Are They Still Friends If You Don't Want to Talk To Them?

[Almond_Joy]

Hi everyone,

 

I've been friends with a girl for about 2.5 years now. We became a big source of emotional support for each other over the first year because we were both recovering from bad relationships.

 

Around 6 - 8 months into our friendship, she met a new guy and he ended up being her dream guy, everything she wanted in a relationship. I congratulated her, and still do, on finding her bit of happiness because she deserves it.

 

Another 6 -8 months goes by and they decide to move out of state for a new start. I missed her more than I miss most at first, but I am used to people coming and going in my life. I started branching out to make new friends, as I realized she was my only real friend when she left.

 

So this has been fine up until about 5 months ago. I moved into a sales position at my job, so I did not have down time during work to text her and keep up the daily communication she's used to. I explained this to her but she kept texting me at the same rate anyway. I stopped trying to keep up and basically she would text me for 2 or 3 days with no response from me. At one point she made a snide comment when I acknowledged I was late getting back to her. at that point I explained to her again that my job takes up a lot of my time and energy and that I just don't have time to talk to her every day, and asked her to please not hold that against me. She said she got it and the texts dwindled down to a couple times a week.

 

Now these last couple of months have been really stressful for me in this sales job. I've been struggling with depression and frustration and just trying to stay positive and do the work. At first when I shared this with her, she was sympathetic and encouraging. After a couple weeks though, her responses to my sharing became canned and the text exchanges became more about how wonderful her relationship is going and me congratulating her on everything being great for her.

 

Now I'm pretty much over the depression and starting to get comfortable with my job, but it still takes a lot out of me socially so I have not tried to ramp up our text convos again. Whenever we do text now though, I can barely get in two texts before she's gushing about her relationship. Every conversation is about how in love they are and how wonderful everything is.

 

I don't even want the conversation to be about me...I'm just tired of constantly hearing about her life. The world does not revolve around her being in love. She never talks about things in the news or social issues or relationships with other people. Plus I have other friends and things I do now! All of my social energies cannot be devoted to her. She hasn't made any friends up there as far as I know - it's just her bf's family and her bf that she talks to. So from what she's told me I'm still like her only gf.

 

Lately when she asks how I'm doing I've just dwindled down to one word responses because she doesn't seem interested in hearing about my life anyway - it's like she's just asking as a gesture of courtesy. The last time she texted I didn't even respond before she was gushing about her relationship. The last time someone did not acknowledge her gushing, she got hurt and upset because "she just wants people to be happy for her, that she's finally happy". I don't want her to think that of me because that's not what this is.

 

Like I said though my needs in a friendship are changing. I don't need to talk to friends several times a week. Now I have a really fun awesome face to face hangout once or twice every couple months, and that's enough for me. The premises of talks with my new friends are not every day incidents or personal relationship qualms/events. I wish her well but I really don't want to talk to my old friend that often any more since she's become increasingly incapable of entertaining anything outside of her relationship. If I try to tell her any of this she'll take it as a rejection or tell me I haven't been trying to keep up the friendship anyway.... Is this still a friendship? If so it feels like it's doing more for her than it is for me now.

[HazyCosmicJive]

Hi everyone,

 

I've been friends with a girl for about 2.5 years now. We became a big source of emotional support for each other over the first year because we were both recovering from bad relationships.

 

Around 6 - 8 months into our friendship, she met a new guy and he ended up being her dream guy, everything she wanted in a relationship. I congratulated her, and still do, on finding her bit of happiness because she deserves it.

 

Another 6 -8 months goes by and they decide to move out of state for a new start. I missed her more than I miss most at first, but I am used to people coming and going in my life. I started branching out to make new friends, as I realized she was my only real friend when she left.

 

So this has been fine up until about 5 months ago. I moved into a sales position at my job, so I did not have down time during work to text her and keep up the daily communication she's used to. I explained this to her but she kept texting me at the same rate anyway. I stopped trying to keep up and basically she would text me for 2 or 3 days with no response from me. At one point she made a snide comment when I acknowledged I was late getting back to her. at that point I explained to her again that my job takes up a lot of my time and energy and that I just don't have time to talk to her every day, and asked her to please not hold that against me. She said she got it and the texts dwindled down to a couple times a week.

 

Now these last couple of months have been really stressful for me in this sales job. I've been struggling with depression and frustration and just trying to stay positive and do the work. At first when I shared this with her, she was sympathetic and encouraging. After a couple weeks though, her responses to my sharing became canned and the text exchanges became more about how wonderful her relationship is going and me congratulating her on everything being great for her.

