Do you have a friend you can talk to about....I don't know....life stuff?

[TheReader]

So, I had a thing happen and it wasn't anything bad or horrible, just a rather awkward-ish situation. It's not a thing I can really talk with my husband about, and my good friend who I would have talked to about it moved away, and our schedules are hard to mesh to get phone calls in. I have a few other good online friends, who I think I could message/call about this, but we're still in that "group chat" phase and not so much the "call one on one" phase, really, and I'm not good at breaking past that. 

I have some local friends, but a lot of those are friends made through my job (I teach at a homeschool co-op, and these friends are parents of my students), so awkward to share too many personal details about things, ya know? 

I've thought about posting here, but...public forum.... but it did make me think/wonder --- do most people have someone(s) like that they can talk to about those weird awkward things?   If so....where do you find them??? Or, how do you break past that chit-chat stage/group chat stage to real-talk??

 

(this kind of thing always makes me miss ex-pat life; you met someone even remotely interesting, and you were just automatically great friends and you skipped over all that "levels of friendship" thing and just....boom. On the other hand, 6 yrs of that = not knowing how to navigate this once back stateside, even 9 yrs later)

 

 

[MEmama]

I have one friend like this.

We’ve been friends since our kids were in middle school so 7-8 years, and it’s just been this year that we’ve been able to start letting down our guard. We typically get together once a week and we are each other’s primary local friend, so it’s not that we weren’t close before—it just takes us both a long time to be truly vulnerable. I’m extremely grateful for her.

It is hard to make close friends at this age, to find a deep connection and feel real safety with. Harder for some of us than others, I suppose.

[TexasProud]

Before the last 2 months, that would be here and still is to a certain extent.

My ladies group is doing the Finding Your People Study, though obviously not everyone is ok with that level of interaction. Our group of 20 is down to 30 with some people telling the organizer they couldn't do that level of intimacy.

So I am working on it. I have a counselor, spiritual director and working on a few friendships.  

As you mentioned, much more common when serving overseas or in other cultures. Not very common here in the states. 

[Indigo Blue]

No. I have friends, but I don’t talk about my deepest “life stuff”. It gets dumped here. For all the world to see. Because it has to go somewhere. 
 

Dumping stuff here is worth the risk to me (of having someone to be less than kind or getting dog-piled) because I really need and appreciate the solid advice from most. 
 

ETA: I don’t have a sister. Our family is too dysfunctional and triangulated, so no one to confide in there. And my two sons are wonderful listeners, but I don’t think I should trouble them with things like that. I do sometimes to a certain point, but I like for things to be happy and light when we are together. So I don’t do that. 

Edited October 25, 2022 by Indigo Blue

[ScoutTN]

I do have several friends like that. One I’ve known for over 30 years and is like a sister to me, though we live a 7 hour drive apart. We were in grad school together.

My other friends are local and from church and homeschooling and the relationships have developed over more than a decade as our kids have grown up. Kindred spirit sort of friends can be hard to find! 
 

 

[Indigo Blue]

23 minutes ago, TheReader said:

you met someone even remotely interesting, and you were just automatically great friends and you skipped over all that "levels of friendship" thing and just....boom.

That would be so nice. 

[catz]

I don't really right now.  I did have some social groups that met regularly prior to covid but I am stunned how those have fallen apart.  I tried to stay in touch with a some people and I still am linked to many on social media but ugh.  I suspect many of them were/are struggling with mental health through covid.  I can totally relate.  But I also am not a person willing to prop up a friendship if it's not flowing both ways.  

I have joined a couple neighborhood social groups now and we'll see where those go.  My youngest is a senior in high school this year so next year I may be working.  I do have one private group on SM that is important to me on a daily basis.  Hope springs eternal.  

[Arcadia]

I have but none are local. They are ex-schoolmates and so we have known each other for decades and are familiar with each other’s parents. I have friends here who are good listeners and won’t blab. It is just the local ones don’t know my relatives and ex-schoolmates so while they are great as listening ears, they would not feel as competent to be sounding boards. 

