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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To not want to go to this lady's house?

98 replies

cupcakesandbunting · 20/05/2010 13:21

I am going to sound like a right cow but hear me out...

DS has made friends with another boy at a toddler's group we go to and I sit and chat to his mum. She seems nice enough and I sense that she doesn't have many friends here and I know her marriage is in a bad way because she tells me as much. I listen and try and give impartial advice but as a relative stranger, feel a bit awkward discussing things that I would only discuss with family/good mates.

She had been pressing for a while for DS and I to go back to theirs after group and I had a free afternoon yesterday so we went. This is going to sound terrible but her house was really iffy It smelled and I don't just mean housey smells, it was really pungent and offensive. Then she made me a cup of tea and there was a weird oily film floating on the top so I didn't want to drink it, then she offered me some lunch but I said I was saving myself for my curry for tea (which was true tbh) but I really didn't want to eat anything from her kitchen I know I sound like a real snob, my house is NOT pristine whatsoever but it's pretty clean. Her kitchen was just really dirty and whiffy.

I feel really sorry for her but I really don't want to go again but she's already extended an invitation for next week. I don't want to have to be making up excuses every week for why we can't go. TBH, I like chatting to her at the group but I don't want to extend the friendship past that. We don't seem to have anything in common except for the fact that we're both mums and i don't want to become he person that she vents to about her marriage.

I am totally prepared to be told IABU and for a ruddy good flaming...

OP posts:
StealthPolarBear · 20/05/2010 16:25

I am not a rinser unless something is particularly sudsy
it dries!!

SeasideLil · 20/05/2010 16:28

Cupcakesandbunting, tricky one. I've been there myself with someone who I just didn't want to be friends with, as she was a bit peculiar, rather intense and had a very smelly house (exactly the same, perhaps it's her!) I did try a couple of times to go over, but my heart wasn't in it. I ended up just not inviting her over ever, and declining most of her invites. She actually asked me straight out if I didn't want to be friends. I just muttered something about doing family things on weekends.

It is difficult, but surely friends are the one group of people you do choose (not like colleagues, family). I would continue to be friendly at the group but always have things on when she suggests coming round, unless you can bear it once or twice for your son's sake. Charity friends aren't really friends anyway.

thumbwitch · 20/05/2010 16:29

yes but it doesn't go away and if you put something wet/moist on it then it will be soapy again. You must be able to see the bubbles in a glass of water in an unrinsed glass?

StealthPolarBear · 20/05/2010 16:38

well most stuff goes in the dishwasher, and i do tend to rinse glassses i suppose
can't see it on anything else, but maybe i've just never looked that closely. Maybe it's my eyesight - i have vmanaged to lose a whole dinner plate, it has just vanished

Sugarkane · 20/05/2010 16:42

Spoons, always losing spoons.

StealthPolarBear · 20/05/2010 16:44

but a whole plate?!!
We only have four, now we have three. Good thing we're unsociable

thumbwitch · 20/05/2010 16:44

SPB - have you asked all relevant males in the house about it? If I "lose" crockery/glassware, chances are DH has broken it and thrown it away, hoping I won't notice

StealthPolarBear · 20/05/2010 16:46

I'm the clumsy one here
And DS is too young for real plates!

thumbwitch · 20/05/2010 16:49

Betcha it's in the fridge with some leftovers on it then - that's the other place mine go MIA to.

Kathyjelly · 20/05/2010 16:50

Ask her to yours. Or meet in town.

funnysinthegarden · 20/05/2010 16:53

do you people not have dishwashers? Anyway Cupcakes, whats the verdict? To open the door to a beautiful new friendship or to leg it ?

crumpette · 20/05/2010 16:56

Oh OP you don't sound U to me at all. I have a neighbour like this and she doesn't have friends around here and I HATE IT because I'm totally antisocial, have lots of friends I cannot see anyway and choose not to and when I accept an invite from her, thinking, it won't be that bad, it turns into 'let's go here afterwards' or 'let's meet up tomorrow, at 9am' and becomes a daily nightmare because she needs someone and I really don't and I always make up a silly excuse to try and de-latch myself.

If you like her enough to chat to away from her house could you see her before or after the toddler group, go via a park or cafe on the way home but not take it into personal space? And limit it to the times when you would see her anyway? Also, if you keep declining invitations politely she should get the hint but you won't be unreasonable because surely she won't know if you're really busy or not. My one lives next door so it's tricky when I say 'I'm away this weekend and we leave this afternoon so I can't do that' and she then sees me the following day in the street yes yes, IABU I know I am !!!

