Nina: welcome to Dear Nina: Conversations About Friendship. I am your host, Nina Badzin, and I think I made a new friend on this episode.

We had a fun Southern meets Midwestern. I’m the Midwestern one, if you can’t tell just by hearing my voice. Some people say I have a very thick Chicago accent, which is where I’m from, but some people say I have a Minnesota accent, which is where I’ve lived for the past 26 years, and that’s a big chunk of my life as I’m almost 50.

That comes up a few times in the episode. My guest today is the very Southern Melissa Radke.

Melissa is a bestselling author. She is so funny. She just says it like it is. She has two books out. One is called Eat Cake, Be Brave, and she is the author of Chicken Fried Women: Friendship, Kinship, and the Women Who Made Us This Way

Melissa is also an experienced podcaster. She’s had a podcast called Chicken Fried Women, just like the book, And The Radke Show, which is a show she does with her husband, David.

You will just fall in love with [00:01:00] Melissa. I really enjoyed her, we ended up talking about lots of parts about friendship because it is very hard to pin it down to just one thing. But I do try to focus on one thing in an episode, and the issue we circled around a lot is the question of are we all, all of us, Melissa, me, all of us, are we too quick to let go of friendships?

Are we too quick to not recognize the difference between a rough patch and a real problem? And would a lot of heartache and, you know, I hate to use the word drama because it does come up a few times in the episode, and it comes up in my work a lot, but it just feels like a throwaway word sometimes.

what I mean more is having to spend a lot of emotional energy on worrying about if our friendship is going well, if it’s not, if they are upset at us, if we’re upset at them. Would some of that dissipate if we didn’t have to be so definitive about everything and we gave people more of a break? I do have episodes coming up on how to end a friendship in a more kind way, in [00:02:00] a way that you can feel good about later. But that is not what we are talking about today. today is more about asking do we always have to get to that point? Is there a place for working on ourselves a little bit giving other people a break, , and more being able to live with a little bit of gray and nuance. there’s no clear-cut answers. I’ll really let these stories speak for themselves.

Melissa really had a lot to say, and she asked a lot of questions, so I had a lot to say, it was a wonderful, conversation.

You could also get a taste of Melissa on Instagram at Ms. Melissa Radke, where she is just her pure self. I try to be too. I’m gonna learn from Melissa though, ’cause I think she does a really good job of being herself, she’s very, very funny. I laughed a lot. And, sometimes I, I hope I didn’t laugh too much over Melissa, but it was hard not to.

She’s just got a real way about her, excited to meet her and be connected with her now.

So listeners, I hope you enjoy this [00:03:00] Southern moment as much as I did. I learned a few terms too. All right, here she is

Hello, Melissa. Welcome to Dear Nina.

Melissa: Thank you, dear Nina. I’m so glad you’re having me.

Nina: I’m just excited to talk to you, especially because I don’t know how I’ve gotten this far in the podcast and have spoken so many times about friendship breakups, but have spent less time in that really important period before the how do we break up with someone? Do we let it fade away? Do we sit down and have a conversation?

Do we just ghost them? Which I never say you should do, but plenty of people do it. And I’ve talked about that a lot. I have not talked as much about going through the process of knowing, it’s not even sometimes a process, you just know, that you’re done, you’ve reached the end of your rope with particular relationships, friendships, and that is something I wanted to talk to you about ’cause I know you’ve thought a lot about it

Melissa: I actually thought that you were having me on today because A little bird must have told you I have [00:04:00] spent most of my life as a terrible friend. And that is not something that I say lightly or flippantly. and I say that because what I had to do was, A, make a lot of apologies, B, rebuild a lot of bridges. Read books. I’m the girl that goes to the self-help section in Barnes & Noble and buys books on friendship. I don’t know the reason for that. I, I know I was an only child, I grew up around a lot of adults. adults filled my house.

My parents had game nights and all the things, right? But I didn’t really know how to socialize a lot. then you go off to college, and everybody’s like, “You’re a spoiled brat,” they weren’t wrong. I’ve been a bad friend for a long time. So this is such an interesting question and topic because how I would handle something now is so different than how I would have handled it 10, 15 years ago.

I would be your ghost girl.

Nina: It seems like the easiest thing, right? Then you don’t have to have a conversation

Melissa: absolutely, and here’s what’s great about [00:05:00] it. you don’t gotta open up and share your feelings. You just gone.

Nina: um hmm

Melissa: you’re just gone. But let’s be honest, that isn’t the mature way to handle this. First of all, have you ever broken up with a friend or ended a friendship?

Nina: not often. I only did it, once directly. I’ve an entire episode about it. I wish I had the number, but I’ll put it in the show notes, because that only lasted about two years. It was my best friend from college, she has now been on the podcast twice. We were only, broken up for two years.

I really initiated that. I then deeply regretted it and spent several years trying to, like, get her back. It’s almost like a romance and, you

know, when you … we’re almost 50, so we have been friends again much longer than we weren’t. Now we’ve been friends for 30 years.

But we still sometimes talk about those two years, and we joke that it’s the most examined friendship ever. We’re long-distance friends, we are very, very close. she came on the podcast, and we actually spoke about why I did what I did, why [00:06:00] she was resistant to us making up, and then how we eventually made up, and people love that episode.

I’ve had over 200 episodes. That’s still one of the most popular this one was a good one because it was hopeful and there was reconciliation at the end

Melissa: I have to ask because it sounds really similar to a story that, that I went through as well why did you instantly regret it?

