If you have no friends…

[PegorySpeck]

Do you think there is something wrong with you, or you just haven’t met your tribe yet?

@CMOTDibbler - I empathise.,
I only have distant family apart from dh and DCs which is why I put so much store by my friends. I am very lucky and have good friends from my childhood/teens and have picked up others along the way. I think if I didn’t have those strong long-standing friends I’d have to be proactive and go and find some.
It’s never too late: my mum met her best friend when she was in her 50s as they were both widows and were introduced. They had a fantastic friendship of 13idh years before my mum died.

@DeepaBeesKit

I don't have loads. I have a large & very close family, which means there isn't space in my life for loads of friends. My closest couple of friends are similar, we aren't looking for intense all confiding bezzies, just an occasional glass of wine & some light hearted chat.

I think the older you get then the less friends you have, when I was younger, like teenage age to round about 23 then I had 14 close female pals but your lives start going in different directions and you soon see with your personalities who you will suit being pals with, and who you will not.

My very best pal died when she was just 3 days away from being 32 and she was honestly my only friend that I would consider a best friend, we were pals from age 12 to age 31.

Definitely me! I cut people off if they are the slightest bit rude and generally cba with most people!

Big difference between having no friends out of choice and desperately wanting friends but can’t get any.

Have a wide social circle at work though. Great relationship and big family.

I don't have a big circle, just a few. Used to know loads of people and be out most weekends. It's the kids that have killed my social life and it's full time work that means I don't get to do the playdates or meet other mums, so the kids suffer too.

I have a lot of sympathy with @HateJudgmentalPeople

I've had female and male pals all through my life BUT I've been staggeringly unlucky with female pals.

IME it's harder to get along with women, and harder to make friends with them. Despite that, by making huge effort I have managed to become close friends with a number of women and by diligent attention to the friendship I have managed to keep it going for years. However, after a while something ends this.

In several cases, the friend has either slept with my boyfriend, or offered him sex in an attempt to take him away from me.

In several other cases the friend has moved to another country and then kept in touch until she's made new friends, then stopped all contact.

Some women have taken advantage of my good and generous nature and either abused me, or exploited me.

I've also had a few friends who have suddenly accused me of some batshit crazy untrue thing, or blown some tiny little thing all out of proportion, and thrown a wobbly ended the friendship in a huge huff for no valid reason.

I am a radical feminist, and wish I could meet more like-minded feminist women who don't do any of the above to me.

Strangely, whilst all this has been happening over the decades, I have male friends who are far less demanding, still keep in touch even though they've moved away, and none of them have abused or exploited me, thrown all their toys out of the pram because I forgot to phone them once, or sent them a birthday card a day late, nor has any tried to break up my romantic/sexual relationship with my boyfriend.

So currently I have only four female friends that I am in frequent contact with, plus loads of shallow acquaintanceships.

@daisychain01

Why do you ask OP? Are you researching or something?

I just suddenly feel very lonely. I’ve never felt lonely before. It’s making me tearful all the time.

I love Jessica Lang

I've got plenty of friends. But very few that are 'my tribe' I do most things in my own as none of my friends share my interests.

I'm 38. It's me.

I grew up with two sisters who were great friends and close in age with each other but a lot older than me. I moved house and school many times and was bullied a lot as a child. I've almost always felt on the periphery of everything.

I'm quite a sociable person. I appear confident, can make conversation with almost anyone and have lots of acquaintances. I've just never really learned how proper, deep, meaningful friendships are supposed to work.

I've mostly accepted it now and it feels OK. DH has very good friends that he's known since school. That makes it harder sometimes, because I see what I don't have, and there's also an expectation that I will form equivalent friendships with his friends' respective others. The pressure to do this when we relocated to his home town was huge. I resisted (I'm friendly and chatty and kind, but there's nothing more there) and now (partly because they're all very close) they all think I'm weird. No change there then!

I'm used to it, it suits me. Could life have been very different? Probably. Will it drastically change? Probably not. I am who I am now, I like my own company and have my own interests, and if I find more meaningful friendships as I get older and more certain of myself, as I seem to do with age, I'll welcome them. But I doubt it somehow.

I have acquaintances but I don't really have friends. I had friends in primary school but I went to a different secondary to all of them, I was relentlessly bullied in secondary school and ended up with v low self esteem. I didn't fit in at all in uni and was suicidal and ended up drinking too much which didn't help. Moved far away after graduating and worked in a highly unsocial job which made it difficult to make friends or maintain relationships with acquaintances. Moved again to a small town where everyone knows each other and I'm an outsider, still working a job with long and antisocial hours. Unable to go to clubs/activities on a frequent basis due to work pattern, unable to do any form of team sport due to work pattern (work lots of 12hr shifts over weekends and nights). Have a ds now and tried really hard to make mum friends on maternity by going to loads of baby and toddler groups and activities. The town is small and everyone already knows everyone and are very cliquey. Managed to make one friend who I still talk to but see rarely due to work. Hoped to make friends when D's started preschool last year but covid meant no standing next to or talking to other parents and again they all already have established friendship groups due to growing up together. Ds is in reception now and I still haven't been able to really speak to any of the other parents due to covid social distancing measures. I have managed to get a phone number from one of them due to bumping into them in a local park repeatedly. My boy is desperate to have a friend come round but I can't even speak to the other parents to ask for him. I have given up on trying to make friends now, I will always work in my antisocial job, I'm exhausted by trying to infiltrate the mum cliques. Fortunately I enjoy my own company though I do get the occasional periods of loneliness. I do feel sad for D's, he seems to play with all children but I can't arrange for friends to come over or meet in parks for him because of my social ineptitude. I hope he doesn't grow up to be like me, he seems to have more charisma and confidence than I had at the same age so far but he is being hampered by having me as his mum.

