Best friend only wants to catch up with me (childfree) at kid-oriented venues

For me the nail in the coffin was when one of my mum friends brought her 10 year old daughter to a hen do meal and then started picking on everyone else for wanting to order alcohol as it was “setting a bad example”.

She’d been like the mum in the OP for years and we’d been putting up with it, but for whatever reason nobody thought she’d be that bonkers. I think she lost quite a few of her mates that night.

So yeah - this behaviour doesn’t always stop when the kids go to school!

@GreenClock She absolutely shouldn’t feel an obligation to put up with this until the kids are teens - another 10+ years when she’s already done 7 - to support her mate. It’s particularly galling that you blithely say that the DH may be just happy to let his wife do all the parenting! God forbid he be under any sort of obligation as the father. Nope - the obligation as always falls on some random woman with no familial connection to the kids.

@EmmaEmerald You should post about this on the MNetters without children board. Name change was made to ensure that both childless and childfree are welcome, and I can’t see how anyone would be offended by what you’ve said here.

After reading multiple threads on here about people going for a coffee with girl friends and bringing their 16 year old son or similar I'd worry it might never end.

I'd keep inviting her to adult stuff just in case but would probably write this friendship off. If people want to choose to only spend time with their kids that's fine but you need to be realistic about the consequences.

She is really going to struggle when they’re older and don’t want to spend every minute with her. It’s not healthy for all your identity to be wrapped up in being a mum.

I would find these meet-ups really tedious and boring but I suppose if you think she is and has been in the past a really good friend and don’t want to loose the friendship maybe you just need to put up with this for the next few years until the kids get a bit older and more independent and trips to the playground etc are no longer a thing

Since she has been her very good friend for so many years I think you are just going to have to be a bit more direct with her and tell her that you don't want to do these things every single time.

Who knows though, maybe she's always been this way and has always been the one who get her way and to take more than she gives?

The offering to pay/drive is not about 'being a good friend', it's about controlling the destination. Also, if she had expected you to PAY! to go to the petting zoo, you'd have been more likely to stand up and say no.

Maybe OP, you were best mates for 20 years. 20 years is a long time, she's probably your oldest friend.

However - 'old friend' is not the same as 'good friend'. 'Old friends' are people you have a shared past with. 'Good friends' are people you have a shared present with. 'Old friends' can be 'good friends' too. But she is really only an 'old friend' now. She refuses to have a shared present, insisting on you attending her personal present. No sharing.

I suspect it won’t last more than a couple more years, but feel your pain!

@hydriotaphia I've worked full time for most of my kids' lives. And socialised. Eldest is now 18 and we're very close. It is possible to keep friendships, work and be a good close parent. I divorced last year & lost a parent recently and my friendships kept me going. Friendships are very important, more so as your kids get older and you age yourself. Being a parent will always be my top priority but it doesn't have to be at the expense of everything else in my life.

@GreenClock Why should OP stay in her life to pick up the pieces?

Also, that might not happen. I've had older and younger friends and I've seen the older ones morph into "must stay at home in case the kids need me" when the kids are teens, as well as chauffeuring round.

If there's something I wish someone had told me when my friends started having children, it would be "don't make too much effort".

People are entitled to live as they want, so I'd not criticise this lady for those choices, but OP, I think it's worth being aware this might not change.

I am actually starting to feel sorry for here children.

"She feels much happier and complete when they're with her."
Do they even get playdates in their friends' houses? As in, dropped off to play with their friends and the friend's mother watches them? Or does she attend those too, following them around the friend's house, never letting them out of her grasp sight?

She is absolutely suffocating them, and there are two extremes that OP's friend is opening up as possibilities for her children.

1. The child cannot operate independently because they're never allowed to so much as try. The fact that their mother won't let them out of sight leads the child to think it's because she's 'keeping them safe' and begin to wonder just what she's keeping them safe from. Their imagination creates all sorts of bogeymen, they start limiting themselves to their mum's restrictions. These timid children become adult in age, but infantilised. They're still living at home in their forties, single. This suits their suffocating mother.
2. The child rebels against the excessive presence of their mother, and feeling under scrutiny whenever at home. They become secretive about their school life, because it's the only life they have without her being there. They distance themselves emotionally from their mother, and may either go off the rails or leave home just as soon as they can. Mother starts wailing to their face how she feels incomplete without them, and drives child further away.

Having read your updates I’ve changed my mind. I don’t think she’s a user and I do think that you need to stay in her life to support her when the kids are teens and there’s the inevitable meltdown when they make it clear that they don’t want to be smothered any more.

Her DH should be noticing this unhealthy behaviour and trying to discourage it. But perhaps he’s happy enough with the status quo if she’s doing most of the parenting legwork. Selfish but understandable.

In your position I’d probably suck it up for her sake tbh because she’s a decent mate in other ways and you’ve been close for so long.

@Fofftwenty21 have DM'd you.

So what are you actually going to do about it?

You're friends is obviously struggling with parenting but you are definitely not being unreasonable. You have been lovely and really patient but enough is enough. In my experience these people just take take take and this won't be reciprocated. It's OK to let this friendship cool a bit she might come back to you...but she might not. That's fine not all friendships last. Just suit yourself a bit more.

I did also say ‘both’ as this applies equally
to both parents.

@hydriotaphia

you matter too!
take some time to see your friends so that when your kids are older you haven’t lost them all! Go for a cocktails, mocktails, whatever with them.
you matter too!

Apologies if someone else had mentioned this, but could her DH be controlling? Maybe she's not allowed out to see friends or to have friends over so seeing you with the children is her only option to maintain your friendship. I may be way off the mark but those were the vibes I was getting.

Well I know what it feels like to want to prioritise stuff that's important to me and choose that over different options. In this case it's her children. Of course I don't know how she feels, we can only apply that to ourselves but I have empathy, intelligence and imagination so 'l kinda know'.

No criticism from me. Like I said, my thoughts are kindly meant from a place of experience.

I am not under any illusions that I will keep up any of my old friendships except those that I have been actively maintaining (ie with close friends). TBH I have a very strong sense of self through my career and see a lot less of my children than most mums I know (most of whom are SAHPs or work PT/reduced hours). I do feel that it's easy to criticise working mothers for getting it wrong, but I personally am comfortable that I will not regret prioritising career progression and a relationship with my kids over socialising. I don't think men who are ambitious get them same level of criticism tbh. However, I appreciate this may apply less to the OP's friend who works PT herself.

I mean this very kindly having been where you are but you both need to try and find a way to have a strong coffee and see your friends on the odd occasion. Otherwise you will come out of the other side of early parenting with a diminished sense of self to find that your former friends have moved on.

Yes I stopped drinking due to pregnancy and then breastfeeding and never started again.

Well he can and does but he already does the lion's share of housework/childcare so I like to be home when I can. I don't go out in the evenings at the moment as I breastfeed my youngest every night. Which suits me as a way to connect before anyone tells me to stop...

@hydriotaphia

did you become tee total when you became a parent like OP’s mate?