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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

Friend inviting everyone to everything

55 replies

FluffyFlowerFace · 10/10/2017 08:25

AiBu? I have a lovely friend but this annoys me. Well arrange to go out say just 3 of us then we'll get messages to inform other people have been invited. Sometimes it would be nice to just be a smaller group and sometimes I am a bit out out that lots of other people end up joining on due to her invite!

OP posts:

Anecdoche · 10/10/2017 08:26

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

ShatnersWig · 10/10/2017 08:28

I have a friend who does this. Even after it was pointed out to her that it's fine if she's organising a night out or a night in at hers to invite who she likes, but if someone else organises a night out or a night in at theirs or a weekend away, she can't just go and invite other people to come along.

Got to the point now I socialise less with her.

Original poster

FluffyFlowerFace · 10/10/2017 09:09

She has been told but will text on the day is it ok if such a such comes having already invited them!

OP posts:

Anecdoche · 10/10/2017 09:24

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

AlternativeTentacle · 10/10/2017 09:25

You need to respond ' no, not ok. Please uninvite them' and do it every time.

CoughLaughFart · 10/10/2017 09:28

I'd get annoyed too. There might be a very good reason I hadn't invited a particular person (for example, if I knew they didn't get on that well with someone else in the group). What gives someone else the right to make that decision for me?

lidoshuffle · 10/10/2017 09:29

I organised a night out with a friend to see something and was looking forward to a nice girly catch up. She turned up with her husband, two bored teenage daughters and a goth boy whom I'd never met. I felt the interloper at my own event.

redexpat · 10/10/2017 09:29

I have a friend who does this and it's really annoying. I invited her out for a drink, then she invited someone who I really didnt like, the feeling was mutual. So I told her that actually I had stuff that I had really needed to talk about with her, not in his presence and could she not do that again. She hasnt done it since.

FeralBeryl · 10/10/2017 09:31

My mum has a friend like this.
She lives in another city too so it's even worse, mum travels up looking forwards to some lovely catch up time with her old school friend only for fucking Barbara and Marie from HR to tag along they obviously only talk about work/current common factors and mum is left out.

Standingcat · 10/10/2017 09:34

I had a colleague like this, we arranged a nice team drink and she brings along complete randoms. Stopped inviting her as a result

shakeyourcaboose · 10/10/2017 09:41

I have a relative who does this- invites her 'bestie' to everything which is just bizarre. Ie christenings, my cousins hen, really annoying!

Nanny0gg · 10/10/2017 09:46

Tell them...

Qvar · 10/10/2017 09:46

This is my least favourite thing. I thought I was just being miserable, I didn't realise that it's normal to get annoyed.

I too have a friend that does this. Most recently I invited her to a nineties night in a local city, and 45 minutes before I was due to pick her up, she texted "I've told x we are going to city, she wants to come, you don't mind do you?"

And I didn't, really, but then x was a miserable bitch who wanted to go to funky rnb clubs. I don't like funky r n b clubs, I like the spice girls and dancing round my hand bag in a safe space where I don't feel old, fat and past it. And for fucksake I was driving, so was sober.

Anyway we went to the nineties night but not before a passive aggressive tantrum at 10pm in which I offered to drive her home "right now, really I would NOT mind". She sulked with half a lager until 1 am when I called it quits and took us home.

And really, although she was a miserable bitch and wrecked my night out, I'm still cross with my friend for bringing her.

HopelesslydevotedtoGu · 10/10/2017 09:47

I have a friend who invites others, I think she believes "the more the merrier". I think she also feels bad if anyone is 'left out'. I try to remember that it's coming from a good place and we are just different...

I find big groups overwhelming and
the conversation is less satisfying, more chat/ catching up rather than anything in depth. We meet up with our kids and I much prefer meeting up with one other family, I find two toddlers can play together or apart while the mums chat, but 3-4 toddlers need more refereeing/ intervention from parents.

