How can I respond to the things I don't like about my friends?

January 9, 2023 3:50 PM

Sometimes my friends do things that I don't like, and it gets me angry. At times, it just pushes my buttons a lot. Regardless, I am sure that much like they do, I also have things that I do that annoy them. In some cases these things are minor, and I guess I should just ignore them or deal with them somehow. Either way sometimes I feel angry about it, and like I want to confront the situation, even though the best course of action would be to not do that.

To be clear this comes from two situations, one of them is probably not at all that big, and the other is serious.

So the first friend, Kevin can sometimes be very passive-aggressive and negative when he's upset about his own stuff. He also starts projecting a lot of his issues on me. For instance, I know that there are things with his relationship that are just not working out. The relationship he's in has been going on for a long while, but I don't think he or his girlfriend are happy with it, but neither one of them really wants to admit it. When he is upset, he makes passive-aggressive comments at me or projects his problems on me. It's not personal, he does it to everyone. But sometimes it really bothers me, some people have told me I should tell him something, but I have hesitated to do so because I know that if I do it's going to lead into his relationship issues, something that I don't think he's going to want to be too keen in talking about.

For the second situation, I think there's a problem. This friend of mine, she started going out with this dude that has a lot of insecurities. I personally have never liked him and don't really like to be around him. But at times I feel really underappreciated by my friend. Sometimes her boyfriend does things that I think she should call out. For instance, there was this one time when he stole something of mine, it was food, nothing major, but he took advantage of me being drunk, and stole it thinking I wouldn't notice. I did, and I found the packaging of what he stole in the trash, she knew he stole it and said nothing. More than that, recently I went to Toronto with her when that huge storm came around. It was difficult to get out of where I am, because there were no trains or buses, so I looked for people that might have been carpooling that day, and found a couple. But then my friend complains, says that the stops which these people go to were too far away from her house in Toronto. More than that, during the trip the boyfriend kept making passive-aggressive remarks about my French, implying that it wasn't that great (I passed a very difficult test recently), and once again she just stands by and lets him treat me like that. More than that, after having to wait for hours in North York, because the boyfriend decided he wanted to accompany my friend to her house, then we got stuck over there on NYE at 4:00 AM. So I get us an Uber, but he complains that it was too expensive, and then as if that is not enough he also complains to me that I didn't put his house on the address.

The first situation doesn't bother me that much, but it does bother me. The second definitely warrants a response. However, I'm not quite so sure what to do. When I respond to things, I usually do so very directly and very harshly. These two situations warrant different responses. I'm wondering if anybody has any advice on that.

posted by Tarsonis10 to Human Relations (10 answers total)

Your first friend, Kevin, sounds like someone that's not worth your time to deal with. You've given no positive comments about him, and he seems to be a drag on you. I would not deal with him.

For your second friend, your friend's boyfriend sounds like someone that's also not worth your time to deal with, for exactly the same reason. Hence, there is also exactly the same solution - I think you should simply decline to meet the friend with her boyfriend. Here's a sample script: "hey $FRIEND - I'm having a hard time getting along with $BOYFRIEND. Do you mind if we meet without him in the future?". Once you get comfortable with that, then the next step is to ask your friend how to interact with the boyfriend without conflict. Here's a sample script: "hey $FRIEND, thanks for doing $STUFF with me. Could we talk at some point about how I can understand to talk with $BOYFRIEND better? I think we're not getting along very well, and I would like to improve my relationship with him in the future".
posted by saeculorum at 4:04 PM on January 9, 2023

There seems to be two problems here. First, your friends are making life decisions that you judge to be not in their best interest (or your best interest), and second, sometimes your friends and/or romantic partners do things that upset you.

