chance to see her in person, the 'rare and special' time with dh trumped seeing her, despite you seeing your dh every single day for 25 years!

She is fed up coming nowhere in your priority list, and your latest visit without even bothering to see her no doubt was the final straw. I would be deeply hurt if a close friend of mine of 35 years could not even spare 1/2 hour for a coffee when she is never ever around.

You don't value her or the friendship as much as you should, there should be room in your life for more than dh and dd, and old and special friends are hard to come by. The kind that would pick up the pieces if dh leaves one day.

If want to salvage this you need an honest conversation that starts and finishes with an apology and a promise you will commit more time to spending with her, and remind her how important she is to you. Own the fact everyone else has come first for too long, and there is room for her. This is on you to fix, and if you choose not to, then it really is your loss. Trusted friends spanning decades are rare and special and should be nurtured.

I've been in your friend's place sort of. A friend of mine was in my area for a week (still an hour drive away, but I was prepared to do the drive). I know it can be hard when staying with family to make outside plans but, in a week, I feel like, if she really wanted to, she could have found an hour or two to commit to. That wasn't what ended the friendship in the end, but it was a consideration when I jumped ship. I know she was upset but her actions at that point didn't feel like a real friend.

Is your friend prone to drama? I wonder whether she has wound herself up about you visiting her area and not seeing her (& fwiw OP I would have done the same as you and had I been your friend expected you to do the same as you did). She may not be able to tell you because she knows that saying it out loud highlights that she is making a big fuss that is undeserved. Maybe she meant you to notice she wasn’t in contact before the visit and for you to rush to see her to prove your friendship in some way.

If so there isn’t much you can do. You behaved reasonably, she won’t have a conversation about it so all you can do is remove yourself from the situation.

A week is different from less than 24 hours with a husband who isn’t keen on friend in tow and a specific task to complete as well.

And if it is that she should have mentioned it in advance rather than gone on a 5 day sulk before the visit.

I'm grateful for the different perspectives on this.

Meeting up hadn't been mentioned but my friend ghosted me five days before the trip was scheduled during which time either of us might have raised the subject if she hadn't ghosted me already. This is why I'm not sure if this is the cause of the problem. My friend doesn't even know whether I made the trip at all, I have a debilitating health condition which means it's hard for me to travel so it wasn't obvious that any planned trip would actually go ahead.

I ghosted a friend of 35 years because once again she got a new man in her life and put everything and everyone else on the back burner in favor of him and trying to integrate into his family.

Tired of being expendable in the same old pattern.

Yes, 24 hours is different and I'd understand you come for a reason and that's all you have time for. What ended the friendship in the end was that my child died and she was meant to be like a best friend, but didn't ask how I was at any stage during the first year. After the first anniversary I went through my Facebook friend list and removed anyone who fit that criteria.

My now ex best friend tells people this story, that once I met my partner i dumped her. The reality is completely different. I did not ghost her, I stopped talking to her after she physically assaulted me and then tried to manipulate me into thinking I had given her reason to do it and it was all my fault.

@lifeinthehills that is abhorrent. My friends baby died at 3 days old and she always says that not only did she lose her child she lost a number of friends because they couldn't be bothered with her when she was in the darkest time of her life. I am sorry you had to deal with losing a child and your friend in the same space of time.

@Blip I had similar to you. A friend of decades sent me a message ending our friendship but wouldn't disclose why. She sent me a message saying 'You went too far with me. I am not prepared to discuss why. Don't contact me.' So I didn't, haven't heard from her for 2 years and it has actually been a blessing. We had been on a night out the previous weekend with her and my DP and I wracked our brains about what I could have said to upset her. There was nothing. I was sober, she was drunk so I was well placed to remember. I posted on here and got some great advice. Good friends do not unilaterally decide to end a friendship with cryptic messages or block you from saying sorry/making amends. It is game playing and is no loss. Like a pp said, the disrespect is closure. My ex-friend had form for it so i should have been fore armed and even went as far to call her other best friends wife a c@*t. She wasn't a good person deep down, she was quite disordered from her childhood. I think whatever I unintentionally said or did was probably quite small and she used it as a 'reason' because she really was pissed off I had got my life together after a childhood sexual assault and then domestic abuse and was happy and settled - she loved to play the wounded healer but I didn't need that from her and it bruised her ego. Sometimes you have to think 'It's not me, it's them'.

@SafeMove Thank you. Sometimes I wonder if I was too harsh but she wasn't always that kind anyway. I was told she posted something about trying to be a good person but always failing in response. If she'd sent me a message, I'd have told her why, and maybe we could have worked it out.

As for your friend, a real friend would at least discuss why or tell you why, if a discussion couldn't solve anything. Some people are strange that way.

