In my 34 years on this earth I’ve had a lot of friends.
Some have been life-long friendships, some have been “friendship flings”, and others have resulted in the kind of dramatic breakups you’d expect from romantic relationships.
Friendships can be tricky, but they can also be an absolute lifeline and one of the most important parts of your life.
You do need to be a little wary of who you invite into your life though – bad friendships can be toxic and they can end up being a huge waste of your time and energy.
Here are seven friendship red flags you need to look out for:
1. The friend who wants to become your best friend way too quickly.
I’d like to take this opportunity to remind you about little film called Single White Female.
The movie is about a woman named Hedra who becomes obsessed with her new housemate, Allison (Bridget Fonda) – to the point that she starts to dress and act just like her. Then right at the end of the movie she tries to kill her with the heel of her stiletto.
The Mamamia Out Loud team discuss how to cut loose your ‘obligatory friend’ (and how to tell if you ARE the obligatory friend). Post continues…
There were many red flags before she got to that point, but Allison didn’t see them or chose to shrug them off.
Of course, I’m not suggesting that every new friend who comes into your life is trying to kill you with footwear – but not all of them have the best of intentions.
If you find yourself the target of a friend who is coming on a little too strong, it’s best to establish clear boundaries straight away… and to also hid any sharp objects.
2. The friend who ignores your successes but revels in your failures.
I call this one the partly-cloudy friend.
In a sentence – she’s overcast with a 90% chance of being a complete cow.
She’s that friend who’s always around, seemingly supportive and interested in your life, but she has an ulterior motive – you’re a prop in her efforts to feel better about herself. Your failures are her successes.
She’ll love you when things aren’t going well for you and ignore you as soon as things turn around.
3. The fairweather friend who just wants to have a good time.
She’s the mate who’s always around when you’re kicking ass. She’s always up for a good time, lives for the #selfies and spends hours recounting her latest big night out.
The fair-weather friend is a hell of a lot of fun when she shows up, but at the first sign of trouble, she’ll drop you like it’s hot.
She’s most definitely not the friend you call when your boyfriend has left you for the mailman.
4. The friend who’s always gossiping about their other friends.
This is a huge red flag.
Chances are if your friend is gossiping about other friends to you, she’s talking about you behind your back too.
She’s probably also not that trustworthy and is telling people exactly what you say about them.
5. The friend who always wants to catch up… but never does.
Look, we’ve all been this friend at different times in our lives.
But if you have a friend who constantly texts “We should catch up!” and never actually does catch up, is she really your friend?
You might be better off just cutting off the constant text message back and forth that just gets your hopes up and ultimately lets you down.
6. The friend who disappears whenever she’s in a relationship.
We’ve all had one of these friends.
The opposite of your fair-weathered mate, Ms Foul-Weather only comes around when there’s something in it for her. She’s going through a messy break up and needs a shoulder to cry on or she’s heading out of town and needs someone to feed her psycho cat for the next two months.
She’s only your chum when she’s glum. So don’t expect to be invited to her next event, you’re pretty much a glorified free counsellor/personal assistant to her.
7. The friend who only ever talks about their own life.
This is the friend who will call you and wax lyrically for two hours about everything that’s happened in their life since you last spoke.
If you’re lucky, they’ll ask a quick ‘and how are you?’ before they abruptly end the call.
Avoid this friend. You deserve better.
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Top Comments
I had a very toxic friendship with someone for over 10 years. I was constantly criticised and put down, sent endless abusive messages and phone calls, blamed for things that she did - I was once told by her that I had to pay half the fine for her not wearing her seatbelt while she was driving because according to her, I was to blame because somehow it was my responsibility to remind her to wear her seatbelt. I was constantly gaslighted although at the time I had no idea I was being gaslighted. She put my life in danger when she deliberately sped and swerved across the road while driving and then just missed running into a ditch. Afterwards I was shaking and upset and she told me to "get over it and stop being such a loser". I was once yelled and screamed at because I hadn't liked a movie she had, in fact she would often start screaming at me any time I had a different opinion to her. I witnessed her doing a Jekyll and Hyde and believe me it's one of the most disturbing things I've ever seen. Any time something good happened to me she would pretend to be happy for me and would then go into all the reasons why it would all go wrong. She didn't like me having other friends and once went into a rage in public because I hadn't introduced her to a friend after seeing a photo of her on my computer. She would constantly talk about all her dramas and how everyone she worked with was useless and how she knew way more than them. According to herself she was an expert in just about everything and everyone else were "uneducated plebs". She had no empathy for anyone. She once told me that babies born with disabilities should be aborted or put down at birth, homeless people deserved to suffer, victims of domestic violence deserved what they got because it was their own fault they were in that relationship and when I was diagnosed with a mental illness I was told that mentally ill people are losers in life and that I should just get over it. I was then told she couldn't possibly be friends with someone like me who has a mental illness and that I was a pathetic loser who would never achieve anything in life. As far as I'm concerned her being out of my life is a great achievement and I am so much happier. I just wish I had seen the abuse much earlier on but it wasn't easy to do since it began with her being very lovely and giving me great comments, it then moved into put downs that were subtle and often dressed up as jokes but I knew weren't, then it moved into the more nasty stuff and then her telling me I was useless and pathetic and then ending the friendship.
I had a one single friend who was ALL of those things. The end of the friendship proved to be very dramatic as well. She tried to make out we were a lot closer than we actually were and would not accept her abusive behaviour nor apologise for it. Hence to say, it was good to end the friendship when I did.
I wonder if we were friends with the same person! The scary thing is that these people are out there and they don't often recognise their bad behaviour because according to them it's never their fault.