Making friends. Do you still do it?

beks101

Friendship. We all need it. Most of us are lucky enough to have it.

Some of us maintain a large group of friends born in our school days; college is where core friendships develop for some others. Working life accounts for others again. Most people I would say maintain friendships from all these, and many other walks of life.

My question is, where does the making-close-friends business end? When are you full-to-capacity, so to speak? Or when do you stop pledging that emotional availability that it takes to develop a close, lifelong friendship, settle on your core friends and leave everyone else you meet at the 'acquaintance' or 'social friend' doorstep?

Personally, I didn't really believe there was an end point, and I'm still not convinced, but I do believe the nature of this friend-making process changes over time.

The article has been pretty thought-provoking to me on that front:

http://www.mercurynews.com/family-relationships/ci_21112526/challenge-making-friends-an-adult


This bit is a killer for me:

"My ideas of friendship were built by 'The Godfather' and 'Diner,'" he said. "Your friends were your brothers, and anything but total loyalty at all costs meant excommunication. As you get older, that model becomes unrealistic."
By that point, you have been through your share of wearying or failed relationships. You have come to grips with the responsibilities of juggling work, family and existing friends, so you become more wary about making yourself emotionally available to new people.
"You're more keenly aware of the downside," said Koppelman, 46. "You're also more keenly aware of your own capacity to disappoint."

I read this and found myself wondering, when did I last induct someone into my 'close friends' circle and make the necessary effort/compromise etc to keep them there?

And the answer: college. Which is five years ago for me now, when I was 18 - 22. And before that; secondary school.

Don't get me wrong; I meet, and click with a lot of really great people on a regular basis. A LOT of people, actually. I had a great social circle in work after college - countless nights out and a constantly buzzing phone. I emigrated to Canada two years ago and have met dozens of Canadians, and Irish people, most of whom I meet, travel, eat and drink with, facebook, text etc on a weekly basis. Friends. Interesting, intelligent, fun loving people who could easily be my best friends - my 'bridesmaid' type friends - under different circumstances.

But these, I would classify as 'social friends'. The 'emotional availability' thing I quoted above rings so true for me: with a crazy work schedule, commitment to family and existing friendships, distance, a new relationship and my own solitary hobbies - that emotional availability just seems too costly to invest in - to pull someone into the tight circle of best friends I have that I have that same 'Godfather'-style view of. The girls that are more like sisters; the girls that will be my bridesmaids if I ever get married.

So I guess I'll throw the question to the floor. Have you noticed a change in the nature of your friendships and your friend-making as you've gotten older? Are your core group long-time friends you've had for ten, twenty years?

Has having a partner, a family, a career etc, made you less emotionally available in the way you need to be to make a new 'best friend'? Have previous friendship disappointments made you a bit reluctant to go there again?

Do you find yourself connecting with people sometimes, really clicking with them, but not making the necessary effort to fully pull them in...maybe seeing them/emailing them a few times a year?

Acoshla

I don't have a core group from school or from when I was growing up, I have no friends from school (by choice, friendship disappointments as you mentioned), have one from my local area that I met when we were about 9, I have two from college 8/9 years ago, one from a former job 6 years ago, these would be my closest friends. I have two other friends who I would consider to be quite good friends already, one that I met through my boyfriend's job, another that I met through boards last year.

I am always open to new friendships, especially as I only have one good friend in the area I live at the moment and then the one I met through my boyfriend, I've been trying to change that and meet new friends since I moved here 3 years ago but I see nobody day to day and it's a small area. But I don't think there's any cap on when you should meet new friends.

I am wary of letting new people in after bad experiences with horrible "friends" in the past, but at the same time sometimes you can't deny a connection with someone, and if I hit it off with someone I will always make an effort to develop the friendship. Having a boyfriend doesn't change my meeting friends, but my work does. Having said that though I never usually make friends in any work place I've been in.

nbar12

Acoshla wrote: »

I don't have a core group from school or from when I was growing up, I have no friends from school (by choice), have one from my local area that I met when we were about 9, I have two from college 8/9 years ago, one from a former job 6 years ago, these would be my closest friends. I have two other friends who I would consider to be quite good friends already, one that I met through my boyfriend's job, another that I met through boards last year.

