When did someone show you their true colours?

[vickynotvicy]

What a gut wrenching feeling when someone you thought you liked and respected suddenly shows their true colours, and you realise they were never actually the person you thought and never really a friend at all.

I’m 42, so not a spring chicken, but honestly, that feeling has completely floored me. I’m still trying to process it. Has anyone else experienced this? How did it come about, and how did things work out in the end?

An employee who became what I thought was a good friend, seemed to have my back, had great laughs together...turns out she had been trying to get with my xh, and business partner, and was planning to oust me from my own business. It was so insidious but I found out afterwards that she hadnt fooled other staff. Sacked and the workplace improved 100%.

She's the only person I refer to as a cunt

Why was your mother at the funeral then

My ex fiancee. When it all came out about his cheating and I wanted to know the details (what was I thinking!!), I asked him where he had met her and how long it had been going on for. He told me it was none of my f*** business. Pure vitriol in his voice. It was like he enjoyed seeing me upset. In the 12 years I had known him, he had never spoken to me like that and I had never seen that side of him. In that moment, I realised I never really knew him and had wasted over a decade of my life.

Met my former friend at new hire day, we hit it off, had lunch and coffee together. Worked the same wards every so often. We could chat and have a laugh.

I can keep secrets and people tell me thing that I don't want to or need to know. I knew when her mother was dying, when she married and divorced (people at work didn't know). I knew she was dating someone and really happy when she remarried. Her life had been hard, she was the most irreverant person I knew. No hijab, loved a bacon sandwich, had support for the military stickers on her car. Refugee, new education in a new land. I vouched for her on wards that I worked on, so she could be trained for them.

After about 12 years our husbands met and it turned out they actually liked each other. Had a few meals together, just social chit chat.

We got a new hire who saw herself as a leader among nurses of her religion and background.

I know the day, I was trashed to my former friend. I literally walked in on it and saw her face in the distance.

I was told that we could no longer be friends as I was not trustworthy or loyal. I was a gossip, etc.

Even our manager was appalled by the breakdown. 16 years down the drain because of a truly nasty woman.

Just before I retired she started talking to me, two years of being ignored. Every so often she appears on my list of "people you might know" on Facebook.

I miss her, but if someone who comes from the same religious background can be believed over me, I don't want to risk a repeat.

Yeah it's usually someone in a position of authority. Teachers, lecturers, team leaders. I don't remember experiencing it with friends.

My mum

I guess, she'd always been that way, but only when I had my DD did I see what she was really like when it came to me

💐 To all here xx

Really hope you’re okay OP, so sorry you’re in this position x

For me, my best friend of many decades cut me off (and my mum and siblings) for a couple of months after MY dad’s tree planting where his ashes were interred because she was pissed that someone she didn’t like had gone to the planting and she hadn’t. During that time of her blanking us, some further really difficult things happened to us as a family which she was aware of (my sibling had updated family on SM and she’d seen it all) and still didn’t reach out. When she finally broke the silence it was to say that she’d seen red and needed time away to cool down and that it was the right thing for her to have done, and continued to talk badly about the other person. Still reeling from it if I’m honest and it’s been nearly a year!

I had similar years ago

It's with the benefit of hindsight (and mumsnet) that I can see now he was a sponging,narcissistic cocklodger but at the time,I really loved him and thought that he really loved me

Just after I'd had his baby,it all came out in the wash that he'd been shagging my best mate,all the way through my pregnancy,the night I'd given birth and about twice a week afterwards (while I was still trying to recover from the birth,breastfeed and run around after my other dc on no sleep)

He came back to pick up his clothes and other bits and i'll never forget the look of spite and the venom in his voice when he told me he'd never loved me,had only been using me for sex,a home,money and that I'd baby trapped him (with our ds who was very much planned)

They broke up after about 6 weeks (she lived with her mother,who enabled her behaviour,no matter how bad it was and who saw him for what he was and put pressure on him to grow up and get a job rather than sponging from the pair of them)

He tried to come snivelling back not long after but I'd had enough and couldn't unhear his words

So he tried to get his revenge by dragging me through court,lost interest and fucked off into the sunset (while refusing to pay for his ds)

He came back a few years later to try and get me back into bed see ds but lost interest again whenI refused to give him a pity shag or two and walked out of my house and disappeared (he's not been seen or heard from in about 15 years)

She sent me a fb message about 9 years ago,to tell me I should say I'm sorry,that she might forgive me for all I've done to her and that she might consider being mates with me again if I was sorry enough

I blocked her arse so fast i almost got whiplash

When I was diagnosed with MS and my boyfriend of a couple of years told me he realised "I just don't love you enough to push you around in a wheelchair"... I was still processing myself, and it felt very brutal! Made the break-up easier though - now with an absolute Prince, everything happens for a reason...

