Ep. 103: Is This Friendship Over? How to Know, and How to Handle It.

Have you ever found yourself wondering whether a friendship has run its course—or if a difficult conversation could actually save it? In this episode, we’re diving into one of the hardest relationship challenges women face in midlife: friendship breakups. We explore what happens when a friendship feels one-sided, when trust has been broken, or when life changes reveal who’s truly in your corner.

We also share our own experiences with friendship loss, hurt feelings, resentment, and the courage it takes to have honest conversations. If you’ve been struggling with a friendship that no longer feels good, this episode will help you think through what’s really happening beneath the surface and whether repair, distance, or closure is the next right step.

Episode Highlights

[0:40] - Why friendship breakups are so difficult—and why they matter in midlife

[1:14] - The powerful role female friendships play in creating a meaningful life

[3:28] - What healthy friendships look like: support, reciprocity, honesty, and emotional safety

[5:06] - How major life events reveal who your true friends are

[8:18] - Outgrowing friendships, one-sided relationships, and evaluating where your energy goes

[10:21] - A candid look at reciprocity and what keeps friendships strong over time

[14:53] - Signs that something may be wrong in a friendship

[16:02] - Laura shares the heartbreak of losing a friendship without closure

[18:33] - Colette opens up about having a difficult conversation after feeling deeply hurt by a friend

[20:57] - Can friendships recover after honest confrontation?

[24:31] - Why speaking up may be the only chance a wounded friendship has to heal

[26:02] - Practical steps to take before deciding to end a friendship

[27:19] - Don’t mistake a difficult season for the end of a relationship

[28:38] - The importance of reciprocity, honesty, and emotional investment

[31:09] - Why midlife may be a season of pruning relationships

[31:32] - How to confront a friendship issue with clarity, kindness, and vulnerability

[33:33] - The mistake many adults make when pulling away from friendships

[34:43] - Why difficult conversations are usually easier than we imagine

[36:09] - How repair can deepen and strengthen meaningful friendships

If today's discussion resonated with you or sparked curiosity, please rate, follow, and share "Insights from the Couch" with others. Your support helps us reach more people and continue providing valuable insights. Here’s to finding our purposes and living a life full of meaning and joy. Stay tuned for more!

Ever stayed quiet to keep the peace and felt yourself disappear? The Cost of Quiet is for anyone who avoids conflict and pays the price. Reclaim your voice, strengthen your relationships, and experience real peace. Order your copy and join the movement: https://www.colettejanefehr.com/new-book

🎙️ Love the podcast? Come talk about episodes with us inside The Midlife Chat. It’s a free, private community just for women at midlife who want to keep these conversations going. We’ve created this space for real talk, fresh resources, and honest connection—where you can share ideas and resources, ask questions, and get support from women navigating the same season.  Come join us—we’d love to have you!

👉 Join The Midlife Chat here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/795863256460970/

Order The Cost of Quiet now! Colette’s new book, The Cost of Quiet: How to Have the Hard Conversations that Create Secure, Lasting Love, launched February 3rd. Order your copy today: https://www.colettejanefehr.com/new-book

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Transcript

Laura Bowman: 0:44

welcome to Insights from the Couch, where real conversations meet real life at midlife, where Colette and Laura, two therapists and best friends, walking through the journey right alongside you. Whether you're feeling stuck, restless, or just unsure of what's next, this is a space for honest conversations, messy truths, and meaningful change. And our midlife master class is now open. If you're looking to level up, get into action, and make midlife the best season yet, go to Insights from the couch.org and join our wait list. Now, let's dive in.

Colette Fehr: 1:21

Hi guys, welcome back to Insights from the Couch. We're talking today about a really hard but important topic. When you have to break up with a friend, when it's not the right season, the friendship's outlived its usefulness, something hurtful has happened. We'll unpack some of the reasons, and then also give you some tips for how to do this, because it doesn't have to be damaging. There is a way to end friendships with care, kindness, and clarity, and sometimes we have to do that without avoiding the difficult conversations.