I am always open to new friendships, especially as I only have one good friend in the area I live at the moment and then the one I met through my boyfriend, I've been trying to change that and meet new friends since I moved here 3 years ago but I see nobody day to day and it's a small area. But I don't think there's any cap on when you should meet new friends.

DO THIS: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2172760/The-man-gave-world-number--called-Jilted-lover-posts-cellphone-digits-fliers-New-York--gets-70-000-responses.html

Acoshla

nbar12 wrote: »

DO THIS: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2172760/The-man-gave-world-number--called-Jilted-lover-posts-cellphone-digits-fliers-New-York--gets-70-000-responses.html

I'm not lonely so wouldn't be going to those lengths, I talk to friends/mother/boyfriend/his family every day, I just have an ability to talk endlessly and like meeting new friends so am always open to it if it happens, I tend not to force it though, as most of my friendships have come from chance encounters and getting on like a house on fire.

nbar12

I think you should do it, there are people out there who would be very grateful for your services of listening to them and talking to them about their problems. I only wish there were more services like this because I find it incredibly hard to make friends.

Princess Peach

I really don't have any close friends. Had friends from school and college, but we all drifted apart from falling out or just not making the effort to see each other or keep in touch.

I moved this year and I have made a big effort to make friends, and I have some great ones, but again I would call them social friends. I wouldn't feel right calling up any of them to talk about a personal problem. And I'm just not sure how to break down that barrier. One thing about the group of girls is we are all really busy so don't spend much time together except for nights out. I guess you look back on school and college friends and you had all the time in the world to chat and have lunch and hang out to get to know them. I'm not sure too if its because all these girls already have close friends, and most of them boyfriends, that they don't feel the need to extend themselves to me? Or maybe we just really haven't clicked! I went to a seminar before about inter-cultural communication that said Canadians are known to be extremely friendly, but hard to make friends with.

I'll be moving again early next year, so it all starts over. It does make me a little sad that I'm mid twenties without a best friend, just not sure how to fix it though! I'm well able to make social friends, just not close ones.

nbar12

nbar12 wrote: »

I think you should do it, there are people out there who would be very grateful for your services of listening to them and talking to them about their problems. I only wish there were more services like this because I find it incredibly hard to make friends.

I'm not sure that acoshla is here to provide services for you


Have some close friends from school and college, happy to meet new people and get on better with them
met some lovely ladies on boards for example

Colonel Panic

I don't have any close friend either. I kept in touch with a few guys from school all through college and for years afterwards, but I realised that we were just going through the motions so I stopped trying to arrange things.

I didn't mind so much until the end of my last relationship a few months ago. She had become my best friend, but for me it had stopped being romantic and she wanted more passion so I felt we both deserved better.

It feels selfish to say it but I'm a bit lost without her now. I met her last night and she's in a really good place where I've always struggled to make friends. I'm not shy, but I've always been an introvert and this got me a bit of bullying in school hence lack of emotional availability and trust issues.

I do still try to make friends though, but it's just harder to meet people you click with and want to spend time with when everyone's busy.

Sometimes I wonder do people let that assumption get in the way of putting themselves out on a limb though. It certainly does for me.

Ickle Magoo

nbar12- please acquaint yourself with site and forum rules before posting here again.

Ah_Yeah

I have two close friends left from school, and that would have been secondary school. No close childhood friends, they were just not my cup of tea, they all turned into the complete opposite of what I would ever aspire to be.

Have another couple of close friends left from college, and they will be friends for life.

Most of my close friends I made when I moved to Dublin, through work. I know who I'll keep in touch with, who will fizzle out.

I am always open to new friendships. You can never have enough friends. I'm naturally a sociable/chatty person, and I have a wide range of interests, so making friends has never been hard for me. It's the close friendships I value the most, and I know almost instantly when I meet a person if it's going to be a friendship I'm going to nurture. With those friendships, I really make the effort and go the extra mile.

