Help needed to end a friendship

[Lucylongcat]

I am going to sound like a horrible person here, I know.

I have a friend I made when our children were at nursery. Our children are now at secondary and are no longer friends. The mum wants to meet up at least once per half term. I found it really hard to deflect invitations for my daughter to meet up with hers, but switched it to the pair of us going out for brunch instead, as my daughter felt obligated, but really didn't want to attend.

The thing is, I dread going for these brunches. She is a lovely woman and has been very thoughtful, but we don't have anything in common. I would never be the one to instigate the meetings and I would always end up feeling guilty when she pushed for them. She'd often comment about how it had been so long, etc. I really am not a brunch kind of person and would much rather spend any free time I have with my nuclear family, sad as that may sound.

We've gone six months without seeing each other, and I've ignored the last few texts, feeling worse and worse each time I do. I know it isn't fair to keep ignoring her, but how can I say that I really don't want to meet up anymore? I've written out a few texts and then not sent them, on more than one occasion. I can't see anything that I can write that isn't going to make her feel horrible.

Please help me write a gentle response that gets me out of having to continue with a friendship I really don't want. Anything has to be better than sending nothing!

But she hasn't said that and the OP doesn't want to be a friend to her in general. I'm sure the OP wouldn't refuse to help her in an emergency but the only alternatives were keep making excuses which wasn't working, ignore her which is shitty, or meet her, which she didn't want to do. I think this is quite well handled. Reasonably clear but enough kindness if they cross paths again.

I think it's SM that makes this difference as you wouldn't keep knocking on someone's door or calling their house phone. My mum had several 'mum friends' whom I think just drifted off with no bad feelings as there was just no common ground apart from kids who didn't remain friends in their own right. They're on good terms as they go to the same local groups (WI or yoga or whatever it is) but I think she would have felt a regular, indefinite expectation of a meetup was a bit of a weight.

I agree. Better to be clear about binning her off, but OP didn’t have the balls to do it.

It was depressing - the most depressing bit being how many posters thought it was a good idea. A kind of human drawer clear-out.

Sometimes people drift apart, or fall out, but “giving them the friendship sack” as a sort of administrative tidy-up is “Me First” culture taken to the extreme.

The problem with this message (as it seems you have found out) is that it makes it look like there is something wrong and there is something for her to worry about. It’s quite cruel because you want to cut her off but she is probably left with thinking something has happened and worrying about you if she is the caring sort. You have probably put yourself more in her mind now because she’s going to be left wondering what’s wrong.

Saying she is kind and thoughtful but you don’t want her to be worried is like saying because you are kind and thoughtful what’s happening is something she would be worried about if she knew.
I think it has opened you up to getting text messages regularly checking you are ok and asking if there is anything she can do. It’s cruel and put you in a victim position, when actually you are the one causing her discomfort. That’s not nice. Saying you were busy for the foreseeable would have been kinder.

As far as I can see you have already ghosted her, so I don't see any merit in contacting her now with a weird message that will only have her thinking "Why did you randomly contact me after six months to send that?!"

In all honesty this message would annoy me less than most of the other suggestions, because it would make me laugh and I would feel that it was truthful.

Well I agree it’s better expressed than implied!

I find this thread interesting as I don’t think I’ve ever had to end a friendship with someone who I was previously friendly with and was basically a nice sociable person because they wanted to keep in touch over brunch every six months or so. Obviously if the person was being really intense and texting every day then I’d feel differently but I don’t get the sense this is the case with your friend OP.

I’ve occasionally ended friendships if I felt the person had treated me badly for any reason. However I try not to prioritise my immediate family and best friends to the extent that I’d be lonely if the marriage broke up or when the kids moved away. To me it’s worth keeping people in my life if they are genuine and want to be around for me.

Meant to add I wasn’t trying to say you need to stay friends with someone you don’t like OP more that for me there would be a reason why I faded it out - ie they stood me up or were really competitive. I struggle to relate to your post as you haven’t really identified the need to close off the friendship. Appreciate we are all different though.

Agree with this 100 percent. I don’t get it. Plus I spend nearly all my spare time with nuclear family. To me it’s so important to have relationships with people outside of my nuclear family.

Agree with those that say this thread is wholly depressing.
I don't get why you feel the need to end this friendship when you hardly ever see the woman anyway.
And you keep saying how nice she is yet can't cope with spending a couple of hours with her every six months or so.

