Off loading friends - say something or just distance

[Gatecrasher61]

I have a couple of "friends" who only ever seem to contact me when they want something. Either they want to borrow something or they are down and need cheering up. Both have a negative and insular outlook on life and leave me feeling totally drained.

I have decided not to spend any more time with them and concentrate on friends who will be there for me on the rare occasion when I have something I want help with sorting.

So what is the best option to off load friends. Do I just make myself unavailable or do I tell them. Personally I would prefer just to distance myself, but one of them has a habit of inviting themselves over.

Distance yourself. If you be blunt with them you're only going to create a argument where you will be seen as the bad cop when actually good for you for not wanting to be around people who bring you down. You have friends who will be there for you so keep hold of them.

I recently did this with a 'draining' friend ... We've got on fine in the past , but I was starting to realise she just made me feel crap all the time. So I distanced myself from her. I'm still polite and friendly, I just don't 'engage' as much as I used to, and I'm happier for it .
To be honest she's so self absorbed she barely noticed !

LOL - actually Duchess you are probably right. Annoyingly my self-absorbed friend has been in touch recently, only because she wants to invite herself to a social event we have every year. She has never bothered in the past, even though she was invited. Now we (my SO can't stand her) don't want to invite her, she wants to come.

Rainbow, you make a good point. I think it is better to distance myself, but part of me thinks it is a bit of a coward's way out.

It sounds like you'd have to go out of your way to get in contact, just in order to say "we're going to ditch you", which seems a bit extreme for people who haven't done anything specifically awful. I don't think there's anything cowardly about being "unavailable" to people who aren't in contact that often anyway - different if you saw them regularly and wanted to go from that to zero.

Just focus on people who are a benefit to your happiness, and be unavailable to the drains. But you may need to be more clear about if if they do try to invite themselves over and don't seem able to accept vagueness/excuses.

Well another friend of mine said recently that she was only going to surround herself with people who make her happy, i think it's a good way to live !!