Tricky times ahead with my best mate

[Oovavu]

I'm going away for a night with my best mate which was arranged as a get-away-from-it-all girlie stopover to take in a few shops, nice meals, etc. I have 2 girls, she has 2 boys (7 and 5) and has been married 10 years. After events over christmas though i'm pretty sure she will want to talk things over about her relationship with her dh, we're likely to get drunk and i think i'm going to have to come out with a few difficult home truths for her.

she's a devoted mum but she basically picks on her dh nearly all of the time. my dh has said to me many times that if i spoke to him the way she speaks to her dh he'd not put up with it. basically she has had a very hard time with her family; has been seen as the black sheep; has had some horrible experiences with relationships with other men in the past and i'm pretty sure she thinks she has 'settled' for her dh and feels angry at the world and takes it out on him a lot of the time.

he is a LOVELY bloke and a great great dad. dh has talked to him recently even though they don't know each other all that well and he said that bf's dh was very unhappy with his job and that he seemed unhappy generally. he doesn't much like her family who they see a lot of. her siblings are great but her dad is a real PITA and her mum's a doormat. but she can criticise them and he's not allowed to; she jumps down his throat. he's not close to his family and has no close male friends.

Anyway, it all came to a head at christmas - he got paralytically drunk and blurted out that he's felt close to suicide at times, he only stays because he thinks it would cruicfy the kids if they split up and it came as a huge shock to her - but not to me, i have to say when she told me this week. She's NOT a bad person, she's been a fab friend to me and continues to be. She and her dh get along ok for much of the time but this getting at him must be making him feel miserable and inadequate. she'd never dream of speaking to her kids the way she speaks to her dh. i'm sure they love one another but it's certainly not a relationship of mutual respect.

Is it my place to tell her i think she's been acting like a bully? I really want it to work between her and her dh but she really does have a problem when it comes to the way she sees him. BTW, he was very ill a few years back and she was very supportive and it brought them closer together for a while, so i know there is love there and she wouldn't want to be without him.

yes tell her. but id' write it down and give it to her to read when you're there and not tel her on a drunken binge

i think it will ruin your evening if you bring it up then tbh, especially if you are drinking

i would wait until a more appropriate time when she brings the relationship up, or else you will be accused of interfering and she wont thank you for it, even if you are right

Well, yes I think you could be constructive if you do advise her but I wouldn't use the word bully. Tell her to try to help him by being a bit more tactful and generally respectful of him and I would point out to her that in your opinion she is more respectful of her kids than her dh and that that has got to be hurtful and erode his self respect. It doesn't have to be all doom and gloom and don't spend the whole time talking about it either, do try to encourage her to have fun as she will be happier when she goes home. Good luck

God. Hard times. Yes, I think your friend would benefit from your opinion, though only I suppose if she asks for it. It is really hard when you see how bad things are between friends but feel you should not say anything. But if you think it will help, then say something. Definately.

If she really does seem willing to talk about their relationship, I would try together to explore why she has to put him down. It is one thing to know that you do something, it is quite another to stop doing it. Discovering why your friend feels she needs to be so horrible to her partner, and why he 'lets' her (her relationship with her father? how her mother is round her father? his relationship with his parents?) would be a helpful conversation to have. Good luck. You are a really good friend to have.

best advice- giv her the phone No for the local Relate office. and lots of support -

Good Luck

dh and i mostly keep out of it but occasionally when she's having a go at him i'll say 'oh leave him alone!' or when he's done a particularly brilliant thing (like drive her essay to her tutor's house 12 miles away at midnight when he's just come in from work and had no tea!) i'll keep saying 'you're so lucky he's such a star' etc. but i also feel i need to support her in her problems with him even when they seem picky. (by support i mean nod sympathetically and hopefully non-commitally).

i also have to say he's got them into trouble several times with secret spending on credit cards and he's lied to get himself out of the shit but i think these seem like the actions of a kid really who is scared of a parent! he seems very lacking in self esteem and i can see why.

