Friend has gotten really funny due to my weekend away with man

[Laurenn25]

I’ve been single for three years, single Mum to primary age DC who I’ve put first during that time. Only recently did I start looking to date again, I’ve met someone who I get along really well with and we’ve arranged a weekend away for mid-July.

My best friend had been on for a while about the two of us going away for a weekend, but for various reasons I didn’t outright commit to this. I told her it would depend on a few factors including finances.

I’ve told her about my planned weekend with the man I’m seeing and she got really funny and asked is that why I can’t go away with her. I said it wasn’t as simple as that. She said we’ve been friends for years and as soon as I’ve got a ‘sniff of cock’ I’ve dropped her. I haven’t dropped her at all.

It’s true I probably could have gone away with her, but I didn’t commit to it and can’t afford two trips now. She has made me feel a bit crap.

I eat a healthy diet and my shit still stinks.

Look, YANBU to prioritise a romantic weekend over a mates weekend given you’ve been single for 3 years. We all have desires and I’d hands down choose a weekend away with a new boyfriend - I’m going to assume there’s a lot more fun to be had!

Id be honest with friend. “I’d love to go away with you but I have an opportunity for a romantic weekend that I haven’t had in 3 years, so I’m going to take it. I can’t afford two trips right now but I’ll start saving so we can go away next year”. I think any reasonable person would understand - we all have needs.

Have fun!

I think there is a lot of very insecure people in this thread who are projecting their own jealousies and sense of entitlement onto the OP. 😂

It's very simple. The so-called "friend" is a cunt.

Why jealous? why is that used everysingle time someone complains - I wonder if the person speaking of other people being jealous is projecting their own jealously of people who realise a woman's main goal in life is not bagging a man

Although I am married there are women whose are genuinley happly single and dont have childish baggage and jealously intent just because a man is spoken of in their presence

So why the need for the childish ''youse are just jealous'' it make someone sound like they are 12

Of course it's jealousy.

An extremely bitter and aggressive reaction like that could only be driven by jealousy.

No I’m suggesting the opposite. That’s why I wrote it.

Yeah sorry OP, but I’ve ended a friendship over similar. Best friend couldn’t possibly find childcare, time or the money to go away with me, but posted pictures all weekend long of the trip she took with another group of friends. I took away two possibilities from that, she either just didn’t want to go away with me, in which case just say that, or, she didn’t actually like me that much, in which case just say that. The conclusion for both of those situations was that I was better off out the friendship.

I know women of all ages who have at least one girl's weekend a year. Men have their time to usually hunting or fishing. Its not my thing though.

She probably is a mixture of jealousy, anger at thinking she is being strong along and fear of the change to the friendship dynamic.

YABU to say “gotten”.

Yes, it's hard to escape the conclusion that this "friend" does not want OP to find happiness with a man. For all we know this guy could be "the one", and if not, what reason do we have to believe that the friend will behave any differently when "the one" does come along?

Her failure to respect OP's love life and her sneering reduction of the mating and reproductive urge to a "sniff of cock" speak volumes about her. Her argument requires every relationship between men and women to be reduced to casual sex.

But at the end of the day, we're a monogamous species and most of us find fulfilment in pairing off. For the propagation of the species, pair bonding and reproduction have always come before same-sex friendship. The stakes are much higher. The two are not on par and not in mutual competition. The solemn bond of marriage is unique - no such contract, public vows or ceremony apply to friendship. Real friends understand the difference and are happy to coexist with and support their friends' healthy romantic relationships instead of trying to insert themselves and compete for attention and affection.

Statistically it's safe to assume that some of the MNers supporting the "friend" would not even be with us had their own mothers not sensibly put their love life over the demands of such "friends" who tried to overstep the bounds of friendship.

Thank you! It's been jarring on me every time I've seen it!

Bad enough but not nearly as jarring as writing, I would of.......
😂

A relationship or potential relationship dynamic with a member of the opposite sex is a different situation to a platonic friendship dynamic with a member of the same sex, so I don't know why you're comparing your scenario with the OP's.

YANBU

You earn your money and nobody gets to dictate how you spend it nor do they get to own you for a weekend.

