Age gap friendships - do they ever work?

[LovesLettuces]

I've lost a few friends over recent years, for various reasons (drifting apart rather than falling out.)

It's made me analyse why and one thing that comes up is the age difference.

My close friends and I are 3-7 years apart (older and younger.)
The friends that fell by the wayside were 10 - 15 years younger.

I guess I felt we didn't have much in common other than how we met (often work-related.)

My DCs are adults in their early 30s. I'm young at heart but find friends who either don't have kids at all, or their kids are just about to start uni etc are on a different page.

On the other hand I have friends in their 90s. So that works, but friends who are a lot younger, it doesn't seem to.

Anyone else?

My best friend is 10 years younger than me.

We do have children of similar ages. My dd is a few years older than her eldest. But ds is in the middle of her two in age.

We aren't in similar places with other things though. She is returning to Uni this year. I have a long career.

But we both understand each others other commitments and work around them.

My best female friend is 15 years younger than me. We’ve been friends for over 10 years.

Mostly it's hard I think. I'm 51 and I've a friend who's 33. But this is an exception and I know that! I've known her a good while and we live near each other as well as having worked together.
We are friends now. We might even go and walk the camino togehter. But she's a particularly independent person and like me, a single parent. We also have had some similar experiences with our families. So there is a resonance there but unlike other friends my own age, when we talk about the things we've both been through, there's such humour there.

So, yeh, it'd definitely possible! But rare to be really close to somebody more than 8 (approx?!) years younger or older ime.

Im 31 and my oldest friend is 50 and 45. I don't think age matters. Its all about the connection and what you have in common

One of my best friends is 74, I’m 48. We’ve known each other for nearly 25 years. We don’t see so much of each other now but she’s one of the loveliest people I know.

I’m in my 30s and since my mid-20s my friends have mostly been around 15 years older than me. Separately, my partner is 20 years older than me, but my friends are friends I made independently.

My best friend is 20 years older than me.

My best friend is 10 years older than me, I don't actually have that many friends my age, a few from when I was at school who I see now and again. We have all moved away.
My closest friends are also around 7-10 years older than me, and another who is 20 years older, I also have a good friend who is 50 years older than me.
My boyfriend is the only younger friend I have, and that's only a couple of years.

I have good friends who are ten years either side of my age. But we are all living similar lifestyles, with kids with similar SEN, so we have enough if a similar frame of reference that it doesn't matter that we didn't watch the same kids tv etc.

There needs to be something to tie you together. It doesn't have to be age.

"Ever?" Yes.

Both dh and I have different friends who are 10 - 20 years older or younger than ourselves.
I think it is more likely if they are sustained through a shared interest.

Without that shared hobby / passion or even lifestage then it is less likely to be as easily sustained I'd have thought.

Yes but friends my own age are people really on my level. I have much older and much younger friends too. We shared some real bonding times together that can’t be easily replaced, so we are bonded by our experiences. But sometimes I do find it hard, my older friends and younger, at different stages of life, it’s good in one way, we don’t get ‘stuck’ in cliques that so often happens with a bunch of same age friends, but it’s also a stretch to understand another decades or so life stage.

My 2 closest friends are a woman 12 years younger than me and a man 23 years older.

You're forgetting that in your successful age gap friendships, there is still a younger person...

I'm 55, I have a friend who is 63 & another who is 38, it's experiences that make friendships, not age.

My best friend is 30 years older than me. I was born a generation to late. I don't know anyone my age with the same interests.

I'm in my 50s, my two closest friends are 37 and 83.