My friend asked me to approach a boy and ask for his Snapchat username, and I said no. Am I a bad friend?
Absolutely not, says our elder. She was only thinking about herself.
Dear EWC
So I have this friend with anxiety. She is getting help from a counselor about it. We are both 14 by the way. We were ice skating with some other people then she saw this boy who she thought was good looking. She wanted me to go ask for his Snapchat username for her and me to give him hers. I said no because I was scared and anxious about it, I said no then she got mad at me. I got yelled at for being selfish and I got called a bad friend. I do things such as our school shows and things like that. She used that and said, “You’re not an anxious person since you do that.” She then proceeded to call me selfish. My main question is. Am I being selfish? After that we went out with some people. She then asked someone else in our friendship group the same thing she asked me to do to the boy at ice skating. This girl said no because the person was with their family and pushing a pushchair. My friend got mad. The boy at ice skating was also with his family. Which leads me on to my next question. Does my friend have a right to be mad? And is it fair for me to argue back with, “You can’t expect us to do something you wouldn’t do yourself?”
M-Sharon replies
You’re not being selfish. She is the one expecting others to do what she doesn’t have the courage to do herself. In the first situation, she could have said hi to him, and ask if he would like to perhaps communicate on Snapchat. I know this takes a lot of guts to do this, but if someone else doesn’t feel comfortable doing it for her, she needs to let it go. She can’t expect friends to act on her behalf every time she sees someone that she’s attracted to.
She hadn’t considered that the situation was not conducive to this. Each time, the boy was with his family.
I think it’s perfectly fine for you to tell her that not only is it not fair to have a friend do something that she won’t do herself, but that she is being the selfish one. She was only thinking of what she wanted.
I hope this helps.
Letter #: 455499
Category: Friendship