Expectations in friendships
In the last few weeks, I have been a bit sad (okay, let me be honest, it was kind of a meltdown, and I might have cried a little bit:) because of my frustrations with some of my friendships. Unfortunately, a couple of things happened back to back, which made me question my friendships. Of course, I won’t share what happened specifically, but I want to share what I discussed with my therapist about friendships and what I learned from these sad experiences.
Something very important to me may not be important to one of my best friends, and that’s okay.
There are a couple of life events that are very important to me, such as marriage, moving to a new country, having kids, getting a new job, etc. As I care about these life events, I assume my best friends also care about them. However, I realized that even if we are best friends, the meaning of such events can be different for us, so my assumption is wrong. Realizing this is important because I expect my friends to involve me in such life events as much as possible. But, if a life event that is very important to me is not important to my friend, s/he might not think that I need to be involved in that situation.
This also brings me to the next point.
The definition of a friendship is different for everyone. My definition can even be different from the definitions of my closest friends.
As I mentioned above, I think I need to be involved in significant life events as a close friend. A strong friendship requires this. Who says this? Me. Should all my friends agree on this? Of course not.
Easier said than done, right? Honestly, I believe it is very difficult to sustain a friendship if my definition is quite different than my friend’s definition. In this case, I basically have two options. The first option is to end the friendship as soon as I realize this big difference.
The second option is to keep the relationship, but how? This brings me to the next point.
There should be a time lag between an action and my reaction to that action.
Let me explain this. I am quite an emotional person. If someone makes me sad, I cry. That’s okay. I mean, the emotional reaction that I have on my own is fine. As my therapist said, I don’t need to suppress my feelings; if I am sad, I am sad. That’s it. However, the problem is to react based on these immediate high emotions. For example, when I am sad about something my friend did, trying to solve the issue before calming down is a problem. I did this in the past and probably lost some of my good friendships because of this, but now I am an adult. An adult should react to a situation after calming down and thinking thoroughly about their feelings and emotions, most of the time distorted ones.
Long story short, I am still learning to wait before taking action when I am sad about something, hoping that this can lead to healthy friendships.
Again, easier said than done.
Realizing these three things over the last few weeks was eye-opening for me, so I wanted to share them with you.
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Cheers,
Sidika
Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts and experiences. I am a highly emotional person, and this reminds me of my own story. About a year ago, I tried to build a friendship with someone, despite facing many setbacks along the way. However, a few months ago, everything fell apart, and I realized that it had always been a one-sided relationship. I trusted this person deeply, but they never truly saw me as a friend. Whenever I wanted to do something together, they would always tell me, "You can go and do it by yourself."
Afterward, I felt a deep pain in my heart. Friendship, in my opinion, is like shopping—not just one side gives encouragement or support, tolerance; both sides need to show equal care. If it turns toxic, distancing ourselves and setting boundaries can help protect our hearts. From my perspective, every friendship has an expiration date. This date might come from unmet expectations, unresolved issues, or even the end of life itself.
When someone is no longer part of our lives, we must learn to make peace with it, despite everything that has happened in the past.
Sıdıka, I am trying to feel empathy for you as much as I can, and I would say that as a highly emotional person, emotions are part of our lives and it identifies who we are now, and also, we can't bottle up our feelings whatever we experience. Just we should know how to regulate our emotions. It could take time, but okay. Wishing you a wonderful day :)
I am struggling with understanding of friendships like you. Especially after moving to the UK feels like I lost my friends in Turkey like old pages in a book which will never be opened. Anyway accepting this is a good step, though 😌