My mother died suddenly two months ago. I was recently having coffee with a friend and she asked how I was doing and I said I was struggling a bit and kept seeing or hearing things that would remind me of mum and get upset. As an example I said I’d just seen an advert for a café that I knew she’d have absolutely loved and it upset me as I wish I’d known about it and taken her there for lunch. My friend’s immediate response was “oh, maybe I’ll take my mum there” and I’m wondering if I’m being unreasonable to be a bit upset by that?
I said I’d rather she didn’t, at least right away as it would feel sort of like she was taunting me. She then informed me I was being silly and unreasonable and I couldn’t tell her where she could or couldn’t take her mother – so I agreed and said if she wanted to take her that was fine, I’d just rather she didn’t tell me as I’d find it a bit upsetting. She then laughed at me and said that I was being ridiculous and that if her mother died she would be fine with me going to places they’d liked. Just to be clear, she was not familiar with the place in question and me saying that I’d seen an advert and was sad I couldn’t take my mum was the first she’d ever heard of it. She’d not seen any pictures and didn’t know what sort of food they served, or if it was any good; literally all she knew about it was that I’d seen an advert and wished I’d taken my mum there, and it’s location which is about 25 minutes each way from her (elderly and disabled) mother and not an area they usually frequent.
I appreciate that I might be being overly sensitive and unreasonable as I’m in still in shock about my mother but it really hurt me and I keep going over the conversation, in the end I just smiled and agreed that aren’t I silly, she rolled her eyes and we changed the subject. Obviously if it was somewhere that she already knew about and was planning to go I wouldn’t dream of telling her she couldn’t, and if she’d just offered sympathy and support then brought it up in a few days’ time and said her mum would like it there I think I‘d have given the address and wished them well… I think it’s more that it was because the conversation was about how I kept seeing things that upset me and I was really just looking for a bit of a handhold that it seemed a really insensitive response. It’s also very much not the first time something like this has happened with this friend, I often seem to be apologising or acknowledging that she’s right and that I’m being silly, even when I don’t really agree. I seem to come home from seeing her feeling upset quite often and usually over little things like this, but it doesn’t happen with other friends so I don’t know if we just really don’t mesh well or if she’s a bit thoughtless? I am strongly suspected ND if that’s relevant, I do know I can react ‘oddly’ sometimes!