Nina: Well, I don’t know that I instantly regretted it, but I regretted it eventually. it was way too dramatic. I should have given her a chance to, face the things that were bothering me, and there were things I was doing that was bothering her, too. We had so many ups and downs our senior year of college, I did it after we graduated.

Just felt like, okay, why are we working so hard to keep this friendship alive when we both had other friends. This wasn’t our only friendship. We were both in serious relationships, too, it felt like too much work. Now that I’m older and I’ve had other friendships kind of fizzle out that weren’t as important, I wouldn’t have made such a dramatic– I mean, I, I wrote her a letter to break off the friendship.

[00:07:00] Now, I give a lot of friendship advice here, and I really don’t like ghosting. I would maybe advise someone to do what I did in some ways, which is actually communicate, but what I didn’t do is allow her to communicate back at the time,

So it’s like, it’s not– sort of unfair. I gave her all my reasons, and I was like, “And then that’s means we’re done,” as opposed to allowing her to really react.

And so then two years later when I wrote another letter to be like, ” Sorry about that,” she understandably was like, ” I need a minute,”

Melissa: Yeah. Oh, oh, yeah. I don’t blame her. I did the same thing, I broke up with a friend. I l- I called it a divorce. I literally divorced a friend, and I did it in the most obnoxious way, which was I had her over to the house. I made… I’m from the South, so I made chicken salad and fruit tea.

Nina: I’m sorry.

Melissa: I

made her some chicken salad sandwiches and some fruit tea, had her over to the house, and then just told her, “This ain’t working for me, and also my mama don’t like you either.”

Nina: Oh, the ultimate dagger

Melissa: Yeah, and it was so funny because years later, like Justin Bieber had a song called, My Mama Don’t Like You and She Likes [00:08:00] Everybody or whatever. And I was like, “Where was this song when I needed it?” I divorced her right then and there. It was as if I pulled papers across the table and said, “Sign ’em.

You don’t have any other choice. I’m leaving your life. We’re done after this. After this conversation, it’s over.” Here’s what I learned from that. What I learned from that is that, that a friendship can be hard without being wrong

Nina: Oh, that’s so

Melissa: My friendship with her was hard. We were, very similar. We both, wanted the same kind of career, and so it felt competitive at times.

I ended up having two small children after that. my husband and I moved back to the state and the town where I grew up, so now her and I are in different states. I started dealing with some loneliness. I moved back to my town. I had to make friends all over again, ’cause I had not lived in this town for 16 years, 17 years.

So I had to make friends all over again. I realized how hard making friends is in our adult life, and I began [00:09:00] to regret that divorce. I began to regret it because her and I had been through so much stuff. She had held my arms up when I couldn’t. She had, really fought for me. I mean, I’d dealt with infertility for many, many years, and she was in my corner, man, all the way.

And I realized what a rarity that was, and I began to study friendships and figure out why I was the way I was. I began to see a counselor and talk about how I was raised and all these different things, and that’s when I realized our friendship was hard, but it was not wrong,

and I shouldn’t have done what I did.

And when I tell you that I wrote her a letter, I’m talking old school, by

hand on notebook paper, put it in a envelope and mailed it back. And I bet you she had that letter for six weeks, and then all of a sudden I was at Chili’s eating one day, my phone rang, and I looked, and it was her name. And I knew instantly she was willing to reconcile, or she could have just ghosted, right? she owed me nothing. but when I saw her name, I knew she was willing to talk, and that was a first [00:10:00] great sign. And so I told her, I said, “You know, let me call you back tonight.”

She said, “Okay.” And we ended up having a two-hour conversation, and she just old school forgave me.

Nina: Wow

Melissa: And she said, “I’ve never stopped missing you. I’ve never stopped loving you.” and you’re right. It’s like a rom-com.

These are romances. And just like we have to make a marriage work or a love connection work friendships are the same way.

that is not at all what you originally asked me, but I just get on a tangent.

Nina: No, please, so do I. That’s why it’s called Conversations About Friendship, and I agree with you that, it’s work. But one thing I say often is, and not everybody likes it, is to a point, ’cause you actually aren’t married to this person, and we do get to have more than one friend. You can have lots of close friends. I mean, maybe not lots of close friends. You can have lots of friends, and you can have more than one very close friend. that’s part of why it hurts so much when someone really feels like they’re done, ’cause it’s like, wow, it’s not like they only had to have me, so to, to not have me in their life anymore, they must really not [00:11:00] want me in their life.

We can have more than one. sometimes it really is not working.

Have you had ones like that? This person’s not going to be able to show up for you no matter how many conversations you have and how many times you try to work it out

Melissa: Yeah. And I, I will say this, I’ve been married 32 years. I’m in this for the long haul. I made a commitment to him, but you’re right. It may feel like a romance, but it can be left. you can walk away. I actually, j- just to touch on something that you just said, I actually wrote a Substack article yesterday on three ways you are running people off in your relationships,

Nina: yeah, let’s hear

Melissa: well, one of them is, quit being an easily offended person.

And I just wrote at the end of that paragraph, “Blessed is the friend who lets things go.” the third one was, blessed is the friend who pulls up extra chairs at the table. I say that because I was the friend who wanted you to have no other friends. Nina, if I was your bestie, then I was your bestie, and [00:12:00] nobody else could be your bestie. What an immature thing to do. What an immature thing to believe.

