I have a very good friend that I have known for over fifteen years. He lived in the same neighborhood as I did, and we hung out at each other’s houses all the time. Then we graduated, and things started to change. Even though we took different paths (I was a full-time student and worked sporadically, he worked full-time right out of high school) our schedules were generally in sync which meant we could still enjoy weekends playing video games and going to the movies and stuff.
Then he moved out of his parents house, into a tiny apartment 20 minutes away from me (driving wise). He has two roomates, which quickly became total attention whores. I swear I can’t talk to him for more than 5 minutes at a time on the phone before one of his roomates is screeching at him for help, or saying “look at me! look at me! look at me!” He tends to absorb other people’s problems, so when one of his roomates has a crisis, it becomes his crisis. Our spare time dwindled further- I had to work on weekends, and the rare times we both had a day off, he was always so stressed out about his roomates/work/etc that the whole time was often taken up by him venting at me about all the shit he has to put up with. I have been frustrated by the fact that despite being close friends with him, he doesn’t seem to take a lick of my advice, which is that he would be better off kicking them OUT of the apartment, since they don’t pay their share, but act like they own the place.
A cynical part of me feels that no matter how much things improve for my friend and I domestically (me graduating, getting a full time job and living on my own, him getting rid of his roomates) so much has changed that it has really strained our friendship. He never accepts my invitations to come over to my house, where there is 0 drama going on, my mom and her boyfriend are friendly around him (we’ve all known each other for years) and there is plenty of room and quiet.
Anybody else have a friend situation like this? Sometimes I feel like my friendship with him hangs on a thread. Its not the kind of thing I want to give up on, though, because we’ve been through so much over the years.
I kow exactly where you are coming from.
I have (had?) a friend that I have known since she was 14 and I was 16. (going on 16 1/2 years now) She and I were like sisters, even when I moved to the other side of the country, she and I kept in contact. Then she moved out here and I got married. We were still close, she even lived with us for 2 years. Then my husband and I got our lives together and went back to school, I got a real job and later my husband started his own company, which I help him run, while my friend was still working for just above minimum wage at Starbucks. She had no goals, at least none that she would ever carry through with. Finally she moved out and over the last 2 years, she just stopped contacting me. No clue why. Then all of a sudden a couple of months ago, she upped and moved back to Ontario with little more than a nasty e-mail saying that she bet I was glad she was leaving. !?!?
Long story short, when childhood friends become adults and goals and paths are different, it is hard to keep the same rapport you had. Not impossible, but you both have to work on the friendship. You both also have to want to remain friends.
It is really hard when a long-term friendship goes sour, and if you work at it, you might be able to save it. But, as I said before, you both have to want it saved.
Maybe take your friend out somewhere and have a talk about this? Lay it on the line and make your position clear. Hey, you don’t really have anything to lose, do you?
I had a great friend all through high school and college. We lived together our sophmore and junior years and although we used to fight about money and other well more illegal stuff, we remained close. After graduation from college, he cleaned up and to help, went into treatment. I continued to party like a rock-star. We hung out a few times after that and I never minded having a quiet sober, non-bar and non-drinking night but I just don’t think things were ever the same. He was a little to preachy and I was a little to “you won’t believe what we did last night”. We gradually talked less and less.
A few more years have passed and I’m now a responsible married man with a baby on the way. I looked up his email just to say hi and see if maybe we could meet up, but the email went unanswered. I also googled him the other day to see if I could find any “newer” contact information, but no dice.
It’s sad.
I had a great friend in high school (well, one of my only friends in high school) I grew apart from. After high school I moved away for awhile and then moved back. We had lost contact but I ran into her in the mall and we started hanging out again. We became really close friends again and I moved into her house. Once I moved in, everything went downhill. I had ‘blossomed’ after high school and was out making new friends and living life. She never wanted to leave the house.
I got a great new job and a new boyfriend, which seemed to be the last straw for her. Every time I tried to spend time with her she would brush me off or completely ignore me (which was weird since we were still living in the same house). She seemed to be changing even more into a bigoted man-hating bitch and loving every minute of it. I was determined that we could still be friends but she ended it by giving me 3 months to move out. I saw the writing on the wall and left in 3 weeks.
We had a little contact after I moved but it never went anywhere. The last I’ve heard, she is married to an acquaintance from high school (who is unemployed and an alcoholic) and they have a kid. They are living in her mom’s house.
I was sad for a long time about the way things turned out between us but i’ve gotten over it. We were heading two different directions and she just realized it before me.