Laura Bowman: 1:55

Yes, we do. I, you know, women's friendships are so important at this phase of life, like, I feel like our friendships take on such an important role, and having good ones really matters for, like, how much you're going to enjoy your life. I know that my good female friendships really provide, like, so much care. I mean, like, our friendship, like, if I honestly, I have this like meme that I got where it's this comedian going, somebody said to him, like, "Oh, you're handling things so well, and then the guy's like, "I'm not handling anything well. He's like, "My best friend knows everything that I've been dealing with, like blow by blow, and it's like, if you have good relationships, your life is really so much better, but if these relationships aren't good, it can be distracting and painful and sad, and letting go of one of these friendships is really hard,

Colette Fehr: 2:56

and it can be really destructive. I mean, to your point, the fact that we can get together and unburden and talk about everything, and we're both vulnerable, we're both open. There's no fear of judgment. We share the messy bits, we laugh. We can talk about life like real life and how hard it is, but also what we care about, what's meaningful. I'm not afraid to admit things to you. You know, there's a safety there. I think those are the things foundationally that make a friendship so good. And I do think we're facing a potential future where women are living in communes with other women, like a shared dining room, you know, where you can go eat your meals, and then you have your own little cozy space, total safety and emotional peace and freedom, and maybe they plan trips, and there's author talks, and all female retirement living. That's my next business,

Laura Bowman: 3:56

honestly. There, I saw something on online about like a tiny house village of like women over 65 living in their own little individual homes in a small community, and I think this is the answer in

Colette Fehr: 4:08

so many ways, because women are, you know, we like to gather and support and be there for each other, and it goes without saying, before we get into ending a friendship, that female support is so powerful. I went to all girls school, you know. I talk about that all the time. It was the best part of it. I'm so close to so many of those friends and feel such a bond. Small classes, really, really good women. And it goes without saying that your female friends, especially at this stage of life, should be your biggest cheerleaders supportive. These relationships should be reciprocal, and if both people don't open up, it's not really going to feel that good, and you're not going to want to put yourself out there. So, we're trying to get away from it, midlife superficial friendships, and into things that are deeper and more meaningful, because time is a precious commodity, and you have to be very selective about where you spend it, but let's talk a little bit about what happens when this beautiful thing goes awry, and there are a number of different reasons friendships, and I'm in the middle of evaluating a lot of my friendships as I have such little time in my life, and kind of I believe in the adage, make new friends, but keep the old. One is silver and the other is gold. I don't think every friendship has to be so active and engaged. Some friendships rely on history and previous shared experiences, and you're in a different phase of life, but the bond is still good. But sometimes you outgrow a friendship or something really hurtful happens, and I think a big thing for me that I've lived twice in my life is that big changes in your life that are difficult, whether they're joyous or traumatic, can really show you who your true friends are, like when I went through a divorce that was very much a filtering process. A lot of people sucked and were totally either not there for me or actively sort of operated against me, because people are so allergic and scared of divorce. And then my book coming out, I felt like there were a lot of people who were amazing and so supportive, like you and most of my good friends and other people that I was like, wow, I didn't really expect much, but I didn't expect you to do that.

Laura Bowman: 6:33

Yeah, right, like highs and lows will really bring out like who your real friends are, and I think, and I know we've done an episode on this before, but it's like these mismatches, like if I'm in a high and you're in a low, or it's like, you know, people are like, I don't know if I want to be contaminated by all that, you know, so I just like need a little space, you know, which I think sucks, by the way, or people love when you're in a bad time and kind of feed on it, or we're in a bad time together and one person gets off the island and the other person's like, I'm still in a bad time,

Colette Fehr: 7:13

don't worry if you get off the island, I'll still love you,

Laura Bowman: 7:18

send a dingy for me,

Colette Fehr: 7:20

I don't think I'm getting off, but I love that we wish that for each other. I've never been that kind of friend. I, I have felt envy of a friend, but I have felt envy never in a way that I begrudge her her joy or don't also feel happy for her. I've been like going through a breakup when somebody else is madly in love, but for me it's never like, oh, I don't want to hang out with you or I resent you. It's more like, oh, I wish I had that too, but like, yay, I'm so happy for you.

