How to tell friend to stop moaning

[cauliflowersqueeze]

Ok a little bit of advice.

I have been friends with a woman for about 20 years. As the years have gone on she has become more and more negative, constantly complaining about work (we don’t work at the same place) and it’s really getting me down every time I see her.

I do like her, and I do feel very sorry for her, but after I’ve seen her I feel completely drained and sad. I can’t get a word in edgeways, if I try to say something she will look off into the middle distance, wait till I’ve finished and then turn everything back to her.

Everything in me tells me to just keep out her way, but it’s been a long friendship and I do feel sorry for her. I want to tell her to be a bit more positive but I think she would be overly sarcastic at that or just “fake jolly”. All of her complaints are about work - I have tried to find her lots of other jobs but she pretends to be interested but never actually does anything about it.

Is there anything I can say to improve things or AIBU to just let things die off?

I have a family member like this. They complain about everything. And their tone of voice is so harsh. I get constant updates "then I rang such a department and they said blah blah blah". Every mundane minute detail in a vitriolic tone. Glass is always half completely empty. They have had a tough time and to be fair have plenty to complain about but at the same time never look on the bright side. Eg hated job. Got made redundant. Instead of saying "ok blessing in disguise, now I can look for another job" it's unfair this and legal repurcussion that, going to sue, contacting the union. Instead of putting energy into moving forward. It's draining and I don't know what to do! I now just say "um hum" and engage in the conversation as little as possible

Gemma that situation is almost exactly the same as mine!

I think I just feel sorry for her and also it’s been such a long friendship. But I do feel totally used afterwards and she has zero interest in me so it feels very one way.
I also feel frustrated and cowardly that I can’t directly tell her that she makes me feel rubbish after I’ve spent time with her - but she would then feel even worse.

I normally see her once a fortnight or so, and we text quite a bit but haven’t over the last couple of weeks.

I’m pretty sure she does have depression or anxiety or something that needs unpicking, but she always says she never has time to do anything for herself. And I think she’s probably scared of what they might unpick (although she hasn’t said this).

I hugely appreciate your responses and it’s really interesting to see that so many of you have experienced something similar.

I also feel frustrated and cowardly that I can’t directly tell her that she makes me feel rubbish after I’ve spent time with her - but she would then feel even worse

But what about YOU? What about how you feel after these conversations?

You cannot be responsible for her MH. You can offer advice, you can listen, you can be empathic but if someone just wants to say in a loop of negativity, you honestly have to think about yourself and how this relationship is affecting you

*stay in a loop of negativity

Well you could always say ‘for fucks sake, do you ever stop moaning?’

She may never speak to you again but that might be a bonus. 😂

So, sorry to risk a thread hijack, there are a few of us on here where this situation concerns our mothers. Clearly we can’t ghost them. Going low contact doesn’t help either?

My DM is like this. She asks me what I would like for my birthday/xmas present and all I want is a Space NK gift card as she makes a drama out of everything else. But no, that’s too boring. This birthday I asked for some flowers. She spent the entire day demanding a picture of the flowers and complained to the florist that they had taken too long to deliver. She has now worked herself up into a frenzy about a bunch of flowers which were delivered towards the end of their delivery time period. If I say anything then I am “mean” and she phones every one up to say how mean I am to her. I have given up counting on any support from her.

I’m clearly not the only one here with mother issues. But what can we do?

Some people get used to being permanently on ‘transmit’ and don’t get that a conversation is a mix of transmit/receive.

I have to admit that, over the years, I’ve gradually moved people like this to the acquaintance zone as it’s exhausting maintaining non-reciprocal relationships where you provide a free therapy role for people who seem to have such little interest in your life/news/wellbeing.

It’s human nature to want to vent sometimes though but it has to be equal. A good friend (who is a great listener) and I have a pre-timed slot at the start of our get togethers of around 5-10mins each where we take turns to share and then bin the rubbish stuff that’s currently going on in our lives. We have a rule that after that we talk about lighter stuff and things of mutual interest. Obviously if something really grim has happened we don’t keep to a stopwatch but for normal get togethers it jprovides a structure to remind us not to get into a loop of focussing on moaning. We both tend to go away feeling a bit lighter about, having had a bit of fun.

