Jealous of support friend is getting - childish?

[Lizay27]

After entering the world of single mama hood, raising my kids, the pets, paying all the bills, juggling work and home etc I expected my few friends to somewhat give some form emotional support - they haven't.

Last week I broke down after 6 months and one of the 4 messaged me a few days later. They are very aware of the difficulties i am facing emotionally and have been but I don't think they see the seriousness of it.

Now one of them had a common operation and is on hospital for few days. The friends have been so supportive to her and checking in on her daily, planning a visit, buying her gifts. I also plan to go but I am (embarrassingly) jealous that for her physical pain everyone's all in and for my emotional pain, nobody cares to check in. It actually hurts me.

After I broke down, and that 1 friend checked in on me, I felt so happy.

I feel like saying to them I feel so unsupported by my friends but as they are all single with no commitment, I'm talking myself into "it's ok, they probably are just not aware of the trauma of becoming a single parent" but the other side of me is saying, no they SHOULD have checked on me. They know what am going through.

I don't know if I'm just being insecure. I haven't seen them for 4 months.

Op, I'm so sorry, that sucks. I have been there. I echo what everyone else has said, emotionally supporting someone is exhausting, thankless and a lot of people right now are struggling mentally too, so their cup is full and they don't have the mental energy to support anyone else. You just don't see them struggling because it's invisible.

I think life is hard for everyone right now. Don't know a single person who isn't struggling in some way. And sounds like you have been struggling for a while now... It's a big ask on your friends to be your sole source of support in perpetuity, especially as your situation isn't one that can be "fixed". Whereas, temporary illness has very set requirements and people are happy to help out as a one off.

I think there are 2 options here. Either try and meet people in a similar position if you really need to feel understood (but then accept you will be expected to play support to those other single parents who are probably struggling too- I found those relationships to be the opposite of uplifting and couldn't personally maintain them). Or, just accept the friends you have and downgrade them in your head to "party friends", and try to get some therapy or other professional help for your depression.

What do you want them to do for you op?