Maintaining a friendship with someone you dislike

[Sukisubo]

I'm friends with a group of women from work. We have all had children at similar times and have spent much of our maternity leaves together. Meet ups are not as regular now as we have all returned to work after several maternity leaves and work different days, however we still meet a couple of times each month and keep up our WhatsApp group chat daily. We also see each other at work, although there isn't much time to stop and chat in our profession.

I find one friend in the group increasingly difficult and it is a shame because I really enjoy the company of the others. However, this one friend seems to be the main instigator of our meet-ups and WhatsApp group. Everything we do seems to go through her.

I am finding her very insincere when myself or another member of the group has a problem, there is a false display of concern before bringing everything back to herself. I find her draining and extremely negative and yet the other members of the group make me feel so much more positive and upbeat. I don't want to lose the other 3 friends, but it seems in order to be friends with them, I have to maintain the friendship I have with the 'leader' of the group. I have no problem with her taking control and being the main organiser for things, it's more an issue with the strained, negative conversations and often her passive aggressiveness towards certain people/places/things she doesn't agree with.

I found myself bending my beliefs to suit hers for a long time, but have eventually stopped doing this. But I sense strongly a degree of anger from her when I say/do something that doesn't quite fit with her or even if I share a different parenting technique that she doesn't use or agree with. She takes it all very personally.

I think she has been quite a spoiled person throughout her life and is used to getting her own way. I think she has been used to getting attention through being quite dramatic about the smallest of things. I often find myself wanting to tell her to pull herself together. When others have fairly big issues going on in their lives, she will say 'the right thing' in a way that is short and sweet before going back to talking about herself. And if one person shares a problem, she has to share a problem straight afterwards. If one person has a funny story about their child, she will have to share 2 stories.

I have not and would not mention this to any of the others in the group, but I am struggling to find a way to remain friends with the others without gradually distancing myself from this one friend. Her intensity is too much for me. But I really benefit from the friendships I have with the other women, l also don't want to hurt this friend's feelings by distancing her and maintaining close friendships with the others.

We've all got that one 'friend', who we don't like as much as the rest in a group. Others will disagree but I think just try and tolerate her. I couldn't cut someone out my life for just being irritating.

I don’t really have that much advice I’m afraid. Sounds like someone I know :( It’s very hard. Especially when the others seem to think the sun shines out of their arse, right?

In the end I just disengaged. I lost friends in the process. You could try organising one on one meet-ups with the other women to make your friendship ties stronger?

The thing is, you should as a rule enjoy spending time with your friends and come away smiling. If someone makes you feel crappy and miserable every time you see them, time for a cull!

find other common ground with the other women as kids get older. share a hobby or similar. it really doesnt have to obvious

I would like to be able to tolerate her better.

I think I've become a bit too over-invested in the way I feel around her somehow. I find myself mulling over things she's said days later and feeling more irritated than perhaps I should. It's like she's really getting under my skin.

I think you need to remember the mantra:
'You can't change other people. You can only change the way you react to them'.
And then I'd ask myself why am I giving this woman so much headspace? And be ruthlessly honest with yourself because these feelings of anger and outrage will find their own devastatingly car-crash way of being expressed if you don't deal with it.
I speak from experience!
It would be impossible to confide in one of the group I surmise and I just wouldn't anyway. These things have a nasty way of getting back...but you do have to deal with these feelings before they explode and leave you in a worse place than you now are.
I'd be looking to widen my circle of friends urgently because this dynamic that you describe is really unhealthy. And just maybe, the fact that you've seen the light with this person and the others haven't, suggests to me that you are outgrowing the friendship group and its very odd sub-culture.

There's always one wasp at the picnic.

I have no advice really as I am in a similar situation. I can only say to disengage as much as you can, yes yes yes to widening your friendships with others, and just to say don't always assume that you are the only one feeling like this.

I quite understand, I am out this weekend with some other local mums, one in particular is so full of her own importance, but its done so subtly, that either the others don't pick up on it or ignore it. She also has a really smug look (to end all smug looks) most of the time, like she secretly thinks she is better than the rest of us.

