We were friends. Best friends. The kind where I could walk into her house without knocking and nobody would think twice about it because her family treated me like I was their own child. Now we are strangers again.
I must admit, it’s partially my fault that our friendship fell apart. But I refuse to take all of the blame because truthfully, it’s not all of my fault — it’s hers too. As we got older, my friend and I grew apart; we got jobs, moved off to college and made new friends. We began to live two completely separate lives (which was okay). Although we were extremely busy for the majority of the time, my friend and I still made an effort to spend time with each other, whether it be an hour-long coffee date or even just a short phone call to gossip. For a while, this routine worked, but a few months passed by and before I knew it, my best friend had drifted away from me.
People would always tell me that friendship breakups are worse than a romantic breakup, and at first, I didn’t believe them when they said it. However, I totally understand why now. It’s hard to watch the person that you once considered family turn into someone that you don’t recognize at all. Personally, I think what made my friendship breakup so difficult was the fact that my friend was my other half; she was my Cristina Yang. My best friend knew everything about me… all of my secrets, my insecurities and my struggles. Heck, she even knew how I felt without me even having to tell her, so to lose a friendship like that took me a while to get over.
Once I had finally acknowledged that our friendship was truly over, I felt lost. It was like learning to walk again because I had to learn how to do things on my own, while knowing that my friend wouldn’t be there to experience life with me anymore. I also had to take the time to process that I no longer had a “go-to” person to talk to, nor did I have anyone that understood me in the way she did. Although my feelings of despair, isolation and betrayal were deafening, I was quick to master the grieving process. I cried, I mourned, I forgave her and I moved on.
Somedays I reminisce on the good times my ex-best friend and I had, and I even wonder if she thinks about them too. Even though I know it’s for the best that our friendship has come to an end, I can’t help but miss all of our laughs, jokes and memories. But some things just need to stay that way: as memories.