And what I have found, to be perfectly honest, I want to leave friendships a lot less, I want to back out of them a lot less, when I allow them to have other friends, If I make myself so indispensable, and I say to you, “Nina, you and I’ve been friends forever, and I really don’t like it when you spend time with other people.

I mean, you’re my ride or die, and I’m your ride or die, I mean, I’m the package, and you don’t– the whole package, and you don’t need anybody else,” that is so freaking suffocating. yeah, after a while, I can’t be everything for you, and you can’t be everything for me, and I wanna back out. But when I say, “Girl, yes, bring that friend from work that you love.

Absolutely, the girl that’s in your Pilates class, bring her. I’d love to meet her,” and we allow each other room to kind of grow and expand, wouldn’t it make sense then that we have to [00:13:00] end relationships less?

Nina: Yes. No, this is so insightful, and it’s abundance over scarcity, right? Like you’re, you’re advocating that people… I agree with you 1,000%. I completely agree that if we’re not so attached, like holding on for dear life to each person, it’s… Okay, so, and back to also your other one about not being so easily offended, . Those ideas go together because people do get very easily offended that someone did invite someone else, that somebody, you’re right, that someone has other close friends and that it’s not equal. I spend a lot of time on this podcast, almost every episode goes in this direction, not on purpose, but it goes there, where there’s a lot of keeping score that happens in friendships, and it can be as basic as, “Well, I asked you to walk last week.

Now this week you should ask me, and then the next week I’ll ask you.” And it just almost never works like that, and so the person who asks more starts to feel very insecure, and then they’re looking for signs. They’re looking for evidence that the person isn’t as interested. they really might be coming up [00:14:00] against is a friend who has a lot of other friends, has a very, busy work life or a family life or, you know, I know that you recently lost your mom, for example.

And so let’s say in that period of time, you’re probably leading up to that, and now as you’re mourning and grieving and you’re also making up for all the things you missed during, like while you were handling things that need to be handling, including mourning and your grief. things get pushed off, and then you cancel.

well, somebody who’s very insecure would take that all personally instead of being the good friend that they could be and saying, “Okay, Melissa needs a little more space right now. She’s not gonna reach out as much. She’s gonna have to cancel a little more.” I do wish I could get that message across to more people that to give friends a break

Melissa: To give them a break. I, I remembered, because of what you’re talking about right now, I remembered what the third thing was in my Substack article. I was walking out of Target a couple of weeks ago, and I bumped into a girl loading the back of her car. I was loading the back of mine and, uh, we got to talking.

We are sweet friends. Uh, and in the South, sweet friends means [00:15:00] when we see each other, we love each other, but we don’t hang out, okay? But

Nina: Wait, I have never heard that expression. That’s

Melissa: Oh, we’re sweet friends. Oh, she’s a sweet friend. But that just means we know each other enough that we can walk an aisle at Target, but then when we get to the end of the aisle, we’re like, “Okay, see ya.”

And then we just go our separate ways, and we don’t see each other for a year.

Nina: I actually love those people, and those people round out our lives and, like, they’re the frosting on top. They’re the

Melissa: Yeah. So we saw each other putting our stuff in the car. we hugged, and we got to talking, and she shared a story with me, and you’re gonna think I’m making this story up ’cause I was like, “Am I being punked? Is this a real story?”

She said, “This is a real story.” And here’s what she said. She said, “Melissa, I don’t know what to do.” Now, she’s referring to her best girlfriend, her very best friend, and she says, “She won’t leave me alone about the dadgum chickens.” Now, you are not a Southern

girl, But in the South, I don’t get it, but it is apparently a really big thing to get you some chickens and a chicken coop and have your own eggs, okay? I don’t buy into it, but whatever. And that was literally [00:16:00] what her friend kept saying. She kept texting and going, “I don’t understand. My chicken coop is so cute.

You would absolutely love it. You’ve got to come over.” Now, what the best friend didn’t stop to think about was that this girl has so much going on in her life. She is dog paddling in the deep end, okay? She is waving a lifeguard to throw her a line. She had started a new business. She had gone back to school.

She was mourning a loss, that had happened quite a while before, but still, grief is, right, grief. And yet she’s getting, “You have got to come see these chickens. How many times am I gonna ask you to come see these chickens?” And it just is the old adage of have you walked a mile in someone else’s shoe?

have you looked at it from their POV? I don’t think we do that enough because I know in this case, you could really replace chickens with anything. You haven’t come over to see my eye job. You haven’t come over to see how much weight I’ve lost.

Haven’t come over to see my new [00:17:00] car I have a girlfriend, Nina, who once every nine days will say, “Does lunch sound good?” I am in a deep threshold of grief. I am stuck there. I c- can’t move. I’m seeing a counselor again, and I’m really journaling, and I’m trying to get ahold of this.

But I don’t wanna go outside. I don’t wanna leave my house. And you know what she’s never said? Is, “Come and see my chickens.” She’s never said, ” I ask you every other week to go to lunch, and you still say no.” Instead, she just texts, “Does lunch sound good yet?”

Nina: that She’s just throwing a line every so often, and when you’re ready to take it, you will

Melissa: I’m ready to take it, I will. She asks for no more than that, nor does she drive me crazy, but she always lets me know. I love that she ends that with yet, meaning I know you’ll get there, but you might not be there right now. That is the kind of friend I hope goes nowhere. I don’t want her to go [00:18:00] anywhere.

