I’ve had a really hard time making and maintaining solid friendships and I’m always alone on the weekends. I have many people I talk to and hang out with in certain classes and I’m well-respected and liked in those environments. But I never get invited to anything or receive text messages from anybody other than my gf and family. I’ve never been part of a group or anything consistent. I’m graduating this semester, but throughout my undergrad I’ve never really had much of a social life outside of my relationship. And I know once I leave college it becomes even more difficult.
People say to make friends it helps to just invite people to things instead of waiting for people to invite you. The problem is I’ve tried this and they either end up cancelling or they already have plans with their own friends (it’s usually this). I don’t have an issue with people being busy or having their own plans but sometimes it gets hard to tell who’s really interested vs who’s just saying yes to be nice in the moment. And when people constantly cancel it becomes very discouraging. I remember I used to reach out to people all the time back in high school. Got tired of having to text first and always plan things. Tried an experiment—I stopped reaching out first to people I thought were my friends and suddenly I wasn’t being texted or invited anywhere. Figured things might change with a new environment in college, but I ran into the same issues with inviting people places and receiving poor outcomes. I stopped reaching out to people altogether because I guess I decided feeling alone is better than feeling alone and unwanted.
Anyway, I also feel like when you invite someone out somewhere they expect not to be the only person being invited…I just never have anyone else to invite. I lost a friend once because I always had to invite myself or be invited to things—it always ended up with me hanging out with his friends and not the other way around. Whenever he wanted to do something or go somewhere other than what/where his friends were, he’d ask if we could go out with my friends. Became hard to explain why we couldn’t, without admitting to having no other friends.
I’ve also heard you can just go out alone and meet people. I guess this is the best option but I don’t really know how to approach people like this. I never know what to say and I can tell when strangers are uncomfortable.
I feel like there has to be something wrong with me if everyone else manages to find people to hang out with and I can’t. Even other introverted people I know, like my gf, have a handful of friends they hang out with frequently.
Apologies for this being so long. Any constructive criticism or advice is welcome, thanks!
Edit: forgot to mention, I’m 22M