Anyone else ever secretly impressed with how cheeky people can be?

[2ndtimemum2]

Having read another thread where a woman was asked to go 40 minutes out of there way to drop someone elses child to school, or the poor woman who's been asked to give daily injections to her neighbour because her kids couldn't be bothered has gotten me thinking are these people absolutely mental or how are people brazen enough to make these requests?

It seems like a daily occurance where a poster seems to deal with some crazy cf!!! I don't think I'd have the actual nerve or be brazen enough to make some of the ridiculous requests that people have made so I'm secretly impressed that there's these group of people who don't even think twice about these off the wall requests!

For every CF there's a doormat. 🤷‍♀️
These people need to be told no.
But they aren't.
They aren't reasonable people so it's ridiculous to expect them to suddenly become reasonable. They are selfish, entitled fuckers and the ONLY way to deal with them is to tell them no and mean it, and ignore the tantrum

Picture them as your overtired toddler who is demanding ice cream for dinner.
Give them ice cream and it's downhill from there .

Ride it out.

@pombear4949

Ive got a friend who has asked me to : walk their dog look after their dog at my house water their flowers while away pick up their kid/drop off to school baby sit borrow money borrow random things go food shopping for them feed their cats while away help with their gardening help wallpaper their bedroom take stuff to the local tip with them pick up furniture they brought off ebay There's other stuff but its too outing. ..Im a working mum with 3 kids, a home to run, and a team of 15 to manage at work

Why are you friends with this person??

I knew someone who would just walk up to blokes at the bar in pubs and ask for a drink. She would literally just walk off once said drink was purchased for her. It was kind of funny at first but after a while it just seemed quite mean and tight. She would justify it by claiming that the blokes did not have to buy her a drink which was technically true but she was very confident and would target not so assured men and basically bully them.

I am sometimes impressed with brazen cheek , probably because I am really passive and often dont ask for things that are quite reasonable requests. So I am sort of in admiration at people who ask something that the world and his wife can see is blatantly unreasonable, and get away with it!

I am always massively in awe of people who have the ovaries to ask. My dad always says to me if I need help just ask - but I don’t, even when I need it because I’m embarrassed to ever raise it! To be so brazen always really surprises me.

I also know I’m probably ‘door mat’ material to I never say yes the first time to anything that is signalling alarm bells as I’ll struggle to get back out of it.

@DillonPanthersTexas

I knew someone who would just walk up to blokes at the bar in pubs and ask for a drink. She would literally just walk off once said drink was purchased for her. It was kind of funny at first but after a while it just seemed quite mean and tight. She would justify it by claiming that the blokes did not have to buy her a drink which was technically true but she was very confident and would target not so assured men and basically bully them.

Ugh, she sounds desperate!

I have no issue with car shares or lifts to kids classes or even occasional childcare.
Buy I have twice been suckered into providing free before and after school child care for kids in DC classes, despite paying for wrap round care for my own DC! Starts out that is just for an interview, just first week of new job and then oddly they have amazing problems finding childcare...
Killed both "friendships" when I ended my free childcare and made me very suspicious of new friends, which is really really sad.

Helped a friend pack up her kitchen when she separated from her H and take boxes to her new place. She spent the whole time on her phone. Then said to me at the end of the day “You look really tired” 😂

Some of the biggest CFs I know seem to somehow also be the most popular. I have to admit I am slightly in
awe of their skill in managing to have everything their own way and also be almost universally liked. There are a couple of times where one of them has asked me to do something pretty unreasonable for them but has managed to do it in such a way that in that instant I say yes and seem to believe it's almost to my benefit- only to think about it again half an hour later and think 'wtf! why did I agree to that!'

I think it's some form of jedi mind-trick. Like the time that one of them suggested meeting up for a coffee to catch up as we hadn't had a chat in months since the last CF incident. Then suggested we meet at my house. Then mentioned bringing her DC so they could play with mine. Then dropped in to conversation that her sister was visiting that day. Then said she'd drop the DC off at 10am, 'pop' out for lunch with her sister and we could all have coffee at mine when they got back about 2pm. Then showed up at 4pm.

The locus of control is very interesting.

I have a friend with whom you need to have strong boundaries. She regularly presents things she wants as a done deal, presumably to try and make sure you can’t say no. Except I do, regularly - it’s excellent CF training

She bought a cat and expected her ex-husband to be around to feed said cat on “his” weekends with the children on the basis that she wanted to be able to go away when it wasn’t “her” weekend…

I do think it's often a 'boiling the frog' situation. Most people don't set out to be a doormat. It starts with one small favour and, before you know it, you're basically an unpaid PA/nurse/chauffeur. And guilt is a powerful force. I'm pretty feisty generally, but find it hard to say no to my DM, even though she's monstrously selfish and doesn't give a toss about me.

*CF-handling training, not training to be a CF myself

I swear this is true, and I still think about it now.

