Tiger Sisters - The Friendship Breakup Guide: How to Know When to Stay, Distance, or End a Friendship

Episode Date: October 12, 2026

Sign up for our newsletter here: https://tigersisters.substack.com/   Check out our matcha brand, Sisters Matcha at ⁠https://www.sistersmatcha.com⁠  How do you know when a friendship is worth repairing, when it’s time to let go, and how to actually move forward once it does end? In Part 2 of our friendship series, we’re diving into the complicated, painful, and rarely talked-about world of friendship breakups. Tune in for lessons on: ✅ Why friendship breakups can feel so painful (especially between women) ✅ The framework for deciding whether to repair, distance yourself from, or end a friendship ✅ The difference between active and passive friendship endings ✅ How to “compartmentalize” a friendship with personal examples ✅ How to grieve a friendship while still making room for new relationships ✅ Our “What Do I Take With Me?” exercise for post-friendship breakup healing Friendship endings can be messy, emotional, and deeply personal. But they can also teach us a lot about who we are and what we need from the people in our lives. If you’re navigating a friendship breakup, questioning whether a friendship still belongs in your life, or simply trying to make peace with one that ended, this episode is for you. 00:00: Cold Open  02:00: Introducing friendship breakups and episode agenda 02:28: Why friendships matter for our well-being  05:05: The Friendship Dissolution Framework 07:50: Active vs. passive friendship breakups 14:04: Three ways friendships can end 14:50: How to compartmentalize a friendship 22:07: Why female friendship breakups hit differently 23:27 How men and women approach friendship differently 27:05: Cherie’s friendship breakup story 31:48 Can a friendship be repaired? 33:16: The mixed emotions after a friendship breakup 34:20: What therapy taught Cherie about friendship 37:58: Mini Exercise: What Do I Take With Me? 39:10: Making room for new friendships 39:22: Closing thoughts 🐯👯‍♀️ We’re the Tiger Sisters — your Wall Street & Silicon Valley big sisters Decoding Money • Power • Love ✨ New episodes every Monday | Shorts all week ✨ 💌 Want to partner with us?  Sponsorships: [e-mail] Why trust us? ▫️ Cherie Brooke Luo — 100M+ views demystifying tech, finance & MBAs ▫️ Jean Luo — ex-Goldman Sachs, ex-Snapchat exec, 50+ AI patents, startup investor ▫️ Together: 4 Ivy League degrees • built billion-dollar products • two startups — decoded for you What you’ll get (and keep): ▫️ 🚀 Ivy League cheat sheets — no $250K tuition ▫️ Personal finance playbooks (salary, investing, negotiation) ▫️ Networking scripts behind $100M+ deals & job offers ▫️ Real conversations with CEOs, operators & investors ▫️ Mindset resets — clarity without the pricey coach ▫️ Systems for career, money, and long-term growth 💛 LET’S CONNECT ~ CHERIE ~ Instagram — /cherie.brooke TikTok — /cherie.brooke Substack — cherieluo.substack.com LinkedIn — /cherie-luo ~ JEAN ~ Instagram — /jeanluo_ LinkedIn — /jeanluo 👉 Hit Subscribe & tap the 🔔, then leave a ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ review on Spotify & Apple Podcasts. It takes 10 seconds and makes a massive difference in helping new people discover Tiger Sisters. 🛍️ Items: 🍵 Sisters Matcha — http://www.sistersmatcha.com 🌀 Everything else — https://amzn.to/3z0dx5b  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Okay, when I sell my business, I want the best tax and investment advice. I want to help my kids, and I want to give back to the community. Ooh, then it's the vacation of a lifetime. I wonder if my head of office has a forever setting. An IG Private Wealth Advisor creates the clarity you need with plans that harmonize your business, your family, and your dreams. Get financial advice that puts you at the center. Find your advisor at IG Private Wealth.com.

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Discover coffee plus on nispresso.com. When one door closes, a window of opportunity opens on the other side. Make sure you're open to looking at the window rather than staring at the closed door. I do believe that is a Helen Keller quote. Really? From Glenn Cremont. Sometimes people are in your life to serve as a lesson. For sure.

This is a lesson. This is my lesson. And I was kind of expecting other people to friend me that way because I was giving friend to them that way. Like, I friend. Questionable verb message. I friend to them in this way. Do they friend me back in that way? You need befriend?

