Coping with the loss of a best friend

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It's been about 3 months and I know I should be over it, because I know she definitely is. But this feels like a really hard thing to move on from because she was the only friend I ever had.

I first met her in acting class about 3 years ago. For quite some time, it was an amazing friendship. She reciprocated and actually texted me and invited me to hang out regularly, which is something I'd never experienced before. In the past, I was always the one reaching out to people who weren't interested in me.

About a year ago, we decided to produce an Off-Off-Broadway show. All was going well... but then, she started dating someone and began to completely ignore me. I get that when people are dating, they have less free time than they did before. But she wouldn't return my calls, refused to meet me for rehearsals like she promised and had zero interest in spending time with me or being there for me when I needed her. When I finally confronted her about it, she admitted that this is how she gets whenever she's in a relationship and everything else was "on the backburner", including the show which we had both invested money in.

I was both really hurt and really pissed off. Not only was she abandoning me, she was also showing minimal respect for the commitment we had both made to the show. After the show wrapped up, her relationship fizzled out and she was rather apologetic about ditching me for her. So she suggested we take a road trip to Vermont to clear our heads.

A couple days before the trip, she informed me that we would have to return a day early because a modeling gig came up all of a sudden and she said yes to it. I was absolutely outraged. The hotel rooms and car rental were all on my credit card for the time being. The hotel for the last night was non-refundable, and the car rental was impossible to return a day early. She does not have a drivers license, so that would have left me stranded in the city for over 24 hours with no affordable parking nearby. I was soooooo pissed off by how she said yes to the gig without asking me first, and just assumed that I could/would rearrange all of my plans around what was most convenient for her. After I explained how difficult this would make things for me, she grudgingly called back the gig and cancelled it.

On the road, we encountered every imaginable problem. Flash flooding, terrible traffic, nearly running out of gasoline at 1am, etc. etc. In hindsight, I could have definitely done a better job with planning. But much of what happened was unforeseeable and beyond my control. She was super angry because I had planned the hotels too far apart from each other and blamed EVERYTHING on me. I was doing my best to get us around and keep us safe and she would NOT stop bitching at me while I was driving. She kept ranting about how much I stink (I had no opportunity to shower because I was driving the whole time and we arrived at the hotel so late!) and how disgusting it was when I had to get up in the middle of the night for a snack. She would make cruel comments like how I park the car like I'm whipping my dick out.

It was already a stressful situation but she made me feel consistently awful about myself all weekend. She was also resentful about having to help navigate the GPS on the road. She wanted me to buy a tool to hold the phone on the dashboard because she didn't feel like she should have to help me out. She believed that I was supposed to do all the work of driving AND navigating while she just enjoyed the ride. Throughout the entire trip, she treated me like a cheap chauffeur and it really got under my skin. When I pointed out all these things to her, she was furious because how dare I criticize her! Finally, tensions between us rose to the point where we got into a car accident on the way back. Luckily, I didn't have to pay for the accident because I bought insurance for the trip.
It was not a serious accident. Nobody was injured and no other cars were damaged. And with a bit of help from the gas station attendant, we were able to fix the car up well enough to drive back. But she did not want to drive with me anymore, and called her mother to come and pick her up.

We have not spoken since then. This girl is 5 years younger than me, she's an only child and her mother pays over $1700 a month for her to live in a one-bedroom apartment. I'm not judging her negatively for these things in and of themselves, but it definitely helps to explain her selfishness, spoiled attitude and inability to accommodate others. This friendship was one that I know I had to let go of. The way she treated me was unacceptable. It would be one thing if she was remorseful, but she wasn't and isn't. On Instagram, I see that she is in a new relationship with a new person. So even if we never went on that trip, she definitely would have abandoned me again.

But every day I'm really struggling to deal with the huge hole she has left in my life. I have no one to talk to on a regular basis anymore. There's nobody else I know who can be there for me in the way that she used to be. And I don't know how I'll find that again.

Firstly that sounds like a fun, yet awful trip. If you want a buddy next time just shout and I'll be the first on board.

As for this topic in general its pretty close to my heart.

I met my bestfriend at 9, but we weren't best friends until 11. We both were on the spectrum and had similar interests so would game a lot of the time. She also liked drugs, smoking and drinking were as I didn't so had different friends to do other things also.

I moved at 15 across the country yet we still remained friends. Although we didn't see each other as much we were always there for each other. Me more for her as she had a tougher life than I did. That was my mistake though.

She called me on the 7th January and I was busy with a university assignment so I told her this. She then later commited suicide and the guilt built up in me. As I was the last person she called. So I could of helped her if I wasn't so busy in my own life. It's been 9 months now and I still cry over the loss of her as like you said there is a massive void. The person I told everything to has just vanished.

Don't get me wrong I have a couple of other friends and I'm insanely open with things with my cousin. But its not the same. Things do get easier though. You learn to cope and live without them. You still might get sad and cry. Then feel guilty as something awesome has happened and then you can't share it with them. Unfortunatly its just part of life.

I'm here if you ever need to talk about it though as I know how much someone disappearing hurts.

I sympathise with you, it's very hard to get over things like this.

