So a few months ago I wrote a really long post about losing my best friend. If you want to read it, here is a link.
Then I updated saying we were going to try to be friends again. If you want to read that, here is a link.
For the sake of this post, long story short, I tried for a few months to basically "rebuild" this friendship with someone I was best friends with for 3 years. This past week I just came to the realization that I can't do it. He hurt me beyond my capacity to forget (I did forgive). I can't knowingly go into a relationship that is not going to benefit me at all. When he text me to hang out or share something, I just never cared about it. I felt obligated to hang out because I said I'd try to rebuild.
Let's talk about this word rebuild. I tried to use it as starting a brand new friendship. He thought it meant starting back where we left off. Only to him, where we left off was almost a year before we stopped being friends. Ours was not a sudden severance. I'm not the type. I held on until my hands bled and my heart was in the dirt. He watched me suffer and cry out for help, only to take a step back from me every time I asked. It's hard for me to let people go when I care for them so deeply. I will never understand what makes walking away so easy for others. I've watched so many best friends leave me behind and I never know what went wrong.
With him, he told me what went wrong. He owned up to his mistakes. Yet, he tried to also place blame on me and my relationship. I never changed, it was him. I never stopped caring, he did. If he can so easily treat his best friend like a stranger, then I don't want to rebuild a new friendship with that type of person.
I'm sharing this because I need to get it out and I feel safe here.
I'm ready to close that book and remember him as the wonderful friend he was for 3 years that I truly needed him.