Reflections and lamentations on my lack of a social life (and support network)

Avalinette

I'd like to think that my social life is more yellow than red, but maybe it's more red. I've been pretty miserable lately and a lot of my self pitying is focused on not having friends and support and feeling alone. In addition, I'm using my severely introverted husband (who interacts with people at work all day) as a social support (after my days in which my main work is spent in isolation) and you can imagine how well that's working out. Somehow I need to find out what it is other people do get/have a social network and make it work for me. I feel as if circumstances have conspired against me and I can't have and maintain a social network the way other people do. Let's see if we can change that.

Brief background: In preschool and Primary school I somehow got marked as an easy target and I was that kid everyone else picked on. I was the one person not allowed to join in certain games, I was teased and occasionally chased. When I did manage to get a friend, the bullies told her she couldn't be friends with me and had to pick friendship with me or ostacization along with me. She picked me. So, I had one best friend through most of Primary school. I used to believe that if I could just be popular instead of unpopular, everything would be better: I'd be able to sustain it, I just couldn't reach it. Well, I guess my wish was granted. When I was about 11, my family moved to a different country. With my new exotic status I was indeed instantly popular. Sadly, it only lasted a short while before the other kids figured out I was boring or annoying or whatever it is they didn't like about me. At least I was more ignored and left out than actively teased at that school.

Avalinette

After that, my family moved a few more times. I was also homeschooled for a while which in my case was a mercy as it got me away from the toxic social life I'd endured at school. I habitually found myself in churches where there were few or no other kids my age. The other kids in the homeschool groups were younger than me (most of them vastly younger): my parents were different for taking their high school aged kids out of school. I was fairly good at socialising with people a lot older and a lot younger than me. With all the moving I struggled to maintain any long friendships, though I stayed in touch with that one best friend from Primary school though letters and rare overseas phonecalls (and later email) are a poor subsitute for real life. We have grown to be rather different people to each other now.

I went to a regular school for my final year of high school. I found it difficult to fit in. The other kids had known each other since the start of High school and many since Primary school. They would talk about events I hadn't been there for or about things I had little interest in. Though I sometimes sat with a certain group of girls, I was on the outskirts and basically ignored. I ended up spending a lot of my lunchtimes in the library (on the plus side, I rarely had homework to take home). I felt different. I found the academics of school to be a waste of time and tedious (compared to what I'd been doing on my own at home before).

Everywhere, I was on the outskirts of social life. Partly due to being a newcomer and partly due to being different. At school I was the only (openly) Christian (a major facet of my family culture and life) student in my grade. At church there were no girls (or boys) my age and of those close to my age there were none who were academically minded or had university educated parents (education being another though not as important facet of my family culture and life). The girls at church were also particularly clique-ey. In choir I managed to make friends with another social pariah type girl so I had a best friend of sorts, though I think we may have been drawn to each other through pity rather than actual similarity.

By the end of high school I was a confirmed introvert.

Avalinette

In my first year of university I blossomed. I guess everyone was new, we shared an interest in learning and there was a thriving Christian group on campus that I threw myself into thus giving me a purpose of sorts. Looking back, I had a purpose and a joy both in involvement in the Christian group and in studying subjects I loved along side other people who also loved them. I imagine I had a high energy state that helped draw people to me. I made friends widely...and lo and behold, I was an extrovert

Looking back, I think I missed something though: I was friends with everybody, but didn't get to know others deeply. Of those university friends, there are only 2-3 with whom I have regular contact (and one of those is my husband :P). I also related much more easily to guys than girls and so my closer friends were guys (all friendships which dropped in intimacy when I got a boyfriend and then husband).  I felt happy and in the middle of things, but actually just had a lot of shallow friends: lots of people came to my birthday party, but very few stuck around once we didn't have classes keeping us together.

In the middle of my studies, I had an experience that brought back flashbacks of the ostracisation and loneliness of school and it plunged me into depression. I cried a lot. I distanced myself from some friends, others distanced themselves from me. I was on anti-depressants for about 6 months (and hated the emptiness they brought...sure I don't feel sad anymore, I don't feel anything). I saw various psychologists till one of them declared me healed and I was glad to get away.

With hindsight I realise that I also developed an anxiety disorder in that time. None of the doctors or psychologists I was seeing diagnosed this at the time despite me describing depression as a tight black thing on my chest making it hard to breathe. (It was only years later when I was having a one off gp visit to get new asthma meds ordered that he listened to my chest and told me it was clear and when I insisted that I was having difficulties breathing right then, he mentioned anxiety). By the end of my university studies, I was having random attacks of social anxiety and often left social situations to be by myself so as not to cry in front of others.

