If you are someone who doesn’t reply…

[EmeraldRoulette]

… or constantly says “we must meet up” but doesn’t mean it..

I’m interested to know what you think about this.

There’s been a couple of posts on here recently that have got me thinking a lot about this. Also, I was listening to a podcast bye Mel Robbins and she actually said something like “if you never hear from me, it doesn’t mean I don’t care about you. If you have a crisis, you can call me. I would show up at your funeral”.

the last one in particular really pissed me off because frankly there are people who I wouldn’t want at my funeral now! And they would expect to turn up and do all the fake tears and say “oh my God, I am so shocked” when they couldn’t even be bothered to reply to messages.

I don’t know why these people turn up to funerals. Do they think the food will be good?!

With regards to the former, it sounds like a complete copout. If you have not replied to my messages for ages and I’ve given up messaging, how on earth do you expect to be the person I call if I need help?! I presume they don’t really expect that.

And perhaps this is just something people tell themselves to feel better? And I suppose it makes for a good podcast!

So I wouldn’t normally take it too seriously, but I see so much of it on here, I would be really interested to hear from people who feel the way she does. Is it a question of just casually caring about people like in the sense that I know a few people working in the local supermarket and I chat to them and I would be very sorry if something happened to them, but I don’t consider them to be my friends. Part of the local community for sure.

Is that how people see friends now?

Completely agree OP. My sister is a non-replier. I was just saying to her (in person) tonight, ‘we’re getting to a point where everyone is busier than ever - jobs, kids, parents getting older’ and she cuts me off going ‘yes everyone is just too busy to check in’ and I said ‘that’s exactly why we need to check in with people, and keep in touch’.

It’s just 2 different schools of thought and I don’t really understand my sister’s side at all tbh. I feel like no one ever thinks about me and I am always thinking about everyone else and checking in. It takes 2 seconds to shoot off a quick message to people. Everyone is busy and actually, everyone is ALWAYS on their phones (I know for a fact the people I am talking about are always on their phones). They can all reply, but don’t. It’s a case of ‘if they wanted to, they would’.

Friends are two way efforts. Yes have friends under pressure elder parents or other things but not nice leaving u hanging/no reply. This could be days. I feel if people want to see you they will.

My sister is incredibly busy and always replies to me. I am reminded of that old saying "If you want a thing done, ask a busy person to do it."

You have a very specific perspective of friendships which don’t mirror the ones you value.

Many of my friendships (proper ones as opposed to superficial ones) may have started with socializing and regular contact but now are about less frequent but more meaningful conversations, being there when we need eachother etc

Superficial friendships would be more about meeting up and socializing and I don’t have much in the way of SM so I wouldn’t really have friends on there

How can you fight tooth and nail and 'be there in a heartbeat' if you are ignoring their messages? Genuinely?

What if the other person is really struggling with something, reaches out with a message without detailing what's going on over text (lots of people don't want to pour their heart out in a message, and certainly not to friends who ignore messages).

If you've ignored someone repeatedly how are you 'there in a heartbeat?'

You aren't.

You've made that clear with your behaviours.

Hate these narcissistic declarations of true friendshp from people who cba.

I see posters are saying that they don’t reply but would still be there in a crisis. How would your friends know that? surely after a period of time they assume they are unwanted? So if they’re alone in hospital with no one to visit, they’re not going to call and ask you for help. To me that seems entirely logical. Why would I call someone for help if they haven’t replied to me for ages?

And yes...absolutely this. The friend I mentioned has said "I know I don't always text back but call me anytime day or night and I will drop everything for you, hun. You're my ride or die!"

Well...I was close to death in hospital and it took 5 weeks before I actually saw you, love and you ignored me for most of that time!

I'd never feel I could call a bad texter in a crisis...if they don't have 30 secs to confirm that "yes next Tuesday at 2.30 is great,
no need to bring anything" within the space of a week then why on earth would I feel showing up on their doorstep at 10pm if (God forbid) DH died and I was in pieces would be appropriate? I'd go to someone reliable and available who doesn't constantly ignore me.