No, friend. I think in most, if not all cases, it can be very, very, very hard to remove your emotions from it. It's kind of helpful to have a framework to think through it because you can remove yourself from it. You can remove your own feelings. And you can kind of use the framework to try to look at it as objectively as possible to help lead yourself to the right decision. The adult friendship dissolution process model. Let me hear it. This is how to end a friendship.

Clip that. I'm Cherie. I'm Jean. And we're the Tiger Sisters. We are your Wall Street and Silicon Valley Big Sisters. And we're a top 10 business podcast bringing late night sister talk meets boardroom strategy. Hot take. Sometimes friendship breakups can hurt even more than romantic breakups.

I think we've all been there. someone's day-to-day life, you're pesties, you know what's going on with their life, and then suddenly you don't. It is such a universal experience, and I'm not going to sugarcoat it. It is very, very difficult. And for me, personally, a friendship breakup has been one of the most difficult times of my life. Today we're tackling this tough subject head-on, of course, with some research because it's a Tiger Sisters episode, with frameworks, personal stories, and also some big sister advice.

While in the past, we've covered all the wonderful aspects of relationships, friendships, especially female friendships. Today, we're going to teach you how to navigate the endings and learn how to move forward when needed. Whether you've gone through a friendship breakup in the past, or maybe you're kind of currently in one, or maybe this has never happened to you. I feel like this will be a great conversation with advice and takeaways, and hopefully you guys can let us know some of your stories and advice in the comments as well. So let's dive into it. Okay, so before we dig into friendship breakups,

I think we can just even acknowledge why are friendships important. Yeah. Right? It seems so obvious, but we actually have some research behind why they're important. So a 2022 article in the current opinion in psychology journal showed that, and I quote, although friendships have received less attention than other types of relationships, they are associated with better long-term health, well-being, and life satisfaction. Yeah. So friendships are important in your life and they're good when they're good. They're good when they're good. They're good when they're good. Right? Which brings us to the question, conversely, why are friendship breakups also important? So from the same article. Moreover, experiencing strain in friendships such as doubting that friends will be supportive when needed predicts having chronic illnesses later in life. That's crazy. Isn't that crazy? I don't like that. I'm so. I'm so.

sad that that's part of the article. Yeah. Well, that's, but that's kind of setting the stage for this episode, why friendship breakups can be good for your health. Yeah. In the right, right, in the right circumstance. Yeah. And I will say for the friendships that I've experienced, so this is in my own lived experience, I think strain in a friendship or, you know, things happening where you need to have a deep conversation, like we need to sit down and talk about like, I'm bothered by this, whatever. I think that's good in a friendship. That's just a natural relationship. You're not going to be like 100% on the same page the entire time. But it's like how do you work through it? And can you work through those bumps in the road, the bumps in the friendship with dignity,

respect and understanding so that you can repair to make the friendship even stronger. Oftentimes you cannot. And things come out and you're like, okay, I don't think we can make this word. But other times when you can rebuild and repair from a bump in the road, it's like, damn, those friendships are even stronger because I understand you more deeply as a person. Damn. She hit us with a dignity, respect, and understanding. Two minutes in the episode. You have to have that in a, and that's kind of my criteria in one of my friendships. And I do have very high standards.

She's a very dignified individual. Yes. So it brings us to the question if you do have to break up a friend. friendship, what is the right way to do it? It can seem so messy and difficult and like, but we found a framework. We literally, there is a framework from a scientific journal. We found a scientific framework for you to consider. Okay, so this research article called Friendship Loss and Dissolution in Ad adulthood, a conceptual model by V.F. Rothman-Simpson, proposes an adult friendship dissolution process model.

Let me hear it. Which just sounds perfect, honestly. Okay, so this is how to end a friendship. Clip that. Okay, so this research-based model, to summarize, the model is, you have to consider first these four factors. One is who you are. Two is where your life is.

Three is who your friend is, and the fourth one is the friendship itself. So I'm just going to like summarize stuff, then we'll dig into it. Once you consider all those things, then the next step is you decide if you're going to have an active or a passive ending. And then after that, the next step is the question of does the friendship actually end? Because if you initiate a friendship breakup, it could be not reciprocated, basically. And then the fourth consideration, the fourth step is reflecting how do you feel afterwards? Do you feel relief? or do you feel regret, sadness, and distress?

Mm-hmm. I feel like there is a decision tree. It's basically, yeah. The way that I see. If then. Yes, like, do you do a passive ending or an active ending? Yeah. I mean, these are great questions.

