The seemingly simple letter I received about a tiff between two friends riled me up in a surprising way. Come see what the letter writer said about the mistake she made and why her friend’s passive aggressive response got under my skin so much. I hope my advice will help her!
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Dear Nina,
My longtime friend and I had a conflict. It was the first anniversary of her business and I congratulated her on text and commented on her Instagram post, however I didn’t call or post a story for her as I was caught up with an urgent situation and it slipped my mind.
The next day I realized on text she was upset, which I assumed was because I had not called or posted on social media. I apologized and she accepted. But a day later she was acting passive aggressive on text. I told her if she’d like space and time to process my apology, I’d be happy to comply.
Around 10 days later, I reached out on text again and she seemed upset that I hadn’t messaged her earlier and said she expected me to reach out sooner and understands these are her expectations and from now on she will adjust them. I was upset upon hearing this and asked her to at least explain her expectations to me so I would be aware and told her to call so that we could discuss. She said she was busy and told me she’d be busy for the following week and could talk after. I agreed.
First, I don’t understand what I keep doing wrong for her to be so upset with me. Second, should I let her call me or am I supposed to call?
Regards
Trying to Be a Better Friend
Dear Trying to Be a Better Friend,
There are too many details missing about this friendship for me to understand what exactly happened here, but I picked your letter because a few aspects struck a nerve. As a matter of fact, this letter riled me up more than usual! I had to make a lot of assumptions about your friend, but at this point, she’s a symbol to me. She’s “the friend who punishes” in that passive aggressive way that I find so intolerable.
I don’t understand how a “longtime friend” could punish you in such a childish way for what I consider a non-mistake. Was she actually mad at you for something else and didn’t say so? You don’t need to be “acting like a better friend,” at least not from the example you provided.
Your text and Instagram comment acknowledged her big day. It’s over the top to expect a friend to text, call, comment, and share news on their own accounts. Now in fairness to her, she did say something about her expectations being off, even though that referred to the “who will reach out when” bit. Perhaps she meant it and wasn’t being passive aggressive in that instance?
I still suspect she was initially upset with you for something else and didn’t want to say so. If that’s the case, that’s on her, not you. When you’re upset with a friend for a legitimate reason, you can tell the person. AND it’s also a perfectly acceptable choice—and sometimes a wise choice—to let it go and not tell the person. We might make that choice when the positive aspects of a friendship have far outweighed the negative, when the incident was some kind of one-off, or when after thinking about it, the problem is OUR jealousy/ feelings of inadequacy/ competitive feelings and not really something our friend can or should fix for us. But if somebody chooses that route of letting it go, they can’t let the issue come out sideways such as, perhaps, getting upset about not making a big enough deal about the anniversary.
To review: Your friend’s reasons for being so disappointed do not ring true (to me). But if she was angry about something else, she needed to say so or MOVE ON.
To be clear: I’m not saying everyone should stuff their feelings. But I do advocate keeping expectations in check before airing grievances. Perhaps she genuinely was upset about you choosing “only” two of the four possible ways to mark the anniversary. In my opinion, that’s when a balanced friend might say to herself, “You know what, we’ve been friends for a long time. My friend is there for me in other ways and maybe she’s not so big on social media. I’m not going to think about this again.”
Here’s why your letter struck a nerve with me:
#1. I have an extremely low tolerance for punishing behavior in adult friendships or any relationships.
A friend can say why she’s mad. Or not, which is fine, and we already covered the good reasons for making that choice. But if she doesn’t state her issue, she HAS TO ACT PLEASANT. Isn’t that the unspoken agreement we have as adults? I will be pleasant enough, and if I’m so upset that I can’t act pleasant enough, I will tell you why rather than make you guess!? This whole thing about the ten days and her being mad that you didn’t reach out sooner. I can’t take it. If she wanted to talk things out or hear from you sooner, she could have reached out first.
There’s a difference between punishing someone and legitimately needing space. You know the difference when you see it. When a friend is ignoring you to teach you a lesson, I’d think very hard about keeping that friend in your life.
#2. It’s dangerous to decipher tone on text.
I’ve over-analyzed a text, and I’ve been on the receiving end of someone taking my text the wrong way. We could all stand to assume the best and hope that if there’s a real problem, our friends will bring it up directly in a way that doesn’t require a team of emotional experts to decipher the real meaning.
#3. It’s impossible to please someone with unreasonable expectations.
Reading your letter, I suspect this friend is impossible to please. If you had texted, called, commented, and shared on social media, then it would have been, “Why didn’t you also think of two more ways to celebrate my milestone.”
So to answer your final two questions:
The first question: What do I keep doing wrong in her eyes? I have no idea. The real issue to consider is why you keep apologizing to someone who is withholding communication as a form of punishment. As I said, we don’t punish our friends to teach them a lesson.
The second question: Should I wait for her to call or should I call her? I’d call her in case I’m wrong about all of the above in order to give her a last chance to explain why she’s been acting so off. But don’t ask, “What did I do wrong?” The question at this point is, “Why are you acting this way?” If you’re going to stay friends, she needs to take responsibility for this tension. If you’ve had repeated episodes like this with her, I’d think twice about continuing this friendship at all.
Wishing you the best in what seems like a difficult friendship. Stay strong!
Nina
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