I (23F) have a close friend (23F) I met back in October. Despite knowing each other for less than a year, when we first met we really hit it off and were hanging out and doing things together frequently. I’ve never laughed harder or felt better than when we get to see each other, and I consider her one of my closest friends now.
About 2 months ago however, she got a new job. She’s already historically not great at texting–sometimes she’ll respond days later, sometimes up to a week. I’ve been trying to make plans with her like we usually do but every time I text her now, she takes two weeks to reply to me. She keeps apologizing about not texting me back every time she does this, but it hasn’t changed and has only gotten worse. I keep asking her when she’s free, she’ll respond two weeks later asking me the same, and when I respond with when I’m free I just get ignored for 2 more weeks.
She’s always been not great at texting and it’s never really bothered me before, but now that it’s getting worse I’m getting frustrated. Especially because I see her hanging out on social media with her new friends she’s made at work on a semi-regular basis but I can’t seem to get through. I told her the last time I texted her two weeks ago that I hadn’t heard from her in a while and she just explained she’s been really busy and tired from work. I really don’t think she’s ignoring me on purpose just from knowing her very well, but I still am trying to figure out how to approach her about this without saying something that will make her defensive or mad at me.
tldr: my close friend has been taking *weeks* to get back to me and I’m not sure how to solve our communication problem.
5 comments
What happens when you call her?
Call her out on it. If she is a good friend, she needs to know that how she is making you feel. I’d probably just stop reaching out and if she doesn’t initiate or follow through on anything, I’d put my energy into other friends. We spend time on things we care about and you’ve fallen off her priority list.
Sending a text takes less than 30 seconds. Anybody who want to stay in touch with you, will find less than 30 seconds to respond to your text. Mind the actions not words.
Sadly its pretty clear you value her more than she values you; sometimes things change and people grow apart. You are no longer a priority to her and you need to respect that and provide space. Theres a very simple and important observation to keep in mind when it comes to human interactions: actions speak louder than words. If she’s got time for others but not for you, that’s her actions speaking.
Listen.
Okay as someone who is incredibly bad at texting…. the main reason I dont text back is beecause im not emotionally stable enough to text back…. its hard to explain but essentially I dont want stress from my life to travel over when I’m talking to friends so I try to text back when I’m in a better place…. I have no idea if your friend is the same but it might bee a possibility. Another reason is that I get A LOT of work texts that high key drown out the important messages and I also realized I started associating my phone with negative stressful emotions so then I just bee avoiding my phone and avoiding responsibilities
I just wanted to offer an inside perspective (beecause all the comments are basically telling you to end your friendship and that your friend doesn’t like you etc.) beecause im the same way BUT I love my friends and I love talking with them and making plans with them its just that life can get to you sometimes
But also you feeling like your friend isn’t putting as much effort into the relationship as you are is incredibly valid and definitely something to bring up…. also if you know their schedule calling to get an immediate response def helps