And, like, I kind of need to, like, follow the decision tree on my own to figure out if there is a friendship that I'm wanting to break up or in the middle of breaking up, which we will get into. How do you choose what is the right? one. And I think Gene and I are kind of like making light of this because it is such a sad topic, you know, that's kind of why I put on the silly voice. Like I don't think this is silly at all. I think friendship breakups can be so freaking devastating and hurtful for the soul, especially if it's with a girlfriend or a friend of yours that, you know, is so close to you. I think it can be,

it could really destroy you. So I think it is a very heavy topic, which is why I'm going to try and smile through it as we talk about it. But I think it's just very real, very raw, and I think people go through friendship breakups. Okay. When I sell my business, I want the best tax and investment advice. I want to help my kids, and I want to give back to the community. Ooh, then it's the vacation of a lifetime. I wonder if my head of office has a forever setting. An IG private wealth advisor creates the clarity you need with plans that harmonize your

business. family and your dreams. Get financial advice that puts you at the center. Find your advisor at IGPrivatewealth.com. New from Nespresso. Blend wellness into your coffee routine with a coffee plus range infused with functional benefits. Choose the coffee you love with added B vitamins, like coffee plus B12 to help support immune function and coffee plus B6 to keep your day moving. Or go with the flow and choose ginseng delight. Our new double espresso with ginseng extract. Our new double espresso with ginseng extract. Whatever lies ahead, don't change your morning. Let your morning change you. Discover Coffee Plus on Nispresso.com. And I think in most, if not all cases, it can be very, very, very hard to remove your emotions from it.

It is an inherently extremely emotional topic and undergoing. Yeah. Is that the right word? Yeah. And so that's why, back to the framework, it's kind of helpful to have a framework. to think through it because you can remove yourself from it. You can remove your own feelings. And you can kind of use the framework to try to look at it as objectively as possible to help you lead, to help lead yourself to the right decision. So I really want to dig into this idea of an active ending versus a passive ending of a friendship breakup. And so the researchers basically distinguished between these two pathways. In other words, why do some friendships end abruptly while some fade more gradually.

So it's interesting that the authors found that most friendships end through passive routes, which means they fade gradually, there's a decrease in communication, people grow apart. I think we can all relate to that. Yeah, it makes sense. But one reason is that passive endings are easier, and they preserve the possibility that friendships could someday be renewed or saved or possibly rekindled, Whereas active endings tend to be more acrimonious and more likely to be permanent. I think also the quote unquote benefit of a passive ending is that it is less disruptive to a broader friend group, right? Because I think a lot of times friendships don't always exist in a vacuum and they're not always just dyads, right?

like a pair. It often has many other relationships connected to it. So if you have an active ending, it's obviously very active. It's very, it's more easy. It can be more public. It's more public and it's more easy for it to be felt as personal. As opposed to if something is passive, it's kind of, it's less directed. Yeah, it's less directed and there's room for ambiguity of why a friendship might have faded, right? Someone maybe got busy with work, with family, with a newborn or whatever. So even if they like don't want to be friends with you anymore, they can kind of, you know, pass it off as a passive ending to a friendship. You know, there's more room for questions. And it's not as personal. Yeah. And I think it leaves the, it leaves open the option of more and continual and ongoing

interaction in a group environment. True. True. It feels less personal. Yeah. So I think it begs the question, what do you think is easier or harder? Me, I'm really not a confrontational person. So for me, passive. And I think actually, honestly, that is a reaction to when I was in college, I had one of the most painful, well, the most painful friendship breakup I've ever experienced. And that was active. So after that, like I just remember, since, sitting on a bench and like bawling on the green in college. And so then after that I was like, why am I going to, I don't want to go through that pain again. It's like too, too difficult for me.

I will push you to consider that that was when you were, you know, less than 22 years old, between the ages of 18 and 22. Perhaps it might not be as difficult now. Yeah. I wouldn't let that inform the next five decades, six decades of relationships. So maybe think about that. Yeah. I mean, I'll think on it.

I think I also, it's not really a topic that you are actively thinking about daily, right? So like I haven't really thought about it until right now, until we do a podcast. Until we do a podcast and really dive into this topic. Until we broadcast the friendship breakup episode. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. What about you?

See, I think passive, it's too easy of an out. She says life is too easy. Life is too easy. I'm a Leo. I'm a Leo. I got to address the issue. We got to sit down and talk about this. We got to sit down.

