A guy I considered a close friend — someone I’ve known for years and thought of as a brother — just sent me a message that really shook me. He lost his father recently, and I’ll be honest… I didn’t reach out like I should have. Not because I didn’t care — I did. I just froze. I didn’t know what to say, didn’t want to say the wrong thing, and somehow ended up saying nothing at all.
Now he’s cut me off.
His message was respectful, not angry. But it was final. He said I wasn’t there when he needed me most — and he’s right. He told me he didn’t see us as just friends, he saw me as family… and that my silence felt like betrayal.
I’ve been sitting with that for hours, and I can’t stop thinking about how I failed someone who trusted me. I didn’t mean to disappear. I thought giving space was the right thing. Clearly, it wasn’t.
I don’t know what to do. I don’t want to chase someone who’s made their peace, but I also don’t want to leave things broken like this.
I don’t know what to do
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When I lost someone close to me, I cut off people who stayed silent. Been almost a decade, no regrets.
I couldnt imagine a close friend of mine losing a parent and me not being there….
maybe tell your friend what you just told us, and apologize
Grief hits everyone differently.
Give them time and take some time to reach out.
I loved my late mother, but I have been angry for her leaving me, sad for her leaving me, apathetic about her leaving me, everything and nothing at once.
Reach out in a week or two and tell them you also view them as family, it was not your intention to ghost them but you were at a loss.
Don’t mention what you want or what you want them to do. Let them take initiative, apart from reaching out every two weeks or so.
I’m with your friend man. Use this as a wake up call to be a better friend. I don’t have time as a grown man to chase buddies and I certainly don’t have time for people that are going to leave me high and dry when I need them. Being a man sometimes means not being lazy and showing up even when you’re not sure if you can help.
Tell your friend you’re genuinely sorry and that you just don’t know how to handle situations like this. If you want him to forgive you, I believe you’ll have to cry in front of him. That’s the only way to make up for him crying so much behind closed doors thinking of where his friend went.
By the way, when you say you were silent, does he mean you did not initiate communication or that you didn’t respond to him? The former is harder to do. The latter would 100% make you a bad friend if he sent you a text or something and you just ignored it.
You learn from it and move on and don’t make that mistake again. At a minimum you should have went to the funeral or visitation.
Seems like a good first draft of an apology note.
You could end it with:
You can be as mad at me as you need to be for letting you down, for as long as you need. I’ll respect your desire for space. But I will always deeply care for you, and hope that some day you might be comfortable and trusting enough to reach out.
Tell them what you said to us. Don’t ask to stay friends, or beg for them back.
Just say you’re right, I didn’t know what to do and I fked up.
But I wouldn’t hold your hopes.
I was surprised by some people who came, and some who didn’t when my father dad. Funerals and weddings, you remember the attendance.
you guys cutting people off because they didn’t reach out when someone died … people deal with it differently and most deal with it badly
cut people off for other reasons, but I don’t think this one warrants it
You reach out and apologize. You explain that you didn’t know what to say and you’re extremely sorry for not being there for them. Let him know that you respect him and that while you also consider him a brother and would hate to lose him in your life, if that is really what he wants to do that you’ll respect it.
When I got divorced I was nowhere near family. I had very few friends, at least friends I’d consider close enough to talk about it with, and a couple of times I made plans with them. A couple backed out, some never really acknowledged because it wasn’t anything they’d necessarily want to do. I felt like I went through my divorce alone and it almost literally killed me. A while later I was explaining that to someone with one of them present and they apologized profusely. They said that I seemed like I was good (I’ve been called stoic and have trouble showing emotion at time, product of a boomer). It’s been 6 years and they will still sometimes apologize for it. The honest apology went a long way. Knowing that they did care, helped.
My wife told me friends for me when my dad passed last year, mostly so they’d understand why I wasn’t around or so they didn’t send me some dumb ass meme.
I was genuinely taken back when they all showed up. Traveled, sat at the back, and saw me for 30 seconds at the end. But it’s tough to forget.
Never had anyone care about me that much.
If he wasn’t open to further discussion, he would have just ghosted you for life instead of letting you know how he felt.