But yes, I still make friends, and intend to continue to do so until I kick it :P

Sea Filly

I've always found it difficult to make good friends, or even social ones.

I long since left behind my childhood and secondary school friends, bar one who remains a close friend. I'm happy with that, to be honest, school friends are often friends of convenience anyway.

College? We've all drifted due to distance, busy lives, relationships and a few hiccups that have been difficult to recover from.

Now I'm working and living in a new city, been here about five months, and no friends are on the horizon. The people at work are very easy to work with but I have little in common with them outside of that, and they don't seem pushed on me either.

And being in a relationship is definitely isolating. We're doing long distance at the moment and it's great but we spend pretty much all our weekends together, making it difficult and way too tiring for me to travel to see other friends on our rare weekends away from each other.

Sigh.

Wow, this is a downbeat post. I very much identify with what Princess Peach said about it being hard to find people who become more than social friends. Being an introvert doesn't help!

Mugatuu

I'm no longer friends with the girls I went to secondary school with as a previous poster said they turned out to be very different to what I thought they would be so I parted my ways with them and didn't keep in contact with childhood friends.
I have 5 very close friends I met in college that will be life-long friends!
Not so keen on making friends in work as I try to keep it separate! :rolleyes:
Very much open to making new friends tho!

Kooli

I'd say I have 10 close friends, most of whom I met before I was 20. (am now over 30)

I have to say that I don't feel I'm that 'open' to new friends at the moment. There would have to be specific circumstances that would lead to me investing in a new person (like, I imagine if I've kids I might befriend other mothers)
I guess there is that feeling of 'full to capacity'. It does take time and effort to maintain friendships (which I'm very happy to do), so you can't have endless numbers of them.

Rubberlegs

I have just one friend who I'd really open up to. We meet up once or twice a week for a stroll/coffee. I had a good friend from primary school, through secondary school, we lived on the same street. We became mothers at the same time, very young. When I moved to another town about 10 miles away we saw each other less and less. She would say she was calling out but wouldn't show, didn't let me know she wasn't coming. I found I was the one making all the effort, and eventually stopped. I have friends that I made in college who I still send Christmas cards to. I know lots of people to stop and chat to, but nothing beyond that. I was friends with a woman on my estate for 10 years, but when I found out she was talking about my daughter behind my back, I confronted her. All I got was lies, I can't handle liars:(. That friendship had become a habit more than anything, looking back on it she was very negative, not happy unless she was spreading gossip, or putting others down. The one friend I do have, I love her to bits, she's the best, but her life couldn't be anymore different to mine. She still lives at home. She has no kids, I have 3. I became a Mam again at the beginning of the year, and sometimes think it would be great to have another mother to chat to at times.

JuliaJones

I have a core group that nearly 10 yrs after college I am lucky enough to be as close to as I was in college, we may not all see each other all the time but we have scheduled meetups that I wouldnt miss for the world and one or two of us will meet in between these. These are the people I would count as my friends more so than others I may see more often,
I have alot of social friends as another poster called it whom I do enjoy spending time with but would not make the same effort for, I am always open to having more people in my life but I dont really make an effort to be honest to make new friends anymore,

beks101

I find it interesting that some people struggle to develop close friendships and have no problem with the social ones.

I have four close friends - one from school, two from college and my younger sister who I have a great friendship with. Three of those I'd be in contact with on a regular basis, several times a week - my 'best' friend, I email over and back at work all day, call in the evening and meet up every couple of days.

The fourth friend is back in Ireland - she's one of those friends who I could not see for six months, then get back and we'd just take up from where we left off. She's always been there.

I trust and rely on these girls 100 percent. In times of crisis, they've stood the test of time. They've let me rant about the mundane stuff and listened to the critical stuff. They're the difference between me bottling up my problems and becoming self-destructive, which I had a tendency to do in the past, and opening up and facing my problems head on.

But these friendships are head and shoulders above the social ones. Not that they aren't incredibly important as far as my social life goes, which of course contribute massively to my life balance and happiness. But if the texts/invites/phone calls stopped in the morning and I found myself with no-one to hang out with at the weekend, I'd be OK. As long as I have those core people who I know really care about me and are willing to listen to my bullsh1t!

