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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To be hacked off that she finds it impossible to compliment me????

77 replies

Kakanto · 03/01/2016 11:00

I am ready for a pasting here and to be told I am bu. it's not the end of the world and very trivial but starting to bug me.

Concerns my friend. It suddenly dawned on me yesterday. Never compliments me on anything. I recently moved into a new house and have spent so much time and effort getting it all together and not a single nice comment apart from things like "I like your bath against the wall, that's what I'm getting" (aren't most baths fixed against a wall?)

I'm not after praise and and I know it's trivial but she's fine dishing out the compliments to other people. Case in point when we visited another friend and his wife's new house days later and she went nuts over it.

I tend to be v self deprecating and people often go along with this but it has suddenly dawned on me that this happens a lot.

Come to think of it, the same happened with my wedding.

Aibu

OP posts:

apricotdanish · 03/01/2016 12:19

Oh, I don't know. People are always so quick to accuse others of drip feeding but I often think, in our RL interactions with people, more and more comes to light the further we go into a conversation. As posters have given points the OP has responded, that to me, doesn't constitute drip feeding.

ThisIsStartingToBoreMe · 03/01/2016 12:22

she's jealous.

Lexigrey · 03/01/2016 12:25

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Original poster

Kakanto · 03/01/2016 12:27

Now this will sound big headed and it's not meant to. She hardly would have hated it.

OP posts:

Theimpossiblegirl · 03/01/2016 12:27

apricotdanish
That is one of the best responses I've seen on MN for a long time. People are so snippy lately, too fast to call troll (not this thread) or accuse of drip feeding (not just this thread). You are a voice of reason.

OP, I would find it annoying too. Do you pay lots of compliments? I find they are generally reciprocal. Or your friend is just not very good at basic niceties. It would annoy me too. Try not playing things down- say how pleased you are with something, ask what she thinks, see what kind of responses she gives.

areyoubeingserviced · 03/01/2016 12:28

Lexi- this friend never gives compliments.
Surely one could find one genuine compliment for a 'friend '
OP- your friend IS jealous

areyoubeingserviced · 03/01/2016 12:29

Agree about apricots response

Original poster

Kakanto · 03/01/2016 12:31

Thanks for your comments. I am very complimentary. Not In a forced or ott way, either.

OP posts:

intothewoods · 03/01/2016 12:31

Well said Apricot it is like a RL conversation, of course you can't say everything to beginning with, you don't know where the conversation will lead.

greengreenten · 03/01/2016 12:34

So, what did your friend actually say as you showed her around? I wouldn't know what else to say other than something nice and kind (even if I hate it). Just good manners?

apricotdanish · 03/01/2016 12:35

Theimpossiblegirl Thank you . I agree, it happens way too much and isn't necessary.

MLGs · 03/01/2016 12:36

Traditionally it was rude to pay compliments.

However she feels able to compliment others so unlikely to be that.

I have known people like this and it can be done deliberately in some cases. Hard to know when not present in the situation.

Original poster

Kakanto · 03/01/2016 12:36

Greengreenten she didn't say anything! my husband showed her round upstairs as I was making tea

OP posts:

AppleSetsSail · 03/01/2016 12:43

My sister is like this, and it's because she is jealous of me. It feels strange to put that to words, but it's true.

When she came to our newly renovated London house for the first time ever, she didn't ask me to show her around or say a single word about it during her entire visit. Of course on the two occasions I have visited her in a new hours in the US, I have been full of sincere compliments: 'you have beautiful doors, you can't find those in a new house'; 'your colours are beautiful'; 'I love this bedding'; 'Look at how amazing your closet looks'; etc. All the normal things that you would say to someone when walking through a new house.

It's just the way our relationship has been cast.

Sounds like the same is true for your and your friend.

Leelu6 · 03/01/2016 12:50

possible compliments if you don't actually like the decor:

Wow, love the size of the rooms
Everything is so new and fresh
The builders have done a really good job
Love that there's so much light in this room
This room must be so cosy in the evenings

Can't understand how anyone could not find something nice to say when being shown around someone's newly renovated home

AppleSetsSail · 03/01/2016 12:53

Can't understand how anyone could not find something nice to say when being shown around someone's newly renovated home

It is incredibly rude and one of those times where it is obligatory to spin a polite lie. Leelu has created a fantastic list, I'm going to keep those in mind!

areyoubeingserviced · 03/01/2016 12:57

Agree Lee

OohMavis · 03/01/2016 13:36

It is jealousy.