In all seriousness, see, here I am bringing jokes again to lighten up the episode. Jokes, jokes, jokes. But in all seriousness, it really depends on the friendship. It really depends on the person. Yeah. If I care about this friendship, it's going to. going to be, and there's a way to salvage it, I'm going to try and be as active as possible, not maybe actively ending it, but I'm going to be like, we need to sit down, let's talk.

Yes. Like, this is something that's bothering me. And if something's bothering you, you should definitely bring it up because I want to repair and grow our friendship because I care about you. I think if it's someone on the fringes, maybe an acquaintance or like someone that I'm not super close with, and I'm like, hmm, I don't want to be friends with anymore. I think a passive route is probably better because I don't want to bring anything up. to this person. Yeah. I don't know you. You don't know me that well. So I think it depends on the

situation. But I like to be more active in the relationship and that could end up with an active ending. I think most of the endings of my friendship have been more active. Well, that's because I think for the most part you have quite deep relationships. Yeah. That you do want to salvage and you don't want to just throw them away. So when you sense an issue or when there is an issue, you are more likely to address it. But this, it goes back to the first part of this model, which is who you are. Yeah. What your life is, who your friend is and the friendship itself. Totally. Right. So for who you are, she's an intense individual. I'm a little, I'm not combative, but I'm like, I will want to talk about something. Yeah. And also you have very deep relationships.

Yes, because my friendships are so, I cherish them so much. Yeah. I. It's not something I'm just throwing away passively. Yeah. And then it's who your friend is. And then for the most part, your friendships are quite deep. Yeah. But if they're not deep, then you're not going to... Or if the person's not deep.

She's not going to deep it. Yeah, I'm not going to deep it. I'll deep if I need to. Hey, Tiger fam. Take five seconds to subscribe to the Tiger Sisters podcast. When you subscribe, you are notified every single time a new episode drops. And if you are listening on Spotify or Apple Podcast, please rate us five stars. and leave a comment about this podcast because it really helps people discover our content

and it helps us to continue to make the show for you. If you're listening to this on Spotify right now, take this opportunity to turn on the video. Thanks. Now back to the show. Okay, the next thing to consider is that these researchers also identified three different types of dissolution behavior. So they are. One, ending the friendship completely. Always an option.

Always an option. Two, distancing from the friend. And then three is compartmentalizing the friendship. So essentially changing what role the person is allowed to occupy in your life. This is such a good. It's like so helpful to hear it put into categories. It's so scientific and it sounds so frameworky that I am like in love with this. Because like it's usually the conversation you have with your girlfriends and you're like,

oh no, I'm having trouble. But you're like kind of trying to figure out together, but we have a framework. We have a framework for you. I'm very interested in number three, compartmentalizing the friendship, which is changing the role that person is allowed to occupy in your life. And this is something quite honestly that I have been working on for the last like five years, trying to figure that out because I think I am someone who gives so deeply in a friendship that I expect all my girlfriend friendships to also be at that level.

and I feel very lucky in life that I have, you know, a handful of women in my life who also reciprocate and give so deeply and are so loyal and, like, there's so much love there. But there have been times where I've, like, expected that model of people who weren't able to get there or weren't able to reciprocate. And that's just not their method of friendship. That's not their mode of friendship. So honestly, I was placing an expectation on them because that is how I love and that is how I love my friends. That is how she friends. That is how I friend. That is how I'm sorry, that's how I friend.

That's really true. Yeah. And I was kind of expecting other people to friend me that way because I was giving friend to them that way. Hmm. You know, I friend. Questionable verb message. I friend to them in this way.

Do they friend me back in that way? You mean be friend? No, friend. But you guys understand what I'm trying to say. So I think, I love this idea of compartmentalizing because honestly I have high expectations of my friends. and if they are not able to meet that expectation, that's like kind of on me of like placing that on them. Do you know what I mean? There are friends in your life that you're like, okay, we're go out,

have fun party friends. And like if you're expecting them to be your like spend five hours in a museum on a Saturday friend, like that's just different. That's like a different type of person and different type of personality. And maybe you can find a person who's able to like move through those zones with you, but maybe not. So don't expect everyone to be everything to you. I'm basically trying to tell myself that. Yeah. I agree. I also really like that they offered this third option of compartmentalizing the friendship because it is a very healthy thing to do that I don't think we actively think about enough. It sounds so clinical. You know, compartmentalizing a person. That's why. Yeah, but you're not compartmentalizing the person. You're compartmentalizing your friendship with them, right? You're

compartmentalizing how you experience each other. Yeah. Like you're taking agency of your own happiness and your own satisfaction in that relationship. Yeah. You know, like you said like, oh, it's on me. So this is what you can do. Like this is how you can be active in the relationship, right? And it's funny because on the outside, nothing can change, right?

