Anyone else struggling to make female friends after turning 50?

[Munchkinjack]

Hi all
I basically don't have any friends
I've just turned 50.
i would love a best friend for girly chats etc
my kids are grown up I have a dog and my partner is my best friend but I would love a female friend . I work from home. I get lonely .
My partner has lots of friends, he still lives in his home town . They are all men tbh and he has curry nights football nights etc . I had a friend, a drinking buddy and dog walking buddy but she sadly passed away a couple of years ago i miss her . I'm going to try a gym as I need to feel better about myself and more confident.. maybe I'll meet a friend there. Anyone else ? I feel it's just me like this .

I think that’s a bit unfair… surely this is just women talking. It could be a range of topics. OP is wanting someone who is interested in the same things that she is. I will have different types of conversations with different friends.

At 56 I’ve made more friends in the last 8-10 years than I did in the proceeding years. These are the places I’ve met them
School gates - boring but true. When younger I invited all parents to mine after drop off and I have pastries and coffee. Later on I ran into one mum on the train and we chatted about books all the way into London and she then invited me to her book club
Work - another boring one. Various friends over the years. The closest one was interested in art and I invited her to an exhibition with me because we got on so well ( she’s 15 years younger than me ). Our trips out became more frequent and we attracted a couple of guys who now come along. 3 of us are now retired but we still meet for dinner etc
Tennis - I play in. “ socials” every week and it took me saying “ do you want to get coffee” after to make a couple of good friends. I just ran into an old NCT friend at yoga last week so I will re connect with her but I’ve never made a friend actually in the gym or a class.
Hobby - I did a sewing class and became friends with a Canadian lady for a while who sadly moved back. Photography was a no friendship wise.
Random. - I lost weight and had a load of alterations done to clothes and I clicked with the lady who did them and we now meet up periodically. We have a love of slightly geeky local history and have been to talks together.

With all of these it takes someone saying “ we should get a drink / coffee sometime”. Or maybe a dog walk or trip to a tournament or exhibition. I have a membership to a
local cinema and can get cheaper tickets so I will put out a little message for a particular film and people will tag along. Another one likes lake swimming and will arrange that and whoever wants to go will tag along to that.

oh and I don’t live in my hometown. I have one friend from home who I see every 3 months but we go away for a weekend most years. A very old friend from college who’s in Texas who I see every 3 years or so.

Im not an oap yet, I'm prob a young 50 love my rock music , live bands (couldn't do a festival tho) , pubs , get my nails done etc and yes I still love girly chats shopping with my daughter, my daughters friends call me a young mum

Yes, another one here struggling to make friends (early 50's)
I've lurched into early retirement on health grounds.
I find many people flaky.

One potential friend still works and has lots of other friends.
I have one friend much older than me and lovely - we message a fair bit.
Another good friend through an interest group - we meet up a fair bit.
Another friendship I'm looking at building don't know about connection yet, early days.
One longer friendship but don't see a lot of her (I need to make more effort)
I need to expand my world. Not sure where to start, so starting with gym as it will get me out of the house I hope. Would really like to make a friend or two there but it doesn't sound hopeful.
Take up an art class of some description.
Take up a sport I'm interested in (but it is more of a summer sport)
Volunteer somewhere.
Unfortunately, I do go into groups etc. looking for friendships. I have found I put a lot of energy into friendships that has not been reciprocated.

It does feel a bit like dating in a way.

People tend to get wrapped up in family matters which is fair enough especially if working as well, it can create a lot of pressure and not a lot of time.
I am worried for my older age at this point in terms of isolation.
I'm likely ND (awaiting diagnosis).
It feels very daunting to build a decent social network.

I think that’s true but also baffling. I don’t really understand why single people are inherently more suspicious than married ones after all married women have affairs as well as single ones. And it suggests they don’t think much of their husbands if that’s what they’re worried about.

Maybe it’s because it’s easier to meet up as couples as they have a ready made chum for their husbands without him having to make the effort?

It makes it doubly hard though to be single if you haven’t got a partner to do things with and you can’t find friends that want to socialise either. I’ve noticed that there are quite a few women doing things on their own these days snd maybe that’s why!

A girly group isn’t for everyone. When I find myself near one, I find the relationships quite lightweight but nice for a coffee catch up

its hard to meet people because everyone is so busy. I think a woman at work was suggesting we catch up - she seems lonely - what she doesn’t know is I have major crap to deal with at home and no space for friends right now. It’s not her.

I meet people as like music and sports. Pub sessions, cycles, walks. I do stuff I like and tend to meet like minded people but I like to dip in and out.

if I wanted to meet close friends then a local book group - you could even set one up. Or a crafting group - these women seem to meet and have a great time. Choirs is another one. Volunteering is amazing as you are doing something with a purpose.

smile and be interested in others. Don’t be a negative Nelly.

A girly group isn’t for everyone. When I find myself near one, I find the relationships quite lightweight but nice for a coffee catch up

A girly group sounds like a bunch of wannabe teenagers having pamper parties though, & very different from a group of women friends.

maybe join some gym classes, a walking group, a craft hobby.

ask on your towns Facebook what activities are around for a woman who would like to make friends

There are girly groups about. Usually drinking wine and getting louder and louder! Many of us just want a chat!

meetme it’s hard if you don’t drink. I don’t drink and find it large nights a bit dull by the end when most people are shit faced. I find sports groups easier as less drinking.

empress that’s true. Women groups can be amazing, can be lightweight, can be toxic. I’m on the fringes of one and there are some incredibly lovely people but it can be quite othering. I feel far more lonely around groups like that than when I have a great chat and connection with one or two people. I wonder if that is what the OP also finds

I’ve been part of big groups but now I’m part of several different small groups & do different things with different friends, which I like better. Most of us are either child free or have adult kids, which solves that problem.

