Anyone assume that you'd have more friends later in life?

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Growing up, I didn’t have many friends. Like many here, I was bullied and teased a lot. I pretty much hung around other kids who were also bullied and teased.

However, I always figured that I would “grow out of it”. After all, my brother and sister always seemed to have a lot of friends. So, I figured that once I graduated from high school, I would have more friends (once in college).

When that didn’t happen, I figured that I would have more friends once I started working. When that didn’t happen, I figured I would have more friends once I got married.

I was so deluded about this, that when my wife and I registered for our wedding (> 20 years ago), I was adamant about registering for dishware, etc. for entertaining. I thought, after we were married, we would throw parties and entertain guests (just like my parents did). Funny, we have never used any of that stuff. It remains wrapped up in its original packaging.

Honestly, I am not certain why I figured this would magically happen. In any event, anyone else suffer from similar magical thinking?

I had loads of friends as a teenager but lost touch with them all as an adult

I don't assume anything. I let stuff happen. And while I may not be one of those popular people I got some friends. I really have no idea why some people like me now (in my opinion I gain more from them then they gain from me) but they really do. They started to come once I stopped to care if I have friends or not. I guess nice people gather around people who are comfortable by their own and don't need anyone else to be happy and they avoid those who desperately want friends in order to "be decent human" (on the other hand the desperate ones attract mean people who want to use them - be careful).

I never gave "having friends" much thought, I didn't really feel the need for them. I had my books and my music and my drawing and painting to keep me occupied. I went through periods where I had a friend or two, and periods where I didn't know anybody very well, depending on where we lived at the time.

Actually my present situation is the first time in my life I actually kind of miss not having any friends at all, out of sheer boredom.

I do have more friends than I did as a child as I have one friend now. I even had two for awhile but am losing or maybe have lost touch with the second one. As a child I thought a friend was anyone who was nice to me and didn't bully or tease me, no requirement of spending time with me but I didn't have any real friends.

As a teenager I wanted friends. For most of my life I was socially interested and wanted friends or more friends/a boyfriend at various points. Now I don't think I would actually enjoy having an active social life and lots of friends being the way I am.

Last edited by daydreamer84 on 06 Apr 2014, 2:00 pm, edited 2 times in total.

I thought like that in primary school, particularly in the long periods were I had no friends.

In secondary school, I thought I'd be fine for friends forever.

Now, I have next to no friends, but I still picture a future where I'm doing a doctorate and I have more friends. In reality, I guess I'll probably never have the quality of friends I had at secondary school.

I always thought things would get easier for me, and I would grow up to be a normal adult.
Needless to say I didn't, or else I wouldn't be here.

Making friends actually became harder after I went to secondary school. It was never easy, but as a kid I could play with other children and do games with them. I managed to make some friends in primary school once I got the hang of that.
But as you get older, socializing, social skills and social status becomes more important, you're expected to conform to unwritten social rules en etiquette, and you need to "fit in with the group" in order to be liked and make friends. I'm no good at that. I can't even have a normal conversation with someone who doesn't share my interests.

I had one close friend as a kid but we drifted apart because we went to different schools, and I rarely speak to him anymore.
He only calls me when his computer needs fixing. I don't consider him to be my friend anymore.

Nowadays I only "socialize" with two people. Both are on the spectrum, but probably higher functioning than me. I only see them once every few months. Other than that, I haven't had a friend in years.

I'd often thought that I'd get over being socially awkward and anxious someday, and have lots of friends. Well, I'm only somewhat awkward and not anxious now, but I still don't have many friends. That's probably for the best.

The truth is that other people usually don't have anything I want and I usually don't have anything they want. I don't really like to swap personal factoids and "get to know" others just because, gush feelings, or go on/listen to long rambles on a special interest.

Yes I always thought I would have more friends, and I thought I would have better friends, friends who treat me better, friends I have more in common with. And more than anything I thought I would have a more active social life.

Growing up I always had friends but I didn't get to see them much outside of school. My parents just wouldn't allow me to go anywhere and living in a rural community there was not much to do anyway. I thought I would have moved somewhere very different but instead I'm still living in the same place where I grew up. I don't know if I was born to be reclusive, or my upbringing made me that way, but at this point I'm too set in my ways to break the habit.

I always pictured myself having a social life more like a character in a Woody Allen movie. I imagined myself having a wide circle of friends and having dinner parties. I was reading women's magazines from the time I was 6-7 and they always have lots of articles about entertaining. So I always imagined that is what I would do, have people over, cook for them, have parties. I don't know how I thought any of that would ever actually happen.

Rocket I totally understand about having the dishware and stuff for entertaining because that sounds exactly like something I would do. The funny thing is I wouldn't even be able to just host a holiday meal for a few family members let alone have a party. But I still hold on to dishes and other kitchen things I don't really need because I like the idea of entertaining.

Yeah, I think I have liked the idea of having friends, but never gave much thought to exactly what that would entail.
I had a naïve idea that my life would eventually be normal and I would eventually have a husband and friends.
Now I am old and it took a lifetime to understand why my life has been different.

I also like the idea of entertaining. I have nice china that I take out when my daughter and grandkids visit.

I did but I have changed my mind. I am fed up with humans constantly going on and on about feelings of worthlessness, self hatred, superiority, inferiority, perfection, imperfection....

I refuse to talk to other human beings now, if they can't talk about more positive things I don't really want to know.

There is more to life than the size of the human ego...I wish they would stop being obsessed with it. Life is too short. Do they ever think about anything else? Do they ever take a moment to enjoy the feel of a breeze, or the sound of the sea or taste of good food. Does their whole life consist of thinking about their f*****g worth as a human being all day?

