Help me understand this 'friend's' behaviour

[TomTomTom34]

About 2 years ago someone I work with made a real effort to become friends with me, coming by my office everyday, being very supportive about work issues and inviting me to do things at the weekend. We got on really well and I thought she was lovely and I had made a new close friend. But after about a year she started distancing herself from me and refusing invites to do social things. I tried to probe about whether she had things going on I didn't know about or if I had done something wrong but didn't get a reason.

Then the distancing turned into outright meanness. She was very unsupportive about a stressful personal situation I had, everytime we met she pointed out my negative qualities and never said anything nice and generally turned into a bit of a bitch. Again, I tried to get to the bottom of it but got told that I was misremembering her as a nice person and actually she wasn't like that at all.

I became very wary of her and generally tried to keep out of her way, thinking I must have horribly misread the situation. But over the past couple of months I have notice that she is now actively seeking friendship with another colleague in exactly the same way she did with me. Part of me is thinking that I can't be a very good friend if I managed to turn this nice person into a bitch, yet I can maintain friendships with lots of other people, and another part of me is just confused by her.

If you can maintain friendships with other people then the problem is with her, not you.

Some people are very fickle in their friendships; very full on and intense in the early days, everything's wonderful, your the best person they've ever met etc., then they start to feel fidgety and need to move on to the next flavour of the month so they find flaws and pick holes as a way of justifying distancing themselves from you. If it helps at all, most people who do this are known to do it, and have a trail of bewildered ex-friends behind them who don't know what they did wrong.

The answer is probably nothing.

I could have written this post, the only difference is that the so-called friend was actively trying to destroy my career whilst smiling to my face! Turns out she was doing it to everyone else as well and when called out on her behaviour did the bug wide eyed teary 'who me' act. She was the queen of gaslightinh! This was a few years ago and took me ages to repair the damage she did and to make matters worse she actively continued to look for ways to get her own back years later. I though this stuff only happened in bad Channel 5 dramas!

Anyway everything went quiet until recently she sent me a FB friend request! I actually had to show my husband to make sure I wasn't dreaming. Genuinely cannot understand what she was thinking!

Anyway ftom bitter experience my red flags now are:

If the prospective friend gets too friendly too quickly be suspicious. Why are they rushing to sweep you in? I think you noticed this one in her behaviour already. The best friendships grow slowly over time and develop deep solid roots.

Do they have a million FB friends but struggle to hold down regular friendships in real life?

Have they had long term relationships with other people in the past ie partner or spouse? My so called 'friend' had got to 40 years old and never had a proper adult live in relationship with anyone ever.

Are they up and down ALL the time? Is there a need for drama?

I'm happy to say I have a small very valued group of friends who I know I'll be growing old with and trust completely. Makes life much happier.

Just a few musings!

Dd is a teen, she is negotiating friendships in Y7. There are lots of girls who dont seem able to form friendships, and are looking out for the most popular crowd, or trying to be included in the in party/town trips. They dont seem to have the ability to recognise a friendship as just that. There has to be something to gain. I saw it in Y6 when birthday girl having a do/sleepover wriggled their way in for an invite only for birthday girl dropped for the next one. Its immature behaviour. Move on.

Take the high ground - you've done the right thing. New friendships with better people will come along.