Game playing friend - how to deal with it

[Blizzard23]

I am based in a small village this is not unimportant. When we moved here twenty years ago I made good friends with ‘Belle’ and our dc were friends and we spent many Christmases, birthdays, holidays and were super close. Over the pandemic we only grew closer.

In the interim we made separate groups of friends with different circles of friends but still sharing many local friends. Somewhere along the line once the lockdowns lifted she started prioritising some newer friends and I noticed she didn’t invite me to her birthday etc any longer - I asked her about it, if something was wrong she said no, but was vague and blamed other people for messing up the guest list. Really feeble excuses regarding dinners and parties etc but she still claimed we were the best of friends and nothing had changed. It happened repeatedly.
I continued to invite her to the things I was doing for a very long time, not wishing to be petty and to avoid tit for tat. She accepted all of our invites but never returned them for years! Instead she continued to invite others. Eventually I eased off including her, assuming our friendship was cooling, and moving to a different stage. It was sad at the time ofc but just one of those things.

I have some very close friends elsewhere and have been spending more time with them in the last few years. I have accepted this particular friendship has changed, and even after we spoke about it nothing changed for the better in terms of reciprocity. I am planning a birthday party in the summer and have invited local friends and others.

I have now received an outraged message from this friend demanding to know why she isn’t invited and really kicking off. It appears she expects to have birthdays and parties and not invite me, but I am expected to continue to roll out the invites and red carpet for her…

Can someone please share with me their thoughts on this. I am stumped.

Should I have invited her?
Why is she doing this?

Your post made me feel better thank you Billy. I feel in my heart I really don’t need people like this. I don’t want to be part of anything that picks people off as a blood sport.

Thank goodness I have other friends that are genuine, intelligent women that would never ever behave this way.

I hope this passes soon. Very grateful for such kindness on this thread.

It will calm down if you simply refuse to engage with it.

Would you consider asking some of your other friends unconnected to Nutty to add to the mix?

I think if any anybof her previous victims are nice local women, it might be nice to engage with them should you havevthe opportunity.

I think you are going to be just fine.

So, @Blizzard23, it looks like the rot has started. It's a shame that there are still Nutty acolytes holding on for fear of receiving the the treatment that you, and others, have been on the end of. It's very good, therefore, that this is not your only friendship group and that you will have, from the sound of it, some strong support. Keep on keeping on my dear. 🌹

Hey @Blizzard23 , I have lots of experience with small village mentality. I think we are alike in that we enjoy having friends but I like low maintenance friendships. I am a pretty low maintenance friend too. I am happy for people to meet up with or without me, as long as no one plays games.

over time I have found I know a lot of people but I only have 5 friends in this group that I really class real friends. They’re brilliant!

please don’t mourn losing nutty, or be cross with yourself, she’s a master at this. However, don’t be a silent victim! I’d be vocal bit not bitchy. Don’t stoop to her level but a simple ‘I can’t believe she expected to come to my party when she hasn’t invited me for years and has been talking about me behind my back.’ It is simple and honest. If you lose people, they weren’t worth keeping.

Let’s face it, if I didn’t live here I would have avoided nutty (discreetly) like the plague, but because we all live here and it’s so small it’s impossible. So you have quietly get on with it, and try to keep everything in a good place so we can all enjoy quality of life.

It can be dull if you don’t work, and are not involved with life outside of here and I guess to some extent that’s at the root of this. Boredom. Creating drama and gossip because there is literally nothing else going on.

I might invite some other friends that is a good suggestion. And yes I will be factual and honest about what has happened if anyone asks being careful to be neutral about nutty and not critical of her. She is very insecure and was bullied at school, and it’s like she worked hard to become the bully now instead, some strange need to stay on top.

As ever @billy1966 has amazing insight

@Blizzard23 im so cross for you, this is shit and it’s always so sad to be so disappointed by people we thought were friends

she sounds really bad, but best you know the truth.

Have you read the Mapp and Lucia books by EF Benson? They're all about this sort of Queen Bee set-up in a small village.

@Blizzard23 The problem with bullies is that they perceive any resistance as bullying. It’s called “projection”. I think she began her war against you when you didn’t fall into line and die of the cancer you had. She had plans of being the most grief-stricken “friend” ever and feeding off that for ages. (Grief Vampires are very real too. Well done for foiling that plan!) Basically you cut off her source of entertainment and all of the secondary attention she was receiving as a result of your illness. If you had died, she could have ridden that particular train for months or years. *dramatic sniff. Now people see you without her as a conduit and she isn’t “needed”. She’s jealous because she doesn’t control the narrative and probably deep down knows that she doesn’t have what it takes for people to genuinely like her for her own sake. (Hence the control issues and need for a “purpose”.)

It sounds like nutty is upping her game because you're not falling into line. For whatever reason, she's selected you as the next person to fall out with, and been laying the groundwork for a while it seems. Now that you're responding to it by not inviting her, I'm guessing she sees that as some kind of warped justification for the way she's been behaving. Stay strong and don't feed the drama, by not playing her game you don't leave her with many places to go. It will pass and eventually she will be revealed for who she truly is.

It will pass and eventually she will be revealed for who she truly is.

Agree. The other friends will see what she's doing to you and the penny will drop that they could be, and probably will be, in your shoes. It might take a while but she'll reap what she sows.

I know a few nutties. One ended up moving hundreds of miles away to make a fresh start and the others ended up in a group of two as the nice friends realised they weren't worth the drama.

I adored Mapp &Lucia as a teen.

@Fraaahnces that is a brutal assessment but likely has a massive grain of truth in it.

A dear friend died suddenly in the last couple of years and the death vampires would have totally cracked her up.

I actively avoided them as I felt sullied at the very thought of even passing a few words with them.

