That friends meet up without me?

[lovevlyt]

I have friends that sometimes meet without including me.

The annoying thing is they all met through me and didn't know each other before. They also have kids, I don't - probably another factor in it.

Do they not understand it's upsetting?

Am I being too sensitive? It really annoys me and part of me feels like distancing myself from them.

[Cloudfrost]

Easy to say when you don't have kids!
And your attitude will pushes away friends with kids. You are unable to put yourself in their shoes and have the superiority vibe.

[lovevlyt]

@PurpleDaisies no I didn't say that and if I did I'll rephrase. If something is out of your control then obviously cancelling is fine / but otherwise the frequency does matter.

[HarebrightCedarmoon]

They probably aren't being deliberately hurtful, but just don't value your friendship in the same light and find they have more in common with the other friends. Also being more forthright and invite yourself along. Perhaps they think you wouldn't be interested.

[lovevlyt]

Could your friends feel that you would judge them on these three aspects? Cancelling/being late/not making an effort on how they look.

I have no interest in how someone looks when they meet me in there for their company not judge their apppearance.

Being late, even with kids - if it's all the time I'm sorry is not acceptable. If it's ten minutes fine - an hour? Not fine.

If it happens occasionally fine but really you'd be cool with friends that rock up an hour late to every meet up? I don't want friends like that

[PurpleDaisies]

[quote lovevlyt]@PurpleDaisies no I didn't say that and if I did I'll rephrase. If something is out of your control then obviously cancelling is fine / but otherwise the frequency does matter.

[/quote]
So you just didn’t mean this...

My level of flakiness is this - if someone has a genuine reason ie - they are sick or kids unexpectedly sick or an emergency happens or they double booked by accident and decide to stick with original plan then fine.

If they keep doing the above say one out of every two or three planned meets not fine. The frequency is also important.

[HarebrightCedarmoon]

And when people cancel things, maybe they are exhausted, depressed or anxious. I'll tell you what though, being needy, uptight and over-analysing things is the biggest turn-off for friendships for me.

[lovevlyt]

@PurpleDaisies ok - I'd find it very odd if 9 out of ten meets something out of your control kept happening so you had to cancel. In which case / even though our of control I wouldn't want to have a friendship like that,

[Moondust001]

You are coming across as extremely controlling, very judgemental, and with an "I introduced them so I own them" attitude. Perhaps that is why they don't always want you there. I'd find this pretty exhausting, but then if you did it to me then I would have dropped you by now. Perhaps they don't feel they can be that impolite?

[bunglebee]

I try and stick to all my commitments, but sometimes there is simply absolutely nothing left in the tank and although I could force myself to go out for a social engagement, I've really got nothing to give a friend because all I want is to be lying down with a cold washcloth over my face.

If a friend is always flaking because they can't be arsed, that sucks, but it doesn't bother me at all for a friend to say "today's been rough, can we reschedule".

[HarebrightCedarmoon]

If it happens occasionally fine but really you'd be cool with friends that rock up an hour late to every meet up? I don't want friends like that

I don't either but the answer is not to have friends like that, rather than moaning about it online and expecting this to somehow miraculously reform the friends' behaviour.

[PurpleDaisies]

[quote lovevlyt]@PurpleDaisies ok - I'd find it very odd if 9 out of ten meets something out of your control kept happening so you had to cancel. In which case / even though our of control I wouldn't want to have a friendship like that,
[/quote]
Right.

You want your friends to be able to control illness and accidents.

It it becoming absolutely clear that your friends who have children are not leaving out because you don’t have children.

[notacooldad]

If it happens occasionally fine but really you'd be cool with friends that rock up an hour late to every meet up? I don't want friends like that
Neither do I , thats why I don't have friends like that. Nor do I treat people like that.

I suppose the flakiness thing depends a lot on what the an was.
If it was going to an event such as the cinema, restaurant, gig, day out then, no I wouldn't and haven't cancelled because I'm feeling off colour.
However over the last year it has been manly walks that I gave been seeing friends so of one of us not feeling the vibe that day then it's ok. Same if it is just a casual easy thing like going to the pub, a ciffee or gym. If my friends cancel I can just go by myself and they can do the same.No one loses their shit over it or anything. Life is tough enough as it is at the moment.

[lovevlyt]

@notacooldad precisely but it seems by lost posters standards that this is acceptable behaviour? So I must be off kilter in terms of what I feel is reasonable and unreasonable ways to treat people.

[Homehaircuts]

[quote lovevlyt]@Stillfunny exactly.d these things don't seem to happen with men.

My DH goes out with his friends and they don't even talk about their kids barely let alone highlight who is and isn't a parent amongst the group. It's about having fun and catching up with their mates.

They don't care because they just want to see their friends. [/quote]
One thing I've learnt being a parent is that it is the mums who organise meet ups. Dad's get-together yes but it's the mums who get the kids together more often than not. It's starts out with that and as you get the kids together get chatting and friendships form on their own or not. I've met most of my good friends from just meeting up for the kids at first. I know it is wrong to assume you wouldn't want to go because of kid related activities but this is probably what they are thinking. You wouldn't want to. But ultimately I think you know yourself. Do you get a vibe that they really enjoy/have a laugh around you? Let me say from my experience these are the kind of friends I have the ones who rather talk to others or didn't get that vibe from just sort of fizzled out. I would not leave a friend out though if we got on and had a great time together whether they had kids or not. If that's the case stuff them and find friends who want you because they enjoy your company.