A lot of that time I think it's just a platitude said to make themselves feel like they aren't an unkind person.

Yep

It's also very DARVO - "oh, but I'd be there in a heartbeat if you needed me". Instead of the much more honest "you aren't a priority to me so I don't make time for you"

No idea why people struggling with accepting the latter about themselves, it's perfectly ok to have friends that you get on with but wouldn't move heaven or earth for.

It proves my point people are not sincere now at all. We busy busy busy. Ghosting is too easy now. I got blocked by a friend because things didnt go her way. They are not people you want be around. But will have sm posts up friends are everything. Lol.

I don't reply for many reasons but not because I don't care.

Sometimes a text from a person can feel like the straw to break the camel's back.

1. I'm easily overwhelmed.

2. I want to give people my full attention but I often don't have room in my small, overloaded brain.

3. I'm scared of not being able to give the other person what they need.

4. I instinctively avoid neediness from others in order to protect myself.

How is ‘hi Laura! How are you doing? Hope X event went well’ needy? Don’t know why I’m bothering to ask actually as maybe this post is needy 😄 conversation is dead it seems.

Agree on the painful insincerity of “I’ll ignore you because I’m such a busy anxious fascinating conundrum of a person, but I’d be there in a heartbeat if you need me!” It’s bullshit, and rather narcissistic.

However we do need to tune into our friends’ rhythms of communication rather than demand they jump to our perceived schedules. But if someone isn’t there for you when truly needed and doesn’t respond for ages, it is what it is, they don’t care enough about the friendship to nurture it.

It’s like saying I love my house plants! And then never watering them. Well, what does this abstract love mean, then?

Mel Robbins has admirable vivacity and drive, but she is, also, full of shit 😁

I’ve been evaluating my friendships recently

I now manage my own expectations, and I match the other person’s energy. So for friends who reply/ are reliable I treat them with the same respect and never let them down. But if a “friend” is flaky I’m not going to bust a gut to reply to all their messages, make all our plans without ever cancelling.

I need some friends in my life who I know I can rely on / connect with emotionally and who I know if I send some ridiculous banter on WhatsApp they will reply (within say 48 hours or so, assuming they aren’t on holiday or in the midst of a crisis)

Other people can still be my friends, but they won’t be my inner-circle

Read “Friendaholic” by Elizabeth Day

I’m smiling at all the people who have time to come on MN and tell complete strangers why they don’t have time to reply, yet can’t find the time to send a quick message to their supposed friends.
It takes literally 30 seconds to reply to a message if you can’t spare that time they are not really your friend.

Poster saying “Sometimes a text from a person can feel like the straw to break the camel's back.”

I am genuinely shocked to think that a text from a friend might feel that way. Thank you for sharing though - it’s good to get perspectives that I hadn’t thought of. I don’t want to make anyone feel bad.

If we have a creative writing prize here then it has been won 100 times over by this from @PerkyMintDeer “then get something as far fetched as "yeah, we've all had small pox and next doors two week old deleted all the contacts so we had to wait for the tornado to pass to get to the Highlands to visit the only O2 shop which deals with this iphone as it's a special edition".

Thank you for making me smile. Your writing is brilliant!

Re-Mel Robbins, I’ve never actually listened to a full podcast of hers. I listened to one about productivity and some recommended shorts are coming up.

The point about the funeral, I hadn’t thought perhaps she’s coming from an environment where it’s a Very Bad Thing not to attend a funeral. But if not in that situation, it puzzles me that someone would attend a funeral if they didn’t care about the person while they were living.

I am not talking about needy whiny messages myself. I am talking about casual messages like "Hey want to go see a movie?" which need only a simple response. Or "Did you have a good holiday?"
I don't see those as needy myself.

Honestly I think this is one of those things that is impossible to distill to a set of rules.

I have a bunch of friends who I just know are My Friends. We go through phases of disappearing, being out of contact, busy etc - because life is overwhelming (no one has anxiety, we’re just busy!). I also know they would absolutely be there for me if I needed them, and I would absolutely prioritise them if they were struggling. And yes I would absolutely expect them to be sad if I died and go to the funeral (not that I care about people grieving me but would get it!).

