Good friendship gone bad

[DoubleSad]

I am in a pickle. I have a (supposedly) good friend who has to all intents and purposes dumped me for no apparent reason. We were very close in terms of almost daily contact of one kind or another (though in retrospect she did not always make herself available). For the past couple of months however, she has abruptly changed. She rarely calls, ignores any texts or emails that I send, refuses invitations and this is the hardest part for me, has seen me struggle with circumstances at home (we had building work over a number of weeks) and offers of help were mentioned but never carried through.

I don't know what to do. I invited her round with her partner on NYE and whilst HE said they would come she did the usual thing of ignoring the invitation and changing the subject when talk of Christmas and NY plans came up. Then on the night, no show, no text, no call, in fact no contact at all since. I've spent the last couple of months doing the right thing, making the usual approaches and I can't do any more. But I do want an explanation. What do I do?

The only explanation is probably the one you can give yourself, I think - that for whatever of her own reasons, she doesn't feel you and she are cut out to continue as friends, and (this is the important bit) she doesn't think you will understand (or even, maybe accept? though that is presumably unfair, as you sound so reasonable) her reasons.

So she is even more consciously avoiding the explanation to you, than she is avoiding the friendship, if that makes sense?

It's really sad, I know it is. To be honest, before now, and in separate situations (obviously) I've been her as well as I've been you (more often the latter than the former though).

That's why I'm pretty sure of the feelings. You won't I think get a closure from her that will really sort it out - you will have to try and make your own closure.

PS - I'm not your friend, I suddenly thought I sounded like I might be!

If you care about her and value the friendship then you need to speak to her about it - there may be other things going on that you are unaware of.

ask her directy what is going on.
you maynot like th answer but at least you will know where you stand

I feel like I'm in a similar situation DS, a good friend of over 20 years has gone AWOL on me.

we both work full time, have DC's, she seems to have time for everyone else except me. I think I just have to accept that I'm not important in her life anymore and that she is investing that time in people who are.

I feel very very sad about this, we have gone from daily conversations, nights out, when we were younger, which became daily then weekly emails, maybe one night out a year, as we grew older, got married and had children, which was fine by me as I realise we're both really busy, but the odd email and night out kept us in touch.

I made the effort to visit her to give DC's xmas presents, said she was disorganised so hadn't written cards for mine yet, and had presents unwrapped for them. Really didn't bother me, no contact over Christmas and the cards are yet to appear.

I text happy new year and nothing back.

Whenever the subject has been broached in the past it's always come down to work/family/life too busy.

But when you're told by someone else that this person you've been friends with for that long, who is godparent to your child can meet people they work with for cuppa outside of work hours and yet you don't even warrant the couple of minutes for an email it hurts, it bloody hurts.

So, I like you, have decided I can do no more, I don't want an explanation as I'll get the same old same old.

I will move on and if and when she gets in touch I will be there for her, but in the meantime I will invest my time and energy into DH and the DC's and the friends who want to be part of my life.

hope this helps

elfsmum xx

hiya doublesad - if you really want to know - call her and ask - I in the last year have done the same a friend I am embarrassed to say was using me as an alibi constantly so I decided to dump her without saying anything but the really sad thing I suppose is that she has never once phoned and asked why - think she probably know - I do still get the odd text from her which I usually respond to but never in a chatty way - some days I miss her like hell and others I think you know what I have lived for over a year without you in my life - it doesnt matter - sorry that does not help you really does it but if you really want to know dont email dont text phone her or turn up on her doorstep and ask

It's not fair how women rally care about these things so much and men don't. They don't care if their mates don't call for ages, don't come to a party etc etc

I think if you talk to her about it then things might change? However, I lean towards what Bink is saying. This happened to me with a few friends (coincided with me moving house and getting engaged, they were all single) and I got to the point of dumping them because I was so sick of making efforts and feeling let down. When I was upset about it, I sent a pretty heartfelt email saying how I felt etc, then I felt like an idiot for sending it because nothing changed.

I then made a decision to make one last positive effort to let me know where I stood. I sent a text saying "lets meet up on such and such a date" to those friends. I got replies saying "oh, really busy then but must arrange something else though". So I finally replied saying "Ok, well, I will leave it totally up to you guys, just let me know when you are free".

I heard nothing and decided to completely move on, this was about 18 months ago. I no longer keep contact at all and I feel so much better for it to be honest. I get included in the very occasional forwarded joke email but delete without reading. I don't need them in my life anymore and am happy with that. The remaining friends I have are great and now I can see how I was wasting my time in the past when my efforts were not reciprocated.