For the first, while some people will disagree, I think part of the task of being a friend is looking out for your friends - which means sometimes having hard conversations with them that include lines like "I care about you and realize you're an adult who ultimately gets to decide who they date, but it really seems like this relationship isn't serving you well, for x, y, z, reason." Or "Hey friend, I'm worried about you, you don't seem like yourself lately - are you okay?" But, and this is key, if your friend says in response "Look, you're wrong here, they are excellent for me" or "Huh? Sorry, but I'm totally fine" it's usually best to drop it. You can point out what you've observed and hope they're receptive, but you can't badger people into agreeing with you about their romantic choices.

For the second, I'd approach this as politely but firmly sticking up for yourself. "Hey, I don't appreciate commentary on my French skills, though if you'd prefer to take over doing the translation work, be my guest." "Hey friend, I feel like you're being passive aggressive towards me, but I don't know why. Can you either explain why I've done wrong, or if you're just in a bad mood for whatever reason, can you try and not take it out on me?"
posted by coffeecat at 4:07 PM on January 9, 2023 [4 favorites]

It's all tough. I feel for you on both of these. Regarding #1, for myself personally, I probably just not hang out with that person if what they were doing was causing me distress. If we were really close friends, then maybe the next time the projecting (or other distressing behavior) happened, I'd mentioned how it was affecting me and let them correct as they see fit and if no correction happened, not offer to hang out. But I this would only happen if I was close friends with the person and it was a relationship worth salvaging.

Regarding #2, again for me personally, I'd probably just refuse to hang out with that person if her significant other is involved. I realize this may mean the end of hanging out, but that happens in these situations. People prefer their toxic significant others all the time, even over their kids, sadly. I would not offer unsolicited relationship advice because 1) she won't accept it anyway and 2) none of us really know all the dealings of other's relationships.

This is just me though and I honestly I have a very low tolerance for being treated poorly by others these days.
posted by Saucywench at 6:16 PM on January 9, 2023

Do you express disagreement with them at all? Like when Kevin says "I hate dating, don't you hate how dates just don't listen?" Or "it's just like how your boyfriend won't let you do anything" or "women, ugh, so unreasonable" do you just shrug it off or do you disagree? You don't have to "pick a fight" about it but even just saying "oh, I don't notice that at all, this seems really different than what I've seen" or "hm, that hasn't been my experience" and then letting him respond or go on can help you feel less like you're now complicit / coopted in someone's bad decisions. Get your own feet under yourself and know where you stand, and they can do whatever but you don't have to go there with them.
posted by Lady Li at 7:52 PM on January 9, 2023 [1 favorite]

Response by poster: You got it wrong with friend number 1, he's actually a very nice person and a very good friend. The reason I don't want to tell him about those things is because I like him a lot. Like for his birthday he invited three people only, me and another two dudes. We hang around the same people, he could have told many many others. He showed me around his neighborhood in Toronto when I was alone and introduced me to his friends, and he's always always present for everything. I could tell him I disagree or that I don't like what he's doing but he's ultimately a good person but I wouldn't just stop hanging out with him. I don't want to get involved in his relationship though, it's been going on for 8 years or more.

The other one is another story, and I may just tell her that I'm not happy with her behavior.
posted by Tarsonis10 at 8:34 PM on January 9, 2023

Best answer: You can be Kevin's friend and also ask him not to take out his relationship misery on you.

You can also be your 2nd friend's friend and also ask her to socialize without her unpleasant boyfriend. She may elect not to do that. But it's not her behaviour that's the problem here, it's the bf's. And if she is going out with an unpleasant person that may well cost her some friendships. Such is life.
posted by koahiatamadl at 11:39 PM on January 9, 2023 [1 favorite]

he makes passive-aggressive comments at me or projects his problems on me [...] people have told me I should tell him something, but I have hesitated to do so because I know that if I do it's going to lead into his relationship issues

Does it have to lead to his relationship issues, though? Can you just say "hey, my friend, that was kind of passive aggressive" or "everything okay? You're being kind of harsh today" and not go into your personal theories of where the behavior is coming from, which may be wrong?

