How to deal with friend like this ?

[Sugarcainx]

It's not that she's a bad friend as such, just seems to be very insecure. She lives abroad but we speak every day, and every message contains some sort of boast about her.
She's only early 30s but tells me every single time someone told her/thought she was younger, every single time.
She teaches adults as a job and pretty much every day there are messages about how well she did, how they loved her classes, how they gave her great feedback.
Someone always fancies her, and the taken guy at the gym is always teasing her, apparently.
I don't know what i'm expected to reply every time.
On the other hand, if ever I say something she's tried to play it down.
I went to donate blood for the first time, I was very nervous but the nurses were so kind. I told her and she said, "well it's normal they're nice, theyre doing their job !"

The staff I worked with organised a leaving breakfast for me when I changed jobs, even though I hadn't been there that long. When I told her her reply was, "Well they do that for anyone who leaves !"

With the exception of 1 very attractive celebrity, every single guy Ive shown her a picture of (prospective dates for example or boyfriends) are 'not her type'. So I don't send them any more.

I suppose this comes from insecurity, she has to keep trying to big herself up. Just honestly find it annoying now, how would you react ?

She's liked this guy at work for nearly 4 months. He has a girlfriend and she's been waiting 4 months and still waiting to see what will happen. She won't listen to my advice to find someone who's single and that this guy probably likes the ego boost he's done nothing in 4 months. Really don't know what else I can say to her.

What's that saying.... dimming someone else's light won't make your own shine brighter??

Something like that. That's your friend.

She sounds very 'me, me, me' and no doubt insecurities are the root of it all.

She is very me me me for sure. She knows i've started a new job, i've been there for 10 days and she hasn't once asked me a single thing about it, how it's going, which years am I teaching, not a single thing. If I tell her something she will respond but she never asks me much about my life..

She calls you every day?!!

Why are you making yourself so available to her? Just don't pick up every time she calls. Just text her later: "sorry, couldn't answer the phone just then, busy day, good night".

Don't be so available all the time. I had a needy, insecure friend like that and I just stepped back a bit. I was still friends with her but just not so close. Your friendship with her will never be balanced; she won't change.

She doesn't call, just texts on whatsapp every day. I don't mind texting daily, just that every text is about how everyone thinks she's fantastic, her students love her, how men fancy her and how people think she's younger than she is. Just sick of the constant boasting.

Why don't you copy and reply to each WA message with "That's nice"?

Or do what I'd do and just block her! She's not a good friend to you.

Yeah, maybe I should ! She used to reply to each of mine with just a thumbs up or 'I see !' 'cool !'. I've known her for 5 years and I do think the friendship is a little unhealthy, but at the same time I would feel unkind cutting her out.

Just reply to every fourth or fifth text. Skim the messages, don't spend a lot of time reading. Minimize, minimize! She probably texts to other people as well.

I will try and hopefully she gets the message. She's just told me that her adults told her they had written her name with loads of love hearts on their papers. Not quite sure why grown adults would do that and then tell her, sounds pretty odd.

She used to reply to each of mine with just a thumbs up

I was actually going to suggest doing this to her 😂

Actually just do it. Thumbs up every time. Or maybe wait for three or four messages and send a corresponding number of thumbs. She sounds painful.

Haha good idea 😂
It's just draining, I feel like everything has to be a competition. I feel bad for her that she has to do that to make herself feel better.

She's just told me that her adults told her they had written her name with loads of love hearts on their papers
She sounds unhinged.

I have a friend like this. I tolerate it though because when I have needed her, she has never ever let me down, even if we do talk about her the entire time she is supporting me.

I put it down to a massive lack of self confidence and as if she is using me as a narrative/sounding board for positive affirmations.

She also always congratulates me, if in order. And she adores my kids.

If it was completely one sided, I wouldn't be bothering...

next time she sends a boasting text, reply with,
and so humble with it; what a paragon you are !

Yeah, I sometimes feel like I am just a sounding board.
I think i'm just going to ignore it. I do running and I put some of my race results on social media, she knows i'm very into it but never likes anything or congratulates me. I hope she will get the message soon.

Some people need to push others down just to stay afloat........don’t be her float.......fade this one out.

Sounds boring

If she's abroad you only have her word for it. They might be saying 'how old' as in 'Christ you look like Donald Trump's ball sack / I thought you were at least 70' .

I've had enough of insecure people trying to put others down and big themselves up. It's so, so draining. People who are jealous and have to make catty comments or play down your achievements. I should feel for them though because they must be unhappy to have to act like that.

Your friend is a narcissist.

'Insecure' and 'boasting' do not gohand in hand. She is a narcissist.

Run.

I was about to add - the clincher is when they treat everything like competition and scrolled up to see you have already mentioned her doing that too.

Run run run. She is not your friend.

@iklboo maybe 😂 she said once that she's glad people think she's younger because they are less likely to wonder why she isn't settled down. I told her that it's ok to look 32, it's still very young, but she says it's 'not that young.'
She's insecure about it I guess as I've lost count of how often she's told me about people thinking she's younger.

I think she is just shewing off.
you don't have to imagine it must be because she is insecure.
maybe she just has a superiority complex.
you don't have to put up with it, humour her, tolerate her, absorb negative energy, re-align her. she is not your responsibility.
you are not her mother or her therapist.
leave her to live her life however she wants. don't concern yourself with it. I think you are just a target audience for her. why bother.

Some years back I had a friend exactly like this. She bragged and bragged and put me down at every opportunity. She cheered when my boyfriend broke up with me because (and this is a direct quote) she didn't want to be the only single one. In my naivety I was convinced she had no idea how she was coming across and would be horrified to realise she was upsetting me. I decided the only fair thing to do was sit down and talk to her, tell her as kindly and as gently as I could how I felt.

She absolutely flipped out, told me she never wanted to see me again, ran a hate campaign against me and told everyone I had caused her to have a nervous breakdown.

These days I would just cut a person like this out.

Oh and she is quite simply jealous of you and desperate for your approval.

You are right, I don't have to. Some of these stories are really bad ! Just hate the thought of having a friend who's jealous, secretly resents me or wants to bring me down, it's unnerving.

Sounds like you need distance. And also perhaps to ask yourself what you were getting out of the relationship, because you were in it too, it's not all about her...(even is she was solely talking about herself and not really interested in anything you had to say). I have very similar with a friend who I am distancing from.