I am writing this post in the hopes that someone out there can relate, or at least give me some advice. 'Cause I am kinda tired of dealing with this situation.
I know a person, let's call her Ms. Chatterbox, who always calls me out of the blue. This person is not a friend but someone who I have been forced to interact with because of circumstances. I won't get into the logistics of it but let's say that I have no choice in the matter and not talking to her is not an option.
Anyways, Ms. Chatterbox likes to call to catch up. Okay. Not. Really. Ms. Chatterbox basically calls when she has something great going on in her life and wants to brag. I mean, I am no hater. I love to hear good news but Ms. Chatterbox takes it a step further... she does more than call to brag. She likes to insult me. Oh, but she doesn't do it out right, she loves to say things that have double meaning.
At the end of her conversation she will ask how my daughter is doing. At this point, I am just emotionally exhausted and I am short with my answers. I probably have already spent the last hour listening to her about her life and how "great" it is and have been insulted a total of five times. And the last thing I want to do is keep the conversation going. So my answers will be short and to the point.
"She is good. She is getting bigger. We love her." And than we will be invited to some event.
And that will be our interaction until I am forced to see her again. In person, the situation is far worse. I have to sit there and smile politely as she talks about herself. Talks about her great life. But here is the kicker. This person is a habitual liar. Most of the time, I catch her in lies about her "great life". I squirm when this happens. I don't want to be negative and I don't want to call her out ,so I don't say anything. I just listen and in my head I feel bad for her.
But this routine is getting exhausting. I am all for finding inner peace and trying to find a positive balance with the people and things in my life. This situations causes me chaos. Always leaves me emotionally spent. I've gotten to the point where I hide from this person. Avoiding phone calls and events so that I don't have to deal with the tornado of chaos she creates. This is not fair for anyone. Especially not for my family.
So what to do? Have you ever dealt with someone like this?
Any words of advice are greatly appreciated.
I know a person, let's call her Ms. Chatterbox, who always calls me out of the blue. This person is not a friend but someone who I have been forced to interact with because of circumstances. I won't get into the logistics of it but let's say that I have no choice in the matter and not talking to her is not an option.
Anyways, Ms. Chatterbox likes to call to catch up. Okay. Not. Really. Ms. Chatterbox basically calls when she has something great going on in her life and wants to brag. I mean, I am no hater. I love to hear good news but Ms. Chatterbox takes it a step further... she does more than call to brag. She likes to insult me. Oh, but she doesn't do it out right, she loves to say things that have double meaning.
At the end of her conversation she will ask how my daughter is doing. At this point, I am just emotionally exhausted and I am short with my answers. I probably have already spent the last hour listening to her about her life and how "great" it is and have been insulted a total of five times. And the last thing I want to do is keep the conversation going. So my answers will be short and to the point.
"She is good. She is getting bigger. We love her." And than we will be invited to some event.
And that will be our interaction until I am forced to see her again. In person, the situation is far worse. I have to sit there and smile politely as she talks about herself. Talks about her great life. But here is the kicker. This person is a habitual liar. Most of the time, I catch her in lies about her "great life". I squirm when this happens. I don't want to be negative and I don't want to call her out ,so I don't say anything. I just listen and in my head I feel bad for her.
But this routine is getting exhausting. I am all for finding inner peace and trying to find a positive balance with the people and things in my life. This situations causes me chaos. Always leaves me emotionally spent. I've gotten to the point where I hide from this person. Avoiding phone calls and events so that I don't have to deal with the tornado of chaos she creates. This is not fair for anyone. Especially not for my family.
So what to do? Have you ever dealt with someone like this?
Any words of advice are greatly appreciated.
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| If all else fails, this is always good to know. LOL (Source) |
i kind of deal with that sometimes with my read dad. he calls and asks how i am and then it's all about him. very difficult but i listen. that's all you can do without being rude.
ReplyDeleteHow awful, Melissa. These kinds of people are emotional vampires who are so narcissistic they wouldn't notice if you dropped dead of heart attack right in front of them. If it were me and interaction couldn't be avoided due to work or something else, I'd keep the conversation short. Like 1 minute and find a reason to get off the phone or cut the conversation in person. Eventually she'll get the message. Life's too short.
ReplyDeleteMelissa I share your pain. My advice is to keep busy. I know better said than done when you are forced to interact. I think rushing people off the phone and killing them with kindness works Yes it takes much needed energy but It really beats having to endure the lies and chaos. I hope you find peace and I hope this persons true colors are finally revealed.
ReplyDeleteI can so relate. I was finally able to get rid of my Ms. Chatterbox after over a year of trying (sorry, that's not very inspiring). It's not easy and it takes a lot of work but it is rewarding. Cutting the time limits is a great start. I found that if I changed the subject when I got annoyed or cut in when I was sick of listening to her current topic she would get annoyed and want to be done talking to me. It's baby steps and once I got the space I was comfortable with I just let her know that I needed that space, I did it nicely - although I don't think she understood at all but I just said that our interactions brought out negative things in me that I was not okay with and I needed to work on that. I pretty much left it like it was me struggling and I think it worked perfectly because she was too wrapped up in herself to have to put any effort into me or dealing with my "issues." You just have to keep trying and figure out what works and run with it.
ReplyDeleteGOOD LUCK! It's suffocating and so sad how some people can suck so much life out of us.