Be honest…it’s me isn’t it

[RandomlyNormal]

i know so many woman my age that have large groups of friends they’ve known forever everyone gets on goes on holiday together etc etc

ive Tried so hard especially in the last 8 years since having a child meeting new people, keeping in touch with friends from school etc but although I have lovely friendships with 5 friends and other people I see often- I’ve not got a group.
I’ve tried hosting everyone at mine at few times but it feels forced.
lots of school mums I see have big friendship groups they’ve known forever it makes me feel like I’m a loser for not having this.
I feel like I missed the part where you meet your tribe for life?
Im donning my hard hat as I know people with have much worse situations but i do genuinely feel like I’ve really missed out

Is it? @OnMyWayToSenility

I’m not keen on groups and none of my friends know each other. The only problem I have with this is that it takes longer to meet up with people individually. The advantage is that the conversations are more personal.

I’m a bit worried about moving house to a block of houses where all the women meet up for nights out. I really hope they don’t ask me.

I think it's just luck when a whole group gels and it works well and you're lucky if no one falls out, they have kids at similar times etc etc.

I have friends I suppose but I’m easily overlooked. If there was an event and I wasn’t there, nobody would miss me or question my absence. I’m on the outside of lots of groups but when these groups arrange things they don’t invite me. It’s just life.

I've always had individual friends rather than been in a group, which was always how I preferred it, but since having children it is much harder to keep up with people and it would be nice to have a group to meet up with.

I think we are always marketed the idea of "the girls" having bottomless brunches and pillow fights so the reality is never going to be the same.

The nicest group I've met since having children has been a local book group which meets regularly, but we don't really socialise outside of the meetings and we aren't each others' closest friends.

I have loads of friends, but I like to be a lone wolf so I’m not beholden to anyone. As far as a gang is concerned, I haven’t had that since my 30s. And it wasn’t my school friends / mates for life crowd.

I would have had a tight gang in my 20s. But I also moved to Paris & made new friends. In my 30s I lived in the city while my friends got married & had kids. I made a new gang of friends & socialised a lot.

Got married at 40. Had my son during COVID, so I didn’t do any antenatal / mum / baby classes. And the play school mums are all busy with their big families. I honestly don’t feel I’m missing anything.

You could look at families in the same way. My parents are very involved with my son & my sister’s little guy. But her in-laws are super-close & they all holiday together, have big family parties, weddings, etc…

I have one friend who I wish to be in my life until I'm no longer here. I'm not really bothered about having a massive number of friends. It's definitely quality and not quantity for me.

Well, it’s not either/or — you can have a number of good, close friendships.

I think the idea of having one single ‘tribe’ is a media invention, popularised by Friends and Sex in the City etc., purely because we need a finite number of characters. I think most people have a number of much more fluid friendships clusters, which shift and morph over time, as people come and go and circumstances change. I moved countries in early 2020 and the only people I’d met were a few of the parents of DS’s new friends before the schools closed. I would now consider them all friends, but have become closer to a few I see more of, and unexpectedly, after one couple divorced, I’ve become close to the husband, whom I hardly knew before but see a lot of now. But all these people obviously have other friendship groups, too, me included. It’s not ‘exclusive’.

Quality over Quantity every time 👍

@MaudGonneOutForChips of course. I was talking about me

I'm fascinated by tribes and how they work. I've been in a few big ones but they all disbanded and there were a few fallings out that split whole groups which made me sad. I have smaller groups and one on one friendships now but I do feel sad about not having a bigger group. How have your groups changed as new people have been brought in? As group members meet and break up from romantic partners? I was younger when I was in these groups and most people were single (and the few partners there were weren't really part of the groups). But I'm guessing for such long standing friendships it must be different?

