To tell my friend to fuck off and never speak to her again?

[Mammanat222]

Will try to be brief.

Friend came round this morning to see our new place. We moved in a week ago.

It's got brand new [cream] carpets through-out.

As anyone in London can testify today was wet and there has been plenty of rain in recent days.

We are strictly shoes off at the moment, due to aforementioned carpet and I know a lot of people disagree with this in principle but lets not concentrate on that.

Friend turns up with her 3 year old son, he is in his rain stuff including wellies as is she. I greet them in hallway and tell them to take shoes off. Nothing rude or argumentative and friend knows I have had carpet put in, she also knows how much it bloody cost.

Friend obliges and takes her boots off but says "it took me forever to get him dressed today can I leave his boots on and give them a wipe", I politely say he needs to take them off to which I get greeted with a sigh but still she doesn't make any moves to take the boots off. She then says "look you know how hard it is for me to get him dressed, can we just not pop up and I'll keep him in kitchen"

I then try to speak to child directly and cajole him to take his boots off (think along the lines of "take your boots off sweetie and you can go up to see the cat and J's bedroom with all his toys") to which my friend says - words to the effect of 'do you know what we'll leave coming up today, I've told you twice that I am not taking his boots off' and she then proceeded to put her boots back on, frogmarch her child out of the door whilst muttering 'good luck Hyacinth with your two kids and cream carpet'

Now this is a friend I have know for almost 20 years, someone who is normally the kindest, sweetest person and her behaviour was very out of character.

I waited for an apology and it never arrived so an hour later I messaged to see if she was OK and ask what was going on to which I got a shitty reply which was "I am fine, I just don't want my son to come and play in a house full of rules and regulations, good luck if you think your kids are never going to mess your carpet up"

I replied and explained that it might seem over zealous but the carpet is just 10 days old and I not happy for dirty wellies to be worn.

Friend then replied and said she was out having some un-regulated fun with her son and she would contact me when she had calmed down.

What the actual fuck. I turned my phone off as I didn't trust myself to reply.

Where can I go with this

In all our years of friendship I've never had anything like this with her?

enrique I agree, but that wouldn't haves been acquiescing to a tantrum - the friend was anticipating the tantrum in advance.

She's probably doing everything she can to work on her ds's behaviour, there's nothing from the OP about her spoiling him in general, just that he's very had work and she and the DP think the friend is responsible.

Going directly to the child is not helping or supportive to the friend, it's undermining the friends parenting and saying "I'm so much better at this parenting than you are, look I can make him do it "

ici maybe she doesn't want to be confined to her house. Maybe she thought she could go round to a good friends house, and perhaps her good friend, knowing she has a hard time with her son, might understand and on this occasion do as she asks and let her son stay in the kitchen for a couple of minutes while she has a tour of the new carpet.

And perhaps once out of the rain in the kitchen she could have taken his wellies off more easily or dealt with the tantrum somewhere at least dry.

can i just intervene on the side of the 'maybe she'll get a huge battle later on' camp over the DC possibly being difficult.

(and yes i know anecdote is not data) but my DS has both physical and behavioural difficulties, they make putting shoes on/taking them off a challenge, as can the feel of certain carpet materials to him (he has sensory processing disorder) and even i will always make him take his shoes off when we visit people if they ask.

Having behavioural/physical disabilities should not stop you from learning to abide by the majority of social norms and acceptable manners within the limits of those disibilities.

All of our friends understand his problems, and make adjustments, but muddy shoes and walking on clean carpets are NOT a reasonable adjustment! He either takes them off or we dont go in, and i wouldn't berate my friends for forcing that decision.

For all of you saying the OP is wrong, how many would willingly invite a 3 year old in muddy wellies to walk the muck all over their houses with impunity?

I think what I dislike about friends' behaviour is that she is basically blaming the OP as being unreasonable rather than her child. Through her fog of anger and frustration I think if she did a straw poll not just of her DH but her friends most of them would be at the prospect of letting loose a muddy toddler on brand new carpets.

Presume those of you with a relaxed attitude re the wellies have never had beautiful new carpets or anything else of either intrinsic and/or fiscal value in your home?

only skim read but seems like a usual thread where mum is b u and everyone has totally side lined the fact she said " can i clean his boots"

and " can we go stright up the to kitchen and I keep him there"
.
TWICE she tried to come up with a solution and you were un yeilding.

I think you were really mean

If the childs boots had been wiped what is the problem, or does plastic wellie material also damage cream carpets?

Think you've handled this very well OP. I think your friend is jealous of you, your new home (complete with perfect carpets) and two compliant children who sleep in their own beds. Do you also have a supportive partner? If so, she probably also envies that.

Looking at it another way, she's got an annoying shit as a three year old and a total twat as a husband (seriously, who calls their own child "an annoying shit"? That's just wrong on so many levels, least of all the one on which you are jointly responsible for the upbringing and therefore behaviour of your own small child).

If she's still co-sleeping with a difficult 3 year old chances are she's probably not even slept properly for years. Add to that her relationship meltdown and she's going to need all the friends she can get...

Really bad behavior to let a 3yo in someone else's house in wet muddy boots

I don't think she wanted too, she wanted him to wear wiped clean boots.

