What would you do? Friend asking for money AGAIN

[picolosmum]

What would you do in the following situation and am I being tight and unreasonable?

I have a friend, who isn’t a best friend but someone I do see a few times a month if we are both free, sometimes with children, sometimes without. Happy to help this friend where I can but does feel like it’s start to be a bit of a piss take now.

This friend is a single mum, which I empathise with as I know she doesn’t have it easy mentally (feels lonely) or financially (doesn’t work). This mum lives solely off of benefits (not judging that). My gripe is she is in her late 30s and awful at money management - benefits pay her and a week later she’s skint because she’s spent £90 on non essential items like rugs, candles etc and asking me for money for her direct debits so they don’t bounce.

in the past two months I have done 2 large food/toiletry/pet food shops for her, gave her £25 for her phone bill, money for her fags three times, now she’s asked to borrow £20 again (for something she genuinely needs) and I just don’t want to help but feel obliged to and feel guilty if I don’t. I just think learn to manage your finances better, it’s not my problem. However I’m too nice to say no and I hate it. She’s always grateful of the help but now I feel she may be taking advantage. I have also spent £100 this month on two trips out for us as a little pick her up treat.

Thing is I can’t tell her I don’t have the money, without disclosing my job, it’s obvious I have spare money.

what would you do? I don’t feel comfortable saying no or learn to manage your own money. Help!!

@Booksandsport you sound lovely 😍

Another so called friend that's taking your kindness as a weakness.

She's not the only single mum out there and most manage to cope but she never will unless you stop giving her handouts.

The items you name that she's spending her money on are not necssities yet she still choses to do so.

Stop buying her things, especially her fags, I don't smoke but was amazed standing in the queue in the supermarket last week and 2 packs of cigarettes bought by the person in front were £24, jeez.

I posted earlier about a former friend that was like this. My light bulb moment came when after appealing for help to buy food for themselves and their daughter another mate went round with a bag of groceries to find them out in the garden sitting on the new set of garden chairs she had just bought!

I have friends who work for this charity that teaches budgeting and money management as well as helping individuals with debt. They change lives. Perhaps worth mentioning to her?

https://capuk.org/get-help

I think you need to work out what's wrong with you that you feel guilty if you say no.

Don't say 'you're making me feel uncomfortable'. Say 'NO!'. She's a CF and you're enabling her. As PP said, you won't see her for dust once the money dries up.

I’m sorry but there’s being kind and then there’s being a pushover. You’re being a complete mug. Stop giving this woman money? It’s literally as simple as that. Tell her you can’t afford to keep bailing her out and she needs to be an adult and learn to manage her finances better.

Stop enabling her if she's spending her money on luxuries (candles etc).
Buy her a budgeting book and show her how to use it.I know there are many apps available but nothing looks more real than figures on a page. If she has spare cash at the end of the month she can treat herself.
You're being a useful friend to her because you are a kind person but , long term you aren't doing her any favours and she seems to be becoming dependant on your support. She needs to learn to pay her essentials first (by the way I don't and never will think of any kind of tobacco product or vape as an essential)
I'm not saying you should cut her off or stop having your treat days but just ease back on the loans ( except for genuine emergencies, obviously).
Just noticing that word "loans" do they get paid back at all ?

Is a candel really a luxurious item 🤨 there's people of benefits buying crack/heroine and shoplifting this girls being crucified for a candel lol it might of cost £3 gosh.

I had a friend with two kids (a few years ago)

I thought she was a skint single mum,doing her best but was struggling (I've been that single mum,doing her best)

I ended up lending her over £100 (which she paid back) and another £200

I didn't get that money back-turns out she had a cocklodger (the kids father) who was spending her benefit money on booze,weed and fags

Her family where refusing to bail her out,and she was working her way through her mates-they soon saw the light,so she'd move on

She got pregnant again to him,had the baby,left him and is now pregnant again with another cocklodger

She's also bad mouthed me,saying I'm a liar,she owes me nothing as i didnt lend her anything (i have proof i lent her the money) and she fell out with me as I hit one of her kids (not true at all-i wasnt even in my area at the time she claims this-i was 150 miles away,visiting my mil)

I have another friend who will spend her wages on smokes,weed clothes,random crap,takeaway coffee,cakes,sweets and maccys milkshakes for her dog (at least 3 a day) while ignoring the bills piling up

As soon as the bailiffs show up,I get the begging texts to 'lend' her some money

Not a chance in hell am I bailing her out-shes on the same money as me and I pay my way in life

Her stepdad used to bail her out all the time (she's in her 50's) but he died during covid so she doesn't have him as her back-up anymore

It is most DEFINITLEY a luxury item when you're sat on benefits crying poverty, not buying food and borrowing money off all and sundry.

