Losing all my friends and I think it's my fault

[newmomroxi]

I'm 26, recently married with a 11 mth old DS. I am not originally from here so all of my longest friends live thousands of miles away. The few friends I have met here, have subsequently moved away except one (though she is planning to move too). I am a pretty quiet person, and I hate talking on the phone. It's especially difficult since everyone wants to have hour-long conversations.

Last year when I got pregnant, I noticed that everyone distanced themselves from me (or maybe I distanced myself from them). I'm not sure how it happened but I hardly talked to anyone and I had few people return my calls. When I got engaged, instead of calling everyone (6 friends) I posted on facebook. I intended to call everyone, but after almost 3 hours on the phone (with my mom and a friend who happened to be at her house, my dad, my sister, and my local friend) I was tired and DH wanted to spend time with me. I was not looking forward to spending the entire next day on the phone so I took the easy way out and posted on facebook. BIG MISTAKE, because everyone was offended that I didn't tell them personally. Two of my friends told me and I apologized, told them the circumstances and we got past it. The others didn't and things have been strained. Well now, I realize that few people call me and when I call no one returns my calls.

I used to think that it was them. I am the sidekick friend. You know, the one who has a boring, drama-free life and can listen to you go on and on about every little thing. I did it happily but then when my life got crazy, I no longer had the time or energy to constantly cater to them. Plus, I had problems of my own to deal with. I felt like they were bored b/c I wanted to talk for a change and have the conversation center around me for a while.

But now I think it's me. Out of 6 friends, 4 of them have stopped talking to me. Whenever I do happen to talk to someone, I get the whole "I'm so busy" line. Except I know that these friends are not too busy to talk to other people. I see them making an effort to keep in touch with others but not with me so I have to conclude that it's my fault. Since you all don't know me IRL, this might be next to impossible, but why do you think that is? I have spent the last year trying to figure out why and I just don't get it. Maybe I'm lying to myself about something but I would really like to know.

I have given up on restoring those friendships but I want to learn from it so I don't keep making the same mistakes. I would ask that you be kind, but I think I need honesty more than anything. TIA

[Annie Mac]

What type of friends do you have? To me, dumping someone because they posted their engagement on FB vs calling in person is pretty harsh and reactionary. I had a friend who got *married* in a very private ceremony (not even their family was present). She then announced it on FB. I never once thought of chucking her for that. Her life, her choices, congratulations.

It seems from your post that you're an introvert & need time to yourself to recharge. Fair enough. Real friends respect that.

I don't know you or your life. I don't know if you're really doing things to alienate your friends, but just from what you've written, I'd looks at the quality of people you are bringing into your life. I know (trust me, I really know) how difficult it is to make friends as an adult, but maybe it's time to try?

[New_Natural_Mom]

I don't consider those people friends. I really don't have many IRL friends. I am friends with people on FB, but aside from my DH or my family I don't really have someone I could call if needed. It was the same way. "Friends" would always call me when they needed something, but when I needed to talk it just wasn't convenient. I just distanced myself. I would rather have no friends than feel like I am being taken advantage of.

That being said, I wish I had some IRL friends that knew *me* and liked *me* and wanted to be in a mutually supportive, no-pressure friendship. I haven't found any of those people though.

[newmomroxi]

Thanks for your responses.

Annie Mac, I agree that it's time to make new friends but I've found it difficult for numerous reasons (that I won't mention b/c I don't want to sound like I'm making excuses). I think the biggest thing is that I DO need alone time to recharge. Socialising is sometimes more work for me than release and with everything demanded of me, I'm not in a good enough place to be charming and fun.

As for the type of friends I have... I've got acquaintances that I know and can joke with. We make plans ocassionally and have fun together but there is very little depth there. It's not that I need a shoulder to cry on every minute but there is a superficiality to it. We are all on our best behavior. The friends I referred to in my OP all knew me very well at some point. I felt the most real with them and didn't need to always be happy if I didn't feel that way.

New natural mom, I understand exactly how you feel about wanting a real, supportive friendship. It is difficult when there is no one around like that.