Laura Bowman: 7:52

Yeah, that's a sign of a really good friendship is where you can really like root for each other and hold your own life experience, but be happy for somebody else or tolerate somebody else's down period, like that's when you know you have somebody good in your life.

Colette Fehr: 8:10

I agree, and this is why we're friends. I think we do that for each other.

Laura Bowman: 8:14

Yeah, I'm actually incapable of having, and this is probably why I don't have more friends, but the ones I do have are either like they're so completely inside my life and functioning in in the inner circle and they know what's going on in my life I don't I am incapable of doing that sort of like superficial like how's your dog doing how's your kids what how is your tennis game like I like, I can't function on that level particularly well, so I maybe like miss a lot of the, but it, but if something were to happen to one of my, in my good relationships, it would be devastating, because my relationships mean so much to me.

Colette Fehr: 8:59

Okay, I agree with everything you're saying, so let's talk about breaking up with a friend, because this is a big thing. You know, I see a lot of articles about this, and a lot of literature on female friendships ending talks about almost in this cliched language, it's the end of the season, you know, you've outgrown each other. I don't even know that I believe in this outgrowing thing. I have friends from different stages of life, where if we met now, we're probably in very different places politically. What our life is filled with, our approach to marriage and children, so many things, but that doesn't mean I don't hold them dear and value them as individuals. I don't feel like I need to be going through the same things as my friends, or that I have to shed people just because they're not having the same life experiences I am. For me, though, the biggest thing is about reciprocity, which has me evaluating a lot of friendships lately, like I have had friendships end because I just start to notice, and I have a couple of these right now that I feel like, God, I'm the only one who makes any effort, and if I didn't make effort, would we even be friends? And I don't think anything should be tip for tat ever, and I also don't believe friendship should be so high maintenance or demanding. We're all already have so much on our plate, but when you start to really feel like I'm the one who calls, I'm the one who makes plans, I'm the one who asks. When I see you, you never ask me anything or seem curious about my life. If I don't contact. You would I even hear from you, you know, those are things where maybe you don't have to go through a breakup unless somebody asks you and notices you've pulled away, but I'm saying to myself, you know, I don't know that I need to keep, maybe I care about this friendship more than this person does, and maybe I don't need to keep investing so much energy here.

Laura Bowman: 11:02

Yeah, yeah, I agree. I think when you realize that you're not being prioritized or, you know, central to a person's life, and that nobody's making an effort, it's like, how much do I.. and I do think there's always one person who tends to lead. I think there are a lot of people.. I'm probably cop to it. I let people lead, probably some sometimes more than I lead.

Colette Fehr: 11:24

I definitely lead our friendship.

Laura Bowman: 11:27

Do you feel that way?

Colette Fehr: 11:28

Yes.

Laura Bowman: 11:30

Do you want me to lead a little more?

Colette Fehr: 11:32

I mean, yes and no. I think with you, I so really.. I mean, I wouldn't be opposed to it, but I think with you, I really know you so well that I don't take it personally. It's almost like how my romantic relationships operate, like not that I'm saying we're lesbian lovers here or anything, but that, that, like, you know, in my romantic relationships I plan the dates, I plan my own birthday parties, I plan our vacations, like

Laura Bowman: 12:01

you in a marriage, if we were in

Colette Fehr: 12:03

one people would say, like, I want my husband to plan because of what it means, I don't make it mean anything, I just tend to go for a certain kind of guy who, and it's both husbands, boyfriends who like let me have that role, and I enjoy that role, and I don't make it mean the other person doesn't care. I think with you, I feel like if I dropped off the face of the earth, eventually I would hear from you, but I probably wouldn't hear from you as quickly as you would hear from me. But I don't make that mean for us that you're not invested in the relationship, because I think I know it's just sort of how you are.

Laura Bowman: 12:43

I think that's right. I will give you this bit of inside baseball that, like, when you call, I probably rush to the phone quicker than I do most people. Like, if you call and see, like, 'Hey, meet me for wine, I'm, I mean, how many times do I say, like, 'I'll be there, like, most of the time, unless, yeah, yeah, I

Colette Fehr: 13:04

can't now, but how about tomorrow?

