Friend is "sick" all the time and asking for help

[Saddaughter999]

Hello everyone, looking for advice - my friend has some ongoing issues with her husband and their marriage and I strongly believe she pretends to have some "mysterious" illnesses to keep him.
Everything started a yer ago when she told me about their marriage issues- husband had problems with alcohol, both slept in separate rooms, no intimacy, etc. I didn't know all the details but my husband told me some gossips because he works with her husband. Turned out he tried to offer divorce but she refused (she didn't tell me about it).
Since then - she had probably more than 20 GP visits, around 10 visits to A&E with every single body part in pain. She had MRI, multiple scans, bloods, etc - she is perfectly fine. For the last couple of months she started to ask my help to go to A&E as she feels "so bad", that she can't be on her own. We bumped to the same staff members at A&E and even they asked me questions about her mental health as they recognised her coming every few days.
However, she seems to be absolutely fine when she wants, she recently had a holidays with other friends and spent a week at 40+ degrees with zero issues. As soon as she landed to uk- she's sick again- stomach, ears, back, brain fog, blurred vision- possibly every single illness. Yesterday she had a party with our friends and today she's calling me again, to help with A&E.
She is alone in UK, we both arrived here from the same country. However, I feel that I'm just wasting my time (as usually we spent around 12hrs at A&E). As someone who had depression by myself, I strongly believe it's not her issue....
Any thoughts? Thank you

@Saddaughter999 Now is the time to step back. She's attention seeking and she is contributing to long NHS emergency queus. Not acceptable. Tell her that she needs to book a meeting with a psychiatrist because nothing is physically wrong with her. Don't answer her calls or messages. It sounds like she's having fun with other friends while she's using you for all shit in order to let her husband know that she's "ill".

Frim someone who actually has a few chronic conditions (all diagnosed), I would be stepping away from this woman. You’re not obligated to take her to A&E - you say you’re not even close.

Even w my conditions (one of which landed me in A&E before diagnosis), I avoid A&E like the plague. It’s like the 7th circle of hell in there, esp in the summer heat.

Of course in an emergency I’d take a friend (I don’t drive now as excused on medical grounds), so it’d be a taxi, but I certainly wouldn’t be doing this on a regular basis even for my closest friends- I’d be recommending they’d get some type of counselling for a start.

I manage a number of conditions I have to manage. And I can have ups and downs but believe me the last place I want to be is A and E as it is so debilitating if you have chronic illnesses. A trip to the GP takes it out of me.
I don’t go abroad. It’s too much for me now.
I don’t think your friend is chronically ill. I think she’s manipulating you all and it’s not working. She’s using up precious NHS resources.
She may have mental health issues.
But it’s bit your job to solve.

Nothing worse than 14 hours in A and E even if you are lucky enough to be on a stretcher. I avoid like the plague.

Well done for saying no. Even if she believes she's genuinely ill, helping her is just enabling her (and making your life a misery).

When you say no, does she still go to A&E? And why does she expect you to pay for the taxis if she's well off?

This! Last time I spent 8hrs sitting on the floor. I even feel ashamed of being there while people who are really sick has to wait so long.

Stop pandering to her. She’s a bloody joke, wasting nhs resources so I have zero time for this imbecile.

Thats what I thought- medical emergencies purely for attention and emotional input....

It sounds like Health Anxiety. My exH had HA and it was crippling for him and exhausting for me. EVERY single slight niggle was a health crisis. If he was busy it often quieted back down but the moment he was idle he'd start to spiral. He had all sorts of cancers, multiple heart attacks, some complex neurological conditions, coeliac disease, etc.. None of which of course were real to anyone else, but in his head he was convinced. Some heavy duty Anxiety meds helped a bit but they come with thier own problems but it was tough getting him to accept that he genuinely had HA and not some serious and terminal mystery illness. You cannot keep someone else warm by setting yourself on fire so you need to step WAY back from this - she is very poorly but not in the way she thinks and she will drag you down with her if you don't break away.

If I say no - she still goes and calling/texting millions of times.

I would keep saying no, even if she has some super rare mystery illness it shouldn't be up to you to deal with it.

A close friend of course you would help if you could but not an acquaintance.

Maybe if she had to start paying for her own taxi's she'll make a miraculous recovery.

