Do they tell an engaged friend she can do so much better?
DEAR CAROLYN: My friend “Mia” recently got engaged. She and “Steve” have been together since right before covid, and she’s been wanting to get married for a long time.
However, Steve is terrible. None of her close friends like him or think he’s right for her. Two examples of many: Mia always wanted kids, but Steve didn’t; all of sudden, she changed her mind about it. He also drinks and does drugs (mostly party drugs) a lot, while she’s a homebody, and we recently learned she dropped acid with him because he was pushing her to. He dims her sparkle, and everyone sees that except her.
It’s gotten to the point where we have started not inviting her to certain things because we knew he’d be there. Steve doesn’t even seem to be excited about their engagement, let alone the wedding; he made a comment recently about “if it even happens.”
Her oldest and best friend once questioned the relationship, and Mia said that if Steve ever left her, she’d die.
As a group, all her girlfriends want to tell her this guy sucks and she could do so much better. But we also know her well enough to know we could easily lose her.
How do we choose between telling her our feelings and risking her friendship? — Conflicted
DEAR READER: Preserving your friendship is important, but it’s much less of a worry than preserving Mia.
For all the red flags around Steve — flapping like a human United Nations — Mia’s “I’d die” is way more alarming.
Maybe hyperbole is her thing; you’re better able to put it in context than I am. But we have that statement, plus a decent case for Steve’s awfulness, plus her “long time” focus on Getting Married, which tends to crowd out any incentive to be picky about the “to whom” part. Plus, we have her bending to Steve’s will on things that are out of character, off her life path and unsafe. These add up to real peril for Mia.
And while I am super (duper) sympathetic to finding Steve so terrible that you’ll drop Mia to be rid of him, you and her other friends heighten her risk when you do that.
Abuse math is vicious. When Steve drives off all her people, she’ll have no one but Steve, and depend on him more, and feel less able to leave, and take more of his abuse.
Mia needs her friends’ love.
She needs your eyes on her. She needs your steady presence as a reminder that she matters — to each of you specifically, to all of you together and to the universe just because. Coordinate if you can so she’s covered and you’re all sharing the weight.
She also needs to hear how she appears through your eyes: “I am worried. I see you losing your sparkle, and feel helpless to fix it, so I’ll just say this: I’m here for you, 24/7, when you’re ready.”
Say it one-on-one, kindly, with an eye to planting this idea in her heart vs. persuading her this very instant. Also be clear this is concern, not criticism.
And make no mention of Steve. If she’s already not receptive to everyone’s assessments of how terrible he is, then stop. You don’t want to push people in Mia’s position into feeling they have to defend their terrible mates, or their terrible choices to be with terrible mates. I went into this more in a column last month.
Even if your dimmed-sparkle talk upsets her, too, at least she’ll know she has someone she can ask for help. Fingers crossed.
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