WIBTA if I stopped being friends with this girl?

Advice Needed

I (18F) am friends with a girl (C, 18F) who is high functioning autistic. We met in early high school and were close, then drifted for a few years and are now in the same uni accommodation. She is a nice girl who means well, but I feel the friendship is really unbalanced and consists of me trying to help her or meet her needs, whereas I get unintentionally pushed to the wayside. I find it difficult to talk to her about conflict or issues as she is very black-and-white and says unintentionally hurtful things.

If I have a slight disagreement with her, she either shuts you down or shuts down herself. For example, I told her about my human development class where I was learning about stages of pregnancy (eg. at 4 weeks ___), she told me that it was pro life propaganda. I said I disagree because while people can manipulate information, this is factual science. She shut down for the rest of the conversation.

I understand that because she is autistic, she has higher needs than my other friends, and I put in a real effort to try and accommodate her, but I feel like it has become too much for me and she has become expectant of me to do these things. While food is included in our accommodation, she doesn't eat a lot of it due to her sensory issues so invites me to the supermarket a lot. Of course I am happy to go with her, but she has started to expect me to carry her things and follow her. If I decide to look at something a few feet away rather than walk WITH her, she asks what I'm doing or tells me to come with her, but in a way that makes me feel like a dog. I'm an adult human and sometimes I want to get things for myself from the supermarket, ok? I often follow her all the way around the supermarket, spending 15 minutes deciding what kind of crackers or ice cream she wants, and then when it's my turn to find things she gets really impatient and hurries me, asking if I'm done yet. I always carry her stuff for her, it has gotten to the point where I will be eating or doing something on my phone and she shoves something into my hands. The few times I have asked her to do the same for me, or to lend me a bag, she asks why can't I just do it myself.

She is really needy in general and there have been times where I have told her I won't be available because I have several hours of studying to get done, and 30 minutes in she will ask if I'm still studying, an hour in she will ask to get food from the cafeteria, then for a walk to get brunch, then to get coffee, then to go to the supermarket, and then since I haven't responded at all (phone on do not disturb) she will start to video call me. One time I told her I had to do my weekly call with my family, and I would be around an hour, maybe more, so she could do her own thing, hang out with my friends or sit in the common room while I called them. After 15 minutes she started calling me and after 30 she started banging on my door and shouting.

She also doesn't listen to what I say in a conversation with her, or remember things about me or what I just said. She also has ADHD and I understand that this affects memory and attention, but this is how a lot of our conversations go:

C: [Personal anecdote]

Me: Oh that's cool! I also ____

C: [Ignores what I said and talks about herself, something with no relevance]

Because of this, she was shocked to find out that I was born in the UK and my family is Catholic, which I have mentioned to her every time we walk past the Catholic church on our street. She interrupts me a lot, around once every few sentences, and at first I thought it was fine because she was excited to talk about something with me, now it just feels like she doesn't respect what I have to say, but since I've let it happen so many times I feel I can't stop her now.

She struggles to make friends (mostly because she refuses to talk to anyone on her floor), so I introduced her to the friends I made this year. It kind of feels like she is clinging on to them and she has started to invite herself to hang out with us. Of course, she is always welcome, but it is kind of awkward because a lot of the time, she's just there, not really participating in whatever we're doing and interjecting any time she can possibly talk about herself. My friends love to listen to music when we hang out, but this makes her overstimulated, so we try to accommodate her by turning it down or off. Another issue was that my friends and I are going to move into a house together next year, and after hanging out with them for a few weeks she suggested that we remove the girl we are least close with (a lovely addition and great girl who happens to have another friend group she sees more often), and let her join, or let her join as a sixth person. I explained that it took a long time for everyone to be open to a house with five people as some are really introverted, and there aren't many six bedroom houses for rent, she started searching up six bedroom houses in the area to prove me wrong.

The thing is, she can also be a mean and manipulative person at times. I struggle with binge eating and emotionally opened up to her about it. We go out to eat a lot, and I often feel guilty or pressured to eat unhealthy food, and then cannot stop, resulting in often eating two packets of biscuits, two 200g blocks of chocolate, Oreos, candies, chips, etc. until I'm close to being sick. She told me that it's not binge eating since it's not enough food in one binge (rather than the behavioral pattern and cycle) and told me it's invalidating to people who struggle with eating disorders to say that. She is also asexual, which I don't have an issue with or care about, and it's none of my business. She told me that she never plans on having sex in her life because it's "disgusting", and everyone should make the same decision, and then immediately said "You probably think I'm such a weird freak for that". This felt like manipulation and projection to me, if she knew about my values she would know that I don't really care what people do with their own lives as long as it doesn't hurt others. I told her it felt like mischaracterization of me as I believe it's a personal decision for everyone to make on their own terms, but pointed out that I don't think we should devalue people, or make them feel better or worse, based on that decision, and she was insinuating that I was a worse person for having sex. She just said "mhm" and shut down for the rest of the conversation, which made me feel really bad. I feel like if I had called her out on projecting or manipulating me to feel bad for my opinion, that could be seen as ableism in her eyes as I know that she is just being straight up and honest about how she feels, and isn't trying to trick me but just wants me to feel that her way is the right way.

She has also been really mean at times over small situations. For example, I was sending her a photo and she in a righteous tone told me that it didn't send. I explained it was still sending and she YELLED that "YOU DIDN'T SEND IT". When it did deliver, she brushed it off saying "haha, never mind". I've also noticed that she tends to victimise herself over things that happened in high school as she was bullied around the ages of 14-15, in the form of being called names and called weird, although she acted the same to the bullies as she does to me now. She constantly brings this up to new people she meets and I can tell that she is trying to recreate the situation or place people as 'popular' and assumes they will be mean, it's like she has confirmation bias and is trying to make everyone fit her idea of a social hierarchy. Ironically, she was actually friends with my bully in high school and partially helped her to turn an entire friend group against me.

I have talked to my mom, boyfriend and close friend about the situation and they have all given me helpful advice. My mom and friend both told me that I need to set boundaries and ensure that the friendship is 'serving me', but this feels really difficult when it revolves around her needs and wants. My boyfriend told me that he thinks I should ditch her, she is harming and manipulating me and I am kind of enabling her or limiting her from being as fully independent as she could be. He thinks it's better for both of us if I ditch her, and even said that her 'needs' such as going to the supermarket, hanging out with me often, and calling and texting me a lot aren't needs but are instead wants, as while it could be difficult she could hypothetically suck it up and live without them.

The thing is, I don't know if I am 'ableist' for trying to hold her to the same standards as my other friends, as she has extra needs and struggles socially, or if I am ableist for assuming that she isn't able to meet the same standards as everyone else and giving her a free pass. For context, my mother has a chronic illness and brought me up on the belief that her illness doesn't give her a free pass for anything - she still has to show up for her friends and family, and it isn't an excuse to be nasty. She really believes that C should be held to the same standard as my other friends. I really agree with this but I don't know if this is 'right' especially since she has a cognitive disorder. How much of my friend's treatment of me is her autism, and how much is it personality or being a mean person?

Posted Aug 31, 2025, 12:25 AM UTC

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