“Our Friendship Was Only Worth 25 Dollars”: 35 People Who Cut Ties With Their Friends

My best friend for close to 15 years blocked me. When I got in touch with him I asked what was going on, and he said he was just purging his friends list. Said it was a mistake and unblocked me.

 

Well I happened to be dealing with the loss of my father (who basically adopted him) and was struggling with alcohol abuse. I reached out to him just seeking a friend cause I was in such a low spot, then he blocked me again.

 

I totally get cutting off friends who are alcoholics or toxic. But the only time I ever asked him for anything was "Hey man, not sure if you heard but my dad died. I've been drinking too much and could use a friend to talk to."

 

And he blocked me for that.

She was unvaccinated and refused to take a covid test before seeing me. My mother was terminally ill and severely immuno-compromised, so I was absolutely trying to minimise the risk of getting covid so I could still see my Mum.

 

She refused to take a test, twice, despite kind and calm requests and explanations, on the basis that she "didn't want to get a sinus infection." (This was in the time of nasal swabs, not mouth swabs, for covid tests. You know, those nasal swabs that are sterile and can't cause infection.)

 

I'm 100% sure that it wasn't about a sinus infection. It was about control. She had been annoyed because I hadn't validated her anti-vax stance in the past.

 

Similarly, I know she wanted more validation for her religious views, which she'd acquired in her 30s and which I didn't share. I'd told her that I was happy her faith made her happy, but I think she wanted me to truly share her beliefs. I'd also said that her sister's bisexuality was "fine with me" when she'd stated that a wedding of 2 women was "not what God wants."

 

I think all of those different views just threatened the way she saw the world, and how she saw herself.

 

Her last texts thanked me for "sharing my views" re covid and it's potential to kill my Mum, then became pseudo-concerned when I didn't reply. I read the whole situation as "I want to say whatever I want to you, but I want to still feel like a nice person, so please reply and give me that validation."

 

I didn't reply to her, but I still ask myself whether the mature thing to do would have been to clearly reply and state that I didn't want to stay in contact. It's taken me until now (over a year later) to see through the pain and formulate what I might have said.

 

We'd been friends since the first days of high school. 20+ years. In essence we just aquired very different views from each other as adults, but I can't pretend her attitude towards my Mum, and towards the horrible journey my family had to take, wasn't devastating.

 

Life is a bloody painful journey at times, that's for sure.

She slept with my then boyfriend. The most boring tragedy of my life.

Knew him since elementary school. Always abrasive but, that was just him. He went to Europe to go to college and met some really snooty Europeans and came back a horrible person. Like he used to talk nonstop about debt and how he wanted to start a business and only hire people with debt so that he could mistreat them and they couldn't afford to quit. Not joking.

 

So I tried my best to get him to come around, but he was so rude to grocery store clerks, etc. that it was almost a story that sounded made up for internet rage bait.

 

I was straight out of college at the time, and I accepted a night shift job. I compromised my sleep and I'll tell you, the job did not pay well. And he kept pressing me and pressing me to ask me how much I made. I finally gave in, and he lorded it over me.

 

So one night before I punched in for the night shift, we went for coffee and he casually said something like, "Yeah, anybody who gets out of bed for less than six figures is a sucker," knowing full well what I made.

 

After about 20 years of friendship, I said I have to go, said goodbye, walked to my car and got in. I turned the ignition and as the car was starting I said, this friendship is over. And I never, ever looked back.

 

And another friend guilt tripped me about it, said it was awkward that we're not all friends anymore. This bad "friend" walked into another friend's butcher shop, used his friendship with another buddy working there, to run up a tab of several thousand dollars and then never paid.

 

"Oh sorry that's business," was his reply.

I'll tell you, since cutting him out of my life I live much, much, much happier. Had I never stopped being friends with him, I would have never grown so much as a person.

I was in a horrific auto accident, coma for a week, ICU for a month. The person who was my closest friend never came to see me, when I finally got home, wheelchair bound, when he came over his first question was what kind of drugs did they give me. It was supposed to be a joke but I told him that we’re done being friends and not to come back to my house ever again. That was 17 years ago.

 

It was very difficult for me to sit there and tell the person that I no longer wanted to be friends and to leave and never come back. I was lucky to have support of close family which help ease the pain of losing a friend. I had a bunch of acquaintances that disappeared after my accident and during my recovery so I took the position of good riddance.

I had a mate that went through some tough times with his partner. I supported him with late-night chats, gave him a place to stay, and even kept my mouth shut when he cheated on her. Fast-forward a couple of years, I ended up going through some tough times myself and was on the verge of bankruptcy. He didn't give a s**t. Whenever we spoke, conversations always pivoted to how well he was doing and how much money he was making. I always got the impression that he was glad I was struggling.

