AIBU to block depressing friend

[LittleMermaidRose]

Only for a couple of days or so!

We live about 5 hours away from each other but are in contact through email every day.

Her constant negativity really brings me down. Every email is just her complaining, there is no actual conversation anymore. I basically get shut down if I try to talk about anything other than her problems.
Even if we somehow manage to change topics or shock talk about me for a change, she always finds a way to put a damper on anything I say and turns the focus back on to her.

Atm it seems like a very one sided friendship and it's making me feel resentful towards her. I want to be her friend, not her therapist.

I do feel terrible, we've been friends since childhood and I know she does suffer with anxiety and depression, but it's now starting to make me feel depressed too.

I dread opening up an email from her. If I don't reply, she'll send at least another 2 more.

WIBU just to block her for a couple of days? I'm dealing with some family issues atm (which I've told her about yet she's never asked how I'm doing) and I really don't need any more negativity right now.

Am I a terrible friend?
Any tips on how I can deal with this?
I don't want to lose our friendship.

Send her one message to say you have some personal issues going on and you will be coming off SM and not responding to emails for a few days while you deal with things.

You're not a terrible friend at all. It is exhausting having a friend like this and it can really drag you down. You don't need that. Start only replying to every other email. And keep it brief - sorry Janet, I haven't had a moment today as I've been trying to sort out my family issue, etc. I'll reply properly at the weekend. And stick to it, hopefully reducing contact to just weekends. If she still just goes on and on about her problems to be honest I'd just ignore her moaning and not really acknowledge it in your email. Or just something like, sorry to hear you've had a rough week, you must be looking forward to the weekend, what have you got planned? I've been doing xyz. Or say something like, you need to get out and do something, it's no good for you to be sitting in wallowing all the time and change the subject. Don't give her moaning the attention she wants.

I'll definitely try telling her I'll get back to her properly at the weekend, I like that idea a lot.

Oh I've tried so many times to ignore what she says (but I always feel awful for doing so) and I try to put a positive spin on things she complains about - doesn't work.

It really is exhausting

Maybe ignore her emails for a week.
I know it sounds harsh but you have to think about yourself too and give yourself the space you need to focus on your own worries.
Or just send one email saying "Sorry, I have a few issues to deal with" and then take a break.
Don't feel guilty.
It can really drag you down.

I don’t think you need to email daily to maintain the friendship just be honest & say you want to be a good friend but are very worn out at the moment and just haven’t got the time to communicate as much so hope she understands you aren’t able to reply as much at the moment. End with something like ‘I know you’ll understand.’

What are you getting out of this friendship?

Hey, there is an excellent book about dealing with difficult people (can’t remember the name right now!) but I do remember that the strategy that it advises with people like this is not to try and put a positive spin on it as they won’t accept that their situation is anything other than terrible and will see that as you invalidating their feelings. It suggests instead trying the following type of response. ‘That must be really tough, what are you planning to do about it?’ I.e make them come up with a proactive way to solve their own problems rather than just complaining at you whilst acknowledging their feelings.

In the mean time I echo pp in saying ‘sorry I’m a bit snowed under and really want to respond to you properly so will get back to you at the weekend’ is a good way to set expectations and boundaries.

I wouldn’t mind losing touch with her, as it might have once been a good friendship but it all sounds very one-sided now.

I was in a very similar situation 2 years ago. After several long email messages from her about the many things that were going wrong for her, to which I'd not responded, she moaned at how selfish i was. I told my friend that my dp had just had a cancer diagnosis and her response was very simply 'things are a bit shit for you too then'.

I cooled things off very rapidly after that. YADNBU.

I had a friend like that. Very needy. All one sided after a while. You've become her daily counselor OP. Every day emailing is quite full on.

In your shoes i wouldn't want to confront or make an issue - i'd want to start quietly stepping back, and start scaling down the frequency. Start by doing a week of every other day answering. Answers friendly as usual but not too in depth. Then start skipping a couple of days. Loosely aim to get it to weekly perhaps (from you) by next month. Go from there.

If she sends umpteen emails or asks what's happening just stick with the programme, keep breezy and say you're just so busy right now but will reply as soon as you can, or whatever feels comfortable to say.

I would never want to lose her as a friend - we've been friends since childhood, over 20 years. She moved away with family around 4 years ago.

Even when I do ignore her emails, she just sends more and more! I feel like I'm her diary sometimes.

That's really interesting about her perhaps feeling as though her feelings not being validated. I'll definitely take that on board.

Why don't you want to lose her? What does she do for you? How often do you see her?

I've recently just drifted away from a 17 year friendship. And I know it's hard. But I do wonder how much of it is really the sunk cost fallacy.

Can't you divert her emails into your junk folder, then maybe once a week read the most recent one and reply to that?

What is she expecting you to do though?
is she just using you as a sounding board (like a diary) or does she expect you to reply constantly?
Either way it must be draining for you, particularly when you have your own worries to deal with.
Does she have a counsellor at all? If not, maybe suggest she asks to be referred by her GP.