Rhian82 · 20/05/2010 16:57

Oh, what we wouldn't give for a dishwasher?

StealthPolarBear · 20/05/2010 17:01

no, leftovers was my thought but after about 3 weeks...I'm not that much of a slattern

JamesAndTheGiantBanana · 20/05/2010 17:26

The most important reason to rinse is because most washing up liquid contains formaldehyde which is carcinogenic (cancer causing) - you don't want to be ingesting that.

People who leave the suds on washing up may as well not wash up as there's usually bits of soap encrusted food still clinging to the dishes when they dry. It's grim. I have to visit a house where no-one rinses anything and there's always a thin layer of grease on all the supposedly clean dishes and forks in the drawer with mashed potato encrusted round the tines. Shudder.

crumpette · 20/05/2010 17:34

Oh that sounds like when DP does the washing up- tiny bits of food left on everything, totally vile. Yes you must rinse!

StealthPolarBear · 20/05/2010 19:13

ewww my washing up is definitely clean!
Most things are carcinogenic

Original poster
cupcakesandbunting · 20/05/2010 19:56

funisinthegarden I think I'm going to do the neutral ground thing. I'll say something like "We'd love to come with you and DS to the park/coffee shop/whatever but my mum is coming at X time so can't be all afternoon" Wouldn't feel so guilty about this...

I don't have time to rinse dishes of suds, tbpfh.

OP posts:
HairyToe · 20/05/2010 20:47

OP reading this gave me a shiver. I was in a similar poition a few years ago. I was new in a town and cheerfully being friendly with everyone I met at various baby groups. One particular woman really latched onto me and it turned into a complete nightmare. To be fair she had serious mental health issues which she confessed to me but only once we were on our third playdate and I couldn't find any way of breaking free.

She used to bring her diary with her and sort out our next meeting before she left. It got worse and worse till she was ringing at all hours and dropping in unexpectedly first thing in the morning. To be honest it was terrifying - at her worst she was ranting about wanting to stab her husband. I had no clue how to extract myself. In the end I moved to the other side of the country (lucky coincidence, not just to escape her). No idea what I would have done otherwise. Its made me far more wary of striking up friendships ever since...

Sorry to be the voice of doom...I'm sure your friend isn't in the same league.

HairyToe · 20/05/2010 20:48

Now waiting to be flamed for my uncaring attitude towards mental illness.

pedrothellama · 20/05/2010 21:02

Hairy Toe

I once made 'friends' with a woman at work who wrote me 'poems' about how much she 'treasured' our friendship and sent me those grey, furry 'Friend's Forever' bears.

I was running away with arms flailing above my head and I was right.She was a nutter!

The bloody stories I could tell about her! Make your teeth curl.

Sorry Cupcake but a nasty whiff and dodgy tea? You have had a lucky escape.

Her name is........ and she lives in........

Just in case you want to know!

HairyToe · 20/05/2010 21:13

Mine kept hugging me all the time. And getting me to 'examine' bits of her and all kinds of excuses for inappropriate intimateness (scared yet?). On one particularly disturbing afternoon I texted my husband when she was out of the room to phone me on some emergency pretext so I could escape.

Original poster
cupcakesandbunting · 20/05/2010 21:19

HairyToe, we could be talking about the same person. This lady also has MH issues. I didn't mention this in the OP because I didn't want anyone to think I would judge someone on this (I have suffered with severe depression so can empathise) but she often says that she wishes her DH would die on the way home from work TBH I think she needs help and I'm just not qualified to give it.

OP posts:
HairyToe · 20/05/2010 21:37

Is she getting any professional help do you think? The woman I knew was under a pychiatrist who came to her house on a regular basis and she was on some quite serious medication.

Yes I did feel bad and wondered if I should maybe be trying to help her, but to be honest I wasn't happy about the potential effects on me and my family (DD1 was 1 at the time and I was pregnant with DD2 so probably feeling even more protective than usual). She had family (a close sister as I recall) and seemed to have a couple more 'established' friends.

I just didn't feel capable of dealing with her issues adequately. I found it incredibly stressful at the time.

I think it's different if you have a close friend who then maybe goes through some hard times and needs extra help. But to be thrown into this kind of situation with a virtual stranger is asking a lot of anyone.

pigletmania · 20/05/2010 21:47

You dont sound U and a bitch, you dont have to be friends if you dont want to, just because she is in need. You could return the invite and leave it at that, and just meet at toddler group. It does not sound like you want to be friends besides the hygeine issue, you dont sound like you have much stomping ground.