Am I being mean about the "supersweet" friend?

[endlessnonsense]

I have a friend (well, she's equally a friend of me and DH, she and her XH used to be our neighbours). We now only see her a couple of times a year as we live far away now, and I wouldn't call her a really close friend. When we go on holiday, which is to a hot seaside place in Europe, we often get friends joining us as we have a place to stay and a boat, which is fun. This year she came.

I spent a lot of the time she was here in a state of suppressed anger at her, which caused me to resent her being here. This is because she turned out, on a several-days long time together, rather than the odd dinner we usually have, to be constantly pretending (or was she pretending?) to be very thoughtful and considerate, when I felt she was being just the opposite, in a passive aggressive way.

Everywhere we suggested going and everything we suggested doing, she deferred to us, "oh I'll do whatever you want, don't worry about me", never offering any suggestions of her own or seeming especially enthusiatic. OK, fair enough, we know the place and she doesn't. But it went much further. She was always faux putting herself down/being the martyr/putting on performative sweetness.

My son has special needs and she is always supersweet to him, but I told her multiple times during the holiday, no, he doesn't want an ice cream, he doesn't like it. It must have run into more than a dozen times she said, "oh darling, do you want an ice cream, oh please let me get him an ice cream, I'll pay"(as though I wasn't getting him the ice cream myself because of meanness). (Strangely, although she knows he does like chocolate, she never once offered to buy him a chocolate)

We planned a trip to a particular place she hadn't been, specifically to show it to her. Other friends were coming too, they are local and had been to the place many times, but we're coming along to be sociable with us and her. When she asked me how many people were coming and I mentioned it would be quite a few (in positive way, saying it would be a fun social event) she said, all sweetly, "well if you don't have room for me I'll just stay behind at the apartment, I don't mind at all". That really annoyed me, she knew the trip was arranged specifically for her!

Another (even more annoying) example, we were at a beach bar/restaurant with a bunch of people. Too many to get one table so we were split between 2 tables. Our food came marginally before the other table's (not more than 2 or 3 minutes). In that time she expressed concern that the toddler at the other table had not yet got her food, and actually got up to take her own plate of food to the toddler (it was a salad of some sort and the toddler was getting chips, so not even remotely the same thing). Me and DH had to physically get her to stop it and sit down before the toddler's mum saw.

She has always been very much a "oh don't worry about me, I'll just have a tap water" type of person, but on this holiday she really got my goat. She's left now and I am not sure if she noticed I was a bit snippy with her by the end. AIBU and a mean friend?

We didn't "behave in an angry manner", we just both blocked her going over to the other table and said "no, don't do that, shes fine".

I didn't say you behaved in an angry manner I said you chose to highlight it in an angry manner, and it seemed OTT to me.

haha, Well, I wouldn't have behaved in an angry manner, but I absolutely would have been rolling my eyes or a bit exasperated so to reiterate - I am with you 100%!

How erudite, thanks.

She sounds a pain in the arse.

@Marinade

It was overly dramatic on both parts to be honest. The way it was presented in the OP seemed definitely OTT. A clumsy attempt by the friend to ensure the toddler was not left hungry did not need to be highlighted in such an angry manner, in my opinion.

Maybe. Certainly nothing that calls for a public display of anger. I would have rolled my eyes and let it go.

But I would have been (quietly) irritated by that kind of display. I don’t think it was anything to do with the friend not wanting the toddler to be hungry. It was a performative display designed to signal that the friend was public spirited and competent with a side order of judgment. It was pure “me, me, me, look at lovely, kind, me.”

I think it was a clumsy attempt to want to ensure that the toddler was not left hungry. I don't get the need to interpret her reactions in such a negative light. Did you never read The Seven Habits of Emotionally Intelligent People - one of which is to always assume positive intent? Why the need to frame it in such a negative way?

Not read the whole thread , but I've met people like this and it's hard to know how to take them tbh.
She sounds hard going.

@Marinade but the toddler was one in a long long line of unnecesary, and inappropriate, attempts to be helpful!?

Sorry Seven Habits of Highly Effective People.

Eh????

She was NOT nice to her son. She offered to buy him something he doesn't like. How fucking weird you think this was "nice".

This.
I think you showed great restraint.
She sounds like an unmitigated PITA.

What, along with trying to talk to people, I believe that was one of her transgressions?

Unnecessary and inappropriate attempts to be helpful - as I said - let her be hung, drawn and quartered for the terrible crimes against humanity she is guilty of. Jesus wept the outcry on here is just unbelievable.

I actually think you need to calm down a bit.

