My (26F) friend (30F) is exhausting to be around and burning me out. How do I handle this appropriately seeing as we work together?

I’m 26F and my friend is 30F. I have a secure job in our field, and she is just starting out. I’m sorry this got long but I really needed to vent.

I work in a competitive field. A university degree, a year long unpaid internship is required, a rigorous exam, and you are not necessarily guaranteed a job after.

I was lucky to secure some work in the same place I completed my internship. 2 years ago, a new intern started who was doing the same internship as me. A coworker introduced us, mentioned to me that she was having a hard time adjusting with the work load and isolated area, and suggested we hang out outside of work. I reluctantly agreed, only because I wasn’t in a position where I was evaluating her.

Things started off okay, but I noticed that she can be easily stressed, negative, drama focused, and gossipy. She constantly talks about how hard things have been for her, and how she’s been dealt a bad hand. I can see that she’s had some bad luck, but in my opinion it has a lot to do with her expecting negative things to happen to her, so they do. During this time, I was going through a period of unemployment and working up the courage to leave an abusive relationship. Admittedly it was hard to give her support and sympathy, but I did even though it didn’t go both ways.

After 4 years of searching, working casual, getting told “no”, I finally secured steady employment in my area, but it means I sometimes work 7 days a week and have every other weekend off. Needless to say, I’m really tired and look forward to my off time. I have also left that abusive relationship and am doing well on my own.

Last year on a national holiday, she asked what I was doing to which I said spending time with my family. She said her family is so far away and she will be alone, so I invited her to spend the day with mine. She totally dominated my attention the whole time, and wouldn’t let me talk to anyone else. It was all about work things that no one else could relate to. The day was totally ruined and barely talked to my family who I don’t often see.

She’s very disagreeable. If I say something, she has to “one-up” me with a worse experience, or she’s constantly correcting me. For example, I said “we should check out some of the waterfalls in our area”, and she said “well I’m from X, and the waterfalls are way better there”. Something like that happens almost every time we talk.

I don’t feel like she’s really listening when we talk. She’s just waiting for me to stop talking so she can start.

I promised I’d go out and celebrate her birthday with her. She had a whole table of friends but tried to talk to me about work the whole time. The rest of the table looked bored, and regretted coming out to her birthday. I said on 3 occasions “I don’t want to talk about work right now”.

During my period of unemployment, I had a few job interviews. In conversation with her, I told her I didn’t get the jobs but asked her to keep that to herself. I had other coworkers approach me with knowledge that I didn’t get the job, which made me angry because it would have come from her.

She’s always subtly asking me when I’m planning on leaving my job, how my job search is going, what my career plans are. This stresses me out. It feels like she’s trying to steal my job (which logically she can’t), but it makes me paranoid and stressed.

As long as I’ve known her, she has been obsessed with this 1 tinder match who obviously wants nothing to do with her. She creeps him on facebook and is looking for a job in his town (which is near to where we currently live).

She is not great with her money, and is constantly getting drinks, dining out, shopping, etc. Her parents send her money when she is stuck. This is fine, but I’ve had problems with spending and am trying to tighten up. She is a bad influence in this area for me.

I’m starting to feel this friend only wants me around so she can bounce ideas off me, use me to potentially advance her career, complain about work, and complain about her relationship woes. She’s bizarrely and constantly mentioning to people I’m her friend. I’m constantly giving her “pep” talks and trying to cheer her up. She cries about something every time we hang out. My suggestions for her to see a counsellor go nowhere, because she is from out of state and cannot get health coverage here while still a student. When I tell her she is wearing me down sometimes, she says “nobody wants to be here for me like I am for them,” or passive aggressively “sorry for burdening you with my life”.

She not only complains about her life, but makes me feel guilty for when things go well in mine (i.e.) getting a job, getting asked out on a date. She says ignorant things to me like “you don’t need health benefits because you have no health issues” when talking about how she has no way to cover her medical expenses. I do have health issues that I don’t talk to anyone about, and use my benefits on a regular basis for a chronic pain condition.

I feel really grumpy and exhausted when I think about her. I’m sad because there’s some other really great coworkers who I want to hang out with and get to know, but she is mutual friends with them and would likely be there when we hang out. This is a small town, I don’t know very many people here and would love to make a few healthy friendships. I simply don’t have the energy anymore to hang out with this friend.

My lessons learned are: don’t hang out with interns, even if I am not overseeing their work or evaluating them. I am also putting this friend on an “information diet”. I feel really guilty for phasing her out, and I’m worried she will gossip about me to my coworkers, which could negatively affect my career.

I feel really bad for thinking this, but she is 30 years old and acts like an 18 year old. I simply don’t want to hang out with her anymore, but still have to see her at work and want to maintain mutual friend relationships.

Having left an abusive relationship that took 3 years of my life, I have trouble knowing what are healthy boundaries to set and when to stand up for myself. I’m getting a lot better, but I have guilt with setting firm boundaries and sticking to my gut feelings.

TLDR: Exhausting friendship, worried I’m in too deep and she will say negative things to my boss or coworkers if I phase her out. Looking for advice on how to handle this, besides putting her on an information diet and not hanging out with future interns.

Submitted May 05, 2019 at 04:18AM by imtiredandjustcant http://bit.ly/2Ly3GdA