Friend is very secretive

[Mylittlelot]

Please can I have your opinions on this.

I have a friend, who you would think was a best friend, but she lets me down. She lives two roads away. She has a good job, divorced about two years ago - husband left her, has 3 kids (14, 12, 8) and a boyfriend she's been with for two years. I am married to a lovely hubby with 3 kids (18, 16, 12)

She never invites me or hubby and kids over, but comes to ours several times a week for tea or a cuppa. In the last 15 years I've stepped foot in her house twice. She keeps me on the doorstep if I have ever had to pop in with anything - usually to lend her something.

I also feel like she tried to break or ruin something when she's in my house, although I feel I'm imagining it it's getting too often. Like leaving a nail polish open on my couch on its side, knocking a coffee over, squashing food into my chairs'. I just tell her don't worry I'll clean it later.

I always try to plan things for us, nights out, girl weekends, and she never commits. Or cancels last minute. New year eve I invited them over, and up until 5 hours before she said she 'may' come - waiting to see if she has a better offer. When she knew we only had them coming over and we could have gone away.

We plan to get beauty treatments, - lips, Botox, brows and she says let's do it together can we wait until she gets paid and then goes off by herself and gets the treatments done. Denys it when I ask her.

I will see her all week and then she will tag herself in the next day abroad, and not even mentioned it, usually a holiday I planned for us to go on with her or the girls. She has even been round and the next day moved house and not mentioned it. Yet if I even buy a new kettle she wants to know where from, price and why I never told her I was buying one.

She quiz's me on everything, copies my whole house down to decor / furniture (Kids see it on Instagram or I get told).

Thing is we get on really well when she comes for a cuppa, and I love to spend time with her but she constantly lets me down. It makes me feel so sad.

She hates all my other friends who really try with her, and sits and scowls at then when we are in group situations . My other friends ask what's wrong with her all the time and say she's using me. It makes me feel so sad.

I love doing things with hubby. But just want a decent friend I can do girl things with like makeup, wine bars, shopping trips.

I am I asking too much! What am I doing wrong!!

In the last 15 years I've stepped foot in her house twice.

^This is the most bizarre thing I have read on here.

She hates all my other friends who really try with her, and sits and scowls at then when we are in group situations . My other friends ask what's wrong with her all the time and say she's using me. It makes me feel so sad.

^I agree with your friends

Looking in I would suggest she is either ashamed of her home or her relationship.
I stopped inviting people round when me and now exh started to have a rubbish marriage.
Doesn't mean you have to accept her shabby treatment of you though op.

She's not a friend. You need to dump her

She quiz's me on everything, copies my whole house down to decor / furniture (Kids see it on Instagram or I get told)

Kinda linking up why she keeps you on the doorstep here.

Stop having her over, she sounds well weird and destructive. You don't need people like that in your life.

You have bad taste in friends. She's a cow.

You are tolerating her craziness that's what you're doing wrong! I have not read anything like this account of a friend.
Start saying her visit is inconvenient and if she asks why tell heritage just is. If asked why again say it's not up for discussion. See how she likes it!

What a weird jealous freak this user is!

Her house decor is same as yours that's why she doesn't invite you in.
She likes confusing you and making you feel you aren't important as she is a vile nobody.
Sod all wrong with you.

I'm afraid she is using you. You are obviously the dependable person that she can use as a back up, when her other friends are busy. The fact that she is quite happy to ask personal questions about how much your stuff costs, but won't even tell you she's moving house, shows she has no respect for you.

Put some distance in the friendship. She will either start making more of an effort or move on. But either way the distance will give you the opportunity to spend time with better friends.

I'm getting a weird one-upmanship vibe from this. She's essentially is in competition with you and always feels like she has to out-do you.

You have other friends and even if you didn't I would still say definitely make yourself a lot less available to this person.

This isn't what friends do.

Take your power back! You will feel better. Promise.

