Forgot to take my friend to her hospital appointment- how do I fix this!?

[MamaBee22]

First time posting so please bare with me..

I forgot to take my best friend of 20 years to her colosopy appt. We'd arranged for me to take her and stay with her/bring her back, but the date changed to half term. No childcare and hubby at work so I still offered to drop her off and pick her up. She mentioned a few days prior and I said yeah no problem still good to go.

Fast forward to the day of appt. My DC has a chest infection so had to get her a drs appointment and being completely truthful it just slipped my mind. I didn't realise until it was too late and she text me saying have you forgot?

Obviously I went into panic mode and no deflection, I own my mistake and there's no excuse I shouldn't have forgot. I'm only human and it just slipped my mind. I apologised and said I understand why she'd be cross but let me know how it went.

I'm am a dependable friend 99% of the time. I am the most constant person in her life (she's single) and have never let her down before.

She ignored me for a couple of days and then sent a text saying how pissed off she was, people always let her down and its a difficult thing to forget and she doesn't want to talk about it.

Apart from giving her space, is there anything I can do to fix this? I feel sad to loose my friend over a stupid mistake.

Sadly she can be known to use silence as a form of punishment and has definitely tried to make me feel as guilty as possible. Obviously I can take that on the chin, it is my fault, but I have a horrible feeling she will continue to bring this up long term.

Thank you

Yep its emotional abuse. Not nice to go through

You are entirely correct. A child with a chest infection is nothing like sorting last minute childcare to go and have a cuppa…

I am a very forgetful person and absolutely need reminders.

Having said that when i had a similar procedure i took a bus to the hosptal. It was no worse than more intrusive smear test or iud fitting. (i drove myself to the iud fitting) I guess I am superwoman. Apart from the money for the uber your friend has lost nothing.

If a friend so kindly offered to take me to a hospital appointment I would be reminding her in a timely fashion. (Reminder that you said you would take me to appointment tomorrow! Thanks so much! what time are you picking me up this morning? is 10am good? ) It would be on me to remember - why should she also have the additional load of remembering my appointments?

Not sure this person is your friend, if she is she is acting like this over a very human error.

Oh dear 😆😆😆😆

What were the chances of the friend being in here.

@thezanyscroller not for one minute do I think I'm "little miss perfect" so how dare you judge me. I'm human and I've made a mistake. My child wasn't unwell at the time of me agreeing to help out. For the record, I've been the best friend I could since 12 years old and already feel so sad by this without the shitty response from you. I own my mistake but your judging me on incorrect facts you've drawn a conclusion from. You have no idea the type of friend I have been the 99 plus other times so please don't judge me on 1!

For the lovely people on here who have been kind thank you. Talked it through with DH and feel a bit better. She did respond this evening and I'm going round to talk through. Will let her be open and honest with me about her hurt and take it on the chin. We all have our faults, both me and her, but love each other and probably couldn't imagine life apart after all these years so I'm feeling hopeful I can learn from this and we can move on x

So, as a responsible parent prioritizing their child. It is inevitable, other people will get let down. To promise a friend something so important and then letting her down when doing what she shoild be doing anyway has added more stress to her friend no doubt. People shouldn't make promises they can't keep. If you read the title of OPs post it literally says she forgot to take her friend tobher hospital appointment. Ger s grip. Stop trying to brainwash me into your madness. My opinion won't change as it's fundamentally correct.

Wow!

I honestly feel (and hope) some of these comments must be fake! If you had a friend that was always there for you, and genuinely made a mistake and apologised for it would you really never forgive them and forget every other thing they've done for you?

OP, you made a mistake. I can imagine it is annoying for your friend but in the end she got there and no one died. If it were me I'd accept your apology and move on. Life is too short for grudges. I think given there was no harm in the end you shouldn't have to grovel for making a mistake if you're a good friend 99% of the time.

She has asked for space. If I asked for space and the friend that fucked up turned up with flowers, I'd be even more pissed off. Leave her alone.

