Agoraphobianebula Posted June 18, 2009 Posted June 18, 2009 Ok, my boyfriend and I have no mutual friends. I have a two single girlfriends that I hang out with every once in a while, he has no friends in this area at all. As much fun as we have hanging out together, I am finding that I'm getting bored with just him and I all the time. It doesn't help that we live together too so we are constantly in each other's faces. We do engage in some activities like movies, hiking, concerts, camping, dining out, going to bars, etc but it's usually just him and I participating in these activites. We have no friends to invite to anything we do together. No one to chat with at dinner or see a movie with. The bottom line is he is my only friend and I would like to change that dynamic. I was looking to make other friends, especially couples who we can participate in other activities with. I've been taking steps to make this happen, signing up for "meet-up" events, posting ads for friends on craigslist,etc. The problem I'm finding is that my boyfriend is not on board and he doesn't seem interested. He either declines an outing, makes fun of it or tells me to stop talking to people online about him. I don't exactly know how to resolve this. I don't want to us to be an island to ourselves. And activities are just not that fun if you don't have a group to engage with. How do I resolve this issue with him? the boredom is starting to affect me which means it is starting to affect how I relate to him it's funny, we were talking about marriage and he said he would like a wedding ceremony. I was thinking in my head, "who exactly are you going to invite to our wedding, WE HAVE NO FRIENDS!!!!"
bean1 Posted June 18, 2009 Posted June 18, 2009 Some people just don't care to have friends My SO is like that (he has his old friends on the east coast, where he is from, but hates everyone out here, lol). Question is, are you willing to accept that part of him? I'm not sure why he would make fun of you though, that isn't nice. If he doesn't like hanging out with others, fine, but he should encourage you to do so if that is what you want. How old are you? Now that I'm 25 and a mom, I don't care too much about going out, but if I was still 22 I would go insane if I didn't party on the weekend. If you guys are considering marriage then definently head into some pre-marital counselling and see if this is right for you. Good luck
Jester268 Posted June 18, 2009 Posted June 18, 2009 Your feelings are natural. I went through a similar situation with my girlfriend where I was in your boyfriends position. We were living together, and spent all our time together and I never got out to make friends. You are right that you need more friends. It's a great outlet for you both and will overall be healthy for your relationship. Couples that you could be friends with is a great idea, but your boyfriend may need to make some single male friends too. The one thing that makes this difficult is that you can't really accuse him of having few friends. It's not always easy for people to meet someone when they are new to an area, but you should both try and recognize the problem and take steps to remedy it. I would suggest signing up for classes or hobbies or joining a club of some sort. I wish my girlfriend would have talked to me about this when we were dating. At that same time I too wanted to make friends, but I couldn't because we were spending so much time together and I was just new to the area and didn't know where to start. If we would have worked together, and truly made a concerted effort I feel that maybe things would have turned out differently between us. If he still gives you trouble have him PM me.... I went through this EXACT situation hopefully he can learn from my mistakes.
Author Agoraphobianebula Posted June 18, 2009 Author Posted June 18, 2009 Jester, you hit the nail right on the head. That is exactly how I feel that we both need that frienship outlet to maintain a healthy relationship. I have found that even recently as I've been going out and doing things on my own, like volunteering, I come home feeling refreshed. But come saturday when we want to go out drinking, I feel down again. Imagine him and I just standing around at the bar, sipping our drinks and looking at other people. We dance but we just dance by ourselves too. It's not like we don't have things to talk about but let's face it, we've been talking to each other all day long at that point, conversation runs dry. He has acknowleged that he single male friends and I would love for him to have some but the area where we live is kind of difficult to make friends. He's tried but nothing really came of it so I think he just gave up. I am not a life of the party kind of person either and I certainly don't want to befriend the whole neighborhood but just to have a few people to shoot the sh*t with every once in a while, we don't have to be best friends or anything. I feel like his relunctance to expand our social circle is making me grow apart from him.
Jester268 Posted June 18, 2009 Posted June 18, 2009 Jester, you hit the nail right on the head. That is exactly how I feel that we both need that frienship outlet to maintain a healthy relationship. I have found that even recently as I've been going out and doing things on my own, like volunteering, I come home feeling refreshed. But come saturday when we want to go out drinking, I feel down again. Imagine him and I just standing around at the bar, sipping our drinks and looking at other people. We dance but we just dance by ourselves too. It's not like we don't have things to talk about but let's face it, we've been talking to each other all day long at that point, conversation runs dry. He has acknowleged that he single male friends and I would love for him to have some but the area where we live is kind of difficult to make friends. He's tried but nothing really came of it so I think he just gave up. I am not a life of the party kind of person either and I certainly don't want to befriend the whole neighborhood but just to have a few people to shoot the sh*t with every once in a while, we don't have to be best friends or anything. I feel like his relunctance to expand our social circle is making me grow apart from him. I actually identify with him because I was in the same situation. Take solace in the fact that he wants the same thing. Just try to take positive steps foward. This probably is a difficult time, but it can be mended. I think if I were to describe the way you feel it would be "smothered". That is because he has no one but you to turn to. This is one of the things that makes living with a boyfriend or girlfriend SO incredibly difficult. You eventually form this weird two person cult sort of thing, and you get sick of each other. When this was happening with me and my girlfriend she wouldn't tell me how she felt. Eventually I got depressed too and she left me because she didn't want to deal with the problems also another guy came in and offered her a new group of friends. This does not have to happen with you and your boyfriend. The fact that you are here tells me that you do care for him, and that you want things to get better. I believe this can happen, but you may have to give it some time. Just make sure to take positive steps foward. He should get involved in a hobby or sport or local group. Really anything. Try the shotgun approach. Try a bunch of different things and then stick with the ones you like the most. Even if he doesn't make a whole lot of friends sometimes you need to be apart from someone to truly appreciate them. If he is out doing these activities the time you two will spend apart may actually help strengthen the bond you have when you are together. I hope this helps.
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