Like literally nothing can change. You can still interact in the exact same way. but you will stop being disappointed by them. If you're like, well, it's fine. We just see each other in group settings or we only hang out once a month or every so often. I mean, I've told this story before, but a friend of mine changed my entire worldview.

Mind-blown. Once we were talking about this mutual friend of ours, who not a close friend of mine, but would always reach out to hang out, but was extremely flaky. And when it came to the day of hanging out, would cancel all the time. And so then once we were talking about this,

and my friend said, oh, well, yeah, she does the same thing to me, obviously. She's like, I just double book her all the time. And most of the time she cancels. And if she doesn't cancel, then I can rearrange with the other person, like one out of every six, seven times. And I was like, what?

Like, I didn't know this was an option in life because I was so singular in my thinking, because I am a person that really, really, really tries really hard not to cancel, and I think I unnecessarily make myself feel bad if I do have to cancel, which is also silly in its own, right? No, but you're like a responsible, respectable person of dignity, just so dignified. She keeps her commitments. And so I didn't know that was an option to categorize, yeah, to double book someone, first of all. I haven't done that, but it was funny because I realized that my friend had compartmentalized this mutual friend third party of ours in a very specific box, which is they probably won't show up. I'm still friends with them.

It's fine. But I've developed my own method of how to deal with it. So she was never disappointed. Yeah. Isn't that crazy? That's some high level self-management. Because then you're not affected by it as much. And clearly it's not personal.

Like this mutual friend of yours is doing that to like multiple people. So I think that's also helpful to hear that it's not personal. It's just kind of how that person is that they would flake a lot. Right. So. But for me, what I then did was I compartmentalize this person separately. And, you know, for me, since I see, I think I take flaking more seriously than this friend of mine who chose, you know, now uses the double booking method. I compartmentalize this person to be like, you know what?

they're just someone that I see in group settings and that's fine. Yeah. I think that's great. Thank you. I think that's like really that's what I'm trying to work on. That's what I want to be able to regulate internally. I get very upset still. Back to your, what was it you said, dignity, respect and what was the last thing? Communication. Communication. Or understanding. It's kind of a form of self-respect to do that. Yeah. You know? Yeah. It's like you're like, I don't waste other people time, but I'm also not going to waste my own time by being upset about something I can't control in this other person. Yeah, and I can just change the boundaries or change the mode and expectation of how I interact with this person. Yeah, it's brilliant. And honestly, in that way, you don't have to

actively end this friendship, even if this modality of hers doesn't work. You're able to see this person in group settings. And, you know, you are distancing from the friend. See, that was also Number two of the dissolution. So yes, you can combine methods. She's mix and matching. Mix and match. So you don't have to end the friendship completely. You are distancing and compartmentalizing.

I think that's just very adult, you know. That's very, very adult. Hey guys, it came to my attention that some of you don't know, we have a matcha brand. What? A matcha brand? Yes, like some of my friends were talking to me, like, wait, you guys have a matcha brand and it's called Sisters Macha.

Gene and I started it in October 2024. And it's something that means a lot to us because I lived and worked on the farm where we source the matcha from. This matcha brand is our baby and we are so passionate about it. And we really love everything that has gone into it. There's just so much love and passion that goes into our company. And we want to share it with you guys. We source from a small family farm just an hour and a half outside of Kyoto called Wazuka is the name of the town. And it's absolutely incredible.

We've visited the farm. We've worked on the farm. and we're so excited to bring it to you. So you can find out more at sisters matcha.com. That's sisters matcha.com. Alrighty. Now back to the show. Okay, so the next topic that we want to discuss

is not only why are friendship breakup so hard, but why are female friendship breakups especially difficult? And is there any scientific evidence behind this? Okay, so of course we have to bring in a study. So an Oxford psychologist named Robin Dunmar published a major review in 2025 that looked at decades of research of friendship, social connection, and well-being. In the review, he discussed a stark difference in the average social styles of men and women. I think before we dive into what the actual study is, if you kind of think about it on your own, you're like, are the relationships between men and men and women?