I hope you can sort it out, but if not, then it is not the end of the world. It means she wasn't as good a friend as you thought.

Good luck.

Maybe I'm way off the mark, but OP says:
I invited her round with her partner on NYE and whilst HE said they would come..
So where was she at the time? Either jut standing there ignoring the conversation, or is it a case of you sometimes speak to the partner when she is not around. Could she suspect an attraction ?

I had this happen with someone ... never got an explanation. I should have asked at the time, but didn't, and now, four years later, I think I would just feel silly asking. (We still see each other around.)

I had this happen too- a neighbour- we were very close then one day she just stopped phoning and ignored me in the road- for years. I never knew why and was deeply hurt. I toyed with writing to her and just turning up on the doorstep to ask why- but didn't. We have both now moved- same town though- and I know she would still ignore me if we met.

PLEASE if you are unable to continue a friendship, please try to let your friend down gently, or try to behonest and say it just doesn't work for you- or give a reason. I know that might be so hard, but it is much harder for the "left friend" who can spend years wondering what they said or did that was "wrong".

p.s- no advice- either you need to confront her, or accpet it- I would confront her, as I stillwonder about my ex-friend!!!

It's sad but friendships that you think will last do fizzle out. After having dd my 3 closest friends drifted off - 1 moved abroad but the other two had no interest in my child or myself. I found this very upsetting. Though efforts were made eventually I couldn't be arsed to always do the running. One of them has since reappeared as her relationship broke down last year but I am not prepared to be used again.

I do understand about wanting to confront ... but my concern is you might be even almost more hurt by the confrontation, if it is futile, as I think it might be. I suspect that if you get anything at all, you will get that old chestnut of "It's not you, it's me" - which will just not close things.

Oh, unless what you are looking for is just an acknowledgement of your hurt, I guess it would do that. But it wouldn't be an answer.

This has happened a few times to me, like bink both ways. I don't have much to add to what has been said, except to say that (and in a way this has been said already so excuse me guys) it probably has more to do with her than you. One of my close friends has just gone really silent on me, but I know that she is going through a tough time at the moment, and while I am sad that she doesn't want my help and support, which would be hers readily, i realise that she needs some space and has to work through things. Also I think in a way I am a bit of the problem for her, I know she really wants a family, but is not in a position to start one, where as I am starting on that adventure. Perhaps there is something about you that she finds hard to deal with, maybe her relationship is not great, or job or something, and if yours is great then she might find it hard to talk to you about it. Just a thought!

This might be hurtful to think about, but is it possible that the two of you were reading the friendship differently?

I have a friend who is a very good listener and gives loyal support to all her friends. Sometimes this ends up with the 'friends' simply phoning her up, going on about their problems, then saying 'I'm so glad I have you, you're great. Bye'.

My friend has stopped seeking out these people who are a drain on her energy and give nothing in return. Yet those friends might well think 'I don't understand. We always have such a great conversation when we meet'. Maybe not realising that it wasn't such a great conversation on the other side.

This is just one possible explanation so it is not meant as any kind of accusation etc.

Hmmm, thinking about all this more ... I have cut off a friend like this, myself, over the last few years. I didn't take the decision lightly, but I just couldn't cope with her company any more. I found her negative and judgemental.

And, to be fair, if she confronted me, I would probably have just lied and claimed to have been too busy.

Me too nqc. I had a friend I simply didn't want to see any more. It wasn't worth trying to explain why to her so I just saw much less of her. Her company just ground me down.

To be fair, I don't think there's a helpful (e.g. constructive criticism) way to say 'Jesus Christ you are the most sodding negative woman I have ever met in my life, if I spend another minute with you I will throttle you'.

Um ... not that I ever wanted to say that to anyone ...

I ended a long term friendship, there were many factors but ultimately I felt we had grown apart so much and I didn't like the person she had grown into. I started off avoiding her but when she asked why I was being funny with her I told her straight. There was no 'I'm sorry you feel like that' or anything, just a refusal to accept the problem was anyone's but mine, although I had substantial grievances with her behaviour towards me.

A few months later she got in touch but in such a way as to say 'have you still got it wrong?'.

Since then she is on my christmas card list but that is it.

If you think you want to save the friendship then tell her so, tell her you don't know what is changing and would like to put it right if possible. If there is a gripe be prepared to take on board what she is saying, even if you don't see it that way.

That's just my experience of it. Might help you, might not.

