How to pull away from a friend who only talks about herself, her kids, etc.

[Anonymous]

I have a friend like this, but I have realized that part of it is that I don't want share my stuff with her. And I'm realizing that I have a friend that I will tell more too and I need to make sure they are getting good airtime. Each relationship is different.

[Anonymous]

Some people listen. Some people wait to talk. In my experience, this doesn’t change over time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You sound jealous. It’s unbecoming.

No, OP sounds normal. You sound judgy though!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You sound jealous. It’s unbecoming.

Oh, dear.

I mean, she does. She could have made her point just by saying “I have a friend who only talks about herself and never listens to me.“ Instead, she gave all the specific things that the friend says that bother her. Sounds like she’s jealous about those things.

Her friend sounds boorish.

I'm not seeing that. If OP said that her friend never gives her a chance to talk then that's boorish. But it sounds like OP's friend is sharing info about herself and OP isn't doing it at the same level. OP is pissy about the good things going on with the friend. Now OP wants to completely dump her friend because her friend doesn't know that OP has a sister. It looks like OP is jealous and drumming up a reason (not knowing that OP has a sister) to hurt her friend.

The friend hasn't done anything to justify this kind of mean spirited vengeance from OP.

[Anonymous]

I find people who only talk about themselves and never ask about you so rude. I truly don’t understand why they think it’s acceptable behavior.

[Anonymous]

I have a friend who does this but also asks about my "weekend" or something too. I'm not a small talker and she constantly talks about herself or her kids so theres' nothing for me to ask about.
I did once and she declared "thanks so much for asking." as if I had FINALLY asked. In her mind, that's what you do in a friendship.

I've slowly faded away because I feel she's WAY to invested in her adult childrens' lives and its creepy and boring.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have a friend who does this but also asks about my "weekend" or something too. I'm not a small talker and she constantly talks about herself or her kids so theres' nothing for me to ask about.
I did once and she declared "thanks so much for asking." as if I had FINALLY asked. In her mind, that's what you do in a friendship.

I've slowly faded away because I feel she's WAY to invested in her adult childrens' lives and its creepy and boring.

+1. Same. In our case she never bothers to ask, she is just talking at me. What’s the point?

[Anonymous]

Its also tremendously boring to just talk domestic fluff. Does she not have any interest in the rest of the world, politics, art, literature? Nothing?

I mean I would be ready to shoot myself in the head pretty quickly if I hung out with people like "Jane"

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Just ghost her. If she asks why, explain that you grew exhausted with being her cheerleader.

I did the same with a friend from college but at 44.

I was in a parking lot on the phone with her one day while she was crying about yet another boyfriend and I realized she had never asked about my marriage, my three kids, my cross country move while pregnant, nothing.

I was just an ear to abuse. So I stopped taking her calls and the 'friendship' was gone. It's been 4 years and I'm fine with it.

Ghosting is so last decade and just not acceptable behavior for adults. No mentally healthy person is ghosting anyone.

OP just start talking about yourself a bit. Share without being asked. I do this with a relative that sounds similar and it works. She has other attributes that are positive.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Sometimes it feels like shockingly few people have the skills for the kind of give-and-take conversation that I think most people think is ideal. It's so rare to meet someone who can do this. Instead there are a handful of mildly dysfunctional conversational styles and you kind of have to pick and choose based on your personality and what you can deal with.

- Only talks about themselves, never asks questions. This person is great for introverts who don't want to talk about themselves, terrible for people who actually want to share things about themselves.

- Interrogators who only ask questions, never share anything about themselves. This person is great for people who love to talk about themselves, terrible for people who are shy as well as people who are more interested in others than themselves.

- The person who never talks, just listens. Great for people who like to talk, bad for people who struggle to come up with things to talk about. Two of these is bad unless they are both totally happy with long silences.

- The person who only wants to talk about OTHER people. Great for gossips! Bad for people who don't like gossiping, or anyone who doesn't want to be gossiped about to everyone else.

I'm an introvert so I actually like the people who mostly just talk about themselves and a lot of my friends fall in that category! Some are worse than others and I do prefer the people who can do a bit more give and take, but I'd much rather hang out with someone who just talks about their now life a lot than someone who is going to pepper me with a million question or who never has anything at all to say or who just wants to share a bunch of judgmental things about our other friends or colleagues.

These are great points!

I'm also an introvert more likely to ask people questions than volunteer info about myself right away BUT I have noticed that many people don't return conversational volleys and ask me questions back. Just because I'm not immediately launching into my stories doesn't mean that I don't ever want to share.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just ghost her. If she asks why, explain that you grew exhausted with being her cheerleader.

I did the same with a friend from college but at 44.

I was in a parking lot on the phone with her one day while she was crying about yet another boyfriend and I realized she had never asked about my marriage, my three kids, my cross country move while pregnant, nothing.

I was just an ear to abuse. So I stopped taking her calls and the 'friendship' was gone. It's been 4 years and I'm fine with it.

Ghosting is so last decade and just not acceptable behavior for adults. No mentally healthy person is ghosting anyone.

OP just start talking about yourself a bit. Share without being asked. I do this with a relative that sounds similar and it works. She has other attributes that are positive.

Also how does one "ghost" and then "explain why" - that's contradictory to what ghosting is, bone head!