Middle School Relationships

In 7th grade, I became best friends with a group of three girls.
Two of the girls I still have really good friendships with...the other, well let me tell you the story. "M" and I are still best friends with, "A" and I are still good friends, and then there was "T"...
Middle school does a lot to change people, and most of the time this happens to people who aren't necessarily Christians more so than those who have a relationship with Christ. (Or at least it shouldn't happen to those who are believers!)
One of the biggest things that changes a person is peer pressure.
I know this is true from experience, from my one friend who was a pretty nice person in 7th grade. I can't say she was a good influence, and most likely not the best person to call my best friend, but she was nice. That's one of the main reasons I became friends with her: because she was friends with my other two best friends. "M" introduced me to "A" and "T" at our lunch table in 7th grade.
Well, "M" and "A" planned a surprise birthday party for "T", and so she came over and we had a good time, but I had to leave early.
What happened after that wasn't good.
Apparently M and A weren't including T, and T no longer talked to the other girls.
That was pretty much the end of the school year, and so summer arrived.
When school started in 8th grade, I continued to be friends with T, and we hung out together in gym class. But never again did we hang outside of school. I had learned my lesson that T wasn't the best friend, but just because M and A weren't friends with her anymore didn't mean I couldn't be nice to here.
People that had known we were best friends with T questioned about what happened and I would normally just say...something happened and they didn't communicate.
Meanwhile, T had changed a lot towards the end of seventh grade, and it was beginning to show big time in 8th grade. She dyed her hair, and it seemed she was dating someone new about every couple of months. Peer pressure causes you to either change for the better, or for the worse. The people she chose to hang out with weren't reliable people that had a good reputation, and middle school changed her.
She happens to be in my gym class again this year, and I talk to her, but I usually don't like doing that because she tends to talk in a negative way about the class, and that rubs off on me.

Middle school relationships are messy. My younger sister is in middle school right now, and she has mentioned how one girl said something and two friends stopped talking so that resulted in that girl leaving the lunch table.
It's so sad and silly how middle school relationships crumble because they don't communicate.

Communication is such a key factor to keep relationships strong.
I have been hurt because of friendships that I knew just weren't meant to be, which resulted in A not being my best friend anymore by the time we started Freshman year.  I know that sometimes relationships (like my relationship with A) don't stay "best friends" because of the way people grow apart, but that doesn't mean they aren't your friend anymore, or that communication isn't important.M and I are still best friends, but she struggles with health problems, and so I only hung out with her once during the summer, and towards the end of 8th grade, not having my best friend at school with me made me want to stop going to school everyday. It became a struggle to find a lunch table to sit at, where the people didn't cuss, or that would talk to me.
God uses all relationships for his good because now I have met Olivia, and she is one of my best friends. This year, God has led me to become friends with Grace and Maddy, and I wouldn't say we are best friends yet, but God definitely has those relationships in place for a reason.