Or is my friend really overstepping?

[crazyandbeyonce]

I work a super high stress job. It can be quiet at times but when it flares up, I can work 16 hour days with barely a chance to breathe. This week has been like that.

I have a very very close but very demanding friend. She's wonderful but she is in touch A LOT.

This is usually fine and we chat throughout the day but today I told her I literally couldn't chat because I was absolutely snowed under. I don't think I've had a work week so stressful for years.

Nonetheless my friend messaged me incessantly all day. I replied several times to reiterate that I wasn't ignoring her but really couldn't talk. I was close to tears with work stress today.

I was due to go for a walk with another friend after work and did manage to get to it, albeit an hour late.

I needed to massively decompress, so I didn't read or answer my demanding friend's messages (I checked they weren't urgent but they weren't) and went off for my walk.

My friend then text again to ask if I was ok. At this point I lied.

I told her I had cancelled my walk with my other friend and was still stuck working,

I know I shouldn't have lied...I know. I was just tired and needed to not read and reply to her stream of consciousness from the day. I wanted a quiet walk with a calming friend.

This would've been fine and would've given me a much needed breather and break from the screen, except what I didn't know is that she'd already called my au pair (!!!!) to ask where I was (under the guise of checking if I was ok as she hadn't heard from me for hours). My au pair told her I'd gone out for a walk with my other friend, thus revealing my lie.

She sent me a message after to say how hurtful it was that I'd gone out but hadn't replied to her and accusing me of lying (which I was). I managed to convince her the au pair had her wires crossed, but not sure she believed me. I should've confessed right away but my brain was just fried from work and completely blown away that she'd checked up on me, despite knowing exactly where I was and that I was snowed under

I now have to deal with this tomorrow. Both the fact I lied AND the fact that I'm overwhelmed and disturbed that she checked up on me.

AIBU to know I shouldn't have lied but to think this was crazy behaviour on her part?

How would you handle this now? I'm dreading that I have to deal with this when I talk to her next.

This is the second time she's had the hump because I've been too distracted with work (and she's a career woman herself so this really surprises me).

@MonthofSunnydays

I had a male colleague like this. Wouldn’t leave me alone when I said I was busy, kept chat going and complained when I didn’t answer. Text me if I wasn’t in on time, lots of crossing boundaries etc. I tried my best to keep the peace and spare his feelings, but it was affecting my work life and I even felt stressed at home about it. The last straw came when my boss wanted to speak to me and I wasn’t available. Colleague text me and I replied with something like “I must be in trouble” with a laughing emoji as we both knew I wasn’t. This colleague then phoned the boss to say I was worried and could the boss tell him what it’s about so he could pass on the message. It ended with me putting a harassment complaint in about colleague. I felt guilty until Dh pointed out he has no guilt about saying whatever he likes to me.

Oh my god, he sounds like a nightmare!!

She sounds a pain in the arse at best a bit sociopathic at worst. I would drop.

Possible...but not as common as people believe.

I tell my young adult son to remember that close friends don’t tend to come as a convenient set. There’s often someone in the group who if you were being honest, you probably wouldn’t choose to hang out with of your own volition. The same is true for other people and indeed, you will possibly be that person to someone else.

That has always been my experience anyway.

@AtSwimTwoBerts

How would you handle this now? I'm dreading that I have to deal with this when I talk to her next

I'd tell her to go fuck herself, tbh. This isn't what friendship is.

My thoughts exactly.

Just ignore the situation re lying and move on. Reduce the number of times you read messages from this friend and reply. Say 'so sorry I was too busy today - hope xxx went well - nite'. She will get the message and find someone for her incessant messaging!

We all lie once in a while,don’t worry about it. You only did it because you needed a breather and I’m not surprised! She sounds like a colossal pain in the arse! I really wouldn’t be too concerned about any of it but maybe get some new friends

I worry I'm being intrusive if I contact people more than once a week ! Too stalkerish for me .

I used to have a friend like this. It's such a relief that I'm no longer in touch with her, which is another story. I recommend telling her the truth, exactly why you lied, how stressed you are and how she's not respecting that. If she gets the hump I'd then tell her to eff off.

Actually now I've read all your posts I'm thinking this could be my ex friend! There are some crazy people in this world. Believe me, you're better off without her.

@tellmetologoffIamaMNaddict
Omg I had a friend who did that!! And not only that but she messaged someone else she saw in the photo with me as well asking what was going on and demanding to know why she hadn't been invited...
She hadn't been invited because it was a trip to go to a friends birthday party and she had never even met that person before...
She also once rang me when I was at someone else's house having dinner and demanded that I ask the host if she could pop round too and join in even tho this again was a person she had never met

We are no longer friends and I have her blocked on all channels of communication

I’ve been in similar roles where you don’t have time to breathe. End up jumping through hoops of needy friends, just to tick it off your never ending list of things to do. Don’t. Stop. I’d stick with your au pair had wires crossed story. Say you went out, but really to just collect your thoughts.
Lying and then exposing yourself when really you were just trying to protect her feelings is only going to make you look bad and feel worse.
I would now pull back. My ‘needy’ friend got the hump every time I broached how busy I was. If you want to keep your friend but don’t want the drama, just smooth it over and commit so much less!!

@VettiyaIruken

Tell her the truth. I am really busy at work and you refuse to respect that. It's adding to my stress. Yes, I lied. I needed some time to relax but you won't accept that and I was trying to spare your feelings.

Either she will take a good look at herself and stop being so demanding or she'll be so offended she'll chuck her dummy and the problem will solve itself. 🤷‍♀️

^^ this. Great reply. Your friend sounds batshit, you need to get her to rein it in.

