When you make friends as a child – especially if you find someone you consider your best friend – you naturally assume that you will be best friends for the rest of your lives. And that may very well be the case – after all, some folk really do maintain lifelong friendships. However, it’s important to remember that as children, we see things from a child’s perspective. Our little town feels like the entire world, a day feels long, and a year feels like forever – and how very much that changes in adulthood.

But our perspectives aren’t the only things that change as we grow: our personalities, desires, and motivations are liable to change too. That little girl who liked to ride ponies? As an adult she might be a metalhead. And while some friendships allow plenty of space for each individual to evolve, others crumble under the broadening distances between two people who were once very alike. Add to this the fact that you’ll likely make friends whose interests are more similar to your own, and you’ll understand how – despite still having a lot of love and respect for one another – you end up spending less time with someone, and eventually your once close friendship has dwindled.

That’s exactly what seems to be happening to the seventeen year old girls in this story – but rather than their distance being gradual and accepted by both, one of the friends is really fighting it.

Read on to find out how.

AITA for telling my friend that I am too busy to text her?

I recently told my friend (we’re both seventeen and female) that there are simply too many things going on in my life to text her.

I admit, I’m not the best at keeping up with friendships.

I only have very few low-maintenance friends that I keep up with, and I’ve never had a problem with any of them and they’ve never had a problem with me.

Let’s see where this friendship conflict started.

Basically, for a week, I didn’t text her because I was just stressed out in general about school and I went to a wedding.

In my life I barely even have time for myself (strict parents, five AP classes, sat, extracurriculars, etc etc.) and I don’t want to spend my only ME time texting other people.

Anyway, I didn’t text her for that week, and she got very, very, very mad at me.

So naturally I asked her why SHE didn’t text first and she said she would never double-text (the last thing she sent was three sobbing emojis to a funny reel I sent).

And of course, this stressed-out girl didn’t respond well to this.

So I told her my situation and that I’m sorry she feels that way, and she just straight up told me to make more time and that I’m selfish and self-centred to only think about myself.

She said I don’t put any effort into my friendships with people which is very unhealthy (she’s right about that).

She furthered this by elaborating on how we don’t see each other in real life because we go to different schools, and its important to text frequently to maintain a friendship.

She told me she’s not falling for all the “low-maintenance friend propaganda.”

This has all left the girl feeling even more stressed-out and confused.

I feel like I’m ranting, but ultimately I want to know if I’m in the wrong here.

I completely get her point of view, because in reality I do treat my friends like **** and I cancel plans all the time, I barely hang out, I barely text them, but its just that I’m so damn tired all the time.

I’m not depressed or anything, I just feel like most of my energy forms when I spend time with myself, so I really do get her point of view which is why this is so confusing. But then again, I did describe my situation and she didn’t understand.

AITA?

This is a really tricky situation, because it’s clear that neither of these girls are getting what they need from the friendship – and when you’re young that’s really tough to navigate.

Her friend who is conscious about double texting but is mad at her for not messaging her? She’s likely very insecure (as plenty of teens are) and irrationally thinks that her friend doesn’t like her any more or something.

And as for the girl who want slow-maintenance friendships right now? She’s got a lot going on, is clearly very introverted, and feels like when she explained this to her friend, she wasn’t listened to. Both just want to feel understood.

Let’s see what the Reddit community made of this.

This person thought she wasn’t totally in the wrong, but needed to communicate with her friends better.

However, others believed that she wasn’t putting enough effort into her friendships.

Meanwhile, this Redditor totally understood, and thought that perhaps they’d outgrown one another.

The real problem here isn’t either of these girls, it’s the fact that for whatever reason this girl’s parents are very strict and putting a lot of pressure on her. She’s absolutely not wrong to be focussing on her school work and extra-curricular activities – after all, sure she is a teenager now, but very soon she will be an adult working on her college applications, and after that competing for jobs. She’s trying to put herself into the best possible position for the rest of her life, and that’s no bad thing.

She’s also very self aware, and has noticed her own introversion and the fact that she recharges on her own. For folk like this, even text communication can be exhausting – especially if you’re as burned out as she sounds. And she has explained this to her friend, but the sad thing is that she hasn’t even tried to understand. The truth is, it feels like these two girls aren’t on the same page when it comes to friendship right now. Perhaps they were once very close but they aren’t any more. That’s because life happens. Sometimes people grow apart, and that’s okay.