The social anxiety may be a clue to why I struggled to make close friends.

Avalinette

In my first job I was driven and dedicated and felt called to be there, but...I wasn't good at certain aspects of it. I was given leeway at first being new to the job, but I didn't improve as those above me expected me to. My anxiety became really bad: especially before during and after any meetings or training sessions I had with those higher up from me (and I had a lot of that because I needed the help).

After university I worked at 3 different workplaces and then switched to housewife; I've been in 4 different churches; moved countries twice. In any social situation I perpetually feel like the new person and am often aware that I'll be moving on soon anyway. My social anxiety peaks every time I have to go into a new situation/ break into yet another established social group. H and I have not yet lived longer than 2 years in any one place since getting married due to the moving required by his job.

My siblings and parents and the two friends I have maintained since my university days don't have kids. It gets near impossible to arrange anything social when I'm available up till about 5pm when I need to start doing household evening things and they're available after 5:30 when they finish work.

In the majority of my relationships I find I'm the one doing the legwork to try and stay in touch.

Avalinette

So, I'm supposed to look for friends amongst others with kids:

When I fell pregnant I was living in a city I'd moved to a few months before. The other women in the antenatal classes seemed to already be in groups of friends who were at school together; I didn't make friends with any of them. The people at church were very friendly though there were none in our age group and the only other little kid was about 3 years old. We did socialise well with church people but no deep friendships, it was always an older couple befriending a younger couple kind of thing. Once LO was born, I was at first overwhelmed with little baby stuff. Although people were friendly, there were not many offers of help as few people knew us well and those offers of help were not always accepted as well as we could have (we also didn't have family on hand for support). Once I managed to actually get out of the house and get to baby groups again, the other mothers seemed to all know each other well and I was an outsider. I also struggled to identify with the things they talked about (often my parenting style was different; I didn't care to talk about how to feed a 4 month old mush: mine was breastfed and then onto finger foods; I wasn't worried about going back to work, because I wasn't etc. I didn't say anything, but at times I felt judgemental and as if I would be seen as judgemental if I did talk about exclusive breastfeeding, staying home with the kids, babywearing etc.) I made one close Mommy friend in that time and we went to a few things together and had a few play dates, but since moving from that city, she has not responded to any of my emails or letters or texts or phonecalls despite her loud lamentations when she found I was moving and her entreaties that we keep in touch .

Avalinette

We moved countries when LO was 9 months old. In many mothers groups I found myself again on the outside and new and often the only one with a child her age as so many Moms had already gone back to work. My daughter had an adventurous streak; while the other mothers sat around talking, I found myself chasing. (Also, a new bout of social anxiety almost every time I go to something new) At church, there are few little kids and a number of my overtures at socialising have failed because the Moms are working. In our previous house the neighbours (with kids) on both sides were friendly but it took many false starts just to get the neighbours on one side over for a play date once (the others never came). Since moving (about a month ago) we've seen one set once, the other set have ignored my texts. My H has barely met these neighbours.

Avalinette

I feel as if I keep putting effort into finding, making and maintaining friendships even though I haven't much energy in general and rarely is that energy reciprocated. I suspect there are unwritten rules in the game of social interaction that I've missed or am unable to do.

Anyway, there's all the sad stuff. I'll post something more hopeful and proactive soon.

In particular, I have ideas for fostering closer social interaction with people at church and with people at the mother's group I'm in and neighbours and a few other stray aquaintances.

Now, I need to go pay attention to my neglected daughter...and make dinner...

Avalinette

I find it particularly sad when I compare my friendship network with that of others particularly in relation to having babies and the support around that. I didn't have much support around my first baby, but I fully accept that that is part and parcel of having a baby within a year of moving countries and having a baby on the other side of the world from family and long term friends...and I don't want to denigrate the support I did have. My H did his best, but was more clueless than I was how much work a new baby takes and I did have some family visit and help out during the newborn period. We also received lots of gifts and a few people from church made meals and one neighbour used to send over useful baby-rearing gifts like cabbage leaves when I had sore boobs. I think there's a disconnect in that my geographically close friends at the time were almost all older women who had either forgotten their own baby days or were remembering a time when women were kept in hospital a lot longer and there was an assumption that given I'm home from hospital, I'm ok to cope on my own and of course many of them didn't know me well enough to feel comfortable offering help...

