Friendship break-ups suck. We talk all the time about romantic break-ups and getting our hearts broken, but there is little conversation about the pain of losing a friendship. Just like romantic relationships, friendships end for all sorts of reasons. There might be a betrayal, a repeated toxic behaviour, or simply growing apart. I decided to write out some reflections on this topic as I’ve been navigating these losses alongside clients every week.

Like a lot of other losses, the loss of a friendship is often complex. There are usually a lot of different feelings and different parts of ourselves involved. This is the fun part about being humans. We can have many different parts get activated at the same time. But we tend to judge ourselves when certain parts come up. The thing is, it’s normal to have many different reactions to this type of loss. And invalidating ourselves and our reactions is not the answer. Even if it was your choice to end the friendship, you are allowed to have a lot of different responses and tune in to all of your parts that are responding.

For example, you can know that ending a friendship is the best decision for your well-being. You can also have a part of you that misses them, a part of you that tells you that you’re a bad person for not reaching out, a part of you that wants to tell them all the ways they hurt you, to name a few. And the tough part is, you can have all of these parts showing up at the same time.

When we have something upsetting happen like a friendship break-up, it is normal that a lot of different parts get activated. It is normal that we start to feel all sorts of conflicting things. Your system is trying to protect you and keep you safe. You are feeling pain and your system doesn’t want you to. That part of you that tells you to call your ex-friend at 2am after too much wine is trying to help you. But as we know, it doesn’t always know best. What we can do is listen to and validate these parts of ourselves while tuning into our core self and what we know is really best for us. Here are some other ideas that I’ve picked up along the way.

When you miss them, send love and light in their direction through meditation/the universe/prayer instead of through a DM (my favourite is the loving-kindness meditation lines of “May you be safe. May you be happy. May you be healthy.”
Sit with the different feelings that come up using something like a RAIN practice (Recognise, Accept/Allow, Investigate, Nurture)
Honour you parts but offer a different solution (ex. a part of you wishes you could send them a birthday present- send something nice to another friend to show you care)
If you’re remembering good times as well, you can express gratitude that you got to have those experiences while naming that you may not experience that with them again
If you are debating reaching out to reconcile, sit with that choice and ask yourself where it is coming from (ie a part of you that feels guilty or your core self feeling that it is the right choice for you)

I’m sure there are many other tips that people have for getting through friendship break-ups (ice cream and Netflix?) but there are a few. But I think the real take-away that I am hoping for is that if you are going through a friendship break-up:

Friendship break-ups hurt. They are hard. And it is okay to feel whatever you are feeling about it and honour the parts of you that are coming up the best way you can. So validate yourself as much as you can and if you’re sending love and light to your ex-bestie, I hope you can send some to yourself as well. May you be safe. May you be happy. May you be healthy. <3