Especially when she's bloody smoking as well.

in the past two months I have done 2 large food/toiletry/pet food shops for her, gave her £25 for her phone bill, money for her fags three times, now she’s asked to borrow £20 again (for something she genuinely needs)

How many does she smoke a day? If she has say 10 a day that sets her back about £8 each day so that explains why she’s skint.

Instead of enabling her which ultimately isn’t kind, you should definitely say no.

People pleasers often claim they’re motivation is being kind and “nice” to others but really they’re not, at the root of their actions is about them getting to feel a certain way when they do something for people.

And I say this as a recovering people pleaser who eventually opened her eyes. At one point I was sending between £20 and £50 to a friend with 3 kids who had a long term partner who daily smokes weeds - and also always picking up the tab if we went for coffee or dinner and sending presents round every year despite her never getting me so much as a card for Christmas or birthdays. I realised I was effectively paying for her partners weed habit and directly subsidising her lifestyle of perpetual under-employment (she didn’t work for years and now only works 12 hours a week). I was a single person subsidising a couple who chose a certain lifestyles that was already propped up by benefits - ridiculous!

I agree with pp that you need to examine why you’ve felt obliged to go along with this when it’s clear she misusing her money.

I agree about the smoking but I wouldn't resent a candel lol

The person who I helped out, she had enough money for weed, but she'd also help out others, her ex, her friends or so she said. She certainly wasn't poor and had a job and I did wonder sometimes how she got so short on money that she had to ask me for help. Maybe it was being bad at balancing finances.

@GottaLoveKimchi I get what you're saying but at the end of the day this woman appears to be prioritising candles over feeding her kids.

OP please just say no but I suspect she won’t be as much of a friend or wanting to see you so often as a result.

She has absolutely no reason to keep money aside for essentials when she knows she has you for her personal cash point machine.
Fags and candles!!!
Sod that.

See her dust as she flees from your 'closed' sign.

She didn't really expand on if she's getting her money back etc 🤔 Obviously if she was picking candels over food that's an issue but i general I always feel pretty sad for people who are judged for having a glass of wine 🍷 like how dare she the scrounger etc etc

I think you’re right - sometimes it is about being poor at budgeting. My relative - who happened to be a single mother of 4 - was like that. She was quite generous herself but would often end up skint and unable to pay bills. I think sometimes people like that would benefit better from budgeting advice or similar.

The friend I helped had a live in partner with a weed habit. It wasn’t her spending it on weed in this case, but because her partner spent daily on it and sometimes borrowed from her to pay for it that obviously contributed to her having a lack of money in the household. It eventually irritated me though that because she couldn’t or wouldn’t hold the father of her kids to a higher standard, she instead chose to ask me for money knowing I never asked for it back.

If she hasn't run out of electricity then yes a candle is a luxury , especially if she's expecting a friend to subsidise her on a regular basis.
Anyone, whether on benefits or not who buys crack/heroine/any illegal substance/alcohol/tobacco are also wasting their money on non necessities (I wouldn't call drugs a luxury)

I’d give her the last £20

I wouldn't. What I'd tell her would have the word "hell" at the end of it.

Say you want to be her friend... by offering financial/budgeting advice.

Based on the old adage: give a man a fish.... but give him a rod and teach him to fish...

But in my case, my friend who used to borrow money, she was really careful with it, didn't spend lots on clothes and really seemed to be careful with what she had. I don't know whether her family thought she was well off (she apparently sent money home) but her sisters both married millionaires in Nigeria (which I believed) and her DF (father) was a diplomat.

So I don't think she was bad at budgeting, or if she was, maybe me lending her money every so often helped her. She always seemed to have a 'scheme/business plan' on the go. No idea if any of it took off because it didn't when I knew her.

She sounds terrible. I’m a single mum and money is tight but I budget and go without luxuries for myself to ensure my kids want for nothing.
I wouldn’t dream of asking family or friends for money. I made the mistake once of lending a ‘friend’ money for bills and she never paid it back despite constantly posting her night out on fb!
She doesn’t sound like a friend at all.

I think it has to be a flat no. Giving a reason is just inviting the CF to find ways around it for you.