I hate where I live

[bakedoff]

AIBU to hate where I live? I literally hate it. It’s a housing development in south east commuter belt land. The people are so cliquey. I’ve found it incredibly hard to make friends. They’re all in social groups that are incredibly hard to break into. I’ve tried. I’ve been told “I’ve got enough friends and don’t need anymore”. I feel like I’ve really let my kids down by living here. We’ve had no play date requests over the summer holidays. Literally none. I’ve tried and tried but I’m exhausted of always arranging and chasing and nothing coming back. I’ve never had this kind of trouble making friends/fitting in anywhere I’ve lived before. Has anyone moved somewhere with their kids to somewhere they know nobody and found a really friendly/welcoming community with women who actually do want to be friends and aren’t fake/pretentious? If you have please share your story!

Agree with Bookmum, look for community / volunteering type groups where you are actually doing something constructive with your time, you may or may not make good friends but at least you will be filling your time with activities you enjoy.

We've moved a lot but I always start with things like Church, scouting, WI, Community groups ... I know that doesn't suit everyone but I always think it's a bit 'aimless' to just try and make friends without some sort of common interest.

And I know it sounds harsh when someone says 'they have enough friends' but it can be true, I was introduced to someone recently & told she was finding it hard in a new area, I made endless suggestions about activities she could try - I was offering to take her & introduce her etc but nothing was 'suitable' - all she wanted to do was to sit around drinking coffee - to me that is utterly boring.

PandaEyed13 and ImmigrantSong,
Usually when a poster makes even a slight suggestion that a council estate may not be a very nice place to live, they are roundly abused for being snobby.
I haven't seen any of those self-righteous posts in reply to your descriptions of your dreadful predicaments.
I hope you manage to get away before too long.

If you've not been there long, I'd hold out until things get more back to normal. Lockdown has not been kind to friendships just starting to bloom. Everyone has been forced to actively contact people, make choices etc. I've found that those in an established group will stay in contact, but those on the fringes are left out. I have both groups and the one I didn't know so well has been fine since schools went back, casual offers to grab a coffee etc. even though we weren't in touch the last 6mo.

PandaEyed13 and ImmigrantSong,
Usually when a poster makes even a slight suggestion that a council estate may not be a very nice place to live, they are roundly abused for being snobby.
I haven't seen any of those self-righteous posts in reply to your descriptions of your dreadful predicaments.
I hope you manage to get away before too long.

I think that people are commenting on panda’s housing situation rather than council estates in general. I don’t think she mentioned anywhere it was a council estate?
I lived somewhere Panda describes and I totally empathise. It was really horrible and I was worried about my DC growing up there. It was a private let and all we could afford, non estate but rows of terraces. Most of the houses were privately let there.
Anyway I was eventually offered a council house which is a beautiful cottage right by the sea. I don’t think area is nice or rough depending on whether or not it’s council.
Panda I really hope your luck changes soon it sounds awful for you.

I agree with getting involved in community projects- you’ll meet other people involved who have children too.

We chose Bradford for its affordable houses. We could afford a brand new 3 bedroom, 3 bathroom house in a cult de sac with brand new houses and good links to Halifax and Manchester and Leeds.

What we didn't know, was that buying a house by a public footpath in the UK is a recipe for disaster. We chose it because it had the biggest garden and abroad where we come from it's not an issue, as people just pass by.

We have had rocks thrown and windows broken, they tried to set the house on fire through the letterbox (pushing lit up papers through), all sorts if vandalism and antisocial behaviour.

The public footpath along with feral youth left unsupervised from the age of 2 to roam the streets free is shocking.

As a result after 10 years of living in this house, I developed mental health problems and my physical disabilities got worse as a result of the stress and PTSD experienced.

We have had racial attacks due to us being BAME. 21 years in this country and West Yorkshire has been an inhospitable place to live in. Locals stick together and don't let foreigners in, let alone BAME people.

I hate this place with a passion. I want to leave, but need to sell our home which is not easy, especially with the weekly calls to police we make.

During my 6 weeks at home I have seen a different side to this estate that I'd not noticed before.

It's quite common to have a very different view of an estate when you're out at work and miss the school run, the going home time, the 'daily traffic'. A family friend lived on a notorious London estate and he genuinely had no idea what people were complaining about because the times he left and returned were the 'quiet' periods and he had little interaction with people other than his neighbours.

@Immigrantsong

We chose Bradford for its affordable houses. We could afford a brand new 3 bedroom, 3 bathroom house in a cult de sac with brand new houses and good links to Halifax and Manchester and Leeds.

What we didn't know, was that buying a house by a public footpath in the UK is a recipe for disaster. We chose it because it had the biggest garden and abroad where we come from it's not an issue, as people just pass by.

We have had rocks thrown and windows broken, they tried to set the house on fire through the letterbox (pushing lit up papers through), all sorts if vandalism and antisocial behaviour.

The public footpath along with feral youth left unsupervised from the age of 2 to roam the streets free is shocking.

As a result after 10 years of living in this house, I developed mental health problems and my physical disabilities got worse as a result of the stress and PTSD experienced.

We have had racial attacks due to us being BAME. 21 years in this country and West Yorkshire has been an inhospitable place to live in. Locals stick together and don't let foreigners in, let alone BAME people.

I hate this place with a passion. I want to leave, but need to sell our home which is not easy, especially with the weekly calls to police we make.

Jesus wept, I'm so sorry you are going through this. Why do people behave like this? It's horrendous

I live in London...when I went to baby groups and at the school gates I found that overwhelmingly the women most open to friendships were immigrants and not local people. I found the latter already had a wide circle of friends 😂 family in the area and didn't need more people in their life.

