People Are Sharing The Last Straw That Ended Their Friendship For Good, And The Stories Are Heartbreaking
Some say a friendship breakup is even more heartbreaking than a romantic one. It's even more devastating if that person was your best friend for years or even decades. Recently, redditor Salamander-One asked the r/AskReddit community to share why they stopped talking to their best friend. Here were their gut-wrenching and frustrating stories.
1."I stopped texting first."
"This happened to me. It's been over a decade. Never got a message again."
2."He committed a crime, pinned it on me, and I went to prison for it. It took some time to prove it was him, but I was immediately released, and he is in prison now. We were best friends for 13 years, so huge trust issues followed."
3."I grew tired of being taken advantage of and taken for granted. Without ever getting a 'thank you' for everything I did for them. We were best friends for 17 years. I ended that friendship, deleted their number, and deleted them off my social media accounts. A weight was lifted off my shoulders when I ended that friendship. We haven't talked for three years and will continue to do so. What they do is none of my concern anymore, nor has it been."
4."His dumb, married ass tried to sleep with my ex less than 48 hours after we'd broken up. Now, two years later, he's sitting in prison for 20-ish years after sending an undercover FBI agent some sick pictures/videos. Serves the fucker right."
5."She invited a friend I had introduced her to to her wedding but didn’t invite me. That hurt."
"Same. She set a wedding date and told me immediately, so I kept it open. I got a bridal shower invitation. The wedding invitation never came, and I know it wasn't lost in the mail because I was invited to her weird secondary reception that was basically for all her parents' friends.
After a lot of reflection, I realized she was never my friend. I was only hers. We never spoke again."
6."I grew up. He didn't. He's a flat earther, born again, and fixated on people and memories from high school when we graduated about 20 years ago. 'Hey, remember when Mikey from 3rd period dropped his pencil, and he farted when he grabbed it?' 'Hey, remember when that one hot girl from geology, whose name I can't remember, asked me for a Listerine strip? Yeah, she was into me.' It just slowly became a bummer to hang out with, and I had to cut ties."
7."She stopped reading/answering my messages for MONTHS, more than once, for years. I don't require constant communication, and I've had a lot of patience over this as I know she's going through some shit, but I feel like I can't trust her anymore. What kind of friendship is it if you can't even hold a conversation?"
8."I paid her husband's auto shop to replace my radiator, and the techs failed to put fluids back in my car. The new radiator exploded, far from home and even further from the auto shop. They refused to fix the problems, so I complained to the corporate office, and her husband got in trouble and lost bonuses. So, my best friend was not allowed to speak to me anymore."
"My other bestie's boyfriend wanted to advertise his tree services in my yard. I was OK with it, but the landscaping company my landlord paid was not, and they removed the sign without telling me. I was accused of sabotaging the boyfriend's business. Glad to be free of the drama."
9."We were friends but decided we wanted more. He decided out of the blue that after we had started to fall in love, he just wanted to be friends. I was devastated and needed some time to process everything. He said let's take a few days, so we went no-contact. I thought it would be like two or three days. He ghosted me for half a year, then popped up in my and our friends' lives like nothing had happened. We made plans to have a chat on a Friday. I never heard from him again. I don't ever think I'll ever find a friend like that who made me feel so comfortable in my own skin ever again. I still am in disbelief that I lost my love and my best friend in one breath."
10."I don't know the answer, and it's been haunting me for years. She cut off contact with me back in 2022 and suddenly disappeared off the face of the earth — not just me, but literally everyone who knew her in our friend group and even her acquaintances in the city. It's something we talk about from time to time. The only reason I'm assured she's alive and well is because our families still talk. Her mom has given a few updates but largely keeps it hush-hush, too."
"She's active on social media and kept all the pictures of us together, plus her profile picture is still one I took of her many years ago. I don't understand what happened, and it's messed me up pretty bad; this girl was my whole world, and losing her was really hard.
I tried getting back in touch, but she won't respond. Since I'm extremely non-confrontational, I've given up. Probably the biggest mystery of my life, and I'd do anything to know why."
11."We used to love debating political shit, but as I got older, I stopped wanting to do it for a lot of reasons. He discovered that he could win by not being honest. I started by changing the subject or saying that I didn't feel like getting into it tonight or that we could talk about it later. He never got the hint and started calling me drunk late at night, hollering about people taking over the country and the downfall of America, and that I needed to agree with him. It went from putting it off to just not answering the phone to asking him to stop calling me. Sad. I knew the dude for 20 years. I just couldn't keep up with his energy; I had way bigger fish to fry."
