No one can argue that good friends are rare to find and that friends who like you for you without any hidden agendas and no preconceptions are even rarer than the first type. You find yourself a good friend and say; I can talk to this person about anything, I can tell them everything, I can be transparent with them, speak my mind and express my true feelings and not fearing being judged or looked at in a different way.

Friendship as I understand is when you are there for your friend whenever they need you or don’t need you, i.e. being there always, sharing their joy and sorrow, picking them through their low moments, understanding where they are coming from when they are angry, frustrated, desperate, depressed, happy … etc.

What makes friends so special is that you get to pick them and keep them closer to you. We don’t get to pick our families or relatives, but we do get to pick our friends. We have the opportunity to meet people who are a match to us in the way they think or feel, people we can communicate with and have fun with.

Sometimes we go through difficult times in our lives and feel that we are alone, no one can understand or relate to what we are going through. Only friends pull us through such times and help us out by being nonjudgmental, supporting, loving and most importantly; patient. When you crack under the pressure of your life and its demands, you need someone strong to help you handle that pressure and come out of it a stronger person.

This friend might need to be strong enough to make us see our mistakes and confront us with our fears, help us see through ourselves and reach deep down to find the real cause of our problems and work on solving them.

In the state of panic that we all go through when we are facing a problem or a critical situation; we seldom control our ability of listening and responding, and more often than not, we become aggressive and offensive; we might unintentionally hurt those who are trying to help us and be there for us by shutting them out and keeping everything inside. Good friends stick around in such circumstances and forgive you because they believe in you and know that you are reacting to a certain variable in your life that will soon go away and you will be back to yourself again.

But do all stick around? Do all take the pressure? Do all go the extra mile for their chosen mates and friends?

Of course not!

Some will be waiting for you to make a mistake to walk out of your life, some will attack back and add to your problems, some will withdraw quietly and make all sorts of excuses for not being there, and some will become your enemies; let me rephrase that; they will become your worst enemies because they know so much about you; and that is what I call: “frienimies”.

So, what are we supposed to do? Stop trusting people? Refrain from getting closer to anyone? Practice more caution? What are we to do? How can we know that this friend will not turn into an enemy one day? How can we take it when it happens for real?

I have a friend; I am not really sure if we are still friends; he was supportive and caring, he always said that he wanted the best for me, always said that he will always be there for me, always said that I can tell him anything and confide in him as if I was taking to myself, he said that he wanted to see me happy and content and he said that I can always rely and depend on him. I told him that my experience tells me that I should not be so trusting, that I cannot depend on anyone being there for me, that I can only rely on myself but he kept arguing that he will prove me wrong.

I might have consumed his support, I might have gotten carried away with relying on him being there or maybe I have reached a point where I took him for granted, but what happened lately; is that he started caring about my friends more than he cared about me, maybe because he approves their lifestyle more than he does mine, or maybe he feels that they are more worthy of his support because their way of life matches his ideas and conceptions. I don’t know what happened, but he was slipping away, became less tolerant and less supportive, more judgmental and aggressive and finally slipped away and wouldn’t even answer my messages any more.

Is he only angry? I don’t know because he wouldn’t answer me; I don’t know why he would have gotten angry in the first place. Has he become a frienemy? Maybe; I have learned to expect everything and accept anything. Will he come back and take his best friend status again? No idea and no expectations. Have I tried to understand what happened and why he did this? YES! Is he reading these lines and will he know that he is meant by this post? Definitely! What will he do about that? I don’t know!

Last but not least; I will quote our dear prophet (PBUH) when he said: Love your beloveds moderately as they might become your hated one day, and hate your hated moderately as they might become your beloveds one day!

أحبب حبيبك هوناُ ما عسى أن يكون بغيضك يوماً ما … وابغض بغيضك هوناً ما عسى أن يكون حبيبك يوماً ما