[TheReader]

8 minutes ago, Indigo Blue said:

That would be so nice. 

It was great....and it's warped me on how friendships work, in the here & now. I kind of routinely think I'm closer with people than they think we are. 

Well, and then of course is the reason for it, which is that everyone's moving in/out all the time, so great, close friendships....for a little while. Anyway, yes, I wish it was more like that here sometimes. 

[TheReader]

16 minutes ago, Indigo Blue said:

No. I have friends, but I don’t talk about my deepest “life stuff”. It gets dumped here. For all the world to see. Because it has to go somewhere. 
 

Dumping stuff here is worth the risk to me (of having someone to be less than kind or getting dog-piled) because I really need and appreciate the solid advice from most. 
 

ETA: I don’t have a sister. Our family is too dysfunctional and triangulated, so no one to confide in there. And my two sons are wonderful listeners, but I don’t think I should trouble them with things like that. I do sometimes to a certain point, but I like for things to be happy and light when we are together. So I don’t do that. 

It's funny....I've dumped a LOT Of things here over the years. This particular weird thing just feels different.  Perhaps because I'm still processing it? I don't know. 

I do have a sister, but not a confide-in-able one.  And yes, the guys are good listeners, but not everything is a mother/son conversation either. Life is weird. 

[TheReader]

6 minutes ago, Arcadia said:

I have but none are local. They are ex-schoolmates and so we have known each other for decades and are familiar with each other’s parents. I have friends here who are good listeners and won’t blab. It is just the local ones don’t know my relatives and ex-schoolmates so while they are great as listening ears, they would not feel as competent to be sounding boards. 

re: the bold, I think that's a bit of why I haven't talked to any of my various friends on this weird thing yet.  Their various backgrounds, combined with this weird thing, means I'm not certain their feedback would be valuable/applicable in this case.  Like, this is not the thing, but if you have an argument with your husband you don't jump to the friend who escaped an abuser, b/c her viewpoint is likely to be skewed, ya know?  (that's not what this is, nor the background in question, but just as an example....). 

Does speak to why it can be important to have friends of many backgrounds/diverse situations, but also some with similar world-views to you....

[Jean in Newcastle]

51 minutes ago, TheReader said:

So, I had a thing happen and it wasn't anything bad or horrible, just a rather awkward-ish situation. It's not a thing I can really talk with my husband about, and my good friend who I would have talked to about it moved away, and our schedules are hard to mesh to get phone calls in. I have a few other good online friends, who I think I could message/call about this, but we're still in that "group chat" phase and not so much the "call one on one" phase, really, and I'm not good at breaking past that. 

I have some local friends, but a lot of those are friends made through my job (I teach at a homeschool co-op, and these friends are parents of my students), so awkward to share too many personal details about things, ya know? 

I've thought about posting here, but...public forum.... but it did make me think/wonder --- do most people have someone(s) like that they can talk to about those weird awkward things?   If so....where do you find them??? Or, how do you break past that chit-chat stage/group chat stage to real-talk??

 

(this kind of thing always makes me miss ex-pat life; you met someone even remotely interesting, and you were just automatically great friends and you skipped over all that "levels of friendship" thing and just....boom. On the other hand, 6 yrs of that = not knowing how to navigate this once back stateside, even 9 yrs later)

 

 

I have a lot of friends like that. Some are from my ex-pat days. Some are from here. I just do the same as I did overseas. I have a sense of who meshes with me and is trustworthy. So I am open and honest with them (on not so personal stuff first). I know pretty much immediately if I made a misjudgment or not. People will respond in kind with similar honesty and openness. But it’s not just about openness and honesty for me. We also need to share a similar worldview on God and “how things work “ for the really deep things. Otherwise as nice, open and wise they are as friends, they just won’t get where I am coming from on the deepest things. 