Thank you everyone - it is really helpful to get some other opinions on this. I accept that not you can have different views of a friendship but I don't believe that I have changed in the 2.5 years that we've been friends. If anything, she is the one who comes along with all the family dramas and crises and I do a lot, and I mean a lot of listening. I have lived through her revamping her house and had to admire every last purchase. As soon as I had work done on mine, she wasn't interested in the least. As far as I was concerned our friendship was about sharing interests (gossip, makeup, books, films), hanging out together, having someone to go to the pub or theatre with as well as to sound off about niggles with family and kids. Funny though, that she has no, and I mean no, long-term friends, no real neighbourhood friends and that she's cut off more friends and family than I've had hot dinners. Her modus operandi seems to be "you piss me off, I just don't speak to you, return your calls or emails and hopefully you go quietly". I never thought it would happen to me and it has and it's horrible, not least because the DPs and DCs are friends too. I have shed more than a few tears and now I just want to do the right thing to make myself feel better and concentrate, as one of you said, on my real friends, who I might have neglected whilst I basked in her glow. By the way, there's no thing between her DP and me - it's just that she had left before he did and we were talking about New Year's. He was really positive and enthusiastic but in the end I knew they wouldn't come. On the night my DP asked him to the pub, and he came but gave some excuse about her being busy at home cooking (!)
Thanks for everything xxx

Hi,

this is happening to me right now, friend of 20 years and my bridesmaid..thought we would be friends forever. Have invited her partner and her and baby over for lunch and she didnt even text me back to accept/decline. Then sent a new year text suggesting we meet, then called her and we have got a lunch planned. Problem is I feel as though I have done alot of the running now, soI am planning to tell her that will leave it up to her to call me now...

The thing that hurts is that we haven't fallen out or anything ... yet I get this feeling she just doesnt want me in her life anymore.. very hurtful . I have plenty of other friends but none that go back to the playground and none that I have such a history with. But I guess if it is no longer two sided than it is time to let go...though I know that I will always wonder throughout my life what exactely I did that was so wrong...it also makes you wary of getting close to people again as you can be so easily dumped

Is she GM to your child DS? If so I think she really owes you an explanation.

I can't understand why some people agree to being Godparents only to shirk the responsibility. You have my sympathies.

She's not godmother, no CrushWithEyeliner.

I've been dropped like a hot potato. A girl I went to school with, kept wanting to go obscure plays.. I had no interest, but we did still get on well, could have a laugh, knew the same people from home... I am not the philestine she would have liked to believe though, just, if going to theatre at all, would prefer to be the one picking what it is.

I had children and she went out of her way to assume I had changed. And become boring. I was stupidly trying to prove I wasn't a philestine, wasn't boring, wasn't a one dimensional mother.

Now, I'm glad we're not in touch anymore.

Long time lurker on Mumsnet, but first time poster - had to post when I saw this thread & realised it is exactly what I'm going through at the moment too!

I also have a very dear friend, who I've been friends with for many years and who is a godmother to my son, who also appears to have ditched me, as she just isn't returning my calls or emails. It's so odd, as I just don't know why, and so have been racking my brain about it in case I've done something to upset her, although I really don't think I have, as I'm very fond of her and would never intentionally upset her. So now I'm really worried about her, in case she's having a horrific time for some reason and needs some support. I do know she's extremely busy, as she has an impressive career as well as being a fantastic mother, so of course understand that it could just be that she is so busy - but she has always been really good about staying in touch before, and it has now been several months, so unfortunately I think it is more than that.

It's very sad, as I thought we were very good friends and would be friends for life - which of course is why I asked her to be godmother to my son, to show her how much I valued her as a friend (perhaps I'm wrong but I always think it's quite an honour to be asked to be a GM). I also thought we had a pretty equal friendship (neither of us being remotely "needy" or anything like that), based on shared interests, values, ideas, etc. I certainly didn't notice any undercurrents that she felt our friendship was failing, so I just can't understand what could suddenly have occurred to change things. Not being given the chance to know why she is apparently upset/cross with me, means I can't defend myself against any possible misunderstandings that perhaps have arisen.

It's all extremely upsetting, particularly as I have had a very difficult time myself recently for several reasons, and so this is probably getting me down more than it would usually. Hopefully she'll get back in contact with me (and my son, her godson), but, if she doesn't, then I'm really going to miss her & will forever be wondering what on earth happened. It seems such a waste of what I thought was a good friendship.

So to all those above who have said the same, I can really sympathise with you all. It's not a nice situation to be in, particularly if you've been good friends with someone for a long time.

its really upsetting when you think you value a relationship more than the other person/people.

For me i do what i have to , to ensure i am in the right. one i am certain of that, then i leave it up to them to initiate the contacts.