This! I had a best friend with this and it got so bad in the end she made up a storey that I said no one would want her with her disabilities and people with disabilities are basically less than. My mums in a wheelchair for fs. But what you’ll find is they have this need for attention and they will go through every illness and their life becomes getting the next diagnosis which is often paid for privately somewhere and if all that isn’t enough they need attention from drama in their life so OP is likely to find herself in a situation where they are the next person to do them wrong. It doesn’t end and to those saying she may be ill, I think deep down we can sense people who bullshit and those who are genuinely ill. This does sound like she wants her husband to finally care about her again and this is what she think will do it. Very sad situation.

Just tell bluntly to stop calling/texting and that you’re busy and if she carries on you will have no choice but to block her number.

Sounds nasty but op she’s literally taking the piss out of your kindness.

I don’t think you need to say anything specifically. Just be less available to her calls and messages. Don’t respond immediately, take longer and longer to reply. She will realise she’s not going to get the attention she craves from you (which is actually a substitute for the attention she wants from her husband). One of my friend’s friends went crazy when her husband was leaving her. She basically was expecting my friend to act as a surrogate husband. It’s very sad but you don’t have any obligation to go to A&E with her or answer a deluge of texts & calls

I don’t think you need to say anything specifically. Just be less available to her calls and messages. Don’t respond immediately, take longer and longer to reply. She will realise she’s not going to get the attention she craves from you (which is actually a substitute for the attention she wants from her husband). One of my friend’s friends went crazy when her husband was leaving her. She basically was expecting my friend to act as a surrogate husband. It’s very sad but you don’t have any obligation to go to A&E with her or answer a deluge of texts & calls

Emotionally or mentally she seems to be having a hard time, her motivations however are her own business and for your own peace better not to speculate or be involved. It might be the right time to draw a line that you can’t offer practical support and limit replies, if you don’t feel it’s something you want to be involved in (at least that’s what I’d do).

i think you are talking to the wrong people about this op! Of course you are not obliged to help her. It sounds like she needs professional help anyway.

But let her know kindly. Her toxic marriage is probably making her ill and she is from abroad and feels vulnerable.

Take her out for a coffee and explain that she is asking for more help than you can give, that 50 texts is wildly inappropriate, and instead of contacting you she needs to seek professional help and go armed fighting with some numbers for support charities or support groups for your country’s expats,

And suggest she sees the CAB to ask about where she stands if she separated from her dh?

I think this is what you want ?

https://www.nhs.uk/mental-health/conditions/munchausen-syndrome/overview/

I don't think you should go with her if you don't want to - but she is describing symptoms that fit under real bigger problems so please don't tell her its because you think she is being fictious.

I can't tell you how many times my daughter has been told her symptoms are anxiety. In fact her very first peds dr suggested the solution to her headaches was anxiety and I needed to hug her more. Her first neurologist said her solution to her migraines was to do her homework as soon as she got home from school.

But she has now (after testing) been diagnosed with POTS, Hashimotos thryoid disease, Hypermobility (Ehler Danlos Syndrome), low dao (so affected ability to break down histamine which can lead to a range of symptoms) and they now testing for mast cell activation syndrome.

That said - the outside world does not know how sick she is. She's at uni now. She masks through things and the collapses ill at home.

I understand these kind of things happen, however, if you are feeling so bad - you wouldn't fly to Dubai for 40+ temperature and wouldn't drink cocktails 10 times per day.

I think if you say no and she keeps on calling and texting I would put my phone in “priority mode”.

If she doesn’t listen to you saying that you can no longer help but you don’t feel able to block her, then I’d start taking longer to answer. So if for instance she calls eight times from A&E I would text her back the next morning and say something like “sounds awful, hope you’re feeling a bit better now” and then don’t respond to anything else for at least another day.

Without sounding harsh, not your problem. Respond once a day at most, and ignore the rest.
As you say, her symptoms get switched on and off. when you do reply, keep pointing her in the direction of gp, Samaritans, etc

I would send a message saying that I was sorry that she was going through such a rough time and I hope she gets some answers but due to how much i have going on I just can't continue to support with A&E visits and I don't have the capacity to keep up with all the messages or calls so please could she use some of the resources I'd sent previously
Then mute her messages and dont answer her calls- surely she would stop after a few days of zero response??

I think you need mute (or even block) her (and get your DH to tell her husband that communication about the kids now needs to go via the men because you can't find the important messages among the 24 hours at A&E spam)

She's a vampire OP..She needs to start feeding on someone else, she has bled you dry :(