I Admit It, I Was A Bad Friend

One of the realities of going abroad is that you have to leave everyone behind. When it comes to friends, there’s no knowing exactly when we’ll hang out again. This has, at times, been my reality long before I decided to go travelling- meeting up sporadically over the year but vowing to stay reachable over calls, texts, and social media. Except I haven’t always been an easily reachable friend.

Last year I made a really good friend. We met on an app called Bumble BFF at the beginning of the year, when I first moved to my apartment and I was looking to meet local people around my age to hang out with. We bonded quickly over the things we had in common; we were from the same country, we were both creatives, had busy jobs, were middle children from big families, and we both enjoyed psycho-analysing Love Island cast members. We talked almost every day and would regularly profess our appreciation for having found a fulfilling adult friendship that was so low maintenance.

I’m not sure how I suddenly became ‘busier.’ I’m aware that busy can mean many different things to me. Sometimes I’m busy drawing cartoons. Sometimes I’m busy socialising. Sometimes I’m busy scrolling through social media, bouncing from app to app. A lot of the time, I’m busy recovering from being busy. When I’m busy, I choose to prioritise my solitude and will take as long as I need to respond to calls, texts and emails. I found myself too mentally exhausted to reply to the voice notes I’d once replied to within an hour or two. My responses went from timely, extensive, and detailed to late, short and apologetic. ‘Isn’t that the beauty of a low maintenance friendship?’ I thought, ‘we don’t have to talk or hang out all the time!

Months went by and although we remained good friends, I look back at our conversations and see how much harder she tried than I did. Most of the memes, TikTok’s, voice notes and texts were sent by her. Even though we both valued our friendship, it was clear that she was much better at expressing this than I was.

The straw that broke the camel’s back was a few months ago when she sent the last voice note. She talked about the general stuff; being in medical school, family life, dating, and her thoughts on the winter season of Love Island. I smiled as I listened to it, curled up in bed, before yawning and falling asleep. I did not respond the next day. I did not respond the day after that. In fact, I did not respond until almost one month later. In that month, this friend crossed my mind many times and for some reason I was convinced my unexplained silence was understandable and we could chuck it down to the whole low maintenance thing. When I did eventually reach out, I started with my usual apology for being ‘super busy,’ and thought I could make up for it by sending a 4-minute voice note and extending an invite to hang out soon. Understandably, I was met with the radio silence I deserved.

To this day, we still haven’t spoken. In the time that I sent that message and now, I’ve learnt a few things about myself. I can be a bad friend. This isn’t news to me. In general, I think I’m a good friend but I can think of times where I could have been more present, more available, and more consistent. I’ve learnt the importance of accountability and how necessary it is for thriving adult friendships. I think a lot of adults struggle to make new friends because we’re not available for the work it takes to sustain these friendships and put the entire onus on others to pursue us in friendships. I’m learning that taking a backseat while the other person pulls their weight in the friendship isn’t fair or sustainable in the long run. Low-maintenance friendships where we both put in minimal effort without this affecting the quality of our friendship may work with some friends, but I can’t assume it’ll work with everyone.

I’ve reached out again, with no expectations or pressure for a response. This friend is owed a sincere apology and should know that they deserved much better. This experience has made me look at my existing friendships differently. I’m more inspired to reach out first more often, make more plans, respond in a timely manner, and be an overall more present friend. I think this lesson came just in time as I’m about to embark on a new adventure and (hopefully) make new connections that reflect the kind, attentive, and reliable friend I want to be.