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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

Conversation hogger!

817 replies

Banoffeematernity · 18/04/2018 20:29

A month ago I started a new baby group and the majority of mums are lovely but one mum in particular is an expert at hogging conversations. I happily listen to her stories but I can never get more than two sentences out before she talks right over me with the next thing in her head.

She does it so effortlessly and without raising her voice, and I feel like it's a contant battle to have any kind of input. I find it exhausting and end up giving up.

Anyway today she asked me if I fancied going for a coffee next week. I was exhausted again as the LO has been crabby for a few days. I politely told her that I'd rather not as I feel she talks at me rather than being interested in what I had to say and I find conversations with her a battle that leave me exhausted. I honestly think if she subs me for a traffic cone she'll have just as good a time! (I never said that though).

Was that rude of me? I honestly had no energy to think up a decent excuse. Does anyone have any self defence tips for counteracting conversation hoggers... short of screaming 'let me finish one f'ing sentence FFS!' lol

OP posts:

flowermug2 · 23/04/2018 16:58

I'm not saying you were necessarily wrong btw! But I'd definitely avoid you as I'd feel you didn't like me, I'd be embarrassed.

AnxiousPeg · 23/04/2018 17:09

Namey I specifically conceded that most of us don't have that total control 100% of the time to avoid someone making the exact point you just made

But if someone is always hogging the conversation, it's not that unreasonable that someone like OP might snap. But the conversation-hogger never exercises normal self-control.

Yeah, OP let herself down once. Convo-hoggers do it all the bloody time.

Amirite · 23/04/2018 17:15

I wish I had your courage. I have a friend like this, she just fires words at you like a machine gun. Very tiring! Good on you I say!

Queenofthedrivensnow · 23/04/2018 17:35

Mispronouncing your kids name is rude. I'm an adult with a name with 2 pronunciations and I get my hand up my arse about people who can't pay enough attention to get it right. That's not unreasonable

PoorYorick · 23/04/2018 19:16

You're not serious. Your name can be pronounced one of two ways and you're arsey because people make mistakes about it?

It's not as though your name is Ailise and they're calling you Arsehole, is it? Or is it?

Queenofthedrivensnow · 23/04/2018 20:25

It goes like this - hi my names Jane
Them - ohhhh Sandra yes great to meet you

That

PoorYorick · 23/04/2018 20:27

So the two ways that your name could be pronounced are as dissimilar sounding as the names Jane and Sandra?

NameyMcChangeRae · 23/04/2018 20:58

Wouldn’t it be more like:
Hi,my names Emilia
Hello Amelia

Understandable, and easy to correct.
Just say with an ‘e’
Why would you take offence?!

NameyMcChangeRae · 23/04/2018 21:00

This happens to me btw, and I would never think of being offended. There’s nothing offensive or rude about people pronouncing your name slightly differently/ using a very similar variant - just correct them and say it happens all the time!

browneyes77 · 23/04/2018 21:46

Sorry OP, but I think you were very cruel and extremely rude.

There was absolutely no need for you to speak to her that way. It’s all very well being honest with people, but you can do it in a tactful way rather than attacking their personality.

You may feel she was rude to hog conversations, but she never attacked your personality. From what you’ve told us, she’s never actually put you down or criticised you as a person. That’s what you did to her.

And for those people who think they’re ‘direct’ and ‘straight talking’. In my experience this is just an excuse for being downright rude. Every person I’ve known who has claimed they are a ‘direct’ person, is in fact just a rude person. They have no consideration whatsoever as to how their words might impact someone. They only care about putting their point across.

There is nothing wrong with being honest. But you can do it with tact. If you don’t do it with tact, then you’re just plain rude.

I’m not saying you shouldn’t have told her how her behaviour makes you feel, but you should’ve done it in a better setting rather than randomly barking it at her when she’d just asked you to go for a coffee. Maybe if you’d accepted the coffee, you could’ve explained it to her then in a better way. Alternatively, you could have brought it up in a jokey way when she next does it.

