to be annoyed and cancel this whole trip...

[drecmore]

I know my friend over 20 years, we went through lots of different stages in our lives and I could say she's my closest friend.
Despite the fact that we leave in different countries now, we still in regular contact and see each other at least once, twice a year.

She is having hard time and not coping very well with things from what I gather.

She's single mum, and last year had a very difficult break up with guy, that was supposed to be the one. It looks like she still suffering and feel very lonely and low about it.

She's been desperate for me to come and visit for months. It was not easy to organise as required my husband to book time off, as well as moving my schedule around (easier for me as I'm freelance).

So we choose the date that suited everyone I confirmed with her and booked plane tickets. All very excited until today. She sent me an email saying that her schedule changed an now she will have to be somewhere else for most part of the weekend. It's important as it s course related to work so obviously I don't want her to miss it, but at the same time I don't feel like I want to go now.

I can't believe it's something that she found out about just now, I'm sure she messed up her dates while she was confirming with me.

I planned to go Sat to Wed, had spend weekend with her, and I didn't expect her to miss work so happy to arrange something for myself Mon. Tue and hang with her in the evening. Now essentially she ask me to come and sit in her apartment waiting for her.

For context, when she came to visit last year with her son, she stayed for nearly 2 weeks. During her stay I missed lots of work, as I am working from home and it's difficult for me to do anything when someone is around. We did lots of outings during the day, one day trip and lots of stuff with kids.

I feel bit shit and don't want to go spend few hundreds pounds to essentially waiting for her around.

So would it be unreasonable to just cancel this trip?

So what days will she be there?

It looks like now, only evenings.... which would've ok, if agreed before but that wasn't the plan...

You've got every justification for cancelling it.

Will you lose all the money if you cancel thus making it impossible to rearrange? If so I'd go anyway, explore the city over the weekend, enjoy a lazy dinner in a nice restaurant alone, etc and catch up with your friend in the week.
Does she get any toil if she's on a work course all weekend?

I think if you're cancelling because you genuinely feel it's just not worth the time and expense for the now much reduced time you'll get to spend with her, then that's fine. I would send her a polite message to that effect saying how sorry you are but you totally understand these things happen.

However I get the sense that really you're a bit pissed off with your friend and you'd be cancelling to show her that and to "punish" her. Do you feel taken for granted? You seem to have rearranged a lot for the trip (and obviously paid for it) and she can even checking her diary properly. Similarly you went out of your way to free up time when she visited and she isn't making the same effort for you.

If you feel the friendship is becoming uneven then that is obviously a bigger issue than just this one trip. How much slack you're willing to cut her given the tough time she's having is obviously something only you can answer.

PCohle you nailed it!
The town she is living is extremely boring (especially this time of year) - and I know because I grow up there.
I could spend time with other people, but they will be working as well.

Anyway I feel annoyed because that's not the plan. And as much I love her it would be not the first time she done it. Few years ago I went to see her (she insisted) and I have not seen her more than few hours.
Other thing is I feel resentful about money because either way I'm out of pocket- and that's not the first time either.