Laura Bowman: 13:06

Yeah, like, let's, you know, I'm so.. it's very.. I'm always very eager to do like whatever you have in mind.

Colette Fehr: 13:12

Feel that, and that's probably why, like, I feel your care for the friendship, that's what I'm trying to do. The fact that you may not do it at the same pace that doesn't affect me the way it might was, and also I don't feel like if I stopped we wouldn't be friends,

Laura Bowman: 13:29

no, and I would like, like you're right, I would miss you, I'd be like, because I'm so used to you being in my life like every week to some level, yes,

Colette Fehr: 13:36

you're the only person I have regular active contact with other than my husband and father.

Laura Bowman: 13:45

Yeah, like I actually expect that I'm going to see you every week. I don't think we've ever made that explicit, but like I expect that. So, like, there was like two weeks that went by that didn't see you. I'd be like, where are you? Where are you? Yeah, and you know what, this is

Colette Fehr: 13:59

really a great foil, I think, for the idea of breaking up with a friendship is that to me our friendship is a lot of a model of what friendship should be. It's not tit for tat, I don't need anything really from you, so explicit, or you didn't call me, or we don't talk every day, we don't have to explain when we're in an irritated mood or rut, it's just very effortless, but we see each other, we download what's happening, there's space for both people, and I do feel, and some of this may be being therapists to all the work you have to do as a therapist, but if that, if there was a problem, it would still be hard for me, but I would bring it to you. I wouldn't swallow

Laura Bowman: 14:45

it. Yeah, yeah, you know what, but like, you're right. Like, so we have this rhythm, and maybe we can use our friendship as an example. It's like a very predictable rhythm, like maybe you reach out more, but I definitely respond, and we get together. So, if something were to go south in that, where like I was like you were reaching for me and you couldn't find me, and I was like, "Oh, I can't or not today. You

Colette Fehr: 15:11

started like repeatedly saying no, I know something was wrong, and I would be totally freaked out.

Laura Bowman: 15:20

Yes,

Colette Fehr: 15:20

and then you could go through that, like, wait, is there something wrong?

Laura Bowman: 15:24

Or if you stop reaching, if you stopped reaching, and I'm like, she doesn't even call me, or like, where is she, or who she hanging out with, right? That isn't right,

Colette Fehr: 15:34

or what if you didn't hear from me, and then all of a sudden it had been three weeks, and you were like, hey, we need. To get together, and I was like, I can't, no explanation, you would know immediately something's wrong. So this is part of why we're talking about this breakup thing, because I think sometimes either a friendship isn't reciprocal, you feel like you've outgrown it, I know politics is a big thing for people, or like you said, someone's in a bad place, they do something that you don't agree with, value systems change, or like for me, I have a friendship right now that maybe I'm not sure what's going to happen, but in this current moment I don't really want to pursue it, and I have had other friendships end for very concrete reasons, like feeling really hurt or betrayed, sometimes you're going to have to have a conversation, and you can actually break up in a way that honors the fact that the relationship was really meaningful and does so with clarity and kindness, where you don't leave someone going, wait, what happened, why did she pull away, what's wrong, I don't know,

Laura Bowman: 16:42

let's just admit that that's the exception rather than the rule. I agree. I think this is so damn hard, and I've talked about how I did lose a friendship mainly because of, like, a mismatch season. It was, it was pregnancy related. I kept having kids, she couldn't get out off of Infertility Island. Our lives took like just really acute turns, there was hurt feelings, I think there was empathic failure, and then just she just pulled away like very abruptly, and there was no meaning made of that, it was we were like sisters, it, it really ripped my guts out, like it just hurt, and, and there was even in the attempt to try to make sense of what had happened, it was so hard to talk about that it was just like avoided.

