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To Lose a Friend

Losing a close friend can be hard. When we care about someone enough to incorporate

them into our personal lives on a daily basis they become irreplaceable to us. Whether we care to

recognise this or not does not change the fact that it is an irrefutable piece of human

relationships. However, what can hurt even more is to be the reason that our friend left us

behind. The disparaging feeling when you have to acknowledge where you went wrong and all

your mistakes is heartbreaking, and the closer the friend is, the stronger the pain that comes from

losing them. Even so, looking back and reflecting on these past mistakes can benefit our future

relationships. Whether your friend left because you were ignoring them, because they felt

undervalued, or if you outright betrayed them, we can always ask ourselves where we went

wrong and build off that.

I believe that one of the most common ways that people hurt their friends is through

ignoring them or their needs as a separate human being. I myself have had wonderful

relationships in the past that were ruined over time by one of us not acknowledging the other or

our interests. Especially if one person in the friendship is putting in a huge amount of effort and

the other is putting in close to none. Friendships are built on any-shared something, and I mean

that literally. Whether it be a shared experience, shared emotions, or even shared loneliness,

friendship is sparked when someone is given the opportunity to share something with another

person. However, the sharing of emotions, experiences and time can’t end after a week, month,

or year. Human relationships are held together through human interaction. While there are times

when people can be close but still have limited amounts of communication it is on the occasion

that both parties are not contributing outside of the bare minimum. The issue truly arises when

one person is putting in the effort to maintain a close relationship and the other puts in zero
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effort. While one is getting all the emotional benefits of support and care from their friend the

one providing that support is receiving nothing in return. This creates an uncomfortable,

draining, atmosphere for that person and they will start to lose all desire to maintain the

relationship they have with you. Of course the loss of this friend might not be so drastic as to not

be on speaking terms, but when you begin to lose their unfaltering support it can be hard to

recover regards of where the blame falls.

There are definitely some more immature and cruel ways of losing a friend though. For

instance when you might devalue your friend. We’ve all been there, on that particularly difficult

day and somehow your subconscious has convinced you that you are the only one with problems

and troubles in this world. So instead of reaching out for help we snapped at everyone and when

someone else tried to relate we told them they had no clue what they were talking about and that

our day had been miles worse then anything they had ever experienced in their life. Dramatic and

ridiculous? Absolutely. Did we then turn our back on them and act like they were rude for

bringing up their own troubles in conversation anyway. Yes. If anyone has not done this, even in

the most inconsequential of moments then they’re either lying or were a saint as a child. The

point however, is to bring up the fact that no matter how inconsequential the instance it strikes a

feeling of discontent into the heart of your friend as you devalue their emotions and opinions as a

human. Not to say it can’t go the other way too. Should you talk over your friend when they are

expressing themself then that too can devalue their opinion and words. Once by itself, or every

now and then followed by a sincere apology, won’t ruin a friendship. However when this kind of

thing happens every other time you talk to your friend they’re no longer going to want to talk to

you. They’ll pull away from you because who wants to talk to someone who’s always showing

that your opinion means nothing to them.

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While the first two examples are things that only begin to affect a relationship after some

time of continued incidents there is another more drastic and quick way in which someone might

lose a friend. Betrayal in a friendship isn’t always so dramatic as literally stabbing them in the

back. A lot of the time talking bad about them to others or using them to benefit yourself can ruin

a relationship. Yes there are unfortunately some more dramatic betrayals that are more common

than they really should be, likely stealing a friend's boyfriend or some other teenage romcom

situation. The level of betrayal a friend might feel for any such thing varies between individuals.

There might be someone who lets their best friend steal looks at their work every time they have

a test, and another that would see cheating off them the highest of offenses and betrayals. It

really just goes to show that if you betray someone enough to end a friendship, that you either

didn’t put enough effort into learning what not to do, or that you genuinely weren’t showing

nearly enough compassion towards someone who you cared for. Not only does this ruin your

relationship with this friend, but it also hurts your prospects at having any other friend. By

betraying them or being a bad friend in general you put yourself in a place for a bad reputation to

develop. That reputation can, and likely will, spread to everyone you both know and even to

people outside of shared friend groups.

To end a friendship is such a manner as to ignore, devalue,or betray a friend is

inexcusable, and clearly that friendship was not deserved in the first place. However that does

not mean you should completely ignore it and just move on with your life. In order to make sure

you don’t repeat the mistakes you make you need to think about everything that went wrong,

consider how you could have changed it, and use it to improve yourself as a human being.

Losing a friend can hurt you and it’s never gonna be fun when you lose the support of someone
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who cared. But, there are good things that can come out of this too if only you put in the effort to

take advantage of them.

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