 

Now I'm pretty much over the depression and starting to get comfortable with my job, but it still takes a lot out of me socially so I have not tried to ramp up our text convos again. Whenever we do text now though, I can barely get in two texts before she's gushing about her relationship. Every conversation is about how in love they are and how wonderful everything is.

 

I don't even want the conversation to be about me...I'm just tired of constantly hearing about her life. The world does not revolve around her being in love. She never talks about things in the news or social issues or relationships with other people. Plus I have other friends and things I do now! All of my social energies cannot be devoted to her. She hasn't made any friends up there as far as I know - it's just her bf's family and her bf that she talks to. So from what she's told me I'm still like her only gf.

 

Lately when she asks how I'm doing I've just dwindled down to one word responses because she doesn't seem interested in hearing about my life anyway - it's like she's just asking as a gesture of courtesy. The last time she texted I didn't even respond before she was gushing about her relationship. The last time someone did not acknowledge her gushing, she got hurt and upset because "she just wants people to be happy for her, that she's finally happy". I don't want her to think that of me because that's not what this is.

 

Like I said though my needs in a friendship are changing. I don't need to talk to friends several times a week. Now I have a really fun awesome face to face hangout once or twice every couple months, and that's enough for me. The premises of talks with my new friends are not every day incidents or personal relationship qualms/events. I wish her well but I really don't want to talk to my old friend that often any more since she's become increasingly incapable of entertaining anything outside of her relationship. If I try to tell her any of this she'll take it as a rejection or tell me I haven't been trying to keep up the friendship anyway.... Is this still a friendship? If so it feels like it's doing more for her than it is for me now.

 

I have a lot of friends I rarely talk to. LOL. It gets to a certain point in your life where people start to go their separate ways yet they're still fond of each other. I have a friend from a previous job who lives about 10 minutes away, yet he's so busy with his home life we've fallen out of touch, though I know I can call him anytime if I ever needed help with something and he wouldn't hesitate to give me a hand. I've learned that things never stay the same and you have to move on and make new friends who suit your current "friendship needs." I don't know how you can get this across to her without hurting her feelings, but maybe it would help if you gave her a phone call instead of texting. Things never come across the same in a text or an e-mail as they do over the phone or face-to-face.

[Almond_Joy]

Thanks, it never occurred to me that a phone call vs. a text would make a difference.

[preraph]

People who keep repeating themselves often do so because you are not acknowledging what they are saying. When she writes you about her bf or whatever, repeat back a summarized version of what she told you so she knows you listened. Something like, "So you two went and had a swanky dinner, huh? Sounds fun." It's not fair shooting back terse answers just because she's happy now. It isn't as if she isn't asking you how things are. You're just not replying to that. If you truly have nothing to report, it's time you made time for an outside activity so you have something to say. If your life is all work to the point where that's all you can talk about, or being depressed, time to balance your life so you have something good to report. It doesn't have to be much, just something like "Took a walk in the park at lunch. It felt great to be out in the sunshine. Do you and your bf ever just go walking?"

 

If you want to be friends, you have to put in a little effort not only on your communication style but also on yourself. If you think friends are just too much trouble at this point, then it still sounds to me like you need to strike a balance. Good luck.

[dispatch3d]

This is more talking to my friends than I would normally do. I agree phone calls will be better than text messages. I'm surprised you can keep in contact this much with a girl and not develop feelings.

[La Trese]

Hi everyone,

 

I've been friends with a girl for about 2.5 years now. We became a big source of emotional support for each other over the first year because we were both recovering from bad relationships.

 

Around 6 - 8 months into our friendship, she met a new guy and he ended up being her dream guy, everything she wanted in a relationship. I congratulated her, and still do, on finding her bit of happiness because she deserves it.

 

Another 6 -8 months goes by and they decide to move out of state for a new start. I missed her more than I miss most at first, but I am used to people coming and going in my life. I started branching out to make new friends, as I realized she was my only real friend when she left.

 

So this has been fine up until about 5 months ago. I moved into a sales position at my job, so I did not have down time during work to text her and keep up the daily communication she's used to. I explained this to her but she kept texting me at the same rate anyway. I stopped trying to keep up and basically she would text me for 2 or 3 days with no response from me. At one point she made a snide comment when I acknowledged I was late getting back to her. at that point I explained to her again that my job takes up a lot of my time and energy and that I just don't have time to talk to her every day, and asked her to please not hold that against me. She said she got it and the texts dwindled down to a couple times a week.

 

Now these last couple of months have been really stressful for me in this sales job. I've been struggling with depression and frustration and just trying to stay positive and do the work. At first when I shared this with her, she was sympathetic and encouraging. After a couple weeks though, her responses to my sharing became canned and the text exchanges became more about how wonderful her relationship is going and me congratulating her on everything being great for her.

