I am someone who has been the friend to end a friendship and I understand some reasons why friendships end.
I know at times our friendships could be closer to us than our own family. When it comes to having friends, we tend to friend people similar to us and probably more relatable than our family. Our friends are people we tend to be more comfortable around and be more of ourselves around. We can talk to them about anything and sometimes we can, unknowingly, be connected because of traumas and trauma bonding.
I’ve noticed when we do not have a close bond or strong emotional connection with our family we tend to really invest and spend a lot of time with friends. We tend to grow a strong bond with our friends which tends to increase the emotional connection with them.
I’m sure you probably thought that your friendship was tight, unbreakable, and all of that. Now the friENDship is over because of what and now what?
Now you’re in shock because it seemed to come out of nowhere. Sometimes people give us signs before the breakup that we either make excuses for or completely ignore.
Some Advice for Healing After a Friendship Has Ended
Cry it out, write it out, find a healthy way to grieve. It really is acceptable to have emotional sadness from a friendship breakup. You HAVE to let it out or you will keep it inside and explode later. Holding in emotions is not going to go well in the long run. That goes for both males and females.
An example could be, you go through a fast food drive-thru and the employee is rude to you for no reasonable reason. That employee does not know that their friendship breakup is impacting their work because they did not take the time needed to mourn that breakup. Now they are letting out their anger on people who have nothing to do with the friendship ending.
Do not stay in the grieving stage too long. I believe it can turn into depression if it lasts too long, which is not healthy. Grief is inconsistent painful feelings mixed in with good memories/thoughts. As for depression, you could almost constantly be in a negative mood/thoughts for a long time. “To be diagnosed with depression, the symptoms must be present for at least 2 weeks.” -NIH. Read more about depression here. If you experience depression seek professional help. I hope that you will not let the friendship breakup negatively impact your life. Your purpose/mission on this earth is way greater than that friendship. I will explain more about you having a purpose/mission at the end of this post.
Do some reflection. If that ex-friend was or is willing to give you an explanation as to why the friendship ended, then you listen and listen mostly. You don’t have to be rudely short with them, you can respond as if it’s a normal conversation you all usually have. This is where maturity comes in, self-control. Try your best not to argue with them. Going back and forth with them is most likely not going to get you anywhere positive. If you would like to express yourself and tell them how you truly feel or your true intentions, tastefully do that.
With this information, you can reflect on how you came off to that person. Most likely the ex-friend mentioned something negative about you that they did not like. You should measure it with how you perceive yourself and how others may perceive you. Remember to be honest with yourself and take reasonable accountability. If you find that others have said similar things as the ex-friend said about you, then do some evaluation on whether you want to change that thing about yourself or not. If you don’t want to change then you have chosen to accept the negative trait or thing about yourself that someone else may not like about you.
If you don’t want to change because that person misconstrued who you are, then really don’t change especially if they are the only person saying it about you. For instance, the ex-friend said that you are self-centered because when both of you are in a group of people, the other people always talk to you and not your ex-friend. If that is all it was and you were not purposely hogging all the attention from others, then you know that your ex-friend was feeling some kind of way because the other people liked talking to you more than them.
Have people around you who accept you for who you accept yourself as and for who you are. If you realize that you want to change to become a better person because of your own desire then start working on making yourself a better person for YOURSELF.
If the person does not give you an explanation you will have to accept that and know that you will not always get an answer for everything. You will have to really do the work to accept the friendship ending and to forgive that person genuinely. Something that helps me to forgive someone is being empathetic.
This is how I discovered what really works for me to forgive someone. What I’m about to say may sound like I’m making excuses for a person. For instance, I may say to myself maybe that person has been hurt by their partner(s) and does not know how to properly process and communicate their feelings. I would usually go on to think that it’s not their fault and I forgive them because they do not know. They do not have to know I forgive them, especially if I no longer talk to them anymore. So what I’m doing is building up empathy to genuinely forgive this person and not just say/tell myself I forgive them and I really don’t.
Sometimes people will say they forgive you and they really don’t. When you genuinely forgive a person it will make you feel better and free you. I believe it is more beneficial for you to forgive them for your healing and wellness.
Heal yourself sooner than later. You have to know or now learn yourself. You will need to focus so much on yourself to the point that you instantly know what healing practices work for you and what doesn’t. Keep a journal or notes for this tracking. Learn what helps uplift your mood outside of that friend, what triggers you, what foods put you in a good mood, etc. You will be so focused on yourself at this point, which is very much so needed, that you slowly start healing and overcoming the breakup.
Some Reasons Why the Friendship Ended
1. Someone is growing or needing to grow. When I say growing I mean as in your mindset, interests, career, etc.
Maybe both of you are growing in different directions. Maybe you are growing. Or maybe you are not growing and that is your life path. If you’ve found this blog I believe you are growing. My blog is not for people who do not want to grow and become better.