[Grace Hopper]

33 minutes ago, TexasProud said:

Before the last 2 months, that would be here and still is to a certain extent.

My ladies group is doing the Finding Your People Study, though obviously not everyone is ok with that level of interaction. Our group of 20 is down to 30 with some people telling the organizer they couldn't do that level of intimacy.

So I am working on it. I have a counselor, spiritual director and working on a few friendships.  

As you mentioned, much more common when serving overseas or in other cultures. Not very common here in the states. 

Off topic, I could not do the Finding Your People study. I went to an introduction to it and will just say, it was not an experience I enjoyed. I bet the third who dropped from your class were introverts who found themselves feeling guilty they aren’t extroverts. Maybe not, maybe it was just the way the leaders in my particular situation presented it, but that’s where I knew I’d end up if I had signed up for that class! Which is sad because we all need to find our people. 
 

OP, I have found friends through attending Bible studies at churches where I am not a member of the congregation (but of compatible doctrinal beliefs). This gave me relationships where I could be with like minded people who could give sound feedback, but weren’t in the same circle of people that say, my husband and I might engage with friends as a couple. Or that didn’t know any of the parents at my kids’ school activities, in case I needed to seek wisdom about an issue with that circle. If you don’t want to do a church thing, maybe a club for something you’re interested in. Especially for an introvert like me, it’s helpful to build relationships while  working side by side in a common activity. It takes time, but it’s doable. I know it probably won’t help in the short term, but can be cultivated for the future. 

[TheReader]

11 minutes ago, Grace Hopper said:

Off topic, I could not do the Finding Your People study. I went to an introduction to it and will just say, it was not an experience I enjoyed. I bet the third who dropped from your class were introverts who found themselves feeling guilty they aren’t extroverts. Maybe not, maybe it was just the way the leaders in my particular situation presented it, but that’s where I knew I’d end up if I had signed up for that class! Which is sad because we all need to find our people. 
 

OP, I have found friends through attending Bible studies at churches where I am not a member of the congregation (but of compatible doctrinal beliefs). This gave me relationships where I could be with like minded people who could give sound feedback, but weren’t in the same circle of people that say, my husband and I might engage with friends as a couple. Or that didn’t know any of the parents at my kids’ school activities, in case I needed to seek wisdom about an issue with that circle. If you don’t want to do a church thing, maybe a club for something you’re interested in. Especially for an introvert like me, it’s helpful to build relationships while  working side by side in a common activity. It takes time, but it’s doable. I know it probably won’t help in the short term, but can be cultivated for the future. 

This is a good idea - I had a ladies Bible study I attended at our old church, but it was always so....iffy...sharing things about my kids or husband when they all knew them.  I'll have to see if I can find one in a different church. 

Our main activity is very heavily male dominated, which does not lend itself well to friendships, unfortunately (at least, not of this sort).  (DH and I are both newly into fencing, which I adore, but there are not a lot of women in our club....).  I have been debating getting more involved in the art league....hmm. those are good thoughts. Thank you! 

[TheReader]

18 minutes ago, Jean in Newcastle said:

I have a lot of friends like that. Some are from my ex-pat days. Some are from here. I just do the same as I did overseas. I have a sense of who meshes with me and is trustworthy. So I am open and honest with them (on not so personal stuff first). I know pretty much immediately if I made a misjudgment or not. People will respond in kind with similar honesty and openness. But it’s not just about openness and honesty for me. We also need to share a similar worldview on God and “how things work “ for the really deep things. Otherwise as nice, open and wise they are as friends, they just won’t get where I am coming from on the deepest things. 

Yes, I definitely find that for some topics, you need that shared world view. 

[Scarlett]

I have several.  My best friend of 46 years. My two sisters. My sisters in law. And 2 here where we have only lived for 10 years.  I don’t know what I would do without my friends.  

And like @Indigo Bluei also dump a lot here. Some replies are harsh and negative but mostly I have found the responses helpful. 

[Lady Florida.]

