...about a 'delicate' friend?

[Nettletheelf]

I'm part of a group of six who have been friends for more than twenty years. We're all women in our forties.

We live in different parts of the country and go on holiday together twice a year: city breaks, spa breaks, that sort of thing.

One of our number (who I'm less friendly with than the others, but whom I still like) regards herself as 'delicate'. She has never been diagnosed with any health problems, but her delicacy manifests itself as follows:

• nights out have to be curtailed early because she 'gets tired easily' and can't go back to the hotel or airBnB on her own.

• many restaurant and cafe options are rejected because she has a delicate digestion and the menu doesn't suit it.

• when we find a restaurant or cafe that fits the specification, she has to choose the best chair because of her delicate joints.

• when we order wine in a restaurant, she won't have the same as everybody else because whatever everybody else likes somehow upsets her delicate stomach.

• says that she never sleeps in hotels or unfamiliar bedrooms, so everybody has to walk slowly in the morning because she is exhausted.

We've just returned from a trip, so I'm more irritated than I'd normally be. What I don't get is how she manages to take so many people in. Am I the unreasonable one? There's nothing medically wrong with the woman.

After a long-ish day out on our most recent trip, we decided to sit on the balcony and have a glass of wine. Delicate friend decided that she was going straight to bed because she was tired through not sleeping in unfamiliar beds, etc. After she said goodnight, one of the other members of the group said, "X has done well today hasn't she?"

Me: "Done well how?"

Friend: "well, it's been a long day and it's late for her" (it was 10.30 pm)

Me: "She's a grown up. She can cope with being up until 10.30".

Friend: "but she's a delicate little flower, isn't she?"

Me (laughing): "she's no more delicate than you or I!"

I resent being part of what feels like a ridiculous pantomime in which we're all expected to dance attendance on the dainty, delicate one. I think that cultivating 'delicacy' is a very good way of getting other people to dance to your tune.

Am I right or am I just intolerant?

Luckily I only see this particular friend twice a year. I see the others far more regularly.

Some excellent work on this thread! Thanks for your input everyone.

I think that next time I'll just bite the bullet and ask outright what is wrong with DLF. I've been avoiding doing so for fear of spoiling it for the others!

They are being driven by the urge to be 'nice' and nobody wants to break ranks.

I'll answer some questions:

This isn't my only friendship group but it's my oldest one and we have a lot of shared history. We all met in our first jobs. I'm very close to four of them, and see a lot of two of them (shared interests).

I won't be 'walking away' from this group just because DLF gets on my nerves. Somebody suggested that I might be envious of her: I'm not. Luckily for me, I'm popular in the group (and I think that finding friendship groups of like minded people can be sheer luck: I've had lots of that luck, but I can't bank on an endless supply!)

Re the stressful job thing: DLF's job is actually less stressful than four of the other members'. If you are exhausted from your job, you could choose to cut back on the weekly dancing, rather than restricting everybody else's fun on holiday, I think!

It's a long time since we were the stay out until 3 am type...I'm 45 and I know my limits, but being asked to return to the hotel at 10 pm is a little excessive I think.

Actually, that made me think of something. On the trip we just got back from, one evening we'd been out and about and had dinner relatively late (9.30 pm, which was not at all late in the country we visited). So we'd be getting back rather later than DLF wanted, but we were walking distance from our accommodation and I wasn't going back to eat crisps on the balcony instead of dinner as DLF suggested. So out we went to nice restaurant that passed DLF's tests.

DLF was at the other end of the table from me, and I noticed that after drinking one of the buckets of gin popular in that country, she burst into tears causing one of the other members of the group to move her chair to the other side if the table to dispense comfort and attention.

Was this the equivalent of "I'll scream and scream until I'm sick, and I can" (TM Violet Elizabeth Bott) ?

I pointedly did not ask what was the matter. Interestingly nor did two of the others.

The more you post, the more unpleasant you sound OP.

Yh she's a twat and attention seeking. Definitely call her out on it op try and sound as concerned as you can so she has no reason to snipe at you. Be clear and just ask that she either learns to take herself back if she feels unwell or not to come at all but the dictating has to stop.

I just couldn't cope with that, she's annoying me and I don't even have to be around her lol

I think OP should play DLF at her own game and kill her with kindness.
Don't wait for her to get tired at 10:00 and demand that everyone goes back to the hotel. Tell her at 9:30 that she is looking peaky and very kindly but very firmly take her back. You five can then continue the rest of the evening without her.
Tell her that you have specially asked the hotel chef to cook her an allergen-free meal aka the blandest, most boring food you can think of. Meanwhile the rest of you will slum it with the a la carte menu.
Tell her that she needs a lie-in so you'll leave her in peace and go shopping without her.

All cos you are a good friend and a kind caring person who won't take 'no' for an answer..
Spoil her fun before she spoils yours!

Like the 'killing with kindness' plan, but I wouldn't have the guts to carry that off!

Thanks for calling me unpleasant, Newnn. I checked the thread and it was you who suggested that I was envious of DLF because you thought that she might be more popular. So sorry to disappoint!

(Incidentally, for anybody who is interested, the tears in the restaurant did not reveal a hidden illness. Apparently she was upset over something her brother had said to her two years ago, and peace was restored by the next morning).

