I’ll try to make it short, I think it’s so hard to have friends in your mid-30s (maybe always? but it has def gotten worse). I’m 36f, married, no kids, and most of my friends are female and have kids (actually only one is male with two kids). I hardly ever see them. It has been starting before they got kids and had gotten into serious relationships (I was single a long time, met my husband later than most of them). I feel like they are in their bubble and don’t have time for most people outside their closest family and I get it, I’m often so tired after work I can’t even think of meeting up with anyone – and then image that when you also have to care of tiny humans!
My husband’s really great, but I want female friendships as well. He can’t be everything for me and shouldn’t be. Also when he’s gone for some time, I feel like I’m starting to get depressed (I’ve had depression, in and out of it for maybe 15 years? I take anxiety pills, they should help with it, but well….).
It’s not like I have nobody, I have a friend that lives further away and we talk on the phone sometimes and see each other maybe like 3 times a year? I have co-workers that I really like and also have hung out outside of work once. I also have a good connection to a family member which whom I text on most days. And there is another friend that I meet for lunch at work sometimes, but haven’t in a while.
I’m not really good at initiating friendships, I always feel like my social anxiety kicks in then. I am ok at maintaining friendships, but I often don’t even get replies to the texts I send my married with kids-friends.
I often go like: ok, I’ll text them again and see maybe they will want to hang out? And then I get sad, when again: nothing.
A part of me just wanted to vent and another part wanted to see if people feel the same and another part wants tips?
btw, I think it’s the hardest thing ever to ask another woman that one would like to be friends with to have a coffee or something (I think it’s equally hard than asking someone on a date romantically!), but then again, some people seem to manage to do that on a regular basis, so idk.