Trust broken in friendship

LegacyUser

A good friend of mine has destroyed my trust in him and we have been arguing and not speaking for the past month.
Yet he wants us to put everything behind us and move on as he puts it. ie continue as friends.
He will not discuss with me certain questions I have about being 2 faced. He just ignores me whenever I mention it or changes the subject. And this makes it worse because I feel foolish then for bringing it up.
My question is do the same rules about trust apply between friends as in a relationship?
Should I do as he suggests and just forget whatever happened, what said etc?
I can't see how our friendship can survive this

MagicMarker

How can we possibly answer this when we have no idea what happened??

banshee_bones

yeah, sorry more background,details please....

Nevyn

What ever happened it has changed how you view him as a person and you are still hurt
enough by what happened to want to bring it up again.

While this is the case I don't think you can be friends.

I have to agree- it is possible that maybe you 2 can't be friends anymore. Well, for the time being. Give him some space. Don't ask questions. And who knows, maybe at some point ye will become friends again?

LegacyUser

banshee_bones wrote: »

yeah, sorry more background,details please....

Well I'd prefer not to go into too much detail or it could be a very long post.
Basically this person is happy to be my friend and we spend a lot of time together. But he downplays to his other friends how close we are and how important I am to him. I have only really found this out recently.

I value friendship and would stand by and stand up for a friend if someone else said something bad or unfair about them. I witnessed this happening recently when his friend called me all sorts of unmentionable names, completely unfairly, and he did not stand up for me and tell him to **** off. He just said nothing. And it's not like he's shy or anything.
The next day I brought it up with him and he brushed it off like it was nothing.

Other trust-related things, I tell him something about my life or myself and a few days later he will have twisted what I said and use it against me somehow the next time we have a disagreement about something.

I am thinking of cutting off contact completely.

wasper

trusting-unreg wrote: »

Well I'd prefer not to go into too much detail or it could be a very long post.
Basically this person is happy to be my friend and we spend a lot of time together. But he downplays to his other friends how close we are and how important I am to him. I have only really found this out recently.

I value friendship and would stand by and stand up for a friend if someone else said something bad or unfair about them. I witnessed this happening recently when his friend called me all sorts of unmentionable names, completely unfairly, and he did not stand up for me and tell him to **** off. He just said nothing. And it's not like he's shy or anything.
The next day I brought it up with him and he brushed it off like it was nothing.

Other trust-related things, I tell him something about my life or myself and a few days later he will have twisted what I said and use it against me somehow the next time we have a disagreement about something.

I am thinking of cutting off contact completely.

When I have 2 friends arguing. I tend to keep my mouth shut & not side with one or the other. You will be a loser if you take sides. Perhaps that was his rational.

Phototoxin

He will not discuss with me certain questions I have about being 2 faced. He just ignores me whenever I mention it or changes the subject. And this makes it worse because I feel foolish then for bringing it up.
My question is do the same rules about trust apply between friends as in a relationship?
Should I do as he suggests and just forget whatever happened, what said etc?

If he will not openly discuss certain issues then there are clearly troubles. In adition the ignoring will only turn it into resentmen. While at times you may think that you are foolish for ending the friendship over something others may see as trivial relationships need to have mutual respect. Having been in a similar situation a few years ago I can identify epically with the ignoring part. My advice would be to move on unless he has sufficient maturity to be able to discuss issues rather than ignoring them or changing topic.

But he downplays to his other friends how close we are and how important I am to him. I have only really found this out recently.

Either he does not see you as being that close or he is not wish to have you as a close friend. These would be clear warning bells to me.

LegacyUser

OP, we need more info to help you!!! Do you have a boyfriend? How long have you known your friend? What were your rows about?

Terodil

wasper wrote: »

When I have 2 friends arguing. I tend to keep my mouth shut & not side with one or the other. You will be a loser if you take sides. Perhaps that was his rational.

I agree with this in principle, but I wouldn't go down the 'silent route'. If one of them gets insulting as the OP indicates, then you can mediate in the conflict and get them to make up or at least boil it down rather than let them hurt each other needlessly.

Silence is a very valid option, but it's also a conscious choice. If you choose to stay silent you tend to make whatever arguments come forth your own. And that's what the OP is hurt about, if I got her right.

If it's important enough to you to take it to heart (i.e. if you cannot shrug it off as the ramblings of some insignificant person below your threshold of acceptance) and he was aware of how hurtful the things she said were, then I can understand you breaking off the relationship. I would probably do the same, from the little info we have.

