my friend is always talking about the men who hit on her?? Why

[NattyCoralHam]

I want to know if other women go through the same thing. I've had this best friend for 10 years, and we studied together. She moved to another city, and we still see each other, but she's obsessed with talking about the guys who approach her, or how pretty they think she is. She spends hours talking about it and about every compliment she receives from men, seeming like she's dazzled by it. My other friends aren't like that. Well, I'm a young woman and attractive to men, and she knows that, but I don't care and rarely talk about the guys who approach me, unless it's someone I really want. I just want to have nice conversations without guys getting involved. Am I being annoying, envious? But she always steers the conversations towards the guys desiring her, what i supposed to react??

She sounds very insecure if she feels the need to validate herself by telling you how attractive men think she is.
I don’t know any women who do this.

It's rooted in deep insecurity, in a lot of women, I think. Measuring their worth by how men see them. Maybe you've outgrown her? Does she compare herself to you? Is she threatened by you? Or trying to put you in your place beneath her on some pecking order in her head?

Or perhaps it's just like a fun hobby for her. Similar to collecting likes on Instagram?!

I have found that women who are highly attuned to what men think of them can take it terribly badly when they inevitably start ageing, and not getting male attention any more. Which I find very tedious in otherwise intelligent and successful friends/women. What a narrow scope of self worth.. Sure, sex and flirting is fun, but it isn't worth taking up so much time over, in my opinion. And it does not last!

This in itself is is misogynistic, what an Awful view of women you have.

Sounds like Year 10. We would report for hours if a member of the opposite sec happened to even vaguely glance in our direction! Oh! My! God!

Leave her alone if she's happy.

Some people enjoy looking attractive and the attention it can bring.

And others don't.

Horses for courses 🤷‍♂️

I've never known anyone to be like this either. They might make a joke about it occasionally or express displeasure about being pestered or perved on.

Or if they fancied the guy mention it briefly or say you swapped numbers or whatever.

But not take it as a compliment or make the fact you attract unwanted attention from random sleazes your entire raison d'etre.

She sounds as though she has an incredibly high opinion of herself. I would find her obsession with what people think about her looks very off putting.
I think I'd be socialising with people who weren't so full of themselves.

She had a history of putting me down when some people said I was pretty, but I never really cared, we were teenagers

How so? I didn't say there's anything wrong with sex, flirting, etc. But to base your entire life and conversations around it... The overwhelming majority of men aren't worthy of that.

I have a friend who does something like this - constantly tells some very tall stories about her sex life which, if I'm being honest, I sometimes find rather difficult to believe. Aside from this one thing though she is an incredible friend - supportive, hilarious, incredibly kind etc. So when she launches into one of her unlikely tales I honestly don't mind and am happy to nod along and smile/laugh as appropriate.

So is this a real best friend of 10 years or a Mumsnet best friend of 10 years?

If it's the former you'll be able to say "Oh Barbara, can you give it a rest for a while?"

If it's the latter, you won't be able to say anything at all and will have to make do with inviting others to criticise your best friend on a public internet forum.

exactly, my other friends do this when it's a guy they really want or something funny, but she says this about EVERY guy who hits on her, and it's always things she's said before "that guy was obsessed with me"

She sounds insufferable. Does she have a boyfriend ?

Have you never told her how boring she is?

Admittedly, I'm male, but any of my friends who constantly went on about how many women fancied him would get mocked mercilessly for it, and probably accused of being Jay from the inbetweeners

Well, when she starts to talk about i just stay quiet like "ooh really cool" 🤣

Yes

Ooooh, I knew someone like this as a teenager. She was convinced every boy was in love with her. She's middle-aged and married and still thinks every man she meets is in love with her (they're definitely not now nor were they then). I realized that her whole way of viewing the world comes down to a hierarchy of physical beauty and her self-worth is so limited that she has to feel like she's the most beautiful woman in the world or she doesn't matter. Putting other women down and competing with them for male attention is how she feels good about herself. She's not going to be a good friend to you because she can't see past her own fragile self-esteem.

I knew someone like this and I use to think wow I hardly get any attention like this then the more I spent time with her it turned out she just really misjudged situations. For e.g. we would be in a restaurant and the waiter is being friendly (just doing his actual job) and she would go on about how much he is flirting with her (he wasnt). Then we would be walking down the street and she was convinced every man who even slightly looked in our direction was checking her out.

From experience I would say it's due to the following

1 - parental neglect / emotional neglect
or something happened to her in her teens.

2 - Leads to seeking validation from men

3 - She sees her value & self worth = is the number of men who flirted / hit on her

It's actually quite common and very very sad. Many women don't realise until their mid / late 30s and need therapy to overcome

Please don't ask me how I know ☹️

Lmaoo🤣

She sounds incredibly tedious. Men may or not be looking at her but it's weird and obsessive to think it important enough to give someone else a full run down.

People look at other people, particularly if they are aesthetically pleasing, it's normal and barely registers with most people. I'm sure I notice good looking people (male and female), nice clothes/style, cute babies, cute doggies etc. I have zero interest beyond a quick glance though.

There was a school mum at my kids primary school and sometimes went out with her as part of a bigger group. She was always saying men were staring at her or flirting or trying it on but I honestly didn't see any evidence of it myself. I think she just had such a high opinion of how gorgeous she thought she was (she was fairly average looking I would say) she read into every brief eye contact. I think she went out of her way to look for this "evidence".

I'm sure he must love how popular she is?!

If she`s happy leave her alone.
At least men look at her,i dont even get that.

I had a friend like this. It was exhausting and I didn't know what she expected me to say in response. She wasn't exactly a supermodel but was obsessed with men approaching her or looking at her and would then be quite unpleasant to them. I went no contact in the end as she seemed to think that I should be up for a flirt with whoever was around when we were out together and I was happily settled by then and not willing to play games. I found it a bit sad really as it seemed to be such a focus for her.

Sure, but who said she based her entire life round it. Very few if any do that.