NEED TO KNOW
- A woman vents on Reddit after her husband’s best friend and his wife repeatedly use their home as a crash pad with little regard for boundaries or basic courtesy
- She and her husband are beginning to feel sidelined in their own home when the couple visits
- Now she’s looking for advice on how to handle the friendship that feels one-sided
A woman turns to the Reddit community for advice following repeated visits from her husband’s best friend and his wife, who have left her feeling frustrated, used and ignored in her own home.
What started as occasional visits has begun to feel like hosting entitled guests who treat their apartment like a free hotel rather than a place to connect with friends.
“They live in a smaller city and come to ours (a big metro) regularly for personal errands, events, or work and almost always stay with us,” she writes in her post. “While it’s framed as ‘visiting us,’ it pretty much never feels like they’re here for us.”
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She explains that their latest visit revolved entirely around a tennis match, with the couple arriving Sunday evening, attending the event Monday, and working remotely from her home on Tuesday before heading out.
After the match, things took a turn when the wife took over the living room to rewatch part of the game. “She put it on our TV and took over the living room,” the woman says. “They know my husband and I aren’t into tennis, so it felt awkward.” She describes sitting with her back to the TV, trying to talk with her husband, who seemed equally annoyed by the situation.
Dinner that night was slightly better, and she appreciated that they helped clean up. But the feeling of being sidelined in her own space lingered. “Once the match was done, we finally got to talk a bit and then had dinner,” she adds, trying to find at least one silver lining in the evening.
The next day brought another layer of discomfort as the visiting couple worked remotely from their home without offering help. “My husband was running around making breakfast and hadn’t even gotten to his own work by 11 a.m.,” she writes. “Neither of them offered to pitch in.” The wife eventually said, “Don’t worry, we’ll order our food,” but the gesture turned out to be self-serving.
“They did, but only for themselves,” the woman shares. “They didn’t ask if we wanted anything.” This marked their second stay in a single month, each time including multiple meals in the host couple’s home without any shared effort or consideration.
To top things off, just before they left, the husband’s friend made an additional request that the woman found especially ironic.
“Right before leaving, the friend asked my husband to pack some home food for his wife as she was feeling sick,” she says. “Of course, my husband did not refuse but it seemed so ironic.” She notes that the wife is newly pregnant, but the continued expectation for favors felt over the line.
The final straw came when both the friend and his wife separately asked to stay again, even though the woman’s parents were about to visit from abroad. Thankfully, her husband finally stood firm. “My husband drew a boundary and said no,” she says.
“I’m frustrated with how one-sided this friendship has become,” she confesses. “My husband has been [very] generous although he’s starting to see through it himself.” The woman makes it clear that what once may have been casual generosity has turned into a situation where they’re being taken advantage of.
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In a follow-up note, the woman reveals that this isn’t the first time the wife has made her feel uncomfortable or small. “The one-off time when we could not host them, the wife made sure to tell me how much they spent on a hotel,” she shares. “I’m not sure if she was trying to make me feel guilty but I remember feeling small.”
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She also recounts a previous vacation with the couple that left her with more hurt feelings. “I used her body wash (without her consent because I forgot to carry mine and it was literally there in the bathroom), she threw shade at me,” she writes. “It’s crazy to think you go out of your way for people and they behave so disrespectfully.”
Now, she’s choosing to draw the line for her own peace of mind. “I have now decided that if my husband wants to see his friend, he can do so by making a separate plan with him,” she says. “I don’t want any part in this.”