My child wasn't ill at the time of me making the promise! If your going to comment with such a strong opinion, atleast read the updates and full facts before drawing your conclusion! My circumstances changed and had I not forgot, because god forbid I made a mistake, I was still willing to take and collect her with my child! It slipped my mind. Fair enough the 1 time I forgot is one of the worst things I could forget but that's the honest truth. I never intend to make a promise I couldn't keep

Oh grow up.

The silent treatment is when the abuser is in the same house and as the abused and deliberately doesn't speak to them.

This is not that.

Im glad for you that shes replied but honestly op I hope you dont take too much shit over this. You do sound like a very good friend 😊

It was an honest mistake op. You’ve apologised and she still got to the appointment on time, if she wants to be childish and give you the cold shoulder then let her, don’t keep grovelling. But next time put it in your calendar and set a reminder.

Haven't rtft

But my question is, what does this friend do for you?

It sounds like you have been a great support to her aside from this but is it reciprocated?

It sounds like a potentially unhealthy dynamic.

Secondly I would always text the day before / day of to check plans were still in place for something like this where I've asked a favour. I'm surprised she didn't.

She said she didn't want to talk about it further and you've sent her follow up messages.

What you are interpreting as silent treatment could be your friend taking time to process things so she doesn't blurt something out in anger, especially if she also wants to maintain the friendship or is undecided about whether you're in a good place to resume a friendship.

Give her some space. If she doesn't come back then a friendship with someone who can't forgive human error isn't something you'd want to resume anyway and if she does come back to you she would be grateful for you respecting her boundaries.

Let her sulk I say. Sounds like you’ve done hundreds of things for her and she won’t give you grace this one time.

I had a couple of instances of a close relative and so called long standing friends letting me down despite big promises

Once when l'd had an old fashioned radical hysterectomy years ago. No keyhole surgery then.Felt as though l had been cut in half.

Really struggled after the operation as a live by myself.
After a couple of weeks visits, phone calls from a relative and several friends disappeared

Second when an old boyfriend died in very tragic circumstances who was the love of my life. Close friends were sympathetic at first. But after a couple of months they were not interested and thought l should be over it.

Taught me in that times of needs you find out who your real friends are.

If l were your friend l don't think l would want your friendship. You let her down big time. End of.

I would be pissed off. A colposcopy following a smear is because they've found precancerous cells. It is Hella painful too. I've had it twice and been out of my mind with worry as they told me they cannot fully classify the cells or rule out cancer until you've had the colposcopy/loop treatment performed to remove all the cells.

Give her time. She will need to process the procedure as well as being let down by her oldest friend. I'd be even more pissed off if you wouldn't leave me alone afterwards when I just wanted some space.

You made a mistake, you apologised. Give your friend some time. If she doesn't get over it that's on her - but id leave her for a week or 2.

A colposcopy is absolutely not always done because there is a suspicion of pre-cancerous cells. Op said it wasn't due to a cancer scare too.

They arent always painful either. Mine weren't at all painful. I had LLETZ at least twice.

Your friends disappeared because they didn’t want to help anymore, OP genuinely forgot.

She sounds immature. I would never expect so much practical support. I'd just get a taxi. I'm an orphan and almost got a taxi to hospital when giving birth to my daughter as my husband was late back from biz trip. That much expectation is a recipe for disappointment and bad feeling - she isn't your child.

I think you were lovely to offer to help during half term. We all make mistakes and I have had kids with bad chest infections and it can be scary.

In all honesty. If I was your pal I wouldn't have asked you particularly with half term. It is hard enough to juggle so as she has family I think she needs to assess her own judgement.

Hope your little one is ok

I feel like your mistake was agreeing to still do it once you knew you were going to be responsible for the kids at half term. I know you didn’t want to let her down but as soon as you were sole adult in charge the kids then they always needed to be your priority and it wasn’t really sensible to try and accommodate your friend as well. I totally get how you’ve managed to forget. Even with things in your calendar it’s easy to lose track of what you are doing when off with kids and something goes wrong (like your child being ill).