Colette Fehr: 17:35

Yeah, okay, that I think, as sad and painful as that is, I think that is the more typical norm. I recently made an effort to do something different. I wanted to do it that way. A friend really hurt me. I really, to this day, don't understand the behaviors that happened. It, it's just hard to see it as any, you know what, forget why. What the intention was, the impact it had was this person doesn't value our friendship the way I do. We're not as close as I thought we were, because if we were, you would never have done these couple of things, and I couldn't shake it, and what I wanted to do was just completely avoid it. The person isn't right here in town, where I would have to see them regularly, but there's a long history, and there's mutual friends, and I kept going back and forth, and I could make a really great excuse for why it wasn't really avoidance, it was really just like letting the natural flow that all of this literature talks about, you know, sometimes you just outgrow a friend and you kind of move apart, but it wasn't that, and I realized that if I continued to be nice-ish but not available, like we're talking about, there was going to be resentment that I had not expressed that would poison my own system, and that the only reason for not being honest about it was that it was awkward, and I dreaded it,

Laura Bowman: 19:13

and I watched you do this, and I felt the awkwardness for you, and I have to say, like, it is such.. I mean, well, it's the like mission of your book, so like it's hard for you to like avoid this work. I

Colette Fehr: 19:24

swear that was part of what got me to do it. I'm like, I cannot be running around the country talking about this fucking book, and I can't even have the hard conversation,

Laura Bowman: 19:33

right? Right, but I have to say, like, I would have opted for a drift. I will probably always opt for a quiet drift, but I think you're right. I think it's when you feel like there's something so stuck in you, and like resentment, where it's like this was really hurtful, like I have to say something, you know, because you would have never been able to sort of paper over that friendship and just show up and be like status quo, no.

Colette Fehr: 20:02

And what I did, and this is part of why we're doing this episode, and we're not saying every scenario you have to have a confrontation, but there are probably more scenarios where we can be honest, but we can really do it like I talk about in the cost of quiet, where it is clear and kind, and I didn't let I do have anger, not as much anymore, but I didn't let the anger lead the conversation. I acknowledged it, and I went into it really using the best of, like, couples therapy principles of not blaming. Not accusing, I wanted to say I honestly cannot believe you did x, y, and z, like I don't even respect you anymore. I mean, there's a part of me that just wanted to read the riot act, but underneath that was hurt, and so instead, what I did, that is a way we can have all these conversations, is just to name the behaviors and say this is what happened, right, and this is how it made me feel. It made me feel really hurt. It sent a message that the friendship wasn't important, as important to you as it was to me. And I don't want to pretend that everything's fine. I also don't.. I'm not asking for anything. I just don't know what the future of the friendship is, because even though I did get a sincere apology into this person's credit, she showed care. I also feel like a lot of people don't like the idea of someone being upset with them.

Laura Bowman: 21:38

Yes, yeah,

Colette Fehr: 21:39

and so there can be some like anxiety around that, but if you are really made to feel like somebody doesn't care about you, have your back, celebrate your success, your life isn't important to them, no matter what the intention, sometimes you can't come back from that.

Laura Bowman: 21:59

How, what do you think, though? Like, what's your just honest take after real come to Jesus conversation like that? How many friendships can move forward in a stronger place, or how many, how many relationships does a conversation like that kind of, you know, just that's like such an impasse, or it's so hard for one person that it's just like it's

Colette Fehr: 22:25

ruined. Yeah, I think there are cases like that, certainly around divorces. I think there are cases like that. I know of some cases, both from friendships and clients, where you know a big one that comes to mind is somebody is like cheating on their spouse, and people really,

Laura Bowman: 22:45

or somebody new didn't say anything,

Colette Fehr: 22:47

yeah, or, or not even that. Like, you have a friend who's cheating on their spouse or having an affair with a married man or woman, you don't approve it, feels threatening to your relationship. I mean, I personally wouldn't end a friendship over those things, I mean, I'm a therapist, so like,

Laura Bowman: 23:04

what if you found out, like, I knew that, like, somebody was cheating on you, and I didn't, or like, a friend knew,