The fact that she has zero interest in you or your life is a bigger issue imo, relationships are a two way street, otherwise, what's the point?

@Triglesoffy
When my mother goes on, I now have started to shush her, walk away, tell her I can’t listen to this any more, keep calls short.

Her current issues are a lot but not exclusively about her health, when she has far better health than me. Her other is her operation and recovery, which although incredibly debilitating, horrible and scary at the time was far easier than mine because she only had one operation and recovered pretty fast for what it was. Whereas I had major surgery after her then went under the knife again several months later. The second surgery has been terrible for my mental health. Coupled with this I am disabled and chronically ill. Nowhere near close to recovery atm btw.

She was shocked by my reaction when I refused to listen to her operation recovery woes but I have got myself to a place, where her reaction is her reaction and I’m not responsible for that. Nor her feelings or lack of indecision. This ability to not give a much of a shit about her trivial issues has been vastly helped by my state of mental health after op 2.

Needless to say, I don’t tell her about my struggles (for which I have been accused of being secretive on a few occasions). However, she just doesn’t have the ability to empathise and makes it all about her. So sharing my problems with her are a no go.

My advice is to refuse to listen. Shut it down. Walk away. Change the subject. End the call. Do a David Cameron. He wasn’t prepared so sort out the shit so neither should anyone else.

I know something really difficult in my life happened to make the change. But therapy had already very much started the process. I suggest getting a therapist. It helped me to stop being the scared child, who feared mummy rejecting her over and over again just for wanting to be a real person.

On rereading it should say “she was shocked I would no longer listen to her recovery woes....” They’ve pretty much been a feature of every convo for a looooong time.

My DH has a tendency to be like this.

When irritated or cross about something, he’ll respond to my, ‘everything ok?’ With an, ‘No, it’s not. How are you?!’ in a really pissed off tone.

It has made me not want to ever ask that question again.

He is very negative. I am on the verge of a snapping and calling him a mood hoover, but have so far managed to restrain myself...

Triglesoffy Yep, it’s much trickier when it’s a close relation doing it. There doesn’t seem to be a magic wand to stop this and I end up using a mix of zoning out and thinking about what to have for tea or using questions like ‘that seems to have really upset you can you explain why?’ Providing an alternative reaction(‘it really didn’t bother me that the flowers arrived at 4pm, they were lovely!’) often seems to go down like a lead balloon (probably because it’s not focussing on them/their feelings/their reactions). With more robust family members I tend to be more direct now (‘right, it sounds like you’ve had quite a day/week/month. Now, wait till you hear what’s been happening in the Suki household.’ and if they interrupt to derail it back to their stuff ‘Nope, still my turn. I listened to yours.’) Can see that this would not work at all with more fragile egos:-)

I am a Tigger married to an Eeyore. I labelled his grumbling 'relentless negativity'. He also tends to get stuck on transmit mode!

I ration him to one moan for every five positives (not really counting, just provoking some positives). The DC and I used to play sickness bingo with him, counting how many sentences it took for him to turn anyone's mention of pain or sickness to himself. The day he did it within three words he was offended that we laughed.

Yet he has a very real, long-standing, painful illness that limits his mobility and he never, ever complains about that.

It's habit, and he's working on it!

Unfortunately there do seem to be a lot of people like this. I totally relate to the "active listening" one does for hours on end, only to be met with absolute silence and tumbleweed blowing across the room/phone line if you say something about yourself.

With one relation I manage to ameliorate it by doing something together rather than just talking.

With dms it is often the case that they are stuck in their ways and probably more than a bit lonely. I feel the frustration of being presented constantly with a problem, talking for hours, coming up with solutions and then being met with exactly the same spiel in the next conversation, as if you had never talked about the matter before.

