I am struggling with this so much I can’t sleep.Obligatory background: I (30F)have been best friends with this man (30M)since kindergarten. His fiancé (24f)and I became best friends also.
Firstly, His fiancé and I are pregnant at the same time, and it has shown my best friend’s true colors in a way I never expected. He has been ignoring that his fiancé is pregnant, drinking heavily, and neglecting her. She sent screenshots of him saying he felt she had taken out her birth control, she ruined his life, and she has really trapped him. He said they would never afford anything, and that he would never be able to have friends over or go out. He makes over $20 an hour, he owns three houses and a few acres of land. He has a shop nicer than any repair shop in town. They are NOT hurting financially. Well, when she sent me all of that, I was shocked and upset for her. She only wanted love and support from the man she has loved and supported for years now. She doesn’t deserve to be treated like that.I told her this and she asked me not to say anything to him about it, so I didn’t. I don’t want to ruin the trust she has for me and I don’t want to cause any problems. So we continued life normally, with me giving her extra support.
Secondly,My baby shower was recent and I invited them both.She texted me to tell me that he wouldn’t be attending my baby shower, but he wouldn’t even attending his own. When I asked her why she told me to ask him myself.I did, and he said he couldn’t go to mine if he wasn’t going to his, and because it was a women’s event. I asked where he got that idea, as my fiancé was excited to go to ours.He statedhis grandpa said it wasn’t for men. Honestly, I was really hurt and told him even so he should go to his to support his fiancé, as she had been raised differently than he had and she needs his support. I told him he was hurting her by doing this. He ignored me. I told her and she told me he needed to hear it from someone else not me. Nobody else would dare tell him. I told him that it’s time to decide who you want to be as a parent. No response.
So lastly, and this has been weighing on my mind. They often have people over, to the point of fifty plus for special events.One that has been a frequent in the past year is a known person who is facing charges for things involving kids.He lied to them and told them that he was set up, and I can’t say how I know he’s lying-I do. Let’s say I used to work somewhere where he was present many times.I was able to tell them without sayinghow I knew, only pulling up court records and showing them a post about him. They believe him. I’m debating on just sending a baby shower gift to their home and just stepping out of the friendship. They haven’t talked to me in over a week.
Ending a twenty year friendship? Me 30F, he 30M, and also his fiancé 24F.
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Your friend is a dick. Also another reason she should leave him if he’s inviting an known child abuser to their house. Where do you live that $20/hr gets you three houses, land and a nice shop better than any actual shop?
The trouble with seeing toxic relationships is that you know that a spade is a spade. They will call a spade a fork. Your friend and his gf are not willing to changing anything or face the facts of the situation.
Unfortunately, washing your hands of the situation seems to be the best for you: reduce potential stress during pregnancy, prevent exposure to that person who harmed kids (and people who are COOL WITH IT), and not get suckered into drama. There is being there for a friend and then there is being an unpaid therapist and watching someone torpedo their mental health.
You do what you think is best/healthiest. But I would cut ties, even just for a little while.
Okay, I’ll go out on a limb and say your friend is a gigantic shitbag, and the slight age gap here (seeing that she’s been with him a few years now) explains a lot. I would no longer be friends with this person, and he sounds like he brings a lot of drama to the table that will make postpartum life hell for both of you. His drinking is nothing to ignore and I feel so bad for her, because her life is probably about to get very hard. Does she have outside support that you know of?
I would tell your friend he is being a grade A douchebag and that until he gets his crap together you aren’t going to sit there and continue to watch him treat his fiancé and women in general like shit. Tell her that if she needs help to get away from him to let you know but in the meantime you aren’t going to be in their life just to watch emotional abuse happen in front of you.
The man does not want this kid, this man does not love or even remotely care for her, be very careful you get pregnant by as this happens all the time
Honestly I would try convince her to leave him. It might hurt her now but it’s going to hurt her a lot more in the future if her child is neglected and/or abused in other ways… 🙁 such a crap situation.
Regarding baby showers… tbh the tradition amongst my friends has always been that the guy takes the day off with some buddies even if they have mutual friends. I’ve gone baby showers for my buddies partner before and my buddy wasn’t there on purpose.
Of course any precedence for that should be null but just asking him to attended.
Sounds like this dude is freaking out because he feels trapped and he should probably seek therapy so he’s not a neglectful father.