Nina: And hopefully, okay, so extending this idea, she has to have the security to not take it personally, and a good friend can do that. You might say no the next 10 times, she may, you know, be disappointed and miss you and all that can be true, but hopefully she does not take it personally that it’s about her.

‘Cause that’s often when we act out in a friendship is ’cause we feel criticized or somehow demeaned or dismissed when it’s not

Melissa: It’s coming up Yeah. I find her to be very confident in our friendship, which has been really nice. she isn’t easily offended. she doesn’t keep score. She doesn’t keep a record of wrongs, as Corinthians would say, you know? She, she doesn’t do that.

She doesn’t tally things up and then hold them against me. And I also know this to be true about her. She has a ton of other friends. Now, she has once used the phrase with me from, uh, Grey’s Anatomy, You’re my person.”

And she’s told me that, so I know the place that I have in her heart. she has made me feel [00:19:00] so confident there.

But I also know that every time I don’t go to lunch with her, or she’s just asking somebody else, and I’m okay with that, and she’s okay with that, and I’m so thankful that I never said, “You can’t have any other friends but me,” because then where would she be right now, right, when I wanna escape and hide?

so what a wonderful friend to have in your corner,

the kind that doesn’t keep a record of wrongs and isn’t insecure in where things are right now and her place in it, and I love that. but anyway, back to the question. you’ve had guests on here before. You’ve asked them about the breaking up of a friendship.

What does the majority of people say? Do they say ghost?

Nina: No, no one says to do that. the therapists generally say that the kind thing to do is to actually do what you did with your chicken salad and your tea, but maybe to have given her a warning ahead of time to say, “Hey, I wanna talk to you about some things.”

to give some sort of warning that we’re about to have a hard conversation so they don’t think they’re just coming over to hang, probably in the [00:20:00] ideal, the person would have a chance to react in some way. Maybe even it’s at a later time. maybe you would say all the reasons why you don’t feel a friendship is working, and the other person could take that in, and you get together again to talk about it, and maybe there’s a possibility for reconciliation or maybe you really just know This friendship does not have a place in your life anymore, and you do have to communicate that in some way.

That’s the technical, technical. What most people do is not necessarily ghost, although there’s plenty of it. Most people do what’s called quiet quitting, you used to walk once a week or you used to text back right away. Now you don’t text back quite as often.

Now we’re walking once a month, and you never tell the person why, and it leaves a lot of mystery. So the, problem with that for the other person who’s on the receiving end is they’re kinda, like, not sure if they’re going crazy. Hey, is, Melissa upset at me, or has this relationship changed?”

And you might feel on your end, ” We’ve talked about this a number of times over the past 10 years. I’m done. You’re [00:21:00] not gonna change. I’m not gonna change.” And maybe we’re not wrong. Maybe e- neither person is wrong. Maybe we just aren’t a match, ’cause not all friendships are forever.

it can feel really aggressive to sit down and have a talk with someone, especially if you know in your heart you actually really don’t want to work on it. ‘ is it cruel to sit the person down and tell them all these things if you’re not willing to do anything about it? Maybe. And then the quiet quitting can be cruel because it leaves a lot of questions, ’cause if you are the kind of person who is very secure and you’re, like, giving people a break and you are trying not to keep score, you may not even realize the friendship has changed because you’re just being someone who gives a person a break, which is eventually a year might go by and you’re like, “Oh, I only got together with Melissa twice this year.

That’s strange. She kept canceling or she kept pushing it up.” That is the more common thing. People let it fade,

but on purpose. there’s really no right way because if you’ve been on the receiving end of it, I had a very…

M- I mean, this is a long time ago, before the college friend, I had a friend completely ghost me after high school, . I didn’t like [00:22:00] that, but would I rather she sat me down… You know, in hindsight, would I have rather she sat me down and been like, “Here’s all the ways I don’t like being friends with you”?

Probably not.

And would the slow fade have been better than just the ripping off the Band-Aid ghost, we didn’t have the smartphones.

You know, you and I are about the same age, so we didn’t have that then. Like, when you ghosted someone, it might take a while. You might not

realize you’ve been ghosted cause there’s no texting.

Melissa: if I wasn’t 50, I probably would do the quiet quit. that’d be my go-to move. But now that I’m 50, I like to think I’m a little more mature and able to confront some things. the other day I left a voice text, you know, where you speak into your phone and then they just can play it, ’cause I was driving my car.

Nina: Oh, I’m a big voice texter. I

Melissa: Oh, yeah, yeah. And I voice text my girlfriend, Ashley, and I said, “Hey, Ashley, I am voice texting you for two reasons. Number one, I’m driving, and number two, I didn’t wanna call you about this ’cause I don’t wanna put you on the spot.” I just had to ask her a favor, to do me a favor. the reason I mention that is because if I had to go back in time to the chicken salad and fruit tea debacle, what I would have done is I would have [00:23:00] texted her, I would have invited her over, and I would have said, ” I’d like to sit down and have a heart-to-heart with you about some things.” Because what would have happened is she would have thought about that, and she would have thought, ” I’m not sure what we’re talking about today specifically, but I think I’ve got a couple of things for Melissa, too.” You see, I didn’t meet with her and allow her to talk. Because I took her so by storm, she couldn’t get her thoughts together.

But what if I, God forbid, was also a hard friend?

What if I, God forbid, she wanted to run screaming from the room too sometimes? Wouldn’t that have helped me?

The chances are we would have still split, but I would have at least left with some things that I could mull over and maybe work on and get better at.

