Ask Lemmy

Not sure why you're being shit on so hard in the comments. Speaking as someone who's pretty guilty of soft ghosting people, including longtime friends. I don't really mean to do it. I lie to myself and say I'll reply later. Reason why I'm not replying at the time usually being lack of energy. My worldview is so bleak and warped from what it used to be that it's unrecognizable. Sometimes I feel like why bother replying, I've got nothing new and if they ask how I'm doing it'll just bring them down with the same old shit. My texting is mostly mechanical. Order ready for pickup, meeting location/time, etc. And I'm getting tired of tacking on positive lies to keep the vibe acceptable. "...but I'm making things work", "...but I'm doing alright", "...but things will get better soon I'm sure."

People are being ground up by capitalism and it's easier to just look at tiktok or play Baldur's gate than actually engage with a messy person.

I try to stay in touch with people but it's hard. I'm also kind of an insufferable asshole, and I think some people leave because they're tired of "capitalism sucks" coming up

It feels like I’m surrounded by NPCs.

I mean, that's a big red flag even using that term...

the only people I talk to are my parents, sister, and my girlfriend

Get their honest feedback, and don't get shitty if their feedback isn't positive.

But if you think this is the reason:

I’m probably just an asshole nobody wants to talk to

Then work on being nicer, it's not going to hurt.

After a while, try reaching out to some old friends, if you've done something shitty, that would be a good time to apologize. But you gotta put the work in before reaching out or you'll get the same result.

I'm assuming your age but I think its normal when people hit early adulthood to start drifting a direction and possibly start losing contact. At least for a few people, not everyone.

That being said, there's a lot of unnatural disconnect lately due to stress and such and I think people tend to 'replace' them with parasocial or low effort social media relationships instead. Basically if you're overwhelmed you can get some socializing in on Facebook or Instagram or the Ask Lemmy section of the fediverse and it feels like communicating but its actually leaves you wanting more but with less energy than before.

There's also a possibility they're dealing with something they haven't been able (or wanting) to talk about.

The things that have worked for me are low bar meetups. That is, not a lot of time or effort to join. Like hey I'm jumping on XYZ game tonight, who's down. Or there's a new coffee shop near your house, want to check it out, etc.

burnout and depression are fucking real. i barely have the energy to hang out with my boyfriend some nights, let alone other people. though tbh if I knew someone's taking my absence as an insult, I'd probably stop trying, and if they were referring to me as an NPC, I wouldn't even feel bad about it.

also, just saw that you're 31. I'm betting a lot of your friends' careers are starting to really ramp up, and if they have kids, that's where their energy is going

yes.

for me it's mostly that many people became political extremists and they basically tolerate zero disagreement. These people basically totally dismiss your humanity and the humanity of anyone who they don't 100% agree with. They also massively overgeneralize other people/groups and take super offense at people doing the same to them.

I have no issue with my more moderate friends who are able to tolerate people of different viewpoints without entirely dismissing their humanity. They generally also are more open people, they are less offended, less selfish, and less self absorbed and actually listen to me.

Context needed: how old are you?

It's extremely common to lose and gain a huge number of friends in your 20s/30s as you (and they) figure out who you actually are, move around, get busier with actual responsibilities, etc.

yes, both of my closest friends have pulled away. one far less, one far more. we’re all good friends as well so we talk about each other since we care about each other. our mutual friend hasn’t spoken to us in months. i have sent them several texts letting them know whenever they want to talk to reach out. i tell them every so often i care about them and love them and am thinking of them, but nothing. we’ve known each other for 20 years… since teens. it sucks. i know what’s going on and i don’t.

the friend i still talk to has pulled back in other ways. we talk frequently but it isn’t about deep stuff anymore other than politics since we are compatible leftists. but i don’t talk about her life and when i try to ask it gets deflected or dismissed. not rudely, mind you, she just doesn’t go into detail.

i understand.. but i’m still a bit hurt. i miss friendship; the ones i had before. i hope we all come back to each other.

in the meantime, i have also met new friends. i always enjoy meeting people.

How old are you and also have you become a thing lunatic right-winger? Two of those are common causes for friends drifting apart. 1) if you’re in your late 20s / early 30s most other people are busy with their own shit and don’t have time to engage with the people who used to occupy their entire existence. 2) if you became an unhinged rightwinger spouting insane nonsense then people probably don’t wanna engage with you.

Likely it’s just you’re old now so old social circles close up

I realised in recent times that my friends, whom I've befriended since secondary school, grew in different ways. They garnered influences beyond my own, and in a natural fashion became different people.
This happens sometimes, and it's not anyone's fault, however the people we both became (keeping in mind I most certainly have changed, over the years, in the same light) had a polarising effect on our friendships.

So I called it quits, however with the intention of finding new friends. Being with the same people, at least for me, prevented me from properly engaging in circles which would suit me better by today's terms.
Honestly it didn't take too long, I just dived into social situations where I would more likely find like-minded individuals. I've made a bunch of friends since, and we already get along better than the ones I no longer speak to now.

Surround yourself with things you yourself enjoy, within a social setting, and you're more likely to be around people there for similar connections. You'd surely have a lot more to talk about too.
Don't be too upset about people moving on in different ways though, people grow and some people grow apart. Make sure you continue to grow, is all.

