What was the dumbest way that you lost a friend?

Friends; plural. I quit drinking.

Cocaine laced with fentanyl. OD'd in the bathtub. Wasn't even (remotely) a regular user; just having a little extra fun on New Years. Was about to finalize the adoption of his and his wife's baby girl too

Another one from alcohol, fell asleep in the bath

Another one from an undiagnosed heart condition

Another from a peritoneal infection from peritoneal dialysis (they had sickle cell)

My sister from benzos and falling asleep in the bath

All of them in their 30's. Been a difficult few years of losing friends/family for me, ngl

This is ages ago, invited me to an MLM event without telling me it's MLM. I've experienced cult that night.

He became a Qanon ass licking dumbfuck and a pro Trump cum sandwich.

Also, we are French so his savior isn’t able to place us on a map.

My best friend and I suggested online that maybe this friend of ours stop using “gay” as an insult (this was around 2009 or so) and he and his girlfriend became adamantly defensive and mean. When they implied that my best friend was molesting his beloved dog just to be assholes, I just cut the cord and walked away. They were idiots anyway.

Fun fact: the girlfriend was, and is, a huge “do good” volunteer advocacy leader. So, you know, help each other out, but don’t get in the way of my homophobic slurs.

Lost (sent away) two who tried to 'date' my husband.

I bought tickets for a concert for us both provided she drive. She never showed up and didn't answer her phone or anything but was somehow mad at me a few days later.

Mad she didn't get invited to a concert my GF bought tickets to. Welp

I canceled on the biweekly DnD session because it was scheduled for Halloween and I had plans. Told him a little last minute (day before when I realized).

Dude torpedoed our 10 year friendship over that.

I was in the military and was friends with a guy I worked with. When I got promoted I changed positions, so I didn't see him much at work, but we still hung out outside of work often.

One day he did something that could have gotten him in a lot of trouble. I was the only NCO (Sargent) around when it happened. My supervisor offered to take care of the punishment himself because he knew we were friends. I said no, he's my friend, I witnessed it, so I'll take care of it. Plus I was able to convince them to just give him some paperwork, instead of more severe punishment he could have had.

I took him into a private area, explained what he did wrong and that he was only getting paperwork. He didn't say a word, just signed it and walked out. I tried to go talk to him after work and his roommate came out calling me all sorts of names, asking how I could do that to him, and how I was a power tripping asshole, on and on. I asked if I could talk to my friend and explain and he told me my friend requested I never come back over.

I was at that base another year and he never talked to me again.

Dude became an outspoken anti vaxxer, tin foil hat wearing plandemic twat.

The final nail was when he shows up at our business out of the blue one day (literally had not spoken with him in almost a year) where he had left some oil paintings & other artwork to pick them up, then sent a shitty passive aggressive text the next day about how they were not kept in perfect condition.

My dude, you left them without a word otherwise over 4 years ago, we have shit to do besides take care of discarded art.

A friend of 8 years stole a few dresses from me while we were out on a trip. They weren't necessarily expensive, just cute sundresses that I had bought after saving up some money with my first big job. After returning home, I texted her to get one back because it was the dress I wore on my first date with my (now) husband and was sentimental. I was willing to part with the other ones. Her response was "Since I already have it with me, it would be easier if I just keep it and not have to find a way to get it to you."

We lived ~20 minutes apart. After that, I was ghosted. She continued to wear the dress and post photos online, blocking me so that I couldn't see, but other friends saw and reported back to me. Safe to say she was not invited to the wedding.

His last communication was a Facebook post to the world about how he only had room for supportive people in his life, not people who wanted to tear him down.

Guess he got tired of me saying mean things like "You should be paying your debt down, not buying things you can't afford" "Your wife is right and you shouldn't fight her on this" and "I understand that the universe rewards positive thought with positive destiny but you also need a plan".

Brother: Lets just say we had a major disagreement in early November.

Worst example is friend who, after being hospitalized for accident while car surfing, died car surfing again. I wasn't present for either event.

Second worst is dude with head injury (unrelated) started talking about crystals and toxins and juice fasting. Called him out one day, and it was catastrophic. This one is still alive, at least AFAIK.

Third, divorce. You will find out who your real friends are when you get divorced.

I returned to my hometown to handle the passing of my grandfather. I didn’t call my friend, who I had known since preschool, to go hang out. In reality I didn’t give a single thought to contacting anyone I knew – I had family to take care of. He felt insulted by that and chose to never speak to me again.

