Recently one of my friends has come to me with the following problem:
Her best friend is in a serious relationship and will not accept the fact that she wants to be single. The rate at which she tries to set her up with guys is about one to three a month, and she frequently says things like "Oh let me find you a nice guy" or "So, when are you getting a boyfriend? You should let me help!"
Personally, I find this to be a gross invasion of privacy, but my friend just shrugged it off and generally makes excuses not to go on these dates, because she thinks the attempts are good-natured and her heart is in the right place.
I view the situation in a manner similar to this:
To people who obsess over their friends' relationship statuses,Please relax. Unless the relationship is becoming a danger, or there is an active request for you to become involved, you need to back off. Dating/single/engaged/keeping it casual/whatever your friends choose to be, you need to accept it. Maybe you're not at similar points in your lives, but that's OK. It's seriously going to be OK. You need to calm down.Sincerely, People who just want to live their own lives. I find that, in general, people like to have friends that are at the same stages they are in relationships, i.e. if someone is single they want their friends to be single also so they can go out and have fun together, but if someone is in a relationship then they want their friends to be likewise involved so they can go out on double dates or talk about similar relationship issues.
In my opinion, as great as it is to have something similar to chat about, this proves to be a huge problem when wanting this situation starts to put pressure on one or both parties in a friendship.
My advice to the friend in question was this:
She needed to sit down with this girl and calmly explain to her that although she appreciated the sentiment, she would no longer be requiring her match-making services.
I'm sure the friend in question didn't realize she was making my friend uncomfortable with these attempts, so there was no need to get unnecessarily nasty or accusatory. However, if she ever wanted to be in a healthier stage in the friendship, something had to be said immediately.
Personally, I would have stopped hanging out with this girl long ago, but that's probably not the healthiest decision, so talking-it-out it was!
What advice would you have given?
Have you ever had anyone unnecessarily concerned with your relationship status? Did you tell them to back off, or just accept the situation? Let me know in comments!
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Comments (16)
yeah, my parents find it necessary to harass me with this shit every time i'm on the phone with them--which i now try to keep to a maximum of once every 3-4 weeks (and visits only once every 3-4 months). i think they would cry if they knew i don't want to get married, let alone that i've done things with girls before. my mother told me that since i'm back on the east coast, i should be visiting once a month. they make that a very unappealing idea, given their behavior.
what i feel bad about though, is when my grandmother asks me about this stuff. i don't know what to say to her. i don't have a problem telling my parents to fuck off, but i feel bad if it's my grandmother. she just wants to be alive for my wedding. what a difficult position to be in...
Wow you'd never talk to someone again because they tried to set you up? Talk about an overreaction.
People in general never leave one another alone.
If you're single, people will ask you when you will get a boyfriend or girlfriend.
When you're in a relationship they will ask you when you will get engaged.
When you are married they will ask you when you will have kids.
When you have kids, they will ask you when you will have more kids.
When you have (enough) kids people will try to tell you how to parent.
When you are finally all done, people will tell you how you should spend your retirement. I can't tell you how many people tell me I should convince my parents to travel because they retired. My dad is a homebody and is content just staying home. But people (his friends and his brothers) send him brochures and try to pressure him to come on vacation with them.
Ultimately if you want to live in society - be in touch with friends or family etc... you will have to deal with annoying questions and "nosy" behavior. It's not really a big deal.
this is why I don't have facebook and would be wary of anyone who does have one, which is basically everybody and their pets. I don't give 2 shits about their business and I don't want to update and let them see anything about me and ask me about it. if my "friends" and family want to know, then directly call me, but I won't pick up the phone
I'm only close to my mother and bf and my mother is same as me and hates drama. I wouldn't care if the entire world didn't exist rofl except maybe a few of the dreamy people
Like @TheNotoriousGOD@xanga, my grandpa has been pestering me about why I don't have a girlfriend and why I didn't bother to talk to the one him and my uncle tried to set me up on a while ago. He gave me two years to find a girlfriend eventually turned wife. He didn't mention what would happen after two years if I didn't find one.
But, my parents told me to ignore him and told me to take my time and find someone worth being with.
@laytexduckie@xanga - hahaha. i didn't mention, my parents also have been telling me not to do anything with girls before marriage (kind of a few years late...). i was complaining to my cousin about this, and she was like "strange. they knew i had a boyfriend and never said anything about it." i said "yeah, because they think that you guys just hung out, and never touched each other or slept together, let alone banged." i don't understand how my parents could have been so successful while still being so far removed from reality.