[SnuggyBuggy]

I don't think I'd stay friends with someone who kept cancelling last minute just because they decided they couldn't be bothered. I'd wonder if they were trying to give me the brush off.

[lovevlyt]

@SnuggyBuggy exactly but it appears to be normal accepted behaviour here

[IbrahimaRedTwo]

Wow. Honestly I'm really shocked at how acceptable people think flakiness is

Still not getting it. You are the one calling it flakiness, we are not.

In life there's many things you can't be 'arsed to do' but you just do them anyway if you've committed to it

Friendship shouldn't be a chore. Why you want to spend time with people wo are with you because they committed to it, even though they don't want to be there, is beyond odd. That's not friendship, thats a hostage situation.

So I must be off kilter in terms of what I feel is reasonable and unreasonable ways to treat people

After hundreds of posts telling you exactly that, you make it sound like a bizarre notion which you still can't comprehend. But yes, it is exactly that. You are off-kilter.

[bunglebee]

OP, you do seem unusually rigid about friendships and social engagements. This may or may not mean that people find over time that they do not enjoy spending time with you. It's hard to know about being there. But yes, if I had a friend without children who showed no understanding of the substantial challenges that children bring to socialising, resented me meeting other friends with children without her and made really heavy weather of it if I ever had to cancel, my desire to spend my very limited budget of time and energy on seeing her would fall off a cliff.

[SnuggyBuggy]

[quote lovevlyt]@SnuggyBuggy exactly but it appears to be normal accepted behaviour here[/quote]
It's very easy to claim you'd be cool with something in theory. I'm not convinced many people in reality would be OK with the behaviour you describe. I mean the least you owe a friend is a reasonably plausible sounding excuse.

As someone who also struggles with friendship my two cents is that while making an keeping friends can take effort I think there does come a point where the effort isn't worth it.

[notacooldad]

Op
Where do you meet people that become your friends.
Have you any good girlfriends or long term pals?
Who instigates the new friendship?
Some friendships are for the long haul and others are more transient. Both have their place and bring value to peoples lives.

[Oilseed]

I think people are being deliberately obtuse on this thread OP.

I would be hurt too re your friends, it’s a natural reaction to the situation, only on mumsnet are people so ‘cool’ and ‘laid back’

That being said there isn’t an awful lot you can do at the end of the day, I would try my best to make other friends (maybe try bumble BFF) so you’re not as focused on these two. If they’re meeting up all the time without you then I’d probably consider the friendship over, especially if they never get in touch etc. But if it’s just sometimes then it probably is more child related and sometimes 2 people do meet and not invite the third or fourth person or whatever, that’s life and it’s perfectly fine so long as it’s not a constant thing.

I also agree re the flaky friends thing. I try v hard not to be a flaky friend and hardly ever cancel plans unless there is a really good reason. I think that’s pretty normal too. All of my friends are similar, I couldn’t put up with a constant, last minute canceller just because they were too tired/ didn’t feel like it for instance and I wouldn’t expect someone to keep bothering with me either if I kept cancelling on them last min.

[IbrahimaRedTwo]

don't think I'd stay friends with someone who kept cancelling last minute just because they decided they couldn't be bothered. I'd wonder if they were trying to give me the brush off

I think most of us don't have friends like this. We cultivate mutually beneficial relationships that work for both sides, that are flexible and positive to both people.
If you have this as a common problem, you have to ask yourself this: have I picked people with habits that I hate to call friends, or am I doing something that makes this pattern occur? It has to be one or the othere, really.

[Cloudfrost]

@SnuggyBuggybut but if you were good friends you would know what goes on in their lives which would make their behaviour either understandable or inexcusable. Punctuality or lack of is more understandable when ur friend has a small baby,that had a poonami just as they were heading out the door, for example. And yeah that could happen 9 out of 10 meets, which according to the op would be flakiness...

[SnuggyBuggy]

While I get that having kids makes life more complicated it doesn't have to make you flakey. If anything since having them my free time is extremely precious to me because there is so little of it.

I don't think you necessarily have to give up on flakey people but they aren't so good as 1 to 1 friends. The way I manage flakey friends is only meeting as part of a group. I'd only agree to meet them alone if it wasn't too inconvenient.

[Incognitool]

Look, OP, you say your friendships have a pattern of ending, so this isn't a new thing -- the common denominator here is you. Either your behaviour, rigidity and obsession with being 'respected' is pushing people away, or you are, consciously or unconsciously, choosing as friends people who behave in ways you consider 'flaky'.

The other thing that comes across from your posts is that you feel you're shedding friends at a rate of knots, therefore you clearly place more importance on these friendships than the other people in them, which is not a good combination with also being more than usually touchy about being cancelled on, someone being late to meet you, meeting other mutual friends without you -- all of which you view as 'disrespectful'.

What I can't decide from your posts is whether you even like any of these people -- all you say about them (late, flaky, disrespectful etc) suggests you don't.

Maybe time to expand your friendship circle?