Friend or users?

United States
January 22, 2009 7:10am CST
Do you feel your friends use you? I do, Everytime I turn around I have a friend that is always calling me to do things for her. She wanted me to spend my lunch break one day to go and pick up employment applications for her. I wasn't as if she didn't already have a job, she did. She just wanted to find a different job. Then she called me to pick up her daughter from school when she was sick. NO Problem, but instead of comming home to take her to the doc. she wanted me to take her daughter to the doctor. Then she wanted me to take her son to get his drivers permite. when I told her I was busy, I didn't have time. She was looking for a way for me to do it any why cause she didn't want to take the time and do it. I work from home a couple days a week and she is alway calling me, wanting me to run for her. I tell her, I am working... I can't.. and she just keeps on. She never comes to visit. She just calls when she wants something. DO you have friends like that?
1 person likes this
9 responses
@jambi462 (4576)
• United States
22 Jan 09
Yes I do believe that my friends have definitely used me before. It's really a derpressing thing when I dwell on my friends because we used to hang out together like everyday and now it's like I don't even exist anymore. I thought that my friends would never do that to me and who knows maybe I'm just taking things the wrong way but all I want to do is maintain my friends and be able to hang out with them as much as possible. It's hard to do that though if your friends don't want to be with you in return.
1 person likes this
• United States
23 Jan 09
Finding a true friend is really hard. That's why I spend alot of time alone.
@spalladino (17891)
• United States
22 Jan 09
I've had friends like that over the years but only for short periods of time. As soon as someone exposes this user nature to you, you should either officially drop that person as a friend or avoid him/her like the plague. There are a lot of folks who will take advantage of you if you let them so the key is to not let them. Tell her you're busy and, if she persists, say that you have to go and hang up the phone. Eventually she will find someone else to be her personal assistant.
1 person likes this
@mysdianait (66009)
• Italy
22 Jan 09
I have Friends and friends. The person you mention would fall into the second category as I feel if a person is using you there is no friendship involved at all.
• United States
23 Jan 09
Ya, and I know that if I ever had a real problem. The only one I would be able to depend on is myself.
@kellyjeanne (1576)
• United States
31 Jan 09
Yup, that friend of yours sounds like a real user to me too. I don't have friends who use me. My problem is that my friends never call me or visit me unless I offer them something to eat. Gee, come to think of it, I guess that is how a user acts, huh? Real friends are just so hard to come by and you have to be so careful in choosing friends. Purrs, Catwoman=^..^= & Mija
• United States
1 Feb 09
Your right kellyjeanne, real friends are very hard to come by. It took me 20 years but I did find the only friend I feel I ever had. We lost touch when I got married and she moved to another state for school. I can say she was the only real friend I ever had and It's nice to have her back in my life again. I haven't seen her, but we talk about every week. She now lives in CA and I am in MO
• United States
2 Feb 09
I'm so glad that you were able to get in touch with her, tonnie! It's too bad that she lives so far away from you though. Purrs, Catwoman=^..^= & Mija
@moneymaya (901)
• India
22 Jan 09
I think he/she is using you , you should do one thing just try to his trick on him/her self this will show you the reality , you should also keeps call him to your own task , whether its important or not , just take 2 or 3 trial for test only if he would not ready and don't help you then I think its clear , friend means help to each other friend thanks for sharing
• United States
23 Jan 09
You are right. And I have tryed to turn the tables. I have asked her to do something for me and she gave me the. "Can't you do it yourself, or I don't have time, or Oh I have to be here or there" It's always something. And I have tried to talk to her about it and have even use comments such as.... so and so called me and wanted me to do this or that, that just bugs me. She didn't even get it
• India
23 Jan 09
So I think you got your solution
@HansonFan (1653)
• United States
23 Jan 09
Not any more. I got tired of it. I had these two people who couldn't drive (One is 19, the other is 20) so I had to take them everywhere. We go to college together and home is an hour away and I go home on the weekends a lot so they tagged along. One of them either never showered, or he just smelled really bad. I'm assuming he showered once or twice a week. They got really mad at me when I mentioned they should help with gas money...We are all college students without jobs, but I didn't ask them to pay more than $5 a trip home. Driving around the little town to go to the store and everything I would handle, and I didn't ask for help with oil changes or tires or anything. Then they started trying to make me listen to their music, saying mine was bad. They wanted me to watch tv shows and movies that weren't my style. I stopped giving them rides and made some new friends. Its just horrible how people try to use others when they should really learn to grow up and do things for themselves.
• United States
23 Jan 09
You are right. There are so many out there that has had everything done for them and that's what they expect from everyone else. I am tired of being used. I even started a business with one person. That was a mistake, Everytime we would get any money built into the account she would wright a check for what was in there and spend it. I worked for nothing and got nothing out of it. She got all her bills paid off and decided to close the buisness, I was working another job, just to pay my bills and working with her to. It left me out in the cold and nothing to show for all the work I had done and even destroyed my rep as a graphic designer. I can't even get orders for business cards and before her, I had orders all the time, including publications designs. I spent alot of time and money to build my rep and a graphic designer and now that has all been for nothing.
@bamakelly (5191)
• United States
22 Jan 09
I am a stay at home wife and mother and I don't get out a whole lot so I don't really have too many friends "per say". I have had friends in my past though when I was a little younger. There were some times where I felt that they didn't want much to do with me unless there was something I could offer them. I don't really miss that part of my life anymore. All I ever wanted was a good friend I could depend on and wanted me just as their friend. Sometimes it still hurts when I think about it. It is not a good feeling when you are being used or taken advantage of. I don't know how you are going to get it across to this friend that enough is enough. You guys need to get together and do something special with each other with no strings attached.
@laedyan (189)
• Philippines
23 Jan 09
Hi there tonniek02. I always do what they ask me without any complains. The problem is that when i have something to ask them or favor that i wanted from them, they always tell me that they have something to do or very busy. I felt alone every time they avoided something when its not even heavy or a great burden for them. Its been like this so i've decided to avoid them and just go on without them. I don't need friends who are only there when I have money or they wanted something from me.
• United States
23 Jan 09
Sadly I have found that a lot of my "friends" are actually users. Here is a current example. I am off on Thursdays and Fridays of every week (mostly) and am a single parent. I have met a younger couple through my church and we became friends. They have three children, 2 girls ages 9 & 7 and a son who just turned a year old. My son is 6.5 and plays with the girls a lot. (The younger one is totally a tomboy!) Anyway, I started babysitting the youngest on Fridays in exchange for them taking my son on Sundays so he could attend church with us. (I work on Sundays but take my patient to church with me, she got us going there.) This has been going on for some time now. However, there are plenty of Sundays where they don't show up for church and claim to be sick when in fact they are going out on Saturday nights to the wife's boss' house and they get loaded there and are too hungover to go to church and don't want another kid running around. So they make up stories to tell me. Well, over our Christmas break our children got 2 weeks off from school. How about the entire first week I drove 30-40 minutes each way to pick up their THREE kids and drop them off at home. I had all the children all week long. Well, week #2 comes along and they can only watch the kids for 3 days. Yes, they offered to watch my son two of the three days BUT they didn't offer to come pick him up and when I hinted and said "gee, I just don't know if I feel like driving all the way out there just to have to drive all the way back later, it's a lot on me" and NEITHER of them offered to come get him!! I was shocked! All the darn driving back and forth that I do for them and especially the entire week with FOUR KIDS! And not just four kids, but their two girls were HORRIBLY MEAN to my son to where now, I don't let them play as much together anymore and I'm even trying to get out of babysitting. I feel as if they are taking full advantage of me and I don't like it one darn bit. Enough is enough!