Success is loud. It attracts applause, admiration, people who suddenly remember your name. Struggle, though—that’s quiet. It doesn’t call for celebration. It doesn’t draw a crowd. It clears the room.
I learned this in the most unremarkable way. There wasn’t a single dramatic betrayal, no defining moment of abandonment. Just a gradual thinning out. People I used to text daily started taking longer to reply. Plans got postponed. Conversations shrank to small talk. And eventually, silence.
At first, I made excuses for them. Everyone’s busy. Life happens. Maybe I should reach out again. But then I noticed something else.
There was one person who never needed an excuse.
They showed up, not with grand gestures, but in ways that actually mattered. A message that didn’t demand an update but still let me know they were there. A stupid meme at the exact moment I needed something to break the heaviness. An invitation that didn’t come with the pressure to be “on,” just a quiet, steady presence that didn’t require me to be anything other than what I was.
That’s when I understood something most people don’t.
The real test of a relationship isn’t how someone treats you when you’re thriving. It’s how they handle you when you’re not.
Most people love the after—the comeback, the polished version of you that’s fun to be around again. That’s when they resurface, acting like they never left, throwing out a casual “We should catch up!” as if they hadn’t been missing for months.
They think you didn’t notice.
But you do.
And once you see it, you can’t unsee it.
If you have even one person who stayed—who didn’t need you to be interesting or successful or even particularly likable—hold onto them. And if you’ve been that person for someone else, you probably have no idea how much it meant.
Because in the end, it’s not the ones who cheer when you’re winning that matter. It’s the ones who sit beside you when you have nothing left to give.
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