My partner and I mainly socialise with two other couples. Unfortunately, our friends often invite a third couple, whom we really don’t like. I used to work with the woman and she always had a very superior attitude to me - which she’s carried over into our social life. She puts me down in front of our friends, while her husband basically ignores us. We’ve tried explaining the problem to our other friends, but they feel it would be very awkward to exclude anyone from the group. It feels like our social life is being sabotaged.

Susan advises
You’ve tried tackling your original friends over this issue - and that didn’t work. Why not try tackling the new members of the group? By this I don’t mean that you should have a stand-up row - in fact, exactly the opposite.

Instead, you should try to get closer to them, make more contact, become more friendly.

With luck, this will have two repercussions. First, if you offer the hand of friendship to this couple, they may just respond. Welcome them and they’ll find it harder and harder to be snobby back - or if they do, it’ll become clearer and clearer to the whole group that they are acting badly and then the others may well close ranks to support you.

But if you do make an effort on this couple’s behalf, it could just be that something else will happen. You just might start liking them, appreciating them, understanding the insecurities that make them behave badly (or realise that they’re not behaving badly it’s that you’re feeling insecure around them.) In short, one way to disarm an enemy is to move closer and engage!

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