Like, what are the differences? Like, I'm like, yeah, there are differences. I mean, before you get into it, I will say that a common topic with my girlfriends, who, for the most part, my girlfriends who are my age are either married or in serious relationships. And something they talk about all the time is that they try to help their husbands create male friendships. I'm serious. Like they're trying to like set up their husbands with other guy friends. Yeah. With basically their friends' husbands so that they can have male friendships. Yeah. I think that's real. That's so real. Yeah. It's so common.

Yeah. Are men okay? But honestly, are women okay? Because I think you guys will find the study interesting. So men's friendships, they're usually more anonymous and club-like. They're often organized around shared contexts and activities. We love an activity. But they're more substitutable and more likely to form casually or fade when people move apart or stop having contact. So basically, my interpretation of this is that it's very centered around activities, maybe something like sports or watching.

sports, talking about sports, and they seem a little bit more surface level because the researcher used the word substitutable. Substitutable is so funny. It's kind of awkward. It reminds me of econ when you talk about whether a product is substitutable or not. So basically, it makes sense though because if you think about a lot of male friendships, especially adult friendships, are based around watching sports together or say like playing fantasy football, you can easily substitute one person in a league with another person.

just how it is. Yeah. I mean, it also depends on the friendship, too. I think if it's a male friendship that you've had since childhood, that's very different. But I think like making new guy friends is usually based around an activity. Where as opposed to female friendships, women's friendships, they're usually more diatic. Okay. When I sell my business, I want the best tax and investment advice.

I want to help my kids, and I want to give back to the community. Ooh. Then it's the vacation of a lifetime. I wonder if my out of office has a forever setting. An IG Private Wealth Advisor creates the clarity you need with plans that harmonize your business, your family, and your dreams. Get financial advice that puts you at the center. Find your advisor at IGPrivatewealth.com.

New from Nespresso. Blend wellness into your coffee routine with a coffee plus range, infused with functional benefits. Choose the coffee you love with added B vitamins, like coffee plus B12 to help support immune function, and coffee plus B6 to keep your day moving. Or go with the flow and choose ginseng delight, our new double espresso with ginseng extract.

Whatever lies ahead, don't change your morning. Let your morning change you. Discover coffee plus on espresso.com. Because we know what that means. I put in the definition. So diatic is an adjective related to a dyad containing to two parts or pertaining to the number two. They're more diatic, focused and personalized.

The researcher says who the friend is tends to matter more than the activity or context. I mean, that rings true to me in my experience. It's less about the activity or what we're doing and more about the person and getting to know the person very, very deeply who is not substitutable. Yeah, I feel like in a lot of female friendships, you can basically be doing a lot of different activities together and still be bonding and enjoying and growing that friendship. That's so true. That's so true.

Yeah. Like you could just be getting a tea or like a coffee together. Like how often do you hear about men? But they grab, I mean, they grab drinks or something or beer or I don't know what boys do. But I think it's usually around they're like, oh, like want to go watch the game and grab a beer. Not to like. It's centered around an activity. Yeah.

Or go play. shared interest. Play golf or the sharks or something. Or play board games. The San Jose Sharks? Or what sharks are you referencing? Yeah, the sharks. Okay.

But I mean, there are some consequences of this. The researcher notes that women's friendships may therefore require more intensive maintenance and can sometimes experience more abrupt breakdowns. Okay, Sherey, so does this study ring true for you? Yeah. I mean, from my observation of my guy friends and, how they have friendships with other men, it's usually centered around like a trip or something to bring them together. Or maybe it is fantasy football or maybe it's like a biking trip in Italy. Or

golfing. Or golfing or something that they can do together. Whereas I think like you said, with the women in my life that I'm friends with, we could be doing anything. We could be going to a dance class. We can go for a hike. We can have coffee. We can do nothing. We can go shopping. We could go run some errands. like it feels like a true companionship, friendship, partnership with another woman in that way. But I would say because that person becomes so part of my life and like intertwined, it can be really, really hard on the breakup side of that. And so I've been in like kind of a friendship breakup for the last like two years coming out of business school. this was someone that I cherished and was like so, so close with.

Tea. Tea. And it's actually so utterly devastating, you know. Oh, sorry, I made light of it. Yeah, you made light of something that like I'm actively like still working on. But I will say like it is something that does occupy my mind because of how sad it is. This is someone that I thought would be in my life forever from business school. And I think when you have terminology like that and expectations like that, the dissolution of that is all the more painful.