Nothing dramatic happened like that with me, but I had 2 local friends who both disappeared at once 2 or 3 months ago. They are on social media but have totally stopped contacting me. I've been friends with them for about 4 years, they aren't friends with each other but they know OF each other. So I don't think it's some plan they've cooked up together.

I'm too nervous to make the first move contacting them because I've been hurt like this before: a friend suddenly drops me, eventually I contact them again and say 'haven't heard from you for a while, everything okay?' Then the friend turns on me, saying they didn't like something I said, it was horrible and they now hate me. I never have any idea what they're talking about, or it turns out to be a misunderstanding- they misheard or took something out of context etc.

So I don't want to contact these 2 friends in case I get attacked again, I'm just going to let it go

I am so sorry that you had a falling out with this person and it's always hard when you lose someone who were felt you were close to. Based on what I have read about her and as lonely as it sounds, she doesn't sound like she was a good friend from the get-go. For one thing, that's someone who will criticize you but can't take it herself and that's a red flag.

I had a two female "Friends" who treated our friendship as a joke once they found someone to date. Then after that, they would either call me up when they wanted something or would lead me around about getting together but were always busy whenever I would ask.

In fact, she a lot like a former friend who I met during my early 20's who acted like my best friend who always had time for me. Then she met one of her boyfriends and threw me on the back burner too. After that, everyone and everything else was way more important. Confronting her was out of the question because it turned out that she was always right no matter what. She would call me up and leave nasty voice messages about how she didn't appreciate what I did how I was inconsiderate to her problems.

Sweet Pea hugs

Everyone's experiences just make me think that friendship is actually not a real thing anymore. No one seems to have good friends these days, everyone seems to be individuals competing against each other. WTF is going on in society.

I have associated with some competitive people who posed as my friends.

One of them in particular was a woman who is a bit older than I am who was extremely jealous of and threatened by me. She took advantage of every opportunity to get what she wanted and hold things over me. Her bad behavior reached a boiling point with me.

She eventually cut things off because she got tired of me getting mad at her all the time.

Bottom line, I was mad at her for being so self-centered and sneaky rather than being a friend when I needed her the most.

There are some very strange people around. I genuinely think humans have forgotten how to be friends and all they do is compete with each other now.

Similar to you, I've realised quite a few people feel threatened and intimidated by me. I have no idea why. I have health problems, I work alone at home and hardly see anyone, I have no social life, I earn very little money. What's to envy? Maybe because I have a husband and daughter, but so do these people...

I talked to a someone about that yesterday and she they said that fake people typically are threatened by genuine and authentic people.

However, this person was also threatened by me for other reasons. For example, I knew how to get along with people in her family who she didn’t get along with. So she got very jealous did what she could to keep me away from them.

Anyway, I felt just like you did when she dumped me.

Thanks. That's a lovely idea, but where do I find other genuine and authentic people to be friends with? Or maybe everyone I know is fake? I'm not sure what to do.

About your friend being threatened by you getting along with her family: that also sounds like you're genuine and she's fake.

I've given up on finding friends. I'm going to focus on myself, do nice things by myself and just not bother with other people.

Sorry to the original poster for making all this about myself

Kitly, I think I agree with you but I think the OP started a discussion about toxic and destructive relationships.

As for that former friend, she’s got some serious problems of her own that go beyond jealousy and being fake.

I used to associate with one of her sisters as well. I dislike her well because she’s destructive and annoying.

Both of them would criticize me for the way I did things and tell me that I have to change.

Kitly, I think I agree with you but I think the OP started a discussion about toxic and destructive relationships.

As for that former friend, she’s got some serious problems of her own that go beyond jealousy and being fake. I also used to associate with one of her sisters as well who happen to I dislike because I found her both annoying and just as toxic. Both of them would criticize me for the way I did things and told me that I needed to change this or that about myself.

For example, they would hide their true feelings about me behind their family members and make it look like they had a problem with me.

So yeah, I am glad that friendship is over

What does this bit mean? I don't understand.

When the original poster shared her experiences of falling out with a toxic friend, I think it opened up a lot of dialogue about similar experiences that others have gone through. Without also realizing it, I feel that our posts have also been supportive to the OP as well as to each other.

For example, when I first responded to the OP, I talked about a couple of other friends who also pushed me to the bottom of their list when they started dating. Like with the OP's ex-frenemy, both of the females also were not very supportive friends.

For example: One of them body shamed me and also hid her true feelings about me behind other people. Whenever I would call her out for being a bad friend, she brushed me off with excuses. The other one cut me down sometimes but she would turn nasty.

Thanks for explaining, Summer Twilight. I often don't understand and it's nice to get a clear explanation instead of weird NT comments like 'why do you want to know?' 'why don't you understand?' etc.

Thanks Kitlily:

My other ex-friend, who was threatened by my ditched me in other ways.

When she was engaged, I had a house warming party and I asked her to help me prepare for the party. She agreed to help me too. Yet instead of helping me, she went and bought her wedding gown and showed up late. However, she had plenty of time to shop for her wedding dress.

When I confronted her about it, I got “Well I needed to be with my fiancée because we had a fight last week.”