The nuttys of this world are mentally disordered and it really is best to avoid them.

I wonder if posters like Atilla have a view, if anyone could give us the nitty griity on Nuttys fxxked up psychology, it would be her😁.

@Blizzard23 hope you slept well.

I would be so interested to understand the psychology.

What a brilliant and insightful observation that nutty did become less friendly as soon as my recovery started. It was as if her rescuer role has been snatched away and we were left with nothing in its place. What I thought would take its place, fun times, celebrating life etc didn’t materialise and the coldness set in.

For the longest time I have been unnerved by this change in her. Surely if someone close makes it through you are happy?! It felt like a source had been turned off for her; no longer required to swoop in to the save the day, I am not enough as I am (without illness or some other life changing event) I am only worthy if I can provide something traumatic or at least news worthy. When I stopped, I no longer served some warped purpose.

She imagines she is ‘nice’ and can’t bear the idea she isn’t. She visits her elderly mother regularly/daily with the low down of the village, entertaining her with tales of misery, her mothers currency is status and money and praises nutty for scaling the echelons. Nutty can be special even if it’s deflected glory and talent. Worth is measured ruthlessly.

I am just beginning to see what was there all along. I have had a few exchanges with mutual local friends, they seem very nervous. I could even tell from their texts. It makes me wonder what is coming next. I can’t imagine nutty is going to let this go. So the total silence from her is both very welcome and unnerving.

@Blizzard23 What I'm going to suggest might seem a bit left field but it may be what you're going through, particularly as Nutty seems to relish in the role of Queen Bee and being all things to everyone.

The next bit sounds wackadoodle but I think she was jealous of you. Jealous of your cancer diagnosis and health issues because that meant that you had attention on you and it wasn't on her. She dropped in and 'helped' you out and went shopping for you when you couldn't, because then the attention was on her. She was the one putting the information out there about your health/recovery, and she was the one controlling the situation. When you recovered she didn't have that any longer. I don't know how long ago your diagnosis, treatment and recovery was so she could have been spouting goodness knows what for some time.

My advice would be to reach out to the other people that Nutty ostracised in the village and see how they are doing and see if they would be interested in meeting up again? 😊

I can’t really tell who was ostracised, who backed away, who was too busy etc as over the years there have so many friends that have come and gone, unlike my own life where I have friends for decades.
Nutty has an ever changing revolving door, although some have stayed and live in the village - and through choice or not are still friends with her. Many are now suspect have been casualties.

I now realise that I was ‘useful’ in the lockdowns, I was classified as vulnerable so offered priority shopping deliveries, so I would get her entire shopping, and her Mums every week for nearly a year. So perhaps we were not closer at all, but I served a purpose as I would deliver it as well. Once that was gone, and my illness couldn’t be devoured by all and sundry my appeal faded. I

I feel angry myself for putting up with this for so long. Such truly shit behaviour!! I never ever want to see her again, and I don’t care how many so called friends it costs me.
I am truly done!

oh mate - she’s been taking the piss for ages, what a shocker

Don't feel angry at yourself - she is the one you need to direct your anger towards. Silently seethe in her general direction if it helps you.
Go grey rock in relation to any question she may ask you.
Give the least amount of information you can get away with but always, always remain polite.
It'll come out in the wash one day just how much of a bitch she has been to you and to others.

I naively thought I was being a good friend, and repaying her for the kindness shown during my surgeries etc.
What terrible twisted irony as it turns out, she is an accomplished player. 10/10 for that.
She would do well to stay away from me.

@billy1966 - my assessment while cynical, is borne from experience, I’m afraid. Surviving is bloody hard sometimes! (Not that I’d swap…)

I think you nailed it.
And I think the OP knows it too!

Poor @Blizzard23.

It is true that you can live your life and not experience these types of people and genuinely find it hard to believe they exist.

It's only when you have stuff pointed out to you, that the dots can suddenly join themselves, and you truly have a lightbulb moment.

I'm constantly reading stuff on here and being amazed by how others see something that gives me a 💡 moment and I'm not even involved!

Hey @billy1966 you just reminded me of my own lightbulb moment with a sibling lol. I will now think of them as a nutty too. Certainly is a great description. True also that once you join the dots… they are revealed. @Blizzard23 hope things settle down for you but be prepared for anything she might do. All the best 💐

Nothing like a good light 💡 moment.

A combination of wow🤯.....and ...... why am I so dim🤔... 😁

Haha @billy1966 absolutely! I was so dim for sooo long! 😂

OP, this sounds exactly like someone I was once friends with. Introduced her to a friend who had cancer and for a while the 3 of us met up together, then they started arranging things behind my back but when I had my 2nd child, she was outraged I hadn't invited her round. Anyone with a cancer diagnosis she latches on to and tells everyone 'I did this for them, i did that for them.' Are you in Staffordshire by any chance?

No, but it’s quite disturbing so many people recognise a nutty, and kind of comforting.

I can assure you your friend with cancer won’t have noticed this. I was too overwhelmed to take on anything else or notice what anyone was or wasn’t doing. Nutty certainly ‘took over’ everything. Made school run rotas, visiting rotas and seemed so unbelievably kind and caring, but she was doing it for a reason. Chief Rescuer and Local Hero. Scooping up all the accolades whilst using the updates as hard currency. I can’t believe I didn’t see it before. There were signs though looking back.

So I hope you can forgive your friend with cancer, she won’t have intended to hurt you.

Group WhatsApp is unusually absolutely silent so I guess most people know now.

Group WhatsApp is unusually absolutely silent so I guess most people know now.

Sounds like they will have formed another group because manipulative nutty has been stirring up trouble. Invite a load more of your other friends to your barbecue instead.