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A couple of years ago, Fleabag author Phoebe Waller Bridge said on ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour: 'Friendships are the greatest romances of our lives'. A sentiment that resonated with a lot of listeners.

But what happens when friendship goes wrong? How can friendships be repaired, and should we even try?

In a new series called 'Friends Forever?' on Woman’s Hour, Annie and Lizzie told the story of their tumultuous friendship, which involved Lizzie ghosting Annie and the pair not talking for more than 20 years.

They spoke, separately, to our reporter Jo Morris about their long friendship. Read on to find out what happened, and if they ever reunited.

‘We were kindred spirits’

Annie and Lizzie met at school in 1978, in the sixth form of a boys’ boarding school. There were only 50 girls in a school of 600.

“It was a very strange experience’, says Lizzie. “Beyond that it was also a place I wasn't particularly happy being at. At the time my mum and dad were not having a very easy time together. The thinking was that if I went to boarding school, it would take me away from this difficult situation.

“If you’d seen us hanging out at school, you’d have seen us in the art department snorting with laughter. It was a very establishment school, so being a bit arty, being a bit different, being a bit left wing, you slightly stuck out. We were, I suppose, kindred spirits.

“Of all the people in that year, Ann was the person I felt I had most in common with”, says Lizzie, who called Annie, Ann. “I found school very difficult. Because of various things going on at home it was really important to find friends who could be supportive to you. There were very few that were really my tribe. Ann is incredibly compassionate and warm.”

For Annie, Lizzie stood out from the other girls at school.

“The school had a lot of girls coming in who were sort of a bit Mean Girls-y, I think, and she was not like that. She was slightly awkward, clever, quite intense. I don't think I thought she was cool, but she was cool.

“My friendship with Lizzie became better and closer after school. We were at different universities, but we used to write to each other a lot. And I remember going to stay with her. She came down to stay with me. She had a nice group of friends who were always very interesting and cool and clever.”

‘I expected that she’d always be a friend. I certainly didn’t expect there to be a rift’

But in their twenties, things began to change in Annie and Lizzie’s friendship. Ann met her husband at university, they moved in together, got married and had a child.

“I think for me, that was so far from where I was in my life, I probably deep down found it difficult to be around her”, says Lizzie.

“Ann had a competence of who she was, not just being a mum and a wife but she was also studying teacher training and knew what she wanted to do vocationally. Whereas I was still trying to work out what I wanted to be.

“I think that confidence of knowing who she was and being happy in her skin, I pushed that away because it was everything I wasn't.”

“I expected that she'd always be a friend”, says Annie. “I certainly didn't expect there to be a rift.

“I was ticking along with my career and my home life. Lizzie was part of that, but not every week, I don't think. I could have probably been more inclusive and kinder and made more effort.”

‘Basically, I ghosted her'

Soon after Annie’s first child was born, Lizzie decided to cut off contact.

“I just pushed her away”, says Lizzie. “She never neglected me. It was me who neglected her. I was probably jealous. Basically, I ghosted Ann. It's not the word that would have been used in the early 90s. But I ghosted her. I stopped returning her phone calls and tried to cease contact in a most immature way, which I'm not proud of. I'm ashamed.

“Ann rumbled that there was something up because she wrote me a lovely letter to try and understand why I wasn't returning her calls and understand the rift in our friendship. I can remember being in the corner of my bedroom, reading the letter, and I remember feeling cornered, like I didn't have an answer. I didn't even reply to that letter.”

“I'm a bit stubborn”, says Annie. “So I probably kept trying. Too long, probably. A mutual friend of ours said, 'You know what? She's entitled to make the decision if she doesn't want to see you. You have to let her'. So I stopped.

“Probably my pride was quite hurt. I thought, ‘Why aren't I good enough for you?’”

‘I just put my head down and turned away’

In the years after Lizzie cut off contact with her, Annie tried to move on.

“I thought about Lizzie and every now and then I'd sort of Google or whatever, when you could start Googling. But I didn't think about what she'd be thinking. It's that fear of being 16 and people not wanting to be your friend, or 10 and not being in the gang.

“The longer it went, the less easy it became to sort of connect”, says Lizzie.

“I was worried about bumping into Ann. I felt really embarrassed for my bad behaviour.

“There was one time when I did see her walking down the street. It must have been about 18 or 19 years after. She was striding and looked beautiful and so sophisticated. I just put my head down and turned away.”

‘20 years later, I’d made friends with myself’

It was over 20 years later that Lizzie and Annie saw each other again.

“A very dear friend and colleague was very seriously ill”, says Lizzie. “It made me really reflect on life and death and what's important in life and being a good person, but also the importance of friendship. I was also now with my husband and I'd made friends with myself. Facebook was there so I thought, I wonder if she's on Facebook. And she was. So I sent a friend request.”

Annie says she didn’t really know why Lizzie contacted her out of the blue but she was “really, really, really happy”. “We had a correspondence and she invited me for Sunday lunch a couple of weeks later.”

“I can remember going up the path thinking in a few seconds, I'm going to see someone I haven't seen for 20 years”, says Lizzie. “And I just remember the door opening and we both burst into tears. It was just very, very joyous.”

“We both said, ‘You look just the same’”, says Annie. “Obviously we don't, but we feel like we look and are the same. It felt very easy. Immediately.”

Lizzie noted that Annie still had her “punkish, short Jean Seberg hair”. “She knows who she is. To me, that's so cool.”

‘We want to be good friends now and to look after each other’

Both Lizzie and Annie think their relationship has changed since they reconnected after more than 20 years.

“When my mum was very ill, Annie came to visit my mum”, says Lizzie. “Lots of friends were really quite kind and generous and checking in with me. But Ann was the friend who'd go, 'I'm coming down to take you out for lunch. I'm doing it. Now.' She, along with a couple of my other really good women friends, came to my mum's funeral and I feel like she's there.”

“We want to be good friends and to look after each other”, says Annie.

‘Friendship is a lovely thing. Value it’

Do Annie and Lizzie have any advice for people who might be going through this right now – a friendship interrupted or a friendship break-up?

“Maybe be more honest with yourself about how you're being so that you can think about things from someone else's point of view”, suggests Annie. “It's very easy to get caught up in your own world.”

“If a person is living and you cared about them once, I'd say try and repair it”, says Lizzie. “Friendship is good. It's a good, lovely thing. Value it.”

To listen to Annie and Lizzie’s story in Woman’s Hour’s ‘Friends Forever?’ series, head to ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ Sounds and the episode from 31 August.
Join the conversation on Twitter and Instagram @bbcwomanshour.