Is it your responsibility to give them a wake-up call?
Q
I’m afraid I have a real “Am I The Asshole” situation and I’m more afraid that I may very well be the asshole. I’m 32 and have been gainfully employed at the same place for 5 years. I work very hard and have made my way up during my time here. Throughout the years, I’ve had unemployed friends ask me for job recs or inquire about open positions at my company. At first, I would enthusiastically recommend my friends to my colleagues or help use my own network to help them find something. Here’s the thing – my friends are consistently dropping the ball. They either show up late or have no-show interviews, overstate their qualifications on their resume, or if they do get the gig, they frequently call out or underperform. It always ends up making me look bad for backing them, which in turn makes me want to stop helping them. This causes a lot of cognitive dissonance for me because obviously I prioritize humans/friendships over work, but it’s always really tough out here and I worked really hard to be in the spot that I am. I’m aware that community is all about helping out your friends and neighbors but at what point is it going to be to my detriment? I fear that I’m already there.
I’ve tried to offer these friends help with their resumes and applications to be there for them without necessarily having to stick my neck out for them. They always pass me up on this help though, insisting that they have it. But then I see their resume or application materials and find spelling issues, formatting errors, missed opportunities, and other stuff that I’m aware of because of my experience. I feel like a Republican Boomer sometimes because some of these friends, when they do get a job, always complain about having to do it! Again, capitalism is a bitch and we shouldn’t have to work in order to live but here we are.
How do I show up for these friends without constantly getting burned? Is it my responsibility to give them a wake up call/reality check? Or is this just something each person needs to figure out on their own eventually?
A
Valerie Anne: I don’t think you’re a bad friend for not recommending someone for a job you don’t think they would be good at. I think offering to help them with their resumes or applications is above and beyond your responsibilities as a good friend, and if they don’t take you up on that, that’s on them. If I used my connections at a job to get someone an interview and then they NO-SHOWED?? I don’t think I would be able to take that friend seriously anymore, and might even have to re-evaluate our relationship, because that’s not only disrespectful behavior just in general, it’s extra disrespectful to you specifically. I don’t think it’s your responsibility to give them a wake-up call or reality check, but it’s also not your responsibility to help them if they have let you down before. I think it’s perfectly reasonable to say, “Sorry, I need work/life balance, so I prefer to keep my job and my friendships separate,” and link them to your company’s career page. They can take it from there if they want to. You can even explain that you’ve been burned before, but that will probably just encourage a string of “but I’M different.” I think people are going to complain about work, that’s just human nature, and listening to their woes is something you can offer them to be a good friend, and you can ASK if they want advice from you, and give it if they do, but you don’t have to offer them much more than that.
Summer: NTA (IYKYK). Strictly speaking, I don’t think it’s your responsibility to network your friends into any position at your place of work. That’s just socially acceptable, low-grade nepotism. Is it high on the scale of harm we can do? Not even a little. But most people would say it’s a little unfair to the processes and values we cherish if pressed on the topic. More importantly than me bitching autistically about following rules really closely is the effort. As in, I think you’ve put enough effort into it and it’s stressing you out. Which is a good time to step back and rethink it.
Besides helping them get an in at your company (sometimes at your experience, reputationally), you’ve offered them a variety of useful advice and assistance. You’ve tried to give them assistance that could be considered a little unfair and plenty of opportunities to receive extremely constructive and practical guidance. None of that is stuff you had to do, but you did it because you’re a supportive friend. If they can’t meet your effort halfway by listening to good advice or just not screwing up, that’s their problem. Effort deserves to be met with effort. Reciprocity is the foundation of a relationship.
It’s already stressing you out, so I don’t think having sit-downs and giving them ‘reality checks’ is your job. None of this is. One of the only mottos I live by is, “I’m old enough to make my own mistakes,” and I think your friends need to learn that motto for themselves.
Nico: Having to work in order to be given basic human rights like food and healthcare is wrong, and certainly something to complain about, but too much negative talk can make friend interactions unpleasant, so I do understand your being tired of hearing people complain about jobs when they do get them. That’s probably the easiest boundary to set — you can ask if it’s okay to shift the conversation to something more constructive, not necessarily even positive, but less complaint-based.
As for helping friends get jobs at your company, you do not have to do that, especially not if it threatens your own ability to keep your job — because if you get canned because your friends got canned, now even more people are out of work. You can simply say that it’s not possible for you to influence, and again, offer to look at resumes, cover letters, and application materials, which is a big help! You’re right that this is a really crucial aid if people take you up on it, but, again, if they don’t want to, that is just more time you have for yourself and that is completely on them. Everyone prioritizes work differently, and you don’t need to give anyone a wake-up call that they don’t want. If someone comes to you for help, or if you ask permission to have a frank conversation with a friend who is really struggling, that is something completely different, but otherwise, it might not even be welcome.
