What to do when your friends harass you?

It comes with a heavy heart that I make this post, but I've been baffled with some thoughts I've had over my time here on Twitch. I've made friends with a dozen or so people on here, but things can get very nasty when you to take things seriously on the business side of Twitch.

I know I have no room to talk because I'm hardly a blip on the radar with Twitch's discovery system. I was working through the pandemic and didn't get the "Covid" buff. ( Instead I got a cancer debuff instead. )

I've seen fairly large streamers get smeared by chat and or their mods as part of a bit or a joke. I've been guilty of this too being a former moderator in a number of my friend's chats, but I also know when the humor among friends can go too far. I've also seen things get very heated real quick over some personal or controversial things stated in chat. Some ToS testing stuff.

I also noticed that some streamers have a specific person, they tolerate because of an incentive given by someone. Like a constant subscriber or donator. Someone they're on "friendly" terms with so they're lenient to them despite being a deplorable person.

I understand Twitch is a community for gamers by gamers and it wouldn't be surprising if there were a few bad eggs in the bunch but I've watched some of my closer online friends harass me and my audience before. I've since cut them out, but building communities again after such an ordeal leaves such a bad taste in my mouth.

I wish to look at other people hopefully but instead I do so in envy sometimes. I keep telling myself "I'll stream out of spite," that I can do it without those toxic people's company but I feel my commentary becoming jaded. It doesn't feel as genuine as it used to. I feel happier in other's people's communities to some extent but it comes with a sense of heartache. I feel ashamed wanting to ask people for help because I understand feelings some people have with self-promotion and well, I'm also afraid the person I'm asking for assistance with will eventually punch me down. The love I had for the hobby is... quickly dissipating and I wanted so much to keep going.

I no longer have a sustainable audience to watch me, I was growing for a moment but now I just go live maybe days or weeks apart with an average of around 3-4 viewers max.

TL;DR: What do you do when friends harass you and you cut them and most of your audience off in the process but want to continue but are now afraid to connect?