I've had 4 real friends and I can tell you that I've given more than enough reason for them to stop caring about me. Sometimes I would disappear for 6 months, other times I would call in with whatever problem I was going through and just saying way more than I should've, and they never left me if they didn't have any actual reason. So if this friendship of your is as strong as you feel, a setback like this shouldn't be too hard to recover from. Of course, 5 months isn't a lot of time, I've know these people for 7 years, I don't want to give you false hope that things will turn out ok, and if they don't you'll just have to move on. I once lost a very good friend of mine because of my stupidity and haven't really been able to get over it, but I just try to not think too much about it.