Harsh friend - Aibu & what would you do

[Sunbeam22]

I have a friend who I have known since I was 18. We get on well, have never argued.

For the past two years all she has done when we meet up is complain and criticise other people. People at work and especially her cousin. My friend H is soo harsh that sometimes I want to challenge her reg her comments. I'm at the point where I'm saying that I'm not available to meet up just aiming to limit the amount of time with her. We don't meet up much say every month. She would ring me and rant.

She often gets huffy when I don't agree with her. I.e H always complains about her cousin meeting up 10 mins late due to having a baby. So friend H says "I'm sick of cousins putting that baby before me". I would say H it's hard getting out of the house with a young baby, all of a sudden a nappy needs changing you can't control it.

Then my friend tells me how she doesn't like her cousins little baby girl, or the girl always winges when mummy leaves the room. I always say its normal!

H cousin fell pregnant again and all H my friend did was ring me to complain I kept my mouth shut as i thought if I open it I would have said what I was thinking (none of your business!). H was saying why can't cousin be happy with just one baby why did she have to have another - I'm like wtf?! H cousin have cysts and I told h that she will be friend whilst pregnan she will get extra care and tell her contrtulations from me it's fab news, all I could hear was pouting.

My friend h is now pregnant but she is still not happy. She even said "my baby will not rule me" type comments. H mother is a chronic complainer. The type where they can drain you. I think she is turning into her mother.

I'm a bit pissed off and have found she has been winging about me. Her mother rang left a voice mail on behalf of my friend H and started complaining and forgot to put the phone down and I could hear my friend in the background laughing.

Im going off her completely. Can anyone relate?

I really want to limit the contact or do you think I should be up front and tell her how I feel ? I just don't want that type of person in my life soooo draining.

I think it's important to have a bitch and a moan and be here or tour friends but to be a chronic complainer when there is nothing to complain about is just doing my head in.

Any advice?

Cross-post, glad to see you're considering sense.

Friends don't have to delight us every minute of every day. Some whingeing is OK, having to be supportive once in a while is actually nice. But there is no balance here. It's not good for you. You get nothing positive out of this friendship.

Thanks for your comments it's helped me sort my head out a bit.

I'm going to think about what to say then move on.

I think what annoys me the most is her horrible attitude towards a youn baby girl. She just sounds jealous of a child - sickening

Polite reminder to her that her life would be a happier place if she wasnt so negative?

Start singing "Always look on the bright side of life" every time you see/talk to her.

I've got one of those. She's just emigrated and isn't currently speaking to me because I didn't tell her I was pregnant the last time we met in person (at a wedding, before my scan, we hadn't told anyone)

My life is a happier place.

In the past when I've pulled her up on her dementor like qualities she's called me horrid and sulked and cried to anyone who would listen. In the end our friendship was reduced to other people's weddings because we moved away and despite her never visiting me in my new home she complained bitterly that I never visited her.

In my experience, my friends are all good people. So when one of them gets very negative, it's not because she's a bad person or needs to be dropped, quite the opposite in fact. People who aren't happy can either sit and wallow, try to do something to make themselves happier, or fall into the trap of being negative about everyone and everything around them to make themselves feel better.

Are you really that bad a character judge that you've chosen a truly awful friend? Could there be something wrong?

I'm going through the same that atm with my dad. He thinks the world is too horrible, things are too difficult to achieve, people are all awful, nothing is worth doing. I'm worried, that's not him but he's been gradually declining more and more and I hope something changes soon. I won't be abandoning him though because I think he needs a friend and a daughter. Good people can do bad things, doesn't mean they should be dropped unless we are bloody sure they've actually turned bad.

I would scale back the friendship drastically- negativity is catching and friends like this pull you down. I would start being less available and hang with a more positive crew!

Sorry, posted too soon.

So yes, I can empathise. This person spends a lot of time dedicating herself to pointing out how unhappy others are, how she can't understand why anyone would have children at our age (late 20s-early 30s) and how hard he's life is (she has a job she likes, which comes with a free apartment and is in the one place in the world she wanted to live, she's married to a lovely man who treats her like the princess she thinks she is. Hardly hard times)

The majority of this comes from her mother and her own self esteem issues. But I tried the softly softly approach first, tried to get her to talk, to help her build herself up and was ignored and rebuffed at every opportunity. So now I'm out. She doesn't like kids and I'll shortly have two. I fully expect to never hear from her again, I certainly won't be the one to make the first move.

I hope you find a solution OP. This is not a healthy situation. You already know she talks about you behind your back so you have nothing to lose!

I think you can afford to be very blunt with her. When she starts whinging can you suggest she might be depressed and could she talk to her GP? Tell her you overheard her whinging about you to her mum.

If she isn't depressed, it's probably just habit. Can you only respond to the positives. Respond with positives if she is negative. Or change the subject.

Or respond to every negative comment with a jokey 'your a bit grumpy today. Have you pmt'

Depressed .

I would tackle her and if she doesn't like it then much easier to back off.

That sounds very wearing, I'd a friend very like this who constantly sniped about other people and was deeply judgmental, like your friend she was even catty about babies..she finally turned on me for no clear reason other than a fit of paranoia and stopped talking to me. Although I was upset, it worked out fine as it was a relief to actually choose to be with more positive people. My only regret is not telling her that her snippiness about others was really unattractive and couldn't be doing her any good. You should realise that if she's nasty about others, she's probably nasty about you. I'd do her the final favour of letting her know in a calm, measured way that you are tired of her negativity and find it too draining to be around it anymore, end of story.

Thanks for your comments everyone. I feel like I have nothing to loose to start mentioning that I just can't cope with her negativity. I'm going to have to do it soon as I'm afraid one day I might just snap at her and not deal with it tactfully eeeek! Now that would be embarrassing.

I just feel a different person around her. Like I just want to snap at her. So yes will think about it now for the next time we meet up. Think I will try baby steps as I don't want it to end in an argument .

I had a friend who drained the life out of me. There are two types (broadly), those that drain the life out of you and those that radiate life into you. Iyswim.