Flaky Friends

[sweetjess1951]

I've had a pretty solid group of girlfriends for the last 2 years (since I moved to my current city). I always said how happy I was to find some really down to earth girls that I could count on and did a lot together. But lately, within the last 6 months, I've started to question how good of friends a couple of these girls were and not sure what to do moving forward.

 

I'm the type of friend that will go above and beyond. I always follow through with my commitments (even if I don't want to or feel like it), work my schedule out to make birthday get-togethers/events/girl's night/etc and always have their back. I never do only to receive, but I do feel that a friendship should not be a one way street. I shouldn't be the one always doing and always accommodating.

 

Within the last couple of months, one of my girlfriends started cancelling plans last minute. While I'm not saying that my schedule is any more busier than someone else, I have a lot of commitments and other friend groups, in addition to my own personal responsibilities and family time that I have to fit in my schedule as well. And it doesn't help that I work every other Saturday at my job.

 

Her flakiness started when we would make plans to get up at 5:30am to workout. We said that we would be accountable for each other and make sure we work out. Knowing myself and that I'm a huge planner, I have to be in bed by 9:30/10 in order to get up at that time and be productive the rest of the day. So I would either not accept plans with friends the night before, or cut them short to make sure I was home and in bed in time to follow through with my workout commitment. And I can't tell you how many times I would wake up at 5:30am and have a text from this friend with some excuse about how she stayed too late at her date or promised someone else (after she made plans with me) that she would workout with them. There was another time where she told me she wanted to only hang out with me (and not invite other girls in our group) and go to a brewery on Sunday at 2pm. So I got up earlier to make sure I got all my errands done and ready by 2pm. Needless to say, when I got a text from her at 12pm telling me that she had promised another friend (after the fact) that she would go get a pedicure with her and that I could go ahead to the brewery (by myself) and she would meet me there, I wasn't too happy.

 

It has gotten bad over the last couple weeks. To start, I went home to see my family over the 4th of July weekend. I hadn't been home in a while, plus my little sister had just got engaged. My friend asked me if I could come home on the 4th so we could hang out and I agreed. I got up super early that morning and headed back to my city. On the way there, my friend and I talked on the phone and she told me about this guy (flavor of the week) that she met and spent all weekend together and how great their connection was blah blah. When I got home, her and I went to the pool and he joined us. We left the pool with the intention to go get ready and we were going to purchase tickets to our minor league baseball team's game and watch the fireworks our city puts on. Again, needless to say, I was floored to find out that her and this guy purchased tickets without me, with no apology, and she tried to pawn me off on our other friends and told me to watch the fireworks with them. That turned into me standing in the middle of the park in our city watching fireworks by myself.

 

The next week, we had made plans for that weekend for a girl's night on Saturday. Thursday night, she went out drinking with this guy and Friday night she had plans with a group of girls for dinner, bailed on that and ended up getting drinks with a guy friend (who one of our friends happens to like and she asked me not to tell our friend she got drinks with him). So Saturday rolls around and our girl's night out didn't happen. But she PROMISED (again) that we would have girl's night on Saturday this past weekend.

 

Last Thursday rolls around and she texts me saying that she was going to go to the breweries with our friend Amy and some of her girlfriends and I should join. Although text isn't necessarily the best way to communicate an issue, I couldn't not say anything about her changing plans again. So I sent her a long text (nice but firm) about how she had been bailing or changing plans a lot and it would be nice if moving forward we could be a little bit more considerate of our commitments and other people's time and schedule, that I had planned on a girl's night out, got us on the list at a new nightclub (I know the owner) and it looks really bad when they are doing me a favor and we don't show up. When she responded, she didn't even acknowledge how I felt about her cancelling/bailing, but ensured me that we would still have girl's night, that she was just going to meet Amy for a few beforehand.

 

Friday night, I opted out of doing anything because I wanted to make sure I was rested for work and able to follow through with my commitment for girl's night on Saturday. While laying in bed Friday night, I was browsing through Snapchat and happened to see that my friend was out drinking (go figure) and I KNEW that when I texted her the next day about our plans that she would bail. Low and behold, I texted her Saturday and got this long text about how she needs a break from drinking because she feels gross from eating so bad and not working out and needs a day with no pressure or commitments. Followed by "Can you not make friends with the other girls tonight?". I was HEATED!!!!! And I didn't even respond. I got no apology. No nothing. Her text made me feel like I was this orphan who had no other friends to hang out with - like she was doing me a favor. PUH-LEASE!!

 

Last night I hung out with a couple friends in my group and that was when I found out that after she cancelled prior plans with me on Saturday, she ended up meeting the guy our friend is into and his friends and went to dinner and bowling. SERIOUSLY?! Our friend that told me that said that she said she wanted a low key night. UM, then you say "Hey, I know we had plans and I really want to hang out, but is it ok if we do something a little more low key?" and I would have been fine with that. But to totally cancel on me and turn right around and hang out with guys - no, no, no.

 

So now I'm not sure what to do. My friend told me I should talk to her, but at what point is it her responsibility? Why should I go out of my way to talk to her when SHE is the one doing this and she made it very clear to me how important her commitment was to me when she confirmed on Thursday that we would still have our girl's night, after ignoring my feelings on her bailing, and TWO days later doing exactly what I asked her not to? And I am not the only person in our friend group that she has done this to. We are all fed up!

 

There is a huge part of me that wants to be a bitty to her. Haha, we are all going to dinner for our friend's birthday tonight and I wanted to order her an extra water and tell her she looks super thirsty but I just don't have any interest in dedicating any more time to her until she apologizes and changes her way. She acts like she is the glue that holds us together and its her world - and its not!

Edited July 22, 2016 by sweetjess1951

[Miss Peach]

So basically she's flaking in order to spend time with other people or her guy flavor of the week. You can take either the direct or the indirect route. I recommend the direct route for anyone who has been/is a good friend.

 

You can be direct and have a conversation with her so she knows you're not OK with it so she has a chance to change her behavior with you. If not, then you can let her go.

 

The indirect route is that there nothing saying you need to hang out. Just stop agreeing to plans with her alone or where you have the expectation of doing anything with her.