Ex friend invited me to her birthday

I (25F) have a bit of a complicated relationship with this friend let’s call her Sam (25F). Although I don’t know if she feels the same.

For context the story of our friendships starts back in college when we became roommates. How we met was cute, it was junior year, she had pink hair and I had green hair. I noticed her in the library and we clicked immediately, exchanged instagrams and then we both realized we had already met freshman year when we both had black hair lol. We got really close and then decided to live together (mistake). It’s also important to note that we became friends at a very difficult time in my life. I was homeless, I left my abusive family, and was struggling to find work. I was basically couch hopping different friends places for three months. It wasn’t until I found a new job and saved a bit til I found a place to live with her.

For the first half of being roommates it was really fun and I got even closer to her. We hung out a lot I even ended up getting her a job at my restaurant job so we worked together too. Things just started going downhill when I noticed she was a very inconsiderate and disrespectful friend. Things just added up quickly, she wouldn’t do chores when it was her turn and ignore my texts for days and days asking her to clean. And she didn’t really have my back, I quit that job and the owners had a meeting with the entire staff to ask if they had a problem with me and she didn’t come to my defense. She told them “I don’t know I don’t really work with her” even though I trained her in the job. The final line was when she decided to go behind my back to tell our landlord she didn’t want to resign the lease. She had told me the month before she wasn’t sure if she wanted to live there another year so I asked her to wait because I was looking for a new roommate and wanted to have them secured before letting the landlord know because I knew he would make us start a new lease and submit a new deposit of over $3k which i didn’t have at the time. When she told him, He gave me until the end of the month to start a new lease. I just wanted her to let me know and give me some time before going behind my back. It’s hard to explain but her blindsiding me like that put me at risk of being homeless again.

From that point on we both had a talk and decided our relationship probably won’t be the same after that. Months go by and I got a job for after graduation in Chicago. When I moved I went and never looked back. I didn’t speak to her or pay her any mind for nearly two years. But then I ended up visiting our hometown again and on a drunk night out I ended up calling her to let her know I was in town and we planned a dinner to meet up the next day. It was a bit awkward for me but for some reason we kept in touch after that.

Fast forward another couple months she ends up visiting me in Chicago and I honestly didn’t enjoy it. To me she feels like more of a sister than a friend at some points and me and my sister don’t get along lol. She stayed with me the weekend spontaneously after letting me know that same week she’d be coming but expected me to plan everything and ended up telling me at the end of her trip she was disappointed before she met one of my “cool” friends and I guess that was the only highlight of her trip. She’s a bit superficial and cares a lot about how she is perceived, sometimes I feel like she thinks she’s too cool for me. It hurt that she said that and I ended up crying in my car for an hour her last night over because I felt like nothing made her happy.

Nonetheless I stayed her friend. And we even planned a trip to nyc which was also not that fun for me. I feel like I plan a lot and she never appreciated any of my effort. I had to navigate and make reservations for the entire trip while she just blindly followed me around. And for the whole trip she was just on hinge trying to find a NYC man to take her on a date. She was not present the entire time and I jsut didn’t understand why we were friends if she just wanted to be in her own boy crazed world. She met a guy in a bar while we were there and that was basically all the trip was about after that.

I just kept having bad experiences with her but not voicing any of my feelings because I am not very confrontational I’ve actually never confronted a friend really.

then I got a new job and moved back to my hometown. We got close again and we ended up moving to neighboring apartments and would walk to each others apartment every week to hang. We have a lot in common and I love her still. She’s basically a sister to me I feel a connection with her that I haven’t felt with a lot of friends. But I still don’t feel good about our friendship.

Everything just added up and one day she asked me to meet up to hang and I agreed. 20 minutes before we were supposed to meet she texts me “i just found out my friends from out of town are here so i’m gonna hang with them 🥴🥴” i was so hurt. I was already ready and about to leave. Didn’t even get a sorry from her or an invite to come along to meet her other friends. I don’t know that was when I was like this girl really doesn’t gaf about me does she? She doesn’t respect me or my time or our friendship.

I didn’t even respond and I started ghosting her from that point on. She would text me and send me tiktoks and I would ignore them or answer very short responses. And I wanted her to ask what was wrong which was a stupid thought but we ended up just not seeing each other or talking anymore. Part of me thinks she doesn’t even know what she did wrong.

I didn’t talk to her for over six months. And this past month something in me wanted to show her my new cats and I did… I know I’m so stupid I feel like I’m in a toxic relationship. But that kind of initiated some more talking, she asked to meet my cats and I told her she can one weekend and she almost came over to meet them but she lowkey bailed on me again. I thought that was my sign to stop trying with her even more. But she reached out to me today to ask if I would come to her birthday get together at a bar with her close friends and her bf(didn’t know she got a bf in this time apart)

I don’t know what to do. It just feels really complicated but I feel like I’m the only one feeling this way because I don’t even communicate my feelings. I don’t know if she even knows anything had ever been wrong between us because she acts fine. I don’t know I need advice. I definitely don’t think I want to go to her birthday and meet all the new friends she’s made and her new bf. I haven’t even seen her in almost a year. But I was thinking of offering to meet up for lunch or dinner to catch up? Idk