Breaking up with my best friend saved our friendship

‘Not going to make it, I’m sorry,’ I typed. ‘I know in my heart it won’t impact how amazing your day is, and I already wasn’t up for participating, so in a way it’s for the best.’

Before I sent this text telling my best friend, Cinthya*, that I wasn’t coming to her destination wedding the evening before my flight, I knew it was a foul move.

I was part of her bridal party, after all.

It actually occurred to me this was the ultimate friendship betrayal. But as I thought about the selfish way Cinthya had behaved that year, I decided I didn’t have much of a friend left to lose.

I took a deep breath, inhaling the 17 years of friendship that accounted for more than half our lives, ever since we’d sat next to each other in sixth-grade science, age 13.

And then I clicked send, exhaling hundreds of memories away.

It’s hard to pinpoint when Cinthya’s bridal era became my villain origin story.

When she announced that her boyfriend had proposed in February 2023, I flew from my home in Minneapolis to hers in Miami for her engagement party. Although I was going through a hard time personally, I knew the moment called for me to suck it up and celebrate my best friend, and I did. It was a no brainer – I loved her partner and couldn’t be happier for them to take this next step.

But by the time I’d landed in Puerto Rico a few months later for her bachelorette trip, my personal life had snowballed into a blizzard.

My grandmother, who helped raise me, had stage four cancer. I had just left my partner of four years; and I had moved to a new city, away from my friends, where I was working a stressful job that made me feel like the walls were caving in every week.

I wish I’d had the wisdom to tell Cinthya I wasn’t in the position to be the fabulous bridal gay she wanted me to be, and that I couldn’t fathom being on her bachelorette trip, because I was also trying to get sober.

But I didn’t.

I felt so alone, without a moment to breathe. Not to mention, I was becoming fed up listening to all the petty drama that accompanied Cinthya planning her big day – most annoying was listening to cattiness about some of the bridesmaids she’d chosen – and resentment began to build as I realised she hadn’t asked me about my life since she’d got engaged.

In the end, that particular weekend went fine. But there were still moments that irked me – like when she asked me to fetch coffee for the group, or offer everyone water. She and I stayed a couple of extra days, just the two of us, and she refused to get lunch with my friend on the island; even though I had spent the previous three days with a dozen of hers.

Fast forward to her bridal shower when, after four months, I flew to Miami once again. At this point, I was thinking twice about what I meant to Cinthya, but our friendship didn’t hit rock bottom until I saw her seating arrangements.

I had already realised how little significance I carried when she decided to not let me wear my chosen tux matching the bridesmaids, instead asking me to match the groomsmen and stand on their side. It felt like a dagger to our friendship and that’s not what I had agreed to when accepting to be part of her bridal party.

I poured myself several glasses of wine and thought about what a bitch Cinthya had become

Then, at the bridal shower, I immediately noticed there was no room for me on Cinthya’s table at the meal. A random person I’d never heard of was in what I had assumed would be my seat – Cinthya explained that she didn’t want this person to sit alone, since they didn’t know anyone.

I was already angry at things in my own life that I couldn’t control – and it was easier to be furious at Cinthya over superficial things like this than it was to open a Pandora’s box of emotions about what was going on at home by thinking about how everything about my life had changed.

So I poured myself several glasses of wine and thought about what a bitch Cinthya had become.

As Cinthya’s wedding approached, in November 2024, I couldn’t believe it when I found out I was the only person in the bridal party not given a plus one.

‘Only people with partners,’ Cinthya explained to me – which hurt, considering I had best friends, like her, who meant so much more to me than a partner.

It was obvious she didn’t feel the same.

It hit me that I’d be spending the entire weekend alone – and suddenly, I realised I didn’t have to.

That’s when I sent her that message.

My emotional bandwidth had run dry. I was determined to abstain from drinking, and she had taken away the possibility of having someone who loved me there to keep me company the whole weekend.

After I’d messaged her, I knew Cinthya was upset, but she didn’t show it. I just felt her energy in the absence of a reply.

I felt relieved skipping the wedding. I visited my grandmother instead, and it was a very special weekend.

Both Cinthya and I gave each other space, despite never getting in an actual fight about the situation – and a few months later, I reached out only to tell her I decided we weren’t best friends anymore. At the time, I said this was because I wanted to live authentically; but looking back, I realise I just wanted her attention.

She assured me we were still best friends, thinking I thought she was mad at me. I explained, again, that I didn’t want to be friends with her at all.

Cinthya didn’t try to convince me to change my mind; nor did she agree with what I was saying. I think she could see I was a cat clawing at anything and everything, despite the fact some of her thoughtlessness made it easy for me to collect straws.

In some ways, I had wanted her to scream and curse at me so that we’d be ‘even’, but she didn’t – and I felt guilty for everything I’d said and done.

Our friendship went radio silent until I caught glimpses of Cinthya becoming the mother she’d always wanted to be on Instagram. I had known her daughter’s name since Cinthya decided it when we were teenagers – the same name as my mother, albeit spelled differently.

I reached out shortly after. I wrote paragraphs of emotions and ramblings, which had always been the longwinded love language of our friendship – but inside, I just thought, ‘Please forgive me’.

She accepted my apology and congratulations, and we resumed our friendship immediately with zero awkwardness, our wonderful dynamic untampered.

All the little things Cinthya did that once felt thoughtless stopped bothering me because, as a quadruplet, I understood how comfortable we can become with the people we love most. They’re often the first people we expect to make sacrifices for us or the ones we unintentionally take for granted. But it rarely comes from a bad place.

Most of all, Cinthya showed me extraordinary grace in moving on from our friendship break-up; and, seeing that, I finally understood how important I must have been to her all along.

*Name has been changed

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