What do you think of this? Her issue, his issue or just a personality difference

[TellItLikeItReallyIs]

John and Jane are friends and not romantically involved.

Jane is a highly strung, probably has borderline personality disorder or traits. She reacts very badly to people not replying to text messages or returning calls.She starts thinking she has been rejected. Her instinct is to blow up the phone with "why haven't you called me messages". She hates it when people don't call when they say they would.

John is a spontaneous character, not a planner prefers to do things last minute. He is chronically unreliable and very self centred.

John tells Jane he will call her on Tuesday to arrange dinner that weekend.

John doesn't call on Tuesday. In fact he calls on Saturday and suggests dinner Saturday evening.

Jane is massively triggered by his failure to call when he said he would. Thinks this shows he doesn't care about her at all. Blows up at him and refuses to go for dinner.

Is this situation:

• Jane being unreasonable and not making a reasonable allowance for a friend being busy and forgetting to call in a casual arrangement. *John actually not caring and being offensively rude in not calling when he said he would. *Both points of view valid and just different personality types.

John said he'd phone on Tuesday but he didn't. I'd say that's rude, it doesn't matter that she's on the spectrum and he's Mr Casual, as a friend you should do what you say you're going to. I had two mutual friends exactly like this, he let her down again and again, in the end she ditched him.

Jane needs to learn that people are different and that some friends will call/ text all the time, some not so much and some say they'll call/text but then don't. But each one of those scenarios is okay because that's friendship. It's not a right it's a choice.

Jane has no right to demand that John call her or to give him grief if he doesn't. It's up to him. I learnt this about friends when I was about 12.

One of my closest friends who I adore and who has been a true friend to me over 15 years is notorious for saying she'll text and then not. I understand it's not personal and I don't worry about it - I just assume life got in the way. If I'd thrown a strop in the early stages of our relationship BC she didn't text when she said she would, apart from looking a bit daft, I would have missed out on many years of valuable friendship, love and support.

Jane's got issues perhaps, but John's just downright rude. He's her friend, right? He knows that unlike some other friends, it would bother her that he just didn't call even remotely when they'd arranged to?

Part of being a good friend is recognising that not all of your friends are on the same wavelength as you and trying your best to be considerate of their needs - within reason of course.

So, ok, he didn't call Tuesday, not a problem. Jane might not like it but hey ho. But to not call until five days later then say ok TONIGHT?

Fuck off John.

I agree that Jane has issues - but I guess she already knows this.
Has she had counselling?
CBT would help her a lot here.
It's free on the NHS. They run courses and she should attend the next one!
John is way too triggering for her.
She already knows this.
She needs to back away from John.

Im more like john (not quite as bad) and have a friend who's worse than Jane. We've been friends a long time and know each other enough now to work it out but it used to caise arguments. I'd say johns been inconsiderate, even a quick text the night before would have been better but Jane's too highly strung!

With Jane’s anxiety issues, it’s for her to deal with those and not for friends to walk on eggshells. Havig said that, if John is repeatedly like that, I wouldn’t want to be friends with him.

Jane has no right to demand that John call her or to give him grief if he doesn't. It's up to him. I learnt this about friends when I was about 12.

I'm not so sure about this @onemorecupofcoffeefortheroad . According to OP, John SAID he was going to call on a particular day. So Jane has a right to expect that he would call when he said he would.

I'm more Team Jane on this in that I think John is rude and unreliable.
I do think she overreacted massively and badly - either she need so just sack him off or accept his unreliability not go tonto over something you know is coming.

Unreliability is not a nice character trait though in either a friend or a boyfriend.

If you take Jane's over reaction/over investment out of this, then I think John is the person who is badly behaved.

You call when you say you will or you let the other person know in a short text or email that you are a bit busy and will get in touch later.