Trying to see both sides here.. What if it’s true that she did trap him? If he said to her that he don’t ever want kids or something then she suddenly are pregnant. I’d be upset also. I’d also be using condoms for extra security but yeah.. Not the most grown up way to handle things.
honestly, the thing sticking out to me here is that she’s stopped communicating with you. that’s how it goes in abusive relationships; your friend will isolate this girl from people who tell her what a scumbag he is. he’s going to tell her what to think, and even if she doesn’t believe it, she’s gonna think it for her own safety.
i hope i′m wrong, obviously, but this guy sounds like a copy paste of my abusive ex and that shit won’t end until she finds it in herself to be stronger than her fear. there’s nothing you can do but support and love her, but you don’t owe that to anyone, especially not at your own expense.
He’s been a brother, she’s been ur new best friend. Ok that’s where it gets hard.. they begin to pull u 1 day & ure not sure who’s side u should take. So yes in my opinion I would Def walk away or slowly start distancing urself from this moment that they haven’t spoken to u. They’re relationship will cause u stress & u don’t need that. U need to concentrate on U. As hard as it is .. u don’t even have to say anything to them… just slowly start drifting. Like hey I’m busy making my own family u know?
Good riddance to them and to their toxicity. Letting go of such friendships has helped me cleanse my life and be happier. You need to do whatever is best for you and your baby.
Girl, run!! But I also hope your bestie runs too because that man is a RED flag especially bringing someone like that near his unborn child wtf??
Seems like you already traded out the friendship with 30M for the friendship with 24F a long time ago. In regards to the person facing charges, it is normal to not react until after a conviction. You can always see how you feel about that part, at a later stage. But being denied control over when one is ready to have a child, is not at all a small matter. The 24F did her own child a huge disservice in that regards. It is difficult to be more selfish than doing her own child a disservice like that and then still feel it is all about her. To me it sounds like she was not really ready to have children either. When she has children, life is not about her anymore, it is about the child. And she can’t even be bothered to make sure the child will be a dreamchild for the father. Also take notice that every information you gave about their economy was about his financial status. So he had an impression of how those money would be spent and she went and forced that to be spent differently. A woman has the right to control her own body. But a *relationship* is not about having autonomous control of a situation and in her youth, she seems to have forgotten that. In deciding she wanted a child regardless of what her partner would like, she has probably ended the relationship trust right then and there and now it is just going through a slow death. I don’t see good decisions on anyone’s part. If a woman wants a child more than she wants her actual partner or husband, she really have to accept that tradeoff. Not claim to be a victim. She was the one who took the decision, so she has to be an adult and live up to her own responsibility.
Also: congratulations on your own pregnancy:)! I am sorry you have to deal with issues during such a time and if it becomes too much to deal with, you should probably just cut them all off and inform them you unfortunately do not have time to deal with all that, with your own little dreamchild in the picture now.
Sounds like every guy in Texas/Tennessee/Oklahoma. The kid is better off having nothing to do with him. So are both of you. You girls should help each other with the children and let him be him. Guy is acting like he’s worth something, but besides a couple of inherited houses he will never be worth much. All of you need to be better.
The baby shower is a generational / culture thing. It was expected that I would be elsewhere during my wife’s baby shower. I never heard of guys going to baby showers until fairly recently (last 5-10 years).
This is still a pretty normal reaction for a guy. The rest is total douchebaggery – dude is a giant ass! But I get the baby shower thing. In
My mind that’s been a women’s event my entire life and all my personal experiences back that up.
Playing devils advocate…if she did decide to stop taking contraception on her own then it’s understandable he could be going through some things and feeling depressed. If he wasn’t ready to be a father the choice has been taken away from him!
Nobody I know that makes less than 30/he can afford a house, let alone 3 and land. 20 is poverty level. Wtf
Where do you live that $20/hr means someone owns 3 houses? That’s absolutely insane.
I would love to hear her story how did they both came to a decision to have a child, was it really an accident or was he manipulating her.
Get away from both of them because if somebody told me that somebody I was hanging out with was a child abuser I would believe the person who told me that they’re both toxic not just the dick fiance of hers she also is toxic too come on with your pregnancy try to be stress free and get the hell away from both of those people I wouldn’t even send a gift I would just go not talk to them anymore block them on everything social media I might even change my f****** number
The baby shower is not the issue, it’s everything else. They are both selfish and their relationship is toxic.