But maybe that's just my nature. I'm quite outgoing but I'd naturally be a lot more introspective and emotionally driven than socially driven.

My grandmother used to always say, in your entire life, you can probably count your true friends on one hand. I think that becomes more and more apparent the older you get.

Lyaiera

I moved out of home for the first time a month or two ago, even though I'm now in my late twenties. Up until then I haven't been able to afford going out enough to stay in contact with everyone I wanted to. That meant I really only made an effort to stay in contact with my really close friends who I would want to see at least once a week. And then there'd be big parties every few months where I'd see my wider social circle. Since moving out I've made an effort to meet up with people I had sort of lost contact with. Some of the people I've met are new to me, I'd really like to be friends with them and some of the people I've been meeting are people I had lost regular contact with.

The thing that's really tough for me is trying to break into social circles. With some of the people I've met it's always been me getting in contact with them. They're all busy twenty-somethings who have learned to fill their own time and I have no real experience of filling my time with in-my-house activities because I always had family stuff at home. Now I don't know if I'm being too needy, or if I need to make an effort to see them because they already have a weekly or monthly schedule down.

There's one girl I'm having a blast with, and she's the most likely to call me up and we seem to be getting on like a house on fire. So that's great.

The bitch is I've already had to cut one person out. We had been friends for years and had those nights of partying that you tell stories about for decades to come. We met up a good few times since I've moved out, and I thought we were getting a lot closer so I was opening up to him. And that seemed totally normal because I've known him for so long even if we weren't in regular contact. He was someone I could see once a season and fall right back into our usual joking and laughing and even serious talking. I've been there for some really tough times he was going through with family. A few weeks ago I talked to him about something very personal in my life and he was great to me about it, he stayed up chatting to me all night. But ever since then he's been avoiding me, we'd agree to meet up and he'd not show or say he can't make it, leaving me at a total loose end. I've just stopped bothering with him now.

So yeah, I do continue to make new friends. It's a bit of a strange answer from me because this is the first time since my first year in University (quite a while ago) that I've had the opportunity to make new friends. I'm going at it whole hog, but it's tough when people are working and have commitments and you don't know each other's college timetable inside out.

Polloloca

I ended up dating my closest bestest friend, and we ruined our entire friendship. I have loads of good friends, people I call my "best friends" even. But they're not people I would talk about me with. They're people I party with, laugh with and talk about them with.

I think its better that way.

Mc Kenzie

I kinda envy people who have either a best friend or a group of close freinds.

I did have a group of good freinds from sec school however once two of those girls found boyfriends they seem to forget about you adn stop going out and calls texts get less and less. three of them iv remained freinds with although one of them has a boyfriend and her spare time is limited. but im glad i have them,even though our own lives get in the way and i think thats just life.

however where ever i go im open to make new freinds however not everyone is to keen on keeping in touch or perhaps they have there own freinds and dont feel the need to make new freinds. Even the ones i do make seem to have there own mates else where so im not so sure maybe not everyone is as open.

It can be difficult if your single:(

mcmacness

My three best friends now are the same ones that I've had since primary school, I'm 24 now. I made friends then in Secondary school, who are all somehow connected to those initial three friends so they'd be in my good friends list too. I make friends easily enough as I'll talk to anyone, but I rarely add anyone to that very tight knit group. I find as you get older that having an awful lot of best friends is harder to maintain. So I have a few very close friends and a lot that I wouldn't see and contact all that much but I'd still be quite friendly with them when I do see them. Work is a place where I actually wouldn't cultivate very close friendships. I rarely see people I work with outside of work, not because I dont like them or anything, just the way it is.

saa

School friends have moved away or are back in my home town pissing their lives away, didn't make core friends in college and people in work are just work mates. If theres a heap of us out there that all want to make friends why is it so hard.

Lia_lia

I am still friends with er..1 person from school...and I'm only 23 Never really had a "group" of friends in school anyway. Stuck to myself. The rest of my friends are all a few years older than me or college people. And I guess I have friends at work too!

