How do men make friends?!

[TammySwansonTwo]

I'm really feeling for my husband at the moment. We lived in this area when we met (at work) and had a good circle of close friends (also from work). Then we moved to London for 5 years, then came back. At that time we still had good friends here, and my mum.

Gradually our friends all moved to different areas for work. My mum passed away. My husband works from home and I was self employed so we didn't get to meet new people. I have a couple of friends reasonably locally but never see them (they have small kids and health issues, I have health issues etc).

Since I had the twins a year ago I've made some lovely twin mum friends - we are not overly close yet but at least I have people to meet up with during the week and chat to. My husband feels really isolated. He loves being at home with us, but he needs to have some friends too - he just has no idea how to meet any!

Any suggestions for getting him out there? I did say we could try getting together with the twin mums and their other halves but having met them all I don't think that any of them have much in common with him.

Would he be interested in local gaming or role playing groups. Role playing is not dressing up by the way. DH has been doing it for years, he meets up with friends at each others houses every few weeks and from what I can tell they spend hours on imaginative stories and games.

They are all a bit "geeky" but it means they spend ages in a social situation but talking about a specific thing . They always enjoy themselves and I hear lots of laughter and fun when they are together here.

They often design the games themselves and take turns running them (being gamesmaster).

Singing in a choir is a great idea. Local community ones accept anyone. Just drop in an join in (even if you think you can't sing- pretty much everyone can sing)

I love my weekly choir session and I spent years thinking I couldn't sing. Going has improved my singing immensely and we never have a session without jokes and laughter involved. It really is fun

agree bumbling bovine, more or less anyone can sing, though nearly everyone has been told at some time or other that they can't!

And from what I hear choirs can be pretty sociable - the after concert parties go on late into the night! The thing about basses and tenors is that there are less likely to be waiting lists for non-audition choirs than for women, so that is good as well. Give it a try, op's dh?

Be more assertive socially with the mum friends. Invite a family or two over at the weekend dad's too. Young kids are a great way to meet people locally when you new.

Dh knew no one when we moved here in 2008 now he is friends with the DHs of mums I met locally, friendships initiated through kids strengthened by shared hobbies (cycling for dh, band for less sporty ones). They go abroad on group trips etc. Also neighbours- two of the men in our little street are really on his wavelength they go to cinema etc.

Thanks so much everyone - I'm sorry others feel in a similar situation. It's so tough. My husband isn't a shy person and is an awesome friend, but I know how much effort it takes to build up close friendships from scratch and feels a bit pressurised when you're not making friends "naturally" through work etc.

I doubt he'd have the confidence to join a choir. I am a classically trained soprano but stopped singing when my career became quite full on, and haven't gone back to it so I would love to join a choir. Maybe when the twins are slightly older I can get someone to watch the twins and we could go to one together?

I will talk to him about what he might be interested in doing. In fairness I felt very similar to him (no friends left round here any more other than a couple I barely see due to circumstances) until I met other mums so I know how isolating it is.

harmless I'm really sorry you're in that situation and I'm glad you're getting out there again. It really irritates me when people control their partners this way - don't get me wrong, I don't really want him out every single and night getting wasted or anything, but I know it would be good for both of us to have a bit of social time with people other than each other and we haven't had that for a long time really. We are extremely close and I think we've had a sense of not needing anyone else, but I suspect that's partly been grounded in fear of getting out there. Having twins has made that easier as so many of the mums feel this way.

Will look at what's available and suggest some things to him. He has quite a complex personality and I think that makes it harder to find good friends - while he's quite geeky in some respects, I don't think he'd be into LARPing etc, he does like football but isn't particularly comfortable around stereotypical football fans, etc. Makes it tricky! I think some sort of techy / coders group or a freelancer networking thing would be good for him and he's likely to meet people that way he has stuff in common with. I'll do some investigating!

Be careful what you wish for with cycling though ....

Has he become a bit obsessed? My friend's husband is like that!

Ideally I can get him hooked on something less expensive and time consuming ;)

I think that really, many men dont have friends in the same way as women do. A lot of men's friends are really work colleagues or acquaintances. Friendship would seem to involve some kind of emotional attachment which is more common in female friendships whereas male friendships are usually linked with work or shared interests and pursuits and sport.