Unheard

Goodbye Old Friend

After a while, the mild disrespect builds up. The small things become bigger, the tolerance gets lower and you feel like you've had enough. You don't know how they feel so you don't say anything in case you hurt them. You wonder if you have said something that might indicate how you feel, and you just feel like you need to let go but you can't.

Because of this you keep the friendship and keep interacting with them. You tell them you need a break from any unnecessary communications with people because of everything else that's happened to you, but in reality, you just want to think about what to do with them. They don't know this because before every call, you ground yourself, you plan your escape if it gets too much and you have your best friend on speed dial to message when you need advice or to rant. On the call you seem happy and willing to be there and wanting to interact with them, but your mind is racing and thoughts are everywhere. 'I really don't care' or 'I want to leave' or even 'Get me out of here'.

You get through the call and you immediately text your best friend "OMG they are so annoying, we got into this petty argument". Your friends tell you that you need to say goodbye, but you don't know how so you keep it together and you stay with this person. Months go by and you slowly start making more and more excuses as to why you can't call or catch up. You finally cave and you go out somewhere with them. You have a great time, but there are a few flaws. They don't respect your personal space as much as they should, but you let it slide, because you don't want to hurt their feelings. They don't seem interested in anything you say and all they want to do is talk about something about them. You make yourself seem interested, but on the inside, you wish they would just listen to you and let you tell your own stories for once. You try and go to them for your problems and to rant but what do you get in return? No response, until you send them something else more exciting. You want to ask them if they saw your rant, but you don't want to seem naggy so you don't, and the occasional times that you ask them, they say "I did, I just didn't know what to say". All  you want is acknowledgement, you want them to care, but they just don't seem to. 

After a while, you stop sending them those rants because it's not like they respond anyway. You are always there for them and respond when they rant to you, you couldn't care less if they need to get something off of their chest and for you to listen and be there, but they just don't give you that respect back.

You want to stay with this person but every one of your friends is telling you that they are bad for you and your mental health so you progressively plan a message to send to them to let them know how you feel and what you wish to do. You have the message sitting in your notes for weeks, just sitting there, that's all, nothing else, just being a paragraph that may or may not be used one day. Weeks go by and one night you are texting your friend and you decide to commit to leaving this person. You have been putting this day off for as long as possible because you know how they are going to react. 

Your friend that you are messaging tells you to just go for it and not message them until you have done it. So you send the message.

"Hey *friend*, I don't know how to say this, but for a while now, I've been thinking that our friendship is a little bit shaky and I don't get as much respect from you that I give to you. I believe that I need to break away from you. I am willing to maybe give you a second chance if you let me say what I think so we are on the same page, but if not, that is ok, I will just have to say Goodbye. Thank you for being a good friend, I wish you well"

Ten minutes goes by, they've seen the message, no response, you start to think that they are just going to leave you on read like that. Meanwhile, you are messaging your friend on the verge of tears trying to process what you have just done. Eventually, you check back to the message and they are typing, you are scared, what are they going to say to you? Are you going to give a second chance? Are they going to accept what you've said and agree to leave? What is going to happen?

Finally, they respond, you read the first sentence off the push notification... you start to tear up, all you have seen is "I'm sorry but this is your loss..." You are scared to read the message so you message your bestie and tell them "They just responded, I'm so scared it doesn't look good".

As you open the message, you start to read and your heart slowly starts breaking. As you read the words "I'm sorry but this is your loss. I was there for you, I was the best friend I could be to you". You just melt away into a face of tears and crying. You don't know how to process what you have just been told. You've been told the exact opposite of why you left your now ex friend. You've been told they were there for you when they clearly weren't, you've been told that they were the best friend they could be and you wonder how, you wonder why they didn't show that. There's something wrong with you, but you somehow missed it. Even though none of that is true, you still think it because at the time, your world closes in as your eyes become blurred from the oceans of tears flowing from them. You feel like you've just done something wrong as you imagine how they would have reacted when you texted them your first message. You feel this overwhelming guilt pass over you as you think of what just happened. You cry and cry as you come to the realisation that you are never going to message them again, you're never going to hear their voice again, you won't see them again.

You decide not to respond to their message and just leave it be. You message your best friend telling them what just happened and how you feel. And unlike your now ex friend, they are there for you, they give you positive messages and just overall make the situation better. 

You wake up the next day, not seeing their name on your phone, you tell yourself it's over now, you don't have to deal with them anymore. Yet you still feel so guilty for what you've done to them even though you knew it was the right thing to do.

Days go by and the grief starts to fade. But every now and then, something happens or comes up that just reminds you of them, you hold back tears so that nobody knows what's happened and you get over it within minutes. After a while you begin to forget about them, with the occasional reminder and trigger. It all starts to go away, you feel as though you did the right thing and that you are better off without them.

But that grief and guilt never goes away, it always finds a way of creeping up on you and months later you find yourself thinking if you did the right thing by them, remembering all the good times and the laughs you had together and wonder if it was all worth it. 

Eventually, you start to realise more and more that what you did was what was needed and that you did nothing wrong to them. You realise that without them, you have been happier than you were when they were still in your life and you make jokes about them occasionally.

You still get scared when you go to a place where you are likely to see them, planning ways to avoid them if you do happen to cross paths. 

The feeling fades, you don't think much of them anymore and when you do, it's not as triggering as it was before because you've taught yourself that it was right and that you needed to do what you did.

Authors Note: Thank you for reading all the way, this story is based off of an experience I have had in the past and I am writing it in the hopes that someone may relate to it and feel less alone in their situation because of it. I also feel as though leaving a friend because of something they are doing to you is a topic that  is underrated and needs to be talked about more. <3