Ask Lemmy

Yep. I have a few really old friends elsewhere in the world that I'm no longer in regular touch with that were having a great time when we meet. Then I have my homies around the city that I've known for twenty odd years that we have a group chat with almost daily messages and I meet at least one about once a month. Finally I have the local dog people that have become friends over the last years that we happen upon outside, and some go on dog walks and I'm invited to their events and parties.

All these circles are both men and women, curiously progressively younger than me the more new friends and acquaintances I make. I feel that I can ask people in any of these circles if I need help or talk about something, selectively depending on the need but still.

I'm really an introverted dude with a need for private time so this is quite sufficient for my social needs and with my dog by my side I very rarely feel lonely.

Well, very few of them remained successful. There is only like one person right now or maybe two with whom I am open enough to reveal my identity's crucial parts and not being judged. Most of them broke my heart, maybe, cuz I have trusted them from very beginning or maybe I am unlucky person who broke the hearts of those who wanna come closer to me and also got broken heart by those whom I chased.

No. Too lonely

Yeah. I don't expect anyone to help me with anything. I try my best to be available to people and I have a pretty active social life.

I have dozens of cousins who I've known and been friends with since I was born. I have family friends that I have some vague memories of us taking baths together. I have a group of friends I've known since middle school (~25 years ago) that probably includes 7 people. I have some friends who I've known since college which could be 2 to 15 people depending on how I'm feeling that day. I am still in touch with 5 friends from med school and maybe 4 friends from residency and I've got a bunch of friends I've developed in the last few years.

Dang, typing that all out made me feel incredibly blessed.

It's funny, if you ask me most days, I'll tell you dudes are lame and women are more interesting to talk to, but tbh most of my closest and longest running friendships are with dudes. Dudes just need an activity. They don't need to talk to each other. The vast majority of my male friendships at least originally centered on some activities like basketball, playing Warhammer 40k, playing video games, being in med school/residency.

As far as being emotionally vulnerable with another man, I think maybe like 3-4 guys in total. I am pretty emotionally closed off. I'm more of a "bust your balls" type of friend.

I'm satisfied but I think my bar is really low.

I hardly talk to any of them but if they ever messaged me out of the blue for help, I'd be there for them and I'd like to think they'd lend me a hand if things got really bad, too. That's all I could ask of them. I have one I see once every few months for a beer. We talk about games and general frustrations with life. He's an American living in Japan and I'm Canadian, but we seem to align politically so we don't need to tip-toe around that, which is nice.

What kinda friends are you looking for?? What needs weren't met when you say your peers disappointed you? Did they actively hurt you (emotionally or otherwise)?

If other guys are like me, they don't want or particularly feel the need to express their feelings because they already have a particular set of people who they feel comfortable being vulnerable in front of, so they can't reciprocate even if you want to open up.

Now that I've stopped drinking yes. Male friends before that were 'drinking buddies' which is not the same thing.

Also. Therapy helped.

I am lucky to have some of the best dudefriends I could imagine. Some are very open with talking emotions, some are more shy. Regardless, experience taught us the importance of supporting one another and that's what we do. Btw, I just sent them a text over Signal this morning, recalling the dream I had just made : I was cooking a stew for the whole group and at some point I was feeling inspired and took a piss in it- insisting that it added to the flavor(???). They took me by the shoulders and said look we love you, but you have to start the stew over. I said ok fair. One of them responded with "way to make a "piss-too soup" (=pistou=pesto). Anyway

I only have one friendship left, which is fine with me as more would honestly be too many for me. We've been friends since we were boys. Long story short, we both got serious, life-threatening/disabling diseases at the same time, and because of his gentle persistence over years, he finally got me to open up to him about it and be okay with him opening up to me.

Now we have this nice thing where we actually emotionally support each other through tough times. He's one of the best people I've ever known and he's stuck by me for decades even when I didn't bring anything to the friendship.

