Unfiltered Story #292158

My partner has an obnoxious friend who is an endless source of stories for this site. She just returned from a group holiday.

Friend: “My trip was terrible! The other travellers were stupid and mean, no one wanted anything to do with me! I guess it’s mostly [Her Son]’s fault.”

Me: “How can you say that? [Son] is clearly too young to influence your behaviour in any way. Blame the person who had the moronic idea to book the trip!”

Friend: “No! Don’t be stupid as well! It’s not my fault that those people were mean! You should have seen everyone stare when we were introducing ourselves! I just said “I’m [Friend], I’m 36 and live in Vienna. I like old books and films. I gave birth to my son a week ago, and to reward myself, I’m on this holiday alone!”. All the people were pulling faces and instead of congratulating me on being an interesting person and progressive mother, they just acted as if my being there was wrong! They all wanted to know about [Husband], but no one cared what I felt like! Someone even dared to ask about my lactation, as if that was any of their business what [Son] would be fed! During the entire ten days, there was not even one person who wanted to be my friend! I’m booking my next trip with a different company!”

Thankfully, the poor child has a much better father. While no one could ever make her less obnoxious, the combined brainwashing efforts of everyone she knew did make her comprehend that her son was her only ally and blaming anything on an infant was not a feasible approach to receiving any pity or respect.