Why the f**k would anyone want to socialise with humans when they are incapable of enjoying anything other than their usual ego trip day in and day out.

I don't really give a s**t about whatever my worth is or whether or not I am perfect. As long as I am not hurting anyone I'd like to enjoy being alive if people don't mind.

I have decided to adopt a dog, I can take him/her for walks, play fetch with them and they won't keep talking about things I couldn't give a f**k about all night (ie worthlessness).

f*****g hate the human race and its crummy belief systems.

This is pretty much how I feel, only I still don't actually know why my life has been different. (That I might have an ASD might explain it, but I don't know either way.)

I don't remember ever consciously expecting to have more friends, but I must have done, because I look back now and am somewhat surprised at how few friends I have and how I failed to make any in situations where people normally would.

Case in point, I worked at this one place, with some brief interruptions, for eleven years; I loved the job, and really liked a lot of the people I worked with too. About two or three years ago it all started falling apart due to changes in management, and eventually I stopped working there altogether (as the last of my department to leave). A year on from that, I'm not in touch with anyone from there - not the people I worked closely with for years, not the people I considered friends, not even the one person I actually make an effort to keep in touch with (I've written to him on his birthday the past two years; he always writes back as if he were interested in maintaining contact, but then... nothing).

The funny thing is, even while I was working there I always had the feeling I wasn't quite "one of the gang". But I could never figure out why - people seemed to like me, no-one was ever nasty or bullying, I never got the impression they were specifically excluding me - they just didn't seem to bother specifically including me either.

There are other examples, but I won't bore you with them....

Yes, I always thought the same thing an generally I guess it is true.

A primary school I did actually hav friends. At infant school I was happy to hang around by myself, and it was my mum who actually encouraged me to ask one of the other kids to play. Sol from tht time on I did actually have friends, and I think at secondary school people are mucH moe judgemental and it is harder to go up to people and ask if you can hang around with them.

at secondary school I was bullied and didn't have many friends. I hang out with a couple of people in the year below who were also social outcasts. At 6th form college I felt a lot happier, as people seemd to have grown up and were less judgemental of other diffenrences (although i still struggled to make friends ) a lot of people came with their group of friends from secondary school and therefore were less open about having someone else In their circles of friends. I did however make a couple of what I thought were close friends. However, I have since grown apart frm these people and don't talk to them anymore. I don't have any home friends from university.

I thought it would be easy to make friends at uni especially if you are living with these people. But my first year flatmates were really snobby and up themselves and seemed very judgemental. Especially one girl in particular who had a go at me in front of everyone just because I was struggling with the kettle. I didn't make that many friends in my first year uni although I did join a couple of societies which helped a bit. Second year was a bit better, my second yr flatmates were a lot nicer and I met my boyfriend that year as well, as long with a couple of close uni friends. Third yr wasnt so good, as a lot of my third yr flatmates were horrible, and it didn't help that a lot of them were foreign. Erasmus exchange students and as much as I tried to Join in, I couldn't because I didn't speak the languege. They always had massive Erasmus parties which I always felt excluded from. I have to say my masters year has been the best yet, I have a great set of flatmates, as well as another postgrad group . I think it has been a lot easier to make friends at postgrad level than undergrad, maybe people Are finally growing up and being more tolerant. I'm still not that close to them though. I think making real friends for me is difficult, I do have the two uni close friends i made nd my boyfriend.

I think (hope) having friends does get easier as you get older, and learn to adapt more , also I hav found people to be more accepting generally. A lot of the people I talk to, am acquaintances with, and have a slight friendship with now are people studying for PhDs or people who are older studying for a masters and have had a year or a couple of years working, or even have children. Maybe that makes the difference, I don't know. I found a lot of people in my first year at uni only seemed to care about getting drunk, and were really Immature.

Xx

I thought in school that they were either the problem or we simply were not compatible and that as an adult I would flourish and become popular within my workplaces and interests since I would as an adult I would have more time to spend in my areas of strengths therefore come off as confident, intelligent and useful. Also I thought spending time with people who were of varying ages and not teenagers would help too.

Yet things are not much better, in fact in many ways worse. People just don't want to friend me and not having school to attend is making the initial contact almost impossible. I would not have any social contact what so ever if I wasn't such a generous(with time and certain abilities not money) person making me valuable to be at least an acquaintance with.

I guess I did at one stage.
my senior high school was different to the junior one and found the other students to be more bitchy, cliquey and narcissistic, whereas at the junior school there were geeks, nerds princesses etc, but all students were a lot better tolerated. I just thought they'd grow out of it but many didn't.

The friends I had at school all got married, had kids and pretty much drifted away because we no longer had much in common, (if we did in the first place.) I thought once their kids were older and less dependant/obnoxious, that I would hold those dinner parties and sit around eating good food, drinking good wine and discussing interesting things. It didn't really happen.I have made other friends through sport or uni, or work, but most of these have not endured beyond the job, class or team. My most enduring friends are those made through my husband.

bumble, I completely get where you are coming from. I see the same sort of cliques in my current workplace and I'm convinced some people (particularly women) never leave high school. They b***h and gossip and their conversation, when not revolving around how good they are, revolves around undermining others and the latest reality show. Not all, but many of them.

My best friends are my husband and my dog.

Yes, I think this is quite common even by neurotypical standards. From the people I know, the times when you usually have the most friends are the teenage years and for some persons the late 20s - early 30s. Teenagers play plenty of social games and experiment with relationships. People in their early 20s usually give up most of the relationships the created as teenagers and are too busy studying, working or questioning themselves to create many new ones. A few years later they may or may not find new friends. And older people tend to focus on their family and not see their friends any more.