Like I thought this is someone I would see often and obviously at like all of my grad school reunions and we've been on trips together and we would like raise family together and like have our kids be friends and all this stuff. And like so imagining that future and it's not there anymore because of a friendship breakup is just so so painful. And I think the thing that I've figured out, and it's not really compartmentalizing it, but it's working through my expectations of this person. Yeah. Like I treated this person like a sister and invited them into my life so, so deeply. But what I've come to realize as this person and I have discussed things and I've raised things when we have like a problem in our friendship that led to the breakup, they weren't really able to understand me or really understand the problem. or understand the effect of their behavior on me. And like I tried to explain that and go deep on that.

And they weren't able to understand how badly they hurt me, whether or not they want to or honestly, if they're capable of that. So like I am someone who like deeply reflects in journals and being like, this really hurt me for this reason and, you know, try to explain that. But I think if they don't have that ability or like emotional depth to them, they might not get it. So that's kind of something that I'm realizing, like pretty, pretty late into, I guess, our friendship and our friendship breakup. And I think it's because of external factors as well that this friendship kept on so long because we were grad school students. We were classmates with each other. We had class. We had a larger friend group.

And I felt like a lot of social pressure that, like, if anything did break up, it wouldn't. couldn't be big and it couldn't be, you know, some sort of big dissolution because then like people would know about it. But now after we've graduated and things have kind of like faded apart anyways, um, I'm more ready to like actively end the friendship because like I don't really see a place in my life for this person with their current behavior. Hmm. Well, I'm proud of you that you got to that point because now you can move on. Yeah. I think there's a lot of, of grief with a friendship breakup. And I don't think we talk about that enough, especially with a friendship that means so much to you.

It's like being able to grieve because that person is still there, but they're not there in the same way. So it's definitely something that I'm working on and trying to still continually process. So do you think this framework helps you contextualize this breakup or does it help you process the breakup? Is this framework helpful to you? I think it is. I didn't have this framework when we were going through the breakup about two years ago. That's when it started. Honestly, it kind of sounds like a divorce.

It kind of sounds like I've been going through this divorce for two years. You know what I mean? Friend divorce, I guess. It kind of is a friend divorce. But I would say the thing that is probably the most helpful was the how to end a friendship framework that Gene introduced in the beginning, which is who you are, your life, who your friend is, and the friendship itself. I really like the framing of that and like the labels of it because I tried to bring up the problem in our friendship to this person because I it was I went the active route.

I didn't go to the active ending route. I brought up the active part of it to discuss something. And it ended up being like kind of like an active ending route because this person was not able to understand what I was feeling and what I was sharing with them. They couldn't even take accountability for what they had done. The next thing I want to ask you, you don't have to discuss it if you don't want to or it's too raw. But the next step after that is the question, does the friendship actually end? Like if we were going to use this as a case study, would you say, did the friendship actually end? And how do you feel afterwards?

And it kind of seems to be a continuum between relief to regret, sadness, distress. Hmm, interesting. I mean, right now we're in an interesting point because it hasn't actively ended yet. There was a big blow up and I think a request from this person to like try and reconcile something. But for me, because of how the blow up happened and there was no repair and not really an understanding from their side, I don't really think there's a way to make amends unless this person takes accountability for like there is a way forward and I don't think they're able to go the way forward yeah and be like I fucked up I'm sorry I hurt you deeply like I want a real apology like I know what a real apology sounds like and I've given real apologies I've messed up many times in my life and other

friendships and I know what a real apology sounds like damn um and I would like a real apology from this person and then I would consider moving forward and I haven't gotten a real apology in the way that I need. I think this person has tried, but they might not be able to give me what I need, and I think that's part of it. Okay, so since you took the active route, how do you feel?

I am still in the process of taking the active route. I have to still figure it out, but I would say I kind of feel a lot of everything. I feel relief in that there's, I feel relief in my heart, that I'm not holding on to something. anymore. Yeah. But I also feel a lot of sadness and a stress at the same time as well. Like, I think it's okay to have all those feelings. It's kind of mixed and messy because it's mixed and

messy. And I think that's okay. Mostly I just feel sad. I wish that we could have the friendship. We could have the friendship. But I don't think we can. Yeah. Yeah. You took it really hard. Yeah. I'm taking it really hard. It still. It still makes me very sad. I wish I could help you move on from it. You know, I actually told my therapist, because I spend sessions, spend sessions, and a lot of time got you messed up. This person got me messed up. They got you messed up. I spent multiple sessions talking about it and then I told my therapist. I'm like, I just want to wrap this up. I'm like, can we like just, I'm like, I think I'm done talking about it. Like, I'm so tired of talking about this person. And then my therapist is like, because you want to be