I have 3 friends like that. We call ourselves The Golden Girls. One I've known for almost 20 years when we first joined our homeschool group, the other two about 15 years. We weren't always this close but as our homeschooled kids grew up we started doing things together without the kids. We meshed as a close group about 10 years ago. Any one of us can talk to any one of the others.

I'm sorry you don't have someone you can talk to. I went through a short period like that years ago and I know it's hard. 

 

[Lady Florida.]

I also have a same age cousin I can talk to about family of origin stuff. She lives an 1.5 hours away but we talk often and visit periodically. We both grew up in the same dysfunctional extended family so we understand where each other is coming from. I'm not sure why, but she isn't the one I talk to about today's life stuff. I'm close to my brother but not close enough to talk about deep personal subjects. 

[Clarita]

I have different friends for different life stuff. I think it's easier to find several people to fit different aspects than to find the one unicorn that meets them all. I have a friend group that I discuss my children stuff with that I don't talk politics in, I have the homeschool friend to talk about homeschool stuff, I have church and family friend who doesn't share the same life stage as me. 

I like talking here too, because I can see a lot more perspective than just my friends. I don't mind new and different ideas.

[alisoncooks]

I have one friend like that, but we only get to hang out every couple of months or so. 

[Jean in Newcastle]

1 minute ago, Clarita said:

I have different friends for different life stuff. I think it's easier to find several people to fit different aspects than to find the one unicorn that meets them all. I have a friend group that I discuss my children stuff with that I don't talk politics in, I have the homeschool friend to talk about homeschool stuff, I have church and family friend who doesn't share the same life stage as me. 

I like talking here too, because I can see a lot more perspective than just my friends. I don't mind new and different ideas.

Yes, this is true for me too.  I do have a core of good friends that I can talk deeply too but it's also true that I curate my conversation to some degree.  It's not reasonable to think that my friends who have never left the US would understand some of the issues of having been raised in a boarding school overseas.  For those issues, I talk with my longest friend, who has been a very close friend now for 47 years.  (I can talk to others about the same things but some things are lost when  you have to explain the situation vs. having lived through it together.) 

[Jean in Newcastle]

2 minutes ago, alisoncooks said:

I have one friend like that, but we only get to hang out every couple of months or so. 

I don't hang out with very many of my friends.  They are all very busy.  But we do make time for each other as needed even if some conversations are over the phone etc. 

[Spryte]

Yes, I have friends like this. One is from college days, and we can call or text and be into “the stuff” in an instant, even if we’ve been out of touch for a bit. One local, we’ve been friends for almost 15 years now, met through homeschooling. A few others. And sometimes there are close friends that come and go — they don’t all have to be decades-long  friendships.

I’ve moved a lot, over the years, and find that most of my close friends are often also transplants to an area, or people who have moved or traveled a lot. 

 

[Katy]

Yes, but not many. 

We’ve moved a lot over the years and my most reliable source of friends have been church small groups. I think at some point you just have to try braving talking about something personal and see how it goes. People either bond over it or move on. I haven’t done the find your people thing but from the sound of it I wouldn’t. 

I’m curious what’s bothering you and if you don’t want to publicly post please feel free to message me. 

[KatieJ]

Yes,many. I have 2 sisters  I can talk to about pretty much anything.

 I had a dear friend back in MI I could talk to about anything. We moved last year and am now back in our hometown. I have a friend I have known for over 60 years, and we just picked up where we left off 25 years ago. We just went to the gym this am with our hubbies. The 4 of us have been couples  since Highschool. 

I am  very blessed

[Murphy101]

I have 4 that it’s taken me 15-35 years of build relationship with to where we are now. We are very close and talk many times a week to each other about anything and everything. 

[SKL]

I probably share the most with my sisters.  Besides that, I can generally trust my two housemates.  The only problem is that things I say can come back to bite me later, when I least need that.

