Women Who Have No Friends As They Get Older Usually Have These 11 Reasons
As they age, women begin to realize that some things they once tolerated in friendships no longer align with their values.
Pearl PhotoPix / Shutterstock As women grow older, our social landscapes shift dramatically. Responsibilities like careers and health challenges gradually chip away at our once-vibrant social circles. Some of us find ourselves increasingly isolated by a combination of life circumstances and internal factors.
Women who have few or no friends as they get older usually have several reasons for this shift. Over time, we watch as our large social circles shrink with every life-changing event. Many times, these relationships have simply run their course, while other times, it took a lot of learning through trial and error to find that some people never had the best intentions for us. These past experiences make us wary of people, and now that we are older, few get to interact with us like they used to.
Women who have no friends as they get older usually have these 11 reasons
1. Their careers became their priority
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When our goals interfere with our personal lives, we take a step back from communicating with the people we know in order to refocus on our plans. This causes the people we are closest to to feel neglected by our withdrawal from socialization. It can be an unanswered text during a work meeting that causes our closest confidants to overthink themselves into believing that something is wrong with us.
Most of the time, it's not anything they did personally to us. It's just that our headspace is currently preoccupied with the thing that matters most in the moment, work. Yes, people make time for others, but sometimes focusing on work so that you always know you'll be able to pay your bills at the beginning of the month is worth leaving your friends' messages unread.
2. They face mental health challenges
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Sometimes our distance as your friend has more to do with our internal struggles than how we feel about you or the relationship. Our struggles with our mental health can have us lying down in a dark room with just our thoughts. It's not ideal and does us no favors when the few friends we have start asking us what's wrong.
We have so few friends already now that we are older, and to lose you would devastate us. Women who had fewer than three close friends that they could rely on during crises were significantly more likely to report loneliness. This loneliness stays with us because it's hard for us to let go of our past experiences. If we did, then we wouldn't have issues with our mental health.
3. They feel burned out from one-sided friendships
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The more we age, the more we realize just how many of our so-called friends are taking advantage of us. Being the only one who pays for things when the two of us go out can cause resentment. Gifting you something on your birthday, only to have you not reciprocate, leaves us feeling angry and bitter. We soon pinpoint that your lack of attention is the reason for all of this pent-up angst that we are living with.
A lack of support in our friendships is why we choose to be alone, even if we know it's bad for us. Support from friendships has been found to boost life satisfaction in those experiencing strain in their personal relationships. Regardless, we would rather be alone than deal with burnout from a one-sided friendship.
4. They have trust issues from past betrayals
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The older we get, the more we become wary of others trying to befriend us so suddenly. Past betrayals haunt us like shadows, and the only comfort is to keep you at arm's length until we know we can trust you. It's true that our friend circle shrinks, but only because the people whom we've trusted have harmed us with their treachery.
Setting us up for failure or stealing the love of our lives can cause us to hide away. When we are hurt, we avoid conflict by withdrawing when betrayed, which only adds to the strain. While we don't blame you for their past mistakes, you have to understand that we are protecting ourselves.
5. Their values shift
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The woman you knew a long time ago is not the same woman who stands in front of you today. Our values shift the older we get, and things that seemed important to us when we were young are no longer on our radar. We now understand ourselves on a deeper level and have cultivated a life that matches that elevation.
We no longer accept the treatment you have grown accustomed to giving us, and are prepared to leave you behind if it means regaining our peace. We're not just losing friends, but we're also intentionally severing relationships that no longer serve us. Call it whatever you want, but we see it as a shift in our values rather than abandonment.
6. They are introverted
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Our introversion can be polarizing to the rest of the world. We have smaller circles of confidants with whom we prefer to have deep connections rather than a broad social reach. The more people you let in, the higher the chance that they will betray you or spill your secrets.
We maneuver in this way because we've been hurt for a long time and are now decompressing from it all. Our introspection is our superpower, and the more we use it, the more we discern who should be in our corners. It's a barrier of sorts from our higher selves cautioning us from saying something impulsive that makes us look like fools.
7. They have high standards
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Most romantic partners can never live up to our standards, and neither can our friends. To make our friendships work, we've had to learn to hold them to higher standards because of so many others fumbling our presence. No, we are not conceited. In fact, when you meet us, we are some of the best friends you will ever have. The issue is that we give too much of ourselves away, and others take advantage of that.
We set high expectations for ourselves because we can't get out of our heads. The older we get, the less we care about surface-level feelings, especially when we feel like we are being disrespected. The only way to continue our friendships is for our friends to level up with us or risk being left behind.
8. They relocate
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As we age, moving long-distance has caused us to lose acquaintances from our core social media networks. Moving abroad can change your perspective on many aspects of life. You start reminiscing about all of the good and the bad that you endured in your relationships over the years. The little friends that we do have still keep in contact, but it's often fleeting.
Most of our friends were only around us as long as we were part of the group dynamic. Now that we are older and have relocated to a new area, our friends don't really pay much mind to us. They've moved on to have their own little families, while we are strangers in a new city, completely alone.
9. They feel like an outsider
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It can be hard for us not to think of ourselves as outsiders, not only at our jobs but also with our friends. We are constantly comparing our lives to theirs, hoping that we are doing just a little bit better than they are. When we don't get the results we want, we storm off, often resigning from our posts or withdrawing from communication.
Call it impostor syndrome, but it's real, and we feel it the lonelier we get. Our problem is that as we age, we feel like we've missed out on opportunities that could have been beneficial to us. Hindsight is twenty-twenty, and the feeling of regret seeps in when you've had time to really think about it.
10. They have a fear of rejection
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Having no friends for a long time can lead us to believe that there is something fundamentally wrong with us personally. Rejection is not the same for us as it is for men. We feel more shame for the loneliness that we put ourselves in, while they experience it through anger.
It can be hard for us to be realistic in the social game. For too long, we've had our standards for friends too high and too low, which now feels like an insult to ourselves. The only thing that we can find solace in is that our hobbies can help us find the friends we desperately need.
11. They are tired of society's expectations
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We often talk about the male loneliness epidemic, but it's rare that anyone talks about the female loneliness epidemic. It's extremely real, and the main difference is that the media, and therefore our society, has focused on caring for men in this regard.
Despite the fact that research from the Campaign to End Loneliness found that women "are significantly more likely to be chronically lonely than men," we are inundated with articles and podcasts imploring us all to address male loneliness, leaving women with even less energy, stamina, and time to address their own isolation as they worry about caring for the men in their lives.
"Not only are women alarmed that the men in our lives are friendless, but it appears we feel responsible for helping them feel less alone," noted writer Stacia Datskovska.
"In pointing to a real problem," she continued, "media coverage glosses over another issue. Women’s struggles with loneliness can be just as if not more severe than men’s, but female isolation is rarely the topic of think pieces or trend stories. Are women okay? Some of us aren’t, but when we’re not occupied with 'mankeeping,' it’s up to us to mitigate our own social anxiety."
To add insult to injury, women are expected to be happy all the time, be natural, and be social butterflies simultaneously. A lot more is expected from us, like the continuation of the population, but we are finding it hard to keep everything together. At this point, we have to ask if maintaining friendships is our biggest issue as women.
Sylvia Ojeda is a screenplay writer and journalist who covers self-help, relationships, culture, and human interest stories.