He’s overreacting and projecting pain and blame where it doesn’t belong. You don’t cope with loss by burning everything else down. Shame on you for not reaching out but guess what – it wouldn’t have made a core difference anyways. There may have been more laughter between the tears but this is his walk to endure. The loss of a parent is the first real taste of mortality. It’s a solitary and lonely journey that must be walked by all those fortunate enough to outlive their parents. Life is busy and hard for every person. Your love for others isn’t predicated just by what you do for them or what they do for you. It’s unconditional or it’s not love. Tell your friend you love him, you’re sorry and would be there in a flash if you knew how to be but mostly just to listen to him not to talk yourself.
I’ve been where you are. Not quite as dire a situation as this, but one where I thought I was giving support to a person by allowing them at least a few more moments where they can breathe without having to deal with either the situation or people commiserating about the situation. Unfortunately, the other person did not see it that way, and I soon understood why.
There’s no way around it: you messed up. And you messed up during one of the few times that messing up was basically an absolute no-go. A lot of men don’t feel able to be vulnerable too, except in specific situations–like the death of a parent. Given the hurdles they may have crossed, they will feel especially vulnerable in their closest relationships. And having one of your closest relationships turn out to be unreliable is gut-wrenching. Especially when mourning your father.
The only thing you can do is find an appropriate time to reach out, find out how they’re doing, then try to explain your perspective. It may never heal your relationship, but they’ll at least know that your fumble wasn’t out of indifference to them.
All the best, brother.
Is your friend ChatGPT or whatever AI you used in writing this?
I would suggest a formal letter, and tell him what you told us. Just be as honest as possible and then let him sit with the apology. It may take some time but I believe it will have a positive impact. Also your friendship may never fully be the same as well, but that is how the cookie crumbles.
I have two ideas for you to consider, you’re going to want to be honest to what this friendship has really been:
If this has really been truly a good two-way friendship, then he’s probably just hurting and this may actually be a call for help even though it didn’t come across very emotional.
On the flip side, if your friend has always been a bit of a tag-a-long and you kind of rule the friendship, then he may have said, you know what? I see who my true friends are and this ain’t it. This person was really not a real friend.
The fact that you mention “chasing” here is concerning. You weren’t there, eat crow or move on.
Everyone expects everything from us
On the flip side, there are people who even when someone has died want to be the centre of attention, there are people who crumble at too many condolences, however heartfelt, so sometimes people simply choose to give the other time, not crassly judge.
TBH i’d write back and point this out, sometimes people want normality and not to be treated as a special case as they need to normalise, …your flouncy fella ..well things may have happened by that attitude stinks of self pity.
Sometimes we just clam up, we don’t have much experience in this aspect of life, it doesn’t mean you don’t care, I missed a mates dads funeral the other month, lovely fella, didn’t mean I did not care, on the contrary I did, he was very influential and a decent human being who gently guided rather than chided, ..I have spent plenty of time since thinking of him and marking his life in my own way.
As to my mate, whose dad it was, he has a big family around him (unlike me) and knows me long enough to not be judgmental.
Write back, tell him he sounds raw, if he wants to talk once he’s through the other side fine, if not fine also, but different people process differently and display differently, mentally you were at an impasse as to what to say not how you thought or cared, but if that’s not good enough fine, he may not be the friend you thought he was if he cannot see past this as anything other than a snub, but you’ll leave that down to him rather call him out in the same manner as his communication.
NB as a kid who pretty much raised himself, I didn’t necessarily get all the life skills of a family unit, eating out, social gatherings in a group scares me to this day, and i’m an extrovert, so i’m familiar with the freeze up decades on.. I also don’t say things unless I mean it, so use plaudits and platitudes in person sparingly, its awkward and stems from a solitary upbringing, ..it does not mean I don’t care, but sometimes I may think a person may need space not a constant assault, I care enough to give them that space, then follow up or re-acquaint, you can only eat so much of a delicious fruit till it makes you sick regardless… ditto losing a family member, there comes a point a normal person needs to move past it and needs a different level of care shown, help to keep them busy, normalcy, unspoken elements that don’t send you tumbling back down etc.
