Dear Therapist,

I'm hurt by an old close friend of mine. She hasn't shown any interest in my having a baby and I always imagined she'd be deeply involved in my life but it's now awkward and almost as if she doesn't care. I care so much about her and whatever her feelings might be about my having a baby, we could discuss it anything, but how can we if she won't even engage at all with me?

At this point I'm hurt and she isn't even available for me to tell her that. She's denied that anything is wrong when I asked her a few months ago but she shows no warmth or affection. I'm baffled and sad.

Dear baffled and sad,

Oh it's so difficult to tolerate the waves of friendships. Do you have a sense of your friend's feelings about children, and her own feelings about having or not having her own children at the same time as you? There can be so many mixed emotions when a friend changes, and what you've described is the change you feel in your friend's absence but your life has changed too. Even if you're the same person you've always been in some ways, having a baby is a giant plot point in anyone's life story, and your friend may be responding to that development. It can be vaguely threatening and feel like a loss when a close friend has a baby, and it can feel taboo to admit that it's upsetting when ostensibly friends are supposed to be happy for each other. True feelings don't always cooperate with social rules and what we want.

You can't force engagement but you could take the risk of telling her you miss her, knowing you can't control her response or possible avoidance. Change comes with loss invariably, even when it brings new life.

Yours,

Charlotte Fox Weber is a verified Welldoing psychotherapist and the author of What We Want: Understand Your Deepest Desires and Live a Fuller Life