@endlessnonsense I actually find your posts worse and worse the more you go on about this woman . Really horrible in all honesty .
I think the best thing you can do is distance yourself from her, do her a massive favour. Hope that’s straight enough for you. Or maybe tell her in your “no nonsense” way how irritating you find her like you have on this thread which is pretty identifying anyway if she reads this. I think you owe her that .

You sound quite restrained in the circumstances.
Some very insightful posts about why I Don't Minders behave how they do and how triggering it can be. I recognise my MIL's behaviours there. Can't outright ask for something but wobetide if you guess wrong (just silent treatment really).

@Marinade

I don't get the need to interpret her reactions in such a negative light. Did you never read The Seven Habits of Emotionally Intelligent People - one of which is to always assume positive intent? Why the need to frame it in such a negative way?

I haven’t read this. I do think a lot of people have positive intent but, and maybe I am a hardened old cynic, one thing I have consistently observed in my 50 plus years on this planet is that when people want to be genuinely altruistic they don’t make a big public display of it.

This is an obviously unecessary and equally obviously fruitless gesture. Singling out the toddler as if it was about to have a health emergency was needlessly dramatic. The toddler’s food was to have been delayed by at most a few minutes so it was totally unnecessary. And there isn’t a toddler in the world who would be satisfied by the appearance of a salad when s/he has asked for chips. That was a gesture aimed at adults to make a point or I am a water buffalo.

Putting this together with other calculatedly self effacing stuff like the minor pass ag sulk about the boat trip this is clearly a person who wants to centre herself in the story without making it too obvious.

That doesn’t mean she doesn’t have entirely valid reasons for this. And maybe deserves sympathy. But it sure as hell is not guileless altruism and it’s clear why it annoyed OP.

I think you're mixing up some of the actions, that was from another poster.

Would you really assume positive intent when someone repeatedly performs actions that have a negative impact though?

OK whatever. But this is the rub isn't it? You, the OP and many others are seeing her behaviour as having such a negative impact, whereas I simply could not get worked up about it at all.

And I am a glass half empty person believe me, but did she really do such terrible things to warrant the vitriol being spouted against her? She seems like a well meaning person who is rather clumsy in her social gestures probably due to some anxiety?

Calm down a bit

🤣🤣🤣

Totally agree with this: what a thoroughly unpleasant thread full of people thinking they're justified in judging and putting down this poor 'mentally ill' woman (just on OP's say so).

You are too negative, you are now stating a specific action is 'calculated' - that is your individual interpretation and spin that you have put on her actions, you know nothing of her motiviation or state of mind.

Again the toddler would not be happy with the salad but she didn't go and take their dummy she offered a kind gesture! Calm down with such negative takes.

Ok, I accept that I became annoyed by things which would not have annoyed some people. But I also think some people on this thread are wilfully misunderstanding some if my descriptions.

To be clear (for the last time):

I cannot for the life of me see how she was trying to ensure the toddler was not "left hungry", or why she thought it appropriate to basically take over the role of the parent of a child she had just met in trying to feed them. Food had been ordered. Some had come. The rest was presumably on its way. The child was in no way distressed. Her parents were with her and also waiting for their own food to arrive. There was bread on the tables already anyway, if anyone was in danger of starvation in the next two minutes. Me and DH just looked at each other and rose as one to stop her, both realising that the ridiculous attempted offering of the salad was insulting to the parents. We didn't get angry, we were embarrassed.

With the day trip, since people seem to be fundamentally misunderstanding, it went like this:

Group of people in a bar in the evening: "wow that was a nice day out, where shall we go tomorrow? Weather looks good. Hey X, have you ever been to [local beauty spot]?

X: no I don't think so.

Other people: "let's all go there then if you haven't been, it's really nice"
Others: "yes that's an idea, you should see it".

Her: "sounds great, see you tomorrow".

Next morning, a couple more people have heard about the trip and decided to come too. Me: "guess what, Y and Z are also coming now, there'll be quite a group!"

Her: "oh, if you don't have room for me I'll stay behind, I really don't mind".

(No reason at all to think there wouldn't be room on the boats, there is plenty and she kniws it, having been in exactly the sane group the previous day).

Do people really think that's not annoying?

OK that's my last explanation. I have taken people's views on board though.

So she offered to buy him I've cream twice? That's not exactly a huge deal. She probably forgot the second time.

It doesn't sound like she's done anything wrong. You invited her to stay with you.

Going through a divorce is hard and it sounds like her dh was quite bossy. Makes sense she's laid back.

OK.... That makes a lot of sense 😂