First time posting. I (F, mid-20s) am having an existential crisis over something that happened last night.
For context, I have a small but close friend group from college. My two best friends are “John” and “Mary.” I met them at the same time in college, right before they started dating, so they were always *my* friends equally, not “friend + partner.” We’ve all been through heavy life stuff together and are very close.
My current friend group became much closer friends to me after my boyfriend and I broke up. At the time my boyfriend and I broke up I was living in the States with some family, and my friends and ex-boyfriend were all back in my home country.
John and Mary at that time were also having some relationship issues. So they had broken up.
So basically all three of us went through a breakup at the same time.
I started talking more to both of them. John is a more social and active chatter, while Mary is not as quick or consistent with chatting, she is better at in-person and one-on-one hanging out.
John and I talked about everything: loneliness, work, family, memes, music, dumb jokes, daily life. We sent pics of us and random things, encouraged each other, and gave friendly compliments. Nothing sexual or romantic ever happened or was implied.
During this time I also chatted with Mary, but at a less consistent pace as she could take several days to respond, and gets overwhelmed if you send too many messages, so I never spammed her with as many random topics as I did with Jonh.
I never in the past nor present have ever wanted anything romantic with John. I consider him my best guy friend, my third brother. If anything, I joke about how Mary basically found a boyfriend and girl-friend who are the same. (Think two Andy’s and one April from Parks and Rec).
Fast forward to now: I’m back in my home country. John and Mary are together again and working on strengthening their relationship for future next steps. We all hang out a lot. Our full group of 5 friends, us as the 3 musketeers, and her and I on our girl dates.
I continue to chat with John and Mary in my day to day, as well as now with the other college friends I have reconnected with.
Last night, we (all 5 friends) had a party at my house (a normal ocurrence), all good. Music, drinking, smoking, fun stuff.
The next morning Mary woke up feeling sick and asked John to take her home, so she didn’t stay and hang out for the day as we usually do. Later that night, she told me she was angry at both of us. Apparently she went through John’s phone and felt our past messages were inappropriate, seeing as he was her ex boyfriend at the time.
So this is where I feel conflicted. I never thought of our messages as inappropriate, nor did I ever send anything with any ulterior motive of “getting with my friends ex”. We simply topic dumped as friends when we were both in need of someone to talk to.
But AITA? Should I not have talked to John with the consistency I did at that time?
NTA – especially given you were all friends before hand. You are John’s friend too, not just Mary’s.
Mary is TA. A, going through John’s phone is wrong, full stop. And B, this is between Mary and John, not her and you, so any conversation about it should be between them. You did nothing wrong in your friendship or communication.
She did say she is gonna talk to him as well.
I’m not sure what made her feel the need to go through his phone to check our specific messages, we have never been anything but friendly/brotherly/sisterly towards each other. I have always tried to maintain respect and boundaries with my friends and their partners as my boyfriend cheated on me with a “friend” and never not even by mistake would I want to make another girl feel the way I did. But I worry if maybe I was too familiar in the way I chatted at that time. I really was very depressed about my breakup and needed somemone to talk to. And maybe selfishly fill the void with a friendly presence that my breakup/losing my boyfriend/only friend had left.
I really do think of him as a brother/the male version of me because our personalities are similar. I also am very close to my siblings and friends so I talk with a lot trust, but I’m also an overthinker so I know what topics to approach with who and what not.
I just feel devastated about thinking if I broke girl code, and I don’t want to loose her as a friend, or him as a friend over something like this. We have never had any issues before this, which is why I feel totally blindsided.
NTA. You are permitted to have friends and Mary is not the gatekeepers. John will back off because it will be easier than fighting with her. I lost many men friends this way. They always give you this sheepish look or blame you if the gf is listening in. Too bad. You lost two friends.
NTA – you were talking to your friend.
Mary sounds a bit insecure. There is no reason for you to cut ties with John because they broke up. You did nothing wrong. NTA but Mary has some growing up to do.
Nta, Mary is being insecure and she shouldn’t be going through johns phone either. I find it incredibly annoying when people make others ” choose sides” when their relashinships fall apart, we shouldn’t have to choose! They should just come to terms with the fact that THEIR relationship fell apart not their friends’ relationships.