Colette Fehr: 23:12

okay,

Laura Bowman: 23:13

and just,

Colette Fehr: 23:13

yeah,

Laura Bowman: 23:14

decided to, yeah,

Colette Fehr: 23:15

so I have had that, but actually more of a mutual friend that was friends with the partner, but yeah, you're like, and actually an ex of mine. I'll try to keep this as general as possible. At a different time in my life, this tells you how long ago it was. I had a friend who was cheating on her partner. The partner was friends with my partner. She left a message that referenced all of this, and he was hearing the message, and I was trying to stop it. Yeah, like our call got recorded, so I didn't tell him he didn't even want to know. Now he's like, "I have this information I don't want to have, and I was like, "If you tell your friend, like, I will never forgive you. So he didn't, and then the friend eventually found out that he knew, and he was like, "Look, I was between a rock and a hard place. It's my partner, you're my friend. And their friendship didn't survive

Laura Bowman: 24:16

it. Oh, I have goosebumps. That's like horrible, right?

Colette Fehr: 24:20

Horrible.

Laura Bowman: 24:20

Those horrible decision tree,

Colette Fehr: 24:23

yep,

Laura Bowman: 24:23

but that, I mean, that's not, that's not mostly what happens to female friendships, mostly hurt feelings, yes, or said something behind your back. I have a person in my life who found out that, like, her dearest friend had just said some really like horrible things, and this person did not deal with it for a really long time. It really, but would talk about it ad nauseum, like it was so, so much resentment, so much hurt. It took her three years to finally confront this, but when she did, they were able to have a really constructive conversation about it, and this person was like, "I'm so glad I finally said something.

Colette Fehr: 25:11

Well, that's exactly how I felt. And when I say I don't know about the future of the friendship, I know that what happened has given this friendship the only chance it has going forward, and what I said clearly and kindly is right now, if I acted like I got a sincere apology, I genuinely appreciate it. I don't think this person had malintent, but it still left me with a really bad taste in my mouth, and so what I said is I just think I need some time and space and. Let's see what happens. That's honest, but I don't think necessarily I'm never going to be friends with this person again. I just know right now I don't feel great about it, but I feel much better than I said something, and that we had an honest conversation. Much better,

Laura Bowman: 25:55

you know. That's exactly it. It's like it's like you don't want to tackle the wound, but your only shot of like having a friendship in the future is cleaning out the wound, and it may hurt like hell. Yes, but it's like it has to be done, or you have no shot for like heat health in the future,

Colette Fehr: 26:15

right? And sometimes it really is the end of a friendship, like I have another friend that I was friends with for a season, something happened, and you're weighing all the variables of the friendship. Really, looking back, I don't know that I ever felt like this person really had my back, which is the number one thing in a romantic partner for me and a friendship, and that I try to provide for people in my life, so when the bigger thing happened, I was like, you know what, I'm done, I don't care whether the.. and it's not holding a grudge. I wish the person well, you know, like if something good happened to them, I would be happy for them. I'm not bitter, they're not a villain in my life, but I don't seek to have any engagement. So let's keep, give people a couple tips for if you're thinking about ending a friendship, a couple of things to do, and the first is, of course, like we're discussing, get clear on what actually happened, because you know, what are your feelings, are you angry, and if you are, dig beneath the anger, because anger is what we call a secondary emotion. Most of the time, there's something

underneath it: 27:24

hurt, shame, fear, sadness, loneliness, embarrassment. So, dig for those deeper feelings and figure out what do you need, like, is it an apology, is it an acknowledgement, is a promise of future changed behavior. Is it to know that the friendship matters? See, in order to figure out what's actually happened, you've got to really, really dig into your own internal process and get clear on what you need from that person before ending it.

Laura Bowman: 27:59

That's a really good one. I also think that another one on this list is like, do not throw out a friendship over a temporary season. Yes, you know, I'm like in a rough season currently. I think I've told my closest friends, is like, you know, hey, if I'm like a little less available, you know,

Colette Fehr: 28:19

I'm

Laura Bowman: 28:20

just crazy, and I have, like, less bandwidth, but, like, that's not hopefully that's not the standard of friendship, is that you know how you are in a particularly bad season. I

Colette Fehr: 28:32

agree, no friends after launching a book. Everyone hates me if I have to hear about that effing book one more time, or greater, or like I haven't been that available, so yes, it's not just about what's it, shouldn't be just about what's going on in your life,

Laura Bowman: 28:53

yeah, yeah, and see people over multiple seasons, you know, if you are dealing, you know, year over year with a person being mired in drama, or you know, distraction, or not attending to the friendship, you know, that's something to notice, that you're continually out of sync with a person, which is again like notice the reciprocity and the honesty. I think that's it. I mean, it's how honest can you be about what's going on in your..

