I accidentally created a second Reddit account when switching my email address, so this is a bit of a throwaway where I can maintain some anonymity.
I have had friendship struggles my whole life. While I have several long term friendships (15-20+ years) that I’m proud of, I happen to be in a place in my life where I am in a bit of limbo. I’m not very interested in hanging out with my co workers as I don’t have much in common with them (the few I do hang out with are the result of bonding from when I was first hired 8+ years ago), most of my female friends are either obsessed with their partners to a co-dependent degree or they are now having children and that naturally takes up most of their time and attention, and as I am married myself I feel intrusive trying to seek any type of singles group. My partner works a lot/travels for work so I spend 90% of my time physically alone.
I have always felt awkward initiating hangs when trying to bridge that gap of acquaintance to actual friend. Does anyone know the story of Lucille Ball and the actress who played Ethel: they had so much fun on set they never actually hung out after work. I feel like I’m everyone’s Lucy/Ethel. I have a lot of people who tell me things like “I forgot how funny you are!” after a prolonged absence, people who interact with my social media and tell me they like me but we don’t do anything IRL, or just general apathy (they don’t hate me but they don’t go out of their way to talk/hang out with me).
I always feel like I’m the one initiating contact and I’m usually met with some type of rejection. Things like: I’m busy, I can’t do abc because of xyz, I’m not free when you’re asking but I’m down! Yet no one ever actually reaches out to try again or it feels very “Ugh I don’t want to hang out with you but I don’t want to look like a bad guy”
I’m so tired of being lonely. I can never shake the anxiety of feeling like I’m bothering someone and yet I’m also frustrated that no one else attempts to reach out to me first. It makes me not want to try any more because I don’t want to be seen as pathetic.
How can I ask people to hang out without feeling like a burden?
1 comment
Literally in the same exact position (32F) except I have no partner. The majority of my friends are married, having children, doing family events. Many times I feel like I’m forcing a spot in those people’s lives. When I do tag along I feel very third wheel, almost like I’m intruding. I feel like the friendships I do have are EXTREMELY important to me, but I feel like I am not equally as important to them because they have so much other stuff going on. I feel weird reaching out to people I haven’t talked to for a while. For example, I ran into an old friend I used to be fairly close with. After a brief exchange I asked her if she was free for the weekend to go for a hike or maybe lunch. The look on her face was pure confusion. I feel like I’m reaching and trying to hard and I think people can read that and it turns them off. I can definitely relate to how your feeling…