So when we say communication is a two-way street, this is what we’re talking about. If you sit down and discuss it with them, there is a chance you might hear some things that would be valuable to you later in life as well

Nina: Amen. That [00:24:00] is so, so wise. that’s exactly right, ’cause if you cut off the conversation, and I did the same thing with the letter, right? With my college friend. I just said my stuff,

and then I was like, “Okay, now we shouldn’t talk.” of course that was horrible. it was completely one-sided.

I decided to end the friendship, and then two years later when I decided to restart the friendship, she of course was like, ” Hang on. Maybe not.” Although I’m lucky she came around eventually, ’cause she’s ended up being one of the most important friends in my life. I think we’re closer because we had this icky thing that happened, but it didn’t have to be so icky, and it didn’t

have to be, it didn’t have to be two years of silence

Melissa: And this dramatic thing, which is what you said. It, it turned into this

big dramatic thing. But the question is, though… Listen to me, I’m Dear Nina today. I’m like,

“What’s the question?” The question we’re discussing is I’m curious, though, like, let’s figure out what is happening in us and between us before we ever get to that spot.

what is going on there? Are, we reading the room right? Are we doing [00:25:00] friendship wrong? isn’t that something we have to figure out, too, Nina?

Nina: I think people are very, I– not just speaking for myself, I’m speaking from receiving letters from people from the past 15 years. what I see is just patterns, we talked about, people are very hard on each other.

We’re expecting a lot of perfection or, just no mistakes, no mishaps. Somebody, is going through a time when they’re not being as good of a friend. Not that you should be a doormat, but, can we give people a little bit of a break, like we said? And I think people are very conflict avoidant.

They just don’t want anything hard. maybe other parts of life are hard. Maybe work’s hard, and parenting’s hard, and taking care of older parents is hard. All these other things is hard, and we want our friendships to not be the thing that’s hard, but it, it’s sort of just wishful thinking, in my opinion.

So if you’re expecting easy, then everything that’s actually not a problem, things that are just normal friendship stuff, seems like a real big problem, and it’s like, “We’re done.” We just have no patience

Melissa: Absolutely. And I know for me, shared circumstances are what have brought me into a lot of friendships, right? , We go to the same church, [00:26:00] our kids are on the same softball team. my kid has piano lessons at the same time yours do.

We have these shared circumstances, and then everything gets older, or our kids, they, they grow up and they go to college, and then we don’t share the same circumstances, and we don’t therefore run in the same circles. And now that friendship is just like, eh, what we had in common, we don’t have in common anymore. we don’t have as much to talk about. I’ve had those friendships, and those to me, I have quiet quit a couple of those

Nina: I don’t feel bad about those. , I wish people would appreciate that those friendships had their place, and they got you through a time, and like I- we said earlier, the, the sweet friends. You’re kind of describing, like, a level above the sweet friends. Because you weren’t just running into them at Target, let’s say, but you were sitting on the bleachers week after week after week. You actually get to know people. But if you never take the friendship outside of the circumstance

You know, let’s say you’re in a group text for the team. I have four kids. I’ve been on many, and still am on many a group text, okay? for teams and different things. I couldn’t possibly take all of [00:27:00] those in as close friends. I wouldn’t even want to. But it doesn’t, to me, diminish the joy of having that circumstance together.

If I was somebody who was in a period of life where I was suddenly an empty nester, my youngest is 14, so we’re not quite there, but you know, I can see where we’re headed, let’s say I was in a period of life where I was like, “I just don’t feel like I have any close friends,” which is an issue.

You need to have close friends. You really do. It’s for your mental, your physical health, everything. The first place I would look is that layer of the circumstantial friends, and I would try to find the ones that I really wanted to connect with, but you would have to do something. You would have to text the person on the side and be like, “Hey, remember when we were talking about such and such at softball?”

you would have to make an effort, and that’s, a good thing to do. But let’s say you don’t need that. You have some close friends already. I think it’s okay to let that layer of friendship leave with the circumstance, ’cause we do only have so much space in

Melissa: bandwidth.

Nina: Yeah

Melissa: Yeah, I’m actually really glad to hear you say that because The reason I even brought up, friends that happened due to shared circumstances, the [00:28:00] only reason I brought it up is ’cause I was sitting here thinking, “Melissa, you’re a liar. Tell her the truth.” And the truth was, I think I’ve quiet quit some shared circumstance friends.

But then you said it too, so I’m going with you

on

that one,

Nina: also

quiet quit you It might have been mutual.

Melissa: 100%. You know, I quiet quit a group. I don’t know if you’ve ever quiet quit a group before,

Nina: I’ve loud quit a group.

Melissa: Oh, have you really?

Nina: Not on Purrboy. It really, I just have to tell you, I was on Ultimate Frisbee. there’s the group Me’s. But I didn’t even have a kid on it anymore.

I had multiple kids on this league, but eventually nobody was. And so I did eventually leave. And it says on there, Nina Badzin has left the group.” Somebody I’m friendly with took a screenshot and sent it to me, and it was like exclamation point. And I was like, “Oh, I didn’t mean to make such an announcement.”

Anyway, it wasn’t as dramatic as I,

Melissa: Okay, so you’re, you’re, that’s the way you loud quit a group the way I would loud quit a group is like, “I am out of here, y’all.”

Nina: that would be more fun.

