My friend flaked out on me. How would you deal with this situation?

awalt_cupcake · 2015-09-05T04:09:35+00:00

He's not your Friend. He's somebody you know.

Friends don't give excuses to each other.

throwaway-aa2 · 2015-09-05T06:42:47+00:00

You always need to set the stage properly to convey your feelings and how you will approach the situation.

The first mistake, is if he was flaky in his past with you, time should have been addressed in the onset of meeting up I don't know how long you've been here but if you failed to bring this up (let me guess: this was in the back of your head much earlier than 8pm and you still didn't bring it up. Very passive thing to let slide dude).

For people who are flaky, set times and ultimatums at the JUMP: "alright we're meeting here at 8pm. Don't be more than 20 minutes late" or "alright 8pm. Just to let you know I've had a lot of people show up late to appointments so I usually leave if I'm waiting for more than 20 minutes.. no hard feelings" And just like that you've set expectations from the get go. It's much more likely that these people will wait until the last minute to get what they need to get done. If they give you shit about bailing, go silent.

If they don't have a history, if they don't show up in 10 minutes bounce. Do something covertly disrespectful like when they call, immediately ask "hey where were you at X time" and they go "oh battery died, etc... where are you now" and then you go "yeah my battery died TOO! I'm at home charging now. Sorry can't make it out today, I'll see you around though". There are a lot of ways you can handle this but the main thing is that you know you want to set boundaries and bring things up when they should be brought up, you just have to think about the best way of doing that, and as you hold this frame (or frame in general against other people) you'll get better at asserting your desires in a more palatable way. I had to learn to get to the point where I could say to an Ex: "I can't be friends with you" and she says why not and I say "I don't give my time away to a woman who won't be intimate with me, I can find other women who will give me what I want" and be very assured of myself. Had this been in the past, I would have scrambled or not asserted my desired... or just not asserted them in the right way.

AT the end of the day you'll learn all of that. Just make your desires known and you'll learn to polish up the delivery of them.

tuxedoburrito · 2015-09-05T04:30:05+00:00

I'd explain to him how you find it disrespectful that he does this. If he wants to honor your time and not waste it, you're willing to meet up again. If not, then next him like you would a woman.

-TempestofChaos- · 2015-09-05T19:31:54+00:00

My actual friends will be there exactly on time. The best ones will be there early.

Title	My friend flaked out on me. How would you deal with this situation?
Author	[deleted]
Upvotes	5
Comments	5
Date	September 5, 2015 3:57 AM UTC (10 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/askTRP
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/asktrp/comments/3jpf5l/my_friend_flaked_out_on_me_how_would_you_deal/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/askTRP/my-friend-flaked-out-on-me-how-would-you-deal-with.189139 https://theredarchive.com/post/189139

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