I always have the choice to keep quiet, so if I open up, I guess that's me accepting all the predictable results.  😛

There have been times when I blabbed very personal stuff (face to face) to a total stranger first.  Not sure if that was wise or not.  😛  I think it did make me feel braver to tell one or more friends/relatives about stuff I had hidden before.

[mommyoffive]

No not currently.  

[Melissa Louise]

Yes, I do.

I often have, throughout my life, and it's one way in which I've been very lucky.

Right now I have several people like this.

They are people I have known for a decade plus, though parenting activities.

[TheReader]

3 hours ago, Katy said:

Yes, but not many. 

We’ve moved a lot over the years and my most reliable source of friends have been church small groups. I think at some point you just have to try braving talking about something personal and see how it goes. People either bond over it or move on. I haven’t done the find your people thing but from the sound of it I wouldn’t. 

I’m curious what’s bothering you and if you don’t want to publicly post please feel free to message me. 

Aww, thank you! 

I posted it this afternoon - "let's call this being The Reader's friend" and am getting some good feedback. 

[Loowit]

No, not currently.  I used to for years.  We met in kindergarten.  But we drifted apart after I had kids and she stayed kid free.  The final nail in the coffin was me homeschooling, and she was a public school teacher who was opposed to homeschooling.  It was not without reason.  She had seen some pretty bad homeschoolers.

The last time we talked was when my grandfather disappeared five years ago and I needed someone to talk to and I asked if she could meet with me.  We went to dinner and it was like old times, but that was it.  Nothing really since then.  She has her life and I have mine.  Part of me wonders if now that I am almost an emptynester if things might be able to catch back up, but I kind of doubt it.

I have never been great at making friends, so it is either share things with DH or keep it to myself.  My mom and sister aren't really people I feel comfortable sharing things with.  I love them, but my mom tends to talk a lot so anything I tell her will probably get out at some point and my sister is just super busy with her own life and friends and we have never been close.

[fairfarmhand]

I have 4 friends like that. I’ve made 2 of them in the last 2-3 years. One of them is a friend from about 5-6 years ago and the other has been my friend for about 10 years. I have no sisters and my sisters in law live a long way off.

[heartlikealion]

Mainly one friend and we shoot messages at any time of day/night and the other will just read/respond when they get to it. We usually interact daily. My phone doesn't make sounds when I get a message.

I'm not much of a small talk person so I'm quite tired of the facebook posts which are surface level. Then if I share anything personal I feel like there are "lurkers" reading my timeline among just a small handful of actual people that read/respond. So I'm second-guessing what to say on facebook these days. 

[Resilient]

I have three friends like this, and I also have what my mom called a 50-mile friend: someone you can talk to who is not part of your daily life, doesn't know who you are talking about (so you can rant about someone), but has shared interests and principles/beliefs. Mom insisted that everyone had to have a 50-mile friend. 

I assume you want someone to talk to IRL or at least not in a public forum. I met my 50-mile friend on a public forum but we don't talk on that forum. We phone call, we text.  

 

[Guest]

I do have one in particular but there have been years-long spells that I didn’t. One was my soul-mate friend but moved far away. Another who was like this had a drastic change in her life situation, moved and kind of disappeared. 
 

I have another handful of friends that are *almost* that. I would talk to them about most things but since I see the other friend almost weekly, I may not; I already talked about the thing with my closest friend. 
 

For me, I need to see the person in a regularly-occurring setting in order to develop to that level. I make friends slowly and I’m choosy about what I will share. If I have any inkling the the person is a blabbermouth, is condescending or will judge me hurt fully, I won’t tell them anything of substance; we’re just going to hover around topics like having eaten a really good sandwich or where to go for a good haircut. 
 

PS: I read that find your people book and I *strongly* dislike the strategies in that book. People who try to push into my inner life get shut out. 

[Katy]

2 minutes ago, Quill said:

 

PS: I read that find your people book and I *strongly* dislike the strategies in that book. People who try to push into my inner life get shut out. 