Anyway, my alone ness has been brought to the forefront recently seeing my sister pregnant with her first baby. As soon as she announced her pregnancy, she was given a bag of maternity clothing from the church because so many other ladies there are going through pregnancies. She already has a mother's group lined up because the ladies at church have play group. I can just see the support is all lined up. There are things I thought I'd be being there for her with and I'm not even needed. As sister, I'm on the forefront of organising her baby shower. I didn't have a baby shower because there was no one to do one for me. At the organising meeting, they turned to me to ask how baby showers go nowadays with the presumption that, as the one whose got a baby, I know all about it: I've not been invited to a single baby shower my whole adult life, so I have no idea. The nearly teen age daughters of a friend of mine were chatting to me about one of the new babies at their church and how they take turns looking after the babies after church so the Moms have some time: at my church, I look after my baby after church ...it's always been that way. I remember when I was a nearly teen and a teenager, I was one of the eager young single girls taking turns to watch other lady's kids.

Avalinette

Some ideas to make things better

I've been making an effort to invite someone on a playdate every week for a while. I have to make quite a few invites to get a bite, but play dates are fun once they happen. Sometimes I'm discouraged (especially the time the playdate just didn't turn up without even letting me know they weren't coming). People are really friendly in person and excited when I mention something but slippery to actually pin down. So I'll keep doing that. Couldn't get one this past week, but have one lined up for next week already.

H and I periodically undertake to invite people to our house for dinner and keep struggling to actually do it. We've agreed to make Friday night our default invite someone over for a barbecue night. I'll see if I can persuade someone to come next week.

I'd love to have a mother's group/play group that actually feels like my friends and a church mother's group would be ideal. Sadly there isn't one. H has mentioned a few times that I should start one up, but I'm scared I'll not be able to persuade anyone to come/I won't have the energy to make it happen. There are very few young children at our church and many mothers work so the pool is limited. In addition, members of our church live quite far away from each other making any mid week thing difficult. But, right now there is an energetic lady with a 10 mo and 4 yo who works only 4 days a week and a lady with a 7 mo who I think is a bit socially isolated like me and both these ladies live near me. So, if I can sell the idea of a fortnightly playgroup to them hosted at my house , I think I'll have enough traction that we can invite the other ladies and kids along (3 families). I'll talk to the lady with the 2 kids this week about it. The lady with the 7mo will almost certainly come along if invited, I just don't think I have the energy to run something with just her, whereas the 2 kids lady will bring energy to the group if she joins.

MrGrimm

I can relate to this.  My wife and I are naturally introverts as well.  We were never ostracized in school, but we were never the popular kids.  We both had a couple close friends in school, but have since drifted apart through distance or whatever.  My wife is pretty sad at times because her best friend is about six hours away.  We talk to people at church or work, but neither of us seems to make any close friends.  The biggest frustration we have is we are always the ones to make effort.  Whether it's friends or even family, we'll be the ones to make contact to do something, but the other party almost never does.  We seem to have a good time, but it just seems like others don't want to take an interest in us.  Sometimes it makes us wonder what is wrong with us. It really makes it a bit of a struggle at home at times because we don't have anyone to help with the kids.  We're probably the closest with my parents, but they are 20 minutes away and they don't ever offer to watch the kids or have them spend the night for some "us" time.

Louise

I've never been a very social person, though I was never ostracised or anything like that.  Never an extravert though. I ccan't imagine anyone would have done a baby shower for me, though I don't think they have them here.  But I did make friends with some other mothers when my sons started school, and perhaps you will find you do too.  You get chatting to people while waiting to pick your kids up.  And getting involved with stuff like school fetes etc is a good way of getting to know people.

Avalinette

MrGrimm said:

I can relate to this.  My wife and I are naturally introverts as well.  We were never ostracized in school, but we were never the popular kids.  We both had a couple close friends in school, but have since drifted apart through distance or whatever.  My wife is pretty sad at times because her best friend is about six hours away.  We talk to people at church or work, but neither of us seems to make any close friends.  The biggest frustration we have is we are always the ones to make effort.  Whether it's friends or even family, we'll be the ones to make contact to do something, but the other party almost never does.  We seem to have a good time, but it just seems like others don't want to take an interest in us.  Sometimes it makes us wonder what is wrong with us. It really makes it a bit of a struggle at home at times because we don't have anyone to help with the kids.  We're probably the closest with my parents, but they are 20 minutes away and they don't ever offer to watch the kids or have them spend the night for some "us" time.

