To be pissed off at friend & husband

[Over40Overdating]

Bit of a rant! And long - sorry!

I’ve been friends with A for many years. She’s a brilliant friend and I would trust her with my life. Since she met her husband, B, 5 years ago, he has been involved in every part of our friendship.
It’s been bloody irritating but she says she likes that he wants to be friends with her friends so I have tolerated it for her.

B isn’t a bad man but has zero social skills and finds himself the most fascinating subject of all time.
He contradicts people, says inappropriate things and will interrupt conversations to start monologing about whatever is on his mind.

It makes spending time together really dull and hard.

A&B had a baby last year and in January moved quite far away (plane ride) to get support from family.
A made me promise I would visit as soon as possible. I said I would but there just hasn’t been time yet : I have been working on a really high stress project that often needed 60 hour weeks and when it came to an end recently I was able to take 2 weeks off : my first break in 4 months to literally crash and rest and catch up on boring domestic stuff.

She messaged me over the weekend to say ‘now that you’ve taken all this time to yourself, I need to know when are you coming to see us’. I replied honestly that I don’t know - work is in flux, I may or may not be made redundant in the coming months and as I’ve just taken 2 weeks off I’ll have to wait to see how everyone else’s diary lines up.

No reply - this is unusual. I thought she’d be disappointed as I know she is lonely and struggling with B as her only social outlet but would give her a call today

I woke up this morning to a string of messages from B berating me for upsetting his wife, being a selfish friend and pretty much demanding I come NOW as he ‘won’t be happy’ with me til I do.

This is not the first time he’s sent me messages making demands or telling me I’ve offended him by not doing what he thinks is best and on every other occasion I’ve checked if A knew and she hadn’t so I’ve told him he’s being inappropriate and patronising and cut it out.

Except today he says she does know he’s messaging me and fully supports it and I ‘should do as he says’.

I am pretty livid right now so haven’t replied.

I don’t think she’s in a controlling or coercive relationship and he treats her very well but this passive aggressive stuff now being at her instigation is both disappointing and pissing me off.

And right now the last thing I want to do is make the effort to take a 2 hour plane ride to sleep on a sofa (they have made it clear they expect me to stay with them to ‘make the most of the time’) with two people who seem to think I’m so very awful and selfish anyway!

AIBU to think ‘away off and shite the pair of you’?!

“Friend’s dh,

Your message was deeply inappropriate and disrespectful, both in tone and in content. You do not have any right to abuse me like this, or to attempt to order me to visit. I will not discuss this with you any more, and if you cannot speak to me politely, I will be blocking you.

Yours,
@Over40Overdating“

What a pair of dicks. Given the family hasn’t helped as much as promised and their insistence you stay at their place makes me think they wanted you to do some free babysitting and they’re throwing a tantrum that it won’t be happening. She sounds resentful and jealous that you have had some time off “to yourself” when she hasn’t.

PS the 'now you've had time to yourself' comment suggests the pair of them have been bitching about you... I would be questioning whether I wanted to continue the friendship tbh.

I'd be bloody livid if a friend's DH sent me messages like that! Who the hell does he think he is. I'd be inclined to reply to them both saying "I don't appreciate waking up to a barrage of angry messages when I've made it clear that my work situation is precarious right now and I don't know if I'll have a job in a few weeks, so I can't commit to any trips abroad. Don't message me again about when I can come over unless you're prepared to be civil about it."

No one said she should tolerate being spoken to like that but don’t let that get in the way of you smashing those keyboard keys love 💪🏻

He won't be happy with you?
Do as he says?
Who made him the boss - especially of you?

I'd block his number/unfriend him on FB/cut him off so that he has no way of contacting you and tell your friend that you've done so. Remind her that your HER friend, not HIS and that you don't wish to converse with him anymore as you find his communication to be inappropriate, overbearing and unnecessary. However, she can contact you anytime.

No one said she should tolerate being spoken to like that but don’t let that get in the way of you smashing those keyboard keys love

Oh behave 😂

I'd have blocked him the first time he tried this shite.

You’ve just made my day with your mention of they can away and raffle themselves. I last heard it said by my late granny 30 years ago. Thank you.

That’s what I’d do. I get to define the terms of my friendships, thank you very much. Sometimes a new partner is an excellent new friend, and sometimes, unexpectedly, becomes a closer friend than the original friend, their partner (I’m now much closer to the ex-husband of a friend of mine, and have lost touch with her), but I would say those times were the exception.

He sounds awful.

You have the right to go visit at your convenience and of course to book at hotel as who wants to sleep on a sofa when you need to relax?

to be fair the fact that she says she endorses this message would seriously make me question what's she is about as a friend. Unless he has had a hand in her sending that.

I'd want her to know she is backing someone in being very disrespectful to her good friend and want to talk to her in person to see if she geuinely is all on board with this. If she is... hmmmm

So I’ve spoken to her briefly by text - she knew he would be texting me. She thought the message would be along the lines of ‘we miss you and can’t wait to see you, when are you thinking of coming’ because that’s what she had said to him.

Her phrasing of her request she’s acknowledged came across a bit iffy because she’s now thinking/living in her native language which is a little more brusque when translated directly. She meant to offence and understands I needed this time to recuperate.

She was horrified with the actual messages and is really upset. She’s asked for time to deal with it and will call later!

They moved. Surely they had to factor in things change when you move so far away??

Why are all the responses here about messaging back? Pick up your phone and call to ask what's going on. Messaging is a miscommunication risk!

sory to me that is controlling-even if she says shes ok with it its because hes conditioned her to

you dont go o9ut with your friends and have you husband tag along unless the other husbands are there its weird

and this demanding of you t go over right now is really ott

You must be relieved she didn't want his approach.
I would draw a line on his involvement in your friendship from this point if I was you, he can be the husband of your friend with no link to you of his own, other than being civil to each other for her sake.

Well, that’s heartening. Be prepared for her to defend him or claim a misunderstanding/language problem, though. I would use the opportunity to reaffirm my friendship with her, while reasserting my boundaries, and my reasons for needing to prioritise myself atm — and making it clear my friendship is with her, and I will absolutely not tolerate further hectoring by her partner.

sorry didnt see the update-shes got real problems there with him

She was horrified with the actual messages and is really upset.

I'm guessing then that she doesn't know that he has sent you similar messages before.

So he has lied about who he is and what he does?

She has made poor decisions that make her very vulnerable.

I would think it is likely her family think he is a complete loser and are stepping back.

There is little point engaging with him, perhaps calling her in a few days.

If he is unemployed he is constantly around her.

His text now is possibly the result of her being upset at her poor decisions, his lies being exposed, financial issues and he is feeling the pressure of her disappointment.

He's a dud and it is likely she is realising it.

If you are friendly with any of her family and they are discreet, a call might be an idea for them to check in with her.

Ultimately though she has chosen to move far away with a dud, and have his child.

Not an easy path.

Glad you have spoken to her and she seems to understand. Hopefully dh can keep out if it in future. At the very least she knows she can't assume he will message anything reasonable so she should not be encourgaing him to communicate with you.

In which countries?

This idea that every knobber must be foreign is borderline racist.

Is he very religious?