Thanks everyone, just feel constantly like I'm the safe option if she hadn't anything else to do. I am one of those people if you rang me in the middle of the night I'd be straight there. Such a shame as when she comes round I enjoy chatting to her. She doesn't appear to have any other friends either, so always feel sorry for her. Was hoping over the years she may change but it's been 15 years and she's still the same.

You are finding her weirdo ways difficult to tolerate. After 15 years of her you need an OBE.
How do you now envisage tackling this?
If you enjoy chatting keep it like that? Reduce expectations as she aint normal.

She sounds really odd?

No she's not your friend sorry, think you would be better off without her. Stop asking her round, stop planning things for the 2 of you. Tell her nothing about your life. You have other friends and they sound as if they can see her for what she is, time you did too.

I think you sound too nice. And this is why it is baffling you that she behaves like this, because she just isn’t that nice.

She's not your friend.
She's using you.
She's also deliberately damaging stuff in your house. There's obviously a lot going on under the surface with her.
She could just be a nasty, underhand person or have a personality disorder.
Either way it's not your problem to solve.

If your self esteem was better you'd have ditched her a long time ago.

She is jealous of you, very resentful, always has to be top dog, would love you to fail, at the same time wants to be you.

Her home would look exactly like yours inside. She copies you because she has no personality of her own...just a bitter, unkind nature.

That's how I see it and I would drop her like a brick.

Think of it this way. You accomodating her, hosting her, forgiving her etc because you like to be a nice person and because you feel sorry for her isn’t actually helping her. If you stopped enabling her in all these ways, a few things might happen:

She hates being friendless, and starts to reflect on why;
She stops focusing on competing with you/sabotaging you and puts that time into more fruitful pursuits;
She is freed to make new friends, who will force her to behave better;
She will have to start organising events, treats, outings by herself and realise the effort it takes.
She will be stood up and feel the sting of it, making her more conscious of not doing it herself;

And a million other things that would cause some self-awareness and a better life for her. So your ‘kindness’ actually isn’t so nice, maybe?

The rest of the responses to your thread outline why you should distance yourself from her, for the benefit of your life and mental health. But that distance would be good for her too. She seems trapped in an unhealthy dance with you. Unwrap your arms from around her. Set her free.

And later perhaps reflect on why you’re drawn to relationships that are so unfulfilling for you? The flip side of all this niceness can be martyrdom. Be sure you aren’t unhealthily attached to the suffering she inflicts. It’s a real thing.

I can't get over her destroying your house - that's really awful.

I can see why her husband left her. You should too.

She sounds horrible. I can’t really imagine why you’d want to be friends with her.

The interesting thing here is not her weirdo behaviour — to be honest, I find the idea of recreational Botox and lip-fillers as a fun day out almost as weird as the fact you’ve never been in her house in 15 years — but why you keep trotting after her, wanting your ‘friendship’ to be something it patently isn’t. From your post, you have lots of other friends who presumably like you and are less secretive — why not go to wine bars with them?

Oh, and do explain the holiday thing — are you saying that you were planning, say, a week in Barcelona with her for some point in the future, and you’d arranged dates etc, and then the next day, without ever mentioning it, she posts on Fb that she’s having a lovely time in Barcelona?

@Repertory in the summer I suggested we could go to Ibiza with the girls for 3 nights, she was up for it, so said I'd book it and she can just send me the deposit when I've done it, so she starts not replying, so I hold off booking waiting for her. I see her and mention it and she says she's up for it, I message to finalise she ignores it. Next thing I'm on Instagram and there she is tagged in there! I'd seen her in the days before, not mentioned it. It's not even a one off, it's happened when I've gone to arrange cinema, theatre, concerts. Exact same scenario as above. It ends up I hold off waiting for her, miss tickets, and then she tags herself in!

I feel so much better getting all this off my chest!

Can't you tag yourself somewhere without actually being there? Maybe she's doing that

Find a better friend!