help me, what makes female friendships tick.

[ItsInTheSand]

I am 40 and I still don't get the whole female friendship thing and it's impacting on my children.

Meeting for coffee, texting about tv shows, play dates, bbqs...

What are the rules and what does and does n't work. I seem to misjudge the situation over and over again, tips needed to cope and pass on examples of best practise to kids.

You either need to make an effort to fit in, or look in other places. I think you're looking in the wrong places if you're finding people with dramatically different personalities to you.

For the record, tomboys like me don't like women who make out like they are some rare species or something. We are not. And we do like female friends as well as blokes! We also tend to avoid anyone who says they don't get on with women and don't have any female friends! It's also better for us because there's less chance of any sexual tension building (assuming you're both hetero).

I fail really badly when it comes to unwritten social rules, I've often thought I'd get on much better if they were all just written down somewhere so that I could memorise them and maybe I'd be less socially awkward. I'm more awkward around other women though and feel more self-conscious but what I've found that works is alcohol, similar sense of humour and similar hobbies.

Sonlypuppyfat I agree.

In fact I would say that for most women the thing that makes their friendship tick is bitchiness, nastiness, excluding and mocking other women.

There are exceptions, I have female ones, but I do find that a very high percentage of women are out and out nasty.

I don't

I find that the vast majority of women are great. You just have to get to know them and enjoy them for what they are and their differences.

Do you care about the women?

It doesnt mean you have to be best buddies with them,but if you care about them, it should show.

Watching with interest as I have similar concerns. I just seem to be incapable of bonding with other women the way most other women seem to be able to. At school and uni it was fairly easy as there was sooo much 24-7 shared environment. But in adulthood I constantly seem to be the one who joins a new group of women (excercise class, or hobby group, for example), thinks she's getting along fine and then by week 3 or 4 is sitting on the sidelines while everyone else seems to know each other's life stories and is arranging separate meetups. I'm NOT naturally sociable, I know that, but I think I'm fairly ok at being chatty and open. Occasionally I find someone who I seem to effortlessly get to the fairly intimate stage with, and I don't think I've done anything differently on those occasions. But so many women I come accross seem to do this effortlessly all the time!

I kind of know there aren't rules, per se, but equally I always feel like there's some kind of generally accepted normal routine that I'm getting wrong somehow. I've been told sometimes that my social nervousness comes accross as stand-offishness, but I've been told way more often that I come accross as bubbly and friendly. One way or another I think I either give off the wrong signals, or I don't do something I'm supposed to do...

In fact I would say that for most women the thing that makes their friendship tick is bitchiness, nastiness, excluding and mocking other women.

SeaSickSal, that's so sad, isn't it? I think when I was at school and in my early 20s, I'd have wholeheartedly agreed with that statement, and I do know a lot of people whose friendships seem to work like that.

But these days I feel blessed to have amazing female friends, whom I've met through many different parts of my life. We're all pretty different people, but what we do have in common is that none of us are gameplayers, petty or bitchy. We care about the world around us, we're interested in travelling, learning new things. If one of my friends bitched about another, I'd call her out on it. None of us are very stereotypically 'girly' either - we love clothes, babies, a wee gossip, but we talk about plenty of other things. We've all share a fun, daft sense of humour. We don't bitch about 'men' as if they were a different species, and we all have near enough equal amounts of male and female friends.

I think, ItsintheSand, you've just not found your 'people.' I would run a mile from the kind of game-playing 'frenemies' I had when I was younger! But maybe also don't think you won't have anything in common with someone who watches crap TV and texts about it - I'm the only one in my office who watches Honey Boo Boo and reads the National Enquirer, but I have great friends here and we have loads in common - just not my interest in 'popular culture.'

'In fact I would say that for most women the thing that makes their friendship tick is bitchiness, nastiness, excluding and mocking other women.

'There are exceptions, I have female ones, but I do find that a very high percentage of women are out and out nasty.'

Wow, that's an amazingly sexist thing to say. Oh, and completely untrue. No wonder you have trouble making friends if you have such a low opinion of your own sex.

I have good female friendships and I have never, with any of them, been bitchy, excluding, had a bbq or texted about a tv show. I am just myself - the way I am with all my friends, male and female. I take an interest in their lives, I invite them to spend time with me, I provide a listening ear when they are going through a hard time, I socialise with them in the pub, do sport with them - so many things.

There are no hard and fast rules, just do what you enjoy and put effort into forging links with people you enjoy spending time with.

Hi OP,
It could be that you haven't failed at friendship stuff -you've just not found a like minded person yet.
Could you give examples of when you think you've misunderstood stuff?

I know that when the kids were babies and I moved to a new area, I had many false starts with people that were not destined to be my close friends: doesn't mean I did anything wrong.

If you really truly want more friends (I'm not sure you do) then you just have to put yourself out there as much as possible, join stuff, start stuff up, talk to randoms: but do stay yourself or it won't work.

However, my family weren't particularly good at social rules/quite self absorbed and I can remember consciously having to remember to ask people how they were and about themselves well into my 20s-now it's second nature (and I do care how they are -if I stop and think about it) and I think I'm ok. So I do think some of this stuff needs to be modeled.

