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Hi Doc,
The issue I’m having does not necessarily pertain to dating, but it is about relationships nonetheless.
My boyfriend of three years and I broke up back at the end of October, and ever since then, I’ve been super fucking lonely. Not lonely in the sense that I need a boyfriend–for the time being, I’m perfectly content being single–but lonely in the sense that I’m sick and tired of spending all my free time either by myself or with my parents.
I have a few close friends but everyone seems to always have an excuse not to hang out with me. My best friend, who I’ve been friends with for almost 20 years and lives right down the street from me, is so crippled by fear of this pandemic that I’ve only seen her a handful of times in the past two years. One friend is super busy literally ALL the time. And my other friend I’ve all but given up on because she works 50+ hours a week (which I’m not holding against her) and it’s become clear to me over the past six months that the only people she makes time for anymore are her boyfriend and her family. Not to mention the fact that if I don’t reach out, I’ll never hear from her. Plus, when we do hang out–an occurrence that has become increasingly rare–she’s either constantly telling me how exhausted she is or she overpowers the conversation and it inevitably turns to some drama between her and her boyfriend–which is exhausting for me.
So, needless to say, when it comes to hanging out with people, it’s almost become an dialogue of “okay, well why the fuck do I even try?” Also, I find myself feeling a twinge of resentment towards my friends because no one ever reaches out to me to make plans or even just to check in.
Anyway, I started a new job just after my boyfriend and I broke up. My coworker, we’ll call him Mark, is also gay. What started out as a crush has subsided and has become just me wanting a friendship with this guy because I need gay friends in my life. I see him everyday and I want to ask if we could build some kind of friendship outside of work, but I have such a crippling fear of rejection that I just don’t. And I follow him on Snapchat, so I see him with all his friends outside of work and I almost get jealous. Not only because he’s hanging out with friends and having fun but also because I want to be his friend, because I want someone in my life that I can relate to on that level. (You know exactly what level I’m talking about.)
If you could offer your two cents about one or both of these situations, I’d deeply appreciate it.
Sincerely,
Mr. Lonely
I’m wondering if this isn’t an area where expectations are screwing with you more than reality, ML. When I first read your letter, I got to the part about your friends always having excuses to not hang out with you, and I was primed to see some classic examples of shallow or blatantly false excuses that were serving as polite social niceties to cover the awkwardness of not wanting to tell someone you didn’t want to see them any more.
But if I’m being honest… all of your friends sound like they’re stressed and overwhelmed in very real and legitimate ways. I mean, I can absolutely understand why someone might be so worried about COVID that they basically become hermits. I’ve got many friends who’ve been hit hard by Long COVID, including people who were careful, who were vaccinated and boosted and did their best to avoid exposure. I’ve got others who’ve been all but avoiding going anywhere because they have a toddler who couldn’t get vaccinated and the last thing they wanted was to risk their child getting infected and still others who are severely immunocompromised and will steadfastly avoid crowds or any place that’s exclusively indoors.
Similarly, your other friends are overwhelmed with work or other responsibilities, which has meant that they either have no time to socialize or have prioritized what little free time they do have to spend with family. That’s not entirely unreasonable for them. It sucks for you, don’t get me wrong. Your feeling lonely and left out is entirely understandable. But looking at it from their perspective with the information you’ve given, their choices make sense for them and the situations they’re in.
Unfortunately, that’s life; there will be times when people have very limited time or availability – if any – and they have to be choosy about when and how they spend it and with who. That blows, especially when you’re not the person they’re choosing. It’s not malicious, it’s not capricious and it’s not as though they’re deliberately avoiding you, it’s just that sometimes everything is fucking chaos and also on fire.
(And while it’s less than ideal, I feel like I should point out that the friend you do see may be venting to you because you’re the only person she feels like she can vent to. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t say “hey, let’s talk about something else!” but it does suggest that she sees you as someone she feels close enough to and secure enough with that she can share these frustrations.)
The “having to reach out first” issue is also understandably sucky. But again, despite how it feels, that doesn’t mean that people don’t necessarily care. It’s easy to assume, if not malice then indifference at least, when you’re the one who always makes the plans or always is reaching out. But that isn’t always the case. Leaving aside friends who have issues that interfere with being social or even engaging with people – ranging from depression and ADHD, chronic pain or fatigue and so on – there’s also the issue of simply not having the bandwidth or spoons for it. When someone is under a lot of pressure or stress, as it seems your friends are, then a lot of things get set aside. It’s not that they don’t care, it’s that they’ve done the mental and emotional equivalent of diverting all power to life-support. They miss you and would love to see you but they’re so overwhelmed that the idea of doing something that isn’t mission-critical doesn’t stick long enough to go from “thought” to “action”.
And even in calmer, less “exciting” times, friend groups can have particular dynamics and roles, with different folks bringing different things to the table. Some friends are The Organizer – the ones whose gifts are making plans and handling logistics. That may well be the role you came to occupy, especially if you were better at it than others.
At the same time, it’s also a mistake to assume negligence or a lack of caring if it’s possible that they don’t know that you’re frustrated making the first move. Or, for that matter, it could be a case like it is with your co-worker: they’d love to reach out but they’re afraid to because they feel like they might be bothering or intruding on you. I mean, God knows I’ve got friends who I know like me and enjoy spending time with me, but I still worry about messaging them out of the blue for fear of bothering them and vice-versa.
So while this is very understandably frustrating, even maddening… I think it’s worth shifting your perspective and expectations a bit. It’s less that they don’t care, so much as life has been making shit impossible for them, and if you want to see them, then everyone’s going to have to make accommodations. It may be easier to see your best friend if you can do so in ways that she’d feel safer from potential infection – hanging out outside or masked up if you’re inside, having a negative test before going to see her and so on. You may have to schedule things in advance with your friends who’re overworked, even weeks in advance. One of the annoying realities of getting older is having to plan around growing lists of responsibilities and obligations, ranging from work to family to just having the energy to do things.