Colette Fehr: 29:18

I think if you're evaluating whether or not to really end a potential friendship, the reciprocity is a huge thing, and again, shouldn't be tit for tat, but does this person put some energy into the friendship, and that doesn't mean they're available all the time. I don't think it's that. I think it's like I just saw a really good friend that I've had for 30 years, we never talk, we don't need to, like I know this person has my back. The minute I see her, it's like five seconds haven't passed. If I called her at 2am she would pick up the phone. She's happy for me, she's there for me. I do anything for her, it doesn't need a lot of daily or regular fuel, but it's just good at the root.

Laura Bowman: 30:10

Yeah, yeah. And I think it goes to like reciprocity plus honesty, like, do you do you get to sit with that person, and does that person tell you, bring you into to the interior of their lives, do you get like the real person, or are you getting the person's representative, where you feel like you're held out from what's really going on? Because I think it's that honesty that does so much to cement our good friendships. You're,

Colette Fehr: 30:35

you're absolutely right, that when I think about all the friendships that I. I really enjoy at this stage of life, and some are newer, and some are really long term, even if it's not the people I'm the closest to. It's a person that I can get together for dinner, even if it's once a year or once every five years. And when we talk, and it's like, How are you? It's real, it's raw, it's not nothing. I don't have any space for anybody competitive, competitive, superficial, status-oriented. I have never been interested in that, you know. As women, when someone else does well, we all do better.

Laura Bowman: 31:17

Yeah, well, not all women feel that. I

Colette Fehr: 31:20

mean, I think that's to me, that's the case. For okay, I don't really want to spend my energy there.

Laura Bowman: 31:26

Yeah, and I guess you know what, why we have to say is like that. I think when you get to this stage of life, the stakes just get higher, you know? I mean, we're watching our parents age, you're watching our kids leave, so if the friendships aren't good, you know, it's time for like a season of pruning, yep, and so I think more women listening to this are going to have to deal with some version of what we're talking about. Oh,

Colette Fehr: 31:49

I agree, I agree, because space frees up a bit at the empty nest, and I think if there's something part of what I'd like to encourage people today is if there's something with a friend that, like, doesn't feel right, or you're wondering about it's very hard, but really think about confronting

Laura Bowman: 32:12

it. Yeah, and

Colette Fehr: 32:13

confronting it, and I also wrote a whole book that will help you do this, of course, The Cost of Quiet, but really confronting it in a way that is self-focused, meaning you're going to talk more about yourself and your feelings, that's honest and vulnerable, you know, that's not blaming or accusing or making assumptions and interpretations about that other person. It's very hard to hear feedback. It's very hard to hear you upset someone and not feel like someone's telling you you're a terrible person, and I know that if a friend were upset with me, I would be so flooded and panicked, because it's hard not to collapse into, oh no, they think I'm a bad friend, and we want to set that conversation up as gently as possible by saying, look, I want to talk to you about something difficult, it's very hard for me, but I really care about the friendship, and so I'm bringing this to you, and this is what I did with my friend, and I think part of it is how I came forward, and part of it was her own, you know, what's really great about her as a person, and she is a really good person, is that she, I could feel a little bit of defensiveness bubble up, but then she shifted gears and was like, I'm really sorry that I hurt you, and so, whatever the future holds, how close we are, the conversation freed up all that space in me, where it was cycling around, she had noticed neither one of us was acknowledging it, and now we're on honest terms, and this is really the most important thing for us as women at midlife, in particular, is we want to live on honest terms with ourselves.

