**TLDR:** Friends dog pile on me when teasing/making fun of each other, they tend to go too far. But they’ve shown genuine gratitude/like towards me as a friend.
I’m a freshman in college in a small yet close-knit friend group of five people (including me.) I think it’s important here to give names and context on my friendship here.
A – Great friend since freshman year of high school, sibling dynamic
B – Friend I made during orientation, considers me their best friend
C – Friend from high school, got closer in college but were in each others circles in high school
D – Is with B, the only other one whos the same gender as me (group’s pretty mixed)
Recently, it feels like the disrespect from my friends have been growing more prominent, originally, our group was a lot of banter/teasing but recently it feels like it’s only been on me. When C gets teased, it’s some gay joke that guys make to each other. If B gets teased, it’s a running joke we’ve had for months that he’s completely embraced, or something he’ll amplify for the bit. A doesn’t get made fun of or teased, while D gets teased, but not on anything serious. I’d like to note here that I’ve always had a “banter with A like siblings” thing for 4 years, but it spread to the rest of the group and it just feels like too much now.
**Here’s things I get made fun of now:**
* I got diagnosed with being on the spectrum recently, a lot of jokes are made about it (I made some towards myself, but i don’t enjoy it when they do it now, feels like it’s the only thing they see from me.) I also have a lot of social anxiety, and they’ll make fun of it when I mess up a situation because of it.
* Embarrassing moments (They’ll amplify these like crazy, these are like decently cringe but nobody’s cringe moments get brought up as much as mine, especially if there’s were more worse in a way.
* A weird double standard (I don’t know if it’s a gender thing, but they’ll make fun of me or look at me weird for talking about something, while dapping each other up if one of them says the same.)
* Appearance?? This is mostly from A, who’s always vocal against body shaming, and I personally don’t do it. (At least specific, I don’t call him fat or anything, but the occasional big head comment comes through.) But he’ll go after me, and target personal things, despite being vocally against it towards himself.
* Bad decisions, I was very suicidal and depressed in the beginning of the school year and felt very alone. I ended up making some bad choices yet they’ll bring them up and make fun of it. This choice was becoming involved someone who was kind of weird, and they’ll make fun of my taste in guys, or how I’m so stupid for liking someone like him, but I was alone at that time, no thanks to them.
I’ve tried vocalizing my dislike of some of these jokes, but it feels like it gets swept under the rug all the time. I know they like me as a person, they ask me to hang out, they’ll buy me food, they’ll express their gratefulness to me and so forth. I know they think it’s all fun and games, but I don’t feel respected at all in my friend group. It’s all jokes to them, but is it really that funny to pileup on me?
I also have a somewhat unique role in the group, they called it the glue, or connecter. I was the reason all of these people met, even the couple met through me. I also helped them stick together, and more. Five’s an uneven number, and A/C meet daily at the gym, while B/D are together, but another thing with this group is I’m kind of the middle of the scale. I hang out with all of them equally that they tell me all the stuff they have going on. I’m also the one to plan all the things.
But all in all, I know this isn’t a one-sided friendship or that they don’t like me as a person but I just feel like when they joke around, it feels targeted and all one-sided. I just don’t know what to do, because it feels like they won’t listen, or they’ll call me sensitive.
4 comments
I was feeling that your situation was eerily smilar to mine until you made that point about you being the “glue” or “connector”. At that point my jaw literally dropped because that’s exactly what my group used to tell me. It hands down felt super creepy having this degree of striking similarities between your case and mine.
I was going through the same feeling during my first year at uni. I was part of the group. I was always invited to any gathering. I was always heard during any matter involving the five of us, but just like in your case it was almost always me who was on the receiving end of their jokes and teases. I started to express that after a certain point their jokes, although funny and hilarious for them, started hurting me and I wasn’t appriciative of whatever they joked about. Of course since I had been taking those jokes silently, it kinda became the norm for them to just joke AT me and my words just LOST THEIR VALUE. After trying to convey my feelings to them for the better part of my first year at uni, I decided towards the latter part of my first year that since my word had lost all meaning I had to take action and show them that if they don’t listen and respect to what I say, I can distance myself from them and be relatively unaffected by it, So I did exactly that. For the next six months I kept my distance from them. I would greet them and ask them how they were doing and then go on about my day. At the same time I developed some good bonds with other class mates.
But make sure to never backbite about your previous group in front of your new Mates. If anything just tell them about the positives those five people had and blame you being away from them as a concequence of your own mental fuckeries and other stuff. Eventually word will get to them (that despite you being away from them, you still have respect for them).
So after this six month period slow and steadily they sort of reincorporated me back into the friend group but this time I feel that the level of respect is greater than it ever was when I used to be friends with them before the six month haitus.
This is how I was able to get some weight into my words and let them know when it’s time to stop.
Hopefully this proves of some worth to you.
Do you want to be more respected or more liked? The more you have respect for yourself, even in the face of close friends or family, the more people will be required to respect you. If they don’t respect you, then they’re simply not worth your time and the value you bring. If this was your best friend, you would be sticking up for them, explaining that they deserve to be respected properly, and consequently deserve friends who do so. If those said friends of theirs didn’t learn to be more respectful, then you would tell your bestfriend to be free of such disrespectful people, because they deserve better. You deserve better, and it makes perfect sense to treat yourself with such.
you are weak, here the problem. You don’t even understand why they are doing it.
Ask you why and learn to think over their minds
As ” the connector,” they probably dogpile on you in part because they’re all the most comfortable with you, so they tease you harder than other members of the group they’re not as close to. That said, if they’re really your friends they’ll respect that you’re sensitive. I would try talking to them each individually about it, maybe starting with A, asking they support you when the group is going in that direction. Also, to just generally tease less as a group, and don’t participate in any teasing. If they don’t shape up, go make new friends and think twice before you mix your groups.
If one person more than the others makes fun of your taste in guys, they may have a crush on you they are not able to handle well.