I have this with a friend of mine, though not about decor, about my cakes. I've started my own business and I'm now doing very well - it took me five years to get to the point, skill-wise, that I am now. She loved my early work, couldn't compliment me enough, but as I got better and started producing professional-quality work, it stopped completely. It was very strange. To the point where I'd make her son a birthday cake at her request, for free, and she'd take it with a simple 'thank you'. I had to ask her if she liked it, and she said 'yeah, cheers' - it was the exact thing she'd ask for and it was very polished. No enthusiasm.

I found out a couple of months ago that she'd been trying to start a home-made cake business of her own on the down-low, charging neighbours £25 for 12 cupcakes and business had not gone well for her. Explains so much.

DragAct · 03/01/2016 13:48

It may just be a misunderstanding, though. I mean, did she ask for a tour of your redecorated house? I would find it pretty strange to be trekked around someone's revamped bathroom especially if I felt there was an expectation I was supposed to fall into raptures of delight over a bath or tiles! Obviously, I would be able to come out with a few nice things to say, but the expectation that I would want to see someone's new bathroom would feel quite weird to me.

Is it an English thing, to show people round a redecorated house? Or to want to be shown?

We've just renovated ours, after buying it, having rented it for a few years - new kitchen, new flooring, lighting and ceilings throughout, new bathroom, all repainted etc etc - but although visiting friends will inevitably have seen the downstairs changes, it never occurred to me to actually take them around and show them parts of the house they wouldn't normally be in!

HoggleHoggle · 03/01/2016 14:06

I have someone like this in my life. We've moved house 3 times and on no occasion have they mentioned one single thing about the houses. I've had radical new haircuts that you couldn't miss, but nothing. If I make a big celebration cake for example, there will be nothing. I don't expect a compliment on everything, I really don't, but it does get to the point that it's more of an effort to say nothing at all, and I find it amazing that someone would do that. If I see something I like, I say it, and I mean it.

Leelu6 · 03/01/2016 14:18

OohMavis, hope you're still not making her free cakes!

greengreenten · 03/01/2016 18:30

Oh dear OP. Shocking not to say anything at all. Bit weird really.

My MIL does this though. eg she says "oh you've painted the kitchen?".

Me: yes, do you like it?

MIL: hmm, very good (through gritted teeth)

I know just ask outright, "don't you love it? It's amazing isn't it?"

MIL : (cringes)

I know lots of others who just can't give it away, compliments I mean. DH did this too until I pointed out how nice it would feel (for him as well as the recipient) to give a compliment. He does it now and understands that even if it's fake it makes him feel good to be positive and generous.

Obvs limited audience you're able to teach but for now just gush maybe and draw the compliments out. I suffer loads of boasty people all the time. You'll know how to balance it as you're sensitive to it.

Eigg · 03/01/2016 18:56

Kakanto sorry just caught up, been out all day. It could of course just be that like Lexi she isn't very good at offererung the kind of polite compliments that most British people consider critical to maintaining relationships. There's always something polite and enthusiastic to say, even if it's just "you must be so excited to have moved in" or "I'm so pleased for you".

And Lexi I'm not someone who jumps automatically to jealousy as an excuse for every bad behaviour but in my personal experience the people who asked for a tour and said nothing nice at all were those whose noses were out of joint. One 'good' friend's sole comment was 'I'm glad I don't have to clean all those bathrooms'. I laughed but I'm pretty sure that wasn't the response she was going for.

TendonQueen · 03/01/2016 19:02

Is it so hard to pay a compliment and sound at least vaguely as if you mean it? People on here make it sound like you're asking the earth. I've never had any trouble saying 'ah, lovely!' about a baby name I hated or wallpaper I didn't really like, because manners override doing anything different. I assume that people who don't do this are either rude, or making a point - here it must be the latter as she was complimentary to your other friend.

candykane25 · 03/01/2016 20:14

I remember a friend once asked me how she looked (we were all dressed up for some do) and I replied Fine. Fine!! She said, Fine!! She was most put out. I had to be more accurate and say you look gorgeous, which she did, in my head, fine means groomed, no toothpaste on top, no lipstick on teeth. It was different expectations.
I later realised that my very confident appearing, stunning, talented and successful friend actually has a few insecurities about her appearance. I was really surprised because she always looks fab and appears very confident. I hadn't been excessively complimentary about her because I assumed she already knew and didn't need my validation. But it turns out she loves s compliment just like me so I don't hold back. This wasn't a conscious thing, holding back, it was just the dynamics of the friendship.
I find I give more compliments to those I pereceive as less confident. Again, not a conscious thing.
I bet your house is gorgeous.

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