Romantic breakups are bad, but friendship breakups are worse.
The last time me and my ex-best friend hung out, it was one of the few days of the year that South Florida wasn’t humid and disgusting. The air at the beach smelled like salt and the sand was warm under our feet even though the sixty-degree weather kept us cool. The ocean glittered in front of us — a deep blue that contrasted the light sky. It was gorgeous. That day started with us packing a picnic in the early morning; it ended with a paragraph-long text in which she told me that she didn’t want to be my friend anymore.
The details of why she chose to end our friendship aren’t relevant. Essentially, she felt that I wasn’t prioritizing her enough. At face value, this seems like a valid complaint, but it came with no warning after three years of friendship in which I helped her with her homework, offered her emotional support whenever she fought with her family or her boyfriend, and countless other gestures. Granted, these are all actions that are normal and expected in a friendship, but I’m only listing them to show that I had done a lot for her, and I hadn’t expected anything in return.
I’m sure that you’ve had a similar argument with a past friend; I know so many people — especially women — who give so much of themselves in friendships only to be discarded without a second thought. The end of this friendship made me feel utterly worthless. My thought process for a couple months was this: If I did all of that and she still didn’t want to be my friend, then I clearly wasn’t enough. And if I wasn’t enough, I needed to become enough so that none of my other friends would leave me like that. On some level, I felt used. The timing of this text coincided with the end of the college application cycle, and I had edited almost all her essays for her. I reconsidered my value as a friend and a person. If she didn’t want me, who would? I didn’t think I’d find another friendship as rewarding as ours. I felt blindsided — we had just spent the entire day together, and I thought that we had a fun time. It seemed like at one second, we were playing in the water like kids and the next, she was texting me using proper punctuation to drop me. I already have issues with abandonment. I’m terrified that I won’t ever be good enough to make my loved ones stay in my life. The end of our friendship worsened this fear tenfold.
None of my past romantic breakups affected me as much as the end of my friendship with this person did. It was harder for me, because friendship is uniquely intimate. We censor ourselves to an extent with romantic partners. Until a certain milestone, (three months, the first time, etc.) we are putting up our most attractive front to make ourselves desirable for another person. Friendships are different in that it’s easier to be vulnerable in a friendship. We’re not trying to be cute or sexy — we just are. I automatically feel comfortable with my friends. I don’t hesitate to show them all sides of myself. It hurt that my ex-friend had seen all of my personality over the course of three years and still decided that I wasn’t good enough for her. The loss of others is a universal experience. We’ve all felt this way, but there’s not much conversation about how we move on.
I got over it through a lot of communication. I wrote countless letters to her as I cycled through grief and anger. Most importantly, I felt my way through it. When waves of sadness came because I had just lost an important part of my life, I let myself mope and cry. When my sadness turned to rage, I let myself rant and scream to my remaining friends. I wrote scathing diary entries. My family heard about all my feelings. I didn’t censor myself or hold back my worst thoughts. I didn’t let her positive qualities outweigh the fact that she mistreated me. We’re often told that we must be “mature” about the loss of partners and friends. We aren’t supposed to be vehemently angry, and we’re not allowed to talk badly of them. We’re told to be neutral and polite — to “be the bigger person.” I don’t think this is the best message to send to people.
Anger is a valid emotion that we should fully allow ourselves to experience. If I wasn’t angry, I was sad. Anger was better for my personal growth, because it allowed me to see how I wasn’t totally at fault for our problems. When you’re angry at someone, you’re implicitly acknowledging that they’ve wronged you somehow. This is such an important realization, because it lets people create new expectations for their friendships and reaffirms their self-worth. Knowing that I wasn’t to blame for our friendship going south improved my self-esteem. Moreover, it helped me form better friendships with other people, because I was able to adjust my expectations of others, express my boundaries, and create a strong foundation of communication for my best friends. Ultimately, the end of that friendship allowed better ones to flourish.
My ex-friend reached out to me in college to ask if we could make amends. I’m not angry with her anymore. After letting myself talk through my emotions for the better part of a semester, I’ve reached a state of neutrality about her. Still, I said no, because I know now that I don’t owe her anything. Just because she asked for forgiveness doesn’t mean that I must give it to her. To anyone in a similar situation, my best advice is to let yourself be angry. Know that you’re not entirely to blame. Remember that you deserve something different. Understand that you don’t owe them anything anymore — much less kindness or forgiveness. It hurts now, but it’ll get better, and you will definitely be better off in the end.