Friend links herself to MI5 to me!

[NotASecretAgent]

Changed my name for this due to the sensitivity of the topic, hope you can understand and that MN HQ respect the privacy! I have recently become increasingly friendly with a girl who has a child of the same age as mine. It has been great to share our experiences together and support each other, as she also lives nearby and having met by chance I was really pleased I had found such a good friend.

However as the friendship has progressed and we find more and more out about each other I am beginning to find her more than a little odd. She has several issues and problems, which I do not have a problem with in itself at all. Just when looking at the bigger picture I begin to question it all.

She now calls me at all times of the night,(up to about 1 am) and has become quite needey and always wants to meet up. I'm always a bit more laid back about these things, I enjoy my own company and don't really enjoy rushing about too much with my baby.

She spent around 10 years desperately TTC, yet at the same time also suffered from an eating disorder where she claims she was a size 6 attending weight watchers. She says she used to get weighed in her coat which she weighs down with stones in order to make her weight appear more.

The thing that has really baffled me is her partners mysterious trip away. On the phone she told me he was going away but that she could not say where or why. When I met up with her she brought the subject up again and stated that she didn't realise that his job in the CID could lead to a position such as this. I joked that it sounded like MI5 and she just looked at me and said 'hmmm' in a way to make me think that I was right.

Moving on to a few days later on a night out when we both got very tipsy, she boached the subject again, saying she couldn't believe how low paid his new position in MI5 was. I asked how he had come to be working there, and she then said that she also used to work for them .

I'm really confused, the two reasons she gives for him doing this conflict and surely any employee, even an ex employee, couldn't be so indiscreet? Earlier on in the evening she told me in her work (claiming a different occupation) she earnt double the wage she quoted her partner would be earning.

I think she must be a compulsive liar. I could be wrong but I find it unlikely. She is a beautiful, intelligent young woman and I don't see why she would feel she has to make these things up, but I am finding it hard to think of what to make of it all. I am thinking of backing off, and yet at the same time enjoy seeing her and her baby, and we do get on, we have lots in common. Has anyone out there got any opinions/ solutions to this? And do you think she is telling porkies?

[Nimme]

Sorry no solutions for expect to ask her outright. Definitely telling porkies!

[Enid]

woooooooh

isn't an obsession with working for the secret service a sure-fire symptom of a compulsive liar?

I would be dust on the horizon by now.

[luvlymum]

I think you should go with your own intuition, sounds as if she is telling porkies though, sounds as though she has psychological problems you can only feel sorry for her!

[emily05]

I know alot about this situation (but if I tell you how I might have to shoot you ) If this was true she would not have told you.

People in this position are encouraged to tell their family - but definantly not friends. she would have been ALOT more discreet about both her and her dh. There is a very vigerous (sp?!) selection process into the home office and MI5. It sounds doubtful that she fulfills this criteria. Often being in MI5 means taking posting where you are abroad for 3 years - does this sound familiar?

sounds a bit strange to me. Also I would have to say something about phoning that late

ANd the weightwatchers thing??? come on!!!

[SenoraPostrophe]

I bet her dh doesn't work for MI5.

Is she the type to make very dry, apt-to-be-misunderstood jokes? (I can see me being in this situation, on the other side - not because i'm a liar, but because people sometimes take me seriously when I'm joking).

If not she could be a compulsive liar, but it could equally be a one-off thing that she's using to explain something that she doesn't like about her dh? (that he's actually inside or something). Dunno. Does she tell other tall sounding stories?

[AnnaInManchester]

Does she come on here? Im not sure how you can find out if she is lying.

[NotASecretAgent]

No she dosen't come on here. The weight watchers is another example of a tall story IMO. Never any postings abroad, her DH was away for 4 days this week though! Not quite the same really. Not said jokingly at all IMO. I like her but I don't want to be taken for a fool.