Any chance of getting her to laugh at herself about stuff like that? My ex friend LOVED being the butt of teasing (kind teasing obviously, not meanness), as it was a form of focused attention I guess.

Wow and shes a friend? She may have health condidtions she hasn't had diagnoised or has but doesn't want to tell judgy people.

Oh good, this again.

This would drive me insane. Sounds very attention seeking and would irritate the hell out of me.

This whole thread is SO interesting. There are people posting on the thread who cannot see that your friend is simply attention seeking by making herself special by imaginary 'delicateness'.

It must be the case that people who do this sort of thing actually cannot see it about themselves. That they only see what appear to them to be perfectly justifiable reasons of (whichever) illness or condition, real or hypothetical. They cannot understand that it isn't the illness that is the problem but it is the behaviour of dictating to OTHERS how they should behave towards them. And now ON THIS THREAD actually telling other posters how they should post and even think.

@shesnotme - the 'hidden illness' issue has been done to death already on this thread.

And the OP has said that two of the friendship group are close to the delicate one - definitely close enough to be told of any illnesses.

Can you say to the others, I'm sick of her, are ye not sick of this shit too? And then see what they say.

I doubt you are alone.

Also, do ye rotate who organises the holiday?
Let this girl arrange a holiday next and go along and try to have a nice time, just go along with whatever she does. There is no way you are alone.

What the kindest solution is, I don't know though.

It's a shame when people who do have illnesses and health issues take exception to a thread like this, because I've definitely not read it as finger pointing.

We have friends who cross these kind of problems.

One has serious health problems which severely limit their ability. Think daily high doses of morphine. They never complain at all and the group choose to be mindful of situations which might be too taxing whilst the person repeatedly tries to push themself. In my experience, people with genuine problems go to lengths not to impose those issues on anyone else, or to attract any special attention.

Another friend has issues around food, not allergies, just very strong likes and dislikes. This involves only eating meals out which comprise steak or chicken with chips and peas followed by icecream or crepes. Absolutely no salad, even a garnish, will be tolerated, or a sauce. The rest of us really aren't keen on the kind of places that usually serve the food he likes, but when we want to have a get together, we just have to suck it up.

I think the way of dealing with this friend is acceptance. This is who she is and how she behaves. When you're not happy to go along with her ideas, just say as much "Aaah, goodnight. I'm not ready to go back yet, so, see you in the morning" No drama.

OP once you notice behaviours like this, it all escalates in your mind. You can't change your friend, you can only change your response to her.

Again...I have an invisible condition that causes similar things to DLF but I am diagnosed. Friends I go away with know what I've got and if I wanna bail out I don't make them all come back with me or change plans! I know I'm one person in a group of 8 and sometimes they do stuff I can't/don't want to do and I either sit at the side holding bags and cheer them on (and take photos- the good part of not being able to scrum in is taking photos of them that we all laugh at later!) or I entertain myself! It's not difficult and no one feels they NEED to take me home or sit out with me

So that's a totally different situation then?! This is completely circular.

Oh god. I have a work colleague like this. It is so irritating. A real struggle to not be the bad guy and show irritation as she comes up with endless excuses for her fragility - often several in the same day and usually they contradict what was said before. I like being sympathetic but it is really irritating because it doesn't make sense or add up - and yet everyone ends up going along with it or you would end up looking mean. It's like having an attention seeking teenager around.

You have my sympathy. I think that people like this have been rewarded through their life for this attention seeking behaviour and they think it is normal to be the centre of attention.

@pigeondujour my point is that even if she DOES have something then she doesn't have to be a DLF about it

My father had a notoriously bad tempered yet "delicate" great aunt whose sisters spent their lives having to pander to her "poor x". She outlived them all by many years...

I think it's very attention seeking behaviour.

There is someone similar in a large group of friends that I sometimes spend time with. Very 'delicate' but nothing concrete wrong with her. She even bought herself a walking stick, which she is sure to take along if we go out anywhere for a day or weekend, to make sure everyone fusses over her. I've actually see her use her stick on the school run, hobbling along getting fussed over, and then seen her running very fast on a treadmill in the gym an hour later!

Since we're doing diagnosis by internet I'm going for ADD. I've known people who have this get quite controlling and become genuinely emotional and upset when things don't go their way.

I worked with a woman who couldn't possibly walk any distance - insisted she had to have the closest parking space to the office, limped round the office all day (conspicuously) using a stick, with a martyr face and whimpering groans...

Then on her holiday spent almost a week fell walking and spent the last day trudging around very hilly, twisty cobbled streets... we all knew but when her boss asked if she had enjoyed her break, sighed and said she had been nowhere and done nothing at all but rest her poor legs

So, yeah - not all people who are 'delicate' are all that delicate with underlying/undiagnosed/un-shared physical health issues

This thread is hilarious! Love the idea no one can be a dick and they must have a good reason and that means they can do whatever they like.

won't put that they could have something wrong with them and be a dick as the idea that illness happens to dickheads as well as naice people might derail the thread to such an extent that pigeon will come to my house and thump me with my own iPhone and confiscate my MN access

The not sleeping well in a hotel is not uncommon and has been recognised, but to me the unreasonable bit is curtailing everyone else'e night when going off to bed.

Asking why about all the other things, ideally not when others are around, may be the best thing.