 

Fast-forward another couple of years, and things have turned around for me. I'm doing well, have a new job, and was able to move to a great location outside of the UK. He came to visit once and spent the whole time slagging off where I lived, how s**t my job was compared to his, and even dropped a couple of hints that he didn't like my girlfriend (who's now my wife). He went back home, and I never contacted him again. Apparently, he posted something snarky on Facebook about not being invited to 'his best mate's wedding,' but I'm not on Facebook, so don't care.

Over 10 years of friendship. We travelled together, worked together, he was the best man at my wedding. We were best friends, the kind of friend you could call any time of day or night and he’d be there to help. I was there for him through difficult times and vice versa. Then he met his now wife…

Suddenly any gatherings at my house they couldn’t attend because she was always sick from “something she ate”…

She was from a wealthy family, the kind that literally owns a small island, and lived in an affluent neighbourhood. It’s not like I was poor or lived in a bad neighbourhood but by comparison, I’m sure the very thought of her being in my part of town made her sick.

Anyway, I moved overseas, received a save the date for their wedding but the invitation never showed up. He reached out asking if I was coming and was shocked I hadn’t got the invitation as he wanted me there but it was too late to make arrangements and a long way to travel.

I received an email from him while he was on his honeymoon telling me how jealous he was of me and my career and new life overseas.

I travelled back to see family and friends a little while later and tried to make arrangements to see him but he was “too busy”… I was literally in the same building as him visiting old colleagues.

I’m convinced his wife is the reason my invitation got lost in the mail and that it all came out on the honeymoon and now he can’t look me in the face.

We booked a group holiday before we all went to University. She picked the place, picked our rooms, who was sharing with who, she planned the whole itinerary, she *told* one of the other girls in the group she was driving the 3+ hours drive as well, didn't ask, just told her to do it.

She then ditched us every night to talk on the phone with her boyfriend for 2 hours, then go to sleep without telling anyone and was generally a controlling, moody b***h the entire trip.

But the reeeaaal stinker: 2nd to last day she suddenly says work has cancelled her next 2 days of holiday and she has to go in. We all knew she was lying. Next thing she says is she can no longer take any of us back home. The other friend who drove there wasn't going home when we were leaving, she was driving onwards to see family elsewhere. B***h friend said best she could do was drop rest of us at a train station. Reminder we were 3+ hours *drive* away from home, which translated to 6+ hour train journey with multiple changes.

Ends up with b***h friend leaving 6am the next morning, without a word, and my other friend had to reschedule her plans to drive the rest of us 2 hours in the wrong direction to meet my poor mum, who drove 2 hours to meet us halfway at a service station on a random motorway.

None of us have seen or spoken to her in over 10 years, since she left that morning.

He cheated on his wife and left her and their two kids.

She snuck around for a whole summer keeping the secret that she was f*****g and had a relationship with my dying father. she was of age but he was in his last months of life, not in his right mind. hard to look past, she still reaches out every now in then trying to reconnect but it’s just too damn weird.

I found out through one of their friends she thought wouldn't share. She had slept with my past 3 boyfriends and I was in the same house sleeping one of those times.

One of my best friends in high school; he knew I had a massive crush on a girl. He was well aware that I was a bit awkward and not very confident, so he offered to help me out. He invited the young lady in question and me to hang out at his place, to get us in the same place and give me a shot.

 

Then he had sex with her while I was in the next room. I realized what was happening, and just sat there, unsure how to process what was going on. At some point I left. We never really discussed it.

 

The friendship puttered along for a short while longer, withering away after that. That event, along with a few other earlier experiences made it so I've never been quite able to trust other guys and form friendships with them as anything more than acquaintances.

 

To this day (I'm 38) I don't have a single close male friend. One of the few things I dislike about myself.

I'm not completely sure. Our mothers have been besties since elementary school, and they had us a month apart; while we were night and day, personality-wise, and probably should have been the complete opposite, we were besties, too, closer than sisters, from birth until we were 25. She had gotten married a few years before, moved a couple hours away and had her first baby, so naturally, our dynamic had shifted some, but I was still under the impression that we were as close as ever the night she called and told me that her life had changed, she no longer had time or energy for a friendship like ours, and that she pretty much just didn't want me in her life, anymore. There was no falling out, we hadn't had a fight since we were teenagers, there was nothing that I could pinpoint (then or now) that led to her decision, but it broke my heart and I grieved the loss for years after.

He became addicted to [drugs] after his father died. It warped his personality, and he was constantly angry and bitter. He was unpredictable, and genuinely scared me because it felt that it would be very easy for him to do something that would ruin his life in an instant. Also refused any help offered. The only thing I could do was move on.

Not being invited to her wedding after being close friends for nearly four years. The other two people in our friend group were bridesmaids.