If this sounds completely illogical, I can assure you I’m just as baffled as you.

One where I was dumb was when I sold my then one of best friends a laptop and took his word for him going to pay a week later even though I knew he was a small time grifter. We were tight so I thought he wouldn't screw me over but alas, believing in people is dumb.

The second was an online friend of many years and good emotional support one way and the other, but then out of the blue the dude starts spewing hate and straight up tells me he's a nazi. Fuck that guy. Well fuck the first guy too, but at least I knew the devil back then.

Lost all my friends every couple years growing up thanks to the US military moving us around. Do not recommend.

Got a great dad out of the situation though so I’m not bitter. Much.

Friend moved and changed his cell number at same time... I didn't yet have his email so lost contact.

Found him years later at a random shop, got his new contact info and still besties today :)

I don't think there's a reason, which I think is the saddest reason. Growing up and drifting apart. Tried many times to fire up conversations but don't know where to start.

He had an argument with my then girlfriend, and stopped talking to me for some reason. We never had any issues or arguments, but he simply won't reply to me or return my calls. After a while, I gave up. We had been friends for about 7 years at that point.

Whenever I wanted to hang out she was at volleyball practice

Good friend, helped me through my parents long divorce. I moved abroad and got a bit lonely out there. Him and his then longterm gf who I was also good friends with had planned to come out and see me.

They then split shortly before. I wanted to be friends with both of them, but if I'm honest with myself, I thought the gf had feelings for me, as her texts to me were getting very high in emoji content. I encouraged them both to come separately and my friend said that our friendship was over if his ex comes to visit me. I guess he knew me better than I knew myself.

He didn't visit, she did. Nothing happened but there were clearly mixed messages on my side. Lost two good friends in one go.

Have made a few good friends since then, but I do miss him and that social circle a lot. I surprisingly haven't learned to not take liberties in friendship circles, but I'm trying to learn.

Permanently Deleted

I had a friend from high school that was a compulsive liar. we were friends for probably ~10 years and I never said anything because his lies were never hurtful lies. They were usually to entertain and were so obvious that any halfway intelligent person could spot them from a mile away. Fast forward to our early 20s and we're working security together. When I drive him home after a shift one day he started telling a story about how some guys tried to rob him with a knife outside his apartment but he turned the tables and took their knife and broke the guys arm in the process before they ran off. I finally asked him "what really happened?" and he looked at me hurt and didn't say anything. I later felt like a dick but his lies were growing in grandiosity to the point of offending some other people we worked with. A few months later he takes a shift with our supervisor who also happened to be a classmate and my buddy very intentionally fell asleep at the desk in the security office while using a second chair as a leg rest as the supervisor was doing a walking patrol of the building. Anyways, our supervisor came back and saw our buddy so the supervisor opened an emergency exit setting off the security alarm to see if he'd get up and respond. He did not. -That was my buddie's last shift. The following evening he texted me with some false explanation for why he was terminated. My response was "Dude, you were recorded on 3 different surveillance cameras sleeping next to the table we all watch the cameras on."

I didn't know that was the last time we'd talk. Less than 6 months later he had a bachelor party and a wedding neither of which I was invited to.

I came out as bi to her and then she thought me and my girlfriend wanted to sleep with her…

Her and I were close friends and confided in each other about depression, traumatic upbringings, and all sorts of stuff. I tell her in confidence that I think I’m bi and it’s something I struggled with all my life and only came to realize it then. She’s supportive because she’s pansexual and comes from a religious conservative background.

She asks me how my then girlfriend was taking it and I said she was excited because now she may get to have mmf and mfm threesomes. She says she thinks that’s really cool and asked if that meant we were open in the relationship so I said ya.

Fast forward a month or so later, she invites us all over to her place to hang out and smoke weed and chill and sleep over so we stay on the couch and she sleeps in her bed after a fun night. The next day she texts me that she’s not used to people treating her nicely and she thought she picked up vibes from both of us about wanting to sleep with her (???) and that she wasn’t comfortable with that.

We’re both shocked at this point because both of us had no intention of that and just wanted to chat, have weed, and talk about life and joke around and have fun. I tell her that this wasn’t our intent and that I’m really sad to hear that she felt that way from our actions and that we just wanted to enjoy her company since (I thought) we all had fun.

