I have a friend who has a 3 year old. We have been friends for a number of years. Before having her child, our friendship dynamic was that she would somewhat take precedence in conversations - like 65%-35% talking about her vs. talking about me. However, she also has a much more dramatic life than me, with a cancer scare, engagement, marriage, the birth of her child all in succession, so it really made sense that with more "updates", we talk about her more. I thought this was circumstantial.
In the first 1.5 years of having her child, I completely arranged myself around her. All of our meet-ups were in her city (usually 5 mins walking distance from her house), at a time that suited her (the baby was considerably more manageable during mornings), doing an activity that suited her. I sincerely didn't mind this whatsoever while she was breastfeeding/ the baby was so small, this seemed like a completely reasonable thing for a friend to do.
Flash forward to now, and I feel myself not enjoying the friendship anymore. I really can't differentiate between whether I am being unreasonable (the child is still only 3), or whether there's some real validity to my complaints. I'd love to hear from someone who has been in a similar situation. To lay out the biggest issues I have:
- We still exclusively meet in her city, at a time that suits her. This means I need to wake up early on weekends, commute, meet her for a couple of hours, then go home. I feel frustration that I am still the one doing this, especially as she has a car, while I rely on public transport.
- We still predominantly talk about her. There has not been any dramatic updates beyond the birth, and the usual child updates (i.e. hitting a new milestone). I'm beginning to believe that this isn't circumstantial, but rather her expectation of our friendship. I've had some fairly big updates that I would only get to share for c. 5 minutes, before returning to stories about her child. This is the same online also, with me texting her quite important updates in my life to no reply, then her sending a photo of her daughter doing something expecting a response from me a few days later. I feel awful, but I am completely fatigued hearing about her child. I find it hard to even respond now.
- She occasionally acts unfairly towards me. During the early days of being a mother, I put this down to tiredness and exhaustion. I certainly believe with a 3 year old is still tiring and exhausting, however I'm not sure at what point it's expected that I can stand up for myself. This unfair behaviour is things like snapping at me, or implying my life is easier. It's quite possible my life is easier, but it's really alienating to hear almost every time we meet. I can't really imagine what her goal is beyond making me feel uncomfortable.
If I confront her, I don't even know how. I've never confronted this friend about anything, but other friends in our group have and she hasn't taken it well. (Other friends in our group confronted her about different things).
Should I ride this out for longer? Confront about certain things, but not others? Is this just to be expected? Thank you in advance.