I Did A Thing is our weekly advice column where the Her Campus editorial team helps you out when you ruin your own life (hey, we’ve been there). Email advice@hercampus.com for any and everything you need help with. We’ll answer you (anonymously!) on hercampus.com so we can all learn, together. We’ve got your back.
@concerned&confused: So me and my best friend and others planned a trip to Vegas for her birthday earlier this year. But life started getting in the way and I realized that I might not be able to go, but I was to afraid to tell them because I didn’t want to let my friends down. I talked to my other friend and she told me not to force myself to go if I can’t afford it, and I was at the point where I was paying my dad rent and would get kicked out if I didn’t. I told my best friend this, and she said that I have to go because if not, the price will go up for everyone. I told her I’m really sorry, I can’t go, if I go I will get kicked out – and that was the last time I talked to her. I don’t know what to do or how to reach out to her. I texted her happy birthday and let her know that whenever she’s ready I’m here to talk, and she also unfriended me on Facebook. The thing is: I do a lot for my friends. I buy them food, movie tickets – if we want to go to a spa I groupon it for the both us. I’ve done so much more, and I never ask for anything in return, but because I can’t do that one thing I’m bad person. What should I do? Was I wrong in not going? I feel like I lost my best friend, and we’ve been friends for 9 years. I didn’t think this would happen to us.
@helpmehc: First of all, take a minute (or several) and breathe. It totally sucks that you couldn’t make it to your bestie’s birthday party, but you need to take a second and realize that you had no control over this situation. Regardless of how much we micromanage our lives, we can’t predict the future–just like we can’t prevent life from f*cking up our trip to Vegas (or our freshly done makeup for that matter). If your bestie can’t realize that life is chaotic, then you might need be better off enjoying your own personal time or finding a new bestie, to be honest.
We get it: Thinking of any indefinite split with a close friend seems harsh, especially when you’ve been close for nine years. IMO, it sounds like your bestie kind of isn’t your bestie. From a bystander’s perspective, it seems like she might be exploiting your generosity, and now she’s upset because she had to spend some extra change on the hotel room. And when you couldn’t give her something that she wanted at the time she wanted it (in this case, y’all’s collective trip to Vegas), she got passive-aggressive and ghosted you. What’s worse, is she made you feel bad for it, when you really shouldn’t feel bad at all.
Maybe we’re missing out on something here, and she’s currently going through her own life-induced-stresses. If you feel comfortable enough and you want to give your relationship another shot, try to reach out to a mutual friend and see if they can set up a sit down between you two. This way, you can both have an organized environment to talk it out from your respective perspectives. If your friend isn’t willing to at least give you the courtesy to explain yourself (and vice versa), then you might want to find a new #1 friend and a productive self-care regime (because you need to amp up your mental health and de-stress, STAT, and there’s no shame in that). After all, if she can’t recognize that you went through a stressful situation (i.e. almost getting kicked out) and she wants to retcon nine years of friendship because of it, then that’s her MO. For now, you can only focus on you and not how other people react to you.