I know almost nothing about this book except what you've said or implied and I suspect it's highly manipulative. Like a Tony Robbins strategy on forcing people into false intimacy.  Is that accurate or am I misinterpreting?

[KungFuPanda]

9 hours ago, Grace Hopper said:

Off topic, I could not do the Finding Your People study. I went to an introduction to it and will just say, it was not an experience I enjoyed. I bet the third who dropped from your class were introverts who found themselves feeling guilty they aren’t extroverts. Maybe not, maybe it was just the way the leaders in my particular situation presented it, but that’s where I knew I’d end up if I had signed up for that class! Which is sad because we all need to find our people. 
 

OP, I have found friends through attending Bible studies at churches where I am not a member of the congregation (but of compatible doctrinal beliefs). This gave me relationships where I could be with like minded people who could give sound feedback, but weren’t in the same circle of people that say, my husband and I might engage with friends as a couple. Or that didn’t know any of the parents at my kids’ school activities, in case I needed to seek wisdom about an issue with that circle. If you don’t want to do a church thing, maybe a club for something you’re interested in. Especially for an introvert like me, it’s helpful to build relationships while  working side by side in a common activity. It takes time, but it’s doable. I know it probably won’t help in the short term, but can be cultivated for the future. 

I would consider myself an extrovert, or maybe an omnivert? (I’m becoming increasingly convinced these categories aren’t as separate or set in stone as we make them out to be.) Though I can be VERY social this doesn’t mean I’m up for public vulnerability or trust exercises. I’m deeply private about about personal matters and pain. I would not be a good candidate for this sort of thing in a classroom setting. 

9 hours ago, TheReader said:

Yes, I definitely find that for some topics, you need that shared world view. 

I think that it’s so very helpful to get advice from people who don’t share your world view. It forces you think about what’s really right and what’s really going on rather than doubling down on what we think are common truths because we’ve all grown up to believe certain things. 

10 hours ago, TheReader said:

So, I had a thing happen and it wasn't anything bad or horrible, just a rather awkward-ish situation. It's not a thing I can really talk with my husband about, and my good friend who I would have talked to about it moved away, and our schedules are hard to mesh to get phone calls in. I have a few other good online friends, who I think I could message/call about this, but we're still in that "group chat" phase and not so much the "call one on one" phase, really, and I'm not good at breaking past that. 

I have some local friends, but a lot of those are friends made through my job (I teach at a homeschool co-op, and these friends are parents of my students), so awkward to share too many personal details about things, ya know? 

I've thought about posting here, but...public forum.... but it did make me think/wonder --- do most people have someone(s) like that they can talk to about those weird awkward things?   If so....where do you find them??? Or, how do you break past that chit-chat stage/group chat stage to real-talk??

 

(this kind of thing always makes me miss ex-pat life; you met someone even remotely interesting, and you were just automatically great friends and you skipped over all that "levels of friendship" thing and just....boom. On the other hand, 6 yrs of that = not knowing how to navigate this once back stateside, even 9 yrs later)

 

 

If you need a friend at a distance you can message me. I’m not kidding. I’m a good listener and I’m a vault with people’s confidential information. 

[Guest]

12 minutes ago, Katy said:

I know almost nothing about this book except what you've said or implied and I suspect it's highly manipulative. Like a Tony Robbins strategy on forcing people into false intimacy.  Is that accurate or am I misinterpreting?

Accurate. 

[Guest]

Also: the friend I am talking about being my easy to talk to friend used to go to the same church as me, but neither of us have been going since the pandemic. I have a strong suspicion that they just did the Find Your People study thing at church. I still get emails from the church and there were “tips” about connecting with people you hadn’t seen in a while. That same day she and I both heard from people we used to know from church “spontaneously”. I think they were both doing the book.  We were both targets, I guess. “Drip a line to a friend you haven’t seen in a while!” 🙄

[hippymamato3]

Yes, I have 2 lifelong friends that know my whole story. I can talk to them about whatever. I have a few newish friends that I'm working towards a closer relationship with. I'm hesitant due to CPTSD and intimacy is difficult for me - but I am trying.

