Is best friend jealous of me?

My best friend, let’s call her Jenny, and I met in college some ten years ago. We’ve moved cities together and we used to be flatmates. I met my boyfriend around five years ago and since my boyfriend, Jenny and I have busy jobs (we are lawyers and my boyfriend works in another industry), weekends are generally the only free time we get to meet.

Hence the conflict. Jenny has been saying for the past two years that I give all my free time to my boyfriend. As a lawyer it’s difficult otherwise to schedule plans on the weekdays. I have tried to see Jenny as much as I could, but with the little annual leave we get, I cannot afford to spend it on Jenny, as I already need that to see my family who live far away.

I’ve also been noticing signs of what I think are jealousy on her part. This unsettles me, because I never thought of Jenny as the jealous type. Jenny has been single for the most part of the past 6 years. Even in law school, there were guys who later dated her but unbeknownst to her had approached me instead of Jenny to begin with. We used to go to social events together and while I don’t think I’m attractive, it is a fact that guys tend to talk more to me because of how much more of a talker I am.

I don’t know if that breeds resentment; lately, I’ve been fortunate enough to realise a childhood dream of mine as a creative side hustle alongside my day job as a lawyer. Whenever I share updates about this side hustle, she would not acknowledge it. For example if I texted her with an update, she would never reply to that text, and talk about other topics instead. This became really obvious when I was interviewed by a newspaper about this side hustle, I shared the article with her, and she said absolutely nothing about it, whereas the other friends / my boyfriend in my life cheered me for it and said they can’t wait for more updates about this.

I don’t want to think so poorly of her but she also likes to make random criticisms about my relationship with my boyfriend. Granted no relationship is perfect and we have our conflicts, but when I go to her I just wanted her to listen, not to constantly tread on my relationship like it’s the worst one ever. A few months ago I revealed to her that I’d like to marry my boyfriend and she totally flipped out and said that I cannot be serious. Then she goes on to say some random rubbish about how my boyfriend only wears a the same T-shirts all the time and that his shorts are “ugly”.

When I became quite successful in my career as well (invited to conferences, publishing articles), she also chose not to say anything or even acknowledge it. She doesn’t need to constantly say things to bolster my ego but equally I find it strange that she chooses deliberately to ignore all of that and instead says she’s having a lot of issues in her workplace and she’s no longer the favourite on her team etc etc

My question is: is this friendship salvageable and even worth salvaging? It all came to a head when I reserved time for her on a weekend and asked what she wanted to do, she then said I hadn’t followed up with any concrete plans so she’s going to meet her colleague (who she once said she disliked) for the entire weekend. What on earth is this? I’m really flabbergasted. I said she could at least have checked with me if we were meeting and she has not responded.

I do really treasure her friendship but I’m feeling that perhaps we’ve now moved on. We’re both in our early 30s.

Posted Jul 29, 2026, 6:56 AM UTC

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