To stay somewhere where I don't really have any friends?

[duckityduckitygoose]

I was raised in the home counties and studied in London. My friends from school and university are dispersed across the south (as are DH's uni friends).

DH grew up in a Scottish city and still has family and school friends here. We moved to said city after completing our qualifications, planning to only stay for a few years. I (surprisingly, as I'm quite a homebird) fell in love with the city, far more than DH is in fact. We've created a wonderful life here and now have a baby. Years later, I still walk around utterly in love with our home and neighbourhood, and I can see what a wonderful quality of life we can provide for our child. I really like DH's family and they have lots of family events, so life isn't lonely.

However ... I'm really struggling for friendships. For most of the time living here, I've maintained my friendships down south; I was able to visit regularly and we hosted visitors regularly as well. However, this has all dried up - it is much harder than I anticipated for us to travel with our baby and my friends seem less keen to come up due to cost of living and general busy-ness. Quite a few of these friendships have drifted massively. Our lives seem to be heading in totally different directions even without the distance. None have children and although most want them in 5 years time or so, they are currently filling every moment with careers and travel and festivals etc. (fair enough) and don't really have any time for me anyway it feels.

We used to have a lot of local friends but there have been a lot of shifts recently of people moving away, people moving back (and changing the dynamics), some relationships breaking down etc. I've really put myself out to make mum friends but everyone seems busy and stressed and now people are going back to work anyway. The upshot is we have more acquaintance-type friends than we know what to do with, and can easily fill our calendar seeing these people, but I don't have any close friends and struggle to see how I'll ever make them. I definitely don't have, for example, someone to go for cocktails with, or to invite for a last minute bbq on a sunny day.

I'd always planned to move back closer to my own family and friends, but now I wonder if things have changed anyway and if I can ever really give up the life we have. I'm feeling a bit sad about it all (not helped by all of the instagram posts I'm seeing of people meeting big groups of friends over the sunny weekend and a phone call with my closest friend that felt like it just involved her listing her better friends!!) but maybe this is just how things naturally change entering the 30s anyway? AIBU to stay here and accept that my family will be my main source of socialisation or should I start to think about making the move back?

I'm happy to continue trying to develop my local friendships but it honestly seems a bit futile as people are so busy I just never see any one particular friend very often...

I suppose my other question is just really whether it matters. I feel the lack of close friendships a bit at the moment as my childless friends are doing so many nice things with their other close friends, but perhaps in a few years life will be all about school and family weekends anyway?

Baby groups are a great way of making friends but try a few different types to find your tribe. Once they start preschool you'll meet mums there too. I'd also try and take a class or hobby group each week to have something that is you (I didn't and regret it, I now do a few and realise what I missed)

Absolutely don't move because you are expecting things from others- you will be bitterly disappointed.
Most people are .... well a little shit

Instead, work on yourself and ways of gaining fulfillment and I feel the lack of close friends will become less of an issue.

All things being equal I wouldn't assume that you'll necessarily have more luck if you moved so I'd consider the other pros and cons between the places if that makes sense.

I think it's good to have friends but realistically there are a lot of people who do have to cope without them. It must be doable even if it's not how you'd like it to be.

Possibly true. I think just because of how many close friends we have in the area we would have a far more fulfilling social life. I'm not sure I can imagine myself ever making such close friendships again without school or university. However, we do have plenty of fun here and plenty of interesting people to talk to. I'm beginning to wonder how important these close friendships really are and feeling less and less like they'd be worth sacrificing our set up for.

It's easy to form close friendships in uni when you can stay out until 3am on a whim. You can make close friends objects you have kids - it just takes longer.

Would you really have a more fulfilling social life where your old friends are, though? Or would it be you by yourself all week when they are at work, and then them going out late on weekends and you can't go because you have a child who needs looking after?

Would you really be doing all those nice things, even if you lived closer?

but you say you’re too busy for hobbies!

for some it wouldn’t matter
for me, it would matter

the fact you’ve started this thread and actually say you think you’d have a more fulfilling life if you had close friends - would indicate it matters to you too

op… how old is your baby?! it’s relevant!

ah i see
wait until toddlers and you can go to playgroups whilst they go off and play independently
not long

is your dh happy not having any friends locally? what’s his stance on moving?