For me that would be eventually walking into my local and simply being allowed to exist as before, I know they know, and that’s enough for me.
You need to apologize to him and accept and respect whatever outcome comes after that apology
You’re an asshole and a shitty friend. There’s nothing you can do but learn from it. You hurt him
deeply and he knows you don’t care and will never be there for him when things get tough. He can’t trust you. You can apologize but he’s under no obligation to accept it. My dad died in February and I had someone I thought was a friend completely ignore what I was going through. It was additional pain I didn’t need.
It’s said that times of hardship an tragedy will show u who your real friends are. That’s probably his mind set right now. It would probably be mine.
Definitely felt what op is saying tho iv done the same luckily not with anyone close but some one I worked an got on with lost there mother and my reaction was the same I had no clue what to say so just said nothing. Like wtf are u ment to say?
There’s no harm in reaching out an explaing it tho maybe he will understand maybe he won’t. As it stands he thinks u didnt care. Can’t make it anywhere by saying your piece.
He’s actually left the door open by telling you why he closed it. He’s basically challenging you to win him back.
And what you did is pretty common…my wife just had the same issue with a pretty close friend of hers who lost a kid, was ADAMANT about not “intruding”…so I deputized myself and sent a message of condolence. Which was appreciated and probably saved the relationship.
This calls for you mustering up your stones and having a face-to-face, without the wall of anonymity of non-direct communication. Not text. Not phone. Face to face. Figure out a place where you can go up to him which is relatively private, because I can’t guarantee that it will be pretty.
You know where he is. Go find him. Apologize. Don’t overdo it, just apologize. You trusted your gut and your gut was wrong.
What you did doesn’t make you a hero, but like I said, it’s something that a lot of people (perhaps even MOST people) would have done under the situation. Our society absolutely SUCKS at understanding how to deal with death. So stop beating yourself up so much. Unfortunately, he’s chosen to use you as a proxy for all the anger he feels at his dad for dying…trust me, anger is a part of grief.
I’ll also point out that HE DIDN’T REACH OUT. He expected you to read his mind and read his needs and do all the work for him. So he’s not blameless here.
May not work. May not work IMMEDIATELY, but eventually pay off.
You froze once, and you’ve seen the result. Don’t freeze again. This time, break through. No matter how hard it is to do.
And post up a follow-up.
I think you should write back explaining this. Rest is upto him. I’ve realised that good friends always find a way of getting back after hiccups. It might not happen right away but it will eventually
Fuck ‘’should have.’ There are no fucking ‘shoulds’ we are all made differently. If he expects you to act how he expects he would act in the reverse situation (which is dumb enough) then let him be friends with himself.
You are never responsible for someone else‘s feelings (boundaries 101)
I’ve lost both parents, did all my friends and remaining family come running around to give me support? Fuck no.
Am I still resentful at them all years later? Maybe a tiny bit at some of them, but that resentment is MY ISSUE nobody else’s. This is all part of growing up. One day your ‘friend’ might realise this
Notice how OP said ‘cared about’ as in past tense
I mean, look, there’s a reason that when women come to men with emotional reactions to problems, men often try to fix the problem rather than address with the emotions. Because address the problem, and you can fully forget about those pesky emotions. Deal with the emotions in, and you’re going to get hurt. I cannot be more clear, this is my base level OS that I fight against.
In this case, there was literally nothing to fix and only emotions to face. So, your brain shuts down and you didn’t engage. No maliciousness intended. But it’s not surprising in the slightest. Because when it’s emotions and emotions alone it means you have to feel pain. We don’t want to feel pain. So we leave other men to deal with it on their own.
Honesty is your best policy here. You’ll fix this. You just have to be honest and self-effacing.
Some of us deal with loss and grief better than others. Some are there, some distance themselves or freeze. But you definitely have to explain how you reacted to your friend.
