Positive Results by Sabrina

We mourn death. We mourn loss of life, career, dreams but how do we mourn lost friendships? Like marriage, if the break up is intense and public, you may celebrate the release but do you truly take the time to mourn the loss of the good times? Were we ever taught the steps to process the loss, the growing apart, the dream trips and adventures denied?

We Try To Protect Our Kids From Our Pain

When my kids were young and they would have a falling out with friends, I would find myself warning them that it wasn’t going to be the last time. As most moms do, I would find myself trying to protect them from the heartache that I had experienced. “Don’t spend all of your time with them. Make sure you’re making new friends and opening yourself up to other people. You can’t put all of your time into that friendship. What happens if they move away or you guys have another fight?” Because I can still remember friendships from when I was young that didn’t develop the way I thought they would. Kindergarten friends who moved away. Friends I lost contact with when I moved. Some I was lucky enough to reconnect with in Middle and High School but some I never saw again. We didn’t have cell phones and social media back then. We were luck if our parents had exchanged numbers and liked each other enough to keep in touch. When we moved when AJ was little, I tried to keep in touch with her ‘best friend’s’ mom and arrange play dates for them, but eventually they stopped.

That Still Doesn’t Make Us Equipped

As an adult, I realize many of us still don’t have a process for mourning the loss. There are coworkers, college classmates and friends I truly thought I was connected to, but a little time apart and you realize the bond really wasn’t as deep as you thought it was. Friends you used to talk to daily and make plans with regularly, have gone months and now years without so much as a ‘Happy Birthday’ text. One day you’re looking at pictures on social media and you think “I never got to take that trip,” or “I never made it to check out that spa,” because you were planning to do it with that friend and when the friendship dissolved, so did the dreams. It may not even be that you made the conscious decision not to go, you simply forgot because the friend wasn’t there to remind you of the plan.

For me, the fond memories remain but they can stir up a bit of pain also. Did I stop reaching out? Did I miss a message and never reply? Did I miss one too many events because I had to take care of the kids, I didn’t have the money to participate and then I didn’t even have a car to get there?

There Doesn’t Have To Be A Reason

We’re all busy. We all have responsibilities. There may be no fault for why the relationship dissolved, it was just time, distance and circumstance, but what is our process for moving forward? Does the pain make us more cognizant of our current relationships? Does it make us want to hold on tighter to who we have in our lives now? Without understanding the why for losing the relationship how do we protect the current relationships? There doesn’t have to be a reason for the friendship to have ended for you to look forward with hope for other friendships. You hope that your friends are well. You hope that your friendship served them well and that they gained value from the time with you. And you hope that this cycle of building, enjoying and then losing friends will eventually end as we age.

A Reason, A Season or a Lifetime

They say there is ‘a reason, a season, or a lifetime’ for friendships and that gives me hope. If I am meant to be in your life for a reason or a season, let it be one of growth, spring blooms, love and merriment. The world is scary right now. We cannot survive happily if we face it all alone. I am honored to fight alongside the strongest of the strong if that’s how we make it through to the other side.

I remember the first time a friend told me I changed their opinion or single, teen mothers while we were in Junior College. If knowing me allows you to broaden your horizon or open your eyes to new possibilities, then I have done my job. A phrase we often use these days is “positive peer pressure.” If I am the friend that positively pressures you to try something new, expand your horizons or treat yourself to a glorious new adventure, then I am honored to have been in your life, even for a moment.

How do you mourn lost friendships? Share your strategies in the comments and help us all grow.