She went no contact pretty abruptly afterwards and 4 years later I’m still salty about the whole thing. I feel like I should not have shared that part about myself :(

I forgor 💀

I used to have an online friend who never really texts me first unless I do. Since they're a leftie, I wished them on Happy Left-handers Day and they replied that I don't need to wish them, which I only did to spark some conversation. This put me off and I went "Alr I won't bother texting you ever" and they went "Ok".

Haven't texted them in 3 months, neither did they (as they don't ever). Idk who is the idiot here, me, she or both.

I don't really like ending friendships from my side, so I might text them on her birthday and see how it goes.

A mutual friend of ours got into an argument with him because he made some new friends at his local pub and was buying pints for them left, right and centre. He took serious offence to the suggestion that they were using him for his money (he got about £120k in inheritance after his mum died) and cut both of us off, even though I never said anything to him.

I don't want to elaborate on his backstory but he had a lot of mental health problems and past trauma. After a lot of bad things happened a few years ago, he decided that he was done with life and vowed not to outlive his cats. Have tried to talk him out of it but he's set on ending his own life after his cats pass away.

I presume he's still alive, but I can't get in touch with him as he nuked his phone number and blocked me on all socials.

Homie got way into flat-earth bullshit. We (me and other friends) tried everything from ridicule, indulgence, and finally offering "agree to disagree and stop talking about it". He went no-contact with all of us, sold his house and left town.

He chased a ball into the street.

Motorcycle at 16.

Back in primary school (end of 1997), my best friend went to a different high school the next year and we never spoke again.

A friend tried to get me into Amway. I heckled him and refused.

He asked me again and I was more serious this time. I said no, and threatened if he asked me ever again it was the last he'd speak to me.

He asked again. I said "remember how I said we wouldn't be friends if you kept proselytizing that shit to me?", to which he replied, "yeah, but lemme sketch this out to you because it's awesome." Like, he wasn't sorry and he still tried to bring me onboard.

I left. Didn't speak to him for 31 years. He died in COVID.

I let my agoraphobia get the better of me.

His girlfriend at that the time said I was handsome causing dude to become incredibly insecure and petty.

I was working for my best friend of 30 years and his business partner. Over the years I begin a relationship with the ex of said business partner. It's all very new and we don't know what it will do but we want to find out

Her ex, the other business partner is a borderline narcissist with psychopathic tendencies so we want to be careful with him.. For one, I'm assuming fairly this will cost me my job if it comes out, worth it.

Either way, I want my best friend to hear it from me, not from the psycho, and in that week I also receive info that my best friend will be dumped and replaced with, well, me.

I have no interest in the position, I also don't want to see my best friend for 30 years ruined, so I so the right thing.

Be a good boy, but not too good.

I tell him that we're starting something and that his job and income are about to go south, so that he can prepare maybe save his job.

He takes exactly 3 minutes to tell my relationship to his business partner which immediately starts a shit storm with more murder threats than I care to remember. He still has his cosy position.

Took the guy a good 3 minutes to dump 30 years of friendship with the garbage. He immediately blocked me everywhere, never said a word on why.

Be a good boy, but not too good. If your best friend is about to drown, I guess let him.

On fools day he posted a picture of himself and a baby in Facebook with the tag "presenting my baby to everyone" I commented that congratulations for losing his virginity, that it took a while but it's look like it was worth it. He blocked me and never spoke to me again. I tried to contact him a couple of times, we were best friends on primary school and keep in touch even after graduation high school, but we never talked again after that. I can't even count the amount of times I talked about that with my therapist, until I just moved on. Hope he have a happy life.

My own dumb actions.

I deserved it. We are on speaking terms now years later at least.

I was weak and lonely and easily susceptible to her boyfriend's advances. We were quite young, early teens.

Joke was on all 3 of us... he hadn't figured out yet that he was gay. Neither had she for that matter. They're both infinitely more happy now. And I'm happy for them.

I ordered some supplements for him, $24 in value. We should have meet when he returns from the trip. He just ghosted me instead. We were friends since 1997. I didn't even planned to ask him for money... Yes, he is still alive.