12."She didn't ask me to be a bridesmaid at her wedding. I had known her for 25 years, and she asked girls she had known for only a few months. Accordingly, I didn't ask her to be involved in my wedding. I had two sisters whom I had known for longer than her. This didn't stop her from making a spectacle at the wedding, which was on a very hot day. She pulled out the front of my dress and dumped an entire box of confetti down there. I was a bit sweaty, and my dress got stained in red, pink, blue, and green spots for the photos. Thanks, friend."
"She didn’t acknowledge the birth of my first child. To be fair, I did learn later that she had suffered several miscarriages that year, but still.
We would invite her and her husband over for cozy little dinner parties and put a lot of effort into them. Candles and fancy food and nice wines. When she reciprocated the invitation, we always arrived to find out she had also asked three or four other couples and would not bother cooking, so we’d get pizza.
She never got in contact with me; I always called her.
She didn’t call me to tell me that she was finally pregnant, didn’t tell me when she’d had the baby. I always found out through other people.
None of these things seemed like big deals at the time, but they added up and caused a lot of pain and tears on my end. Why didn’t she like me? I got the hint. She didn’t want to be friends anymore.
I removed her from all my socials and accepted that she had moved on, so although I didn’t understand why, I shrugged and moved on, too.
Years later, she goes around telling everyone she doesn’t understand what she did so wrong as to cause me to give her the cold shoulder and block her. I haven’t blocked her; she simply has not re-requested to follow me."
13."He got a job making six figures and became materialistic while ridiculing Union workers (like me). He phased me out of his social life now that he's got rich friends."
14."I honestly don't really know. I was supposed to stay at his house and watch his cat while he was away for a week. A couple of days before that, I had an epileptic seizure. No big deal to me; they happen, and I deal with them. He knew about them; he had even seen a couple happen, so he wasn't at all ignorant about them. I mentioned in casual conversation that I had a seizure, and his response was that I might have another one and somehow burn his house down in the process. He basically blamed me for having epilepsy."
"That pissed me off, so I told him how he made me feel, and I remained civil about it, but he decided that was the end of our friendship that had been going on for more than 20 years.
He blocked me and gave no real explanation, and I haven't heard from him since. It was totally an over-the-top reaction to a simple, 'Dude, that wasn't cool' and very out of character for him."
15."She asked me to help her fake a vaccine card to keep her job at a nail salon because she didn't want to get one. I said no. She stopped texting."
16."I was always expected to talk her off the ledge, but I never got any support back. She has substance abuse issues but always puts herself in situations in which she’d be faced with said substances. Then, I’d have to talk her down for a week afterward due to her anxiety. The last straw was a friend campout. She got hammered, as per usual. She did coke and went off the rails. She hyper-focused on me and brought up issues we had in our friendship from three years ago that we had talked extensively about. It turned into her literally yelling at me and not allowing me to talk. I simply looked at her and said, 'I'm not going to stand here and take this,' and walked away."
"She followed me around and accused me of being 'the bad guy.' No clue what she was even saying. I gave her one last warning. She told me she was done with me, she'd never talk to me again, and to go fuck myself. I walked away. This was around 8 p.m.
For the rest of the evening, she tried hugging me, holding my hand, and putting her head on my shoulder. I ignored her, walked away, and continued enjoying my night.
She was so messed up that she couldn't stand straight. Mutual friends put her to bed four times. Each time, she came back out. I blocked her on all platforms the next morning.
I heard from friends later that she 'doesn't remember what happened' and doesn't know why I'm upset with her. She even ran into my mom at the store and started to cry, saying she missed me and regretted going camping.
It's been a year and a half. My life has been substantially calmer, and I no longer deal with high school theatrics. Oh, and we're in our mid-30s."
17."We used to be inseparable, and losing that connection to her is the one thing I've regretted in my life. We came from very different backgrounds and were in very different situations, so I just didn't think she would understand what I was going through. I was dealing with a really bad depression that led me to isolate myself from my friendships more and more every time, so I slowly stopped reaching out to her. The more time passed without talking, the harder it was for me to reach out to her again for fear of her being mad at me."
"At this point, I haven't talked to her in about five years, but I heard from an old mutual friend that she had gotten engaged and seemed to be thriving, so I'm really glad for her. I wish her nothing but the best in life, even if I can't tell her directly."
18."She told her son (he and my daughter are the same age) that my daughter looked like a 'whore' in her homecoming dress. He told my daughter she said that. I asked her through text if it was true, and she left me on read. I never talked to her again. Several years later, she started working where I was already working and tried to buddy up to me in her new hire training, and I completely ignored her."
If you had a falling out with a close friend, what was the "final straw" that ended your friendship? Tell us in the comments or fill out this form if you prefer to remain anonymous.
Note: Some responses have been edited for length and/or clarity.
