Do some people just attract 'drama'?

[Echobelly]

I just wonder about this as I see some people on social media who are forever being 'betrayed' by friends, or having people 'gossip' about them or turn against them, and have relationships bust up spectacularly, but nothing like this has ever remotely happened to me.

I'm sure that's in part as I do keep my emotional distance a bit - I don't have super close, confiding relationships with my friends, I've never had secrets to share and so on. It does seem like more intense people get more of a rollercoaster, but doesn't appeal to me at all. But I suppose they might find my life deathly dull!

[Fdksyihfd]

I sometimes wonder this and the people I’m thinking of don’t have good boundaries and the things that would be red flags to me in a friendship or make me back off don’t have the same effect for them so they become embroiled in arguments and drama.
I had stage of my life where my love life was very dramatic but part of my enjoyed the drama of it and I did know what I was doing to a certain extent.

[LadyWithLapdog]

You’re not alone. My life isn’t an episode of Hollyoaks either.

[Aquamarine1029]

They don't attract drama, they create it. People like that thrive on it.

[GoodGrief100]

@Aquamarine1029

They don't attract drama, they create it. People like that thrive on it.

This

[Fluffycloudland77]

Yeah they enjoy it 🙄 utter loons that they are.

[jollygreenpea]

I think some people see a mountain where others wouldn't even see a mole hill.

Some people have to be over dramatic about every thing, they can't keep a sense of proportion or perspective.

My sister is like this, it's very tiring to deal with, when really there isn't much to deal with in the first place.

[ACPC]

Absolutely they create it. I couldn't attend a night out once as something came up. Organiser had a rare old time posting memes on fb about being let down, betrayed etc

[fairgame84]

What they said. They create it and revel in it. DM is prime example. Always drama but she embellishes a lot and creates drama because she loves the attention.

[In4mation]

I do have really close confiding friendships but we don’t do drama either.

[ImInStealthMode]

Yes there are absolutely people who revel in drama and can create it out of nowhere. I try to avoid them.

[Echobelly]

I see it in DH's family, especially with MIL. It's like, stuff that would not even be noted in my family can escalate into massive screaming rows while I'm sitting there totally

[TheUnbearable]

We meet people and then stuff happens and if you don’t like drama you back away as soon as there is any kind of an inkling. I had enough drama in my childhood to last a lifetime so I avoid anyone like this.

My sister had the same terrible childhood but she absolutely makes drama. Affairs with married men and stuff like that. It’s a craving as that’s what they are used to and need adrenaline and that fix.

[Lettingoffstea]

Absolutely they delight in all the drama they cause
Some people live their lives like a tv soap, and we are their beloved audience. Can be so tiresome

[Sparklingbrook]

Yes I also think they don’t attract drama they produce it. It must be exhausting. It’s exhausting having to listen to it.

[Rosesareyellow]

They don’t attract drama - they invite drama. And they like to use it for attention. Everyone goes through their own difficulties - some broadcast them and some don’t. And many make mountains out of mole hills. Like friendship ‘betrayal’ - you say you haven’t been through this OP but you probably have and just thought ‘meh’ e.g. your friend didn’t turn up for get together you planned. Instead of just thinking ‘meh’ some people post memes on Facebook about how you can’t rely on anyone but yourself (written across a picture of a brooding Tom Hardy) because Donna was 10 minutes late to a casual meet up at Costa.

[SpongeBobJudgeyPants]

@TheUnbearable . That's interesting that you and your sister went in the opposite direction. Good on you for having better boundaries. I do think that often people have had childhoods that were lacking in boundaries, and had lots of drama. Some people, like Unbeatable, have the insight not to get involved. Others are kind of comfortable in a weird way with drama, as it's familiar to them, sadly.

[TeaSoakedDisasterMagnet]

They definitely create it, or at the least they actively seek it out. In my experience people who constantly have drama generally lack the empathy and insight to realise not everything is about them, and hate that not everything is about them. It seems to give them a rush, that they’ve got attention. I’ve also noticed that people so embroiled in drama are terrible with boundaries, both having boundaries and continually crossing the boundaries of other people.

[AdelindSchade]

They create it but can't necessarily always help that. They haven't been taught or learned how to regulate emotions and conduct relationships. Doesn't mean anyone else has to engage with it though, life is too short. Also some folk put everything on facebook. I was really ill this year and it never occurred to me to advertise the fact on social media. But some people are on there with sad faces every time they stub their toe and don't seem to ever worry about washing dirty linen in public.

[Sparklingbrook]

I think it goes along with oversharing which is also tedious.

[Fluffycloudland77]

The best of it is when another family member has drama and the drama inviter loses their shit and starts another drama 😂

[sashagabadon]

Yes. I work with someone like this and it’s draining. I brace myself for the latest thing that’s happened. I’m not interested and don’t care but pretend I am interested as she is a colleague.

[Sparklingbrook]

Yes when you arrive at work-

Drama person-‘Ooh Sparkling you’ll never guess what’s happened to me’
I think I’m not even going to try. Because it will be both and And I’m too busy for it all.

[BiLuminous]

People who have had complicated or difficult childhoods tend to prefer to live in chaos than happiness, because one is much more comfortable and familiar than the other. People get unsettled when they are just happy.
I used to be this way until I had therapy. I couldn't stand happy clappy family days out and stuff like that, it was uncomfortable. Some people never realise this is what they're doing to themselves.

Then there's just some people who are dicks.

[Siriisatwat]

I have had this a few times in my life. I do tend to attract arseholes though and used to be quite well known for something which attracts them in droves.

So when someone was an absolute tosser to me and spread untrue gossip, lots of other people piled in because that person was even better known and they wanted a slice of the drama.

So I had a year or so where lots of so called friends turned on me. Nothing I had done and all due to someone else.

So sometimes it can be really bad luck and getting mixed up with someone who is a prick.

[Quire]

@jollygreenpea

I think some people see a mountain where others wouldn't even see a mole hill.

Some people have to be over dramatic about every thing, they can't keep a sense of proportion or perspective.

My sister is like this, it's very tiring to deal with, when really there isn't much to deal with in the first place.

Yes, I think this is it. There’s a current thread where an OP feels a friend is trying to ‘push her out’ from a new group of mutual friends because they went on a night out organised while the OP was on holidays, and the friend hasn’t yet added her to the relevant WhatsApp group (having been asked yesterday).

Virtually everyone on the thread is talking darkly about ‘a shitty thing to do’ and accusing the friend of bullying and exclusion and strategic forgetfulness and all sorts, whereas, as far as I can see, no one has done anything wrong, and the OP is ascribing malice where I can’t see any evidence of any the OP hasn’t herself created.

I’m a fairly intense person, and my friendships are important to me — and some of them are close and confiding — but in my 49 years I’ve certainly never had anything like the betrayals, backstabbing, arguments, exploitation, unrepaid loans, dramas over hen parties and bridesmaids or opposite-sex friendships that seem to be detailed so often as normal on Mn. My son has been at two schools — at one, the school run was rather lonely when I did it, as it was an insular place and I was a foreigner, and at the second, most are very friendly —but at neither did I regard it as a kind of torment and tie myself into knots about ‘cliques’..

I remain puzzled by the apparently widespread phenomenon of the person described as a ‘friend’ but for whom the OP has visibly neither liking nor respect, and who treats the OP badly, but they continue to spend time together.