Your (solicited!) dating advice to a younger friend is falling flat.
Q
I’m 24. My younger friend (19) is dating a woman ten years older than her. They have known each other since my friend was 17. This is my friend’s first relationship. There are other things there— the most important one being that this woman is straight up mean and manipulative to my friend (I’ve seen screenshots of their texts, but never met her).
I know that my friend is an adult and can make her own choices. However, I’m finding my advice (that she asks for! And is more than “dump her”) is falling flat. The responses I get range from “but she loves me” and “but I love her” to “I know she’s toxic but [this this and that].” I am finding it pretty annoying to listen to her talk about this woman she’s dating, but I also know that most of her other friends won’t listen to her about it at all.
I want her to leave this woman. I dated a person 7 years older than me at her age and it sucked, and I am pretty convinced my friend’s situation is as bad or worse than mine was (and I know that this fact might be coloring my interpretation of the situation). Is there any way to get her to listen to me? Should I even be trying?
Thanks :)
A
Riese: Unfortunately, you can’t and won’t convince her to leave this woman, she has to make that choice for herself. I think it’s valiant to try, though. That said — I don’t think focusing on the age difference is the most effective approach here. (But more on that at the end of my answer!) I’d suggest really getting down to the exact specifics of the relationship she has with this woman and how the woman treats her and behaves towards her. When I’ve been in emotionally abusive or toxic relationships — or simply in relationships that were not serving me, that were breaking my heart — I still remember so many specific moments from people trying to intervene. Nothing changed overnight, but every single one of those people and those moments helped get me out a little closer.
In 2004, was coming in from the balcony at a party with my Macaroni Grill friends, because I’d been on the balcony talking to my boyfriend (my co-workers liked to joke that i was the “person most likely to be outside on the phone,” because my boyfriend would get mad and come looking for me if i didn’t answer, so I always answered). When I came back inside, they were all passing around photos they’d just developed and I could see how life had been going on all around me all that time, connections made and grown, and I wasn’t in the pictures. I’d always been in the other room, or I hadn’t showed up at all.
My co-worker Anna was at this party. Maybe two years earlier, she’d been madly in love with a man who immigrated to the U.S. to marry her and she was over the moon and then in time we saw that happiness fade, she was sick, and crying, and told us that he was cheating. But in the past six months or so they’d started divorce proceedings, they didn’t live together anymore. I didn’t know Anna very well, but she came up to me that night and said “You think you can’t live without him, don’t you?” and I nodded “yes,” and she said “I know that nothing i say to you will make a difference. Because I have been there. But Marie, you will realize, when you finally get free, that life is so beautiful. That there are so many wonderful people who will love you in a way that he never will, they will be there for you when you need them, and—people have just let me in when I thought i wasn’t worth anyone’s time. You have friends, Marie, and you will see, one day, how much better it is on the other side.” I thought I will never get there, I will never be anywhere but right here, I love him too much, he’s my soulmate. But one day I did, and she was right.
Over a decade later, I remember sitting in the pole barn talking to Laneia on the phone when she said, “I promise you the loneliness you fear experiencing without them will still be better than the pain you’re feeling now, with them,” and “this is not the world, you are.” I remember when I was in the deepest pit of that post-breakup pain and V told me she’d been there, once, too, but that she happily felt in that moment —the moment in which we were now speaking to each other — that she was THRIVING and wanted me to know that I would be able to say that about myself one day, too. “I want you to be able to say I am thriving,” she told me. It was so generous, and in that moment I believed I could have it, too.
So I think you can say things like that. It might not change anything, at least not right away. 19-year-olds are pretty stubborn, there’s maybe no other age at which the gap between “what we think we know” and “what we actually know” is so deep. But I think you can tell her you’ll be there for her on the other side of it, that you were in a bad relationship once and that life really does go on and get better.. I never would’ve gotten out of any of the things I got out of without knowing I had people waiting for me on the other side. You can tell her that there is another side. Don’t let go of your convictions, here — whenever anybody acted like a toxic partner’s behavior was okay (which I imagine they often did just to be kind/patient, or to end the convo, or to avoid conflict or to avoid the partner getting mad at them), I would ride that validation all the way to the bank for years. Tell her it’s not okay, and it’s not good for her. She might push back because she has to live inside her own reality, but it’ll get under her skin gradually. Change happens but it takes time.