Mouse you really need to RTFT

Skullyton I agree, having behavioural difficulties, or even disabilities does not mean you cannot teach a child (it's what we've spent four years intensively doing exactly that with ds), and I totally agree that muddy shoes are a no-no inside. And that the friend overreacted and was unreasonable in her response.

But... this is a slightly grey area. The friend immediately took her own shoes off. She was upfront about what a nightmare it had already been to get him dressed that morning. The OP knows full well what she has on her plate. The friend suggested an alternative which was rejected. Ok the friend flounced, but looking further, there's a reason for that. We all behave unreasonably sometimes, for other reasons.

I just don't think it's asking too much of someone to help - in this case the friend was clearly asking for a bit of slack.

Mamma can I just say that I think your response was really lovely - she has pissed you off and you're still offering support. I don't want to sound patronising, but well done for being the bigger person.

Definitely think your friend owes you an apology though.

If the childs boots had been wiped what is the problem

To be cleaned they'd have needed to be run under the shower / very hot tap and I would have had to take them off anyway?

If I'd wiped them then they would have still been dirty ??

I only have one DS (heavily pregnant with number 2) and he isn't an angel. Nor is my OH perfect.. we all have our crosses I guess.

winter I have never asked anyone to remove their shoes in my life! I just would not do so.

But then I would never buy cream carpets ^shudders^.

What I would certainly not do is have an argument with one of my oldest friends about it and then post the private details of it on an Internet forum asking the world to join in my condemnation of a friend.

I would see any or all those things as rather ... Low rent.

Um I think it's weird not to take kids welly's off and I don't have a shoes off policy.
I have pale (not cream)carpets and the vast majority take shoes of despite me saying I don't mind, only 1 child ran through with muddy shoes and thankfully vanish carpet cleaner got rid of those footprints.
We don't have carpet by either front or back door (tiles in porch & utility) and as we are rural, boots are generally worn for a large chunk of the year.
Shoes I rarely take off, wet boots immediately as you come in the door.
Your 'friend' is being weird.

I'd have ended the friendship after the cafe incident. You are definitely not being unreasonable. She isn't the first person to have to cope with a difficult child or other challenging circumstances. My daughter could be terrible, behaviour exacerbated by steroids during treatment for leukaemia between the ages of 4 and 6 and I'd have still made her take the fucking wellies off!

It's not about the carpets. It's about her total lack of respect for you and your home.

Goose shit, you know upmarket poo trodders frumpet.

I have my feet on a rug right now that had plenty of goose shit walked in it.
It was from a caravan site by the river.

You would never ever know, however, its clean, been cleaned very easily, and looks fab and is a quality classic wool rug.

I think she knows your hard work and would put the carpet first.

Just to add had I not asked them to remove their boots to begin with I actually think my friend would have let her son in with his mucky boots.

Her asking to wipe them was in response to my asking them to remove their boots. It wasn't an offer out of courtesy, it was only suggested after I made my initial request.

TheWord, sorry my carpets and thread choices aren't high-brow enough for you!!!

TheWord if a child has been out in the pouring rain and has muddy shoes, their parents should remove them whatever the colour of the carpet. Its disrespectful. Are they going to clean the mud off the carpet. Its disrespectful, NOT to remove your shoes in somebodies home, unless told otherwise.

The friend was not offering compromises - she was telling OP that she wasn't even going to try taking the wellies off and then that they should just go through to the kitchen and stay there.

TBH it sounds like there is no way this child would have stayed in the kitchen anyway!

So, friend knows OP is stressed with moving, has got new carpets, is pregnant and has SPD and is dealing with two DC - but thinks the rules of the house should be broken because she might have trouble getting the wellies back on - and yet OP is unreasonable for saying "wellies off" and sticking to it? the little boy needs sensible rules and boundaries in his life and needs to learn what is and isn't negotiable. The friend was very unreasonable not to just whip the wellies off and then deal with putting them back on when the time came instead of trying to dictate to OP in her own home.

the fact that friend's DH agreed with OP is very telling. Friend was determined not even contemplate taking the wellies off - which is very controlling behaviour indeed. Chances are everything would have been fine but she was not even going to consider that. Very unreasonable, aside from the madness of suggesting that a toddler gets to tramp mud all over cream carpets just because it might upset him to take his boots off.

Even if the carpet was brown, it would still have mud trampled into it which op has to clean.

YANBU to have carpets
YANBU that they are cream
YANBU by mentioning that they are new and expensive
YANBU that you asked your friend to take her son's wet, muddy wellies off
YANBU to cajole the child as you did so with the best intentions
YANBU that you stood your ground and didn't let him come in
YANBU that leaving a lunch date midway with no explanation is weird
YANBU in that you think her parenting style is a little lax, that the child gets his way too much, and that it drives you mad to be dictated to by a 2 yr old
YANBU to be really wound up and upset that a 20yr old friendship is a risk.

People on here get fixated about the weirdest and most irrelevant of details! I would lie low for a while and wait to see whether she contacts you. I don't think you did anything wrong at all. I don't think you are rude, weird, bossy or any of the other things people have read into your OP!

squoosh Sun 23-Nov-14 23:41:25

Best ever socks ever seen.