Loss of friend - Is there anyway I can get over this?

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I just joined this forum (having lurked for quite some time) and I finally bit the bullet and registered, as recently, something has happened which has completly torn my life to shreds. It concerns the ending of a very close friendship.

I have known my friend for a very long time, five or six years now, and I met her online through a forum. She's a few years younger than me, but we seemed to have alot in common, and we became good friends quickly. I trusted her, we would talk online a lot, we would phone each other, we even met in person a few times in the past couple of years. I felt I could trust her, and I could tell her what I really thought. Last year, I got my feelings mixed up…I thought I might have been falling in love with her and I told her that. Needless to say, it scared her and I didn’t blame her. My own feelings were mixed up at the time, and it nearly ended our friendship. Needless to say, I thought we got through it, we both resolved to forget about it and never speak about it again. But then my college study hit me hard, I had a week’s study school coming up (I study at home part time while holding down a job, entering my final year). Coupled with my part time job, I was working a lot and I no longer had much time free in the evenings which is when we usually chatted online, or called each other.

I don’t exactly know why I did it…maybe it was stress related as I hated my job, I was worn out from writing constant essays and I wasn’t sleeping too well. Worse, I felt the friendship was stalling, at least on my end. This girl is a tad emotionally immature, nor does she take any kind of criticism well at all, and has rather unrealistic dreams (she wants to be a professional manga artist!). I thought maybe (and I still don't know why I thought this) that I should stop being friends with her….and I told her so in July. That was a mistake…I regretted it instantly and I went on later the same night to try to apologise, and list my reasons why I had wanted to end the friendship at the time. My reasons were honest, they weren’t designed to be nasty, I just wanted her to try to understand and forgive me. She was upset…really upset about it, but I thought she forgave me and we carried on as normal. Obviously she didn’t because she called ME up out of the blue three weeks later (that I wasn't surprised about as she would often phone) and said she didn’t want to be friends anymore three weeks later, the week after I got back from my study school when I was in the middle of writing more essays. I was hurt, but I accepted her decision.

I tried to respect her final decision, but I missed her. It’s very difficult, especially for me, to cut someone who you’ve known for five years out of your life completely, especially if you were close friends with them. So, I contacted her a week later…we made up…for about 90 minutes. Next day she called me, angry, said she HADN’T forgiven me about what happened in July and that she didn’t want to talk to me again. This was sudden, it was just after work, I didn’t understand why her voice was so hostile. So I called her back, I was angry as well. We shouted a bit, we argued, I begged her to change her mind, hell I was even crying. But her mind was made up…I had to let it go.

I missed her terribly. My anime DVDs went straight into the trash, along with my mangas (such as Negima which she had introduced me to), sold my PS2 and games...everything. I just felt like I wanted to throw everything away that reminded me of her. The feeling wouldn’t go away so I called her AGAIN last week…deciding that if she didn’t want to talk to me, that I would give up, and try to move on.

And her first words when she answered the phone were ‘Oh god’, which hurt me very very deeply! No ‘Hello’. No ‘Hi’. Not even ‘Oh, it’s you’…but ‘Oh god!!’ Needless to say, I gave up completely, it was obvious she wasn’t missing me at all. But then I heard from another online friend (I only have a few...I'm not much better socially using online messenger programs than I am in real life) about what she’s been saying about me..that everything is my fault! Yes, I made mistakes, and yes, what I did in July was completely idiotic of me. But I thought everything was fine. SHE was the one who wanted to end it, and I did not say hurtful things to her. I apologised over and over again for what I said and for wanting to end the relationship, but clearly for her, that’s not enough. I missed her, but now I’m feeling completely and utterly betrayed by her. I have been hurt by someone who I thought was my best friend…fair enough, I may have hurt her, but I was deeply sorry for it. And now she’s hurting me back, perhaps moreso.

And this is the problem. Even if I try to tear everything out of my life that reminds me for her, or try and remain angry at her about it, I still keep thinking about her, and I keep missing her. I want to try and get over this completly and move on, but I keep remembering her even when I don't want to, and I get really upset about it. I couldn't even contact her anymore even if I wanted to (she moved away right after she went nuclear on me) which I suppose helps, but I don't want to remember the last five years at all...I loved her like a sister, we talked about everything, we supported each other...and now it's gone. 'Broken wings mend in time', but some extra advice or suggestions would really feel good right about now.

My 21 year old son went through the same sort of thing last year, but over a girlfriend relationship. He took quite a while to get over this girl, and I think the only way it works is to make your life so busy and full of other relationships that they replace the relationship that you lost. I know this may seem hard. What worked for my son was to have as many experiences -- with classes at college, getting involved in a band, going to church, seeing lots of old friends -- that slowly but surely all of those many relationships (none of which were as intense or as close as the one with the girlfriend) helped to replace the girlfriend. If you can take a new class, or join a group, or go to church activities (if you're religious), or start a band -- do as many different things as possible -- you will develop small relationships. These won't be as intense as your relationship with this girl, but they may end up serving the same purpose. That way, you won't put "all your eggs in one basket" so-to-speak, you'll be spreading out your need to talk and have friendships and confide in people, and one person won't feel all the responsibility to be your support.

