A 50-year friendship has deteriorated as one friend transformed from kind and supportive into self-absorbed and demanding, expecting others to cater to her needs. The letter writer struggles with whether to maintain contact.
Advice columnist Eleanor Gordon-Smith identifies this as a common problem in long-term friendships. The core tension: deciding whether to relate to the person someone was decades ago or accept who they have become.
The dynamic creates a practical dilemma. Long friendships carry weight and history that newer relationships lack. Ending contact means severing decades of shared experience. Yet continuing means tolerating behavior that has become genuinely draining.
Gordon-Smith frames the decision as less about cutting someone off entirely and more about resetting the relationship's terms. Rather than accommodating every demand, the letter writer can establish boundaries. This might mean less frequent contact, clearer limits on what support looks like, or honest conversations about how the friendship has changed.
The columnist suggests this approach preserves the history while acknowledging current reality. People evolve, sometimes in directions we don't like. The question isn't whether the old friend still exists, but whether the current person is someone worth keeping in your life on new terms.