[elegantlion]

Yes, I consider SO that type of friend. We're both old enough, frank enough to talk about anything with each other - even if it's issues we have with each other. It's weird in some ways. I've never had a relationship where I could talk so openly. We were that open even before we were together, that's part of the attraction for me.

I also have other friends that I can share certain aspects of openness, generally categorized oppenness, if that makes sense. So, if I'm having issues in one area, I'll talk to one friends; issues in another area, I'll talk to another friend. 

[DawnM]

Yes, I am blessed with some wonderful friends.   I do have a couple of close friends locally, but most are not as local and are from my boarding school days.   We talk weekly, sometimes more than weekly.   I do wish we all lived closer, but it is what it is.

[TheReader]

17 hours ago, KungFuPanda said:

I would consider myself an extrovert, or maybe an omnivert? (I’m becoming increasingly convinced these categories aren’t as separate or set in stone as we make them out to be.) Though I can be VERY social this doesn’t mean I’m up for public vulnerability or trust exercises. I’m deeply private about about personal matters and pain. I would not be a good candidate for this sort of thing in a classroom setting. 

I think that it’s so very helpful to get advice from people who don’t share your world view. It forces you think about what’s really right and what’s really going on rather than doubling down on what we think are common truths because we’ve all grown up to believe certain things. 

If you need a friend at a distance you can message me. I’m not kidding. I’m a good listener and I’m a vault with people’s confidential information. 

Thanks very much; I appreciate it. I may well take you up on it someday. 

And re: the world view thing....I definitely feel like on most things/a lot of things, differing views help expand your thinking  - much of why I do post here, when I do, is for exactly that.  On some things, though, a similar world view can help.  (ex: I'm surely not going to tell my "essential oils solve everything, and mental health is just made up" friend about my kiddos' mental health struggles, ya know? Or my  "homeschool is ridiculous, should be illegal, can't possibly be done properly" friend about my day-to-day struggles with balancing homeschool, home life, etc. -- because in either case, their advice would be counterproductive to what my actual goals are).

[Resilient]

I think it is nice that people reached out to "missing friends" even if it was based on a class they were attending...unless it was part of their grade or they got some other reward for reaching out, or they are trying to recruit you to their MLM scheme or entice you to attend the class.

People taking a class like that probably want to change some things about the way they interact, and I guess I'd like to give them the benefit of the doubt.  Unless...the above conditions.

[Amethyst]

No. 

[theelfqueen]

I do... but she is in a difficult position caring for her mom with Alzheimers right now... 

Part of me doesn't want to burden her, part of me thinks she likes the normalcy of just talking life stuff with me and talking about my kids and her kids and hubby and normal stuff. So I talk to her but test the waters first. 

[wisdomandtreasures]

Aside from my husband, no. 

[Eos]

I hadn't for years but made a new friend during the pandemic, and now I would say yes.  I had many good friends in the past but when they all went to facebook and I did not, I gradually then suddenly became very isolated.  I am so grateful for my new friend, though sadly she moves away for the winter.

[mom2scouts]

No, I don't at this point in my life. There's a friend who I would feel comfortable sharing life stuff with, but she's so busy that we only get together every few months

[Spryte]

Thought of this thread when texting about a funny thing with my college days bestie. Soooo grateful for her. No one else understands the perfection of green chile in the same way — among other things.

And a gentle reminder: if you have the kinds of forever-friends that bounce in and out if your life, and it’s always like you never missed a beat, even if it’s been a long time, and you know you will be doing it for life — don’t take that for granted. I lost one of mine unexpectedly in 2019, and wow, the hole that she left behind is big. I am more conscientious about making sure that life doesn’t intervene too long with those forever-friends, and we check in more often. They are keepers.

Edited October 28, 2022 by Spryte