Friend keeps inviting sister everywhere!

[Chrissywakeup]

Just that really!

me and DF have known each other for years, and she has a sister who’s around 5 years younger than us (we’re both early 30s).

for the past 6 months whenever we plan something, such as a meal, drinks at a bar, a night out, DF will invite her sister. The thing that bothers me is that DF will be a bit underhand about it, and tell fibs such as “oh no, I accidentally slipped up and mentioned we were going to xyz, and DS really wants to come!”.

This has happened so often that it’s starting to get on my nerves, as sometimes I’d like to spend a bit of one on one time with DF! I push back most times, I’ve told her that I’m happy to rearrange so she can spend time with her DS, or I’ll say that I was looking forward to us having a good catch up (as she sees her DS all the time!) sometimes I’ll just go with it and stop acting like a brat, but I never enjoy myself when DF’s sister is there. I’m not the biggest fan of her DS so I don’t want to spend the little free time I have with her.

another frustrating thing that bothers me is when I do agree to go when DF’s sister is there, DF acts really different. Whenever she’s around her sister she acts more like her, a bit mean (not to me) and immature. I might not understand the dynamic as I haven’t got a sister, but surely you can’t expect to always spend time with them and butt in on their time with friends??

the dynamic has really changed, and it feels like every event me and DF plan now her sister will be invited. I’m an introvert so I’m not the type of person to think “the more the merrier”, especially when it’s someone I don’t particularly like very much…

On the off chance that me and DF plan something alone she will keep it hush hush so her sister doesn’t find out, which makes the whole thing seem very cloak and dagger.

what would you do? Suck it up, or keep pushing back? And is this normal behaviour for those with sisters?

I would tell her how you feel and leave the ball in her court. It's her sister so she needs to tell her to stop inviting herself (unless DF is actually inviting her and not telling the truth.)

YANBU I'd be annoyed too.

Can you book cinema or theatre tickets so only the two of you can go, then speak to her in person about it. She may not realise how often it's happening and how much you'd prefer to catch up with your friend alone. There may also be something going on in the family that you aren't aware of which would mean that you'd be ok with her coming along occasionally.

This happened to me in a slightly different context and unfortunately you either suck it up or speak up. I spoke up and just said it straight that it changed the dynamic and I’d prefer going back to meeting up separately. It was fine.

This happened in our friendship group.
We just had to suck it up tbh

This is actually quite weird, isn’t it? Even if someone’s close to their sister, it’s not exactly normal for the sister to say “Can I come?” every time they meet a friend.

I think perhaps the problem is that she is more like her sister than you would care to believe. Having her sister there allows her to be more, well mean and immature. And she wants her there, she invites her to everything she wants that dynamic, not the one she has with just you two. Maybe time for some new friends?

Some sisters are just really close. Before we we had our families I used to go everywhere with mine. The dynamic changes perhaps because she feels more comfortable when she is with her sister. You need to be clear when you make the arrangements about it being just the two of you.

If she is a good friend, tell her. Tell her that you want to go out just you and her not you, her and her sister.
If her sister is lonely or has no friends of her own, then that is not up to either of you to fix.
Why is her sister tagging along? Have you ever asked that? Have you ever had a quiet word with her sister to find out why she feels the need to tag along every time you and her older sister meet up?

If this is new something must have changed?

Either there's a reason sister "needs" to be there or friend isn't keen to spend time with you anymore.

Either way, it's not much of a friendship if you don't just talk about it.

If it's only the past 6 months, I'd say maybe her sister has been through a break-up/fallen out with friends/is going through something and that's why your friend is inviting her.

It is awkward though, I hate when people bring others to things and it totally changes the dynamic.

I don't know what you can do really beyond asking "Is your sister OK? It's just you never used to invite her out with us and now she's here almost every time?"

I'd tell her exactly what you told us and drastically reduce the planned meet-ups

I don’t know - sister relationships can be really close and I’d say take a similar approach you would take to someone inviting their partner everywhere. If it’s a one on one meeting or specifically for a certain group that have particular interests (I.e. school friends reunion, Harry Potter fans uniting), then ask to leave her out. But house parties and casual girls nights shouldn’t be a problem.

Also lots of people become more immature around their family members as they automatically slip into the dynamics they had growing up. It’s not a poor reflection of your friend and is completely normal.

I don't really have any friends or get out much so quite often my sister invites me out with her friends but I rarely go as would feel awkward being the 'pity invite'.

Don’t feel bad you’re not the pity invite. I invited my sister to lots of things with my friends when she was new to London- and they all loved her. To the point that at least 5 of those friends I’m no longer in touch with regularly but my sister sees them all the time still!

if you want to go, go! The easiest way to make new friends is by being invited into existing groups, or making friends with friends of friends.

I would push back and tell her exactly how you feel. Personally, I won't spend time with people I don't like, a sister or not.

You should go! I've been out with my sister loads :)

There is a difference between doing occasional nights out as a group and OP's situation where her friend's sister is going almost every time, despite OP making it clear she'd rather she didn't.

Nothing wrong with going out with your sister in general.

Be honest, just say you've nothing against her sister but feel no connection, you don't want to hang out with her, so it can't happen again.

Rather than ‘I’m happy to rearrange’ you need to say ‘Let’s rearrange then, are you free x date?’

Time for some blunt conversation then, isn't it? 'And will your sister be joining us AGAIN? Yes? Well I'm out, the two of you have a nice time. Bye, speak to you later.'

My best friend has three sisters she is close to (one of them is her twin!). She has never brought any of them along to any of our meet-ups unless it was a group-event that they were going to attend anyway. It's totally weird and you need to ask her to stop bringing her.

I have always hated the ‘more the merrier’ approach. Fine if it’s someone’s birthday etc but sometimes I just want to see MY friends, the ones I choose.

Thanks all! To answer a few questions:

They had a fall out a few years ago where the sister did some quite awful things to DF. They’ve made up since then and seem to be closer than ever, however DF does have a habit of talking about her sister to me (sometimes in quite a judgmental way too, such as having an opinion on the different men she’s talking to).

I can understand how she might be more comfortable with her sister, however she’s told me the opposite. DF’s sister has a few MH problems and can “flip” in DF’s words - DF has told me multiple times that she has to watch what she says to her sister as she doesn’t want her to kick off.

I’ve almost been made to feel like it’s my fault that the sister wants to tag along with us. Apparently I’m “so much more fun” that DS’s friends and she has much more fun with us, so she prefers to come out with us. Definitely not a stealth brag by the way, I’m not that fun 😒

DS hasn’t been through anything major as far as I know, and DF tells me everything anyway. I’m not too sure what’s caused the sudden change.

also to mention that DS has lots of friends so I don’t think it’s a loneliness thing.

DF is a people pleaser and doesn’t like to be the bad guy in any situation, but it feels like she puts her sisters feelings before mine in order to not have to tell her no, if that makes any sense?

i think there’s a bit of jealousy on my part as sometimes I just want to see my friend and have a good chat, without having DS butting in or not being able to talk about certain things around her.

having read your update OP you need to have the difficult conversation with your friend. And then say something like "it's fine now and again but not every time". And then every time you know she's invited sis along say "let's do it another time. X date or Y date? No sister"