No idea why there's an emoji in my post, is was meant to the word 'and'

Maybe get a dog? It will keep you all occupied and fret less about being left out, and chances are the neighbours will coo over it and become friendlier?

Or am I being naive?

@formerbabe

I live in London...when I went to baby groups and at the school gates I found that overwhelmingly the women most open to friendships were immigrants and not local people. I found the latter already had a wide circle of friends 😂 family in the area and didn't need more people in their life.

I agree. We tried so hard to integrate and make friends with locals, but they wouldn't allow us in.

Other immigrants however have been fine.

We moved all around West Yorkshire too, so it isn't just Bradford.

The North often has the reputation for being welcoming and friendly, but that's not been the case for us at all.

And we tried everything. So feel completely unwanted in this country now. We are undesirables.

@immigrantsong
Sorry you feel like that, I'm British and feel the same. Maybe it's cultural.. I think it's hard to make friends in the UK. People seem very stand offish and suspicious. I have a group of school friends I've known for decades but my new friends I've made since having children are mainly from other countries.

@Jayaywhynot

Yes I absolutely love this post as it’s exactly what I’ve experienced! I bought lovely period house not so good area for a cheaper manageable mortgage whilst I completed my training. Overall it’s not a bad area as such but I too was shocked at the area since lockdown during my annual leave! Lots of unruly children...

I feel for you OP. How would someone feel about the alternative though, living in a lovely community town with good schools, green, no antisocial behavior but living in a house that isn't at all what you wanted? I'm in that position...

I always think it's a bit 'aimless' to just try and make friends without some sort of common interest.

Agree with this. Geographic proximity is not often the best basis for friendship after a certain age, especially when people have kids and jobs and established friendships. So I understand the 'got enough friends' honesty, and don't think that's pretentious. It's nice to be in a community where people are civil and look out for each other, but I wouldn't expect to be making friends on an estate unless I had something else in common with individuals there. Some people might like it being a place where people keep to themselves and don't get involved, as friendships close to home can cause other problems. That said, this is obviously a bad fit for the OP and it's awful hating where you live. I wouldn't blame the other people who do like living there, but just move on to somewhere with a different vibe. There's lots of great intel on the Property threads.

[quote formerbabe]@immigrantsong
Sorry you feel like that, I'm British and feel the same. Maybe it's cultural.. I think it's hard to make friends in the UK. People seem very stand offish and suspicious. I have a group of school friends I've known for decades but my new friends I've made since having children are mainly from other countries.[/quote]
This was very reassuring in a way and makes me feel less alone.

You may be right, as I have heard others say the same.

I don't know why people here are so closed off to new people and relationships. It's such a pity.

How do you cope? Life feels very insular without friends and a social network. I am quite depressed and want a change. Thinking of relocating, even abroad.

It's such a shame but you see it reflected in posts on here a lot. People seem to make a group of friends at school and then entirely stop bothering and treat anyone who does want to befriend them with great suspicion.

I love meeting new people. It's amazing when you meet someone and click. I've lived all over but am now down in the south west where people are very friendly. The York/ N Yorks area is also very friendly in my experience. Kent and the London commuter towns much less so.

Yes sadly it’s a UK thing and the further you get from London and other large cities with strong BAME populations the worse it is! I’m BAME and know for sure! I would say even worse the further North you go hence why when people discuss these places to relocate from London to they don’t realise how much it isn’t really always an option for people of BAME origin if looking at remote village type areas.

There is a reason why the suburbs/Home Counties in London and Birmingham are very pricey.

@Forwhatitsworth101

Yes sadly it’s a UK thing and the further you get from London and other large cities with strong BAME populations the worse it is! I’m BAME and know for sure! I would say even worse the further North you go hence why when people discuss these places to relocate from London to they don’t realise how much it isn’t really always an option for people of BAME origin if looking at remote village type areas.

There is a reason why the suburbs/Home Counties in London and Birmingham are very pricey.

I completely agree.

@Immigrantsong. I have a few friends and my family...I'm fine but it has been hard for my dd. My ds class was full of friendly parents but when my dd started school, the parents all already knew each other from the area, nurseries that my dc didn't attend and so consequently they're very cliquey and we're on the outside. I remember saying good morning to another mum and she looked at me like I was something she stepped in and said a begrudging good morning back. People are so weird

@Forwhatitsworth101
Thanks for the understanding reply, I'm glad it's not just me.
I'd hate to come across as snobbish, I actually started to feel nervous going to the shop & am going to avoid it, before covid I would stop at the supermarket on my way home so I never realised what the area was really like.
Iv definitely had my eyes opened.
I had plans to invest my redundancy for my retirement but now I'm considering using it to move x

One of my best friends is Indian and she organised a night out with some mums she had met, all from different countries, usa, Europe etc...I found everyone so much more open

We recently moved houses from somewhere horrible to somewhere nice and it's so worth the hassle of moving, and a much smaller house than we could get for our budget now in the shit area - much more so than I expected, actually, I hadn't realised the toll that being a bit on edge every time I left the house was taking until it stopped. I had a look at the local FB group for where I used to live the other day - while sort of thinking 'was it really that bad?' - and the first two posts I saw were 'anyone know what's going on on [X] road today? Saw a woman holding a baby headbutting a police officer' and then 'Someone [they used less polite wording, understandably] has shot my cat in the neck with a BB gun and my cat died'. So yes, it was really that bad!

Move!
It is better to live well now than live well later. Can you imagine living here when retired and around all day?