Jasmine, who grew up in Canada but now lives in London, says she’s never had a big group of girlfriends and thinks there’s a stigma around being a “bad friend” that comes from how female friendships are portrayed on TV.

“There’s this narrative of female friendships being so important – you’re supposed to have three or four [female] best friends you can turn to for anything, like in Sex And The City or The Sisterhood Of The Travelling Pants. It’s pushed on you that you [should] form these close bonds.”

Georgina Sturmer, a counsellor and member of the British Association for Counselling & Psychotherapy, agrees there’s a gendered aspect to friendship that goes back to the school playground.

“From a really young age, we’re building this image that you’re of value and worth if you have lots of friends. We ask ‘how many friends have you got?’ and ‘do you have a best friend?’ – and they’re questions we ask really young girls that we don’t tend to ask boys,” she explains.

“The impact that has on you as [a woman] when you grow up is that you see yourself in terms of success and failure [based on] how many friends you have. I don’t think boys have that same pressure.”

George, who now lives in Worcestershire, says her experience made her doubt herself and changed how she behaved.

“I questioned whether I come across as really brutal and reassessed the way I interact with people who have a different view of the world,” she says. “I care so much about being a good friend, it’s one of those things that’s integral to how I view myself, and I think a lot of women see it as a big part of their self-concept. Being told you’re a bad friend really makes you reassess what you think you know about yourself.”

Sturmer says it’s normal to look inward in these situations and think ‘what did I do?’ because we take cues about ourselves from the people around us. “If the world says we’re good then we believe that we are,” she explains. “We don’t take on board that they might just saying ‘you did a bad job’ not ‘you’re a bad person’. And that rattles us, it’s destabilising.”

So what can you do in this kind of situation? Sturmer recommends taking a breath and assessing whether you have in fact behaved badly, or whether the other person’s anxieties or insecurities are perhaps at play. Then, if possible, have a conversation about it.

“We’re only human, and we’re all guilty of slip-ups. Maybe you have been selfish, or unkind, or unreliable. Or maybe you’re just having a bad moment and you’re being hard on yourself,” she says. “Own your behaviour and chat to your friend about it. Sometimes a mark of a good friendship is about how we recover and repair our relationship when it’s been tested.”

*Names have been changed

Why being called a bad friend feels like the worst insult of all