How should I deal with my friend's mood?

[Englishrose]

Okay, I have quite a large circle of friends, some I'm really close to, and some who are just university friends and I don't socialise with outside of school.

In university I have a range of friends who do a whole lot of different courses. Out of my friendship group there are 4 of us who do the same course and have the same timetable. We are all pretty similar personality wise and spend a lot of time together outside school apart from one person on my course. All she does is come to university and then go home. She socialises with us while she is in university but when we invite her out she never comes out. I don't think she has other friends outside university but if she does she never talks about them, she just constantly talks about her family which is fine with us. She constantly talks about her work and where she is up to, how she is dealing with it, how easy/hard she is finding it ect.

So in university yesterday we got results from some portfolios we handed in a few months back. I worked my but off on mine and came out with A's on all of them. I was really proud of myself because I'd practically given up my social life to make sure they were done to a good standard. Three of my friends received roughly the same grade as me. However, the friend I've described above failed her portfolios and is now in danger of being unable to progress to the next year. Now of course we felt sorry for her, and we were quite surprised, she usually comes out with B's and C's and when she speaks about her work, which is constantly by the way, she had been going on that she confident.

Straight after we got our results, we all went out and had a girly day together to celebrate and we invited her along and she turned us down. Today we had another lecture with quite a long gap in between two lectures. Usually during our periods of free time we head into the nearby town to grab something to eat and go shopping. We invited our friend along and she accepted. Now the main topic of discussion was school work since we had more work to do and our results obviously. However, at every topic she bit our heads off. She was in a foul mood. Whenever we mentioned our results she told us to shut up and if we mentioned how well/bad we were doing on our work we would yet again get our heads bitten off. Even when we mentioned our plans non-school related for the weekend we got our heads bitten off.

Now the problem is this isn't the first occurrence. She is very competitive when it comes to school, and I feel harsh for saying this but she isn't exactly the brainbox of the group. Every time, which is most, someone excels her at someone she goes in a bad mood for weeks and we have to watch what we say around her.

My question is, how should I deal with her constant mood swings. I don't feel its fair that we should constantly be walking on egg shells around her. I think she is old enough and mature enough now to accept that there is always going to be someone better than her. We've tried mentioning her mood swings but we always get the "I've got a right to be in a bad mood, leave me alone" response.

Any ideas would be appreciated. Thanks

[INFERNO]

If you've been friends with the competitive one (I'll call her A and you and the rest of your friends B just for simplicity sake) for a while, such as in high-school, perhaps she wants to do the best but cannot however, you and B get higher marks that she envies. Perhaps she wants to be at the top and perhaps her parents are encouraging this but she cannot despite constant studying while you and B can with less studying. Perhaps she even knows she's not the brightest and that you and B are smarter no matter what she does. In all honesty, I wouldn't address her bad moods if she is this competitive but rather than asking her to go with you and B outside classes, why not ask her if she wants to study with you and B in a group? You don't have to spoon-fed her but simply have group discussions and studies about the classes and assignments or portfolios. She may be reluctant at first but try to make it seem that you're not trying to help her because you're supposedly better and don't be confrontational. Since she wants to study quite a bit, then why not do so but take breaks for lunch, washroom, etc... .

If she accepts but continues her moods and is so aggressive and competitive, then I'd consider finding another friend.