One year ago I move out from my country to study, so I met this girl who has been super kind with me and I would say my unique real friend for this time. At the beginning it was normal but with the time we started to be more close and we became like “best friends” it was very fast, the last year we did a lot of things together, and she introduced me a lot of her friends, with the time I even met her family and when I came back to my country last summer I took with me gifts for them and her because they were just very nice with me.
The thing is I was already used to pass a lot of time with her and since making friends in this country is a little but difficult to me because of the cultural differences she was like very special to me, and I thought it was the same for her bc she referred to me as her “best friend” and all, but then we started to distance since I passed my semester but she didn’t so she started to have more friends and hanging out with them, she introduced me a lot of them and we got along very well, but she was kinda distant with me even if I did efforts to see her more, that’s just very difficult bc our schedule is not the same. I thought it was a good idea to give her some space because I thought maybe I was very invasive to her life so I decided to stop to texting her and I just said hey when I saw her, after that one day I decided to say her to meet to lunch since it’s a thing that we used to do the last year but her attitude was just awful, she looked at me very bad and she wasn’t present in the conversation but when we crossed her new friends her attitude was good again, I asked if she was angry but she said to me that she was just exhausted and that she expressed that only w me because she was confortable and not w the others because she didn’t trust them that much at the time.
After that , we keeping getting distanced, I had a couple mental breakdowns and I talked to her for support and that was good (I try to give her support also but she opens out very few) and after all that she started to hang out a lot with the new group of friends and she stopped to answer my messages and kinda ignored me when her new friends were around. In the last months I talked with this group and they like me a lot, they invite me to almost every event they do and always are very kind to me but I can’t avoid to feel a little but guilty since I think that I’m invading the space of my friend, she invites me sometimes to other things also but that just doesn’t feel like before, she’s more cold with me compared to how she’s with her other friends so I don’t know what to think I really miss talk with her like before but it’s just not the same . Am I overreacting? I have to get over it and accepting that people and friends change? I just feel that it is not the same and that I kinda make her uncomfortable with my presence but at the same time I like to hang out with this new people, and if I get away that will be a lil bit awkward idk.
PS: Sorry if there’s any orthography problem, english is not my first language:)
1 comment
At the present moment, why don’t you attempt to invite her for a coffee or food somewhere and try to bring up how you feel like you’re “invading her spece”. Tell her it’s not your intention and you just enjoy her and her friends’ company and you weren’t actively trying to cross any line. Even if she had never thought of these things and it was just her exhaustion making her cold towards you then at the very least she’ll appreciate the effort you spent into respecting her boundaries.
If she’s a good and worthwhile friend. But she sure sounds like it since she made an effort to introduce you to her new circle.
Now, back to you. Have you made the effort to do the same? You know her friends and hang out with them. Does she know yours? Has she ever been invited by your or them to do anything?
In case you don’t have a separate friend group like she does, has an effort been made to make one? Perhaps your friend thinks you’re over-reliant on her and is trying to nudge you to grow out of your shell. She might even be doing this with good intentions. Or maybe she could just want to know you have your own social life that is separate from her, maybe she feels suffocated by her social circle being reliant on her when she’s so busy with her obligations.
I’m sure she means well, she is probably open to discuss these things. You won’t know unless you reach out.