OP, if you say you are too busy with a one year old to have hobbies, do some volunteering and so on (which I can believe!) then you won't have time for nights out with your old friends anyway, I'm puzzled as to what you think would happen if you moved back, as you would still have a one year old and most of them don't have friends yet, but many will in five years time and they will be stuck in a lot/family oriented just like you!

I think it's fine to hanker after the lovely closeness of friendships at school and uni, but it's hard to keep that level of closeness when life intervenes and babies intervene and people move away, and that happens to everyone. When the opportunity to see those old friends comes up, grab it, when the opportunity to make new friends comes up, grab it.

There isn't a place in the world you can live where everything stays the same but it's fine to be sad about that time passing, and perhaps for your uni friends, they are extending it a bit, but just read the threads on here, this is a common situation in early motherhood and you do have to just keep plugging away to eventually end up with close friends, and even then, they move, die (this has happened to me) and things change, nothing in this life stays the same.

I feel for you, OP, and wish I could advise. I have been in my current neck of the woods for 10 years and have no real relationships beyond asking how the kids are doing but I am constantly in awe of how lovely the place is. I have one colleague; we get on well but not enough to be anything more. When I go back home, I struggle to have conversations with one of my three remaining friends, as we’ve just kind of grown apart.

I'd stay where you are and join some baby classes or groups. At nursery you'll meet a network too. Maybe try to eek out some time just for yourself to get a weekend back home when you can. Might make you feel better. There are lots of lonely people around who wouldike a walking group or yoga or suchlike.

@LameBorzoi you're absolutely right, I'm probably hankering after something that exists anymore. I just keep thinking that it will definitely be hard to keep up at all staying here, so moving offers something better, but I'd be giving up so much and friendships can change so much, whereas I need to do what is best for my little one now...

Such a kind and helpful response, I will keep re-reading this.

Honestly I think this is just normal for late 20s. You thought that the “uni years” friendships would last for ever, but they don’t because the dynamic changes and everyone moves on to the next phase. The same as nursery to primary, primary to secondary, secondary to uni. Some friendships maintain, but they are a rarity.

Different friendships, of a different type, will come in time. Most likely from the abundance of acquaintances (although in one’s 30s acquaintance-type friendships can be enough for many people).

OP I am in my fifties and my best friend now is a mum of a friend of my daughter who she met age six! It’s never too late to find friends and life can turn in all sorts of ways.

Do not leave a lovely area and nice life for a nostalgic dream. You will almost certainly be disappointed. And don’t you get free prescriptions and all sorts up there?!

The best thing is to keep busy and value the acquaintances you have around you. I have a philosophy that you can gain something positive from every social interaction. Whether it’s a coffee with a school mum or a joke with the postman or a quick chat with the dry cleaner. Don’t overthink this and things will improve.

Where are you in Scotland?

I live 20min away from where I grew up. I had two best friends from infants school. We still grew apart in our thirties and now see each other a few times a year same with dh and his friends. I made mum friends but most drifted once maternity leave ended. There's a couple I'm still friends with and meet for a coffee.

I do most of my socialising with family but I'm happy with that and see friends as an add on rather than inner circle.

I think a lot of people get busy with work and kids and don't have time/energy to invest in friendships. It would be rubbish if you made the move for friends and nothing changed.

I was the first of my friendship group to have children.

I had twins.

I did manage to keep up the friendships but honestly it was really really hard work. We took the kids to bbqs and sacrificed their nap and stayed up all night as a result.

DH and I would alternate on nights out because we couldn't afford a babysitter.

The ties did loosen.

I got lots of acquaintances through mum and baby groups and NCT and focused on just getting out of the house and having someone I knew well enough to say hello to.

I went back to work part time when they were two and after that the ties loosened a lot more because we had to do housework etc at weekends and grandparents wanted to visit etc.

About ten years later once they all started having children they started daytime meets and lunches out which we could join in very happily!

For about 6 years though I just didn't have the spare time to have a bbq at the drop of a hat because all our weekends would be scheduled with family/friends/birthday parties.