Bad friendship breakup

Hello everyone,

Over the past 3 years, I have been having a hard time moving on and completely forgetting about an unfortunate circumstance I had with a former friend.

About 4 years ago, I attended culinary school and it was pretty intense. The instructors weren’t really emotionally supportive of the students and we basically were each others support systems. When I started first semester, I met a girl named Amber and we pretty much had every class together for 6 semesters. So as time went on, we slowly became close and I remember asking her did she want to be friends and she told me “Yes?”. I didn’t think much of that response but I went along with it anyway. After that, we started hanging out outside of school and we even went out to a club for her birthday.

Fast forward to the summer semester and school was just becoming too stressful for me. Mind you, it was only 3 of us in the class- me Amber and for the sake of this story and privacy I will call this other girl Mary. One day in class, I felt so overwhelmed that I completely had a mental breakdown and started crying uncontrollably. Mary was nice enough to comfort me and hug me but I just wasn’t feeling it that day and so I abruptly went home without telling anyone, including my instructor who told me there would be no crying in the kitchen- so that was another reason why I left school that day. I posted on social media that I just left school and didn’t care anymore I was so over it that day. Then comes amber messaging me saying “you should care because you left your comrades” so I then said “like I said I wasn’t feeling well” and she said “I get that but could we at least get a warning”. After that I just blocked her because I didn’t want to hear it. It was bad enough she didn’t bother to ask if I was okay. The next day, Amber was giving me the cold shoulder and the only thing she said to me that day was “clean up the ice cream machine” but I didn’t because I thought that was rude and considering the fact that SHE was the last one to use it so she ended up cleaning it herself.

I forget exactly when I did this but while I was in the classroom by myself, I in a sense invaded amber’s privacy and told two people about it, one of which went back and told amber what I did and so amber sent me an email telling me how I was a sick person for reading her personal thoughts. After that, we ended up having a meeting with the disciplinarian and I ended up apologizing for what I did to her but I also brung up the fact that she was talking crap about me to the class next door about my abrupt leaving and all she could say was “well that was rude” and how I didn’t give her a chance to ask me what was wrong before I left class that day. Like she didn’t even apologize for what she said about me, she just dismissed the whole thing and ultimately made my situation about her.

Once again because Amber felt like my apology wasn’t genuine, I had to apologize AGAIN and she claimed I bullied her for an entire month when that was not the case at all; even the disciplinarian told her that what I did was a case of invasion of privacy and not bullying but nonetheless amber didn’t care. After I apologized, she started back talking to me (sort of) but I should’ve known then that the friendship was over. I tried to reach back out to her and she told me to stop texting her and once again claimed that I bullied her for an entire month and asked do I really think we could be friends again.

Flash forward 3 years later I no longer feel guilt or shame but I do wish things could’ve worked out between us. I really would’ve liked an apology from her but the people I have told have said that will never happen. In hindsight, Amber was a terrible friend to me and almost everyone I told agreed that she did overreact and that she was just a *** person by the way she treated me. I say all this to say even after 3 years I’m still trying to move on and forget it ever happened but it’s easier said than done. Any advice on this thread would be much appreciated.