Different strokes. I just told a friend that they should let me know if there's anything I can do to help, which I've never done before (for this friend). His mother is having surgery this week. I've known this person my whole life and he's a lot like me, so I know that taking your advice wouldn't be the right path for this.

I would like to be told by a friend that they care about me and would like to help in some way if they can. What I wouldn't like is if they said "OK, I'm going to choose a thing that I think I would want in your situation and do it for you, and you have no choice because I'm going to do it anyway." Chances are, what you thought was helpful is NOT what I need in a difficult moment and I don't want to be subjected to another person's choices being superimposed on my situation. Lucky for me I know that my friend feels the same way, and we have different ways of approaching these things with each other because of it.

"I'm at Costco. What do you need? And don't say 'nothing'. I'm going to bring you something, and that's that" seems incredibly aggressive to me, and if I had many friends who behaved that way I would be endlessly frustrated.