I relfected my own insecurities about my sexuality onto my partner, sadly i didnt realised that they where nonbinary :(

It certainly wasnt the final nail in the coffin but something i still feel guilty about.

tangential but, when i was teenage-ish i had a friend of a friend that was always kind of standoffish with me. i’m a people pleaser so i was always looking for some way to connect with this guy, but i reckon that was coming across in a weird/bad way.

anyway at one point i found out we had the same birthday, year and everything! i thought it was pretty neat, but he thought i was lying. i got really insistent because from my perspective i had no reason to lie about something so mundane, and ig that rubbed him the wrong way because iirc he never spoke to me again.

neglect

Overdose

She stole from me.

I just stopped talking to them or responding well to their efforts. It's a trend. I really couldn't even tell you why with any absolute certainty, aside from the following thought that's come up when trying to figure it out.

If you grow up in a situation where your parents move every couple of years for work, IMO you're going to develop in one of two ways:
-you're going to get really good at making new friends, real fast, and keeping in touch with people over time
-you'll reach a point where you stop putting any effort into connecting with new people or keeping in touch with old friends, because what's the point? You'll be gone soon anyway.

And if you're in the latter camp, unless you put real effort into fixing it, that shit can stick with you long after the situation creating that condition is over.

I've made some progress, I suppose, in trying to at least be a friendly guy on the street open to chance encounters that theoretically could turn into a more robust friendship, but I've got a ways to go to get where I'd like to be re: that.

The Iraq War

Best friend of 6-8 years, I went back to work (I had been receiving VA disability) to get my money right to buy a house. He cut me out and everyone followed his will and did the same, because I couldn't hang out EVERY day. Never mind I was trying to buy a house so wed have somewhere to hang out and party that wasnt checks notes his in-laws house.

We started a business together and after landing our first client together (not one we brought in as a pre existing relationship) we went out drinking to celebrate. We both drank the same stuff, same amounts (and I've had far more before), yet I was more fucked than ever, to the point I'm convinced the dude drugged me. I have 0 memory of leaving the bar, going 5 blocks away after calling our ride, gashing my head open (twice), or how I was "so limp I could barely stand let alone walk" none of which sounds like me when I'm drunk at ALL

He also spent that whole time shit talking me to my wife, something he's previously done to other "friends" he felt were leaving him for significant others

He died of a heroin overdose.

Considering that the last person I knew online was a "friend" (something I'm really not sure, because I guess I'm not even sure what friendship is?), the person accused me of using AI to talk to her, because I often seem cold and emotionless (even though I'm just numb due to events that has been happening throughout my entire existence, and I guess that's different from not being able to feel emotions).

Speaking of offline people, the last person I knew (also not sure whether it was friendship or not) betrayed my trust, they did a thing behind my back, a thing that I became aware of, but the same person continued to hide it from me and insisted of referring to me as "friend".

Well, maybe I never had friends at all, and I guess I won't as I'm now in my 30s. It's okay, as I often mentally repeat to myself, every coffin can only hold a single body anyways (apologies for this memento mori).

An old friend moved across the country to where I’d been living for a few years. About two months later he lost his job due to skipping a shift to go party (small town → big city move).

He then neglected to find another job so when I tried talking to him about it, he got angry then disappeared and drove back to our home state that night.

A good friend of ten years ghosted me after his wife left him. My wife and I helped him through a lot of it, then he just went incommunicado. I'm still not sure why as he won't return my calls, texts, or emails.

Started a friendship with a classmate, he was bit of a know-it-all, we were discussing some esoteric stuff and he laid out his theory I said "ah that's BS", and gave my reasons. Then he got very uptight and ended our friendship there and then, and escorted me out of his apartment.

Very strange experience.

Edit: It's one of those cases you recall and think "Was it me that were the stupid one there?"

I asked someone to stop saying “half 5” as a time since it was ambiguous & confusing, especially given that we weren’t in an English-speaking country & folks come from all over (many culture this means one thing or the other, while many—including where I grew up—don’t even use it as an expression). I asked a few times, then another time we were gonna meet up, I asked him “half five ha” “so what time do you really mean?” “half 5” …so I just didn’t show up, wasn’t in the mood. We haven’t really talked since.

Gave my "best friend" money (apartment deposit & first + last month rent, utility deposit, and six months of car + rent insurance) after a nasty divorce when she had to support three kids from three different dads, all who were younger than 10. Once everything cleared never heard from her again... But she did use me as a job reference for years after disappearing and stealing my SSN to open a credit card.

Her now adult daughter texts me every couple months to tell me how much of a positive impact I had on her childhood though - so $50k well spent?? 🤦‍♀️