To think unhappy people sometimes don't want other people to be happy

[Stilted]

They aren't happy for your achievements
Rain on your parade
"I don't mean to put a dampener on things but..."

Often try and undermine your confidence..

Livid tbh!! Sick of their shit !!

Well, yeah. Hence the phrase “misery loves company”.

I have a friend who has got worse and behaves like this.
Hates it if anything goes well for me, but can’t hide her smile when things fall apart. I’ve massively distanced myself from her now and tell her nothing much these days.

Best policy for these people!

I had a friend who suddenly was very horrible to me, I asked her why she was upsetting me and sending me horrible messages, she told she was unhappy with her life and she wanted me to be unhappy too. It wasn't fair that I was happy and she wasn't. Luckily we live very far away from each other and I no longer have anything to do with her.

i worked with someone who was bitter and made comments about my dh having an affair!
which he wasnt.

This is exactly what I think when parents get angry at childfree people 😆!
Or people in miserablr marriages tell single people they are selfish…

Yes this is true, and psychologically understandable.

It is hard when you are low to see others enjoying life - read up on juxtaposition.

But you have to try to be reasonable when you are unhappy. I remember once during a very stressful time having to work at smiling when people told me good news.

It is one of the reasons a lot of people retreat a bit when sad. I try not to let others' feelings reduce my happiness, but that can be hard too.

I know a couple of people like this. Can’t bear for others to be happy and wrongly assume that bad things must be happening. For example the couple who seem happy and wealthy must be having money and marriage issues behind the scenes- he’s probably having an affair and she’s probably an alcoholic. It’s like they are trying to redress the unfairness or inequity of luck and good fortune. Their own version of what justice or karma would look like to make them feel better about themselves. When one friend does this she grins and I’ll refute what she’s saying but she’s always on the look out for the pain in the lives of those better off.

I think they are in that scarcity mindset though where they feel that if someone else has happiness there is less for them. They don’t realise that taking it off others will not improve their own long term happiness and that there is capacity for everyone to experience good fortune and happy moments. Also the envy of the lives of others is stupid because ( as someone much wiser than me posted here lately a video of a New York rabbi talking about this) that persons’ life comes as a package. You have to take the whole picture in to account. Whilst they may want certain bits of that person’s life they still likely want their own family, their own mum and dad etc.

I don't have the time or energy for people like this. Life is hard but we only get one so enjoy as much of it as possible. Can you go low or no contact with this person?

My oldest and dearest friend became like this. A change in mine and DH situation really put a spanner in the works and changed our relationship.

In the end it totally shattered our 20+ years friendship. It broke my heart but we no longer have a close relationship.

Life is too short to be surrounded by people who like to blow out your candle 🕯️

I know so many people like this. I now keep my business to myself which is the best way.

Not necessarily - sometimes what they are saying is that whatever you're talking about wouldn't make them happy; they're not interested in it.

To give another perspective, I have been on the receiving end of the friend who is always boasting, and it gets wearing, particularly when it seems targeted at you, making their own life look even better at your expense. You get sick of smiling and saying 'that's nice' all the time.

Pretty much sums up huge sections of MN.

I have an ex-friend who was like that. She loved looking down on me when I was her sad single mother friend with always a pathetic dating story to tell. Living in crappy rented accommodation to boot. As soon as things turned around for me she got nasty and soon was no longer a friend 🤷‍♀️

You also get the "I suffered so why should anyone else have it better" variant. See that one on here a lot.

There’s an element of truth to that. To my amusement, when I went from being a ‘selfish’ contentedly-childfree woman to being the mother of one by choice, I was still ‘selfish’, in the opinion of the same people.

some people are negative, glass half empty

There’s always people like this. I choose to distance myself from people who seem to make it their life’s mission to make other people miserable.

This is often used in here to make someone "feel better" on threads when they compare themselves to someone.
The other has
Holidays?-totally on loans and cards you know
Nice partner?- totally cheating, you know
Nice house?- totally miserable with massive mortgage and structural issues
Happy? - totally hiding crumbling marriage and/or serious illness
I always find it extremely crass actually when people do "oh don't worry they are totally miserable and just hiding it" because no one can be happy or have nice things. This thinking is not helping anyone

I don't disagree as such but I don't need people to be happy for me that is up to me

But every thing people do these days seems to have a huge dramatic back story of 'oh they are making me jealous they are judging me, they are making me feel bad, they are just jealous' it goes on

It depends. If it's just that they don't seem happy for you then you're not being unreasonable. But I've known a few people that are completely insensitive when someone is going through a tough time and are boasting about how amazing their lives are and get pissy when they don't get enough applause.

Ignore if that's not you of course

My heart goes out to anyone having a hard time and I will always support people who are struggling with life events and/or depression, but there are definitely people that who seem to want to stay miserable and get angry that others are able to at least count their blessings. I had to cut someone out when their relentless anger was starting to effect my mental health.

Yes, absolutely true. I am related to a glass half empty person, they turn every single situation into a negative. Once you’ve noticed that quality in them, it’s very difficult to spend time with them or tell them anything full stop. I do understand it must be utterly miserable to be them, but I just can’t surround myself by people like that because it knocks my own mental health too.
Having said the above, I do have empathy for them to some extent - it truly must be miserable to always expect the worst in life. If they’re truly so down and out, they cannot feel joy for others. That’s truly sad and I wish they sought help for themselves.

@Templebreedy the risk of going slightly off-topic. I am interested in this, as it's similar to my own situation. I was happily child free for a long time, and that has shifted to most likely being one and done (I now have a 15 month old).
What kind of jibes do you get from other parents about sticking to one? (I want to mentally prepare myself for this crap in future.)