@MrGrimm‌ ;

Yeah, I do feel there's something wrong with me/us that people don't make the effort to be friends. But, I can also understand it from their point of view: so often we are the new unfamiliar people. As a kid it confused me that the popular kids couldn't just be nice to the down trodden, but I realise now that even for the popular kids, their place in the social matrix is tenuous and they kinda need to ignore/tease the ignored people to keep their own status. Sometimes I've felt like I'm the only one with the guts to start a conversation with a new person. Sometimes I can take that as a positive thing, but sometimes it's tiring and depressing. I think maybe it also ties in with Athol's thing of positive energy. I don't give off a positive energy vibe and so no one's attracted to that.

H and I both have a background of moving frequently as kids and even in our original country and original culture we were raised differently to others. Now we're such a hodgepodge, there's no where we actually fit in naturally and easily. Add to that a natural inclination to introversion and preference for each other's company and it's hard for us to make friends.

Next month, our LO will be having her first ever sleep over with the Grandparents

Avalinette

@Louise and @Sweet_Avenue‌ , I'm trying with the getting to know people with kids my kid's age, but it's disappointingly difficult to break into other social groups and I get discouraged. But, I'm also so pessimistic about it that I kinda sabotage my own efforts ...and then I get anxious and withdraw and make everything worse...

SweetAvenue, what did you do to work on that social anxiety? I generally kinda ignore it, push through it...but I'm not exactly sparkling company when I'm focussed on not crying.

Avalinette

Taking stock of my friends/aquaintances:

My sister: Till now she's been busy with work making scheduling hard, though we've managed the occasional meet up for coffee/lunch near her work and I see her sometimes on weekends at my parents' house. We've managed to persuade her and her husband to come to our place once; they've never invited us. Sis sometimes initiates contact. Now she's about to have a baby so it may it easier to get together and we'll have more in common, though it's depressing how much of a ready made Mom's support network she's already got with church and friends with kids. My relationship with Sis is ok. We have some sibling issues, but mainly on my side. My Sis is actually a lovely person and would probably never think badly of anyone. I'm not so charitable toward her and have baggage.

My best friend (R): I've known her for nearly a decade now. She's the one female person I'm comfortable sharing deep stuff with and we know each other well. We've bonded really well, often over our different-ness to those around us (and we're fairly different to each other). She's really difficult to stay in touch with. She's kinda flighty...often changing jobs/homes and always busy with things like trying to hold down multiple jobs or studying on the side. She has a number of vampires in her life that keep her busy. She is single and working rather than married with kids so we live in very different worlds. It's hard to get her to agree to see me and hard geographically for us to get together and her plans are often disrupted. She often doesn't answer her phone and very rarely phones me (again a different lives/scheduling thing: she'll say something like 'I wanted to phone you this week but every night I'd only be done at 10 pm and that's too late for you isn't it and I didn't want to phone in case I woke you up'). Sometimes she'll phone to say 'are you home now...can I come see you now?' and too often I can't do late notice things. We probably communicate in some way once a month/fortnight but it's very variable. So overall, an excellent friend when she's there, but a lot of work to stay in touch with. Luckily, she's also one of those friends I can not see in months, but then when we do get together we click instantly again.

Avalinette

Two ladies (T and : both a bit older than me; they both had kids already when I met them but the youngest kid is the same age as my LO. These families are role models to me. I would consider their kids good role models for my kids and exactly the kind of people I want to foster closer ties with. They are both kind and friendly. But, live a little far away, with school age kids we can pretty much only catch up in the school holidays and they have their own well established social networks that don't include me. They're at the same church as each other: one of those churches with heaps of kids in the same age bracket as their kids and strong community among the families in the church (the church I attended before I got married and joined H's church). Both families, especially B's family, have mentioned inviting us over as a family but have never done so. I've not invited them either mainly because my house has been unsuitable for that many people, but maybe I can now. I missed the last school holiday bracket with B and kids due to sickness and busyness and moving house . I often see both T and B and their kids in one go which is convenient for catching up but less conducive to creating close friendship with them because they're already close friends with each other so they talk to each other...not that they exclude me in any way...I'm just not as easily a part of it. Contacting T and trying to organise an after school visit with her and kids is on my priority list atm (T's kids are especially sad that they haven't seen me since I told them I was pregnant).

