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

If you haven’t told her you need to tell your friend you were distracted by your child being ill. It’s not an excuse, just fact.

Oh dear.... you really messed up.... but very understandable.
You certainly didn't mean to and you feel mortified for forgetting her...
I've done the same.... it's awful... the thing may be really important to you but it just disappears from your mind!!
Nothing you can do but apologise and take it from there.
Your friend should also realise that you're only human and would never do anything so intentional.
Good luck with your friendship going forward. 🤞
And try not to worry that you're losing your marbles, it may never happen again.

OP you are getting a hard time, but I sympathize. Recently I've dropped the ball on some things I never usually would, because I'm very stressed with work, DC and other issues, plus I think perimenopause brain is kicking in. When your DC is ill things really can go out of your mind.

You need to give her space/leave her alone. I cannot understand how you could forget such an important appointment for a close friend! You must not think much of her. Personally I wouldn't forgive you. I think you have to accept that you've possibly lost an old friend. She will feel totally let down, worthless and very sad.

Yes... But equally OP {mention:MamaBee22}kid@MamaBee22kid was suddenly ill.

Why wasn't the patient texting op the night before to double check??

I don’t feel like you’re actually sorry for forgetting. Your posts keep saying I’m not making excuses but….. (insert woeful excuse). The reality is you were being a shit friend and you messed up. There is no excuse and it isn’t your friends fault as on occasion you’ve posted about how she should have reminded you etc. etc. If a friend of mine did this to me I’d also go low contact while I assessed the friendship.

I hope when you’ve been apologising to her you haven’t been saying I’m sorry…. But.

I don’t know how you can make it up to her, but I’d probably start by asking her.

I'm so sorry to hear your friend's giving you the silent treatment at the moment 🫂
Please forgive yourself & remember, most importantly, you were taking good care of 7.8 Darling Child, 1st & foremost, as any Loving Parent would & does 💚
It would be a completely different story, if you just decided to go out partying & living it up instead 😥
Of course you're not only permitted to, but should prioritise Your Child/ren
You've apologised sincerely & if she has any Children herself I'm sure she will understand -
If she doesn't, maybe if she continues to try to hold grudges, ask her to kindly try to at least, put herself in your shoes for a moment 🙏
You didn't choose to let her down, you lovingly put your Child 1st -
Wishing You&Yours all the utmost very best
💚🫂💚

That's a really extreme reaction!!

Yes I'd be irritated... But she made her appt and ALSO she failed to prompt OP the night before /first thing in morning.

If it was that important, I'd always send a reminder text.

I wouldn't dump an otherwise good pal for this. I'd be annoyed but forgiving and also take a share of accountability.

It’s not like you forgot to meet her for coffee. This was unforgivable OP. No wonder she’s hurt.

She hasn't given you the silent treatment, OP. She told you she needed space.

I expect she is really hurt. Hopefully she will be able to accept that you do love and value her and think about her and all those things that forgetting your arrangement has called into question.

Everyone fucks up from time to time. If you've been a good friend over the years, I expect she'll get over it.

Don’t beat yourself up about it because your daughter was ill and the procedure date had changed/was in half term. I’ve been to so many procedures on my own with no friend so not everyone is as lucky as your friend if you forgot the once. I’m sorry but If she can’t forgive or forget, I wouldn’t keep apologising.

When the child is asthmatic it IS an emergency!! It can turn life threatening very quickly and the friends procedure was very minor and not life threatening!

I can’t drive and sometimes people are kind enough to offer me lifts. If one of them offered and then forgot I cannot imagine giving them the “silent treatment” and telling them I needed space.

Because I am an adult who has made my fair share of mistakes - so I don’t expect perfection from my friends. “Unforgivable” is a very melodramatic word to use - there are a few things in life that are unforgivable but that isn’t one of them.

I couldn’t imagine holding a grudge over something that wasn’t deliberate when the person has apologised profusely - that seems like hard work. It makes me wonder if some people enjoy these dramatics.

