I've lost many friends in the course of my life. Either from moving away and not being able to keep in touch or from the ignorance of others actions. Or just from two people growing apart. I usually wouldn't write anything about my past friendships but it's been something that's on my mind. I feel this is the only way to get it out. I don't want to start any drama. There's no point in it. I've always been that person that looks for the best in someone no matter what. Even if they ended up hurting me. And that's something I know that needs to stop. I've learned a lesson from one-sided friendships and toxic relationships.

I had a friend that I used to date. He was my best friend since seventh grade when I moved to Georgia. Our relationship didn't last long and at the time I didn't understand why. Now I do. We never should have dated. Our friendship was too valuable to put the pressure of a romantic relationship in it. We valued our friendship more. Partially, it was my fault. With my past issues of not being able to trust, I never let him in. I never let him know what I was feeling inside. But I can't put the entire blame on me. He played a part too. So it eventually led to our breakup. We're still friends now but at first, we weren't.

There was a lot of drama surrounding our breakup but we eventually got over it. We started to be friends again. But then we fell apart again. We had some more drama that isn't worth repeating. Just note that we had another falling out. And then another one. Long story short, we went back and forth with multiple problems. It lasted for half of my high school career. Now we're okay. Lately, we've been talking almost every day. You could tell that even with our constant arguing that our friendship was extremely important to each other. The reason I've started with this friendship is it helped me realize something. If a person really cares for you, they will try their best to show you no matter what. And that's what he did. We argued a lot but we found our way to work through it. Now our friendship is better than ever.

This leads me to the next friendship and it hurts me to talk about it because I thought this friendship would last a lifetime. And I know. People say that when you go to college that you'll lose your high school friendships. But that's not always the case. I'm still friends with great people from high school because we made an effort to keep in touch. This friendship that I'm going to mention now wasn't like that. We were friends for a while. We got extremely closer to each other over time. We considered each other best friends. Well, you see... I graduated high school and that's where the problems began. We slowly started to grow apart. The difference between both friendships is that the guy tried to make an effort. She didn't. I would text her and she wouldn't reply. I had a break-up and she wasn't there for me like I needed her to be. She would claim that I wouldn't message her and that she was there for me. But she wasn't.

I was going to let the whole thing go. I wasn't going to say anything to her about the situation because I hate drama. But then one day she messaged me, asking if I was mad at her. So, I told her. I didn't appreciate how I was being treated. Friendship is a two-way street. And I was the only one putting any effort in. Of course, she put the blame on me. Apparently, she was busy with school and work. I worked too. I had stuff going on in my family. I had stuff going on with me personally. But I still tried to keep in touch with all my friends. There was more that happened that contributed to the downfall of our friendship. But there's no point of getting into it. But know that I was fed up. I couldn't keep doing it anymore. So I gave up. There was no point in the arguing.

I bring this up now because she's trying to come back into my life now. And honestly, I don't know how to feel. But I do know that I've learned a lesson from this friendship. Or non-friendship I should say. I realized that I need to stop putting other peoples feelings above my own. I needed to look out for myself. My happiness is more important. I'm more important. I won't make the same mistakes that I made. I know what to look out for. I won't leave myself vulnerable to that kind of hurt again.