Was I wrong here. Had fight with friend. :(

In My Humble Opinion
1

My friend “Stacy” had a baby a year ago in April. He died six days after he was born. She won’t let go of it, or try to make progress in getting better. Finally, the baby’s father walked out on her.

I tried to get her to talk about it when he first left her earlier this week, but she told me she didn’t want to. So fine. She called me yesterday and wanted to know if I would come get her (she doesn’t have a car) so we could go to the movies. She also invited Marc, and my roomate. A friend I haven’t seen in weeks happened to come by Sally’s. I called Stacey and she said to invite him along. So when it comes time for everyone to go home, I ask who I am taking home first. Stacy says “Derrick, you are going home first, Torie and I have things to talk about.” I informed Stacy that I had not seen Derrick in weeks. Derrick states that he would like to come along to take Stacy home.
Then Stacy flips out. She has this tendency to talk in a voice so high pitched only a dog would hear it when she gets upset. I call this her dog whistle voice. She proceeds to tell me, in her dog whistle voice, how horrible this is of Derrick. I’m not being a good friend, how could I? Don’t I realize that she has been through alot latetly? Don’t I realize that she needs me? How could I? Derrick is so much important to me than her, and that is wrongbecauseshehasalwaysbeensoooooooooooooomuchofabetterfriendtomethanhimandnowiamgoingtodumpherforhimthewholepointofgoingtothismovietongihtwastotalktomeforgetthatthatiscrapwahwahwahiamnotgettingmywaysoIammaking thingsdifficultandIfeverybodyisn’tkissingmyasseveryminuteofeverydaythenIjust don’twanttoliveanymore!!! All this in her dog whistle voice.

So I lost it a little. I told her to stop acting like a whiny, irrational, petulant child. I was taking her home. She was making everyone uncomfortable because she didn’t get her way. I had gone to get her because I wanted her to have a nice night out. Now I am not being a good enough friend? That is stupid. Call me when you are rational.
Now I feel like I was being too harsh. Do I owe Stacey an apology?

2

She sounds like a bitch to me, a bitch born from the heartache of a lost child, but a bitch nonetheless. I may be jumping to conclusions, but that’s what you get for asking advice from a bunch of people who don’t know her. I do know for sure that you’re going to apologize to her soon though.

3

This thread is better suited for In My Humble Opinion. I’ll move it for you.

Cajun Man
for the SDMB

4

No, don’t apologise. She kidnapped you to talk to you and freaked when it didn’t happen. If she’d asked you out to a movie and talk it would be a different story. She vomited her pent up emotions all over you, you don’t have to apologise for that!

5

The problem with friends is that who’s really right is never the central issue. The question is, how much of an impact would you like this “spiff” to have on your friendship with Stacy? Is it worth not apologizing? Should you just wait til it “blows over?” Is Stacy the type to hold grudges? How much support do you think she needs, and how sympathetic are you to her overall plight? Should you quasi-apologize, while breaking it down for her that while you don’t feel like you did anything wrong, you realize that she took it the wrong way and you’re sorry about that?

That’s how I always break down any kind of fight with friends. If it’s a minor spiff that nobody will remember the next day, it’s never mentioned again; if it’s a situation where things were said and attitudes were thrown down, I have to decide if it’s worth being right, or just sucking it up in the name of friendship.

Sometimes it’s worth being right. Of course it is. And I’m happy to go there, and hash it out, and prove it. For better or worse.

And then sometimes the overall situation is such that I don’t feel right about “piling” on top of already stressed-out and emotionally fragile friend. I just say something like, “Look, sorry about last night, I hope I didn’t hurt your feelings, but I hadn’t seen Derrick in a while and I didn’t want to neglect either one of you. If you want to go out for coffee and talk, let me know when you’d like to do that.”

Only you can make that call. FWIW, I don’t think you were wrong at all. Stacy was being a drama queen.

But I try to take everything into account when I decide how pissed off I’ll be at my girlfriends, because I can turn into a dramatic bitch, too, and so can they, so I try to find a middle ground where we’re “even.”

My advice? If this will blow over without any repercussions, never mention it again, even to apologize. If it will become an “issue,” go with your gut and talk to her about it, and make your feelings known. Don’t issue a garden-variety apology, like you were wrong, but let her know that you understand she’s been under lots of stress lately and that you’d love to talk to her about all her issues whenever she’s ready…and that the time to do that is when you two are all by yourselves with time on your hands for that purpose.

My $0.02.

6

I’ve never had a child and therefore not lost one, but, people who have been bereaved can react to their grief in different ways; and there is no time limit on when someone should start to feel better.

I know it can be very emotionally draining for friends / family to deal with - but again, people deal with their grief in different ways, and at their own time. It might be that Stacey has not felt able to talk to you about her loss in any depth, until now. She said she wanted to talk to you now - ok, so maybe her timing was off; maybe she had no intention of talking about it after you’d dropped people off, but I think that you should give her the benefit of the doubt? You’ve been a great friend to her this far, which says something good about you, no?

I can see that wrapping people in cotton wool isn’t always a good idea either, but neither is being too harsh. It might be that she realised that you do have other friends too and she was a little jealous of that? Maybe she felt threatened? Who knows.

I think if Derrick is a good friend to you, he will be understanding about what happened. I think you should not beat yourself up over this - good friends have fights, it’s how you patch the fights up that counts.

Go talk to her again and suggest counselling or somesuch - give her the numbers of centres she can call; offer to take her even…sometimes people just need a push to get better. She might not have even realised her behaviour has been a little off?

Best of luck.

7

Well, on the one hand, she has to realize that it’s not fair to stonewall someone who’s been trying to help you for most of a year, then suddenly demand that they break up a group outing, or insult someone they haven’t seen in weeks because you’ve suddenly decided it’s time to talk. If she wanted to see a movie and then talk, she shouldn’t have invited other people along. That was rude not just to you, but to the other people.

On the other hand, she’s still recovering from the loss of her child, and has recently been dumped, so I’m sure she’s not in the most stable or rational state of mind, and some allowances should be made.

On the other hand, saying “I’ve done xyz for you, and he only did abc, so you have to drop everything to cater to me,” is childish and inexcusable.

Overall, I think Audrey’s advice is sound. If she’s one of these people who flares up all the time and then just forgets it, I’d leave it lay. If she’s going to be holding a grudge over your “neglect”, then I’d apologize for unintentionally offending her, but explain that her suddenly wanting to talk was a bolt out of the blue for you, and you had too much going on at that particular moment to just drop everything with a half-second’s notice.

8

An apology is not in order, but perhaps a sit-down is.

9

Have you suggested she seek some professional help? Like a grief councelor?