Personally the job search is taking all my energy and yeah im always too exhausted to do anything special. I'm not looking forward to Thanksgiving this year, I just want to apply to jobs and then be alone feeling sorry for myself when recruiters ghost me. Sorry if you're my friend, I'll be in a better mood to socialize when I don't stay up every night wondering if i'm going to be homeless next month. I'm guessing many people are probably in survival mode too right now.

A couple people have told me that they are just feeling burnt out/depressed/etc

That's legit. A lot of people are. And when they are, they pull back, which leads to them getting even more depressed. It's a pretty terrible cycle.

And it really is happening everywhere. There have been a lot of jokes (and rightly so) about the "male loneliness epidemic," but while it isn't male-exclusive and it isn't sexual, there is indeed a loneliness epidemic. Some of it happens because online/social media/parasocial relationships feel like they fill that gap without actually doing so. But it becomes an epidemic because the diminished socialization with one person causes them to socialize less with their own friends, and it spreads like a contagion from there.

I've basically just stopped reaching out to anyone at this point.

I've talked about this with other people a lot, too, as I've gone through my 30s (I turned 40 this year): it really honestly always feels like "I'm the only one reaching out." Like, it tends to feel that way to everyone I talk to, even the people to whom I feel like I'm the only one reaching out myself.

I think that's partially for the same reason that teachers say they're the ones doing all the work to grade students' homework: teachers have to grade 30 assignments per class, whereas from the students' perspective it's "only one assignment, how hard can it be?" Meanwhile, the students themselves have multiple assignments from multiple classes to handle. In the context of this conversation, realize that while the individual touchpoints with a specific person feels like "just one friendship," they're trying to maintain several relationships, too. So you get the divided attention of all of your friends, because they're dividing their attention across of all of their friends, just like you are. So you all feel like you're shouting into the void, and you all pull back.

But it's also partially because, in any friend group, the "squeaky wheel gets the grease." You don't tend to see a whole lot of outpouring of affection and care over people except when they're in a dire situation. So if you seem outwardly fine, you might not get much in the way of proactive outreach.

Both of those factors get amplified significantly in the presence of (1) ADHD (I can literally just forget about contacting my friends for weeks) and (2) introversion (if you're friends with a lot of introverts, they may find that just having your number in their phone feels like a strong friendship and feel no real need to reach out).

This imbalance shows up in a lot of peoples' friendships. Sometimes it just means that one person is the "planner" of the group and just has to bring everyone else together. That's an asymmetric friendship in a way, but if that person's ok with it, then it's fine. It doesn't mean that they're any less loved. That takes communication, and sometimes you just need to start up that conversation.

But it can also mean that you need to find new friends because you no longer fit with your old ones. And that's also ok! As you grow up and discover what you need, you realize what you're looking for.

Outside of my work, literally the only people I talk to are my parents, sister, and my girlfriend.

I would recommend joining a club or society or something. Not like a guild, but something that forces a little bit of conversation as a factor of its existence. RPG groups are great for this. If you have a background with a religious group and you're still on good terms with it, maybe show up to some services. Service groups also can be great for this. You can even tag along with your sister or your girlfriend to one of her groups. Just try to find a way to get that socialization on the calendar so that it happens regularly and you can count on it.

Another option, though this is situational, can be to start a group thread. There's less weight and difficulty around replying in a group thread, and it can be a place to just send memes or thoughts or pictures of a cool leaf you saw. Be honest and upfront that you want to socialize with people more, and that can end up being helpful. The reason this is situational is that it can help a distantly connected friend group feel more immediate, but it can't really create a friend group that doesn't already exist.

I used to have at least 10 people who I could call on a moments notice and all of those people are gone.

If those were people you only talked to at a moment's notice, that might be the problem. It's the scheduled, regular interaction that you both need in order to maintain the friendship.

Adult friendships are hard. And it's a pretty safe bet that the answer to almost any friendship question you have that starts with "am I the only one who..." is almost certainly "no."

If you haven't accepted it by now then it is unfortunately a part of life. I've tried upholding several friendships with established connections that stemmed from the days I lived in my old state for 29 total years of my life. I've been gone from there for over 3 and a half years now and I just felt like we have picked the directions we've picked and this is where we are all going.

It's quite sad honestly, because I know as much as I wish to, I've no hope of even visiting my old state. The traveling would be taxing and I'd only have a small window of time to see anyone anyways. I just recently allowed my FB to be permanently deleted which contained my local friends and I did that as part of the acceptance that we're likely not to see eachother again. Because we all excelled when we're all together in person.

I am under the belief that sometimes, friendships are meant to expire. When they stop doing anything for you and the progressing and building of relations grow to fade because we've held on to old memories that stopped being relevant. The hard truth is that at somepoint, people have to be let go. I have a harder time calling someone a friend when we go so long without doing anything with eachother or even communicating.

Technically some people may see me as the bad friend but honestly, I have tried to hold on to friendships where I knew that it had expired and I wasted enormous amounts of time doing that.

They are. The thing about being a person is that sometimes it's hard to change who you are while people who know you are watching. Give them time, they'll find their way back to you.

I have changed jobs a couple times and honestly just lost interest in interacting with most people outside of my family. I am in the process of renovating a house by myself and don’t have the energy to go out and socialize with other so I just stay home.

Your former friends made new friends without telling you.

So you need to make new friends too.