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!

Yes definitely impressed by how CF people can be without seemingly being aware. I know someone like this and they are very good at putting themselves first (waiting for them to turn up, they expect free stuff, never consider anyone but themselves). I haven't changed who I am but in my head am very clear about what I will and won't give them - which is very little. I've learned to be blunt too 'oh that's not going to work'...Cast iron boundaries all the way.
In many ways could be oddly grateful as I think it's made me more assertive over the years.

I once saw a saying along the lines of 'set limits on what you're happy to give because takers never will' and it's very true.

@Nevermakeit

I wonder if some of the people who then complain about having to do it, do actually offer to do it in the first place. I doubt people march up and demand favours of them out of the blue. I think the people doing the favours offer, as they think it's the 'thing to do', and then get resentful when they are taken up on the offer. I don't offer anything to anyone who isn't a close friend, or someone I very much trust, and any offer I make is carefully considered - so then I am not resentful if people take me up on it.

There are definitely people who do demand these favours. I suspect they prey on people they think are too shy or meek to say no (which may explain why you've never come across them, if you don't fit that category..). I used to get a lot of them when I was younger. In my teens and early 20s I ended up doing all sorts of stuff for people because I didn't know how to say no, and yes, they did just ask right out of the blue.

@FunTimes2020

I think it's that there is a high chance a lot of the "CF" threads are made up

Some are but you would be surprised at how cheeky people can be I have a "friend" who expected me to drive around the corner to collect her from her home like lady bountiful rather than walk around to my house when she wants a lift to school I said be at my house at 2.30 and you can get in the car she won't and moans she has to walk its literally less than a 2 minute walk but im expected to drive up an awkward cul de sac in the opposite direction for her

She walks to school

I think I do come across as meek, but I'm actually the opposite! I'm just quite friendly, smiley and a wee bit socially awkward. People always mistake this for being meek I think. Always amusing to surprise CFs in this way

I think some are invented, and some have a grain of truth, which then gets wildly embellished for the purpose of the thread.

I also think that some people like to imagine it's because they are soooo nice that these people take advantage of them.

I water a neighbours very large garden and vegetable patch for 2 weeks when she was on holiday. It was during a hot summer and I was heavily pregnant and took me an hour each day. I started using a sprinkler on her vegetables whilst watering another section tp make it easier for me.

She came back as I was watering and screamed at me for wasting her water using a sprinkler and I should do each section with a watering can to save water. She was metered. I used my own water since I was not then metered so no cost to her, I explained this, no apology for shouting and no thank you. She used help the aged to help with her gardening and pleaded poverty to everyone so people helped out with her shopping etc.

I stopped speaking her her, she was exhausting and greedy and rude.

She died and we discovered she wasn't poor and could have easily afforded a gardener. Money went to church and religious organisations - buying her way into heaven!

When the school did staggered start/finish times my friend expected me to make my child late and wander to three different classrooms taking her kids to school the school refused to let children come in late due to covid so my child wouldn't be allowed in at all if I had done that the idea that her children would need to be early so mine could be on time was not something she was prepared to do she got someone else to do it but they stopped because it was only a one off that turned into weeks

@Diverseopinions

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.

You are quite right. Throughout my children's school years I always helped out other parents with lifts/baby-sitting/second hand clothes, even having kids stay a couple of days in emergencies. None of them were CFs though, we were an urban community with lots of give and take. I have had as many kindnesses shown to me as I ever did for others.

On occasions I have experienced some people who had potential to be CFs. A friend who used to borrow our holiday home in return for some annual garden care stopped doing the gardening, started leaving the house dirty and taking it for granted he could tip up whenever he wanted. That happened twice and then the house was always busy on the dates he wanted. He's a slow learner though, the last time we loaned it to him was about 15 years ago but he still asks, he even asked last year if his adult DS and his mates could stay there for a stag do! A charity I volunteered for at a very high level (giving a full day of professional services every week + about 4 weekends of training a year) suggested volunteers should not only make a bequest to the charity in their wills but might also like to make a monthly donation of money in addition to our hours of time. I no longer volunteer there.

IMO CFs aren't born that way. They become that way because some people are too soft. It's good to be kind but when people are taking the piss we all need to woman up and unleash the power of NO!

I suspect they prey on people they think are too shy or meek to say no.

That is exactly what they do, they are mostly calculating users. They don't view people based on potential friendship, they see people as assets that can be deployed to make their lives easier or cheaper.

