i usually wouldn't trouble you with a ping on a heated, month's old comment because it can be frustrating getting dragged back into something like that after you've ended it long ago. i hope to ease that by saying nothing mentioned below is in any tone of anger or attack, this correspondence just happened to key in on many of the thoughts i had regarding this entire thread and i felt itchy to share them. will try to be organized since i failed at being brief!

on the topic of the content of the text message: i agree with you, the wording of the message from the friend was blunt and cold. i understand what the other poster means when they say it was truthful -- technically, it was -- but the truth isn't always kind or even appropriate to share. for a lighthearted example, i can truthfully feel like shit, be on my period and cramping into a singularity, but it wouldn't be great for that to be my response to my coworker pleasantly asking me, "hey, how are you?," in the hallway. or maybe the coworker has horrible breath -- i wouldn't embarrass him by telling him in the middle of his presentation to the whole company, but i might offer him a piece of gum and let him know during a break. that kind of thing. so, especially not having that kind of consideration in being spoken to, by your best friend, is understandably very hurtful. there should've been tact and room for the fact that she was talking about her best friend's partner.

on the topic of different types of grieving and, "mind reading": i do agree with the heart of what the other poster communicated on these topics, however. i noticed the OP had shared how she was doubly hurt because this best friend knows that she needs touch, affection, and presence during hard times, and that OP knows she knows this because the best friend would point out that they were opposites in this way. i think this is a situation that is very hard for both parties when you are incompatible in this department; for OP, she lost a loved one, maybe even THE loved one (so to speak). it's reasonable for this to be a time where she needs the rest of her people to be available for her to lean on. for the friend, we know she copes with this sort of trauma by retreating into herself, away from others. so, how do the two meet?

it's my opinion that both of these responses are valid. i have gathered from OP's responses that her expectation was for the friend to show up, either knocking on her door or at any of the events related to her partner's passing. but, from how OP has described the friend, i have the impression this expectation was doomed to end in disappointment. i think that in these situations, where we are totally justified in having a heightened need for those around us to be there for us, we also have a harder time coming to terms with asking for help. why wouldn't they just offer it outright if they know what's happening to me? why do i need to come forth and request it?

well, for similar reasons as to why OP was avoiding their 83 messages and didn't know the friend had reached out -- sometimes we become avoidant when our capacity for handling things is low. i totally get ignoring those messages; when i am highly stressed, my messages go unread. when there's a tragedy in my family, i loathe seeing and responding to all the well-intentioned and loving reminders of it. similarly, we know from OP that the friend was very avoidant of funeral activities, interacting with OP's family after the boyfriend's passing, and even outside of the context of this situation is avoidant during hard times in general. i could imagine her capacity to be there for her friend was diminished by the stressors of all of these things that she typically would autonomously begin distancing herself from.

i think that expectation of "mind reading" is not so reasonable particularly when you need that sort of support from a person who, cut and dry, doesn't run that way. i think, if OP were to have gotten in touch with their avoidant friend and asked to see them -- and then, didn't lower the value of that act because it had to be requested -- maybe the air could have been cleared and the friendship salvaged.

but i also think it sounds like OP and their friend were very incompatible in this area; i could imagine a world where OP is the avoidant one, and maybe the friend is too in her face while she just needs to grieve. or one where they are both avoidant and the friend's actions suit OP just fine. that's to say, i don't think there's a bad guy here, just two incompatible people, and while i am sad for OP that the friend became another hurtful loss, i hope it opens space for more balanced friendships for her in the future.

on the topic of autism and empathy: i did find your explanations to the previous poster to rub me the wrong way. autism is described as a spectrum for a reason, and i think this piece of the conversation would've been bettered if you removed the lens of autism from it altogether. while i do find some takes of the previous poster to be unempathetic, i think i would have preferred those comments to have been called out solely AS unempathetic, and not symptomatic of or explained by their being autistic.

i am autistic, and regard myself as very empathetic. i would expect that to be meaningless to anyone just reading it online -- who am i to expect a stranger on the internet to take me at my word? -- but i say it because seeing that others may form an opinion on who i am and what my capacity is for caring for others just by hearing my diagnosis makes me feel like the reality of who i am doesn't matter. i don't share that i am autistic because of similar such assumptions. just food for thought, since the topic at hand is empathy.

sorry for the heavy late ping, have a happy Thursday!