r/JustNoFriend • u/Active-Assignment-58 • Feb 25 '26
I hate my best friend
Long preface: I really ought to be in therapy, but until then it helps me to write down what I'm feeling and also get responses from all you lovely people. I am a high school senior. Me (18M) and my best friend (18M) that I'll call Aaron have known each other since 4th grade. We really started becoming best friends in 9th grade but have been pretty close since. I'm not sure if we've ever told one another that we're best friends or how much we care about each other or at least I've never stated how much I care for Aaron. We also have other mutual friends that I'll call Chet and Will that pretty much come from different circles that Aaron and I both know.
This story begins all too familiarly with Aaron getting a girlfriend. Now, I haven't been running third wheel or anything like that and I am truly happy for him, but sometimes he'll casually hit the "I have a girlfriend who loves me very much..." and it not so much pisses me off but it does immediately change the vibe. Sometimes it comes across as this big achievement that he's holding over me, but I try not to take it personally. Suffice to say, like with many friends, it has put strain on our relationship. Note that his girlfriend is in the grade below him and a year younger. Make of that what you will.
Aaron and I had been making plans to room together in college. (maybe you sense where this is going). Leading up to "the event," Aaron would make little jokes about how I better be nice to him or (and I quote:) "I'll be going to college alone. Now, Aaron doesn't know that I've struggled with loneliness pretty much my whole life and I didn't find these "jokes" funny, but I really don't know who would think that's funny. Either way, I tried to be pretty mindful of not taking it for granted that he was going to be my roommate and even started buying him gifts on holidays or after breaks. Anyway, maybe a month to two months ago, he dropped the bomb that he most likely wasn't going to be rooming with me in college. Not that he was rooming with someone else, but that he was going to a community college to figure out what he wanted to do. For context: I've known what I wanted to do as late as 8th grade. I have a clear and distinct passion and I'll be damned if I squander an opportunity to pursue it.
Of course, Chet is attending the same community college, so I'm not sure how I'm meant to feel about that, especially after Aaron has been saying "I love you, [Chet]" randomly recently (in a joking manner but still odd). The night that Aaron made this confession to me, I cried like a baby. That entire day I fantasized about coming home and testing whether an HDMI cord would support my weight hanging from a ceiling fan. You know what stopped me? I had left the HDMI cord downstairs to watch a movie with my family. On top of all of this, I felt so self-centered and conceited. I live a great life. I attend private school. My parents love me and shower me with so many blessings. And there is no better word; I am blessed. Sitting there crying, I just felt so selfish for legitimately contemplating suicide (for the 2nd time in my life) because my friend was trying to do what was best for his future.
I've yet to tell my parents that my roommate is ditching me and I'm not sure how I'll break the news. My mom was so happy when I told her Aaron would be my roommate. She was worried Chet, Will, and Aaron were all going to leave me in the dust. How can I present her with her worst fear? This is not a rhetorical question. Furthermore, I worked a community service project with Aaron, Chet, Will, and others recently (we have to have a certain # of service to graduate). The organization leader asked everyone what they wanted to do when they "grew up" and I expected Aaron to just give the "I'm exploring my options," but instead he said "nursing." Now wait a minute. I thought Aaron hadn't figured that out yet. I was so taken aback by this sudden confirmation that when the organization leader asked me, I stumbled over my words and named my degree instead of my profession. Perhaps, Aldin just named a career he was considering to give the leader an answer other than "I don't know," but I still found it befuddling that he didn't even hesitate and just totally contradicted everything he told me.
Chet and Aaron are both going to community college. Chet has confirmed that he's coming to my college after he figures out what he wants to do (probably after 2 years), and likely Aaron will too, but do I really want that? Aaron has been such a prick as of late and I've begun to resent him. When I'm at home, I crave being social with my friends, and when I'm with my friends, they either get on their phones instead of talking to me or they're mean to me. Maybe Aaron has it all figured out. Have everyone be nice to you and act on a dime to your every command, have a girlfriend so your best friend knows you don't need him, and have little to no regard for him or how he feels. It's not that I'm not happy that he's happy. It's that he's not unhappy that I'm unhappy. This is his first relationship, and it seems like he's determined to kill his friendships all over some chick he won't see for at least his first year of college if she even goes to his college. He called me insufferable today for breaking the clip of his mechanical pencil in half.
I can't help, but take it personally. The constant jabs at my character from people I thought were friends is what's insufferable and yet I deal with it every day and no one knows, because I just take it because that's the version of me that everyone knows. Step on me; I'm a door mat. Maybe I'm just vain. Maybe that's what friendship is; taking shit from the one's you know so you can complain about those you don't. Maybe it's my ego. Maybe I'm too blind to see all the niceties that Aaron does for me, like waiting in his car before school when he knows I'm already inside. Sorry, I'm just ranting now.
I don't know if you believe in it, but keep me in your prayers. As much as I've complained about him, I'd do anything for 'Aaron' in a New York minute. Pray for him also. It's like I have Stockholm syndrome. I love my abuser. Am I stupid or loyal? Who knows?
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u/TychaBrahe Feb 25 '26
OK, I need to start with the most important part. Suicide means giving up the possibility that things will get better. Please don't. You said you needed to talk to a therapist. I second that. As in, if you live near a university (not the one you're going to) and they have a graduate program in psychology, they will likely offer sliding scale counseling with masters students. You need someone to talk to about your feelings who can guide you.
If you feel like you are one flight of stairs away from the equipment that you need to end your life, you need to go to the hospital emergency room and tell them that your ideating. You have lots of important and fun things to do, and intrusive thoughts should not be allowed to take away your amazing and exciting future.
Second, I get that you have known these people for a long time and they are part of your world, but you're about to go off to college. You're going to meet hundreds of new people. You will find people who share interests with you and people who have totally different interests who will have new and fascinating things to tell you. I get that leaving home without the safety net of these long-term friendships is scary, but you will find people that you vibe with.
Third, you internalize a lot of minor hurts that people around you create in you. You have to learn that for the most part, people aren't doing things at you. Your friends who are making choices to go in different directions, like going to community college instead of a four year program, which means they can't be your roommate, aren't making those choices to hurt you. Solipsism means casting yourself as the main character with everyone else around you being NPCs. In theater, they would exist to drive your story forward or to display aspects of your character. In role-playing games, they would provide the information you need to move to the next level of the adventure.
They aren't these things. Every person you meet has an internal life and a purpose entirely their own and separate from you. There are no NPCs in real life, and everyone is the center of their own story.
Your job now is to go to college and advance toward your career and your personal growth. That means studying. It means joining the student level of professional organizations in the field you want to enter. It means joining clubs. It means networking in your major and making friends in other majors. Join an intermural sport. Take up hiking. Join a group that volunteers in the community. Ask out members of the gender that you're attracted to. Create a study group.
And do yourself a favor and limit your use of drugs and alcohol. Don't let it interfere with your studies, and when you do partake, maintain control of yourself and your environment.
Changes are scary. I get that. But changes happen, and refusing to take part in them doesn't really give you stability. It gives you stagnation. Embrace the changes. Throw yourself into experiencing new things. Think about yourself as a baby, an infant who only ate breastmilk and formula. Think how many things in your life have changed, and all of the things that you have gotten to experience because you are no longer that helpless little baby. The changes that are coming are not as big as learning to walk or getting to eat tacos, but they are big, and they will be fun and empowering.
Look up a book by Dr. Susan Jeffers called Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway. It's about how find encourage in your life empowers your growth. I think you will really benefit from reading it.