Many years ago when my DS was around 3, I had moved into a new area and joined a local young parents group as a way of meeting others in similar circumstances. It was suggested I joined their babysitting circle - bearing in mind I hardly knew anyone and they didn’t know me. I agreed to help others but privately decided I was put having unknowns looking after my children.

I was called in the first week to provide my services. I drove to this really dodgy estate (I was not yet familiar with the area) and the mum was raring to go as soon as I arrived. She was that keen to go, she clearly wasn’t that bothered about any instructions etc and I was left in the hallway. The place was filthy. It was like a squat and the icing on the cake was there were nine children - ranging from a tiny baby to a young teenager. Apart from beds, there was no furniture in the place and just floorboards on the floor. The children looked really nervous as they’d never seen me before and hadn’t even been introduced! I thought the best way to break the ice was get them all together and tell them who I was and get them to tell me what their usual routine was when the eldest child said, ‘why don’t you ask dad?’

In the living room, there was a male sitting on the floor watching football on a large tv!

I decided that I clearly was in the wrong place and if there was an another adult, particularly a parent, it wasn’t appropriate for me to be there - so I told him I was leaving.

I also left the babysitting group too.

@BrightYellowDaffodil

*CF-handling training, not training to be a CF myself

I didn't realise there was specific training to become one - explains a lot 😉

My neighbours, who I can’t stand, always ask my DH to feed their rabbits. They leave minimal food for them so we end up buying more.
They don’t ask me as I’d say no 🤣

Spot on @IveGotASongThatllGetOnYNerves

Out of interest, what happened to the pulling together culture of 60 - 100 years ago when neighbours didn't lock their doors; borrowed sugar; helped out with childcare? In 'Sons and Lovers', the mother actually borrows the train fare from a northern town to Beckenham to see her very ill son. Close communities used to all help one another on a very regular basis.
Usually it's reciprocal. Someone minds someone's kids and then does the favour in return, the next week.
My impression is that, in other parts of the world, friends help each other out more than they do here. We have reached a stage of extreme independence, in the UK, I think, when even having help from siblings is a no-no.

There is an assumption that everyone ought to be able to manage their own stuff and, obviously, a feeling that it is unlikely that a person helped will ever be in a position to help back. I think that is the feeling, that there are needy people who always want others to do things for them. Strange really, as, in my life, I've heard lots of people talking about friends who have helped them, e.g. lending them money to buy a car; definitely pet-minding.

It sounds like something has gone wrong with the council school place allocation, if a family live further than walking distance from school and there is no bus service. There may be a genuine difficulty.

I think older teenagers helping with pet sitting and walking kiddies to school, for community service, is a good idea.

People needing things is not CF-ery though. I volunteer at a children's charity where we gather stuff parents with young DCs might need and deliver it to people who have asked for it. You can self refer for some things. These people are not CFs. And they do get some help!

But when someone who is doing fine and doesn't need the help, but just CBA, takes advantage of someone who doesn't have unlimited time or money to give; that is CF-ery. Helping people and asking for help is not the issue. Context is everything.

@Diverseopinions Reciprocal, yes. As in 'it takes a village to raise a child' kind of way. All small communities band together because they all need each other.

Things are slightly different these days in your average commuter town

What surprises me more and what I think is even crazier is the people who agree to do all these things the CFs ask them to do!

Thrusting a bag of dog poo at a stranger on the grounds that they were going to the nearby park with their dog anyway and they could put it in the bin.

Very cheeky. Got stung for lifts to sport "she going that route anyway" she would never do another week. Find childcare worst one u help them once then they keep asking. I learnt NO doesnt suit since all this crap!

Years ago, a friend of mine got a call from a male friend of ours. He said he wasn’t feeling well and could she help him out. She thought he was going to ask her to get some shopping…he asked her to paint his living room. She politely declined.

I sometimes think I am but then do shit like get one friends ADHD DC bathed and hair washed no issue when friend would only get violent reaction and meltdowns.
I take another friends dogs out for a walk or have them for sleepovers like over the summer she had an electrician in so I offered to have them.

I’m return friends take me shopping or do too runs etc.

I don’t get them to look after sen DC though. It’s mostly the practical stuff I can return the favour with iyswim.

DH's sister asked if DS could go on holiday with them to their holiday home, to keep their DS company, DS was about 10/11 at the top me. I drove him 2.5 hours to drop him off. Gave him some spending money, and told him to make sure he bought everyone ice cream/ drinks when out. They were away about 5 days.
I drove 2.5 hours to pick him up, then was promptly asked for £80 because they had gone out to eat a couple of times, and gone on a small boat trip. DS had spent £30 on ice creams and drinks, and was not really that happy having to babysit their DS.

When they asked if he wanted to go the following year, I told them I couldn't afford it. They had the cheek to say but it doesn't cost anything as we are staying in our house.