I only realized in therapy that I’m just an emotional container for a childhood friend

We’ve been friends since childhood. I’m introverted and she’s one of my only close friends, so I’ve always helped her unconditionally and hold her in high regard. But it wasn’t until I started therapy that I really saw the pattern I’ve been stuck in for years.

She never calls or checks in on me. She’ll go months without saying a word, then last week she called out of nowhere just to vent about her life and ask me to take care of her cat because she is going on vacations. I feel like I’m literally an emotional container for her problems, but I’m never the one who gets asked how I’m doing.

Whenever she travels, I’m the one going to her place every single day to look after her cat, and I always leave homemade food ready for when she gets back. When her baby was born, I brought her homemade meals several times. When she went through a breakup, I even paid for several things for her. I don’t want to make this about gifts, but honestly, after everything I do for her, it wouldn’t be too much to expect some kind of return every now and then, even something small.

She never invites me to anything. I constantly see her out with other friends, movies, spa days, dinners, and I even found out she once treated another friend to a spa package just because that friend “needed it.” Me? Nothing.

I’ve finally started pulling away. But I feel genuinely betrayed that it took me this long to see it clearly.

Has anyone else been through a friendship like this?