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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

To worry my friend is wasting her life?

9 replies

JacksJacks · 18/06/2026 19:09

I know it’s none of my business, and I try and keep my mouth shut, but I read so often on here about men who keep a woman around until he finds ‘the one’ and then he’s off in a flash.

She’s 38 and has been off and on with the same man for around 15 years. During this time, he’s slept with other women and she has had affairs, ONS and brief relationships with other men, so I’m by no means saying she’s been hanging around waiting.

For much of the time they’ve been good friends who often slept together. She was very clearly in love with him, and he continuously rejected her. He went on a date with another woman a few years ago and she came to me very upset, and I advised her to finish it and find someone better. She did finish it, but of course he came crawling back.

She met a (I thought) lovely bloke a few years ago, and finished things with the other man and I was so pleased she was being treated as I think she should be. But after a few months she’d left him and went back to the other man.

Since then they’ve been faithful to each other, she says anyway. I’ve been for lunch with her today and they are now ‘official’.

She doesn’t ever see his family. She’s never met them. He’s going on holiday with them next week and she’s not invited. For years he’s messed her around and repeatedly told her he doesn’t want her.

AIBU to think that he will drop her like a brick when someone he really falls for comes along and she will have entirely wasted her time and find herself heartbroken and alone? I really struggled not to tell her what I thought today. She is an attractive and intelligent woman!

OP posts:
chocoluv · 18/06/2026 19:12

YANBU!!

She is wasting her life and once he finds someone better, she’ll look back and regret it.

But she is an adult and she is completely in control of her own life.

You can tell her over and over but she won’t listen.

You just need to let her make her own mistakes, no matter how hard it is for you to watch.

DollopOfFun · 18/06/2026 19:16

YANBU but the heart wants what the heart wants.

JacksJacks · 18/06/2026 19:38

chocoluv · 18/06/2026 19:12

YANBU!!

She is wasting her life and once he finds someone better, she’ll look back and regret it.

But she is an adult and she is completely in control of her own life.

You can tell her over and over but she won’t listen.

You just need to let her make her own mistakes, no matter how hard it is for you to watch.

Indeed.

She says the relationship has changed, and that she’s happy with what they’ve got. I don’t think she realises how common it is for men to use women as a placeholder until someone else comes along. She has said this to him, but of course he’s reassured her that there’s no way he will do that..

OP posts:
Larrythecatforpm · 18/06/2026 20:00

Can’t fix stupid.

5128gap · 18/06/2026 20:07

By blowing hot and cold for years, he's trained her into thinking of him as a prize, associating him being around with happiness and being absent with unhappiness.
She's not gone without him long enough to realise she can be happy without him, and she's not been with him enough to realise that he's just a bloke like any other.
One day she may decide enough is enough. Until then nothing you say will change things. Its like an addiction, it has to come from her.

AlbertaGeorgia · 18/06/2026 20:21

She is and you’re not being unreasonable but there’s not much you can do about it.

I have a similar friend. In her 40s, a long trail of relationships with absolute wankers (excuse my French).

The guy who was superficially OK but had a massive coke habit; the arrogant loser who put his sporting interests ahead of her and cheated on her left right and centre.

Now, a total deadbeat with a “troubled” ex, legal issues (which are, of course, not his fault), who lives with her with paying rent or contributing to the mortgage (because he has to spend the money due to his legal issues), who frequently kicks off for no reason, disappears and doesn’t come home, engages in the silent treatment.

I just want to shake her, she’s not an idiot and prides herself on being a strong woman, but tolerates these utter shit shows.

Pistachiocake · 18/06/2026 20:24

Well, you say she had the chance of a good man, and threw that away? So she prefers to be round this other guy, and if she chooses to do that, how is she any better? It's her life if she chooses to have ONS and be FWB with him, and you say she is intelligent?

IrnBruAndDietCoke · 18/06/2026 20:28

I have a friend like this. Except my friend decided to bring a kid into this shitshow. That was after a string of abusive relationships then she jumped into marrying a woman after 6 months, and the wife now replies for my friend on FB so I can’t even say hi to her privately. I’ve known her since 13. Just taking a massive step back this year because I can’t stand to watch what she puts herself through anymore.

JacksJacks · 18/06/2026 20:36

Pistachiocake · 18/06/2026 20:24

Well, you say she had the chance of a good man, and threw that away? So she prefers to be round this other guy, and if she chooses to do that, how is she any better? It's her life if she chooses to have ONS and be FWB with him, and you say she is intelligent?

She had a couple of one night stands in her 20s. They aren’t a recent thing. They are in a relationship now, according to her, although a very strange one in my view given she’s never met his family.

I do believe that they’ve been faithful to each other for years, and that she loves him. But I’m not sure he loves her. I think he’s just settled while he waits for someone else.

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