About 20 years ago (when I was in my late teens) I became friends with a gal who is 2 years older than me. She had a BF at the time (and by all accounts he was a control freak - I never actually met him), she became pregnant, and he did a runner. I was, for a while [so she told me] her only friend. While she’d been seeing that fella she’d dumped all her friends and none of them wanted to know her now. We became pretty close pals (people often thought we were sisters), and I rode out her PMS rages and occasional snide remarks about my being a Catholic. After a time, she moved to another town and I shared a house with her [going home at weekends]. Then about 15 years ago I wrecked my back, and during my bed-ridden months my parents decided to move to Ireland (my mother is Irish, my father Scots - we’d been living in Scotland), I wasn’t in a position to do anything but go with them. For the next few years me and my friend phoned and wrote to each other (no internet in them thar days kiddies!), then four years after I’d come here, she came over for a holiday. For two weeks she drove me demented, the “you’re an unmarried Catholic therefore you’re a virgin and I must mock you mercilessly” routine was trotted out, and she was due her monthly ‘visitor’, she was rude to me and mean to her daughter (who was 7 IIRC), and I kept thinking “why am I friends with this woman?” She insisted that I was to move back to Scotland, something I had and have no intention of doing, so then she insisted she’d move to Ireland and live with me :eek: I balked at the idea and she got snitty about it and twice threatened to commit suicide because I wasn’t going along with her plans. When I still refused to cow to her she got really angry and practically spat in my face and told me I’d gotten far to confident for my own good 
She finally went home, and two days later I got a letter from her asking if I’d gotten a house for us yet? Three days later another letter, asking the same thing, two days and a phone call demanding to know why hadn’t I written and had I fallen out with her? Two days later another letter, demanding to know why I’d fallen out with her …
I didn’t answer any of them.
About two years ago her daughter emailed me (for the life of me I cannot think how she got my email address) and we used to chat online on MSN, but I’ve never spoken to my ‘friend’ since … Apparently, back in the day, I’d been a submissive wuss and I’d let her walk all over me, but a few years in a new place and having new friends had turned me into a monster that she couldn’t control any more
My best friend from childhood was a girl about a year and a half younger. We were close as close can be from grade school, through high school and in the early days of our respective marriages. Then I got pregnant, and her and her husband’s drinking took a turn for the much worse. Their drunken escapades were bearable as comic relief sometimes, but it started to take a toll. Then she had kids, and became a terribly lax parent, while her husband’s drinking spiraled completely out of control. I miss the old her desperately, and I HATE to come off as judgemental, especially of her, because we were so close for so long. But she very much resents my life (which I must admit is comfortably middle-class and suburban) and can’t figure out why hers didn’t turn out as well - and the only way she can deal with my life is to take the piss out of it as often and as cuttingly as she can. For my part, I can’t stand to see the shambles she’s made of her life - it breaks my heart and there’s not a damn thing I can do about it.
Incubus, my guess is that it has happened to nearly all of us with one friend or another. In one way, it’s really sad to lose someone you were once so close to. OTOH, though, that’s all a part of growing up and disovering new things. There is nothing wrong with it; as time passes and you get older you will realize that a friendship can have a definite lifecycle of its own. Often you walk away from a friendship having learned a lot from that friend, having appreciated being their friend, and having loved them, but not needing them as a friend anymore. (You presumably don’t have the same childhood toys you did back them, or have the same favorite books. Why would it be any different with a person?) It doesn’t mean that you no longer care about the person or wish them well, but simply that your tastes have changed and you’re no longer getting what you need from that friend. If it’s a lot of effort to still be friends, perhaps it is time to move on. Friendship should be easy; that’s the point of it.
There’s a guy I had known from junior high onward and we used to spend a lot of time together. Once we got into college I only saw him on occasion. He started going to all the parties and hooking up with all the party-holics, while I was only going to college to take classes and not get in on any of the social gatherings. Last time I saw him was about 6-7 years ago when he was coming into a supermarket just as I was exiting. We briefly exchanged hellos and small-talked a little, but we didn’t have much to say to each other anymore as our lives had changed so much.
Another friend of mine since grade school had remained fairly close to me and I’d talked to him at least a couple times per week when he just lived down the road from me. He even helped me get the job that I have now, so we saw each other every day at work. About two years ago he was fired, and around that time he had moved about 20 miles away from where I live. I hardly ever see him now. Last time I saw him at his place I was with another friend who has also known him since childhood. When I was there he didn’t talk to me much (he was busy working on a car, though, so I’ll grant him this). I still consider him a friend and I know he probably still thinks about me. As much as I’d like to get together with him and talk about “old times” I’d be afraid that it would be an awkward and difficult arrangement in which not a lot is said. He has four boys to look after, so I know he has other concerns to deal with now.