done talking about it, I don't think you're done talking about it. I'm like, he's like, why do you want to be done talking about it so much. And I was just like, I've given this person enough airtime. I like have so many other things going on in my life that are so happy. Why do I have to spend time thinking about this? And he's just like, I think it's a larger reflection of how you see friendships and relationships in your life and how I rushed into this friendship and trusted this person so quickly. That's who I am. Interesting. And actually, I've learned a lot from this friendship and this friendship dissolution, this friendship breakup, because now going into new friendships, which my therapist has pointed out, I am much more cautious in a way that protects my heart, that I'm not

like becoming deep, deep friends and vulnerable with people immediately, which is how I usually live my life, because that's how I love. And I get hurt. Can I just say, I think everything in life is, what's that phrase? They're like, everything in life is a learning, right? Either I learn or I win. Sure, yeah, something like that. Either I win or I learn. I think this is a really important learning for you because you're entering a phase of your life now where you are meeting tons of new people because we are in a new industry that we've never worked in before. We're not really familiar with the players in the industry, with the people in it and with norms of behavior, honestly. It's kind of a whole new cast of characters. and you've learned this sense of caution to not just give yourself fully and completely over

and automatically be besties, deep, best friends with every single person you meet and to reveal everything to them. So honestly, I think it's a lesson. God was doing you a solid. Right? Like, wait, remember we used to say, we used to say that sometimes people are in your life to serve as a lesson. Yeah.

For you. For sure. This is a lesson. This is my lesson. This is my goddamn lesson. This is my lesson. What's this something like Miley Cyrus used to say on Disney? He'd be like, this is my story.

This is my story. Do you know what I'm saying? No. Shut down dirt. Yeah. So this is my lesson. And I'm still learning. I'm still going through it.

Obviously, I'm still working on it. Yeah. But it is a very painful lesson that I had to learn. Thank you for sharing your experience with us so that other people can also learn from your lesson too without maybe necessarily having to go through it themselves. Or if they have gone through a friendship breakup, it's hard to do all that reflection after because you're still kind of like poking in that wound that you had. So maybe instead of them having to do that on their own. No, they got to do it on their own. Well, you know, there still can be takeaways.

from hearing you talk about yours. For sure. Yeah. And I always just say looking back on it, I like this framework. I'm like, I think one of the takeaways from me is just like, wow, I'm so happy that I have like this research and framework to like think about as I'm going through the decision tree of like a friendship breakup potentially. So funny though that we found a framework.

Found a framework and we applied it to this case study. An active live case study. Active live case study. That I'm still going. to therapy before. Okay, so you guys know we never leave you without a many exercise, and we have one that kind of ends things on a positive note. Okay, so please consider, if you are currently going through a friendship breakup or you have had one in the past, think about what you want to take with you from the friendship and what you're ready to leave behind. One last question, to be more

forward looking is what kind of friendships do I want to make more room for now, now that I've let go of the previous friendship? I really like ending in that previous note because, you know, there's this quote that I love that Professor Glenn Kremont says is that when one door closes, a window of opportunity opens on the other side. But you have to make sure you're open to looking at the window rather than staring at the closed door. I do believe that is a Helen Keller quote. Really? From Glenn Kramer.

You have to turn around to find the open window. Yeah. The closed door is hard and you have to make sure that you're not staring at it and you're open to the window on the other side. So I think that's really beautiful and making room for new and wonderful friendships that you can have. Yeah. May your life be full of windows.

May your life be full of windows. And may your life be full of windows. So Tiger Fam, thank you so much for joining us on this episode. It's a bit tough to talk about, but we made it through, and hopefully they're great takeaways for you guys. Yeah, and we ask you to please share this episode with a friend. Also, please comment about if you have gone through this before, so Cherie doesn't feel so alone.

I'm so alone. She's bared her soul for you guys. Yeah. So if you want to kind of give her some props for doing that. Good job, Cherie. Can I hear a good job from y'all? Thank you. And please remember to subscribe or follow the Tiger Sisters podcast.

It makes sure that you are notified whenever a new podcast episode drops and you can follow subscribe on Spotify, on YouTube, on Apple Podcasts. We also have the Tiger Sisters newsletter, which is linked in the description in this video, so please subscribe to that. All right, Tiger fam, we'll see you next time. Bye! In communities across Canada, hourly Amazon employees earn an average of over $26 an hour. Employees also have the opportunity to grow their skills and their paycheck

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