To All the Friends I Have Loved Before
People talk about how in your 20s friendship changes, because of lifestyle changes or how you grow up to be different people. People normalize growth and self-awareness. Everyone tells you it’s normal to lose friendships, that it’s all okay and part and parcel of life. Even I wrote a piece on it here some time ago. I tried to cut my own personal emotions from it and write a piece that would have more of a purpose instead of something that sounds like a rant. But I don’t think anyone has come close to actually talking about exactly WHY you had to end a friendship, how hard it is to actually do so, how much it makes you feel like a bad person and how much it hurts for days, sometimes weeks, months, years after. Yes, I’ve cut not one, but quite a few friends from my life. Even as recently as last year, a mention of someone I used to be friends with still resurfaced old wounds. The pain felt fresh and with it came a pang of how things used to be. That faint inner voice took it as an opportunity to emerge, whispering quietly so that I could only hear “Aren’t you a cold-hearted bitch for removing people from your life?” I spend the next hour to a day wondering if I am.
I promised this would be a space to navigate life, and I think writing this would perhaps better improve the stance on moving on from friendships. I think it can also prove to be cathartic for me. So, in the least rant-y way possible, here’s a letter to all the friends I have loved before.
You know I’m not one to tiptoe around things. I get straight to the point. So here it is. Things between us have been ruined by distance, time, a shared holiday, a guy, neglect. Over the years, my thought process about this has moved from who is to blame here to should anyone be blamed here? And now, I don’t think anyone is to be blamed. Things happened. And after trying a bunch of ways to handle it, I thought the best way to handle it would be to cut things off. If you’re still wondering why, although if you ask me, it’s completely arbitrary, here are the whys.
I cut it off because you had a way of making me feel inferior every time. I’m not sure if this inferiority was innate or how you made me feel.
I cut it off because you didn’t grow with me in life and one day, I didn’t even recognize who you are anymore. Seeing you for you helped me understand how you don’t fit into my life anymore.
I cut it off because you made it all about yourself. You cherished the few times you fulfilled a promise while burying the multitude of words you had forgotten and failed.
I cut it off because I was tired of being the only person initiating everything – from text messages to meet up plans.
I cut it off because I felt downright disrespected, neglected and as your punching bag and as someone to play “hot and cold” with.
I cut it off because there was no future here and it was for the best for both of us. We were genuinely dragging each other down, allowing each other to cuddle in our comfort zones, patronizing our pseudo-insecurities and not calling each other out on our bullshit and helping each other grow.
I cut it off because it was toxic.
I cut it off because we were hurting each other indirectly.
I promise you, I felt – scratch that – know, it was for the best. It really has been. Yes, I cried myself to sleep a few times, I cried when in the shower when you crossed my mind. I cried for you. For the first few days, weeks, months, even years, after we parted ways, I hoped and hurt for a lot.
I hoped you understood why.
I hoped you had fought a little more to try and keep me in your life, tell me what I could have done better or what I had taken for granted. Ask me what you could have done better, reach out more.
I really hoped before I sent the texts that you wouldn’t make my exit so easy for myself.
I really hoped you hadn’t made my exit so easy for myself.
I hoped you knew it was still all out of love and concern, before we started tearing each other apart and before things got ugly.
I hoped you saw this was for the best.
I wished so much, that you didn’t see me as the bad guy.
But in retrospect and having it all in words and out of me, I realize it doesn’t matter anymore. I am flawed. I am the one who cut things off. But I felt lighter when I cut you off. Weights were lifted from my shoulder and soon I found, I could stand on my own two feet. Tall and proud. It wasn’t entirely you, I promise. Sometimes when you get comfortable with a friendship, ideas and stereotypes for yourself, the friend and the friendship start to form. They start to intervene, they start to take over. When I let you go, my inadequacies left as well. The dangerous words that were afflicting my self-esteem left. My tendency to feel inferior left. Of course, this wasn’t going to be pretty. I don’t know if this narrative we had towards the end of our friendship was all in my own head, or if it had been built by us. I just didn’t want it to stay that way. So, I moved on, I met people and I grew. And right now, I wish you have done, and continue to do the same. I hope you know I still love you and I want absolutely nothing but beyond the best for you.
As Always,
Thendral
I had a dream last night about one of the girls I’ve ended the friendship with over the years. We were on a bus on a journey of sorts. I was sitting next to her and all I remember from the dream is me telling her “We are not friends anymore.” In a firm tone and then saying goodbye and getting off the bus. The brain is a funny thing, isn’t it? I have not spoken to her or thought about her in a while. But that’s where my brain decided to go, conjuring up a “bus journey” – Bravo on the most textbook of analogies, by the way, brain. I like that you kept it simple enough so that I don’t have to spend hours trying to crack the code, but could you please be a bit more imaginative next time? – to add some “setting” to my dream. Which is why this is going up instead of what I had prepared instead. I woke up this morning wondering if I miss her. If I miss any of them. The truth is, no. It couldn’t be clearer. I surely miss the good times, the laughter and the memories and moments we had created together. That’s what I had spent so much time heartbroken by. The good times we had had and wondering why it couldn’t have been that way all the time. I’m grateful for those and for the time spent with them that taught me a lot more about myself. But I don’t miss them as individual people. What I wish to say to them, is best captured by the wise words of a cultural pop icon: “Thank u, next.”
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