It wasn't that much of an emergency else OP would've taken her to hospital rather than GP

And still doesn't explain not bothering to put in phone calendar in first place

You don’t always know, my DD almost died during an asthma episode, she was already admitted to hospital on o2, she only went to the toilet and took the mask off for 5 mins. No one expected her o2 to drop so quickly she would need to be resuscitated. It’s not uncommon for my daughter to be happily getting ready for school, then by 8.30 feeling a bit under the weather and we decide to go to school, then by lunchtime she’s been admitted to hospital.

The slightest cough from my DD triggers PTSD and I go into high alert mode, it’s hard to concentrate on anything else. Sometimes things escalate, sometimes they don’t. But a chest infection would have me very worried. And I have to be completely on top of even the mildest asthma episode as especially in children things can change very fast. I totally let a friend down once while we were in hospital and it took me two days before I even realised I fucked up. She didn’t say anything, she gave me the benefit of the doubt because we are friends.

lets not forget OP was doing her friend a favour, like she has done many times before. Her friend is lucky to have someone she can (usually) rely on, many people don’t.

In your opinion you mean… I get that it wasn’t done on purpose but to then to try and excuse it by blaming the friend on previous “ silent treatment” or that she didn’t remind her makes a very disappointing friend indeed. Own it, apologise and make a nice gesture is what most sincere friends would do. I certainly would and wouldn’t class it as being ridiculous however, we’re all different.

I get that but then she went on to practically blame the friend for not reminding her and having previous for silent treatment.

@thezanyscroller I'm in the market for a crystal ball, could you tell me where you got yours please?

TYIA x

Op, you made a mistake, and yes - it was a doozy of a mistake, but it was not intentional so all you can really do now is sit with this unfortunately and learn from it.

I would personally reach out once more and send flowers and a card with a heart-felt apology and detail what she means to you as a friend but I'd say in it that you really hope she is willing to move forwards with you as you are committed to doing better in future but that you will ultimately respect her decision if she chooses not to and if you don't hear from her then you'll take it that she doesn't want to hear from you.

Worded better than that in some way!

I think ultimately op mistakes happen and I don't think it's right to use silence in this way, but then again she's maybe just had a serious health scare and that's hard as a single person.

Missing the point, but what is a coloscopy?

Unforgivable? Really?

Do you speak to people like this in real life?

I am so sorry for you..i was horrified when i saw the collective bitches pounce on you. You obviously got the hormonal SAHM replies first ..(..think glass houses)

It was a forgotten outpatient appointment..not life or death
You have never let her down before..its a first
You are not perfect...who is?
You both usually remind each other....she obviously forgot to
A friend who does not forgive the first mistake is not a friend ...it is a tyrant
She knew it was half term..she knew you had children....as another parent she should empathise and forgive
Dont keep apologising...you are giving fuel to her grievance

You have apologised..now leave her be, she will soon realise that that she is jeopardising her only reliable friendship and hopefully apologise to you for making such a drama out of a simple, understandable mistake.
Now relax, ignore the comments and forgive yourself!

People are giving you a hard time, OP. If a friend was driving me to the hospital, I would text in the morning to check they are still able to do it. And a child with asthma and a chest infection is a very stressful situation - easy to forget everything else. I have had a gynae colposcopy more than once, and have also looked after an asthmatic child with a chest infection many times. I definitely found the latter to be much much much more stressful.

i think ur friend is partly to blame here. She should’ve sent you a reminder in the morning. I forget a lot of important things bc of my kids! Bring the holidays and routine change then I’m guaranteed to forgot a lot. I use my calendar for literally the smallest of things but even then I forget bc sometimes my phone doesn’t alert me or I’m so busy that I’ll miss the notification on my phone as I’m quickly going into my phone to do something and then the notification is removed from the screen but I actually haven’t seen it.

Colposcopies can be very painful, I'd give her time to recover. I'm not I'd want to bothered with texting back & forth if I'd had a rough procedure and she might need a bit of time once she's feeling better to let it go.

You could send flowers, but don't grovel now. You've apologised properly and fairly, you can apologise again in person or on the phone when you both speak properly but there's no need for self-flaggellation.