I have a really good friend actually, we open up to each other about what we've got in mind, our emotions, anxieties, etc. We got each other's back, we started a band and we even work out together. He's married so sometimes he's a bit busy though.
I met him this year in a DnD group and I'm in my mid twenties, so although finding friends becomes a bit harder with age, it is not impossible. Cheer up mate, I hope that you'll find a friend like that soon :D

Yes, I don't hang out with toxic people.

No. I grew up with parents who cut me off from the entire world and now I can't make friends without it getting awkward. It's usually because I don't know proper guy behavior, and they end up thinking I'm gay, but a new low was achieved recently, where I was actually the problem this time by leaning into the stereotype and freaking all the guys I know out.

I just grew tired of getting friends, hanging out the first time, and never getting a call back. Or, "if you need anything, let me know/hey bud, how's it going?" Making random ass promises that we'd hang out. Then never following through. So I just leaned the hell into it. I don't even remember what I said. A lot of the guys have stopped being friendly with me now though. Used to talk about their home countries and shit.

It was just frustrating, trying to find authenticity and constantly getting people who couldn't see me as a person. It had happened over and over and over and over. And they all just wiggle out of it with fakeness, so they don't have to be a bad person. Which hurts more than them actually manning up and just telling me the truth.

I wouldn't call my male friendship status any better or worse than my non-male friendships.

Lots of people that I wish to hold contact with but also don't wish to be in contact with too often. It's not too difficult for me to pick out similar folks or be picked out by similar folks in a crowd of people, so I'm not in a rush to make more connections.

No, they are all retarded

Yes.

I think the 'lonliness epidemic' is really born of delusional expecations. Most of the sad lonely people expect things from others they'd never give of themselves...

my most socially unhappy time in my life was the one when I had the most friends.

I have like one actual male friend I still talk to every week left, I'm okay with that. One or two female friends too depending on the week. My male friend I've known for like 10 years now since my first week in college, so we usually have no issue talking about whatever, theres no emabrassment or anything like that. I don't really talk about emotional sht with my female friends, it's always been more about entertaining each other and making the other laugh.

I never got the whole woman are more emotional and want to talk about sht like emotions or whatever, they can handle it better and are more used to it, sure, but do they actually want to talk about that stuff, probably not.

I'm not as hungup on needing friends or wanting to be social all the time as I used to be. I feel like I still don't have enough alone time to do and learn all the things I want to.

Having friends that share the same hobbies I do seems like a dream (I've had that in the past, but I hobby hop, maybe these friends are also into yugioh but I lose interest and swap to blender and they don't care about that at all, so eventually we stop communicating and maybe a year or two later im back into yugioh but now its been too long.

I swap hobbies way too often and I never know when, I at least return to most of them eventually but the friends related to it are gone. The friends that remain are the ones I've spent years drinking with (and ocasionally hanging out sober, but im a social drinker, I go mute otherwise)

I have never understood the "I can't talk to my male friends" meme. As long as the vibe is right you can say anything. And nz men have a reputation for being emotional brick walls. (In a relationship I can be an emotional brick wall so I get it)

But when I catch up with a friend I havent seen in a while and we ask "how have you been" its a genuine question and sometimes the response is "not good man, ..." Its easier to share mental state concerns with friends than partners.

I don't project insecurities as lack of friendships

I am very fairly satisfied. And yes, I get cuddly with them because I can, and why not?

How often do you find such friends?

I have no friends.

it's mostly a personal choice, but also a lack of acceptable partners.

I rely on nobody. I lean on nobody. I share with nobody. not because I feel masculine doing it, but because I don't feel the need to. I've been "alone" for decades at this point and anything else feels foreign.

should I find one or many friends, they would inevitably need me more than I them and that would be unfair to them and me. if I would befriend someone like me it negates the friendship entirely. the importance of a friendship being built on bilateral support is often undersold or ignored entirely.

Am I lonely? sometimes. Am I happy? rarely. Am I satisfied? satisfactorily. introducing a friend to my life would inevitably destabilize my balanced world where it was no longer within my control.