Small town problems!

[Givenup2026]

as I don’t have that many friends, I’m trying out myself out there. There’s a FB group where people post and organise meet-ups. Somebody posted about meeting this Saturday, and I was one of the first ones to reply.

For better or for worse, my friend (who I’m trying to extend / separate) my non existent friend group also replied. So then I had to separately message the organiser telling her I really wanted to go but won’t go anymore to avoid any awkwardness. I also explained there’s absolutely nothing wrong with her and she’s lovely but I just want a completely separate friend group.

i talked to my DH and 15yo and they both agreed it would had been awkward to attend, but that considering we’re in a smallish town, it will
keep happening. So I could try and have an open and frank conversation with her, but that it would invariably misconstrued.

AIBU to be a bit annoyed? They also seemed like a proper party crowd (the organiser even told me she is) and that’s something that I’m looking for.

of course I could go and semi ignore her but I think it would be worse!

You’re overanalysing the whole thing, I go in PJs not as a performative thing, it literally came out of need.

i had a lot of issues down there which meant I couldn’t wear jeans or any type of tight clothes.

in the summer i wear some pretty funky trousers my mom got me but only because they’re comfy and i can wear them without underwear.

before this started, i still wouldn’t wear anything fancy in the winter, but at least in the summer i would wear shorts and skirts that are slightly more fashionable.

i also wear kids clothes but because I like to! I still have clothes from when I was 15 and still wear them

Why did you feel the need to justify that though? No one cares what you wear or why you wear those clothes. You say you don’t care what people think of you but your whole thread is about how you think people perceive you when they probably don’t give it any brain space

it does sound like you are suffering from main character syndrome

It's not a small town problem, it's a YOU problem

I had to separately message the organiser telling her I really wanted to go but won’t go anymore to avoid any awkwardness
Honestly, how old are you. You just created the awkwardness.

If you are that insecure about the image you think you are showing, just go away for the weekend and be the "fun party girl" where no one knows you, I am sure you can find destinations easily, from Ibiza to Las Vegas via Magalluf.

It sounds like your small town is not the right set up for such a superior being as you are 😂

(and no, I am not jealous, I do the school run in muddy leggins just as much as in a designer suit or a sequin skirt, depending on my mood and what my day plans are)

Are you sure you do have a 15yo child?

This is bizarre. I imagine most people feel very uncomfortable around you.

You understand that everyone is like this, right? Everyone puts on their work face etc. No one is shocked that you like to dress up when you go out but do the school run in jogging bottoms.

Messaging the organiser will have made her think you like drama and comes across as very mean girl. If someone messaged me saying they couldn't come to something because another woman was going and then caveated it loads about how she's perfectly nice I would assume she was a massive cunt or had shagged her husband, so you've fucked your "boring" mate over (so boring she goes to loads of different events even if they aren't her thing) and made yourself look slightly mad.

Unless you're planning to get your tits out and then vomit six pints of Shires in the Bull and don't want any witnesses - and as you're in a small town it'll get around anyway - you're being incredibly weird about this.

All those "sides" are you though.
Not "different personas", you've got an incredibly strange way of looking at things.
Why do you have to separate out each thing you like into separate parts with different people?
True friends would like you for who you are.

I dont think people are missing the point at all but it makes no sense. Why would your friend not want you to make new friends when she herself is wanting to make new friends?! I've not come acrosd jealousy of people having other mates since about year 8, why do you think she cares? My best friend has taken up am dram as a way of making new friends. Im happy for her, i went to watch her show and met some of them, theyre not necessary 'my people' but thats ok, they were nice enough. She is still my best friend! I cannot wrap my head around this at all tbh. Its just a night out - go or dont go, its not that big of a deal

Yes, bet the organiser on receiving that message be like ooookay....<backing away slowly> 😁

I was thinking this. OP doesn't really sound mature enough to have a child that age. All this stuff about different personas and all that is how I was when I was 15. By the time you're grown up with kids of your own at a certain age (adjusting to motherhood can be tough but by the time they're 15, most people have managed it), you've generally reconciled the fact that people are multi faceted and it really isn't this big, incredibly deep and fragile thing.

Maybe I’m missing something but I don’t understand what you wanting to party, dress up, etc. has to do with someone else who doesn’t. Go to the
meet up, be yourself, dress how you like and she will do the same. You don’t really need to match. I also think it was strange that you messaged the organiser.

Exactly! And I haven’t met anyone like that since I was 16.

I’ve found the people I’ve met in my adult years don’t get me, so I’ve learned not be my true self all the time.

is it because everyone else has grown up, but you are stuck trying to be a 15yo?

How do you expect people to ‘get you’ when you don’t seem to get yourself? It sounds like you’re so busy trying to project a persona you don’t actually engage ‘authentically’

But OP EVERYONE has lots of different facets to their personalities, not just you. No one is going to like every one single thing about you. My friends and I are all very different, we all love each other and irritate each other in minor ways. It doesn't matter...

So that's a them problem, not you.
You sound like you need to work on your self esteem and confidence - why are you hiding parts of yourself depending on who's company you're in?
Don't change for others, and what you think they want, or like.

I'm not over analysing your clothing choices. I'm giving my opinion on the mind set you have revealed by your posts here.
You have told us you portray different personas in different circumstances. Which is fine if that makes you happy.
However, the feeling that you have to do this is now causing you some bother. You've made yourself look a bit daft to a woman you hoped to befriend, lost out on the new group, and run the risk someone will tell your friend you're not going because of her.
This is a whole heap of unfortunate things that were completely avoidable if you just reframed your thinking, stopped worrying about your image, and how you should perform, and just got on with your life.

Very weird read to me as I am autistic and have spent most of my life thinking about personas and trying to wear masks to fit in with various different groups of people that crop up in my life. I tried to work out why these groups of people all got on and how I could integrate myself into those groups.

When I got my diagnosis at 42 I dropped the mask, it wasn’t worth thinking about any more. Now I’m me in whatever/wherever situation I find myself in. I dress the same for a pub lunch out as I do for the school run. I am so much more comfortable and happy with myself now.

Some people here are saying that you’re overthinking - I don’t actually think that’s true - I think you’re generalising and allowing very little room for the fact that you are but one tiny insignificant cog in a very complex circuit that is your life. Your town has nothing to do with it. I grew up in a small town. I lived in central London for twelve years. The issues were the same. The issue was…well… me.

Why not though? And I know people would find it cringe but genuinely why not?

Is the title Bronski Beat’s slightly disappointing follow up to their huge 80s hit Smalltown Boy?

Well I think the main thing here is that it doesn't seem to be serving you very well...

Of all the ages to stick at 15 must be the worst!!!

This is how a teenager talks to another teenager, not how a mother talks to a child. Bizarre.

Given all your updates, I think you just need to relax and stop portraying different sides and stop trying to control how you appear to people. Try being fully yourself…there is no need to change friendship groups to do that. Great that you want to expand your friendship group, but you are really not helping yourself by going about it the way you did.

Because navigating the adult world with a teenage mindset is incredibly restrictive and self destructive, as you are discovering.

Besides, if this really is what you're doing then it rather blows a hole in all your talk about being true to yourself and whatnot. A genuine person would not try to act like they are the age of their child.