Apologize. It’s not rocket surgery
My dad died recently so I’ll tell you from my perspective, I’d never forgive you if you told me what you just typed out. While I didn’t want to hear I’m sorry, the few who reached out and just told me they loved me and were there meant more than anything. Giving space is ok of course it is but just being silent to someone you consider family. In reality you should have been one of the first ppl over their house with food,a six pack, or at least a shoulder to lean on you failed your “brother” in every conceivable way. Someone you care that deeply for you move a mountain for. I’d take time to really consider what family means to you.
I’m gonna be totally honest- I don’t believe you.
It’s easy to say you’re really close to somebody or they’re like family. But words are just words. Something tells me you intended to reach out but you forgot because you were wrapped up in your own shit. Which, is fair enough but if that’s the case he’s not your close friend/family. This post reads like cope to me.
I hope I’m wrong but I doubt it. If I genuinely am, you owe it to say to him what you’ve posted here. But only if it is genuine and not, as I suspect a big pile of cope.
Sometimes you have to take your lumps in life. You did someone wrong. You can apologize but they don’t have to accept it. It’s your responsibility to do better.
But a side note: no one knows what to say about grief. But silence is saying you’re not even willing to try.
Just a piece of advice for anymore finding themselves in a similar situation.
Anytime this happens and death makes people very uncomfortable all you need to do is “I’m thinking of you at this time.”
Or
“I am unsure what exactly to say in this moment and wanted you to know I care about you.”
It’s ok not to know what to say. It’s ok to tell someone you don’t know what to say other than sending condolences.
Just remember it’s not about you. So don’t go on some long winded email about your feelings. It can be short and to the point.
The important part is also contacting the person. It’s okay that you are uncomfortable. The person mourning their loved one isn’t to blame for you being uncomfortable.
To OP. I’m sorry you lost your friend. You can apologize people can be very forgiving but you should not expect anything from him.
Se d him an apology and tell him you respect his wishes if he is to be your friend agsin he will reach out one day
I think this is the maturity and adult part of friendships in communication. I think you both need to be better at it.
You should have reached out, but he should have said something too. I think a more appropriate thing would be in person conversation.
If I was in his shoes, I would have went to you in person and talked to you, but maybe this situation is the straw that broke the camels back. Maybe you have a tendency to do this, and you don’t realize it.
I legit don’t understand.
When I lost my parent abruptly in my 20s, I cut off people I knew didnt care.
Not people I assume didnt care because they stayed silent.
Silence does not mean not caring. Everybody has issue, there’s millions of reasons to be silent. World doesnt stop spinning for others when you grief. I would have assumed you were unsure how to help or having issues of your own.
Plain weird he didnt like… i dont know invite you to some activity as an excuse to give you space to talk. If he needed it.
Death is awkward to deal with, doesnt mean you don’t care. If he left for that he would have left for something else. Feels childish to me but grief can make people irrational. Explains it. Doesnt make it nice.
Dang dude. When I lost my mom I learned who my friends were too. I think if you express what you did here it might help. But man you’re a really bad friend and far too old to be avoiding serious issues.
People like you annoy me. You deserved to be cut off. Don’t call that guy your brother. Your instinctual reaction should be reaching out instantly. “Give him some space” are you a woman? In times of your brother’s lowest, that’s when you need to be there the most . I can’t believe you even made this post. No shit you got cut off.
Learn from this and be a better person to people. Close friends are valuable. Show up.
One of the side effects of losing my father unexpectedly was never seeing my friendships the same. People I considered brothers who I had been there for numerous times left me out to hang. My wife had a stroke 3 weeks later. I got a few calls but then nothing. Then I heard they were hanging out without me. Loneliest time of my life and not one of them were there for me. I still send them birthday texts and will pick up if they call but I don’t consider them friends. Just people I used to know.
This is a life lesson for both of you.
He’s grieving. He didn’t know where to push this displaced anger and frustration and he justified it by taking it out on you and his justification was because you didn’t reach out. I feel if you apologize and leave the door open for him to reach out when you he’s ready he’ll come back into your life. If not you did the right thing reaching out.
Good lesson to learn.
You cared more about yourself and your own anxiety during that time than you cared about your friend.
Try to learn from it and be a less selfish person in the future. Being in any relationship means putting another person above your own anxiety, fears, doubts, and needs.