Would you let this go? Friend obsessed with narcissists becoming narcissistic!

[PillowQuilt]

Long, and sorry if in wrong topic.

My friend of 30+ years has become obsessed by the idea that both her mother and her ex are narcissists. I've never been overly fond of either of them and I do see my friend's point, but I've literally had 5 years now of monologues about triangulation and golden children and how she was never allowed to really express herself etc. She's always been the more dominant one in our friendship but it's become evident that this is the only subject she's really interested in, and she now sees everything through that lens.

Yesterday we were chatting and she mentioned something about her job that I didn't remember the details of (a tv programme she'd been working on). She got very huffy and said 'it's kind of a big deal actually' and implied I'm another in the list of people who don't care about her. I feel that was extremely unfair, given I listen to her and support her constantly, but I've since looked over our WhatsApp and she never actually sent me the video she was annoyed about me not remembering!

Would you bring this up or is there any point? I can't cover it all in one post but I feel increasingly like she has minimal interest in me other than as a kind of reflecting surface for her. When I 'failed' at that yesterday by not remembering something, her reaction was very telling. Can this kind of relationship be reset or is it too far gone?

Oh, this sounds bad. My mum said Practice makes Perfect. She sounds needy, hard to get rid of and very manipulative. You are worth loads more. Find new friends and go.

5 years of monologuing would be too much for me. It seems she is down the rabbit hole now and very self absorbed. I’ve known similar people, I would take a step back as it’s not a reciprocal friendship. And she doesn’t sound the reflective type!

Ditch her. A lot of people who complain about narcissism in others are actually objecting to people standing up to themselves.

DM accuses me of lack of empathy, and others of various other crimes which all amount to ‘not letting me do what I like when I like’.

Any attempt to stand up to her, and any attempt to have a life of your own, assert your own preferences or even be insufficiently appreciative, are considered terrible injustices.

Oh god a lot of that resonates. 'Not reciprocal' is definitely the case. It's a very long friendship and we used to have great times together so I find it very hard to accept that things have changed so much, but 5 years is definitely too long for it to be a phase!

I know what you mean OP, and personally I wouldn’t cut her off completely but I would just take a step back and focus on other (more reciprocal!) friendships. Being monologued at is exhausting.