Perhaps he thought that it was nothing too serious, perhaps it was a misunderstanding, which might explain the fact that he shrugged it off. Some people just tick that way (men tend to make this mistake more often than women I guess) that they hear it, dismiss it as groundless, hope it's over soon and then forget about it because it's totally irrelevant or unfounded, without realising how close to the heart of their friend it got. Speak with him about it again and explain -- non-offensively! -- why you feel hurt by his inaction. See how he reacts and take it from there to decide if your friendship can go on or if your expectations differ too much to support it.

Edit/PS: My pre-poster has a point. Downplaying the relationship is a warning sign. Ask him also why he does that. It's not what friends would usually do.

cafecolour

Are you sure you don't have somewhat of a crush/underlying romantic interest in him that you aren't really acknowledging to yourself? And that he doesn't reciprocate? I'm getting a little bit of that vibe from your posts, and that can def make you more sensitive to things than he will be back to you.

In any case, if he's causing you this most emotional turmoil, and you aren't getting much else out of it, then by all means fade him out of your life - you don't need friends like that.

bluecell99

cafecolour wrote: »

Are you sure you don't have somewhat of a crush/underlying romantic interest in him that you aren't really acknowledging to yourself? And that he doesn't reciprocate? I'm getting a little bit of that vibe from your posts, and that can def make you more sensitive to things than he will be back to you.

In any case, if he's causing you this most emotional turmoil, and you aren't getting much else out of it, then by all means fade him out of your life - you don't need friends like that.

Completely agree with this.In any event ,notwithstanding the possible romantic angle,if a "friend" treats you like this its time to cut them off.

DIfferent situation but a couple of years I was in hospital for a while and underwent surgery(totally recovery thankfully).Four frieends of long standing never texted,called or visited!Have dropped them from my life and never regretted it for a minute.

LegacyUser

Ive been in a similar situation with a friend recently. They were being a little two faced, and plain out lying to me. A typical example being one night I had asked my mate to come out for a few pints for my birthday. They said they like to but that he was dying with a head ache. I had later found out that he decide later that night to go drinking 40 miles away in another town with a mutual friend.
This was the straw that broke the camals back for me. I decided I didnt want to have anything to do with them anymore. Note it was over tis one event. This was one of a series of similar events.

About three months later this person still wanted to be mates so I decided to put it behind us and continue as was. But something happend a week or two later. When I realsised that my mate intended to coninue on as was and didn make any attempt to change there behaviour.

What is the point of you both going back to be friends if the underlining cause for your inital rift is still there.

Do yourself a favour unless they have changed or at least attempted to change. Have nothing to do with them. They are only wasting your time. A few months down the line your just going to get feed up of your mate ignoring you and be back exactly where you are now

coillcam

People make mistakes... Yes absolutely.

But no amount of "sincerity" can make up for the fact that some people are douches and won't change. I'd tell them that your relationship relies on trust and honesty. Frankly if they can't accept than they can feck off or at least maybe until they grow up.

trusting-unreg wrote: »

But he downplays to his other friends how close we are and how important I am to him.

trusting-unreg wrote: »

I can't see how our friendship can survive this

I think these are 2 key points to reflect on. You have answered your own question here imo.

Wagon

Maybe he just doesn't see the point in proving how close you are as mates? Maybe he just wants to stay out of arguments?

Laivasse

His underlying motive is what's key, yet it's very hard to know what motivates the guy without knowing him personally. Your judgement of his character will be the deciding factor.

Regardless of how shy he is or isn't, it could be that he's something of a coward when it comes to situations like this, where there are conflicts within the same social circle. Being afraid of social awkwardness is forgivable; although he should be encouraged in that case to man up a little, it might be counterproductive for you to press it too hard. It could also be that he senses/fears a romantic interest on your part, doesn't want to be seen to be doing anything that encourages you, and therefore overcompensates by leaving you to fend for yourself in situations where a friend should really either defend you or seek to mediate.

The worst reading of his character is that he doesn't value your friendship or that he doesn't want to be seen as valuing it. This would, in essence, be another form of cowardice, in that he's not telling his other friends how much he values you, or he's not telling you that he doesn't value you. Either way in that case, you deserve better treatment from a better friend than that.

We don't know him, you do. As those other posters said, however, make sure that romantic interest isn't clouding your judgement.

TURRICAN

i think you should leave him.
when you said his friends call you unmentionable names he is not sticking up for you which in my eyes means he deffo dosent love you and dosent really care about you.on the flipside the lads call you names only because they are jealous that they are not with you and thats why they insult you in front of your bf.
thats my idea could be miles off.