Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Flexible and made to last.

Meet the Other Phone.
Flexible and made to last.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

*LONG* (and a bit ranty) I am a horrible awful friend but am i really being that unreasonable...? i am prepared for a flaming btw...

81 replies

RoystonVaseySmegHead · 02/05/2016 14:08

one of my best friends is pregnant... lovely! i am so excited for her and i cant wait to spoil the baby rotten when s/he's born. But since i knew her (just under a year) she's been to a&e for quite a few non life threatening things... like 3 of the main things i can remember: she 'dislocated' her collarbone... turned out to be slight bruising... then she had an episode of feeling suicidal... so went to a&e again even though she has counselling and a contact for the local crisis team (i understand mental health and am completely for taking even small things seriously when you feel like taking your life!!)... but there are lots of things she's been for (at least 8 times in the last 6 months that have all turned out to be nothing) and i just feel like she's using the hospital for minor things that could be taken care of at the doctors.. like she could have made a same day appt for everything she's been for, or she could have contacted crisis etc. for mental health things... but now she's pregnant, she was really quite ill a week or so ago, and quite rightly went to hospital and was admitted. turns out she has HG. but last night the sickness pills stopped working and she's been sick today but can keep water down afaik... but she's going back to a&e again today anyway because if it... tried talking her into phoning 111, finding out if out of hours or walk in are open.. and she cant be bothered with any of those because 'they take too long'. AIBU to think she's taking the piss a bit?! if anything happens it seems like the first place shell go is a&e, and its grating quite a lot now, but i cnt decide if im being unreasonable but i probably am.. and now i feel like an awful friend for thinking these things about her when i know what its like myself to be throwing up morning noon and night... what are your opinions on it? like i said in thread title, i am perfectly open to being flamed for being so unsupportive but can i add i havent actually told my friend any of this and have offered to go with her if she needs someone else there apart from her DP because he can be bit of a killjoy/ very unsupportive at times Sad sorry for the rant by the way :/

OP posts:
Skylander01 · 02/05/2016 16:28

I have worked in A&E for years and just reading this made my stomach knot! Sadly the general public are so spoon fed these days that A&E is full of these type of "emergencies" all complaining about the wait!! It wont be long before she has a name for herself as a "frequent flier" and I just hope it doesn't end up as a cry wolf situation!

Kariana · 02/05/2016 17:03

I'm not commenting on whether this is reasonable or unreasonable, however if she repeatedly takes her child there once it's born for small things it will be flagged up. As a teacher I saw letters about parents 'misusing' A&E a couple of times. Someone (either SS or HV) always went out to have a word with the parents about it. Thought it might help you to know that if it gets to the point where the doctors feel it's unreasonable it will be flagged up, at least once the child is here.

AgathaMystery · 02/05/2016 17:41

My attention is always piqued at work when I see a patient who accesses A&E regularly. Esp in pregnancy.

SINBU to go to A&E with HG on a bank holiday. She will need a couple of days IVI to rehydrate and a new anti emetic plan. Poor woman. She will get nowhere with 111 with HG.

Malvolia · 02/05/2016 17:45

Leaving aside the possible misuse of A and E, it's slightly odd that you describe her as one of your best friends, but have known her under a year, and describe her effect on you as 'grating'. None of these things add up to a best friendship imo, unless they've totally changed the definition.

Original poster
RoystonVaseySmegHead · 02/05/2016 17:50

malvolia I don't have many friends... 8-10 at best.. So I class most people as best friends as I spend quite a lot of time with them... But idk we kinda just clicked so maybe you have a different definition of friendship as I do... And why is she not allowed to annoy me, i know for a fact I get on her nerves sometimes?

OP posts:
ScreenshottingIsNotJournalism · 02/05/2016 17:58

You need to disingage with her a bit

You can be friends with someone without being involved in any way with their medical stuff

If it's annoying you just don't discuss health so much and base your friendship on things you have in common that don't annoy you

Friendship isn't all or nothing, sounds like you're living in her pocket perhap

Original poster
RoystonVaseySmegHead · 02/05/2016 18:09

screenshot I try not to be involved, we only talk about it when she brings it up... But I'm not sure what the last part means?

OP posts:
Notso · 02/05/2016 18:28

People who misuse A&E and even the GP drive me mad. I don't understand why they are not told to go away or that they should go to the GP.
I see so many people moaning on FB they have had to wait hours to be seen. Why aren't they told to go home?

NeedsAsockamnesty · 02/05/2016 18:35

Rae

Going to A&E is not just about being assesed to see if admittance is needed.

Many drop in clinics will not administer injectable anti sickness meds and a lot of GP's wont without a consultant care plan.

Often if you can get the injectables quickly enough it can avoid admittance and quite a lot of the time A&E are able to respond a lot quicker than out of hours even with no keytones

ScreenshottingIsNotJournalism · 02/05/2016 18:38

about living in her pocket? well just the gist of your posts, and all your friends being "best friends". I have some friends who I love and I enjoy what time we do spend together and talk a lot, but if I was to have a more intense "best friend" relationship with them we'ld probably fall out

there's very few people I enjoy an intensive best friend relationship with

Original poster
RoystonVaseySmegHead · 02/05/2016 18:49

Well in that case she's a very good friend, and I have maybe 2 best friends

OP posts:
RaeSkywalker · 02/05/2016 18:53

Needs I am aware of that, and I did say that I don't think the OP's friend is in the wrong. I just said it's probably not what I would do as a first port of call. There's nothing wrong with her doing it though.