I thought a lot about what you ladies said and I think it does come down to me picking the wrong types of people to be friends with. I don't think that I've done anything to my friends that warrant being ignored. Yes, I have done some socially awkward things but mostly I have been kind, honest, and supportive. I'm not perfect but neither are they. I guess we just don't have compatible personalities and since my life has changed so much, we have little in common.

[sanguine_speed]

I wonder if my experience might be helpful.

I find that there are times in my life when friendships change dramatically, and shift seemingly all at once. I mean, when friendships are ending, there are a few at a time, not just one here and one there. Same with new friendships beginning. It's never one at at time.

What I theorize about all of this is that friendships change at times of major change in life. And I don't mean external, directly-observable change. I mean, at times when you make shifts internally. Perhaps some amount of self-realization, or the tipping point when you're on a journey of change...a place where you reach a fork in the road and set out on a different path.

This has been my experience, and this is where I have been very recently. I think my recent shift was an actualization of confidence and increased self-esteem. I grew weary of being taken advantage of and worrying about upsetting other people and reached a level of confidence where I really just wasn't going to do it anymore. As I reached that conclusion in my own heart and mind, a few friendships naturally all but ended.

Just something I've been thinking about and noticing lately.
It's still unsettling in a way, but I get to the point where it's time, as uncomfortable and unfortunate as it may be.

[provocativa]

yes and. . . many people distance themselves from the pregnant lady. i was the first one in our social circle to get pg and keep the baby. even though we were all adults 25-40 somethings. . . .poof i had no friends. two moved away (learned later that part of that was that one was in love with me). one started doing pills and i told him i couldn't handle his level of addiction. those were my 3 closest guy friends. my closest girl friend had an abortion the week i found out i was pg, and she just couldn't handle my transition to mom-hood, for whatever reasons. so there was a perfect storm of no close friends for me. then, the folks in our greater circle just couldn't talk to me. they literally would stop cussing in front of me, as if the babe in utero could here them. they couldn't make the transition with me, from being hang out in the bar friends to other stuff. it was really hard the first 5 years, especially because my marriage sucks, but now i have met some radical homeschooling mamas, and things are looking up. my advice would be, find the mama on the playground or in the children's museum who looks like she shares your interests, and start talking. i met one of my best mama friends that way, she just started talking to me at the playground. it turned out her dad had taught at my alma mater and we blah blah blah'd from there into a real friendship.

[newmomroxi]

at times when you make shifts internally. Perhaps some amount of self-realization, or the tipping point when you're on a journey of change...a place where you reach a fork in the road and set out on a different path.

That really struck a nerve with me. I did come to a fork in the road last year. It was a turning point in my relationship with DH (then boyfriend, of 1 rocky year) and also with my older sister. I chose to have a kid with a guy who was pretty shady for half of our relationship and I told my sister that I couldn't take care of her anymore. Those were some incredibly bold moves for me and I think my friends had never seen me do that before. Essentially, I told every one to shove it b/c I wasn't going to do what everyone thought I should.

many people distance themselves from the pregnant lady

It's funny you say this because that is really how I felt. I could not understand why it was so difficult for my friends to relate to me just because I was pregnant. I tried to blow it off as something else but I kept getting comments like "well, you're pregnant know so you can't "fill in the blank".

Your responses have helped so much. I was really starting to get down on myself and think that this whole thing was my fault. I don't think that anymore though. Now I need to be open to new friendships and stay aware of those friendly moms and women that I bump into around town.

[berry987]

I agree with all of the previous posters. There are probably many factors affecting the change - change of life status (married with baby now), an inner change (doing what you want without and not letting anyone stop you), and just the normal ebb and flow of friendships. I've had a lot of friendships blow away over the years. I'm fairly extroverted, so maybe that's the difference - I've always made friends pretty quickly (not all deep friendships, but I've always had someone around the chat with). So I don't really miss the ones that go away. There's usually a reason they do - we drift apart because our lives change, we don't mesh well anymore, whatever. I have my sisters who I am very close with who will never go away and two other friends that I've know since childhood who always seem to pop back into my life. We stay in touch through FB (I NEVER talk on the phone with anyone but my sisters...hate the phone!) and have very low expectations about communication. But we always seem to find each other again (we're in our mid-30s). I say embrace the change, don't worry over it, and focus on making new friends who fit into your life now (that is, if you want new friends).