If your ex-friend is not growing as a person and has said something like this “You’ve changed, you aren’t the same person I once knew” and you are growing in a positive direction, then you can assume that you are outgrowing that friend.
To me, that is completely fine because I care more about bettering myself than keeping a friend around who will hold me back. It has taken some time for me to get to this point and it was not easy because I had to do some self-work and healing. Now, I’m here to stay in this energy. 😛
Related Storytime
My niece had a best friend who recently ended their friendship. She called me in so much sadness and I felt so bad for her and wanted to do something for her. So, at the time I let her talk out her feelings. She expressed how she thought she couldn’t live without being friends with this girl, how she would fight or do whatever to have the girl’s back, not wanting to leave the state she was in because of that ex-best friend, and how hurt she was. The girl didn’t give her much of an explanation as to why she no longer wanted to be in a friendship with my niece. I instantly figured that it was meant to happen from Most High. That was the instant feeling I was getting.
My niece had been stagnant and wanted more in her life. You want more, most times, something has to go. It could be you have to stop indulging in bad foods, stop spending so much time doing something that is not aligned with your life mission, drop people who no longer serve you, etc. We have to figure out what has to go or it will happen for us. I figured it was her friend that was keeping her stagnant and I believe I was right. Two months after their friendship ended, my niece moved out of state because she got a bomb job offer in another state.
Some friends have been there since we were young and as you get older you experience new things, find new interests and hobbies, have your specific viewpoint on things, etc. All those things can be different than what your ex-friend is interested in. If your ex-friend is not willing to accept you for your growing self, then they will most likely want to cut you off. This is two people growing apart and it is supposed to happen. Everybody is not supposed to grow or go with you.
You should care more about doing better in life than holding on to someone who is holding you back. If the Most High wants better for you and you steadily want to hold on to what is no longer good for you, you will experience a hard friendship ending.
Just know if you want, you can find friends who align with your growing self. You can find people at events, conferences, groups formed online that meet in person (be safe), etc.
2. There is no good reciprocation in the friendship.
A friendship or any relationship should not be one-sided. There has to be some kind of reciprocation in the friendship that makes it a good friendship.
If someone feels like you aren’t reciprocating what they want you to reciprocate in the friendship, then they will get tired of it and want to end the friendship.
As I’ve said earlier in this post, ask them, listen, and evaluate. If they do not explain then you will have to do the work yourself to heal from the friendship ending over lack of reciprocation. Think about what you could’ve done better and how to move forward and do better in the next friendship. Sometimes the ex-friend could have been wrong about the reciprocation for one reason or another. With this, you will still have to accept it, heal, and move forward even better.
This reason is why I ended two friendships. Two of the best decisions I’ve made in my life.
The first friendship ended when I realized I did not have to take a person’s mistreatment. The girl would say slick things about me, she would purposely try to humiliate me to make herself look or feel better, and some other stuff I have forgotten. I just remember how it made me feel.
You may not know exactly what they said or did but you remember how it made you feel.
All I can remember is the last conversation we had and I told her I did not want to be her friend anymore because I felt that she was not a good friend. That conversation happened after I visited her at her parent’s house and she was ok with leaving me on some dude’s living room floor all night.
I cannot remember exactly what we did that day or night before going to that dude’s house. At the end of the night, we stayed the night at this dude’s apartment, without her telling me that was the plan. This dude lived in an apartment with other dudes. While she was in the room and in a bed with the dude she liked, I was in the living room on the floor because they didn’t have any furniture. I could not really sleep because people were going in and out of the apartment the whole night and morning.
After the mini trip to visit her and I was back home, I thought about if I was doing too much by feeling like she didn’t care about my safety and feelings. I felt the way I felt and decided to cut her off. I stopped talking to her. When she called me and asked why I wasn’t responding to her I told her I didn’t want to be friends because I did not think she was a good friend. She was trying to argue and all. She ended up telling me to lose her number, which I had already deleted her number. And that was the last I had talked to her. I think I had blocked her on the phone I had at the time.
I hadn’t spoken to her in a decade or more. This year, 2024, she randomly texted me happy birthday on my birthday. I texted back “Who is this?” and she told me her name. All I said was thank you. Not long after that, my phone number was disconnected.
When I let that friendship go, I saw so much good happen in my life that I couldn’t care less about having a friendship with that girl.
The second friendship I ended was because of mistreatment and greed. I was kind of bullied by this girl in the friendship, now that I think about it. I was not comfortable around her. She was aggressive in how she spoke and all. You couldn’t hardly say anything to her without her getting defensive or taking something you said out of proportion.
I had visited this ex-friend for her birthday. I stayed for a few days. I bought her a pretty expensive clutch bag while I was there because she said she wanted it. While visiting she was telling me that I should move where she was. She was selling me on moving to where she was like she was a recruiter. So I thought about it for a few days and said why not, let’s try it.
