We had this happen decently recently. DH had connected over Facebook with someone he’d known in high school (I’ll call him Frank), but they had never been particularly close. DH is as friendly as they come, and they quickly bonded over movies and video games and such, and it wasn’t long before the stories started pouring in. First, Frank and his wife had a new baby and so we sent a (non monetary) gift. Then Frank’s wife ended up in the hospital with a health condition, and that’s when it all started. Frank began texting DH about how he needed money to pay the hospital (we’re American). He started texting about how he lost his job and they had a new baby and had fallen out with their family and how hard it all was. He posted online about how their family wasn’t offering “support.”
DH mentioned this to me, and my eyebrows went up immediately. Over here, hospitals bill you over time and if you cannot pay there are options for that. (They have to treat you regardless.) Then Frank told DH that he needed to borrow a certain amount of money for the hospital bill. DH came to me, and I told him firmly but kindly that the story seemed off and why would Frank’s first port of call for money be someone he had only reconnected on Facebook with a few weeks ago, that he barely knew from high school?
DH was still agonizing about his friend because he’s generous to a fault. I’d suffered significant health problems in the past and had no problem paying that money forward into the universe or what have you, so I told DH to give Frank the money but by no means lend it. I said honestly that we wouldn’t get it back, the story was suspicious, and I didn’t want DH hurt by that. I also told DH that if Frank was asking for X amount, he almost certainly needed more. And I was right. The sum went up (Frank asked for as much as we could give, I chose a slightly higher number that made sense for us to afford to give away), we gave it as a gift and that was that.
Until it wasn’t. A couple of weeks later DH got another text about how Frank needed another large amount (equal to the last amount, given not two weeks before) to make ends meet. DH said he’d have to think about it and ask me, and then Frank went into a bit of a panic and started calling and texting about how his wife didn’t know and he had hidden it from her so as not to exacerbate her health condition, and how he had to have it soon, and he’d had a job interview that had gone well, and would pay us back the next month when he probably got the job, etc.
DH was heartbroken, because he knew at that point what it was. Frank asked how long it would take DH to think about it, and DH said the next morning so he could talk to me. Frank ramped up the texts in the meantime, promising to tell his wife, then claiming he just told his wife, promising to pay us back the first gift if we lent this amount, and all kinds of things he thought might up his chances. We politely declined, and the texts stopped.
And I mean really stopped. Frank texted DH once in awhile to say hi but things were never the same again.
OP, the parallels with your story are uncanny. When people lean on friends to bail them out financially, it really does mean they’ve tapped out everyone else and that happens for a reason. Anyone can get into a tight spot, but when the stories don’t add up and when the requests pile on, when they have money for other things but need to borrow yours and guilt you into giving or lending it, it’s never a good idea to get involved. I’m getting the same kind of vibes from your friend’s story as I did Frank’s. All these kinds of stories might have different beginnings, but they always have the same ending, don’t you think?