Losing many friends in 40s

[outthereandbeyond]

I seem to losing many friends now I’m in my 40s and wonder if this is normal.

many of these women (and I) are growing, putting up boundaries and being less tolerating.

one friend had a meltdown over my cat going to another home because I ‘abandoned my cat’ but I didn't feel I could look after him anymore (I had many carer responsibilities and cat was having a delicate op that would potentially make it double incontinent after an accident), another mum friend chose not to continue our friendship when the children fell out, and now I discover a very good friend who I’ve known since childhood betrayed my trust by telling another friend of mine she’d met once at my birthday party some confidential things about me. Now the other friend is pissed off that I told old friend, not new friend things. Another friend dated a man after I asked her for his number as I liked him (they are neighbours) only for her to suddenly open her eyes to him and started dating (well fucking only actually. It lasted 3 weeks) so that pissed me off.

anyway, all small things, but I feel my network is crumbling away, one by one. And that people don’t care about each other. I’m starting to feel isolated and alone.

is this normal at this age to lose friends?

Losing as in death

Od say it's most people OP, family included.
Not as many get togethers and people begrudge meeting for big occasions like Christmas.

Previously, there would be excitement about meeting up, going out, going shopping, fpr meals, visiting each other etc.

COL is a big reason too as well as just being tired with peri..

I am 60 and still have a good solid amount of friends I have known for over 40years .
They are not in a group so I catch up with some weekly,monthly and longer than that.
Consider myself very lucky and love each and everyone of them.

I’m in my 60s. Friends have drifted in and out of my life. My most important girl died.
I have 3 close friends - 2 since I was 3yrsold and 1 since I was 5.
The first 2 I met the first day of Sunday school and the other I met the first day of kindergarten.
I suppose you could call them lifetime friends.
We’re all old ladies now but we don’t notice.
I’d give my life for any one of them.
Pals.

This is really interesting. I’m in my late 40s and have found my two closest friends getting odder and more difficult. (Maybe they’d say the same about me?!)

Coupled with some other friends falling away during the child rearing years (I had kids late), it’s all making me feel really sad.

You sound blessed. I don’t know what that feels like anymore (to die for someone). Only my child. I’ve felt betrayed, letdown and surprised by so many people. And it has intensified since we gotten older.

I know I am not perfect, and I realise I must be doing or choosing situation subconsciously. The latest blow is from a friend I genuinely love and have known since I was a child. But her telling the new friend my business has shocked me.

Also interested to hear this. So many friends just disappeared when they had kids. I found it so sad and hurtful tbh. And now they are trying to reach back out as their kids are older and they want friends. I find it hurtful and I'm not interested in reconnecting.

I know I am not perfect, and I realise I must be doing or choosing situation subconsciously. The latest blow is from a friend I genuinely love and have known since I was a child. But her telling the new friend my business has shocked me.

I'm sure you know this already but reading your comment did trigger the thought that it's best not to tell friends your business if you don't want it to become common knowledge (working on the basis that any data shared is outside one's control), plus it burdens them to keep their mouth shut which very few people know how to do. They can't resist oversharing, unfortunately. So don't be shocked that people talk!

with that in mind, maybe you could take some accountability and thereby cut your friend some slack, recognising your role in the 'business sharing' and let it go, so your friendship isn't lost.

I absolutely agree OP. People are strange, the older I get the less I understand them. I’m 44.

I do have friends, I have a group who are flaky and it has a weird dynamic where people meet up without others and then mention it when we’re all together. I can’t work it out. Almost all of the 5 women in it are totally selfish if I was to analyse it.

I also have individual friends who I enjoy seeing. But one of my closest friends I made around four years ago. He’s a gay man 10 years younger than me and we get on so well, he’s so much fun and we’re are weirdly similar. So it shows that friendships can come in all forms, you don’t have to necessarily just be friends with fellow middle aged women.

It’s not really surprising when I compare what my life is like in my mid-40s with my parents at the same age. Both with primary-aged children. My DM worked a very few hours a week, had a lot of free time, worked locally and socialised locally. She’d was only ten years away from retirement and already winding down. She’d have friends she saw every week but almost always at home or their home rather than going out. I don’t think she liked some of them, she was always complaining about them to other friends! Some of them were people she worked with, I suppose they had to get on as they worked together. Everything was very local, you’d bump into the same people from work, toddler group, school at the supermarket. Everybody seemed to know everybody else’s business!

Whereas I work full time in a high pressure job, have a commute (meaning work colleagues live all over the place and not nearby). If I do meet up with a friend it tends to be somewhere halfway between us, rather than in someone’s house. So a travel and an eating cost. And I simply have nothing like the amount of free time she had to spend on friendships so am much more selective about who I do spend time with.

I'm lucky to have 4 brilliant best friends, as a group of 5 we are solid, have known each other for 20+ years and know each other inside out. I know this to be true are we all go way together and get on fine - the test of true friendship 😆 We do have disagreements but I wouldn't be without them. We all know eachothers good and bad points and accept them. Outside of this people come and go and im ok with that. I think as you get older you don't try as hard to make friends, unless it comes naturally. Quality over quantity in my eyes! Im also totally OK with my own company as I get older.

I agree with this.

Friendships have to respectful too. I stepped back from a very longterm friendship group.

I don't believe in falling out over DC, some friend parents do, there was an issue between our teenage DC she got overly involved, it was silly issue. I said I would step back rather than make it awkward for others in the group.