Ladies from my church: X lives near me and has a younger baby. She's a nervous first time Mom and often asks me for advice. She pretty much always comes to anything I invite her to and will come out to see me (rather than me going out there) but she's never taken any initiative to spend time with me. I suspect she is lonely and isolated and shy like me. I see her at church every week (though I don't always talk to her) and she often comes to the fortnightly mother's group I introduced her to. She's a little transport challenged: doesn't drive, but my new house is walking distance for her (not for me, I couldn't walk to her house) She reminds me a lot of myself when I first had a baby. I don't think she has any family near her either. K has daughters, one older than mine and the other younger. She is very friendly, but busy with work and her own friends and family. If I put in the effort I could probably get a playdate with them every month or more often, but again, I'm the one who has to make the effort. K's parenting philosophy is similar to mine and as her oldest is older than mine she's good for bouncing ideas off. X's parenting philosophy seems similar to mine too, but I get the feeling that she's actually patterning her parenting off mine (flattering): there are lots of things she's changed after talking to me. Other church people: F has an older boy, I don't know them well; Q has lots of children, rarely comes to church and while friendly hasn't really responded to any of my overtures, I has one child still preschool age (and others school age), they're kinda new to the church and she was excited when I mentioned a play date but I've not been able to actually get anything going. I mentioned trying to start a playgroup with some of these ladies. I'll talk to K this week. There also a number of older ladies at church. I've not managed to foster any particular friendships with them; I try to go to Bible Study.

Time for me to go...next time I'll explore next door neighbours, old house and new house and women at the mother's group I attend and my university friend D whom I am incidentally seeing on Monday (provisionally).

Avalinette

Thanks for that @Sweet_Avenue‌.

What triggers social anxiety for me?

I know things are worse if I am physically tired, especially if I've just had physical exertion or stress: the worst way for me to get to an event is to be running late and walking up a hill :P. The types of social situation most likely to trigger acute social anxiety in me is going to something new where there's a group of people who seem to already know each other.

Being a good conversationalist and moments of silence:

I need to learn some good stock questions/comments to keep conversation going. Once I've used up 'What's your name? What are your kids' names ages? and what do you do for a living?' I often get a mind blank on any more to say. Or if I manage to get some more out 'Oh, your LO is x months old, how are you going with y?' or some question about whatever event we're at etc...if the conversation doesn't keep flowing I get stuck.

I'm at my worst as a conversationalist at that awkward point of friendship when you've met them once or multiple times before so you can't ask the easy introductory questions, but you're not close enough to know what a successful conversation topic would be or have enough details of their life to ask specific questions. I was discussing this dilemma with my H thinking of a particular conversation I've had a few times.

'So, what have you been up to this week?'

'Oh, just the usual, nothing much.'

I personally hate being asked this question because , yeah, I didn't do much this week..chances are I napped every day, cleaned the house and cooked the food. However, if asked I make an effort to think up something: I'll talk about yesterday cause I remember it or think up something amusing my LO did. Most of the time when I ask the question I get the 'nothing' response. It's like I threw the conversational ball and they didn't throw it back. I'll try say something about what I did that week to keep it going. For the next iteration I may try:

'Any plans for next week?'

which invariably gets the nothing response 

If I do go with the just talking about me option, then I'm left with the same dilemma next time because I still don't know anything about my conversational partner.

Characteristics that make a good friend vs me:

Obviously, I don't have the characteristics that make me a good friend/someone others seek out when they want company. I believe one of my flaws is talking too much about myself. Partly it's to fill in the gaps because I can't get the other person to talk about themselves and sometimes it's because I've become so desperate for a chance to talk that the flood gates just open and I struggle to stop myself. I also don't seem to know the unwritten rules to. As a teenager, I think I came off as cold and reserved and just kinda different to others. I had integrity and wasn't willing to change myself or sacrifice my values to fit in. I have at least one sibling to took the opposite approach and became very different to the rest of our family but a carbon copy of the other kids at school ...and of course found friends easily. Once I got into the bigger pool of people that was university I found many people who did share my values and blossomed socially, but I think those earlier experiences of being different and shunned came back to haunt me later. 

Natalie_Lorin

When I know I'm going to be seeing someone (or just think that I will) I try to have a running idea of topics I can introduce. So I see on FB or hear otherwise that an acquaintance wants to become a La Leche leader - ok, so when I see that person I can say "I noticed you mentioning that. What got you interested in La Leche?" In the back of my head I know this conversation can segue into female "war stories" or a discussion on postpartum care or support structures for women or things like that, and that if I does I can turn the conversation back to her (if needed) by asking her to share about her experiences postpartum and what she wished someone had done for her/told her/etc.