You could have offered her a meal out or coffee or a day together or anything. If the friendship is dependent on you agreeing to do whatever she wants to do, when she says so, then I'd bin the friendship anyway.

Newsflash: sometimes men leave. Or turn out to be abusive arseholes. Or love simply dies. People are perfectly entitled to sideline their friends in the pursuit of love, but they shouldn't then be surprised if they find they then have no one to turn to if things go wrong. It isn't healthy to make relationships the be-all and end-all.

Here's a thought, though: not everyone automatically ranks relationships as top priority. DH and I didn't, and we still managed to find each other. For some of us our friendships are equally important.

I find it interesting that many people on this thread are implying good friends understand relationships come first, but no one has thought to explore the concept that maybe, just maybe, not everyone agrees they do come first. As far as I am concerned, good partners are the ones who understand that their partner's friends matter just as much as they do. Except that for a lot of people they clearly don't. Personally I find that rather depressing.

I could have written this myself! It's insulting to friends to say that partners take priority. And yes, depressing. Frankly, with the high break-up rate, I'm amazed that anyone puts them first. By high break-up rate, I mean that marriages have a failure rate of about 43 percent, and the rate for couples who aren't yet at the marital point must be even higher. The point is that most new relationships fail at some point. Statistically, this new relationship of OP's has a really, really, really high chance that it will fail. So it's a pity she's hurt her friend.

For the people whose partners are the first priority, I hope they are OK with being left on their own if they get divorced or widowed. After all, most people are in relationships and partners take priority. Right? So they should be OK with staying home alone Friday and Saturday nights and being relegated to Sunday lunchtimes, because priorities.

Exactly!

The eggs-in-one-basket approach displays a lack of foresight and common sense, imo!

And @MarmaladeSandwich7 Nope! "Gotten" is British! You see it in Shakespeare, and it survives today in "ill-gotten gains." For some reason it dropped out of fashion here, but it was taken to America by our forbears who emigrated there around 250 years ago, and they clearly like it.

Every day's a school day!

Yep. I'll never forget being relegated to bloody Sunday lunchtime when my bestie got together with a man (who turned out to be utterly useless). I wouldn't mind at all if she had already made plans with him when I asked if she wanted to do something. Wouldn't mind at all! The thing that really, really annoyed me is that she refused to make plans with me in case he asked her out!!! That is, there were no plans in place when I asked her, but she kept it free just in case. I'm the opposite, whoever asks me first gets me, and if the man didn't ask me in time, he'll learn to ask earlier next time. This was about twenty years ago. I didn't understand keeping an evening free for a man who hasn't asked me out then, and I don't understand it now.

@BlokeyMcBlokersonVonMannSplainHeim

But at the end of the day, we're a monogamous species

🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣 Did you really just write that? LMFAO! Of course we're not! If we were, we'd all be happily mated for life and infidelity would not be a thing! Human beings famously chafe at monogamy.

ETA: In fact, all human beings are such a bunch of slags that the male penis has a spade to dig out the sperm of the man just before him who came inside the woman he's now porking! Note that the bottom part of this AI summary wonders how often two men would be doing her in quick succession, but this ignores how early societies would just shag each other willy-nilly, if you'll excuse the expression. I read an account of one explorer - might have been Cook - who arrived on an island somewhere to find the locals all going at it on the beach, with some older women showing a younger one what to do "Although she hardly seemed to need the instruction" as the diary went. And God knows what cave people in cold climates got up to in the dark caves, huddled under fur skins, all sleeping in communities. Truth is we all shagged with gay abandon before Society as we know it came along.

Bollocks.

Whatever happened to common courtesy and considering the feelings of others? So many scenarios in life now boil down to: I’ll do what I want and if anyone dares question me they’re controlling, insecure, jealous?

Friendship is a relationship that needs to be worked at too. You can’t just have one person doing whatever and expect the other to suck it up.

I despair at the atomisation and entitlement of people nowadays. I really do. But hey, I’m probably just bitter, controlling and jealous.

@BlokeyMcBlokersonVonMannSplainHeim

Sorry, couldn't paste this in my previous reply.