Do your friends turn into total strangers?

Basically as a child (9 - 15) I played or hung around with other kids all the time I shared everything with them they were best friends. Now after 5/6 years I walk past a lot of them i the street and they don't even make eye contact they look then glance away. I try to catch their eye so I can say hello but why don't they want to? Its just so strange its as though I never knew them :confused:

S

Same with someone I have known ALL my life and went to sixth form with 2 years ago, we were best mates but I saw her with a pram in town 4 weeks ago and she saw me but then looked away and pretended she hadn't noticed me. It was only 2 years ago!! we were best friends at sixth form and all throughout high school. In fact we have known each other since nursary.

Does this happen to you lot?

Reply 1

SmilerNuts

15

I wouldn't say it happened a lot, certainly not to such extremes as have happened to you. People just drift apart if you don't keep contact. Maybe they were embarassed that they hadn't made the effort to stay in contact with you.

Reply 2

Kater Murr

20

Riddy

Basically as a child (9 - 15) I played or hung around with other kids all the time I shared everything with them they were best friends. Now after 5/6 years I walk past a lot of them i the street and they don't even make eye contact they look then glance away. I try to catch their eye so I can say hello but why don't they want to? Its just so strange its as though I never knew them :confused:

S

Same with someone I have known ALL my life and went to sixth form with 2 years ago, we were best mates but I saw her with a pram in town 4 weeks ago and she saw me but then looked away and pretended she hadn't noticed me. It was only 2 years ago!! we were best friends at sixth form and all throughout high school. In fact we have known each other since nursary.

Does this happen to you lot?

Yeah, with some of my friends from year 8/9 (I'm year 13 now).

It's quite sad.

Reply 3

HacklyFracture

I (unfortunately) know exactly what you mean. I'm only in my second year of college and already people from my old school who I see in town or on the bus home don't even give a hello. I've smiled and waved and them and they just walk past me. :frown:

Sometimes I wonder if It's me but I suppose people just grow apart and some people seem to prefer not even being acquantancies with old friends. No idea why.

Reply 4

aliclare

I've been at uni for what 6 weeks now.. and yeah extremely disappointed that friends haven't bothered to keep it touch, it's like they don't want to speak to me anymore, even though I'm making such an effort. I was really good friends with a girl for the last 2 years, and now she's just like wiped me out of her life, I saw her in town 2 weekends ago and she blanked me completely even though I said hello. It's really sad :frown:

Reply 5

Tommy Jet

It's awful when that happens.
I had a friend, who was my best friend from when we were in nursery to the end of high school. I couldn't remember a time in my life when she wasn't my best friend. Then, two years ago, as I started 6th form, she had a baby and we never see each other anymore. And now I've moved to uni, so there's less chance to see each other. When we do meet, she's so different. It's so sad because I loved her so much and now she's not the friend I had for eleven years.

Reply 6

Riddy

OP

I wonder if its me as well, it makes me think well maybe we were not as close/friendly as I thought.

Its mad as even strangers sometimes smiles at each other as they walk past, yet best friends you have known most of your life don't acknowledge you and walk in the opposite direction.

I did ring my old friends every few months but they never rang me it was always me contacting them so Ive give up it felt like I was mithering them

Reply 7

CorpusNinja

15

a lot of the times its just a misunderstanding. there may be a time when both people just appear to blank each other by chance coz they're busy/genuinely didn't notice the person, and so each gets the impression that the other has a problem with them etc.
Most of the times its solved by a quick chat, even if its just a 'hows things going' 5 min convo. can clear the air a bit.

If they're STILL being weird then something is wrong.

Reply 8

SmilerNuts

15

If they don't value your friendship enough to even say Hi then are they really worth worrying about?

Reply 9

HacklyFracture

Riddy

I did ring my old friends every few months but they never rang me it was always me contacting them so Ive give up it felt like I was mithering them

Sounds horribly like me and my school friend. :frown:

I thought we were really close but after we went to different colleges I felt like I was bothering her when I phoned or send a text to ask if she wanted to catch up and she never asked me or seemed interested in meeting. Turned out she didn't want to see me anymore and she's got a whole new set of friends who are presumably better than me. Makes me wonder if she was ever as close to me as I was to her or as she gave the impression that we were.

Not saying this happens all the time. I've had other incidences when I've felt like I'm mithering them etc and it's just me being paranoid!

Reply 10

Sunofnight

3

Look... all these old friends you are all describing a lot of them are probably thinking the same about you. I mean if you don't say hi to them AS SOON as you see them walking towards you things get really awkward. First they will think 'well he/she has seen me and not said anything so im embarrased about speaking to them now maybe he/she has changed, I'l just carry on/avoid eye contact and pretend I didn't see them'. Your old friends then come away thinking exactly the same as you are thinking about them.

Reply 11

manderton

13

Has happened to me too :frown:

its sad when u look back, but then you have to think could you have actively done anything to prevent it - I commonly have found the answer to be no.

However, I have alo noticed, and laughed about it, is that I'm on quite good terms with people I didn't get along with at all in the not too distant past.

Its part of life - as hard as it is, I have just learnt to accept it.

Reply 12

Sunofnight

3

CorpusNinja

a lot of the times its just a misunderstanding. there may be a time when both people just appear to blank each other by chance coz they're busy/genuinely didn't notice the person, and so each gets the impression that the other has a problem with them etc.
Most of the times its solved by a quick chat, even if its just a 'hows things going' 5 min convo. can clear the air a bit.

If they're STILL being weird then something is wrong.

Exactly, I have seen old friends look and then look away but I plucked up the courage to say hi first, we chatted for 5 minutes, they said they had to go and that was that.

Reply 13

M.A.H

17

some of my friends i knew from year 11 now dont even acknowledge me if we walk past eachother and i look like an idiot trying to catch their eye, i mean ITS ONLY BEEN A YEAR, the people that i hardly spoke to at secondary aclnowledge me in college and stuff we we walk past or see eachother, also recently i've been totally ignored by a ''mate'' since we had a disagreement about something soooo silly, just goes to show what they're really like i guess

Reply 14

9mm

12

That's really odd. If I see an old friend from say 3 years ago whilst walking around Cambridge, then we always stop for a chat, and usually they make the eye contact first. It's only happened once when a guy I knew pretended that he didn't see me, but that's probably because he was embarassed lol. It's a shame really. I guess people change... : (

Reply 15

devilsthorn

1

They don't like you now that their lives are better than yours. Embarrassed of association with you. Move on and find true friends.

Reply 16

Cherry Kisses

13

This happens all the time unfortunatly; people drift apart/make a new circle of friends :frown:

It is really sad when you feel invisible to them

Reply 17

mikeski

3

Some of my friends have turned like that recently. But that's just the way it goes...

Reply 18

MrsTimms

I have on a few ocassions seen old friends in town who I used to know donkey years ago, but I usually come over embarrassed and pretend I haven't seen them. I'm not sure why, maybe it's the whole, 'oh, aren't you so-and-so', and maybe not knowing how to greet each other after all that time - do you give a big hello hug? Maybe it's the fear that they are doing a lot better in their life now compared to me??

Reply 19

MrsTimms

Friends come and go, all part and parcel of life I'm afraid!

Do your friends turn into total strangers?

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