I text a (now former) best friend a couple weeks before my double mastectomy for breast cancer asking to meet up for a coffee and a hug.

This was her response:

“I can glean from your Facebook page, that you do have quite a bit of people that are in a place to support you — and you need to lean on them instead. I can't be your shoulder anymore. I've been it since the beginning, and this relationship has been consistently depleting me for a long time. I've given so much grace to this friendship, and I'm spent. I know how the timing of all this must look and feel to you, and while I'm truly sorry that you're going through these things with your health — it doesn't change how I feel, and the fact that I need space. How long that's going to be, is an answer I don't have for you.

I am of course still sending you well-wishes for a smooth surgery and recovery, but I'm asking that you please respect this boundary, and to seek support from someone else that is able.”

Even one of the advocates from the National Breast Cancer Foundation support group said it was one of the nastiest things she’s ever read.

I have since blocked her nearly everywhere but she still keeps popping up on mutual friends’ pages. She’s also a local musician and I feel like I can’t go into these venues bc she’s there. Everyone is always lauding and fawning over her and abandoning a friend who had a hysterectomy 2/6 followed by a double mastectomy 4/4 is just so flipping low. I want people to know, but that in turn, would make me look like an asshole. It’s sort of absurd I’m so frustrated over this given I have TRULY much bigger problems like reconstructive surgery and endocrine therapy my body isn’t tolerating.

How do you move past that kind of coldness and heartbreak and grief. I just wanted a freaking hug.

Has this happened to anyone else? What would you do? I just can’t get over it.