A mobile hairdresser I used to use, slightly unreliable, always trying to get me to change the appointment I had prebooked six weeks in advance to fit someone else in. Last straw was when she insisted that I move the appointment booked at my house to her house which would have meant me driving 40 minutes home from my job, waiting a couple of hours, then driving 40 minutes back in the same direction to her house because she wanted to keep an eye on her partner who had some health issues (minor, resolved). Said partner had been out all day working as normal. Didn't seem to need monitoring then.

Perfect opportunity to put and end to the relationship and save myself the two hours of ear burning ranting about this person or that person who had wronged her.

@pombear4949

Part of the issue is people who DO go along with their mad requests for one reason or another, which validates the A) people that it was reasonable and fine to ask because they’d say no otherwise, or the B) that you can get away with it as long as you find someone too passive to say no

///\
this

I know I should say no and I think my friend plays on that. eg how do I say no I cannot take your child to school when I'm going that way myself to drop my own kids off. The problem here is that her child has (undiagnosed) special needs and is difficult to manage and also hates my child to the point i cannot leave him in the same room as my child. Also, how do I say no you cannot borrow cash when she knows full well I have it (I earn a lot more) but she has either over spent or over committed herself, which is why she needs to borrow money (usually around £450 a time, not talking £20 here and there). I don't mind helping someone, but mixed in with all the other asks makes me reluctant.

Jeezus Fucking Christ!! Tell her you have just got your tax bill. Just no!

We moved recently our new neighbour on one side is a chap probably mid 70s...he keeps asking me to cut his grass/ hedges..umm no..apparently he has tried it with all the neighbours..they have given him numbers for cheap gardeners but he doesn't want to pay.

No, I'm never impressed, secretly or otherwise, by people who think they're so important and special that they feel they have the right to exploit and manipulate people who are too kind or timid to stand up to them.

I don't like users.

I know a few and I try my hardest to avoid them.

• @ lockdownmadnessdotcom

I know a couple who are pretty wealthy and fairly recently bought a new house.

As mentioned, they are wealthy. They somehow managed to persuade their "lovely friends" to help them plant 80 trees for free (well, a takeaway and a beer). They are LOADED and could easily pay someone to do it for them.

But I am quite impressed with the sheer brazen confidence.*

This sounds like a lovely thing to do! They obviously asked the wrong person.

I was an unofficial, unpaid childminder to a woman I met one day in the queue to collect my DS from nursery. For 3 weeks solid she asked favours of me relentlessly. When I stopped saying yes, she moved onto a new innocent victim. I sort of admired her (after about 6 months of being astounded)

CFs see my MIL coming a mile away. The worst of them was an overbearing “friend” who used to regularly book MIL onto holidays without asking her first (friend was single and wanted the company). As MIL was still working this would then mean MIL had to book time off, share a room with someone who snored too loudly for MIL to sleep and trail round after friend all holiday doing what friend wanted. Then MIL would tell us how fed up and annoyed she was. Eventually, after years of this, we persuaded MIL that she had to tell friend that she couldn’t take time off next time and and that friend should have checked first. That stopped the holidays. Now her downstairs neighbours are asking her to pick up their shopping! She is a (healthy) 71yo lady and while one of the neighbours is disabled, they are refusing to ask their daughter who lives nearby as she is “busy” and instead waylay MIL every time she leaves the house. It’s not on.

Our Parish priest is a CF. He has absolutely no shame about asking people to help out with awful jobs that then go on for years. I think people are embarrassed/scareed to say no to him because of his position.

I'm not lazy and like to support the church but there are limits. I once offered to make the starter for a diosecan lunch he was hosting. Homemade soup and bread for 40. Instead of saying thank you he suggested I also made pancakes for their dessert. I laughed in his face and said nothing on earth would induce me to make pancakes for 40 people. He was undeterred though and asked the person catering the main course who agreed to do it and then moaned nonstop about it behind his back. He was also very taken aback that I didn't fall for his flattery when he thought my wonderful organisational skills made me just the person to act as his (unpaid) PA 2 mornings a week. I explained that I had taken early retirement because I didn't want to work not because I wanted to work for no wages!

If it's true that God loves a trier this man is assured his place in heaven.

@Franklyfrost

* @ lockdownmadnessdotcom

I know a couple who are pretty wealthy and fairly recently bought a new house.

As mentioned, they are wealthy. They somehow managed to persuade their "lovely friends" to help them plant 80 trees for free (well, a takeaway and a beer). They are LOADED and could easily pay someone to do it for them.