I could have written this post. Seems I also missed that bit. It’s weird as I didn’t stay in touch with school friends when I went to uni. It was harder back then queuing for the phone. Those who’ve stuck together a lot didn’t go to uni where I live. We have had a reunion for school which was interesting and I’ve re connected with many on FB but no one meets up unless they had stayed in touch. Same with uni friends. We all went back to our home towns, got married etc. Connected back up via FB. My baby group friends were lovely whilst I was off on maternity and working part time but I was the first to have a second baby so they all basically stopped inviting me out when my hyperemesis started as I kept declining. Again we are fb friends and chat if we meet accidentally out and about. The school playground crowd have been interesting. I made really good friends with one of them and we do sometimes meet up but she has been going through alot personally and often cancels. Luckily I don’t mind my own company (or a good Netflix box set). Lol. I’m also a single parent which I think was part of the issue with the school playground mums - catholic school, gets divorced!! Slightly joking but I do often wonder if me being single and them not is off putting too. I’ve joined other groups to try and make friends (church, various choirs, meet up app) but they all seem to be much older than me. I don’t socialise with people outside of work either.

I don’t have a group of friends either.
My closest friends from school all had their children super young, like 14-16 (it seemed to be a thing in our hometown) and I didn’t want to take that route, so naturally we grew apart. I was working and earning and they were having a rough time being single teen mums.
Theyre kids are now passing their driving tests and getting jobs etc and I’m only just starting my family.
I too try, but you just can’t force these things. My DD is in nursery now starting school next year and I’m hoping we find a nice group then, but if not, as long as my DD has friends I’m sure I’ll survive.

I hear you 💐💐💐x

I’m a drifter. I have a few close friends who I am quite close to, communicate regularly and see fairly often. I have access to a couple of tribes and it’s really not for me. There is always a queen bee, I’m not into that and actually I’m one of those slightly dominant personality types who has a habit of upsetting the Apple cart by suggesting alternatives options. Then I end up with people looking to me for the answers on what to do next and I find it stressful. So yes, it is me, but it’s also ok.

Don't worry about the group thing. It's quite overrated anyway. I have a very loose one. We all know each other since school and meet 2/3 times a year. At this stage of life, it's beginning to feel a bit forced. Nothing made that more obvious than the dawn of WhatsApp. Different groups withint the group now clearly have their own WhatsApp, That's just the way people behave. I'm sure cavemen did it too. I go to the meet ups just because I don't want to create an issue, but honestly, at this stage of my life, I could do without it. I'm not sure I ever enjoyed it if I'm honest.... it was all done in such an alcoholic haze (in 20s 30s) usually that its hard to tell.

Sometimes people have this, I think they’re overrated. I haven’t been on holiday with friends since having kids.

i have a couple of close friends, kids ages don’t match or anywhere near / they don’t have kids. I would change my friends for the world. Those groups probably have one or two bossy ones, I remember when my first DC started school and people were asking each other what job they did, what road they lived on and what car they drove. I think they were actually sussing out who are to hang out with. I’d waited for the ones who didn’t ask those and was friends with them.

I do feel for you, I def missed the boat as I moved around with work, but I have core friends away from school and I feel this is better fit for me, although I do have some amazing Mum friends also.

I think its actually quite rare for people to have a group of genuine friends.

My husband is the only person I know who has a group who all genuinely like each other, don't have any drama etc.

I don't have any friends at all! I like his friends, they like me, but we don't interact outside birthday parties and the like.

Whereas I think it’s very normal to have multiple genuine friends that genuinely like and value you. I don’t recognise the drama-prone ‘friendships’ described on Mn, or the ‘cliques’, ‘exclusions’, fallings-out over hen parties and weddings etc.

Sounds a bit like my life. Aa a child I went to about 10 schools in different countries and it didn't seem worth getting too close with people. Also I'm almost 58 and as there was no internet etc when I was at university and we all moved around a lot - I moved abroad for 10 years - we all lost touch. I'm also disabled now which makes it harder to meet up - and don't have much money.

@OnMyWayToSenility Please enlighten us as to how you have determined this.