As for the age gap —I know there are a lot of strong opinions on this topic, and I think sometimes those opinions tend to drown out the fact that there are all kinds of tricky-to-dangerous power dynamics in relationships between people of all ages and it’s impossible to generalize an entire age group. Every relationship is its very own blessing and its very own beast. In my personal opinion, as someone who has been on the younger end and the older end of various age gap relationships and of course been alive and witnessed many others in the world around me and people close to me— it’s not the age gap itself that is potentially problematic, but your friend specifically being only 19 with someone who is 29. We don’t know a lot about their relationship — like, there’s a big difference between an older person happening to fall for someone younger despite their age vs. a 29 year old actively seeking out or preferring to date people under the age of 20.
And listen, no age gap between consenting adults is automatically dangerous, but 19/29 at the very least invites scrutiny and would require a lot of care and consciousness to function in a healthy way. That clearly isn’t happening here. Quite the opposite. I hope your friend sees that soon enough and in a few years can look back and say she’s so glad to be past that point in her life and now she is thriving.
Summer: Age gap or not, a relationship that is detrimental to a person that is difficult to extract from is borderline abusive. I can’t call this outright abusive because I don’t know more details, but it certainly doesn’t sound enjoyable if your friend is positioned to excuse harmful behavior from their partner. It’s also difficult for me to ascertain a course of action for you without knowing details because you’ve had bad experiences with an age gap relationship that may color your opinions.
I can advise elsewhere: I was once in the position of trying to talk someone out of a (very abusive) relationship. Their relationship was emotionally, verbally, and physically abusive. Over time, I watched my friend withdraw from her friendships, lose track of work, and otherwise fall into dysfunction. Despite her frequent complaints to other friends about the state of this relationship, she remained embedded for a range of reasons (material and emotional). Eventually, we drifted away from her because it was so difficult to reach her at all, much less convince her out of the situation.
It’s not our duty to parent our friends. Especially ones who are adults. You can’t shift someone who doesn’t respond to reason without risking nuclear consequences for yourself. Unless you see active crimes or people’s lives being endangered, you can’t really force the issue. The harm of toxic or abusive relationships extends beyond the people who are victimized. It includes secondary victims in the form of loved ones caught nearby. If extracting a friend becomes too tedious or unlikely, you’re within your rights to close the topic, or even leave them to it. You’re already getting annoyed listening to her talk about this partner. I doubt things will improve for either of you. Sometimes, saving yourself from a bad situation is the best you can do for everyone involved.
Submit your own advice questions right here!
AF members get the benefit of having your advice questions answered by the team. We do our best to answer every question, which is like, 99% of them — very rarely do they stump us. Questions remain anonymous!
You can send questions on any topic, at any time. Submit those questions into the AF+ Contact Box which we’ve also embedded here:AF+ Contact & Advice Inbox
Age gap relationships are not inherently bad (full disclosure: I am 15 years older than my wife). While 19/29 is certainly interesting and likely less than ideal, the problem here is the unacceptable behaviour by the older person. The 19 year old is probably not well equipped, due to their lack of life experience, to see this behaviour for what it is, but this general scenario is not age-specific. It certainly plays out in age-comparable relationships. I am pleased Summer’s advice rightly focuses on the behaviour first and foremost.
Autostraddle, I’d love to see you commission an article on couples in a loving and mutually supportive age-gap relationship. I accept power imbalances exist and that age is one signifier, but it is critical that we do not pathologise age-gap relationships as inherently problematic, as the writer of Q2 does.
Totally agree Kerryn (and I think you’re probably right that this is more to do with a lack of relevant life experiences that might help them see the red flags).
I know this is technically a sex diary, but the Sex/Life we published last week is about a very healthy and loving 22-year age gap! (And just as an aside, I wish SO MUCH everyone could listen to the audio for that interview, because those two were HILARIOUS and ADORABLE.) (And very horny 🙏)
I read this and 💜’d it. Thank you. Oh for the audio!
I wish the answer to the second question had consulted some experts on abuse. I don’t think the accepted wisdom is, as Summer said, to give up and withdraw from a friend in an abusive relationship because somehow you’re the victim too. If someone is being abused (and I’m not saying if this friend is or is not!), they really, really need friends to stick by them, because isolation is a key tactic of abusers. I don’t think it’s ethical to recommend someone distance themself from a friend because that friend is being abused and they find it frustrating to hear about.