How do you tell a friend that you just don't wanna be friends anymore?
Last month, something happened between me and two of my closest friends, Yara and Jen.
For context, I'm the oldest in our trio. Jen and I had known each other for years, but we only became close after Yara came along. We met at church and eventually became inseparable.
During a church event, I served as a facilitator while Yara and Jen attended as participants. I also had a small crush on a guy named James. While serving, I quickly became friends with the other facilitators, so I naturally spent most of my time with them. I still talked to Yara and Jen, but not as much.
Then Yara suddenly started avoiding me. I was confused and tried reaching out, but she ignored me. At the same time, she started acting strangely whenever James and I interacted. She would stare at us, act differently around him, and even James noticed it. Other people noticed too and thought she might hate James because of how she looked at him, although it mostly seemed like she was upset whenever we were together, which is most of the time.
For additional context, Yara used to like me, and I was infatuated with her at one point, too, but those feelings ended a long time ago.
Eventually, I kept overthinking and blocked her; she soon apologized through Jen's account. The apology was messy, and she kept making excuses, but nonetheless, I accepted it because I hate conflict and always try to understand people, even when they've hurt me. However, things never really felt the same after that.
Later, when I asked for the real reason she avoided me, she admitted that she was hurt because I hadn't been spending much time with her for months due to different schedules. Seeing me grow close to new people made her afraid I would leave her behind.
I forgave her, but I've realized that the friendship has been draining me for a while. Yara tends to be controlling and avoidant at the same time. She ignores people when she's upset instead of communicating, and I often end up being the one trying to understand her. In short, she's toxic.
Now she still texts me regularly, and I still reply, but honestly, I don't think I want to continue the friendship anymore. I don't hate her, and I don't hold any grudges. I've just changed, become emotionally exhausted, and lost interest in maintaining a friendship that no longer feels healthy to me.
The problem is that I still reply because I feel guilty. I don't want to hurt her, but I also feel like slowly distancing myself while pretending everything is okay might be hurting her more in the long run.