I'd be completely honest and say I lied because I needed some space. I'd told you how busy and stressed I was but you continued to message me all day. That put additional stress on me feeling I had to reply. I'm afraid I lost it and wanted you to understand just how bad it has been for me. I'm sorry I lied and you are hurt but please don't phone checking up on me if I don't reply after expressly telling you I'm struggling at work.

@Swashbuckled

Your friend is batshit, with borderline personality disorder to boot. Keep the brilliant boundaries suggested above, but try to find a sense of amusement in it rather than just stress and anxiety. Watch her escalate into a trillion text tantrums. Like you would with your toddler who was kicking and screaming in the supermarket aisle for want of a lollipop (you know that it wouldn’t be kind to give him one). It won’t work, and you’re not her mother, but it might help you learn to find some comedy in this dreadful situation before you cut the apron strings.

This is exactly what's ended up happening.

I received a first message yesterday. Very much 'woe is me' and saying I'd cut her so deep and that I could never be as hurt as she was etc etc'.

I replied when I had time and was very blunt and said she didn't get to tell me how hurt I was and reiterating that I had told her multiple times how busy I was and in the context of that, calling my au pair was suffocating.

I then got an essay-like response later in the evening telling me how awful I am and how the words I'd used about the situation 'suffocating, obligated, overwhelming' were so unkind and had left her heartbroken.

She also said I was only allowed to reply to her message if I was more careful with my words and wasn't going to hurt her feelings.

She used the words 'I know your job is important but a short reply would've been better than no reply' (this was the most shocking part to me...I didn't even have my phone in front of me for most of the day!)

The crux was that she said if the way she cares for people is too much for me, then we can no longer be friends and I had to let her know either way.

The sad thing is, at the moment I feel ok with that. It feels like she's saying 'if I have to respect your boundaries, we can't be friends'.

Maybe I'm being super harsh at this point and not considering her feelings but this is getting insane.

And I should add, I had paraphrased re my other friend using the word abandoned. She didn't and I didn't mean to misconstrue. She didn't use such dramatic words.

Everything I've said re my first friend is completely literal though.

@VettiyaIruken

Tell her the truth. I am really busy at work and you refuse to respect that. It's adding to my stress. Yes, I lied. I needed some time to relax but you won't accept that and I was trying to spare your feelings.

Either she will take a good look at herself and stop being so demanding or she'll be so offended she'll chuck her dummy and the problem will solve itself. 🤷‍♀️

Yep. That. It is honest, blunt but kind. You may lose a friend over that, but...sometimes losing a friend is less stressful than keeping them.

I have a very good friend with 5 kids and a full time job... she frequently doesn’t reply to my texts for days or sometimes not at all. I could sort of imagine I might chase her once if it was something really urgent but if she replied saying she was snowed under, I’d respect that. I’m not her husband so I don’t have automatic rights to her attention! We care about each other deeply, but have busy lives dealing with kids and jobs. I know if I rang her in an emergency she would be there for me. But this isn’t that, it’s a very weirdly needy friend who isn’t respecting normal boundaries not an emergency.

Jesus, you're not a friend to her, you're an unpaid, on tap therapist!!

I really think you need to politely end this 'friendship' ASAP for your own mental health!

This is just utterly ridiculous. Is she in a relationship? Are you in a relationship? Is she wanting a relationship with you? This is not in the realms of normal friendships.
Why are you engaging and enabling her behaviour. Just distance yourself. Why are you using up so much emotional energy over this as it just doesn’t make sense.

So she wants you to be her emotional crux 24/7 and if not you can't be her friend?

On the one hand it's the perfect out. I would be grabbing that with both hands. But if you want to maintain a relationship with any mutual friends I'd be a bit wary as shes bound to bad mouth you and twist it to you 'abandoning' her.

But honestly anyone who thinks this is normal is someone else I would be avoiding.

@friendlycat

This is just utterly ridiculous. Is she in a relationship? Are you in a relationship? Is she wanting a relationship with you? This is not in the realms of normal friendships. Why are you engaging and enabling her behaviour. Just distance yourself. Why are you using up so much emotional energy over this as it just doesn’t make sense.

I'm not really using any energy over it now. In fact, I skim read her last dramatic message and haven't replied to it. I feel like I might be being heartless but I'm really over the whole thing.

Belloc, The danger with that approach is that the overstepping friend will simply overstep when the OP is not at work. Also, it's cowardly. The OP is fully entitled at ALL times to not be constantly badgered and bothered by anybody at all (as we all are we.) Making up excuses just wastes more emootional energy. . .the friend has massively overstepped boundaries and needs to be told. Whether the OP was at work or not is really irrelevant, what's relevant is that the friend is out of order and not showing even basic consideration. She is behaving like a sulky and tantrummy child. Like others, I too felt suffocated just reading this!

Of course you are not being super harsh! There are 2 problems here. One, your friend is obsessional, unstable and is harassing you and guilt-tripping you andmaking your life super-stressful.She has shown no regard for your boundaries at all. And two, your boundaries are very shaky. As soon as you try to put your foot down, you feel guilty. Stop bloody apologizing! Every time she throws a tantrum, you are getting back to her trying to fix the situation: stop this too!

I'm usually loathe to ascribe a label to people online but I agree with everybody who says this has the classic signs of borderline personality disorder. All the talk about being heartbroken, being abandoned, all the kneejerk responses, all the rage, all the guilt-tripping, all the drama. I had a friend like this a few years ago. On a good day, you'd hardly know; on a bad day (and far too many days were bad) she was exhausting: demanding, tantrummy, manipulative, unpleasant. She had to go because it was affecting my own mental health.

I have a similarly stressful job with long hours. Friends in other careers don't really get it. My now husband didn't even get it until we lived together.

Your friend sounds very selfish.

Sorry sent to soon... your friend also sounds very controlling and not really all that bothered about your feelings or boundaries.