 

Now I'm pretty much over the depression and starting to get comfortable with my job, but it still takes a lot out of me socially so I have not tried to ramp up our text convos again. Whenever we do text now though, I can barely get in two texts before she's gushing about her relationship. Every conversation is about how in love they are and how wonderful everything is.

 

I don't even want the conversation to be about me...I'm just tired of constantly hearing about her life. The world does not revolve around her being in love. She never talks about things in the news or social issues or relationships with other people. Plus I have other friends and things I do now! All of my social energies cannot be devoted to her. She hasn't made any friends up there as far as I know - it's just her bf's family and her bf that she talks to. So from what she's told me I'm still like her only gf.

 

Lately when she asks how I'm doing I've just dwindled down to one word responses because she doesn't seem interested in hearing about my life anyway - it's like she's just asking as a gesture of courtesy. The last time she texted I didn't even respond before she was gushing about her relationship. The last time someone did not acknowledge her gushing, she got hurt and upset because "she just wants people to be happy for her, that she's finally happy". I don't want her to think that of me because that's not what this is.

 

Like I said though my needs in a friendship are changing. I don't need to talk to friends several times a week. Now I have a really fun awesome face to face hangout once or twice every couple months, and that's enough for me. The premises of talks with my new friends are not every day incidents or personal relationship qualms/events. I wish her well but I really don't want to talk to my old friend that often any more since she's become increasingly incapable of entertaining anything outside of her relationship. If I try to tell her any of this she'll take it as a rejection or tell me I haven't been trying to keep up the friendship anyway.... Is this still a friendship? If so it feels like it's doing more for her than it is for me now.

This is kind of a two sided issue here. On one hand, if you are still single its a little inconsiderate for the person to gush about their relationship too much. On the other hand if I were her I would be upset because by not responding it makes it seem like as you are not happy for her and that would upset me. I agree with the other poster, acknowledge her relationship, make it clear you are happy for her, but then quickly change the subject.

[littleplanet]

Thanks, it never occurred to me that a phone call vs. a text would make a difference.

 

 

I have to remind myself to be civil here......after all,we're strangers.

I want to say of course a phone call could make a difference. As if this is an obvious thing.

But I know for many people.....texting is a given.

I'm not quite sure I understand why.

But what the heck; I'll go for it.

 

There's this thing about wanting to hear the sound of someone's voice.

As if - nothing they could ever write could possibly have the same impact as the sound of them.

Let's just suppose for a minute you have good ears.

By that I mean you know how to listen...................

(sort of like knowing how to read between the lines?)

Except, instead - knowing how to hear inside the speech - the tone, the inflection, the phrasing, the pauses, the timbre, the accent......the voiceprint, so to speak.

 

Beyond all that - many people, unless completely comfortable with the art of writing (and it is an art) - can talk rings around their ability to put it in print. A comfortable conversational skill.

 

All this can make a phone call do things a text cannot.

 

On the other hand - there are people who hate phones, being on the phone, feeling trapped by a phone.....and all of that.

I never text. Ever. Yet I email all the time.

You've probably guessed that I usually have a lot to say.

You'd be right.

Which makes a few dozen paltry characters feel practically useless.

 

One thing's for sure though. If I sense any tension from not being understood, misunderstood...........from what I write........it's a no-brainer to want to switch to verbal discussion with lots of audio prompt.

(Back to those listening and hearing skills again.)

And of course - it works both ways. Both sides. You hear them - they hear you.

 

A little story. It's kinda cute.

I recall the first time I ever told a girl that I loved her.

I was 17. Moody. Terrified. Determined.

I used the three basic words to put it across....no more, no less.

 

I remember to this day, exactly how she responded.

(she was a sensible girl of few words, liked to say a lot with a little)

To this day, this has never changed (46 years later)

She replied: "Not a good idea. People get hurt.")

Now - that was true enough.

But the point of the story is this:

She had damned good ears.

She didn't just hear what I said......she heard how I said it.

She knew it was true.

That impressed her.

So much so that in time (three months later) she said the same thing back to me.

Only she stepped out of her own pattern. She gave me a speech.

Helluva speech it was, too.

 

There is no way possible that those three words written (in whatever medium) could have had the tiniest fraction of the impact they actually had, when I said them.

It was the sound of them..........in the way that I spoke them - that made them mean exactly what I intended them to mean.

 

And what was that?

(they were true)

And how did she know that?

Like I said.....she had damned good ears. Still does.

 

All the difference in the world.