Anyway, my friend isn't rude enough to invite others to my house (when there are hints I ignore them!). If she did I would reply "no that's not convenient this week, tell Sarah I'll invite her over another time".

In my case I do see this friend less often now. When I do see her I try to make quite specific plans eg a ticketed event, or catching a particular train, so it is less easy to invite lots of others. I've also met her half way and see that sometimes groups can be fun and go along with her plans happily, and on other occasions be more firm about not inviting others.

SecretSmellies · 10/10/2017 09:47

I had a friend who did this too. You would arrange lunch out, or a trip to the cinema or whatever and she would just turn up with whoever.

shakey my mum has an old friend (they are in their 70s) who for decades brings her sister along to everything- whether invited or not (including my wedding! The invite was for her and her DH, she brought her sister instead).

Really odd.

Original poster

FluffyFlowerFace · 10/10/2017 09:50

It's so annoying. She has ended up with some right odd bods invited along who then expect to be invited to everything! She never learns

OP posts:

Original poster

FluffyFlowerFace · 10/10/2017 09:52

She has been told but does it again!

OP posts:

BlackAmericanoNoSugar · 10/10/2017 09:52

What would she do if you replied "If you're busy with other people then I will leave you to it. Let me know when you're next free as I was looking forward to catching up with you." If there are three of you, and you know that it annoys the third person too, then perhaps you and she could say that the two of you will meet up and busy friend can enjoy herself with her friends and the THREE of you can meet up another time. Until she gets the message that she meets you in the manner that has been agreed, or she doesn't see you at all.

pigeondujour · 10/10/2017 09:55

and a goth boy whom I'd never met

TobleroneBoo · 10/10/2017 09:59

I hate this, it makes me feel as though my company isnt good enough, but then I'm not a very sociable person.

I would tell her how you feel!

SugarMiceInTheRain · 10/10/2017 10:00

YANBU. I have 2 friends who do this. I feel like a right misery guts but when I'm going to meet a friend then realise she's invited others along my heart sinks. Can't chat about the same things - I'm not exactly likely to confide in her random friend so conversation is fairly superficial and I usually end up making my excuses early and being annoyed that something I was looking forward to has been changed (especially if I've moved other plans to meet the friend). In the summer, when we were going somewhere a fair drive away to meet up and a friend told me another friend (who I don't know) was coming I was so miffed. We got stuck in traffic on the way and I'd have sat through the traffic if we were just meeting her and kids but couldn't be bothered with the hassle for a meetup with Susie Randomer and her kids as well so texted to say we had got stuck due to an accident and were turning round and going home because DC couldn't cope with hours waiting in traffic. We turned around at the next roundabout, found a nearby park and had a lovely picnic on our own.

KungFuEric · 10/10/2017 10:00

Urgh, I also have a friend who tried to do this at the beginning of our friendship before she realised it wasn't my scene and I'd decline changes of arranged plans.

I think it's one of those things that the people who do it genuinely fail to understand why it isn't perfectly acceptable, the 'more the merrier' extrovert crowd.

SloeSloeQuickQuickGin · 10/10/2017 10:05

Does anyone have this exfriend?

So, its down to you to organise the works night out - you organise the time, the venue, the menu and take the deposits THEN she comes along and emails everyone to ask if the date is suitable for every one, a tick box questionnaire offering a choice of Indian, Chinese, Mexican etc …then after much emailing it all ends up at what was organised in the first place.

RebeccaWrongDaily · 10/10/2017 10:06

maybe she's short of time/childcare/money and so needs to shoehorn as many people into one night as poss?

Maybe she doesn't want the same things as you any more from your friendship and finds time having a girly catch up arseclenching so is trying to change the dynamic, you wont know unless you ask her.

KungFuEric · 10/10/2017 10:14

I think it's fine to want different things Rebecca but what these people tend to do is bamboozle you into a very different event at the last moment, rarher than arranging a large social gathering and inviting you, where you can accept or decline the invite.

Basically, don't be a bamboozler.

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