Someone I had considered my best friend throughout my twenties (but who my husband always felt was a bit selfish) who dropped me when I was experiencing fertility issues and stopped drinking etc. I wasn't moping about being a wet blanket, I still wanted to go out and have fun, but I was focussed on doing everything I could to support my fertility, so I gave up alcohol, and I focussed on saving my money towards IVF should we need it. She wasn't at all interested or bothered by any of it.
During her heartbreaks, work problems, friend fall outs - all the usual ups and downs of life - I'd been there for her, but when I needed her support and care, she just wasn't there.
We've talked about it since and she said that my troubles gave her anxiety about her own potential fertility journey that she might one day have and she couldn't cope.
That might be true, but I still think it is a weak friend who turns your current difficulties into a concentrated fear for their future potential trouble!
I've never been able to see her the same way.

Mine was a work one but my workplace changed overnight (company takeover). Our teams merged and people were bullied out. I saw HER from the start… she showed her colours to me but everyone else thought she was a superstar. 3 years later… everyone sees it and she performs in a team meeting and no one is impressed - it’s entertaining now.i stick true to my values and carried on being me. She now can’t slag me off to the team because they know me and are no longer drawn into her drama.

Another was a long term friend in Covid. Not very interesting but she came over after minimal interaction, spoke about herself and left. Never once asked how I was. I was done.

Friends and family when I suffered with a really bad depressive episode and was dropped or verbally attacked for it. With an ex when he said he'd disown our own son if they turned out to be gay because he didn't like football.

That’s so sad. People are always saying to talk to them if you’re depressed etc. but when you talk about it, they euther give you a wide berth or have a go at you for feeling sorry for yourself and bringing their mood down!

A friend of 30 years. Told her I had PTSD and she ghosted me.

I have had this, OP and it’s shocking and very upsetting. Someone I thought was a friend suddenly turned on me over something quite trivial, shouted at me (in public with another friend present) and refused to speak to me again. We were work colleagues as well - it was deeply distressing, and I never really knew what I had said to trigger this. It came out of nowhere.

I have good friends who I’ve had for years so although I’m sure I can be annoying sometimes, I don’t think I’m a bad person or hard to get on with. Despite knowing that this was really down to her insecurities and not anything I’d done, I was left shaken and very upset and it made me very wary of getting friendly with new people.

I hope you are ok; the other person’s behaviour doesn’t mean you have done anything wrong, and you are probably better off for finding out what they are really like.

That is distressing. I had similar and it left me shaken-up too. Even though the friend, has reacted with similar anger towards others

I think many, if not most women find out their husband's true colours at the end of their marriage. You have no idea who you're married to until you tell him you want a divorce.

Someone I'd done a lot for was really ungrateful and even said the chores I'd done for them weren't correct!

Someone else accused me of doing something to some animals of theirs even though I was the one that rescued most of these 'pets' and wouldn't have dreamt of hurting them!

Trivial one, but it's quite telling when you are ill (even slightly) and people don't even pretend to care.

Death, divorce and alcohol tend to show people's worst side. I wouldn't go as far as saying their true colours, but definitely shows where you stand on their pecking order.

Im adopted. I found my birth mother through Friends Reunited when I was 17. She said she loved and missed me etc etc would spend every weekend at hers with her at the time second DH.

As soon as her younger daughter was old enough to come on the train to see her or whatever, she dropped me. I guess the novelty wore off and she really wanted her proper child.

I let a friend stay at my house for free when she was homeless and she did nothing but slag off my home to mutual friends. Turns out beggars can be choosers.

I was attacked in the street by a bully from my school when I was about 13. I was short and skinny, she was tall and strong. She grabbed two fistfuls of hair close to the scalp, lifted me off my feet and shook me. I struggled and tried to scream. My best friend from the age of three was with me and just walked away. She didn't know the bully, lived in another county, and there was no possible repercussions for her, but she walked away because 'she didn't want to get involved'. The bully was on her own.

Eventually a woman crossed over the road from a bus stop and told the her to stop, and I was able to get free. We stayed in touch for a couple of years after that but I could never trust her again and it spoiled the memory of our friendship.

I'm so sorry for your loss and the lack of support that followed.

My best friend of twenty something years. Loved her, she was one of two people who’ve ever truly understood me. I told her something in confidence and she told another friend who used it against me. Apparently that’s what they always did, used my traumatic happenings as gossip to laugh about over a glass of wine.
Knew then and there I’d never trust her again. Haven’t spoken to her since.

A shame but taught me a very valuable lesson.