But while that may help in the future, none of this helps the loneliness now. So let’s talk about what you can do in the here and now while you and your friends figure out ways that you all could see each other more and in more satisfying ways. And oh hey, we’ve got your new coworker as a perfect example of what to do. This is a prime opportunity to expand your social circle and make a new friend in the process.
However, doing so means making a leap and risking rejection. The risk isn’t nearly as high as you may think, but it is there… but unless you accept the risk, you can’t reap the reward. The good news is, there’re ways of minimizing the risk and improving the likelihood of a positive result when you shoot your friendship shot.
Now, I’m assuming that you’ve actually talked with Mark and have a cordial work relationship with him. If not… well, that’s where you need to start. If your crush-turned-squish has been entirely from afar, that makes things more difficult. Not impossible, just trickier; the difference between a normal charisma roll and rolling with disadvantage. So if you haven’t actually connected with Mark at work, I’d suggest you start there.
The good news is, if you’re having regular or semi-regular conversations at work – nothing too deep or personal, just something beyond anything needed for the job– then you’re half way through the first step already. If not, then this is where you want to learn to embrace small talk. I realize that there’re lots of folks who insist that they hate small talk, but the truth is that small talk is a vital part of the process of getting to know someone.
Small talk is the on-ramp to the freeway of those deeper conversations. You can’t just launch into “so, tell me about your deepest childhood dreams” with someone you just met, any more than you can just pull straight into a busy freeway. You need to match the speed and merge into the traffic, as it were. Small talk provides that on-ramp by creating the initial, surface level commonalities; you’re getting to know them and finding the low-stakes areas where you can build rapport with them.
This is one of the areas where streaming and binge-watching shows has disadvantaged us; appointment television or shows that were prominent in the zeitgeist – your Lost’s, your Mad Men, your Game of Thrones’, the shows that it seemed everyone was caught up on and needing to discuss – were the easiest ways to build shallow, early rapport with folks. The proverbial water cooler conversations about trying to parse Lost’s mysteries or who John Snow’s parents were served as easy on-ramps to casual conversation. But while we may not have those cultural touchstones the way we used to, there’re still enough Big Moments – shows that break through the noise and gain significance – that we can connect on those levels.
But hey, maybe Mark doesn’t want to talk about that bad-ass moment from Obi-Wan. Ok, so what about sports? Or significant local events? There’s undoubtedly something that you can use to strike up casual conversation with Mark that can lead to some basic “getting to know you” conversations that, in turn, let you build rapport and lead to the deeper, more significant conversations that people want.
The nice thing about these conversations: they’re low risk. The worst that’s likely to happen is that you encounter someone who didn’t/doesn’t watch The Thing. Or, I guess, has an opinion SO glaringly wrong that you no longer need to keep them on the “potential friends” list, anyway.
So, let’s say that you and Mark have a good water cooler-esque convo and it goes well. This is when you make your move. You say “Hey, I was planning on grabbing a beer at $NEARBY_BAR after work. Would you like to go?” This is a fairly low-key, low investment invite; if Mark’s been enjoying talking to you (and has free time) then the odds are good that he’d be down for a beer. Is asking him to join you for a beer too intimidating? OK, then you say “I like talking to you; can I send you a friend request/add you on Instagram/WhatsApp/whatever?” Connecting with co-workers and casual acquaintances on social media is so normalized these days that it’s highly unlikely he’d recoil at the concept.
Regardless, the point is to have opportunities to have non-work related conversations, and use those opportunities to get to know each other. Those help lead to the next step: inviting Mark (and other potential friends) to Do Stuff. In fact, inviting people to Do Stuff is a prime way to try to build your social circle with folks you’d like to hang out with but are too afraid to ask. Having an event to invite folks to – a barbecue, a regular poker night, whatever floats your boat – makes it less intimidating to ask, and gives them something to say “yes” to. If Mark, for example, would actually be interested in hanging out but worries that asking you would be awkward, having a thing to go to that other folks he knows are attending would be a perfect excuse to come hang out without feeling weird.
Plus, the invitation to Do Stuff tends to scale well, upwards and downwards. You can have small or large gatherings as circumstances (and likely available friends) as needed. And if need-be, you can always start with post-work drinks and hangouts to jumpstart friendships with other co-workers.
Incidentally, this also works well with meeting folks at activities you enjoy. If you’re a regular at game nights at your local tabletop store or pub trivia or whatnot, the same process applies. Talk with cool folks at the event and then invite them to hang – solo or to Do Stuff. Do this regularly and see the same people regularly and you start moving up the ladder from acquaintances to friends to good friends.
Now, does this tip into the “I’m always the planner/inviter”? Yeah, that’s a risk. But if that’s already a strength you have, then it makes sense to lean into it. Someone has to be the person to make the first move, and it may as well be you. Clearly, waiting and hoping that people will notice that you’re lonely isn’t doing the trick, so you may as well be proactive about it. But the good news is: you’re not doomed to be the planner and inviter; as you bring new friends in and make new connections, you also connect with other folks who’re more likely to reciprocate and invite you to stuff.
So, TL;DR: it doesn’t seem like your friends are avoiding you, they’re just neck deep in their own shit and are fighting to stay afloat. And if you want to make new friends – starting with Mark – then you need to be willing to risk rejection and put yourself out there. But do it right, and not only is the risk of rejection minimal, but the rewards are much, much higher than the risk.
Good luck
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