A former friend (23M) contacted me after hearing I'm (24F) engaged and it's confused me

For background, I had a group of very close friends for the first half of my undergrad,(so 18 months friendship I guess?) we were very much in each others pockets and the friend from the title practically lived with me for a while. At the start of my 2nd year I suffered a big and fairly traumatic bereavement which meant I pretty much vanished for a solid week to make arrangements etc. After I returned from this by the time I managed to get my head together, all of this group had begun avoiding me: I'm talking walking out of rooms when I entered etc. It was a very difficult and hurtful period for me and I was never able to really find out what had caused such a deep rift. I did hear afterwards from multiple sources that some very horrible rumours were being spread by this group, which really compounded the issue.

Thankfully I met the love of my life later that year and managed to enjoy the rest of my undergrad! We've now been together 4 years and (touch wood) should be getting married next year! My old college does a cute alumnus announcement thing and my fianceé and I submitted our happy news in the most recently published version.

All this is to preface the fact that I got a message on Friday from the person I would have considered myself closest to in this group- congratulating me on my engagement, saying they'd always known me and my girlfriend would go the distance (they've never met her) and wondering why we never kept in touch after that first year. He joked about how he was looking forward to being my maid of honour (a very very old joke among that group) and generally seemed under the impression that we'd all naturally drifted apart.

I've not responded obviously and tbh have no intention to; the whole thing really hurt me and took a long time to process. My fiancee and the friends I made later in college (who I'm still super close to, 2 of them live next door) has reassured me that I'm not somehow misremembering or exaggerating the whole experience, but it's really thrown me for a loop and I'm doubting my own mind?

I'd really appreciate any advice from someone looking at the situation from the outside, without any emotional investment to cloud their judgement? Am I being over dramatic getting spooked and confused over this?

Tl;dr: Someone I had a very bad friendship breakdown with contacted me about my upcoming marriage. It's making me doubt my own experiences, please advise!

Submitted April 26, 2020 at 12:02AM

For background, I had a group of very close friends for the first half of my undergrad,(so 18 months friendship I guess?) we were very much in each others pockets and the friend from the title practically lived with me for a while. At the start of my 2nd year I suffered a big and fairly traumatic bereavement which meant I pretty much vanished for a solid week to make arrangements etc. After I returned from this by the time I managed to get my head together, all of this group had begun avoiding me: I'm talking walking out of rooms when I entered etc. It was a very difficult and hurtful period for me and I was never able to really find out what had caused such a deep rift. I did hear afterwards from multiple sources that some very horrible rumours were being spread by this group, which really compounded the issue.Thankfully I met the love of my life later that year and managed to enjoy the rest of my undergrad! We've now been together 4 years and (touch wood) should be getting married next year! My old college does a cute alumnus announcement thing and my fianceé and I submitted our happy news in the most recently published version.All this is to preface the fact that I got a message on Friday from the person I would have considered myself closest to in this group- congratulating me on my engagement, saying they'd always known me and my girlfriend would go the distance (they've never met her) and wondering why we never kept in touch after that first year. He joked about how he was looking forward to being my maid of honour (a very very old joke among that group) and generally seemed under the impression that we'd all naturally drifted apart.I've not responded obviously and tbh have no intention to; the whole thing really hurt me and took a long time to process. My fiancee and the friends I made later in college (who I'm still super close to, 2 of them live next door) has reassured me that I'm not somehow misremembering or exaggerating the whole experience, but it's really thrown me for a loop and I'm doubting my own mind?I'd really appreciate any advice from someone looking at the situation from the outside, without any emotional investment to cloud their judgement? Am I being over dramatic getting spooked and confused over this?Tl;dr: Someone I had a very bad friendship breakdown with contacted me about my upcoming marriage. It's making me doubt my own experiences, please advise!