Serious the end of a friendship

if you have consciously chosen to leave a friendship of length and importance, what was the reasoning for it? was it gradual or sudden?

I had a best friend who was the living embodiment of the saying "leap before you look". I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with being spontaneous, but she would do literally everything without thought and unfortunately she was not a bright person in the common sense department so the combination of both caused nearly everything she did to end in chaos. But the part that really got me was there was never any realization that the reason why her life was falling to shit was because of her own doing. I tried to give her advice, but it never went anywhere and eventually she started calling upon me to help her out of ridiculous situations. Normally I don't mind helping a friend out, but it reached a point where these situations where so easily avoidable that I became so annoyed. I started gradually distancing myself when once again something crazy happened in her life... I tried to be supportive, but ultimately it took a toll on my own emotions/mind and I ended our friendship.

Small bump, but relevant to this, there's this one guy I've known since high-school, for the past few months if I messaged all he would give is an emoji or one word response.

I did feel annoying, so I stopped initiating conversation for a couple months. Then later on we agreed to do something together, but soon he became unresponsive again. Then he posted a picture of himself with a few friends, doing the thing we agreed on. I can tolerate a lot, but this just felt mean spirited.

Maybe it was an overreaction, but I didn't bother messaging him again. I quietly removed him from all social media, and blocked him on every messaging app. I don't have any ill feelings for him, but I don't want anything to do with him either. I'm simply finished.

I found out they flirted with a 15 year old at 21, was disgusted and promptly blocked them. Helps that it was online.

I broke off a friendship with someone simply telling them "I don't want to talk to you". The person in question had just made me uncomfortable and thrust me in social situations (all online, btw) that made me anxious.

For most friends I had offline, though, I just drifted apart from them completely, I guess? Nothing happened or anything, I just stopped talking to most of them once I graduated, and didn't bother keeping in contact with them anymore. I honestly only keep in contact with one friend irl.

I had two instances of this. The first one actually hurt, the second one not so much. So let's start with the first one.

My "friend" and I were talking consistently for 3 years or so online and we'd even had her over my house several times, spending the night and enjoying each other's company. We shared a lot of secrets and were there for each other. I really enjoyed talking to her and sharing our writing and having fun. The nights where we stayed up pretty much all night together just talking and laughing were some of the most fun nights I've had. I thought everything was going great... Except, she apparently thought I was weird. I learned that she'd talked about me behind my back to a mutual friend. Eventually, she just cut ties with me without any indication she was going to do so. The morning of the mass blocking (Discord, Deviantart, Facebook, even ArchiveofOurOwn), she and I were chatting amiably and everything seemed fine. So I talked to our mutual to find out what was going on. Come to find out, she called me a pedophile. For having a crush on Eridan. A fictional character from Homestuck who was an adult by the end of the series. Who is also an alien. Which clearly makes me a kid diddler. So I was obviously offended and horrified by this behind-my-back accusation. While it hurt a lot, I was glad to be rid of a friend who thought so poorly of me and put on a two-faced front. God knows why she continued to be my friend after the Eridan incident. Little did I know that a fictional alien would be the end of one of my long standing friendships. But it was apparently on false and shaky grounds anyway. :/

Now the one that didn't hurt pretty much at all. I'm pretty sure she was a sociopath or something. She came on really strong after a couple weeks, called me one her best friends (which I was very uncomfortable with because I'm really reserved). She gave me a gift (which I refused several times because I don't like feeling as though I owe people something) but nothing about her really seemed off. Until I saw her in real life, because she lived very close to me. The way she acted to her S.O was pretty off-putting, she was one of those Tumblr style leftists who held views that she didn't fully understand, and was obviously a hypocrite because, despite thinking everyone deserves equal rights and comfort, cheated on her S.O. Multiple times. With many different guys. Despite that her and her S.O had a child together. Eventually, after getting kicked out of her S.O's home and her parents' home (for stealing from them), she went to live with one her male mistresses. She lied to me about not liking him, she lied to me about many things that I don't want to go too deep into.

She stopped talking to me much at all, giving me only one or two word (or emote) responses when I messaged her. Got most of my info from her ex-S.O because she always came crying back to him (luckily, he refused to be manipulated and moved on). She was apparently in an abusive relationship with her male mistress, lying to me about that, too. I couldn't stand feeling like she was trying (and failing) to manipulate me so I sent her a message, letting her know exactly how I feel and how we could salvage what little we had. I was curious to know what she'd say. She left the message on read for 3 months. I gave her so long because I knew she was going through a lot. Then I saw she messaged me out of the blue with "oh, sorry, I forgot you messaged me". Just saw that in my Facebook messenger. Didn't bother clicking on it to read the rest. If she couldn't find time for me and wanted to keep lying to me, I figured she wasn't even worth it. Unfriended her from there and eventually deleted my Facebook.

tl;dr, my first friend talked about me behind my back and said some nasty shit about me. The second friend was a sociopathic liar who thought she could manipulate me like she did with everyone else in her life.

Some people are better left behind.

For me, most of my previous friends I just drifted apart from because of eventual lack of common interests. Or I changed schools/moved from the city. And a couple of times friends sort of left our group to be with the more popular crowd or changed schools or wanting different things or whatever normal things.

As a somewhat more extreme case, there was a guy who sort of turned his back on me in a moment of conflict with his gf at the time when I had been supportive when he had his own conflict. We stopped talking for a time but after a while he contacted me to apologize and mend fences. Can't say I've forgotten the incident but there's no real point in holding it against him besides just being more careful in general.

technically, this person and i were dating for a while, but eventually we broke it off and were friends before i finally got fed up with them and ended the ties we had. we met on tumblr (mistake number one) over an anime series we both really liked. talked to them for about a year, and we started dating.

at first, i really liked them. we were pretty similar in terms of personality and past experiences, and they were very nice, understanding and patient with me. they had a lot of problems at home, and i was there for them when they had no one else. while it felt great to be helping them, i figured out a couple months after we started dating that... they were really focused on their own problems and wouldn't return the favor when i needed their help. i felt like a doormat, but kept being their friend regardless. eventually, they became completely dependent on me to bail them out of any hard situation. if they were having a problem and i didn't respond to them in a matter of minutes, they would say i was abusing them and that i didn't care. for example, their grandfather was in the hospital one day. i told them to keep me updated and that i'd do my best to respond in a timely manner, but i might be slow because i was running errands and driving around town. their grandfather ended up passing away, and they sent me a stream of messages in a matter of minutes while i was driving and then accused me of not caring when i took a bit longer to respond... i was driving. i can't text and drive. it's illegal and dangerous. when i explained myself, they didn't bother to listen.

because of these issues, i broke off our relationship after a year, but remained friends. big mistake. i should have just stopped talking to them then. keep in mind, i identified as polyamorous around then. i had another partner at the time i was also dating them. after we broke up, they started harassing the partner i was with, claiming that i chose the other person over them (which wasnt the case), and that my current partner was abusing me (also not the case) and i should break up with him. eventually, i had enough. they blew up at me randomly while i was out at a theme park enjoying myself with my current partner and i told them "i think it's best we never talk to each other again and go our separate ways" and blocked them. good fucking riddance to them.

i also had a friend that stopped talking to me after i told them i self-harmed but that break up wasnt on me so i guess it doesn't count here.