My 5 'best' friends are people I have met since having my DCs not my old friends as such. I find these 3 people in particular I can tell anything to, we don't have to live in each others pockets and we just accept each other with no worry about jealousy (between each other or our DCs), faults etc etc. If any of us wanted to invite the rest of the world out to coffee the others would be happy, we see each other separately if we want to and we will help ourselves to coffee in each others houses.

I think I have other 'friends' who make me feel differently, ie I am always trying to be the best friend I can be and generally not the most comfortable pay dates etc, I often leave thinking god that was stressful. I can't even pinpoint what it is.

I don't think how you describe yourself would mean you wouldn't be able to have good female friends, I really think you just haven't found someone who is as genuine as you. You would fit into our group nicely as we always say the reason we are such good friends is that we are so different to each other personality wise and like different things, opposites attract and all that.

YABU.

I find it helps not to delineate friendships by gender. People is people, some will want to text about TV programmes & some won't, it's nothing to do with being female or male.

Also, you don't have to be friends with the parents of your children's friends. If you don't have anything in common, fine, it's your children that play together, not you. If you do get on well that's great but you don't have to be best friends.

I have to say I find the tone of your post a little superior (ie how do I make friends with all those stereotypically female women when I'm subverting that by being used to a male environment), but maybe thats just because I abhor the use of the word "laydee".

I did not really think of it the way Brittabot has put it. Do you feel that it is a bit lame to have girly friends as such? I don't mean that to sound horrible towards you, just wondered if you genuinely prefer male company and therefore don't relax enough to make female friends.

Some women are nasty. So are men. I would say, that if you are an adult woman, and you don't engage in nasty behaviour, you will find the way nastiness tends to manifest in women much easier to recognise, so it will seem to you as if there are more nasty women than men.

Friendships are like people- they're individual. It's all about finding people who share your interests and like you back.

squoosh, how would that be sexist if she has found that to be true amongst the women she knows? Genuine question.

op. You dont have to enjoy the coffee, playdate thing.

Can you give examples of how you are misjudging things?

Men can be bitching and nasty, but dont say it out loud as much as women.

It's sexist because I refuse to believe that of all the women she's met in her life, that 'a very high percentage of them are out and out nasty'.

I'm sorry, this says far more about her than it does about 50% of the world's population.

I don't know, I have 1 friend who I met through working together years ago and I don't really know anyone else. I did try to strike up a conversation with a woman of a similar sort of look/age to me at school gates but she cut me dead and tbh it put me off ever trying. Now dd is in yr 4 it feels like the other mums have their "groups" so I just tend to live in my bubble most days.

But if it was true, it wouldnt be sexist?

there is no law in the world that says you have to be friends with the mothers of your children's classmates. And equally its wrong to resent ones who are friends with each other and hang out, or to imply that they are somehow shallow or bitchy for doing so. One of the HUGE perks of being an adult is getting to choose which other adults you spend time with.

Agreed with Brittabot, I think there's a little bit of snidiness about the whole women's interests being naturally inferior to men's interests - as a techy anorak type myself not only is that ridiculous as there are loads of women who aren't into shopping and stuff, but also who am I to say that since my interests are more traditionally "male" that makes them better? Strikes me as being a very sexist viewpoint.

Also really like MrsMelons screen name, if only it'd thought of it first!!

Her judgement has been clouded by some horrible people she's met. It's completely and utterly sexist to declare that most women are 'out and out nasty'.

Ii isn't very intelligent to make dismissive statements about huge sections of society.

Gosh what a refreshing thread. I've often thought that I get on better with men than women - I'm not interested in meeting for coffee or some such either. My sister seems to do nothing else, I've never understood it.
I have some much-valued friends of both sexes, and I've met them all through mutual friends, shared interests and just 'clicking'. Since having DD 6 months ago I've hardly met any other mums I want to stay in touch with. Not being bitchy - they're just not my kind of people, and part of this is because I'm 40 and they're mostly in their 20s, I work full-time and they stay at home and so on. I've been very lucky that a good mate of mine had a baby around the same time as me so we kind of propped each other up through the early months. We're both back at work now and can moan to each other about missing our DDs!
I hardly ever meet up with friends except over a few (alcoholic) drinks - aside from the odd baby date with aforementioned friend. I'm too busy with work and family!

There's a fine line between denigrating things that are seen as traditionally female, and denigrating women.

It is actually possible to argue that because our culture has evolved from a tradition where women were inferior, female pursuits and leisure activities are inferior because the better, more exciting/interesting pursuits were exclusive to men. Before anyone jumps on me, I DO NOT believe that "traditional female activities" are inferior, although I DO believe that men long excluded women from many exciting/interesting activities.

That's very, very different to saying that women who like cross-stitch/sewing/baking/whatever are less interesting because their interests are less exciting. Yet there is very much a tendency to do just that. It is, however, a form of misogyny, whether intended or not.

Agree totally with Squoosh and Hully. Most of my friends are women, from the pint-swillers to the gin-sippers (actually they are often the same).