We tend to think of friendships as easy connections born of convenience, shared interests, and a sense of understanding.
Friendships are supposed to be easy, right? Romance is the hard work part.
Well, that’s not entirely true. After all, friendships can be just as complex, important, and impactful as romantic relationships. It all depends on your approach.
All of this means that a friendship can turn unhealthy or toxic if you don’t set firm enough boundaries.
What about your friendship? Do you and your friend need to set stronger boundaries?
Let’s find out.
1) You feel like you need to know each other’s every move
According to Sean M. Byrne, a professor of psychology at California State Polytechnic University, there’s a difference between a close friendship and a codependent friendship.
“More than interdependent, friends are ‘interlocked,’ with unclear personal boundaries,” she explains.
In a codependent friendship, there’s usually a “giver” who empowers the “taker”—one who gives and the other who takes. This is a very unhealthy dynamic, and can eventually lead to feelings of resentment and bitterness.
Whether you’re the giver or the taker, chances are you’re overly involved in each other’s lives.
If your friend goes on a date without telling you, you’ll feel offended and think, “Why didn’t they tell me?”
If you’re going through some challenges at home and don’t want to talk about them yet, your friend is trying to take it out on you, saying, “I thought we could trust each other. You can confide in me.”
From knowing each other’s every move to constantly texting or involving yourself in each other’s decision-making processes, friendship is simply… too much.
Trust me, I know what I’m talking about. I’ve been in a friendship like this for years. At one point, it felt like we weren’t two individuals but a team of two people who couldn’t function without each other.
It’s safe to say that the friendship eventually fell apart. We couldn’t take it any longer.
2) Your friendships are draining you
“It’s no secret that the quality of your friendships has an impact on your well-being,” says clinical psychologist Roxy Zarabi, Psy.D.
“Research has shown that the quality of your friendships can impact your stress levels, physical health, and the way you cope. A good friendship can have positive effects on your well-being and health, while a friendship with a lot of ups and downs can negatively impact your stress levels and health,” she explains.
With that in mind, I want you to ask yourself: Do you feel drained or recharged after a meeting with this particular friend?
The truth is, a friend should be someone who makes you feel emotionally and conversationally fulfilled; someone you can trust and receive the support and advice you’re looking for; and someone who understands and encourages you.
If your friend is just complaining, or if they talk about themselves for a long time without asking you a single question about yourself, or if they seem to be demanding, putting a lot of pressure on you…
That’s a sign that you need to step back, reflect, and try to set stronger boundaries.
3) You’re Walking on Eggshells
Another sign that your friendship needs a conversation is…
The fact that you can’t have a conversation in the first place.
When there was an issue in my friendship that I wanted to bring up, I tended to bottle up my feelings and let them simmer rather than communicate about it because I was afraid of how my friend would react.
What if she got angry? What if the whole thing blew up in my face? I’d rather not talk about it at all than face the possibility of an argument.
Sound familiar?
Yes, you need to set stronger boundaries. If you don’t, you’ll slowly be consumed by resentment, and what’s more, all those issues that keep coming up over and over again will one day become too much to handle, until…
It all blows up.
This is how my ten-year friendship ended.
Let this example be a lesson to you: It’s time to have a conversation.
4) You make each other feel uncomfortable or insecure
The point of having a friend is that you don’t feel alone. You can share yourself with someone and be accepted instead of judged; it makes you feel like you belong.
If you and your friend make each other feel judged, mocked, or insecure, what is the point of this friendship? Is it tearing you apart? Is it fighting against each other in an invisible battle for power?
As researcher Marianna Bokarova says, “Our close friendships are a sign of happiness, and feeling misunderstood by friends who mean a lot to us can be especially sad.”
If your friend sometimes makes jokes that you find hurtful, or if they give you indirect compliments, or if they’re too sarcastic for your liking, you need to talk to them about it.
They probably won’t stop all of a sudden. They need to realize that this is a problem first.
…which means you have to try to overcome your fear of conflict and incitement (if it’s safe to do so, of course).
5) There’s an imbalance in how much effort you put into each other
I had another friend who I loved very much. We would meet up regularly, go on fun trips, get very vulnerable with each other, and laugh until our stomachs hurt.
Then she got into a long-term relationship. And everything changed.
Over time, my friend started to pull away from me. She would schedule dates and then cancel at the last minute 70% of the time. She would text me and ask how I was doing only to leave me on read the moment I responded.
For months on end, I tolerated this behavior because I didn’t want to push her away even further.
But then I realized that I was putting a lot more effort into the friendship than she was, and why?
The friendship was no longer fulfilling; it was no longer doing the job it once did.
To me, this was a clear sign that we needed to have a conversation about where this friendship was headed.
We did. For a while, things got better before they went back to where they once were.
I knew I had to let go. I stopped putting so much energy and effort in, and suddenly, the friendship eventually fizzled out.
So if you feel like you have to carry everything in a friendship on your shoulders, that’s another sign that something is wrong.
6) You Have Different Expectations
What happened between my friend and I was an unspoken shift in her expectations.
Now that she was busy with her relationship, she no longer wanted as much closeness between herself and me. For her, what had been a close and important friendship had changed to a casual and casual one.
But I wasn’t consulted about this, which left me feeling confused and bitter. If I had set “new terms” for our friendship, I would have known where I stood and could have stopped trying so hard.
Instead, I should have taken the hint.
Sometimes, a friendship doesn’t work because you’re too different; Other times, it fails because you’re both moving into a different phase of life.
There’s also the possibility that you have different expectations of what this friendship should look like. If this is the case, you need to talk about where you stand and set some boundaries.
It’s okay for people to expect different things from each other — as long as they talk about it and come to some kind of understanding and resolution.
Remember: While friendship should be fairly easy, your problems won’t solve themselves if you ignore them long enough.
Communication and honesty are precisely what make things easier in the long run.