of course i won't give advice unsolicited, but she usually confides in me about problems they are having/the latest argument but we never get very far as the kids or dhs are there as we mix with them together. this weekend will be the first time she and i have been alone for a long time for ages and it's bound to come up.

i like the idea of writing it down as suggested by mud, a drunken binge could turn telling her into some really horrible words being exchanged. it shouldnt get to that.

write it from your heart - she's your friend - and tbh boy you are a good friend for being concerned. so many turn a blind eye to friends partners and hubbies.

can your dh talk to her dh when not drunk? - suicide haunts me, men, no close friends, unhappiness - it gives me goose bumps and bad vibes. a good male to talk to may help him, not bottle things up til he's paraletic (i know they find it hard to open up but....)

good luck and good for you for being a friend that cares so much x

be careful. friends only ever hear what they want to and she may not thank you for your opinion, even if deep down she knows its the right one. i would wait until she brings up the relationship herself, or if you're so concerned maybe you could try and steer your conversation towards that so she thinks she was the one to bring it up. remember also that theres always two sides to a story. she's lucky to have a friend like you, good luck.

Message withdrawn

thanks for input so far. i've known her for 20 years and have seen how and why her family has screwed her up. she's also previously gone out with absolute b*stards who have treated her very badly and her dh is the opposite to this. he's also i spose she'd say, not very 'glamorous' or exciting but he has a lovely heart and is funny and quirky and in this way they suit one another. i love them both to pieces and their kids are really lovely lads. it's funny as people alwasy comment on how similar they think she and i are as we both seems confident and outgoing and have strong personalities but i know that she always suffered from shyness as a child and a lot of her persona is a bit of a front. i feel much more settled and sorted (but i don't want that to seem smug, i just know i am more confident and happy than her).

i will just try to tread very carefully and make sure we have the weekend we want but try to find out a bit more. it worried me to death when she told me about what her dh had said about suicide too.

if he's never mentioned it before and it has only come up when he has been so drunk that he didnt know he said it, there may be some truth behind it as to how he's feeling.

its always the ones who never say anything - and he hasnt said anything while sober.

am i making sense?

absolutely. i thought that too because she said he's blurted out that he hates her family too - and i know that's true for a fact, but she doesn't as he's never been allowed to say it in front of her. dh also told me that her dh had booked a night away in a cottage for just the 4 of them on new year's eve but when he told her about it she refused to go as she wanted to be with her family, including her sister-in-law who lost her brother last nye and wanted to be there for her. her dh was really upset about this and told my dh about it. now funnily enough, she never mentioned this to me at all which is unusual. i think she thinks i'd say she should have gone away with her own little family.

i guess there's only so much a person can bottle things up. he's said to her that he can't remember any of what he said that night, which is the easy way of avoiding things... i'm sure the thing that would make her think about it the most and reflect on her actions is trying to imagine that her dh is actually one of her ds's. i know it sounds a bit mad but it just might work as an analogy - she would NEVER speak to or treat her ds's like this.

I think you are on the right track there, ovavu. Analogy's are good. I personally don't like the letter idea thing - no matter how well you write, it is easy to misjudge 'tone' when you read something. You might mean a sentence in a caring, comforting way, she might read it as judgemental or censorious. It also to me feels a bit cowardly, like you are too afraid to say it to her face. And I don't have the worries about being drunk but then, I suppose I don't know how drunk you are going to get! I find that being a bit merry helps you say things that you ordinarily perhaps would shy away from? You sound so perceptive and kind, I don't think you could possibly say the things you have told us to her in a horrible way. She will probably not like what you have to say though, be aware of that. But if people don't like what you are saying, often it is because it is touching a nerve and saying something they know is right. My personal thing would be rather than than concentrate on how horrible she is to him, explore why she feels she has to be the way she is with him. It might be less hard for her to accept if she can find clues for her behaviour in the way she sees her parents for example ie it is the way they are/were that has forged her and made her behave the way she does in this relationship. When you think that your parents are your primary role models, then is it a wonder that the way we behave reflects on them?