@TheNotoriousGOD@xanga - Hah, my parents are the same. Though, they never really told me not to do anything with girls. They are just like your cousin's parents. Maybe they just assume that I'm still a good kid (in a sense, I am, but in others, I'm not). Maybe they just don't want to know and don't want to ask.
@laytexduckie@xanga - i'd like to believe i'm still a good kid, but when i think about it, these days i embody so many things i hated when i first went to college. but back then i was definitely on a moral high horse. my parents never really got off that horse, i suppose. they only very recently figured out that i drink, though i still don't think they're aware of the volume or frequency at which i do.
they'd probably give me more shit for it, but they know i'm doing well for myself, plus i don't really give them the time of day on the phone for them to have the opportunity.
People will always be nosy about your life, you can't escape it unless you plan on living in isolation in a cave for the rest of your life. Either tell them to leave you alone, or just deal with the questions and give them the answers that will get them off your case for a while. Humans are, by nature, nosy, and not being friends with someone because of that is really immature. You're never going to escape those kind of questions unless you cut yourself off from people forever.
This is my advice to your friend... she should say to her friend "Listen, I understand your intentions are good and you want to see me happy, but I am happy, and for now this is how I choose to live my life. So I would appreciate it if you would stop hounding me about being in a relationship and trying to set me up every chance you get. If and when I chose to want a relationship I will go about it in a way I see fit. And maybe I will come to you when the time is right for me. But for now, please just let it go. Please respect my decision. Thanks," and she should leave it at that. I have to agree with AmeliaHart when she says everyone always has something to say no matter what stage of life one is in. BUT I have to disagree that we should accept it. People are too damn nosy and I myself, have no problem telling people to mind their business in a respectful way. I don't get into people's business like that nor do I wonder why they aren't living their lives how everyone thinks they should. We are all individuals and deserve to live our lives by our own choices without being asked why we made those choices. I have a problem with society thinking we as women should have a boyfriend, get engaged, married, and have children. Not everyone wants to live their life like that, and I say, to each their own. There is no reason why people should expect that everyone should live by a certain standard. Frankly, people should mind their own fucking business, period. Especially when it comes to such personal issues.
This is clearly a situation of one well intentioned friend overstepping her boundaries.
She needs to sit down with this friend and say "Look, i know you mean well, but please stop." She doesn't need to go into a long explanation, but she does need to make the boundary clear. A good friend will respect that boundary, but don't expect it to change instantly because obviously she has been letting this go on for a bit.
I think you are being a little over dramatic when you said you'd stop talking to her.
Good friends are hard to find,. dont let something like well-intentioned-match-making ruin it.
So... it didn't bother your friend, but you gave her advice to fix the situation that YOU saw a problem with anyway?
@TheNotoriousGOD@xanga - I can relate to the grandmother thing. For both my grandparents. So far neither of the other two cousins nor I have gotten married and I'm not sure if any of us are even in relationships.
I have asked pretty much all my closest friends to set me up with someone, but nobody is ever right. Literally none. So it is probably just the wrong time haha. I'll just have to wait. I personally think that being set up is a nice way to meet someone new, which I love doing.
Talk about overreacting as some have already stated.
Welcome to life. People will always be nosy about your life - it's not that gross of an invasion of privacy. Suck it up, smile pretty & thank them for caring about if you're happy or not. It's really not a big enough deal to blast it about in a blog.
I would encourage anyone to be open in their communications with friends, and to speak up if something makes them uncomfortable. However, there's always the Catch-22 of that if you aren't speaking up, it may be because you really aren't that uncomfortable with it... but I digress.
Personally, for me and me alone, this kind of behavior from friends is something I treasure very much. It says they're interested in me and my personal life, they'd like to see me be happy, and they are spending their own personal free time thinking about me. That's a little bit of a rarity on this planet. As far as the set-up thing goes, I'd always advise at least trying it. Quite often our friends have a firmer grasp on the reality we project to the world than the one with which we'd describe ourselves, and thus possibly a better grasp of the people who would find us desirable.
You said it perfectly.@AmeliaHart@xanga -
Well my parents are trying to arrange my marriage...so yeah I understand how she feels.