Melissa: I kind of regret that one because I quiet quit the group [00:29:00] because , our kids were all the same age, and then our kids grew up. It just was like shoes on the wrong feet, I think that I probably should have explained. I regret that one. They were sweet to me, and I, I really left, that without any explanation. And I know they continued to get together for a while, and then they stopped getting together. And I’ve always been like, “Oh, I was the glue.”

Nina: Maybe you are.

Melissa: No, I wasn’t. Let me tell you something. I’m pumping myself up. I wasn’t the glue. I have a girlfriend, she moved to this town two weeks after I moved to the town. So again, this is where I grew up. I should know a lot of people, but I was a young mom with small children, and I had to start all over.

And she moved here two weeks after me, so she didn’t know anybody either, and she was from North Dakota. We couldn’t have been more opposite, okay? I didn’t understand a word she said, and I don’t know why people make bars all the time. She was always making bars. “I’m gonna bring some bars.” And I’m like, “Girl, use some seasoning in your [00:30:00] food.”

Anyway, we Became so close. Our kids were the same age, and we became very, very, very close, and she became one of my soul friends. It wasn’t just shared circumstances, it was a deep friendship that she would pray with me about things, and she would help me make hard decisions. And when I thought my marriage was over during one particular season, she stood with me through it, and she never talked bad about my husband.

And she said, “It’s because I knew your marriage wasn’t over, and I didn’t want you to have ever heard me talk bad about him.” And she was just a great friend. And then she was transferred, her and her husband to California. And so she left me about two and a half years ago, and I had to face the question, we were good at becoming who we were together, kind of growing up in this town, watching our kids grow up.

We were good at becoming who we were to-together, but are we good [00:31:00] at being who we’re becoming

together? Because now we’re not sharing circumstances. Now we’re miles and miles apart, and that’s gonna cause us to become different people. The fact that I’m sending a kid off to, college, and her kids are now older and having babies, and we’re becoming different people, will we be as good at that?

And that’s scary. And what I have found is miles don’t matter when it’s a soul connection. Miles don’t matter when it’s a heart connection. The calls are few and far between, but when should we call, Lord block the afternoon. the funny memes back and forth, are enough to sustain us.

And then she turned 50, and her doorbell rang one afternoon when– The, the afternoon she turned 50 and her doorbell rang, and she opened it up, and it was me,

and she just sobbed and sobbed and sobbed. And I realized that we are good at being who we’re becoming. Some friendships are just like that.

Nina: You don’t know until you try, right? I think to go back to maybe something you asked me about what’s happening

in friendships, I, do think people [00:32:00] give up too easy. it’s like we’re scared to be

rejected maybe, and so we bow out before we can be rejected.

That’s, it would’ve been easy…

This is a good example with, with this friend from North Dakota. It would’ve been easy to, for both of you, to just let it go ’cause nobody maybe wants to be the one who’s trying more. it’s hard to be the one who’s trying more. But somebody has to be that person to keep it going, and then hopefully the other person can meet you at least halfway, but they may not do it as much.

Melissa: me… And I’ll share this, and I’m so sorry I keep sharing personal

stories.

Nina: love it. No, please do not apologize

Melissa: I did sit down with a friend once, and I had a really hard heart-to-heart, and I cried a lot through it. here’s what I thought. I thought, “I’m gonna give her the chance to break up with me today.”

I noticed that she was hanging out with someone a whole lot, I’m talking a lot, and her and her husband would go on trips with them together, a lot of trips.

uh, they would– are always posting stuff on Facebook together, but I thought her and I were the thickest of thieves, you know? And so I gathered up [00:33:00] all my emotion and all my willpower, and I sat down with her, and I essentially said, “I am giving you the chance to break up with me. I don’t think I fit in the plans anymore.”

we really had a really hard talk about that. And she said, “I don’t, I don’t have the same kind of energy with her that I do with you. I don’t have the same kind of fun with her. she is in the same business I’m in, so we share a lot of that. and I enjoy talking about that kind of stuff with her.

She runs marathons, and I run marathons, and so we have that in common. But aside from that, we really don’t have a lot. I don’t know why you’re wanting to exit. Why are you wanting to exit so quickly? Why are you wanting to bow out? You’re the one who’s always said it’s okay if we have other friends.

Did you just mean as long as we don’t vacation with them or never take selfies with them? Or did you just mean that it’s okay if we have other friends as long as you never, ever, ever hear any evidence of it whatsoever? What, what did you mean? Why are you so willing to run?” And that was hard for me because what it meant was A, she just called me on my crap.

I can’t [00:34:00] run. And B, now I gotta put up with this other chick. Now I gotta watch y’all run a marathon together. Why did I wanna run so quickly? Why, why did I wanna end it? Why was it so uncomfortable for me? And I think it is because we cannot handle rejection.

Nina: Yeah. You thought she was rejecting you, but she

Melissa: we’ll just throw ourselves in front of the bus just in case.

I’d rather do that than you reject me to my face,

Nina: i think that’s true, and I actually love that you had that talk with her because, oh, if we would, have more honest communication, it does give the other person a chance. Like the… We used the example of if you think you wanna end a friendship, in this case you thought she wanted to, but if we think we wanna end a friendship or we’re having an issue with a friend, allowing the other person to talk, like you said, you will learn some information, maybe some things you’re doing that maybe you’re also doing with other friends that would be helpful to know.

I like that you gave her the opportunity to give you something you needed, which is a little reassurance. And it’s okay to be vulnerable and say , “I need a little reassurance.” I wish people would do that more than instead of [00:35:00] testing their friends. Melissa, what people mostly do is they test their friends.