Kris

Hey, I recently lost a long-time friend as well. I didn't lose him completely, as we still make small talk now and then, but I realized that our friendship never was as profound as I'd previously thought.

I don't really have any advice to offer. I was pretty down about it when I first realized that I shouldn't be around this person as much anymore... but within a couple days I was back to normal. You seem to be having a more intense reaction and I'm not sure anything will help but time, and the realization that all things are transitory.

Sometimes it takes an eternity. I am still dealing with association issues related to the loss of my best friend/girlfriend, and it has been 13 years. We were inseparable for over two years. It sucked. It sucks. It may always suck, but when it comes up I don't cry anymore and try to remember the good times for what they were, rather than dwell on the loss.

A similar thing happened to me. My solution: I made myself angry. I convinced myself that I had done the best I could (even though it's probably the opposite) and that everything bad was her fault. Crude as it was, it helped me accept what happened, and sorta helped me move on...

I can relate. The best and closest friend I've ever had took up with my wife, and suddenly both were out of my life. I didn't take it very well, and was deeply depressed for a couple of years, but I eventually got over it.

I can relate. I too find it very difficult to let go of people and will tend to dwell on memories and long for everything to suddenly be right again etc. I have no advice other than to fill your time with other things and somehow come to an acceptance that she has probably moved on and that it is rare for someone to remain in your life indefinitely. People seem to walk in and walk out of your life, so maybe safer to guard your heart and not become too attached... have backup, so to speak, so you don't feel so bereft when this happens.

And next time, don't be so arrogant as to decide whether her hopes and dreams are "realistic."

http://news.softpedia.com/news/A-Pill-T ... 8989.shtml

Start taking propranolol for the next 2 weeks.

Maybe it's how you said you loved her?

I'm getting over it slowly...it's taking time though and I'm not sure if I'll ever stop missing her completly. Thanks to all who replied.

schleppenheimer - I understand what you're saying, but I'm not the type who makes friends easily...and to be honest, I tend to only consider people friends if I feel like I can trust them and confide in them..and having friends like that an be difficult to find.

gwenevyn - Thank you for your reply. I've lost touch with friends before, either in real life or on the net, but this is the first time that a really close friendship ended in an argument and so much hate, and it really hit me hard.

Trigger11 - Thanks for your kind words...in my case though, I'm not even sure if I want to remember the good times as they remind me of her..and they hurt.

maulwurfmann - That's what I'm trying to do...but for everytime I get angry at her, their are just times when I can't get angry and get upset about it..

jfberge - Thanks

Graelwyn - Thanks for the advice...I do have a friend who's trying to support me through this which helps lessen it a bit...it is hard for me to let go and move on...part of me somehow hopes that things would get back to normal...although it's obviously not going to happen.

YowlingCat - No offence but her art is nowhere NEAR pro-standard. It's fine to have dreams, but she had no backup plans, no plans to support herself, nothing. 'Trust in yourself and you can achieve anything', that isn't true in the harshness of the real world.

TheMachine1 - Tad extreme...but thanks for the link.

Cyanide - I said that I loved her a year ago and I told her over the phone. She just wasn't interested in me...a year later, I feel that she's using it partly as a way of justifying her actions.

I once lost a friend who happened to be the only person I had ever laid trust in at the time, It sent me threw an emotional wringer, and I was harassing him. Not to harass him but because I wanted to him understand my pain and I wanted him to tell me the reasons for his actions (which he never did, I think in large part because he didn't want to admit them to himself as they weren't reasons he was happy about having).

Well anyone what got me to stop was telling myself that he was dead. That explained why he wasn't talking to me - after all you can't be mad at the dead for not spending time with you. After a month of that I could face the fact he wasn't my friend and wouldn't ever be the friend I had thought I had. It was still hard, and I still want to talk to him, especially to let him know of major accomplishments, but its only gotten easier from that point.

It did help he was willing to deal with everything and speak with me, but in some ways that made it worse to. i'd be having a perfectly good day and see his id on my messenger and just fly into a rage sending him a scathing offline message. It was better not to have blatant reminders of him around

They say that time heals all wounds.. I guess it depends on how deep that wound goes and how much time has passed.
apparently 13 years isnt long enough

double post

I had almost the EXACT same thing happen to me, including the saying something really dumb ("Dang, I wish you read more books so we had more stuff to talk about) and then regretting it HORRIBLY afterwards. Then , huge fights, thinking we're ok but we're not, her talking behind my back, everything.

Life goes on I guess . We were best friends for a year and a half. Then, poof, nothing.