Laura Bowman: 33:56

I love that expression, living on honest terms. Yeah, it feels really clean, right? Like, so you may not be able to retain all of these friendships, but you will live, be living on honest terms, and that feels in line and in integrity. I agree,

Colette Fehr: 34:15

and if somebody notices that you've pulled away and asks you, give them the respect of telling them yes, something shifted, and if you haven't gathered your thoughts, you're feeling shaky or wobbly about confronting it. I still need some time to process. I'll circle back once I've prepared my thoughts. Don't gaslight somebody into no, no, I'm just busy.

Laura Bowman: 34:40

Yes,

Colette Fehr: 34:40

really immature, and it's really, you're doing a disservice to you, you're building distrust within self, and you're also dangling somebody who is.. this is for middle school girls, not for grown women,

Laura Bowman: 34:55

grown women, and you know, because I always say, like, people know the truth when they hear it, so somebody says, yeah, you know, I pulled away from you, because to be honest, every time we got together, it was always about this particular situation, and I just felt like you were really stuck there, and it was bringing me down, and I just didn't know how to talk to you about it. Now we have something to work with, right? Now it's like, okay, now I know why she pulled away exactly, and now we, yeah,

Colette Fehr: 35:24

and one final thought before we wrap up. This conversation will not be as bad as what your brain tells you in anticipation, the fear, the anticipatory, how the person is going to react, the awkward. Before I had the conversation with my friend, my heart was pounding, and I do this for a freaking living. I was in such physiological distress, and as soon as I got in and got going, my body settled. It went really well, and when you communicate like a mature adult, you feel so good inside. It builds your confidence. It builds your trust in yourself, that no matter how it goes, it's going to feel better than you think. And people usually don't react as badly as what our nervous system tells us they will.

Laura Bowman: 36:14

Yeah, and that was the experience of that three year, that three year thing with this other person I know, that it was such a confidence booster, they had such a reparative conversation. Was it? Would be initially it does feel like death, like just the idea that I could hurt somebody, like, is it's dreadful, or that feeling of like being called into the principal's office and being told, like, yeah, it's like nobody likes those feelings. I understand why they're avoided, but they can be gotten through. Yeah,

Colette Fehr: 36:50

and when, if somebody tells you, 'Hey, you hurt me, and you repair it, which relationships are a series of rupture and repair. Even the closest relationships have times that we step on each other's toes, when you can have that with somebody and survive it. Most relationships can survive some hurt feelings, and

Laura Bowman: 37:10

they get stronger, make it deeper.

Colette Fehr: 37:12

Absolutely, and for every, for the big ones, we're talking about friendships ending. I have had so many friendships that have gone through difficult seasons, you know, I hurt someone's feelings, they hurt my feelings. We've talked about it and moved on, but talk about it like our female friendships are really everything, and we need to prioritize the ones that are really good and are open and honest, and if we're going to shed some, let's do it in a way that's mature and humane and good for all, so

Laura Bowman: 37:45

yes, I agree. Well,

Colette Fehr: 37:46

if I ever piss you off, I trust that you'll tell me, and I,

Laura Bowman: 37:51

yes,

Colette Fehr: 37:51

everything I can to repair.

Laura Bowman: 37:54

Same, same,

Colette Fehr: 37:57

huh?

Laura Bowman: 37:57

Yeah,

Colette Fehr: 37:58

yeah,

Laura Bowman: 37:58

and I'll initiate more. Or do you not want me to know, I

Colette Fehr: 38:02

mean, I don't want you to feel like it's like a pressure, and certainly this doesn't have to be at this moment, but I definitely would love

Laura Bowman: 38:12

it if also let's do that,

Colette Fehr: 38:13

yeah, yeah, but I will say, even if you don't like it, it's not going to be an issue, and I would tell you if it would be

Laura Bowman: 38:21

okay, I trust that you would

Colette Fehr: 38:23

thank you. Oh, now I feel all cozy about our friendship. So, okay, you guys, I hope you got some good insights from our couch today. This stuff is hard, but really, really important, and there's such good feelings on the other side. So, I hope this gives you something to think about if you're struggling with whether or not to end a friendship. And we will see you next time. Bye, guys.

Unknown: 38:55

Bye.