How to End a Bad Friendship: by Cadence

Sometimes it is necessary to end a bad friendship. While many of us would like to keep the peace in friendships and maintain them to the best of our abilities, it is best to end a bad friendship when necessary. If a friendship is causing you pain and creates a lot of unnecessary stress in your life, it may be in your best interest to walk away before any further harm is done.


Step 1
Identify a bad friendship. A bad friendship is not a relationship where you and a friend have an occasional argument, but are close most of the time. A bad friendship is one where your friend intentionally tries to hurt you or does unforgivable things to you. For example, a person who sleeps with your ex-boyfriend and then brags about it to your friends at your own home without telling you is a toxic friend, and you should break away from that friendship immediately.


Step 2
Create a plan of action for slowly removing yourself from the situation with a bad friend. Call the friend less. Share less personal details when you talk to the person. Be kind, but do not put yourself into a situation where the person can hurt you. Create distance from the person, but not hostility.


Step 3
If you trust them 100%, let a few close, mutual friends know that you are planning to limit your friendship with your toxic friend. This way, they will know not to invite you out if they are hanging out with this person. It may be tough at first to have a more limited social life, but this is a great opportunity to reconnect with other friends, and break away from hanging out with the person involved in the bad friendship.


Step 4
Maintain relationships with the friends that you and your bad friend shared. Just because you are not friends with one person does not mean that you have to break away from your other friends.


Step 5
Don't be quick to end the relationship in online formats. For example, deleting your bad friend from your Facebook and Myspace profiles right away looks obvious and petty. If you can handle it, leave your former friend on those pages as a friend to avoid petty drama. You can always delete the person later when you haven't spoken in a few months and it will be less hurtful for this person. (Remember, just because they hurt you does not mean that you should hurt them in return.)


Step 6
Although it's tough, try not to worry about retaliation when the person realizes that you are ending the bad friendship. This person may be upset and talk about you, but your real friends will understand the situation and will not judge you based on what this person says. And, any information that they have to talk about you will be old and outdated, so it won't matter much anyway.


Step 7
If you see this person in social situations, be kind. Ending a bad friendship does not mean that the other person has to become an enemy. You can simply be acquaintances. That is why it is important not to alienate this person. Smile kindly and make small talk, then walk away and talk to someone else.


Step 8 
If the person really does change in the future and becomes less toxic towards you, leave yourself open to reopening the friendship, if you want to. However, if you are going to do this, do not forget the past. Keep your guard up until you are absolutely sure that this person can be trusted.