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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:

Casmama · 18/04/2018 21:20

I’m not sure there was anything polite about what you said op.

I’m generally a fan of a direct approach but if you really said everything you have written here then I think that goes way beyond anything that was necessary or constructive.

Witchend · 18/04/2018 21:21

How totally nasty. It's the sort of thing that stays with people for years.

If you've only known her a month you can't possibly know she isn't suffering from social anxiety and waffling to try and cover that. I had a friend who could be a bit like that at toddler group. New mums often used to say how confident she was.
They didn't know it had taken her 6 weeks to actually get through the door having turned up and panicked upon arrival.
If someone had said that to her she wouldn't have left the house for days.

DanceDisaster · 18/04/2018 21:22

I’ve got a friend who talks a lot, but he’s so brilliantly entertaining. He’s probably my best friend anyway, but even if he wasn’t, I’d still want him to be at every party I went to as he always has something brilliant and funny to say. Just throwing that out there for those who say they are like the friend! It’s not all bad.

I wish I was naturally entertaining like that. Far better than being a boring joy sponge - being the boring joy sponge is my biggest fear, socially speaking, as I sometimes manage to drift into conversation about something serious, based on a lighthearted comment . I try not to do it if I can possibly help it!

AtrociousCircumstance · 18/04/2018 21:22

All the conversation hoggers reading this thread who are becoming offended, please stop and reflect instead - learn to pause, ask questions, drum up some interest in other people. Listen more. Open your minds

summerinthecountry · 18/04/2018 21:22

Wow, the other mother has had a lucky escape!!!! To only hope she has somehow read the thread.
She can calm down and become more confident, she will be fine. Wish I could say same for you.

monkeychickenpig · 18/04/2018 21:23

Anxious people can also be very loud and talk a lot.
I am extremely anxious and known to talk a lot.
So what if you know lots about her? You could have sat with someone else.
Your additional remarks about the pronunciation of her daughter name are snide.
You sound like a nasty piece of work and I hope next week you get what you wished for, which is evidentially silence. Go sit alone next week.
And text her tonight. You owe her it.

flubdub · 18/04/2018 21:23

I hope she's got some other friends

kaitlinktm · 18/04/2018 21:24

People who are “socially awkward” are usually quiet and shy. What new breed of social awkwardness is this?

There are all kinds of social awkwardness. Some people can't think of the right thing to say, some people are panicked by silences and long pauses in the conversation. Others are brutally honest and think they are being polite. It takes all sorts to be socially awkward.

NewYearNewMe18 · 18/04/2018 21:24

This reply has been deleted

Message deleted by MNHQ. Here's a link to our Talk Guidelines.

corcaithecat · 18/04/2018 21:24

I do that, the interrupting without meaning to. I'm a lot better now but it's taken years to reign it in.
I think with me, it's about insecurity but I'd be grateful that you'd mentioned it and I'd probably try really hard to keep myself in check when we met up.
Hopefully, she'll realise you were just frustrated but that you still want to be friends, assuming you do.

Maybe invite her to coffee in a few days to see how it goes?

Tomorrowillbeachicken · 18/04/2018 21:25

flubdub OP is not her friend.

summerinthecountry · 18/04/2018 21:26

By the way my most chatty friend, she is by far my most favourite!! She doesn’t stop and I love listening to her, everyone loves her. She always knows what to say and is confident, vivacious, bold and interesting and she has the best dinner parties.

Maybe you are jealous op?

Hiptroubles · 18/04/2018 21:26

Tough one. I get both sides. Sometimes i nust cant stop myself as i am woth 3 kids 24 hours a day. When an adult wants to talk to me i can get carried away and i have to keep saying in my head shut up and ask them a question! But i have also been in your shoes too. It was a bit harsh but honest

eddielizzard · 18/04/2018 21:26

good on you. yes she may be hurt. but also she may struggle to make friends and this is a valuable insight. the truth can be brutal, but so can all the snubs that people pull instead of being honest too.

AtrociousCircumstance · 18/04/2018 21:27

Wow NewYear - you want the OP to feel so guilty, she might have driven someone to suicide?!

The OP has described a hugely confident person who drones on about themselves in endless narcissistic monologues. Tedious and entitled.

Maybe the OP was unnecessarily harsh (because she’s exhausted with a new baby) but people who talk at others and over others are draining, boring and arrogant.

Monkee4 · 18/04/2018 21:28

Well done you! In my experience people like this are pretty thick skinned. I have experienced several people like this and they are quite happy to talk at you and over you and everyone else without ever caring what you are going through or what you think. I think you have actually done her a massive favour. She was probably hurt initially but if it makes her change her behaviour she will find herself with a lot more friends who don't avoid her in the future. Don't beat yourself up - I wish I was as brave as you. I am personally in favour of the direct approach but just never seem to be able to acheive it myself. Much better than talking behind someones back which happens to the ones I know who babble on regardless!!

hollieberrie · 18/04/2018 21:28

I sympathise OP. I had a few people like this in my life and although i understand it may come from a lonely / anxious place, it was just toooooo draining. I stopped being friends with them in the end.

flubdub · 18/04/2018 21:29

@Tomorrowillbeachicken

I know, but the other lady sounds as though she wanted to make some new friends. I hope she has other people to talk to if she dare engage in conversations ever again.

RoseWhiteTips · 18/04/2018 21:29

NewYearNewMe18

That is a horrible thing to say.

Sara107 · 18/04/2018 21:30

I would have been delighted if anyone at baby group had invited me for coffee, even if they were annoying. It was a pretty lonely, isolating experience I found, not the supportive, social nirvana I imagined. You may feel you have been honest, but please don' kid yourself that you were polite in your response, you were rude, personal and cutting and it was uncalled for. She made you an offer, you could have just said 'no thank you, bit busy next week'. She probably would have felt rebuffed by that anyway. She asked you for coffee, not for feedback on her personality. If you don't like her, don't spend time with her, you don't have to humiliate her. And the same goes to all your supporters on here, in between building shrines to you etc, they could just avoid the people they don't like where possible and perhaps show a bit of kindness. Your 'conversation hog' may be somebody else's 'friendly, bubbly' person. And tbh, why should she be interested in what you say? You're clearly not interested in what she says.

NoMudNoLotus · 18/04/2018 21:30

What goes around comes around @Banoffeematernity .

I hope you are happy for someone to be equally blunt and dispassionate with you about your short comings.

Thequeenisdeadboys · 18/04/2018 21:31

And also OP..I have been hugely sleep deprived too but never used that as an excuse to be so nasty and rude. Bloody hell, there are some horrendous posters on this thread !

bonnyshide · 18/04/2018 21:31

We should all just learn to be a little bit kinder, at least (by the look of responses on this thread) most people would be kinder than the OP was, thank goodness for that.

The fact that the OP came on here to get validation for her unkind response speaks volumes about the type of person she is.

DanceDisaster · 18/04/2018 21:32

She doesn’t sound boring though, as the op said she was happy to sit an listen to her anecdotes. Maybe there is a touch of the green eyed monster about this? Only based on the op and how “effortlessly” this other woman holds court .

RosyPrimroseface · 18/04/2018 21:33

I agree with Sara107

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