Oh god I know someone like this. I didn't mind the offloading but found her lack of interest in anything I had to say quite offensive! I'm not sure these people can change but you never know..

One of the mums at school is like this. It's quite rude and I find it exhausting. You ask, 'how's things' and she will literally give you a lowdown of all the negative things in her life and go on and on and on. There is no self awareness, and no notion that she is dumping all her negativity on the other mums. Funnily, she has not much time nor inclination to provide helpful advice when somebody else tells her about their own problems.

It's me, me, me.

She is also fiercely ambitious and lives through her kids so their every success or problem is THE MOST IMPORTANT THING IN THE UNIVERSE.

She has a really bitter look about her but my ability to empathise diminishes with each time she couldn't give a shiny shit about other people.

Total energy sucker. I have distanced myself as I wasn't looking forward to years of her misery thrown at me. She is a user of people. I used to help her all the time with parties, childcare etc. but this was never reciprocated. She also always bitches about the other mums. Nobody lives up to her expectations. Utterly self-centred world view. As I said really very rude.

OP, distance yourself from that soul sucker.

One thing I would say is that we have a family policy of pushing back on our moaner, not making suggestions to fix it. If they are moaning about something then we ask what they are going to do about it. This does stop them as they have no intention of doing anything about it at all, they just want to moan about it!

Doesn't stop them moving on to another moaning topic, but it does cut them off.

My sister is like this. She can talk at with me for hours about anything (including people I don't know and their friends and relatives!) The last time we got together I listened to her talk moan non stop for two hours. When she finally finished she said 'how's things with you?' as I started to speak she took out her mobile phone and started scrolling through it which I thought was extremely rude. As we were leaving she said 'when can we meet up again, I love meeting up with you' I love her to bits but I do wish she wouldn't dump all her crap and woes on me especially as I have got plenty of my own!

Op - your friend could be my sister. It is so draining.

Seriously negative about her life, never has a complimentary thing to say about anything I wear, say, do.

Added to this, she is extremely jealous.

We are like chalk and cheese

Gosh, my dsis does this too! I was when I caught her surreptitiously looking at her phone when I was saying something (after a very long story about her in-laws). I stopped short in the middle of a sentence, and she didn't even notice!

To the pps who said she is stuck on “transmit” and not “receive” you are SO right.

That’s it exactly.

And the total disinterest in my life is galling, yes. Makes me feel like crap.

So much harder if it’s a member of the family though. Jeeeez.

I am finding this thread so useful. Like many PPs I have a parent who moans endlessly, is negative about everything, barely listens to me and never asks anything about my life. Next time I speak to them I plan to try the "that seems to have really upset you, can you explain why?" response to the ridiculous moans about minor things that don't affect them, and "what are you going to do about it?" for the things that do affect them and which I know damn well they have no intention of doing anything about.

As others have said, it is so incredibly draining listening to extended moaning, especially as my parent tends to raise their voice and seem almost angry about some of the things they are moaning about. I used to offer advice but was met with "that won't work" or "I have tried that and it didn't work" so gave up, and now I just let them moan while I think about something else and occasionally say "uh-uh" or similar. I only phone them every few weeks because I know I am going to come off the phone feeling emotionallly battered and exhausted and I can't cope with that any more often (and need to prepare myself for it and be in the right frame of mind)

I have read through this thread with a creeping sense of shame as I know I have strong tendencies to be somewhat like your friend (though I am aware that by saying that I am once again I am making it all about me ) Like the other pp on this thread, I am interested in and care about other people so it's more the relentless negativity although I do have to catch myself sometimes when I start to get stuck on transmit.

Really liked some of the pp's suggestions on this. I think it is really hard to make someone aware of their behaviour in a way that helps them to change. You may well be met with defensiveness, but if you care about her you sort of don't have much to lose in being direct as you may find the only other solution is that you reduce contact.

Good luck OP and thanks for the indirect kick up the bum!

Penguin that made me laugh!!
I’m sure you’re not on transmit all the time!!