I have other…friends…I like them, we are friendly, but the relationship is more situational and superficial. They rarely survive the phase of life that we’re in contact for. I regret not being closer to some of them - they’re great people, but for whatever reason we just didn’t build enough emotional ballast before life intervened.

on MN a lot of these posts seem to be about the second type of friendship. I don’t know how you distinguish between the two - but I’m very clear on the difference for me. I appreciate and honor those who are in the second category, but it is different - and I guess the problem is if you think you have Friendship 1 ans your friend thinks its category 2. I don’t know why this asymmetry happens

I genuinely can't decide about this.

My two closest' friends have both sort of drifted off in recent months, and it hurts.

In my head I know there's some actual reasons behind it - single parents, caring responsibilities, bad time at work, didn't want to discuss it, etc - but in my head the narrative I spin is all about me.

Why don't they want to talk to me, why does nobody want me, and I guess there's elements of both sides at play.

I would show up for both of these people without blinking; I don't know I can say the same for them now.

@stealthbanana From what I see here a lot of us got put in category two as part of a “my little family” thing in the last year or two. Which is a bit of a shock when you’ve both really shown up for each other in the in the past. Also not talking about people with little children. It happened to me with single childfree friends as well.

@FourToTheMFingFloor That was a great song!

But honestly, you say you care but what is the point of caring if the other person can't tell?
Caring is of no benefit whatsoever if it is not followed up with actions. You cannot care from a distance and opt out.

The 'being scared you can't give people what they need' feels like a cop out. What if you ask what they need? What if you are able to give them 5 or 10% of what they need? What if that's actually enough?

Sometimes we can all go into our shells a bit and get stuck but really, we need to get over ourselves a wee bit too.

Sometimes people can just have a lot on. It’s almost school holidays and I know a few teachers and people that work in higher education. So now everyone is going to be free and I’m trying to arrange six meet ups, these are all independent of each other and three require travelling a decent distance. They all have other commitments as well, kids back from uni and some still have elderly parents, we have MIL stay for a week every year, end of July as DH birthday. She was also a teacher and as well as birthday only time she could come up easily.

For me it's that I don't really recognise any connection between sending messages as a method of communication and my relationship with someone.

If someone is my friend or family then I truly value that relationship. I will cherish spending time with them, I will care about their life, I will do whatever they need when they need help, I will show up to important times in their life, I will send thoughtful gifts for occasions, when we are together I will be fully present.

But I frequently don't reply to messages. Messages are just words that appear on my phone. I know they have a name at the top but I don't feel any connection to that person from that message. My brain will read it and pretty much straight away it'll be forgotten.

I don't have the enthusiasm or inclination to maintain relationships written electronically. I'll do the basic required to facilitate seeing someone in person, so that'll be a message (more likely a call) to check what day/time we are meeting. But I have no interest at all in the "how are you/did you have a nice holiday/how was that thing/etc" typed conversations.

So yes, I won't reply to your chat which means it might be months perhaps more that we aren't in touch, but if you call me with a crisis I'll still drop everything and drive overnight to help you.

@HoHoHoliday This post is about the people who there isn’t a cat’s chance in hell of actually seeing them in person.

The candid thoughts and expressions on this thread are helping me - a lot. I do need to get out of my own head and be more responsive to my friends. Genuine thank you to all posters for this.

I think perhaps I misunderstood yesterday. It seems you and the majority of posters are talking about texts that have plans, and with people you rarely see.

I was talking generally about messages. I need to reply to a message from a friend from Friday evening - I just haven’t got round to it yet. But I will; and I’ve already got plans to see her on Monday. She knows I like her, she’s not left wondering if I’ve ghosted her or anything of the sort.

I’d never not reply to plans or a text with a question that needed actioning. I’m just not quite as good with the general chatty ones that need a bit of thought. The one from Friday asks for potty training advice and mentions feeling a bit left out by a mutual friend, so needs some thought to reply.