YANBU. This kind of relationship is really one-sided and exhausting. There is no way to tackle it either without major hurt and fallout imo.

I had a similar situation with my ex best friend. We started out both single and unlucky in love in London and then I got married and had kids and she didn't. It was really hard for her because she really wants that for herself. Our relationship didn't evolve and she wanted to just vent her spleen to me about her latest boyfriend or being single depending.

She would spend hours on the phone ranting at me and crying and I would make her feel better. If we met up it was the same. Hours of complaining and ranting and drunk crying then wanting to go out on the pull.

I realised I got nothing but stress and feeling drained from any contact with her. And I ended up pulling back more and more until we didn't contact each other. It was really sad. But she was really affecting my mental health tbh - a real drain on my strength and energy. Every conversation would end in a cursory 'how are you' after hours of drama and I could tell she didn't actually care how I was at all.

Sorry that was long. What I mean is that when you become counsellor instead of friend then it is hard to break the cycle. It is draining as hell. Don't block her but do step back and ignore her and stop offering advice.

I would actually tell her that you can't cope with her emails anymore as they are dragging g you down.

Putting a positive spin on her problems is belittling in its effect. No wonder the dynamics are off. It's better to show that you understand what she is saying and feel some empathy for her situation.

It's definitely fine to limit or stop interactions if they are draining for you though.

The negativity is wearing you down.

Ignore her for a few weeks.

At first repeated messages (etc) may be guilt inducing or alarming, but will become less so. I'm sure you have other things to do and are busy.

In a short while ignoring her will be easy.

Then make the ignoring permanent, and never get drawn in to explaining yourself..

Life is too short, it doesn't matter if you have known her for 20 years. It's not friendship if it's one sided.

Sticking to her problems and her negative view of the world is doing her no favour anyway.

Of course you can detach yourself, she 's not your daughter.

Omg I couldn’t have written this only my friend lives round the corner so less easy to hide!

Putting a positive spin on her problems is belittling in its effect. No wonder the dynamics are off. It's better to show that you understand what she is saying and feel some empathy for her situation.

I was going to say similar. It does make it feel like you haven't understood what's been said to be on the receiving end of somebody who twists every difficult thing in your life into a positive and therefore dismisses it. I understand that's not what you intend, but it tends to be the effect.

However, you're right, you're not her therapist.

It does sound like she might find emailing samaritans helpful instead. I admit I have no brilliant suggestions on how to raise it with her, but emailing daily to get things off her chest would be entirely within how their email service works. She doesn't need to be suicidal to use it.

[email protected] - they aim to reply within 24 hours, but it's usually quicker than that. They keep your messages for a rolling month so although it will be different volunteers responding under the same name she'd get continuity because they can see her previous messages when they reply to her. So it's not like phoning when you start from scratch each time and instead it feels like they know you. Plus it's still email which clearly works for her.

It would be a much more appropriate outlet for her day to day feelings and stresses.

I don't know your friend but if it were me I think I'd try explaining how it works (there's more info on their website), being clear it's not just about suicide, and pitch it as something you thought would be ideal for her as she finds email so helpful etc etc and thought you'd mention it as won't be as available anymore but don't want her without support. I don't know, something like that. So it doesn't come across as her being abandoned or cast off but is clear this situation will be changing whether or not she decides to try them.

You do need to care for yourself and this is clearly not sustainable. Hopefully this might make it less distressing for her and help her develop more robust coping mechanisms so she's leaning on you in a lighter way.

I understand why you would feel guilty (and sad probably) about this, but you can't be her therapist even if you wanted to be.

It's ok to take steps to safeguard yourself, just try to find a way that isn't avoidably hurtful or damaging. There's nothing here to suggest she's distressing you deliberately, it sounds like she's in such a dark place she can't manage alone. So offer her alternatives as you retreat.

If the relationship is draining you there is no rule to say you have to stay in it. You can drift away from people. Surrounding yourself with happy positive people or people who are generally upbeat is a surefire way of improving your life.

Just be honest. I’ve had a lot of problems with personal circumstances in the last few months which have made me very low. I live with my boyfriend and it hasn’t effected him in the slightest because I wouldn’t bring him down with my problems. She’s choosing to use you as a free therapist.

She might not have a clue you feel this way. Be honest with her but in a polite way.

Thanks for all your responses.

I've never intended to belittle her problems by trying to get her to look at the positives, I would really hate to think that it's came across that way to her. I'll definitely be mindful of that in the future.

It's just that she's got so many different problems. Sometimes I think she goes looking for them. I give her suggestions that I think might help her but she doesn't even try, which is frustrating.

I've turned off my notifications from her, and I'll get back to her in a few days... I'll just say I've had a lot going on. Then maybe wait a couple days to reply again. I feel like I'm being particularly harsh but I really do need a break