I had moved into her and her husband’s house because I had listened to her tell me to move where she was because it would be better job opportunities for me and all this salesmen talk stuff. After ending that friendship, I figured out that she was only telling me to move because of her greed and her being lonely being away from her family. Her husband was in the military and he had been stationed in a state 21 driving hours away from the state we all (me, her, her cousin, and her husband) lived in. After I moved in her cousin moved in a week after me. Her cousin (female) was cool and I began to chill with her cousin more.
All in all, the ex-friend made this laughable contract for me and her cousin saying that we needed to pay $400 a month each to stay there and some other bs like if we ate any of their food we would have to pay them a certain percentage. At the time their rent was $800 a month. I literally did not know why she thought it was ok to confidently do that. At the time I was like she knows I took up engineering in school, which included taking complicated math courses. She must’ve forgotten that I do math well and have a great memory. I was so confused by her asking me and her cousin to pay all of their rent and then telling us to not take showers longer than 5 minutes. It was not the place to be.
Thankfully I had found a job and a new apartment a week or so after she gave me and her cousin those bs contracts.
I left and told her and her husband that I didn’t have to give them $400 because the contract said it would start the next month. So I gave them $100 which was what we agreed upon after I moved it. Before I moved in she was telling me over and over that all I had to pay was one of their cheaper bills which was like $40 or so because she knew I was up and leaving my job and all. I was in my early 20s when this happened, making mistakes and taking risks.
I am really happy to have ended the friendship. I have not spoken to her since then and I am so happy. I also saw the benefit of letting her go as a friend.
I am happy I stood up for myself and ended a lopsided friendship.
In both friendships, I experienced not being reciprocated with respect, care, love, loyalty, and other things. I did what was best for me and saw its benefits.
3. You may be going through a tough time in life and they just don’t want to be a part of it.
This kind of energy is like they only want you as a friend when you’re doing good because that’s all they are willing to accept. As if they don’t have flaws and falls.
Now in my life, I have seen so many friends turn their backs on me after I had my baby and experienced financial hardship. It used to hurt until I thought about how I wouldn’t want people in my life who just wanted to be friends when I was doing well.
I needed to see how many friends in my life did not mean well by me. I was letting things slide that I thought were not that big of a deal. I guess in the grand scheme of things, they were bigger issues than I thought.
I used to pour into my friends more than they were doing for me. Now I know, it took a big event to happen in my life to see that I do not have one tight friendship anywhere in my life. It showed me that I needed to redirect my energy into people who are worth it.
Letting a friendship go because of this reason is hard. If you’re already down because of what is going on in your life, the last thing you want is to have friends dropping out of your life when you need familiar support the most.
Ultimately it is the best for you because a real friend will be there for you through good and bad. They should want to help you out in a healthy way. They should not be there to help you out too much because you have to do the majority of the work to help yourself out.
A great friend’s help during a tough time in your life can help encourage you, talk to you, let you vent and listen to you, go out with you to make you feel better, pray for you, etc.
4. They are jealous of you or something similar
This one is probably rare. As it is said, the devil has to let you know what it is doing. This is how I feel when someone boldly tells you that they are jealous of you. That feeling eats them up enough, they will let you know. I’ve only heard of two people who have had a friend tell them, flat out, they are jealous of them.
You should stay away from a friend that is jealous of you. If they tell you that they are jealous of you and you all are still friends, you should consider letting them go. It’s not flattering to have a friend that is jealous of you. You stay their friend, they will play in your face and probably get worse because they may think, oh this person still wants to be my friend even after I told them I was jealous of them, ok well I can do more because they really want a friendship with me. It probably makes them feel better about themselves and boosts their confidence to know that you aren’t really all that to be jealous of if you’re still their friend. It will make you look desperate and some people are so negative in energy that they feed off of that desperation and want to keep you there for their selfish benefit.
This is a friend that will do you a huge favor if they let you go as a friend because they are jealous of you. Take that as a favor, do the work to better yourself as I mentioned earlier in this post, and find better friends.
5. They honestly don’t know.
In this case, this can be because of the Most High moving in your life. If a person honestly does not know, it has to be spirit talking to you. Some people can be so hardheaded that it has to be that blunt of a message from someone they care about and love. It is a clear and loud message for you to move forward without that friend because you have better for your life ahead.
We all have a mission on this earth, some people’s mission is to be destructive, some are to be an entertainer, some are to be humanitarians, etc.
To figure out what you are here for, you can sit with yourself to think about what you have a passion for, what you naturally know how to do well, what life experiences you have gone through that may help someone else out, etc. You can use other resources such as getting a natal chart reading, a human design reading, a prophet that you trust, numerology, praying and meditating/listening, paying attention to signs, etc.
Whatever the mission is, it is your mission on earth. We all come to learn something. Do not think that there is one person on this earth who is not learning a lesson.
Know that you are worthy of having a meaningful and fulfilling life. That friendship ended for a reason so do what you healthily need to do to mourn and heal from that friendship. You are here for a greater purpose and you should live out that in this lifetime.
Let’s connect and be cool.
Here’s a truthful and lighthearted video I love.