How did you become part of these groups?

.I only have an adult DC and as a couple we are childless so that’s always made things awkward with people I have tried to be friends with. I was the right age to be a parent like them, but I had my DC as a teen so mine was grown up before they’d even had any.

Shared interests - mainly through women’s rights campaigning & volunteering at the local cat rescue, finding there were women I particularly clicked with & suggesting going for a drink or asking if they were interested in going to an event together if something was coming up.

I met one of my oldest friends at a lesbian book group. We walked back to the tube together each week & the friendship grew from there.

With making friends you have to fake it til you make it, fake confidence and put yourself out there, asking people to do things, make plans, invite.
the only people you attract if you sit and wait are users or people who just talk at you as they want a soundboard.

I joined a gym, DL, and very quickly gained a bunch of new friends. I'm heavily into crafts and have loads of friends there. You don't need experience, they will want to help you. Good luck

i will start with a gym I've found a local menopause group so may try that too. Also I'll keep hunting for a book group. I'm not brave enough to start my own but hopefully I'll find one x

I'm headed down a similar route to you Op. I'm waiting for a menopause group to start up as planned. Plan to join a gym in the next couple of weeks. I would start my own book group up as I don't want to attend a traditional book group - more along the lines of choose your own book and discuss. The problem I've got currently is that I start things and get bored quickly (suspected ADHD) so I don't know whether I could sustain commitment to it.

Have you spoken to the library? The library I volunteer at supplies books for a number of different book clubs. ( there is special membership you can get that allows you to order multiple copies of the same book )

@darknight4898 Do we have to
label ourselves like this! It’s just what women do now I suppose but 20 years ago I would never ever have looked for such a group. I’m me! I’m not defined by a biological episode I have no control over.

@MeetMeOnTheCorner it’s interesting that you say that because I have actually found the social things I’ve been going to - I have been going I just haven’t made any friends in a real way - they are dominated by chat about menopause and ADHD. Neither of these subjects do a lot for me I’m afraid.

We’re all different of course, but I’ve been quite surprised at how much women seem to love discussing these two things!

@EmeraldRoulette Nor me! I would run a mile. It’s a bit self absorbed. I’m not overly interested in health and I find people who are, unfailingly boring so I would not choose to be with them. These are topics of the moment so I guess like minds attract ?

Both the menopause and ADHD can have profound effects on someone's life. And real impacts on someone's health and far reaching implications for work and relationships. Meetmeonthecorner and Emeraldroulette I think you would be better suited outside these particular group settings, I do hope you find something less boring. I have other interests but I'm finding them difficult to pursue currently most likely because of these two factors plus another clinically diagnosed health issue and would look forward to discussing them with others going through a similar experience. I hope you don't develop a health issue and want to discuss it only to find no-one is willing to listen or who will say your topic of conversation is boring.

For anyone that’s retired or partially retired look at your local “U3A”
they’re one of biggest organisations in country for retired people. Not all old! Most larger villages and towns have them now . Look up on line.
ours has 90 interest groups, 1500 members just in our small area
its all about friendship, social networking, learning from each other. Cheap as well.
absolutely easy to make friends
I went at 55, knowing nobody local as we’d moved when kids were secondary school and I was doing full on working long hours, to now having a number of different groups of real friends …lots of people like me single, lonely, not used to socialising…and now I’m out and about with activities and meet ups. Transformative

@darknight4898 to be clear half the people discussing it in my social group don’t have ADHD. It just seems to be a very popular topic to try and see if you have it. I don’t know - maybe it’s just the dynamic of the group, one person in particular is very loud. She has ADHD and is also going through menopause. The other thing she tends to do is go on about politics. I think she just has a set list of stuff to talk about which is funny because when you sit down and talk to her as an individual, she has a lot of other stuff to say and I would say she is a really well-rounded interesting and decent individual. I think it also depends how much she’s had to drink.

Maybe I’m being harsh. I had ongoing health problems through my 20s and 30s and I didn’t want to discuss them. I also then had a spinal injury and I had to alert people to various issues relating to that, but I didn’t actually want to discuss it. I might have to explain if I needed a different kind of chair for example. To be honest, it wasn’t so much of an issue back then because I had my original bunch of friends.

actually, none of these women are discussing these two topics as health problems. It’s more the kind of “ I’m hating my husband at the moment because of menopause” perhaps I’m terribly oldschool but I kind of don’t know how to respond to that. I always feel awkward when people are slagging off their husband or children.

it seems like more of a chat that’s anchored in stuff they’ve read on social media? They enjoy the endless quizzes for “ do you have ADHD?” for example.

can someone come to me and talk about their health problems? Yes, absolutely. And I think everyone who knows me would feel confident to do that. To be honest, even people who know me from around MN would know that.

we do have an amazing plethora of art, music, literature, film to appreciate though… and my conversation tends to veer towards that. I wonder if some of those topics have gone out of fashion a bit because people who want to talk about them are doing it on dedicated threads on online boards.

I did a lovely writing class where we had great chats during the sessions, but as usual, people dash off straight afterwards.

I joined a choir. Absolutely the best decision I ever made. I have a whole circle of new friends and four of us have become especially close. We even go on holiday together. I don’t recall having friends this dear to me since university. It is possible.