In my case I tend to have covert contracts of the form "Well, I'm awesome, so how come I wasn't invited to join your clubhouse?" That's just negative energy. Leadership is great, but I think learning to be a good follower is also vital. So for me that means being happy to be there, contributing to the conversation (and not trying to put myself too far forward), and just generally playing a supporting role as far as possible. The nutty thing is that right after I resolved to do this I got invited to help out with the leadership of a different group. I guess with that energy out of the way I could move forward.  

Avalinette

Exploring my friends part 2

a girl I met at uni. She is not married and working fulltime. She is probably the one person in the last few years who actually emails me first/contacts me first and who puts a bit of effort into maintaining our friendship. I don't really feel a strong friendship with her or a closeness, but she's a nice enough girl and certainly a friendship worth cultivating even if only because I don't have to do all the work. We have contact every few months: generally an email exchange to set up lunch and then a lunch together. Our catch up for tonight has been postponed for 2 weeks

Neighbours: Our old house is close enough to our new house that we could stay in touch with old neighbours, but we won't be able to do the 'just happened to see you in the yard and popping over' thing. M has two boys older than my LO; our kids get on really well with each other. M works and is often away. She's very friendly when I pop over the fence because I saw they were home as is her husband. I was never able to get them to come to my house though despite many invites including one memorable playdate when I waited in my house for them and they just didn't show. I kinda want to invite them to our new house for a barbecue but what if I just keep inviting and they never come...despite their friendliness and frequent saying we should get together. N has a boy my LO's age and a baby. Also friendly. She's offered help too and offered babysitting but H figures he doesn't know her and is hesitant. N is friendly and I get on well with her and responds and comes to play dates I set up...but has other friends that she turns to when she's looking for a playdate or company. New neighbours: O has an older son and a daughter my LO's age. Again, friendly...and again they've said things about how we should catch up and get to know each other. This is a clean start...is there any trick to getting to know neighbours well enough that we actually create a friendship?

Mother's group: technically, this is a breastfeeding support group. This is good because I think bf is awesome and I'm enthusiastic about it.  The structure is basically to sit around and discuss a topic related to bf and then morning tea and socialising. People are friendly and I'm comfortable there after getting over the panic attacks from the first few times I attended.But, somehow, I feel I didn't actually get in. I've not made any particular friends. I often find myself sitting on the outskirts and everyone else in groups chatting. If there is someone alone, I'll go talk to them...but often there isn't and it's so awkward breaking into a group of people already talking...I do do it, but can't actually pull it off well. For most of my time in this group my LO has been in that awkward age group where she's not little enough to just lie on the ground or be in my arms, but not big enough that I can trust her to not just walk off by herself (the room is open to a playground which in turn is open out to other groups of people I don't know and then to the street...and playgrounds are like a magnet for my LO) so I often find myself just kinda following her instead of talking to people. I've not really managed any social interaction with any of these Moms outside of these fortnightly meetings, other than my church friend, X, who I invited to the group and knew beforehand.

Avalinette

Purple and Natalie, thanks for your posts. I'll try respond soon (tomorrow maybe?)

2manypasswords

@Avalinette - I have an idea of where you're coming from.  Wife & I are both introverts.  But I work from home most of the time, whereas she works elsewhere most of the time.  So often times, I'll be the one wanting to go out and do things with other people whereas it's the last thing she wants to do b/c she's already had her fill of people at work.

We've lived in our current place for 8 years and it hasn't worked out well socially.  When we moved here, I thought we'd have friends in due time, but it didn't happen.  Part of it is if you don't fit a certain mold here, you're pretty much out of luck.  A fair number of guys out here are betas who let their wives control the social calendar. 

And for lack of a better way of putting it, people here tend to be kind of...bland.  I grew up in a small town.  I'm not itching to move back there, but it seemed like people there had more personality.  There were people who were characters (in a good way), and I just hardly come across that here in my corner of suburbia. 

So, about the only thing I can do is to work on myself and be open to possibilities.       

Avalinette

@Purple‌ , I was thinking of you  when I started this thread because I know you'd just posted in your thread about struggling to socialise...I've had this thread as a project for me to start in the back of my mind, but seeing your brought it back to the front again. We can be 'learning how to make friends' buddies.

@Natalie_Lorin, I try to think of something to talk to people about before I start a conversation. I don't have facebook though, and an awful memory for the trivial facts of others' lives. I see what you say about negative energy. I want to find that positive energy person inside me who makes others want to interact with her.