Testing your friend would look like my birthday’s coming up in a month, let’s say, last year and the year before, my friend didn’t really make as big of a deal of my birthday as I kinda think they should have, and I made a big deal for their birthday. I’m not gonna remind them my birthday’s coming up.

I’m not even gonna mention my birthday. I’m just gonna let the birthday come and go and see what happens. That’s testing a friend.

Melissa: That’s a test,

Nina: If you’re feeling a little insecure about the friendship, the better thing to do would be to take care of yourself and say, “Hey, my birthday’s coming up in a month. I really wanna make sure we do something special.”

that’s just saying what you need.

Melissa: And there’s nothing wrong with

Nina: Yeah, cause not everyone does their birthday the same way.

Melissa: Not only that, but it also alleviates some pressure from them. First of all, it’s really unfair to have someone

Nina: but so many people do this. There’s so many friendship tests. That was a more obvious one. Some are a little more subtle, like you’re getting upset. Let’s use the walk example again. You know, I’ve reached out every time we’ve walked the past five times, [00:36:00] let’s say. if you’re getting upset about that, instead of, this is very typical, instead of saying to your friend, “Hey, I know things don’t have to be tit for tat.

That’s exhausting. I’m not keeping score. But it’s hard not to notice that in the past two months it has always been me. I just wanna make sure you really wanna do this, that I’m not, you know, dragging you out, that you wouldn’t rather get together less often or whatever,” and give your friend the chance to say, ” Oh, I really appreciate you saying something.

I just figured you prefer to do it when it works for you, so I just let you reach out. You’re busier than I am.” I don’t know. There may be some reason that they’re not reaching out, or they may just simply not be as organized and good at reaching out. But have the conversation. What a test would look like is you just completely stop inviting them to walk ’cause you’ve already decided, oh, they don’t really want to.

We’re only doing this because I want to, and I’m making them do this. And so the test would be, let me see what happens if I stop texting her. What’s probably gonna happen is you probably won’t walk because you’ve gotten into a pattern that you have allowed. This pattern has been 50/50. You are the person who reaches out.

they’re gonna fail that test. [00:37:00] Yeah, ’cause like you said, they don’t know they’re taking a test

Melissa: Yeah. And how can we resent someone for failing something they didn’t even know they were taking? I’ve done that, I wonder if I’ve done that subconsciously. I wonder if I’ve done that consciously. I think I’m guilty of that.

Nina: Oh, I’ve done it for sure. But good to stop. That’s like what the point of this episode, right? We want people to, give their friends the opportunity to discuss the thing that you’re upset about. The birthdays are the best example because birthdays are really, often a test of friends that your friends don’t realize.

But what if you’re one of these people that just doesn’t care about their birthday that much? There are people like that, and if anything, they don’t like all the attention, and therefore they don’t do so much for other birthdays because they themselves don’t need that much for their birthdays. They don’t realize like how important it is to other people

Melissa: Yeah. Wow. That’s so interesting. if any of my friends kept texting me to walk and I didn’t text them back, they’d just be like, “That’s just Melissa, she just don’t wanna walk.” I mean, they, they wouldn’t even worry about it. I wanna say this, too. [00:38:00] and I’m only using the blessed are the friends things because I just used it the yesterday, so it’s on my mind.

But blessed are the friends who will be vulnerable enough to remind those they love that they love them.

what if, once every blue moon, we just erased any doubt in their head because we sent them a text that just said, “I was thinking of you today. I know I’ve been out of touch, but man, I love you so much.

It’s so noticeable when we’re not together, ’cause I’m never laughing”? Or, y- what- whatever

Nina: with that girl?

Melissa: mean,

blessed are the friends who just

send a love letter. I’ve done that before, I don’t do it often, and I only do it to those that I mean it. I mean, I’m not just blowing air up somebody’s skirt, right?

I do it to people that I love, and they’ll say, “I needed that reminder.”

I wonder, did they need it from me or did they just need it to be reminded that they’re a good friend in general? it’s okay to be vulnerable, I love that in a person

Nina: Yes, I love this. To ask for what you need and then also to maybe anticipate sometimes someone [00:39:00] else’s need. That this person might need to hear from me. You know you’ve been really busy. it is good every so often, I agree, to let someone know that they still matter to you. ‘Cause we are all just insecure little beings running around the world half the time.

We’re all human, and we’re still gonna have these moments of doubt of, does this person really wanna be in this as much as, as I do?

Melissa: uh, you know, I’ve heard people say, “Well, I just outgrew that friendship.” I’m not a fan of that statement. Well, I just outgrew Megan. It makes Megan sound like she’s just, like she… I don’t know.

I’m not a fan of that one. I get that that does happen. but For listeners, don’t ever say that, “I just, I outgrew them.”

I think that is

Nina: a lot. People say it a l- you’re right, that’s a very common expression

Melissa: Do, is it? I don’t like that. I think it is so rude. I think it actually says more about you than poor Megan. Kinda makes you sound highfalutin is what I think

Nina: Why do you think– Let’s end on this . Why do you think so many friendships do shift in midlife? Because people will use that expression. [00:40:00] they’ll say, “I outgrew so and so because I’m now at this point What are the reasons from your experience that, feeling like not all the friendships are working for you?

