“I feel like I'm doing all the hard work in this friendship.”
Dear Eva 6 guy,
I have been best friends with K for 17 years. We're long-distance friends—she's in Georgia, I'm on Long Island. She's come here a few times, but our friendship is mostly done through email, text, and phone. We used to talk every single day, but as our lives got busier and over the years, it was a few times a week, then once a week.
Our friendship is deep. She knows things about me that no one else knows. For more than ten years we have been sharing the details of our lives and the lives of our children. We've been through parting together. We talked to each other from our ledges.
We had times when we grew apart, but we always came back to each other and we both apologized for not prioritizing our friendship. Well, K just went through a bad breakup (they were engaged and living together) and she's having health problems. I know she likes space when she's super stressed, so I give her that.
The last time we talked, she told me that she was going through a hard time and she wished she had been a very good friend. I told her that I would always be there when she was emotionally ready to talk. I didn't say anything about my recent health scares or my fragile emotional state because I didn't want to burden her with my problems when she clearly had her own.
Two weeks passed and I didn't hear from her, so I sent a quick message asking if everything was okay. She said she was fine and asked me to email her an update on my health issues and my children. I did just that. This was two and a half weeks ago. I haven't heard anything from her since then.
This isn't the first time I've felt like I'm doing all the hard work in this friendship. I was already upset about this. But this is the first time I feel like she's actively ignoring me, and I really think our relationship has become a burden to her, just another item on her very full to-do list that she has to cross off when she can.
I don't want to be like that. I'd rather end a friendship forever than be rejected by her every couple of weeks. But how should I approach her? Should I let her know how I feel and increase her guilt towards us, or should I just let the friendship stagnate?
I feel too old for all this. I thought that as you get older, making friends gets easier. I think not. I appreciate any advice you can give me.
– Feel that I exist Haunted