I think as well remind yourself of what your friend hasn't done for you. I just read a thread on here about a woman wanting to buy her best friend something for her hen do. Mine didn't even organise it. Just when you're feeling like it's your fault remind yourself that you're having a lucky escape

I think she would have realised with just five days to go to your visit that you were not going to ask her to meet up. She was protecting herself by ghosting you first. I would consider asking her if this is the reason for her silence? Is there any reason why you haven't called her even? It speaks volumes that you haven't reached out to her.

I am sorry op, but you don't sound much of a friend. You openly make your friends feel second best, and although most people are aware of family priorities, they do still spend time with them, invest time and energy sometimes put their friends first when the needs arises.

I would feel in her shoes, a friend in name only, and choose to spend my time with other friends that made me feel loved and valued, and had time for me.

I have this difficulty when I go down to London. I go down by train and don't hire a car so I'm on public transport and visit my best friends in Amersham and Ealing, and my late friend's Mum in Sheen.

Last time I went down with my daughter I contacted my friend in Amersham to meet up at Oxford Circus and she couldn't come. I've since found out she has never been on a tube or bus, she prefers to drive everywhere, and Oxford Street was a drive too far.

Her message does sound rather pointed and I think you'd need to be quite unobservant not to see that. It's almost incomprehensible that you could get a message from a lifelong friend saying 'To be honest, I'm just not ready to speak to you yet' and be completely oblivious as to the meaning. I'm almost left wondering if there's a huge gap in the story because that reply just doesn't have any expected context in relation to what you have revealed. She's either having some kind of breakdown or you're just not telling us the whole story. Could it be something that to you is such a tiny matter that it hasn't even occurred to you yet, but to her could be an enormous deal she thinks you would know has upset her?

That’s awful @lifeinthehills I’m so sorry. And yes a very good reason for ending a friendship

OP was doing the trip in under 24 hours, with a specific task to complete (i.e not a jolly) with a husband who friend doesn’t get on with, and has a health problem.

How on earth would she fit in socialising as well?

@lifeinthehills I'm so very sorry for your loss. It's very hard to bear when your friends are absent just when you need them the most.

After a big life event (death of relative) I had two basically best friends completely tiptoe out of my life. They just slowly stopped messaging (they don’t know each other, I had originally met them in different times in my life and didn’t mix as a group so no co-ordination between them). I was still meeting up with people, trying to socialise maybe 3 months later. They pre-emptively back-flipped out of there. One lives in the same area as me, has the whole time and has never reached out (after me trying), and she in particular was very sensitive and always had encouraged self improvement and being thoughtful to people. That’s what she was known for, people joked she was a bit sanctimonious and saintly but we’d known each other for so long and had had really good fun and similar interests.

It has been three years now so 🤷‍♀️ So strange as particularly with these two, I helped them through some really tough times and had been told I was their “friend in need” person who had really supported them. The saintly one, the second set of messages she sent after the death basically asked if I was over it yet. It was actually one of my “fun time friends” who was the most supportive. People can surprise you, in good ways and bad! But everyone’s different, don’t write people off due to a few bad apples and just keep moving forward

@teaandtoastwithmarmite I do think back to our previous conflict in the summer when my friend used very derogatory stereotypes about only children when I have an only child myself. I did say it was a hurtful and inaccurate stereotype that had been scientifically disproved (something along the lines of only children being selfish and unable to see the point of view of others and a few other unpleasant things as well - but she hugely doubled down and refused to apologise and said that the stereotypes were definitely accurate in her experience. I had to accept that there would be no apology and that my friend really did hold these hurtful opinions and would continue to air them with me even though I had told her they upset me.

So I chose to move on with the friendship and accept that we weren't going to agree about this subject and that my friend didn't care if I found that hurtful.

I have reached out to her now 5 or 6 times and maybe she does want me to tie myself in knots trying to win her back at any cost...but for me I needed her to tell me what was bothering her, see if we could work through it and if not to tell me she doesn't want to be friends anymore.

It may well be the case that I am not able to give her what she needs from the friendship any more and if so I just have to accept that. The podcast linked to earlier in the thread about "unfriending" did suggest that generally it's not just one thing that ends the friendship but that one thing is the final straw.

OP says the woman had said she doesn't want to talk to her. And you suggest OP doorsteps her?

No. Don't do this. Hard as it is she has ended your friendship, told you she doesn't want to talk to you and you have to accept that.

Thoughts, in no particular order:

1. People are weird
2. Dynamics in friendships are like undercurrents in water that can pull you off kilter or even kill the friendship
3. it is surprisingly rare that people are completely honest about what they value a relationship for
4. Single friends and married/paired-up friends need different things from a relationship
5. You need boundaries in friendships just as much as in romantic attachments.

@Backstreetsbackalrightdadada I'm sorry this happened to you. Does it still hurt at this point I wonder to look back at the friendships that were lost?