But I am quite impressed with the sheer brazen confidence.*

This sounds like a lovely thing to do! They obviously asked the wrong person.

I agree that this sounds lovely. A day out gardening with friends and then a party. Excellent plan.

The couple who lived opposite my parents some years ago were selling up and emigrating to Oz with their daughter, who was aged around 9-10. One night, out of the blue, the husband knocked and told them that there had been a last minute hitch with the plans, and that he would have to go alone for a few months before his wife and daughter could join him. Problem was they’d sold their house and he was due to start his new job in Oz in a couple of weeks. He asked could his wife and little girl stay with my parents in the meantime and he would ‘send’ for them when he had sorted things out. They refused. It turned out that the couples’ marriage was on the rocks and the wife and daughter were eventually dumped at a friends’ house while the husband went to Oz - apparently never to be heard from again.

I used to live in a shared house with a woman who would never buy what she could scrounge: tissues, tampax, cotton wool, food, wine . . . In return I got nothing, she was a complete cow to me. In the end I lent her whatever she wanted but said 'this is the last time though, because you ask me every time you need it instead of buying your own.' A week later she was commenting that I was always broke because I was extravagant. I said 'you mean I buy stuff instead of scrounging it from other people?' She shut up.

There’s one at my work. She’s just very brazen and people go along with it mostly and do as she asks.

I was popping to Aldi on my lunch and asked if anyone needed anything (as you do in an office). She scurried over with a full shopping list, as in a weekly shop and said “Ooh great. Saves me going on the way home. I’ll get my bags for you.”

I just handed the list back and said “Sorry, no. I’m not going for that much.” She just smiled and moved on. Knew she was pushing her look but must have figured it was worth a try.

She still tries other people in the office for favours but never asked me again.

I have a friend who is a stealth CF. She is very good at offering to help and, occasionally, actually does. It therefore took me decades to realise that I was helping her about 10 times as often as she helped me.

@Diverseopinions

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.

This is what I thought, reading this thread! Where I live in Canada, I never think twice about asking a neighbour to feed my cats while I’m on holiday once or twice a year. I drop off baked goods on her doorstep and toys for her son every few weeks just because it’s a nice and neighbourly thing to do, and invite her family round every couple of weeks to play in the backyard. We genuinely like each other and help each other out. She gave me a few tomato plants when she had too many, I cut some flowers from our garden for her to say thanks… I’m laying it all out now like a tally of favours and gestures back and forth, but it feels organic. I have relationships like this with several people and it’s something I love about our community! I never hesitate to ask local friends or family for occasional help with my cats or my kids, because I know I’ll repay the favour some day (or already have!).

The other one I remember happened to my cousin, let’s call her Meg.

We have 16 other cousins between us, split across two continents and ranging in age from 60 down to us at 39 - so although Meg and I are very close there are many of our other cousins we barely know. One of these, let’s call her Emma, lives in Canada but regularly visits family in the UK for a few weeks at a time and Meg, living nearby, offered to put Emma up. This worked really well on both sides and Emma would always offer to help with cooking or wrangling Meg’s toddlers - she’s a really hands on guest.

One day Meg gets a call from Emma’s sister, a definite CF who we’ll call Lauren. Lauren also barely knows Meg but has seen that Meg has happily hosted Emma at her house, so asks if Meg can put her up for a fortnight.

Her and her husband and three children, aged 15, 8 and 5, none of whom have a bedtime routine and all of whom are unvaccinated against the usual communicable diseases. This might not bother some parents but Meg has OCD and anxiety following the death of her first daughter so is very worried about her surviving children getting ill. Not only do they want Meg to host their entire family, but Lauren also mentions airily how nice it will be to have a break from cooking and cleaning - so is expecting Meg (who works) to clean up and cater for them! They also asked for a key to the house so they could come and go as they pleased.

Meg, having been caught off guard, very nearly said yes to this insufferable CFery and I had to haul her bodily off the phone to avoid it. Lauren may be my own flesh and blood but she’s a proper cheeky arse.

Not too long along my husbands best pal was due to be gracing us with a brief overnight visit (just him). We were all looking forward to seeing him. Then he starts saying what a shame his wife and child can't come this time.

We woke up the next morning to find he'd messaged overnight saying he was now bringing said wife and child...and their dog....oh, and they were now planning on staying in a hotel but could the dog please stay with us in our house?!