The Forums › Forums › Emotional Journey › Is It Just Me? › No Friends › Re: No Friends
Just Me – I found myself in a similar situation when my children were at that preschool stage. I didn’t seem to have any highschool or university friends “carry over” into my married w/ children life and most of the social relationships I had from play groups etc. were superficial and quickly petered out when our children moved on. So many people seemed to already have best friends, sisters, extended family that were filling their needs that, while they had nothing against me, they already had close friends.
During this time I also realized that my Mom and I were really kind of dependent on each other for our social lives, both of us being married to people who really had very little interest in socializing. Even though I love my mom, I realized that this was holding both of us back.
So….It sounds kind of embarassing but what I did was really start working on making friends. I joined a co-op preschool with my kids and committed to taking a leadership role there. Met lots of great people, a couple of which I definitely count as friends now. Around this time some of my aquaintances marriages started falling appart and, lo and behold, when I went out on a limb and offered a sympathetic ear (and a bottle of wine) my offer was accepted. Thanks to that I now officially have a “best friend”.
Thinking about this problem over the years I realized that, most of the time, I have to talk myself into socializing – probably due to some low self esteem issues. I always feel like I’m bothering people when I call them – even people who I know don’t feel that way. I still have to give myself a pep talk and remind myself that my friends don’t mind if I call and ask if they want to do something. I think I just spend way too many years giving into the voice inside my head that told me “don’t call – they probably already have plans and you’ll just be putting them on the spot when they have to turn you down”.
So – I guess I would just tell you to keep trying. I lobbed a lot of “friendship” balls and only a few got returned but I must say, I’m a lot happier now that I took a few risks with it.
As far as “couples friends” go, however – your guess is as good as mine! Still working on that one.
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