I have 4 close friends...1 who I have known since I was about 10 and went to school with. Another 2 who I just know from around town for the past 5/6 years. One lives in London now though. And I'm really good friends with a girl I know from work for about 4 years.

Oh and I've another very good friend who is now living in Australia Still Skype her every now and then...really miss her!
I don't actively try to "make" friends though, really.

I said friends a lot there.

okiss

As you get older I find it is harder to make friends due to people being at different stages in there lives ie if your single and everyone you know is in a couple, married or have children.
One of my friends has not contacted a friend they have had for over 10 years in the past 2 months due to the way they have been treated over the past 12 months. As my friend said we all have busy times or bad times but at this stage when I am lucky to get a 10 cent text message every 2 months I have had enough.
To keep a friendship going you have to make some effort but some times things happen and people move on.
I have a few very good friends who have been there for me when I needed someone but I have done the same for them. There people who make you feel good about yourself, you make you laugh and you life is richer for knowing them.

kylith

I don't have many friends; I lost them all a few years ago (hint: when you start going out with a guy who is the brother of one of your friends and who grew up with most of the people you're hanging round with, dumping him can lead to a complete loss of social life )

I'm always up to make new friends though. I'd be interested in arranging a Stitch 'n' Bitch or girl's Munchkin evening.

lazygal

I've only one friend from primary and secondary school. We lost touch over the years and reconnected and it is one of those friendships where we can always pick up where we left off. I've a smattering of friends from college and various jobs. I find lately though I seem to be making a lot more effort to keep in touch with some people than they keep in touch with me. Maybe they are really busy, maybe they don't consider the friendship to be of the same closeness I do, I just don't know.

I was 'dumped' by a friend over a year ago and at the start it was nearly as bad as a breakup of a serious relationship. Its so difficult, its easy to talk about being dumped by a boyfriend but I haven't been able to talk about being dumped by this friend. She's made what I consider to be some moves towards a reconciliation but I'm not buying it. Given how she has treated me I don't think I can ever regard her in the same way ever again and I would always wonder if she'd just drop me again in the future. Once bitten, twice shy. It bugs me because I don't make friends that easily and value the ones I have a lot.

I've just had a baby and while part of me would like to get to know other mums around my area, another part of me likes that none of my friends have babies so I can talk about other stuff when we meet up.

Posy

I have a good group of 'social friends' and 5 very close friends. One from primary school, one from secondary school, two that I used to work with and one I met at a night class. I had a good friend throughout college but we drifted apart in recent years.

It's not like marriage, where you (hopefully) 'stop looking' once you're attached. I don't think there is a limit for friends. People come into your lives at different points, through different things and one day you realise they are your friend, without any official declarations having been made.
One of my friends lived abroad for two years- we emailed infrequently, life just gets in the way sometimes, but still kept in touch on occasion. Within 2 minutes of meeting her back in Dublin we were talking away like we'd seen each other yesterday.

Catxscotch

Like poster above, I have no friends from school due to "difficulties" and them not being the people I thought they were. I went to college with alot of men, who were grand at college but of course have no interest in maintaining a friendship with me. I have moved to a completely new area in the opposite side of the country, and Im struggling. I don't work with anyone in the same gae gap, and go home most weekends. I live with my boyfriend, and I hang out woth his friends, (all from his class in college, and his home town). I used to play football and have "friends" from it, but I had to leave through injury and moving away..I still speak to them but not all the time. I feel very lonely and upset at my lack of friendship. i feel it pointles strying to establish new relationships where I am now, as I am due to move again early next year.
If I was to be married it would be my sisters/cousins who would be bridesmaids. I have difficulty trusting in friends, as I was badly stung in the past.
Ah well, sounds like Im not the only one!

GunRunner

I don't have any friends, I've always been a bit of a loner. I dont really care though.

Eve_Dublin

I haven't got round to reading this thread (I will tomorrow) but here's an article that might interest you!


http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/jul/31/30-out-of-time-friends