Haffdonga · 02/05/2016 18:58

YABU
I have a friend like that. Every little symptom she or anyone in her family has, she's off to hospital with them google-diagnosing the very worst. (e.g. Her ds was thirsty once and she took him to be tested for diabetes despite him having NO other symptoms of diabetes). She decided she had cancer once because she had a strange rash (again I dismissed her concerns). And of course it was fucking cancer. Sad

I will never dismiss people's health fears or self diagnoses again. Just sometimes they might be right.

OneMagnumisneverenough · 02/05/2016 19:03

Does she have redeeming features? It doesn't sound as if you like her very much? --I don't, based on your description__

I don't think you are being unreasonable as it would annoy me too.

CherryBlossom321 · 02/05/2016 19:08

I went to A&E with HG. It was absolutely the right thing. People don't realise how serious it is.

PirateFairy45 · 02/05/2016 19:21

That'd annoy the hell outa me!

Stratter5 · 02/05/2016 19:26

A&E with HG when you can keep fluids down just fine is unnecessary. Speaking from bitter, bitter experience, A&E is for when you're bad enough to need intervention.

ScreenshottingIsNotJournalism · 02/05/2016 19:27

How do you know if your collarbone is broken/dislocated or just bruised without an x-ray? would you know how to accurately assess that without the use of x-ray facilities OP? I wouldn't

I don't think any of her reasons you've listed are that unreasonable, it's not like she's going in with a cold.

Pollaidh · 02/05/2016 19:28

HG is a medical emergency and many GPs are unwilling to prescribe some of the second and third line treatments, and usually won't give injected anti-emetics, and it's these she will need, as well as fluids probably.

With HG (and there are different degrees of HG too), every single time I presented at the GP, the walk-in clinic or even a standard midwife appointment I was immediately admitted to hospital, including high dependency. Due to the confusion dehydration causes, most HG patients actually under-estimate how ill they are and, disliking hospital (the smells, lights etc make HG worse), women will not go until it gets really bad and they are near collapse. Ketostix are quite useful as they give an external measure of the seriousness of the situation. If you want to be helpful perhaps you can order some of these from Amazon.

If your ketones are too high or you are too dehydrated your organs can start to fail. This can happen a lot quicker than you imagine.

shazzarooney999 · 02/05/2016 19:32

We have next door neighbours like that and i think its wrong to use a&e like that because whilst they are using theyre time on minor ailments someone could be losing theyre life.

GraysAnalogy · 02/05/2016 19:41

I will never dismiss people's health fears or self diagnoses again. Just sometimes they might be right

I completely understand how you came to this thought process but it just isn't reasonable to excuse people abusing a&e services just in case. Every time we have something wrong with us there's always a worst case scenario. The amount of people I see on social media condoning abusing a&e services based on 'just in case' or 'mothers intuition' astounds me. Then you see them raging a few hours later because they haven't been given anything due to it being a viral infection Hmm instead of being happy that it's nothing serious. Sadly though there are scenarios in which going has caught something, these are few and far between but they exist which further fuels the 'just in case' but at the same time is crippling services. I suppose people can't win, it's so hard to make the decision when you or someone you care about is ill

ENormaSnob · 02/05/2016 19:41

She would irritate the shit outta me.

Yanbu

99percentchocolate · 02/05/2016 19:52

You haven't had HG have you?
You can deteriorate very, very quickly. When my meds stopped working my heart rate soared and my ketones went sky high within 24 hours. Dehydration is a medical emergency.
She may be able to keep small sips down, but I was sent straight to A&E in the same state as your friend and my ketones were off the chart.
She may have been a hypochondriac before, but she certainly isnt being one now. She will be in a very lonely and vulnerable position right now, I suggest you read up on the condition so that you can support her at a time when she really needs it.

OneMagnumisneverenough · 02/05/2016 19:56

and in the meantime my elderly mother who arrived at 9am for a routine pre arranged op, is left sitting in a wheelchair until nearly 8pm waiting on a bed. In another case an emergency ambulance is unavailable so a non emergency one is called from the other end of the country to attend (after the caller chasing more than once) to arrive to find the patient deceased sitting on the toilet :(
In another case a non emergency single crew ambulance is left to deal with an RTA with severely injured children etc etc etc.

but let's all rock up at A&E with any old shit that your GP or pharmacy or out of hours or walk in centre etc could deal with. Even the example with the rash that turned out to be cancer above, still wasn't a case for A&E. Would the patient prognosis in this case have been different if the patient had attended their GP etc. I suppose maybe it would but it shouldn't have made any difference.

The clue is in the name.

EweAreHere · 02/05/2016 20:01

YANBU. Her GP's surgery is charged a rather high fee every single time she appears in A&E. That will grate if the reasons are not emergencies.