⚠️mentions sensitive topics of SA
Sorry for the long post, but I need some help. This has been happening on and off for the last year or so, but worse now.
Little backstory: me and my friend, both 22 yo females have known eachother for about 7 years. We were close in high school and kind of fell out for no reason after graduation. We reconnected in March 2025 and were close for the last year or so. We were best friends and did everything like paddleboarding, shopping trips, told eachother everything, etc. Not the hugs and “I love you” when she leaves type friend though lol.
Everything was fine until a few weeks ago. We now both have boyfriends which hasn’t stopped us before or bothered anything. Our friendship feels one way, like I always text first 95% of the time. I always reach out for plans, I ask how her day was and talk about work, and it’s never reciprocated. I kind of stopped dumping so much energy into something that I wasn’t getting back but didn’t say anything or have a conversation about it. I kind of withdrew myself but we still talked some.
She leaves me on delivered or open lately and sends blank snaps of the floor or something which isn’t like her (we mostly communicate through snapchat) and doesn’t reach out. My feelings were kind of hurt at first but I can’t change who she is and I’ve stopped caring at this point. She just isn’t a great friend and hasn’t really been there for me when I’ve gone through stuff.
A couple of examples:
I asked if she wanted to come over and it was barely snowing at the time. I live 20 min away. She said “no I can’t. The roads are too slick and my tires aren’t good.” And I understood. An hour later she was on her way to her boyfriend’s who lives 2 hours away in a snowstorm.
I asked her if she wanted to dye my hair and id do her lashes, she said “as long as im home by 4pm because I have to be to work at 9am tomorrow.” And I said “yeah same I work 5am to 5:30pm.” And she said it’d be too late when I messaged her at 1 pm.
When she left her ex boyfriend, I took several days off work to help her move her things with MY truck and fuel. Asked her how she was doing the whole way through it, helped keep her busy, invited her out, etc. On the flip side, I was SA’d and I called her for a listening ear very upset and she said she was driving, too tired to talk about it, and would talk to me later after a nap. That’s when I realized she isn’t a good friend.
It’s little things like that where effort and the energy for our friendship isn’t the same on her end, and now on mine because it’s one sided.
Also not to criticize her or anyone that feels this way, but she always has a problem. She can’t do stuff when she doesn’t feel like it, or her back will hurt and she’ll have to sleep all day and wear her back brace. Or her carpal tunnel that she’s convinced she has makes her unable to do anything with her hands. Or she can’t go out in the sun for too long because she got a new freckle and she needs to go to the doctor before going outside for long periods of time. She also has a lot of underlying anger with her family I think and just isn’t a happy person overall. I’m not saying that’s her fault, but it’s always the excuse I get.
Another dilemma I have is I booked a cruise with my family like 2 months ago and we invited her on it when we were on better terms. With all of this happening, I really don’t want her to go with us anymore. As bad as it sounds, she wouldn’t want to do anything, she’s want to sleep the whole time, and I don’t know if we’re even going to be friends by then if this continues. I don’t want to completely burn down our friendship over this cruise, but my family is aware of the situation and know her well, and they don’t really want her to come either. She hasn’t said thank you for the invite, hasn’t brought it up at all for planning our excursions we’d like to do together, nothing at all. I want to go and have a good time without this happening the whole 10 days. I have until July 28 to change the person on the cruise, but I don’t know how to tell her. I don’t want to ruin our friendship over this, but at the same time she’s just not a good friend in general and acts like she couldn’t care less about me or our friendship.
It’s difficult to give a good big picture through writing like this, but how do I step away, or tell her I don’t want her to go, and I’m honestly just drained and confused, etc. I don’t know what to do. I’m not a huge fan of confrontation and I don’t want to be a jerk here. I’ve known her a long time but I’m tired of doing this every couple of weeks with a friend that doesn’t check up on me or give back the same effort unless she wants something.
I understand she has things on her plate, or might be going through something I don’t know about, but it doesn’t change her actions over the last year on and off. I don’t want to be a jerk about it at all, but I also don’t want/need somebody in my life that isn’t there for me and effecting my peace. I’m stressed over this vacation as well. I don’t know what to do.