Another my younger child fell out with his pal of 5 years and his mother who I thought was a friend, blanked me. Both of these situations were resolved between the DC, they're all good mates again.

It has changed my feelings towards the mother x 2, I pulled back.

Yes kids fall out. I find with friends it has to be mutual efforts or it drifts off. Im 52. People def flaky now will cancel plans etc. You see it alot on these threads

now I discover a very good friend who I’ve known since childhood betrayed my trust by telling another friend of mine she’d met once at my birthday party some confidential things about me. Now the other friend is pissed off that I told old friend, not new friend things.

Is it possible your new friend (who had a strong reaction to finding out she was perhaps not as close to you as she thought she was) gave your childhood friend the impression the two of you were so close that she knew everything about you and so the childhood friend said ‘oh so you know about x then?’

If your childhood friend has an explanation as to why she told someone else your business then the friendship may be able to continue although, as another poster said, if you want to keep something private tell no one. One you tell someone you can’t control what they do with that information.

I think when you are in your 20's, you've never been hurt before, you are bright eyed and bushy tailed, full of teen angst and drama, and you tell your friends you'd die for them, yada yada, they say the same, and you really feel like that's true. Only you get older, life throws some shit at you, and said friends can't be seen for dust. Then you get a bit jaded. Certainly was the case for me. I had 3 very close friends who didn't even call me when my marriage broke down. Not one call. Then my best friend shagged my ExH days afterwards. I do have friends now, but it's all very surface level. I have zero desire to ever get deep with a female friend ever again. No thanks.

Hmm I've had 3 kids No " mum" friends really. Well a couple of people who I was friends with before who happened to have kids.

I did make the effort to go and do " evening and weekend" things though as see my friends. And I'm still good friends with quite a few of these people 30 years on

The others who did turn into doing " mum " stuff constantly never did really get back into the social group. Out of the 6 of us still in regular touch 4 remained child free

I can't imagine anything worse than being stuck in doing kid stuff on all my free time.

The things that usually change friendship wise now are health related. It's harder for people to socialize when a stroke has robbed their ability to speak for example. Oh and the friends are both male and female , not just cackling girl groups loo

I find it sad too. My closest friend for more than 40 years has gradually relegated me to an outer circles of casual friends who she only agrees to see occasionally as part of a group (a group that never existed in any other form, though we all know each other). I have tried to find out why, but haven't managed it. Also she seems irritable and no longer interested in what I'm up to, and edgy when I ask how she is. I find it odd.
We're not very old, but I think some of us are already finding things like travelling and going to unfamiliar places harder and more stressful to manage. Personally I don't find that 'odd' because we're tireder and less strong than we used to be, and find it harder to process new information quickly, but it does limit contact and probably looks odd to younger people.

In my case it’s emigration or camper vans or lockdown dogs!

As my friends kids have grown up they’ve either got dogs (can’t travel far or leave the dog, and I am a dog-free home), so I always need to go to them, or, they’ve got a camper van and they spend weekends away with their spouse. Two couples have got both dogs AND camper vans. Two families have emigrated, one to Ireland, one to Australia.

I don’t have kids and I am single and work full time, whereas they are starting to reduce their hours. They get upset when I can’t meet up for lunch on a weekday (because I work!), but then don’t want to do something on the weekend because they are away with their husbands because it’s “family time”. I can’t really win.

Wow. That must have stung (ex & bestie). God people are shit sometimes

I thought you meant they were dying. Yes I’m in my 40s and yes my friends are dying, but that’s to be expected I suppose and will only get worse in my 50s.

I can’t get worked up about falling out over cats but I don’t fall out with my friends, they are my friends for a reason and we are adults - differences exist but are not important in the grand scheme of things.

also have plenty of new friends so it’s not all doom and gloom. Loads of places to make new friends - hobbies, new groups, classes, I have a good friend I met two years ago on a campsite. what are your passions?

I do have friends now, but it's all very surface level

My plan going forward is to only have surface level friends, couldn’t be bothered investing the time to have ‘true’ friends anymore, I have had some very long term friendships end very quickly and wouldn’t really trust ‘friends’ after that….but I’m actually not bothered / upset by it all at all to be honest

my 40s and yes my friends are dying, but that’s to be expected I suppose

It’s not to be expect, nor is it the norm to die in your 50s unless you live in a 3rd world country

I put up with "friends" for years who talked about me behind my back ( slagging me off); friends who only bothered if I made all the effort, and I got into my 40s and realised I'd had enough and stopped messaging the one who was slagging me off - she didn't bother contacting me unless I contacted her first, so that told me all I needed to know. I put up with it for years due to low self esteem, despite DH saying he could see what was going on and not to bother with her. I think we run out of patience as we get older; I read somewhere that we put up with treatment from friends that we wouldn't tolerate from a partner. I do feel isolated at times, so I'm in the market for new friends. Not holding out much hope though!

I think this is true - but that people never feel as comfortable with other people deciding to be less people-pleasing as they do about doing it themselves. In OP's example about the friend who started shagging the man she liked - I'm sure the friend would rationalise that as getting to an age where she realises she has to go for the things she wants when she has the chance, and probably say that she 'needed to put herself first for once' (which everyone seems to say all the time and it puts my teeth on edge). Two people who have both decided it's their time to prioritise their own needs and tolerate less from others probably are quite likely to end up in conflict, really.

Tbh, you've fallen out with so many different friends maybe you're the problem. And i don't mean that nastily it could be the ones you were happy to pick before