Friends Hate Me But Demand I Hang Out with Them

[reboundstudent]

About a month ago, two male friends of mine drove 6 hours from where they lived to my city to visit for the weekend. I have been friends with them for a couple of years, and was quite excited because I hadn't seen them in months.

 

The weekend however, turned into a disastrous mess. It turned out one of the friends (Sam) had only driven up because he had a wedding on Saturday, and was using me as a place to crash/time-waster in between wedding events. Whenever he hung out with us, he was sullen, irritable, and let it generally be known he wasn't having a good time.

 

The second friend, Steve, did nothing but complain all weekend. My apartment was too hot, I didn't have enough "drunk food", I had bad mixers for the alcohol they'd brought, I didn't have enough fun things planned (it was raining most of the weekend, so I took them to the museum where I volunteer on my own dollar.) He rolled his eyes at nearly everything I said, told me how whiny and negative I was, and if not for his girlfriend, who was the very spirit of kindness and fun, I think I would have strangled him in his sleep.

 

The real kicker is, a few years ago Sam and I had a... complicated situation. (I had a huge crush on him, he stringed me along for a couple of months, started dating someone else, then strung me along some more until I finally broke off the friendship until I was over him.) Sam's rejection still kinda stings, but for the most part I'm over it. The entire weekend, though, Steve kept bringing up, in front of Sam, how Sam and I should "hook up," since we're both single. I found this humiliating, since Sam has given NO indication that he finds me at all attractive. Every time I tried to tell Steve this, he would tell me off for being "insecure" and keep right on doing it.

 

So, horrible weekend. I decided from that point it was probably a wise idea to keep my distance from the both of them.

 

Originally, we had planned that this upcoming weekend I would go down to visit them. To my surprise, Steve messaged me last week and asked what time they could expect me. I couldn't make excuses about being busy, since this weekend had been agreed on months in advance, so I just told him flat out that it maybe wasn't a good idea for me to visit after the last time we'd hung out.

 

Steve got quite upset, and told me I was being irrational, and overly sensitive, and that refusing to come visit was akin to throwing a tantrum.

 

I'm really not sure how to process this. This situation is the latest in a long pattern of people who act as if I'm an awful human being, and then when I draw back from the friendship, accuse me of "causing drama" or "being a b*tch." Why in the world would people want to hang out with someone they obviously barely tolerate? How should I have handled this situation, and how should I handle it going forward??

[banal]

First of all the thread title made me laugh out loud. "Hate me but demand I hang out with them." It just sounds funny. Sorry.

 

On a serious note...I think there's NOTHING wrong with distancing yourself from bad elements in your life. If only more people did it! These guys seem inconsiderate and flat-out immature. Are you all in college? I mean, you don't have enough "drunk food"? I'd expect to hear that from a college freshman looking to impress someone. Not a mature adult.

 

What I have to ask is this: Why is this the latest in a "long pattern"? Who are these people you have in your life? Do they all come from the same nucleus, like a group of high school friends that you never let go?

[reboundstudent]

First of all the thread title made me laugh out loud. "Hate me but demand I hang out with them." It just sounds funny. Sorry.

 

On a serious note...I think there's NOTHING wrong with distancing yourself from bad elements in your life. If only more people did it! These guys seem inconsiderate and flat-out immature. Are you all in college? I mean, you don't have enough "drunk food"? I'd expect to hear that from a college freshman looking to impress someone. Not a mature adult.

 

What I have to ask is this: Why is this the latest in a "long pattern"? Who are these people you have in your life? Do they all come from the same nucleus, like a group of high school friends that you never let go?

 

Glad you enjoyed! I live to make others laugh and/or feel better about themselves by comparison.

 

I and my friends are mid-twenties; been out and about in the real world for roughly a year or two. (Steve and I are 26, Sam is 24.)

 

The people who pull this are actually from several different times/circles in my life. I had a thread a few months back about my coworker, who called me argumentative and put me down constantly... yet when I quietly just started eating lunch at my desk instead, she began spreading rumors about what a drama queen I was all over the office.

 

It's really.... bizarre. Maybe I live in an alternate reality. Or I am unable to understand proper social interaction, and so am coming accross like a drama queen/b*tch without meaning to. It's possible, but I'd have no idea how to go about correcting it.

[banal]

One thing is, lots of people are just jerks and drama queens/kings themselves, and they'll try and blame you for their own shortcomings. Or project them onto you: whatever you want to call it. That's what happened with your co-worker, it looks like.

 

I'm almost 30, and my social circle is fairly narrow: by choice. I love this kind of thread, because I'm the person who would always cut unhealthy people out of my life without a second thought. I don't know how many people are willing to do that. Like I have a friend in her 40s, and she entertains people she cannot stand in her home out of some weird social obligations. That's an extreme case, but most people seem to have that sense of obligation within themselves.

 

My view is this. If someone makes me feel bad about myself, time and time again, then that person needs to go. I think you handled this well. These guys sound horrible, and there's no room for them in your life. You owe them nothing. You're still almost fresh out of college, and something I've found with college students is that they tolerate a lot of morons and jerks just because, well, that's what you do in college I guess?