Old friend (have posted about her before) who is child free and not very keen on kids, to put it mildly. I had my dd fairly late in life and we had some teething problems with her adjusting to the fact I am a parent: kicking off about my having to cancel things when dd was very sick, making no bones about the fact she can't stand hearing about people's kids etc. We had a bit of a rough time but have come out the other side and generally have a workable compromise: she accommodates the fact I have to put my family first, I have accepted she will probably never play a part in my dds life and keep discussion about my dd to a minimum.
The problem is recently she seems to be channelling some of this previous negativity into lots of very negative remarks about parenthood in general in in her work in particular in a way that I think is about to sabotage her at work. She is working on a project with another woman who has two kids. She feels that this woman is basically not up to the job as a direct result of having kids. Obviously I can't judge this woman's competence, let alone comment on her family set up, but I find this judgemental and occasionally sexist. She says things like how entitled she thinks this woman is because she basically doesn't work weekends, every time she thinks the woman isn't pulling her weight she slips in remarks like "that's what you get for working with mums." Recently she said she had given this woman a dressing down about some perceived failing and said she had told her: "if you are going to do this job for me properly you are going to have to be a bad mother for a while." I was speechless at this: I felt like saying that if my dream employer said this to me I would tell them to piss off on the spot.
It's tricky for me: I don't want to trigger another argument about this topic: it's clearly very sensitive for her, the last few rows we had about it were explosive and very upsetting so I don't want to reawaken an old argument and I want a quiet life. And I doubt she will listen.
On the other hand some of it is downright offensive: I wouldn't sit through that sort of sexist bile from a male colleague so dont see why I should tolerate it from a close (female) friend who calls herself a feminist.
And also I don't think she is doing herself any favours like this: she has a long history of falling out with colleagues and employers because of her lack of tact and I fear this woman is on the point of throwing in the towel on this project (potentially taking financial backers with her) because she is clearly not feeling appreciated by my friend and presumably having to deal with remarks like this isn't helping. It may sound sanctimonious but I genuinely feel that she needs to be told for her own good how much damage she could do to her own business.
Should I tell her that she can't get away with talking like a 1970s police chief and risk another apocalyptic argument, or should I just stay out and let her dig herself further into a hole?
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Should I say something to friend or smile sweetly and let it go? (Long, sorry)
71 replies
quesadilla · 01/07/2013 13:13
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