To be considering walking away from a friendship because of friends work stress

[anon2211]

She is a teacher and I can’t take the negativity. I know it can’t just be me as her brother, mum and husband have all told her it’s too much. Help!!

I am in the same position with a friend of mine. We are both teachers but I can't abide her negativity.

I know it’s a hard job but honestly ... I’ve had enough.

Does she moan and moan.................and carry on moaning?

If anything makes you moan constantly with no resolution, it’s draining. Have you told her to look at concrete ways to make her job better, including leaving teaching?

Oh yes. I think if it was making me as miserable as it makes her I’d have left long ago but she won’t.

I have had to back away from a newish friend for precisely this reason. She is a total Debbie Downer. She would honestly have something to moan about if she won the lottery, the man of her dreams, and the secret recipe to calorie free cake.

I would back off a little (well, I did) and maybe tell her that her stress from work is now affecting not only her, but people around her, and it's time to make some sort of change.

i don’t think you’re necessarily being unreasonable.

Sometimes people lean emotionally too heavily on the people around them to offload, and use that as a means of staying in the bad situation rather than doing something about it. I’m wondering if this is what your friend is doing, especially as her family members are feeling the same as you.

I know someone who is in an incredibly abusive relationship and acknowledges this, but rather than leaving he leans very heavily on those around him. Slowly but surely everyone has realised he has no intention of leaving the relationship, and is in fact getting further committed into it, and relies on those around him to take the resulting load - and slowly but surely he is losing his friends because he puts too much on them.

I think it’s fine to step back from the friendship if it’s become too one sided. It’s one thing having a moan about work but it’s too much to let it dominate all your time with her. I bet she never asks you about your worries and stresses.

Even with teaching there are ways - cut hours, move to a school with more supportive leadership etc. I used to work with a man who loathed his job and he was a life sucker.

Oh God - this is DP at the moment. He got an attendance warning and won't stop going on about it, it's really doing my head in!
Try and see less of her, or go to loud gigs or the cinema so she has less of a chance to moan - change the subject every time she brings it up?
I have a friend who works for the NHS who is just like this and l stopped seeing her every week for the same reason - a couple of times a month is more managable!