I actually don't see the second scenario you described as something to necessarily call out beyond spending less time with that couple (your friend probably thought "he would say so if it actually bothered him" about the French comments, and I didn't really understand the rest beyond that they're annoying and self-centered), but the description wasn't really clear and you're the best judge of the context.
posted by trig at 1:49 AM on January 10, 2023

Response by poster: Does it have to lead to his relationship issues, though?

It's about them, it doesn't have to lead into them, but the reason he gets passive aggressive and projects is due to his relationship. His girlfriend wants to move elsewhere, he doesn't want to do so and he feels like he's never going to meet as many people as he has met now, in addition to not being able to hang out as frequently. He keeps telling me that, and keeps acting like that's my future too. It gets so annoying that he starts meddling in my relationships as well, telling me I should go and ask out X or Y, even though I'm not attracted to either X or Y and both of them have boyfriends. He also says some passive-aggressive trash whenever I talk about my successes.

I don't like that, and I don't want to have to hear it. These are his issues spilling over into my life, and I don't want to get involved in them.

The second scenario are just two inconsiderate people. I'd like to keep hanging out with the girlfriend, but the boyfriend is an idiot. He's so insecure about himself, that he'll go out of his way to criticize her for thinking about accepting a once in a lifetime opportunity from an investment bank like Goldman Sachs, because "they're the capitalist devil". Either way she continues to enable his bad behaviors.
posted by Tarsonis10 at 5:57 AM on January 10, 2023

Best answer: The point is that you don't have to address any of that. Just address the actual behavior you don't like, and don't let it become a discussion about his relationship. Which is not actually the inevitable cause of his behavior towards you - the real cause is his taking his feelings out on other people. But giving him a lecture about his deeper personality flaws is unlikely to go well either, so just focus on the specific behaviors towards you that you want him to cut out.

You don't have to do it in an angry way either, you can be light or joking or fond or anything you like.
posted by trig at 6:24 AM on January 10, 2023

Best answer: I would suggest you live by the motto: "Say it and move on."

"Say it" means you say out loud the reaction you are having in that moment. You don't overstate it, you don't softshoe it, you don't drop a hint, nor throw a tantrum. You say the thing directly. Like, "Hey, that's not a nice thing to say," or "Yo, that's passive aggressive," or "Dude, come on, not now, let's focus on having fun?" or "Man, don't say shit like that about me," or "That's not how *I* feel, sounds like it's how *you* feel though." You say what you're thinking or feeling because you are not a plant or an inanimate object. You are a full participant in that relationship. You have a reaction to what they're saying or doing, so you will express that reaction honestly and kindly and immediately in the moment. Saying what you're feeling immediately in the moment also keeps you from storing up grudges in a big pile. (If you already have grudges, don't spill all your stored up grudges in this manner! That requires a whole other type of conversation, not this technique.)

"And move on" means you don't belabor the point, you don't expect them to solve your feelings, you don't get into a big debate, you don't dwell on the topic, you don't expect an apology, you don't expect the other person to change their behavior immediately, you don't try to convince them, you don't get them to agree with you, you don't even expect the other person to acknowledge what you said. If they argue back, shrug and say, "Okay, sure," and roll with it. Or maybe shrug and say, "Well, that's how I felt," and leave it at that. I cannot stress this enough: don't get hung \up on getting the response you want from them. Your role in a relationship is to BE in the relationship, not to change the other person or teach them a lesson or whatever. They are allowed to ignore your feedback or argue with it or get mad about it or whatever. Or maybe you planted a seed in their mind that will change their entire personality within the next year. You don't know either way. You have said your piece. Your part is done. Shrug it off and move on to having more fun together.

Say it, and move on. The point of saying it is to protect yourself and your sense of being a person in that relationship, and so that you don't just keep swallowing your feelings and building up anger and resentment within yourself. The point of moving on is to protect the relationship and to respect the other person's autonomy. Pretty powerful, right?
posted by MiraK at 2:02 PM on January 11, 2023 [1 favorite]