It’s a hard thing losing a best friend. You think you know them, you think they’ll be there for you, but one day they will decide that they don’t want to be there for you. And that is when you’ll know—it’s a hard thing losing a best friend.

I had this friend that I had known for 5 years—we did most things together and when we didn’t we would still be communicating. We were your typical best friend pair: we knew everything about the other, what would make them feel better, favorite snacks, favorite movies, even favorite blankets. We watched mostly the same things, cared more about what they thought than what we or our families thought, and overall knew we would always be there for each other—until we wouldn’t.

This was the first friendship I had ever had like this, we had the same everything and it seemed perfect, it seemed as though we were meant to be friends. It seemed like we were sisters. It seemed like it would last.

At least, that’s what I thought. Who knows what she thought? I had no warning of the day our friendship would end—it was just a normal day. I woke up, I didn’t have to work, and we had made plans to go swimming. It seemed like everything was working out—until it wasn’t.

Noon—the time we agreed to go swimming—rolled around and there was no sign of her. At first, I thought maybe she was running late, but the time crept steadily to 2 PM and she still hadn’t responded to my text of “Are you still coming?”

I had started to lose hope of seeing her when I received a text from her at 4 PM stating that she had “gotten busy and forgot.” Now, if anyone knows me, they know that one of my biggest fears is getting forgotten. She knew this, and yet she made my nightmare a reality. She made it happen. She didn’t even seem sad that she “couldn’t” hang out. My friends were there, hanging out with me, waiting to pounce on anything negative. The second I received that text—they put their plan into action. One punched me in the stomach while the other started getting into my head. They teamed up and when they work together, it’s hard for me to defend myself and others. I believed them. I knew they were right about her. I knew they were right about everyone.

I went to my room and listened to blink 182 and Good Charlotte and cried for what felt like hours. My mom and my sister were worried about me, but this was my life. This was what I had to deal with on a regular basis, and that was okay—right?

I didn’t even know what was acceptable for best friends to do. I didn’t even know how I was supposed to be treated by my “best friend.” I didn’t know that I was supposed to be a priority, not when I had experienced this type of situation constantly for the past 5 years.

The thing that changed?

My sister talked to me about this and even though she’s 5 years younger than me, she is 5 times smarter than me. She told me that it wasn’t okay to be treated this way, she told me that I should feel important, she told me that I am validated in wishing I was a priority, and she told me I should talk to my “best friend” about how I felt. My sister was a godsend at that time, she saved me. She helped me realize that I shouldn’t have been getting treated the way I was. She helped me remove a cancerous person in my life. I was hurting more from that friendship than I probably would have without it.

I sent a message telling this girl how I felt, I told her how I had felt all through high school, and I asked her if we could talk. I waited and waited for her to reply, but she never did. A few weeks later she sent me a picture and I knew she had to have seen my text at that point. I asked her about the text. She stated that she had seen it and had chosen to ignore it.

She. Had. Chosen. To. Ignore. It.

But what I heard was that she had chosen to ignore me.

She had decided, on her own, that talking this situation out would be a bad idea. She had decided that she didn’t need to talk to me, she had decided that—just like all throughout our friendship—only what she thought mattered. She never considered how much I may have needed to talk about what was going on. She never considered the fact that even though we had spent 5 years on each other, it felt like it was all for naught on my end. She never considered that when she said “you can talk to me about any problems you might have,” I might actually bring to light something about our friendship that was bothering me. She didn’t consider my feelings and that is when we started to fall apart.

I didn’t want to be forgotten anymore and she had decided I wasn’t important. All through high school, I had figured that I probably was just a replacement friend. I understood that her home school best friend was her real best friend. I should’ve known that this was coming, I should have known that I was going to lose her. I should have recognized she’d eventually leave me the first time our plans ever fell through, but I was more vulnerable in 2011 than I was in 2016.

She was there when I met my friends, she was there to help me, but of course now I’m left with them and without her. They stuck with me over the years, they influenced how I thought, they influenced how I felt, they influenced how I acted, and she just stood by and watched. Honestly, she probably wasn’t even watching. She probably “forgot” because of how busy she was ignoring me. All I needed, in regards to the plans that fell through were 7 simple words: “I’m sorry I can’t hang out today.”

I only needed to know that she remembered the plans and couldn’t hang out. I only needed to know that she cared enough about me to let me know. I only needed her to recognize that I was important.

I only needed her to love me, because if she doesn’t, then who will?