Melissa: I’m gonna tell you something. Before I would say to anybody, “Well, I just outgrew that friendship. Megan and I aren’t friends anymore ’cause I outgrew them,” I would have to say, “Megan and I aren’t friends anymore ’cause I’m in menopause.” And that just covers a multitude of sins. I mean, honest to God, David asked me the other day, “You gonna use that excuse for everything?”

And I said, “Yes. Yes, I am.” my goodness, I don’t know about you, Nina. I have never felt such a shift in my body, in my emotions, in my mind, in my physicality, in my hormones, than I have at midlife. It has been shocking to me. It hasn’t just been a shift in temperature, right?

I’m sitting in a room right now recording this podcast with you. The air is set on 68,

and I’m sweating. It’s not just that. It’s that I need things differently. I need things less [00:41:00] than I used to. I, I don’t need girls’ nights with espresso martinis near as much as I used to. I, don’t even desire it as much.

And yet, I need the closeness, the intimacy, of a good two-hour coffee chat in a coffee shop, and then we don’t see each other for five weeks. You

Nina: Yeah

Melissa: Things have just shifted so much for me. And, and you know, honestly, I have to say, I’m mixing mid-life in with grief, and that,

that does coat things differently. But I’ll give you this example we can end on. First of all, let me just say this about me. I’m always looking for a new friend.

Not to replace any friend I have, but I just, I like women. I like people. I like their stories. I like their lives. I got excited about hopping on here with you today. And in fact, I find that our business, this social media podcast business, can be very lonely, or at least it has been for me. I live in a very small town.

No one does what I do, so I have nobody to talk about it with. And so it’s kind of lonely. And when I knew I was [00:42:00] hopping on here with you today, I thought, ” What if I could be friends with her?”

And we got to be really good friends,

But then you hopped on, and I saw you, and I thought you were much younger.

I really did.

Like, you look great.

Nina: Thanks.

Melissa: Um, but then again, God knows my eyesight’s going. So, but I

thought you

Nina: is mine. I notice that the most. I

Melissa: Oh, yeah, I’m, I’m wearing

Oh, I know, I know. I saw you, and you looked younger, and instantly, do you know what I thought? well, I can’t be friends with her. She won’t get it.”

Nina: Oh, gosh. I get a lot of things, and the business I get. We’re gonna talk about that when we press stop, the

Melissa: Yeah, but I, I literally would have shut down a friendship because I thought you were in your 30s, because if you’re in your 30s, you’ll never understand how horrible it is to be in your 50s because, we’re a mess emotionally and hormonally. And I would’ve shut down a great friendship that’s how serious I am taking midlife right now.

You know? It’s just, it’s changing so much of me and what I want and what I need and what I’m looking for. But luckily, [00:43:00] I invested in some friends many years ago who are also around the same age, and so they’re there, too, and we get it. And we’re, we’re soft with each other. handle that wisely.

Nina: Let me put a plug in though, even though we are the same age, so I will not fill this bucket for you, this piece. I have made some younger friends in the past five years or so, much younger. I have a friend who is turning 40 the same month I’m turning 50, and we’re legitimately friends. I’m glad to have that.

I feel like they, they bring a spirit to my life. First of all, they let me play the role of, like, wise friend. Let me you know, gather around, girls, while, you know, Aunt Nina gives you some advice. No, they d- they actually don’t let me make jokes about my age. I used to, and then they were like, “Can you stop?”

And I was like, “Okay, sorry.” A lot of them live in my neighborhood, so I see them more than I maybe would otherwise, and we’d only moved into this neighborhood about six, seven years ago. So they are newer friends, and I really value those friendships. I think that’s a little piece of advice out there for people is it is good to have friends older and younger

Melissa: Absolutely. and if nothing else, they keep you young, right? They [00:44:00] keep you young, and they bring a fun-ness. And, and I live on nine acres of nothing but woods. I live in a very small town. My mother-in-law just moved into assisted living. So essentially, Nina, I go from here to my house to an assisted living

home, so the chances of me bumping into a 38-year-old are pretty rare.

But I welcome it, and I caught myself today being really close-minded

Nina: Yeah

Melissa: about that, and I don’t wanna ever be close-minded about my relationships,

Nina: I always tell people, I’m always open to new friends. I’m not ever actively looking at this point, ’cause I’ve lived in the same town for the past 26 years, and so I’ve collected a lot of people over the years, but I’m always open to it, and it’s a good attitude to have, is to be

open, ’cause you never know.

Melissa: agreed. You never know who could be a sweet

Nina: That’s right, or more. I’m gonna use that expression. , Melissa, it was so, so good to talk to you, and then I’m excited to be connected now. I need a Southern friend. I have no Southern friends, I don’t think.

Melissa: Oh, girl. I’m gonna teach you so much stuff. I’m

Nina: Oh my God, I love it. I love it. Oh my [00:45:00] gosh. I end every episode by saying, when our friendships are going well, we are happier all around.

So come back next week, I will have all the ways people can find you in my show notes. Easy to click on. So look for Melissa, look for her books. It will all be right there when you are in your app, whatever you’re listening or watching to this on. Just look down , so Melissa, thank you for being here.

Melissa: Thank you for having me

Nina: listeners, thank you so much for being here with me. If you got all the way to this part of the episode, I know you enjoyed Melissa as much as I did, you can find me on Instagram at dearnina.friendship.com, on the newsletter at dearnina.substack.com, and in the Facebook group at Dear Nina, the group, where you can get all your anonymous friendship questions answered. All right, that is it for today. I will see you next week

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