But that was a full on assault. A character assassination. You were a truck and you slammed straight into her and she never saw you coming.

If you apologise - and I think you should, then don’t do the “I’m sorry I said this, but...” and then go about re-iterating what you said in a different way. That is not an apology. Just apologise for coming across so brutal and leave it at that. I think you’ve already made your point. She doesn’t need to be humiliated and slapped in the face twice.

MyNameIsNotSteven · 23/04/2018 22:02

You could've just said you weren't available and left it at that.

I know some people didn't like me I'm a group of new mums because I wasn't good socially. I might sound confident but sincerely I'm not and I go back and over-analyse all the wrong things I think I've said. Those mums made me feel like a complete loser.

Given that you had the balls to say what you did, presumably you can also apologise and talk it over. You might help her to become a bit more self aware if she isn't, or to develop a filter if she's just spilling everything out of nerves.

Queenofthedrivensnow · 23/04/2018 22:57

@PoorYorick yes they are.
Even if names are similar sounding it's still good manners to attempt to pronounce them as the bearer has.

Ime the not bothering to listen properly to names is quite class and age specific. It's very entitled.

PoorYorick · 23/04/2018 23:00

I'm trying to think of a name that can be pronounced in two ways, as differently as Jane and Sandra.

If your name is pronounced in two different ways, it seems very likely to me that someone might mishear it, pronounce it the way they're more used to saying it out of habit, or just make a mistake and find it hard to remember which one you are.

Copperbonnet · 23/04/2018 23:19

IME the not bothering to listen properly to names is quite class and age specific

Goodness.

ButchyRestingFace · 23/04/2018 23:29

I'm trying to think of a name that can be pronounced in two ways, as differently as Jane and Sandra

I used to know an Andrea who was mortally offended by people pronouncing it as And-ree-uh rather than An-dray-a.

Her levels of umbrage were quite equal to a Jane persistently referred to as Sandra, I believe.

Queenofthedrivensnow · 23/04/2018 23:31

Nah - experiences you disagree with are made up/invalid.

Makes me laugh though that in other arenas the protection of self identification is way up there in government policy but wanting to be addressed by your given name......too much right?

smurfit · 24/04/2018 05:15

Helena is often mispronounced. It can be Helen-a, Hel-lee-na or Hel-lay-na. Reasonable to mispronounce unless you've been told the correct way.

chestylarue52 · 24/04/2018 06:23

I don’t think you were rude, I think you were just unkind. You could have just said no. Maybe she talks so much because she’s nervous.

MrsDilber · 24/04/2018 07:00

If she said she was unavailable, it's only putting a sticking plaster on the problem till next time.

I'm a bit like Dori, if I don't get my point out, it vanishes quickly, not sure if it makes me like her, but friends and family are amused by it an allow it. My poor DH though 😂 he has to live with it.

I would want to know if a friend felt this way, but I couldn't continue the meeting up because I can't help it. You either accept me as I am or not.

See, I've just done it here!

throwcushions · 24/04/2018 07:47

"I'm trying to think of a name that can be pronounced in two ways, as differently as Jane and Sandra."

One I know of is "Aleesha" vs "Alissia" (for Alicia).

KERALA1 · 24/04/2018 10:31

Clementine! Can be pronounced Clementine to rhyme with wine or teen.

IMO the former is nicer but neither is "right or wrong". Had to use the "rhymes with wine" line a few times initially then everyone picks it up.

AnxiousPeg · 24/04/2018 10:35

MrsDilber

Of course you can help it! You choose not to stop yourself interrupting.

Which is fine if your friends are ok with it. Many people wouldn't be of course.

eloisesparkle · 24/04/2018 18:33

I work with a conversation hogger.
It's all about her, her sons, her daughter. On and on and on.....

Aghhhhhh

RoadToRivendell · 24/04/2018 20:05

It's all about her, her sons, her daughter. On and on and on.....

Yep. Probably all high achievers too?

eloisesparkle · 24/04/2018 20:42

Well Road they're only 11, 9 and 7 but I'm sure they will all be high achievers

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