Do close friendships naturally fade in your fourties with young children?

[Lonelylifestage]

I really miss talking to friends, and I'm wondering if it's something about me, or if it's a life stage thing.
I have two small kids, and I'm an expat in the UK, not originally from here. But I don't really have any friends. I arrived in the UK as I was 30 years old, and I feel like at that point it's really hard to make friends.
And even with small kids, I haven't really got close to school moms. I have a couple of near friends who I sometimes do things with, but I miss having those conversations with close friends that I used to in my 20s. I wonder if other people still have that at this stage in life, as moms with young kids and all the responsibilities, working full-time, kids in school. How do people actually achieve that? Or is this one of the things we loose with age?

I agree with you. I think it's really hard to make and keep friends. I used to have a really close group of friends but as we've got a bit older and people have settled down, we just don't see/speak to each other any more. And one barely has time to reply to messages which I struggle to understand. It's sad really. I'd love to see them more!

But saying that, my sister seems to have a great group of mum friends and old friends she's stayed in touch with so maybe it just depends on the people. It definitely takes give and take from both sides. Where about in the UK are you?

I'm in London, but as I ony moved here when I was 30 I don't have childhood, school, Uni or family friends.
It feels impossible to have very close friends and I try to just do things with a couple of people I'm fairly close to, but it's those osw friends do conversations over a coffee or a glass of wine, that I really miss!

Yes, but that’s because some people with children believe they don’t have not one spare minute in the day to reply to a message.

I have found my friends without kids make the effort but I’ve seen the friends with kids, ignore messages then months later send a patronising message about sorry for the late reply, when you have kids, you’ll realise.

meanwhile, we all see them on SM liking posts or making banal posts about how their greatest thing since sliced bread creations are just amazing and the all on course for noble peace prizes.

I say this as a mother, if your friendships fall by the wayside, it’s because one side made little effort and then eventually the other side matched the same energy.

I am proud to say I have a small circle of friends that stayed solid, I’m the only one left from our original girl gang of 8 and that because the ones with kids suddenly exhibited the behaviour described above.

every friend of mine still in my life don’t have children but they went out of their way to accommodate. Dropped off food, cleaned my place when the baby was born, let me know there were events but no pressure especially in the first six months and then made an effort to plan more suitable events like a brunch instead of an evening. Drinks event to make it easier to attend etc.

I find most people once with kids, act like they don’t have a personality, try keep up with the joneses and appear rather two faced.

I agree it’s all about the effort put in. I do have a small number of the fun friendships you describe, because I make the effort to keep in contact, offer my support when needed and share things in my life. The number is far smaller than in my 20s, because only a few felt worth hanging on to! So either invest in long standing relationships more, or initiate some new ones though groups or the like, and nurture them well.

I agree with this and this is exactly what happened with my friends. I found now the friends I see the most are the ones without kids

I have met most my current closest friends through kids - school gates or organising playdates. You say you haven't got close to school mums - have you tried? Sure can happen that most have enough friends, but surely some are welcoming?
Yes sure friendships are different, you may not chat every day and hang out every weekend. But still totally possible.

Not in my experience, but they won’t fall into your lap. You need to go out and get them. I moved to somewhere I knew no one aged 40 with a baby, and again to another country with a seven year old aged 47, and I made friends both times.

I was fine but I’m not in London I did live there for a bit in my twenties so it was just party central at that stage of life. I made some good friends at the school gate, the kids have almost all left school now. I have relocated completely twice in my life.

How old are your children, OP? I found school mum friendships dud develop but took a few years

I’m in my early forties and it is very hard. Where I live it’s a small town so everyone pretty much has long established friendships. I am sociable and do do play dates and get invited on the odd night out but I don’t have anyone that I could pick up the phone to. I have to be quite pro active to have any kind of social life.

No that hasn’t been my experience at all.

i left the uk age 30, moved to NZ with DH. Lived there for 5 years and made a lot of casual friends. Then we moved to France with DS1 and I made a fabulous group of friends, many of whom are still my best friends today. We all had kids together so hung out when they were babies, then continued our friendships when they went to school. The babies are 18 now and I’m back at work for the last 10 years - and I have several really close friends among my colleagues now.

you have to be proactive if you want an active friendship life. Last night I sat down with my phone and I:

1. Accepted an invitation to one of my book clubs
2. confirmed a date / time to meet an old friend for a beer
3. texted a really close friend and proposed meeting for a walk tomorrow
4. Sent a text to a small group of friends that I only see every such months to suggest we get a date in the diary to meet.

At work I’m going to propose going for a post work beer, and also try and organise a dinner.

all these people are important to me so I make the time to contact them, suggest a meet up, and get it confirmed. You get back what you put in, with friendships.

One of the people I'm close to is a school mum, we do somw things together but it's not the same as the friendships in my 20s... maybe I should try to be more open and even do thung together more often.
My friends from earlier days are all back in my home country, which is half thw world away and several hours time difference. So although we keep in touch, having long conversations about nothing g and everything just doesn't happen.

Tell me your secret! I work full time so don't drop off/pick up kids at school so don't even get to chat with the mums (except birthday parties or school events)

They are 5 and 8

I moved abroad in my mid-30s and made new friends, mostly via children. I would have struggled if I worked FT. I make and made an effort to maintain friendships from home. My job to make the effort as my choice to leave. All these friends are very very dear to me now that I’m in my 50s. I wouldn’t be without any of them and each “set” brings me something different.

yes you certainly need to make more effort. Everybody is busy, me and my friends also work full time, so any meet.-ups need to be scheduled well in advance, those spontaneous 'let's hang out' things like in our 20s rarely happen.

Yes you also should indeed make an effort at birtday parties. Do you do play dates? Highly recommended, and whenever I had a new child over for a play date, I always asked the mum to stay for coffee (it's usually drop and run in my current country), so we can chat a bit and see if we click. With some yes, with some you see that while they are perfectly pleasant, you don't have much in common, also perfectly normal. Kids activities, also great place to meet other parents, especially competitive activities, so you spend a ton of time together during matches.

Or what about your own hobbies? Many options to meet people who at least share the hobby. From rock climbing to choir singing, whatever you fancy.

London can be tricky but it’s full of people who have moved for work. Unless you live very centrally it’s just a series of towns that are connected. I don’t think you’ll have a better opportunity than when you have kids at primary school. I did not have instant success at my kids school. I would chat with different people when I was doing pick ups at the gate but it didn’t really turn into anything. It was year 6 that ran into a mum on the train and we had a bit chat about books and she invited me to her book club. It turned out to be a really close knit group of women who all met during reception year and had gelled. I’m very lucky to have been accepted in. I will organise nights out to the cinema because I have a membership and can get discounted tickets. Someone else is into wild swimming and she’ll organise those. Someone else will suggest a pub night etc.

I also made a couple of good friends from my work. I decided that I wanted to explore more events in London after work so once a month I would head off to something arty. Another lady started to tag along and then we were joined by 2 guys we knew in the department. We still meet for dinners and drinks even though 3 of us have left.

The other place that has been fruitful for me is tennis. Probably more than any sport I’ve done although netball probably would have been good if I’d stuck at it longer. I know it’s tricky if you work full time and I had plenty of periods where I worked shifts or my husband worked shifts but it’s putting the work in. London has so many “analogue” nights and events and if I still lived there I’d be exploring them without question.