He seems to want a woman who will serve him and doesn’t really care how she feels.
She keeps the baby knowing he doesn’t want it and might rescent her and not be a father for the baby.
He will feel trapped, she will feel used and ignored and might have to care for the baby alone.
I agree that the baby shower is an event for the lady’s, like a bridal shower, bachelorette party, and batchelor party for men. There are certain events in life for certain people. I know it’s bad, but I can’t remember if I attended my baby’s shower because it isn’t an event we should be welcomed to. That doesn’t say anything to my involvement in my child’s life or my support to her mother.
Inviting a child abuser to an event with children is always a bad idea, and legally he can’t be there if there are children until/unless he is found innocent. My uncle is a child abuser and we had to uninvite from gatherings where children were present for many years. He is an otherwise logical guy so he accepted it without contest. If the guy in your story isn’t volunteering to remove himself from the presents of children, that tells me he’s not done, not remorseful, and can’t understand the harm he has done to the victim and community.
Your friend sounds like a dick and I suspect there is more going on than you or his wife know. He is probably stressed that he can’t manage his life let alone the life of another. It is scary, exciting, joyfully, stressful and many more emotions than I should list. That is still no excuse to be a dick. Maybe things will settle down after the birth, maybe they won’t, we just don’t know, but maybe it is worth finding out. If they get worse his wife is going to need your support in her next move.
It is where I live, unfortunately. OP said a lot of things that make me think she lives in the south.
Sounds like she needs a friend now more than ever. What kind of person would turn their back on a friend in their time of need? Cut him off, definitely. Her though, no.
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http://www.211.org is resources for low-income people in the USA. http://www.thehotline.con just in case for domestic violence and https://www.rainn.org/ just in case for sexual assault and violence.
Yeah, maybe the guy is a douche and backwards. Fair enough. However…
>She sent screenshots of him saying he felt she had taken out her birth control, she ruined his life, and she has really trapped him.
How is nobody talking about this? Everyone just assummed that this dude spent oh-so-much time getting her pregnant because he wanted to be a daddy and now he’s pulling away.
He is hitting rock bottom. Stay with him don’t leave (if you have faith if he’ll be better) That’s what friends do. Once he’s in better place, hell be thanking you
What sticks out to me here is your friend saying she trapped him. Is this true? Did they not have a conversation about having kids? Everything he is doing tells me something is seriously wrong. He suddenly turned into an alcoholic is accusing his wife of baby trapping him isn’t going to his best friends baby shower? I wouldn’t give up on the friendship you should figure what the fuck is happening. You’ve known him for 20 years but as soon as something is obviously seriously wrong you are ready to abandon ship? This may be a very unpopular opinion but that dude is like family to you now. He hasn’t done anything seriously egregious. And while you may think the other dude is a pedo. He has not yet been convicted of anything and as far as you know he really is innocent.
In short you really should get to the bottom of this situation if you care about keeping the friendship.
So I have a question that no one else seems to have asked…
What business is this of yours?
What I read, is you unnecessarily stressing and sticking your nose into someone else’s relationship and finances. As far as I can tell there is no direct harm to you, or reason for you to even involve yourself.
Do yourself a favour and butt out. It’s not your business as to whether he’s a shit parent and partner. If the fiance has an issue, then she should be talking it out with him, not you. Same for him, he should be talking about this with her.
I think you need to be a better friend to him instead of taking another person’s side based on gender. This is a one sided perspective of the situation which shows no redeeming qualities of someone you’ve known over 20 years and doesn’t include what qualities or issues he has with the fiancé which may have made him no longer be interested in her.
Yo you’re not actually his friend so walk away.
Sound like she might have baby-trapped him.
$20/hr and owns three houses? Fucking what?
Is there any chance he’s secretly in love with you and that’s why he’s treating her like shit?
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Not even born and that poor kid has an a-hole of a dad.
Don’t turn your back on your friend and talk to his parents if you know them.
OP he doesnt feel hurt financialy, she betrayednhim by stopping with birth controll without telling him which is basically a scamm in a way, she wanted a kid he did not so its a fraud imo.
Now she has to live with consequences of her doing