@Tigger85 So much of what you say, particularly about DS, strikes a chord with me. Our DS is an only child and I really want him to have better friendships than I did / do. This has massively influenced our decisions about where we live and what school he goes to. Although covid has dampened things, he will get invited to birthday parties and things, and thats a way in to chat to other mums. I found that from there, and hanging around in the park after school, the casual chats started and the invites to play dates followed. We still.dont have that many people round to play but that's changing now. We have a few of his friends booked to come round in half term already and it makes my heart sing! You'll get there.

From reading this theres 2 types of people.
1 had friends through primary,secondary,uni.
Which is most people.

And then there's us, people who had a few friends splattered through their life.
Who where used,abused and ghosted

We can only give so much.

I've always been a kind and friendly person but have had dire luck with friends over the years, one of my last so called friends decided that she "didn't need me" anymore after I was going through a difficult time. Now I just prefer to keep things on a superficial level so I don't get hurt again, sometimes being used and abused so much can take it's toll. I am also autistic so I suspect that's why friendships have also been challenging for me

@HateJudgmentalPeople I too can relate to so much of what you have wrote. I've always tried hard with the female friends I've had or women in groups I've joined, but seem to just attract resentment even when I've been perfectly nice, it's kinda baffling but I've given up trying to even explain it to most people because they claim the fault must lay with me

[quote smileyemoji]@HateJudgmentalPeople I too can relate to so much of what you have wrote. I've always tried hard with the female friends I've had or women in groups I've joined, but seem to just attract resentment even when I've been perfectly nice, it's kinda baffling but I've given up trying to even explain it to most people because they claim the fault must lay with me[/quote]
In a twisted way then it can be quite flattering because they say when you are treated this way, and/or put down from other females a lot of the times, then it’s because in some way, shape or form, then these types of people are threatened by you, you have something in you that makes other women feel something negative, and so they project their insecurities onto you, I mean let’s face it, if you genuinely didn’t like someone then you would do your best to keep away from them, but to purposely be bitchy to someone more than once, is jealousy of some sort, I know lots of women scoff at this suggestion but it’s absolutely 100% factual.

I have been put down about my body so many times and without blowing my own trumpet, then I do have a nice figure and I can honestly say that every woman that has criticised my body, has been overweight or just out of shape, and if these women genuinely thought all these horrible things about my body then they would most likely be nice to me because I wouldn’t be threatening to them, do you see what I mean? I bet there are bits about you that are great or very attractive, and this is what women have picked at?

I have a BMI of 22 which is bang on perfect for my age, height and body type and the amount of time overweight women have told me I’m ‘too skinny/are you bulimic/do you eat/he must be a paedophile because he likes you and you have the body of a child’, is through the roof, and if these women genuinely thought my body was unattractive, then they wouldn’t dare say anything, for the record I am a size 8 and 5ft 2” so I’m very normal there, but I do work out and women get annoyed because I haven’t let myself go, one said to me “you’re getting to that stage where nobody will want to sleep with you because of your age (I am 40 ) so you may as well just let yourself go like the rest of us” it’s horrible and I have had addiction issues so the many women I was around weren’t the best reference, but I didn’t put women down. Telling someone they are too skinny is as bad as calling them fat, now I just say “you’re just jealous” if ever I get put down and I pretend not to care but inside I do care, I am very sensitive.

My friend, whose boyfriend recently said to her I was pretty, has went all weird on me lately and is being bitchy to me, and she is 40 so should know better, we have a great laugh together and can chat about everything but she is putting the onus on me for her partner being a cunt, he also said to her “I bet she will like me” about me, but yet she gave me a hard time incase he flirts with me, can you believe that? How deluded is she, but then what do I expect, she picked him over her own kids do why I expect her to see thjngs as they are, and not the fantasy in her head.

[quote smileyemoji]@HateJudgmentalPeople I too can relate to so much of what you have wrote. I've always tried hard with the female friends I've had or women in groups I've joined, but seem to just attract resentment even when I've been perfectly nice, it's kinda baffling but I've given up trying to even explain it to most people because they claim the fault must lay with me[/quote]
Also I guarantee that there is something very attractive about you, whether it’s your looks, your figure, your personality, the way you dress, maybe you get lots of male attention, maybe you have a great job, a beautiful house, or maybe you just radiate positive vibes and insecure women don’t like women like this, I think the safest way to get females to like you is to be friends with very beautiful successful happy women and then maybe, just maybe, we women that other women don’t seem to like, would eventually get a decent friend.

I am guessing someone here will flame me for writing what I did but I can only write about my own experiences, so many people only like you when you are miserable.

I have been through quite a bit in the last 10 years and when I finally got over my addiction, and became happier, then the bitchy ‘friends’ got even bitchier! That’s jealousy 100%.

I also had more friends when I was chubby and didn’t take much care of my appearance, funny that...