Do people really think like this? And spend time "decluttering" their friendships?

One day your perfect nuclear family might implode and then, believe me, you will be glad to have lots of friends to turn to.

I agree, ghosting is shitty behaviour and there’s no reason at all not to send a kind message like OP’s second one that doesn’t attribute blame but lays a firm boundary in a non-hurtful way.

It’s awful when one person likes a friend more than the other likes them, but it happens. The difficulty for a lot of ppl however is that some ppl are crap at instigating meetings, but genuinely like them, they just get used to the other person texting first. This places that person in an awkward position of - do they continue doing this, or are they trying to maintain a friendship with someone who doesn’t actually want to meet up but don’t know how to say no. They then stop messaging them and the other person is confused as to why there’s no contact. (I get that it shouldn’t be the responsibility of one person to maintain a friendship, but maybe that’s what ppl, like the OP is describing, think is going on and they don’t mind doing that.)

Rejection always sucks and friendships can be just as poignant and emotional as romantic relationships in that regard.

I’m glad you’re being kind to her, OP. She would probably rather still see you and will be confused and hurt eventually when she realises you are never going to message her again, but it’s the kindest option.

I'm glad there are increasing numbers of posters that recognise that this is completely unreasonable. I'm sorry to say it OP, but you sound awful. There's a real gen-Z style entitlement here and you are quite obviously older than that. You say you have nothing in common with this woman - you're both human beings, that's all it takes for an hour over coffee every 6 months.

I think this woman has had a lucky break. I hope she finds better friends in her life.

Edit for rogue apostrophe!

Yes only send it if she messages you again

Well I know now don't I - why didn't you just tell me straight years ago that you no longer wanted a friendship instead of stringing me along!

That’s horrific. Imagine receiving that!

There truly are some strange, strange people that post on here. Who sends someone a message to say I don’t want to be your friend any more?! I remember doing that when I was at primary school. There are some really selfish and entitled people in this world and I find that really depressing.

Bah wasted a post. Teach me to read the full thread.

It's not strange. It's not dragging someone along and pretending to like them when you don't.

Sometimes it's more awkward to meet up to do something like that!

I'd rather know than be ghosted.

It's not strange to ending it kindly rather than a crappy slow fade which leaves the other person feeling shite and confused.

While I agree that I'd rather know than be ghosted, I do find it depressing that someone can't be arsed to meet up even a couple of times a year. But at least these threads do me make me realise I didn't do anything wrong with people who disappeared.

This

I genuinely hope you're never in the situation where you discover the "friends" you thought you had, turned out not to be anything of the kind and no one checks in. She sounds like a decent sort, and no message you could send with the objective of ending it could be taken kindly or well. I think this is far more about you than her. By all means, be as available or not as you want, but just know that any sort of communication you send that is direct or oblique is not really kind. It's shit.

If anything you spell it out here - your friendship was predicated on your kids. That's not friendship. I guess one day she will figure it out for herself. In the meantime why don't you find out what's going on for her and why she might want to continue what she thought was a genuinely felt relationship and not one where you feel she is a pain?

I think these should be the things called situationships. If you’re ‘friends’ only bc you have children who are actual friends, then it’s not really a friendship is it. It’s conditional. A convenience. You obviously got something out of it to agree to meet in the first place for so many years. But you clearly weren’t really friends as they genuinely care about each other and their welfare. That would warrant meeting a few times a year, even if you couldn’t be bothered, to make sure the other person is ok. You’re not trying to end a real friendship. It’s really sad the other woman believes it to be one though.

I agree with poster who said social media (and technology in general I believe) has drastically changed the way we communicate with one another. However, I disagree with a lot of the posters on here who feel that once a friendship of any kind has been established, you’re obligated to keep contact with that person for the rest of your life unless they do something terribly wrong.

People come in and out of our lives for different reasons and ending friendships is as normal as ending romantic relationships nowadays. Years ago, people wouldn’t keep knocking on your door if you didn’t answer but the convenience of text messages means they will keep texting even when getting no positive reply. That’s why people like the OP are forced to ‘break up’ with her friend. It doesn’t make her a horrible person.

I’ve been ghosted by someone I thought would be one of my best friends forever so I know how painful it can be. But years later, I’m no longer angry or upset about it because I accept that she had her reasons, and I don’t want to be in a relationship with someone who doesn’t want to have a relationship with me.