When the Silence Gets Loud: On Friendship, Loneliness, and the Space in Between

There are days when the world feels a little too quiet. When the heart feels heavier than usual, and you find yourself scrolling through your contacts—not to call anyone, but just to see names you once leaned on. On those days, even when you're surrounded by people—parents, siblings, a partner—you ache for something else. Something older. Something warmer. The friendships that once defined you.

I often think of my school friends, college companions, or those I crossed paths with during the early chapters of adulthood. People who laughed at the same jokes, waited after classes, sent birthday messages without reminders, and showed up without being asked. The kind of friends who didn’t need context to understand your silences. And yet, somewhere along the way, I lost them—or maybe I let them go.

When I enrolled in my PhD program, I unknowingly placed all my friendships on hold. I was consumed by research, deadlines, and this relentless urge to prove myself. I stopped calling, replying in time, or checking in. It wasn’t that I didn’t care; I just told myself that “true friends understand.” Maybe I even believed that friendships, like old photographs, could survive years of neglect and still hold their colour.

But I was wrong.

Friendship is not a trophy you win once and keep forever. It’s more like a plant—quiet, beautiful, and deeply dependent on care. Without watering, it withers. Without attention, it fades. And today, I sit in the shadow of that neglect. I feel the weight of silence, of calls that were never made and texts that died mid-typing. No one has called me in weeks. No one has asked how I’ve been. Despite all the hopeful “we should catch up soon” endings to our conversations, nothing ever happens.

It hurts. More than I’d like to admit. There’s a particular ache in feeling friendless—an ache that isn’t always loud, but always present. And yet, I can't escape the truth: people change, priorities shift, and relationships often come with an expiry date we refuse to read.

Maybe this is what growing up looks like—not just gaining knowledge or degrees, but coming to terms with loss in quieter forms. Friendships that don't end with fights or betrayals, but with time, silence, and unread messages.

Today, I’m grieving what I once had and, more painfully, what I didn’t protect.

But perhaps this grief is also a beginning. Maybe acknowledging the emptiness is the first step to filling it—either by making new connections or learning to be my own friend. To sit with myself, ask how I’m doing, and answer honestly. To become the kind of companion I’ve always needed.

I don’t know what the next chapter holds. But I do know this: I won’t take friendships for granted anymore. And maybe—just maybe—it’s not too late to water the ones that still have roots.