[edam]

I like SP's explanation that she's covering up for her dp's absence somewhere less respectable (if that's the right word) than MI5. It rings true with me as I once met and got to know a girl who said her brother was away at boarding school. Seemed a bit odd as her family were definitely very poor and she was in a crap state school. Later found out he was in borstal.
Have you ever met this man? Maybe she doesn't even have a partner and is embarrassed to admit she's on her own? That could be why you are getting late night phone calls...

[Aero]

I looked after a child a few years ago where the mother was like this. She was a lovely person, but ever so needy and all the things she came out with especially regarding work just didn't add up. She was also unreliable regarding meeting up etc. In the end I got fed up with it all, despite knowing her difficult circumstances. I just couldn't keep up with it all and gradually withdrew from the relationship, although I found it sad for my ds1 who was friends with her ds. Finally they moved away (due to bad circumstances) and I made no attempt to find their forwarding address to keep up any kind of contact.

[Enid]

Maybe she has done him in

[NotASecretAgent]

No I met him when he picked us up on said drunken night. Seemed a nice bloke. She is lonely though as he is in the CID part of the police so is never home. But if he was off on a jolly away somewhere, as he did recently, she moaned about the cost of it, and that was just one night away. Don't feel she would be too embarrassed to talk about it. As his job in CID he may have had to go 'undercover' but still no need to embellish that either really is there.

[NotASecretAgent]

Beetroot, LOL!!

[Blu]

Enid LOL

[Jimjams]

Just found out that someone I have known and liked for several years has been telling a whole load of whoppers. Spot them all the time now, very, very odd, but I think they must hide self-esteem problems. she sounds like a fantasist to me.

[mytwopenceworth]

she could be very insecure and feel like she is boring and she is trying to make you impressed (read it in a magazine advice column about a woman who told the most outragious lies and couldnt stop and she said she did it cos she felt invisble and inadequate and she just wanted attention)

[starlover]

siounds like she is telling porkies.. yes!
if she has problems, and is a compulsive liar, then she can't help herself. If you are still happy to enjoy her company from time to time and just take her stories with a pinch of salt then do so.

I personally would leave my phone off the hook during the night though!

[NotASecretAgent]

MTW, could make sense. She has three step siblings, I wonder if she tried to compensate in some way for this. But like I say, she is very beuatiful, and if her career she claimed to have before is true then very successful too (she told me her occupation in front of her mum). She is with her childhood sweetheart... Don't quite know what I am trying to say but everything is very odd. Unlikely to make much difference but will try and cool for now, maybe she will realise I know she is talking crap and think twice in future

[MamaMaiasaura]

NaSa - You arent from down south are you?

[NotASecretAgent]

Yes, where are you Awen?

[wordsmith]

Sounds to me as though she is rather bored with her life, wants you to be her best friend, realises that you perhaps aren't as keen on constant contact as she is and is trying to make herself sound a little more interesting.

I have a friend who also wants more of my time than I can give and IME these can go either way - bitching about you behind your back (in my case) or inventing reasons for you to think she's fascinating (seemingly in your case.)

I don't have any direct experience of MI5 or other secret service type jobs but I know for a fact they would have vetted and rejected anyone whose wife was in the habit of 'spilling the beans' to someone they've only recently met!

Perhaps her DH is at a shower curtain ring saleman's conference. Like the guy in Trains Planes and Automobiles.

[FIMAC1]

I would have to shoot you if I told you how I know, too! but this is a pack of lies - anyone who works for any of the Security Services (it has not been called MI5 for years - its SS now - MI6 is now SIS) would not say anything about where they worked and would, probably, if it came up in conversation say that they worked for the Government or had some sort of diplomatic role. They 'may' tell siblings and parents, thats about it

I feel sorry for her!

[MamaMaiasaura]

Nasa is said child a little boy? Name beginning with E? Only reason I ask is because if one and same i also think alot of it is total bollox and if you need someone to talk to i know where you are coming from.

[tillykins]

I think she is probably elaborating to make herself seem more interesting to you - bit sad and a bit silly

Anyway, I've watched "Spooks" and "The Professionals" - they definitely don't tell