Fortunately our kids are now much older and we only meet 3-4times a year for a meal, with this person on the edge of the group, so not always coming, so I feel I just have to tolerate her for harmony's sake. I am not looking forward to our forthcoming get together, but I want to see the others in group so will just grit my teeth and think to myself how shallow she is. Unfortunately I am getting less patient with people like her as I get older, so worry that one day I will say something.

I think you just have to be tolerant for now (and hope that she leaves the company/group in time!)

Can you not instigate meet ups on a one to one basis with the ones you do like?

I think this is just normal group dynamic at play. There is always a ‘I went to
Tenerife they’ve been to elevenerifer’ not much you can do except break into smaller sub groups once in a while for a breather.

So you want get rid of the main instigator of our meet-ups and WhatsApp group. but not do the work yourself! Its all very wifework worthy

My bet is you're not the only one who harbours this opinion about her. The only choices are: stay within the group and put up with her narcissistic behaviour in silence, distance from her but maintain separate friendships with the others. You know the nuclear choice which is to challenge her behaviour if you can but that probably wouldn't end well and I doubt you'd want to do that.

Ive just had a rotten six months with someone like this in a group of parents / kids that have been friends since nursery.
She sent a message to our group chat by mistake last summer , slating something my husband and I were doing on holiday to another one of the group. She apologised , I accepted for the good of the group etc. It’s got worse and worse , passive aggressive , fake niceness etc until I’ve had enough. Could have saved myself so much bother if I’d trusted my original ‘don’t like you much’.
Groups will change over time anyway but it’s not worth being around people you don’t enjoy spending time with for the sake of others.

I have been in a situation like this - and as a PP has suggested - the tension rose and eventually blew up. I regret that - it all came out that all the others felt the same way - but it would have been much better that I drifted away and built one to ones with the other earlier. Sometimes these "group leaders" who organise everything do so because they have learnt that they are not actually popular and would not be included naturally otherwise.

Life is too short to spend with people who irritate and who you know can have an open to and fro dialogue - moving on is SUCH a relief.

I've no experience of this but maybe there are others in the group who feel the same?

Why don't you start instigating meet ups with the people you like?

With respect, OP, its a friendship group, not a brownie pack. You don't have to have a 'leader'. Arrange meet-ups with the friends you do like, and dial back the contact with the woman you don't like.

I knew someone on the forum would twist my words. Boneyback: if I'd have said that she plans all our meet-ups and I would rather she didn't,I'd be jealous of her and have control issues. And because I have no problem with her planning things I don't want to "do the work" myself. Excellent! This is one tiny element of a very long story.... if you want to nitpick and you've nothing helpful to add, why are you commenting?

I think others in the group are likely to feel the same, but it wouldn't be nice to begin talking about it so I would never ask. Group dynamics are complicated at any level floozie and there will always be a natural 'leader,' with respect.

Oh well just stay being "nice" then and just suck up her bitchy comments. If you just wanted to have a vent, and didnt really want any suggestions of how to solve the problem, why didnt you say so?

i sometimes worry that people think this about me in one of my friendship groups. It is a nice group of people and we have all had kids more recently. There is a collective "child raising is so haaaarrddd" thing that goes on about sleep, toddler taming, food etc that doesn't chime with my experiences. I find myself either unable to comment, or sometimes trying to emphathise or give an example of a similar thing that happened to me, but I always get the sense that people are rolling their eyes and thinking that I dont really get it. I dont want to not be friendly with them but get really stuck about what to write on this group chat.

"When others have fairly big issues going on in their lives, she will say 'the right thing' in a way that is short and sweet before going back to talking about herself."

You could always try saying something like "its nice that you had a lovely coffee in Waitrose on Thursday, Beryl, but let's let Ethel finish telling us about her leg amputation. Do carry on, Ethel..."

I have posted about the issue I'm having with a friend group and my advice is if you like the other 3 try and put the feelings aside. I agree you should enjoy the company of friends so if you think not seeing her is better be prepared that the others may also back off. The leader of our group took a dislike to me I stopped going out and the other 3 ladies went along with it I don't hear or see them any more. I guess they followed the leader. Of course it might not work out that way but food for thought !

I have that with someone she’s close friends to my longest friend and she’s loud and attention seeking inavoid her

So what makes you happy