So much to relate to LW... and just as Polly said, I feel a desire to be your friend already! I had big relationship upheaval this last year, too, and am around your age. I also am unlearning the belief that to get closer to people means to suffer and that it costs an essential slice of yourself to be in one, whether that's in dating relationships or friendships.
What I am looking for in relationships these days is a feeling of ease; people who are as interested in sharing as much as they are in asking questions about me, people who don't give me such a hard time when I say "no." Instead of feeling like I get a "what's wrong with her?" I hear and feel "I totally get it." People who want to come over and sit on the couch, or in the back yard, and chat or not say anything at all, people who want to do dinner parties and go to the movies, people who you can call and celebrate good news with, and people who I trust because I know they'll set their own boundaries and be honest, too. People who aren't saying "save me," because I know they've taken responsibility for themselves.
The other day, I went on a hike with a guy I was romantically interested in, and felt anxious the whole time. I came back home and cried in my bed, and my friend was there and she laid there and listened to me as I said the worst things about myself-- that I get so frustrated when I don't show up as what I imagined my best self to be, that I alway feel like I fumble everything, that I hate how insecure I feel. Do you know the life saving thing she did? She held my hand and said "Any way you show up is worthy of being cared for and seen." That's love. I want more of that.
Love this invitation. I appreciated what Heather said in another recent column, that friendships in your thirties can be a war zone, with people splintering off and doing all sorts of different things, moving to different places, and leaving the detritus of old friendships in their wake. I am in that place! What I am looking for in friendship now is a certain intensity that isn't about trauma bonding (had too much of that) but is just about an intensity of mind, and of spirit. People who are full of ideas and want to hear mine. Who are concerned with politics, art, spirit, their contribution to this world, the beauty of it. Who are FUNNY! Who love to go to great restaurants, and on road trips. Who will open up their homes, and come to mine. Who have a certain notion of family or community that doesn't just, by default, put ultimate primacy on their own nuclear family life, but is more expansive than that. Who will willingly engage in conversations about clothes, because I have literally no one in my life to talk about that with! And I know this isn't about making friends... but I live in London and Norwich, UK :)
Hi, LW, I’m in a very different moment in my lifespan from you right now, but I so strongly empathize with your desire for more and better intimate relationships! I’m much older, in my 50’s, but when I was your age I also used alcohol and drugs to make me and my social life feel brighter and better, and to tamp down feelings of… well… most feelings, really. These days I have good healthy romantic love and I’m close with my (adult) offspring. But as for friends, not so much. I couldn’t build good authentic friendships at all when I was young, and now I’m going through a friendship extinction event: people I became semi-close to, because we had kids the same age, are (many of them) sloughing off those connections, some leaving town and some just doing a slow fade, as all of our kids are growing up/leaving home. I’m realizing how I never got deep enough with these folks for our friendships to withstand this moment, and I feel like I wasted a good 15-20 years not really connecting to people. I have, really, one good friend right now, and though we plan to stay in close touch, she’s about to move 1000 miles away. So I just want to let you know that *it is amazing* that you are consciously getting going on this project now, at 24. You can plant and tend the garden of your life and not waste decades avoiding this work and missing out on joy and intimacy.
I appreciate your comment so much! My kids are 8 and 10. I feel like the majority of my friendships are with parents of kids the same age as my kids - which is not the same as connecting with people with the same interests (!) It can feel like we never get beyond the superficial and the dynamics of the kids' friendships can also make things extra tough sometimes. As an intense sensitive person, it's hard for me to feel like others aren't just always looking out for #1, their kids, their family, their next trip etc. These friendships tend to break down for me at a certain point and fade, I guess because they are really rooted in the kids not a shared love or kindred spirit. It seems I should be investing more into: 1) Myself and strengthening my ability to put my real *ass* self out for others to see and 2) people not connected to my parent life, preferably, who I can nurture the parts of me that a starved for attention - creativity, deeper connection.
I completely relate to the LW, both in terms of background (eerily similar to my own), and in terms of present feelings of outside-looking-in (and I am about 40, but feel 24 most of the time, whatever that means!).
It's really difficult, when you've endured decades of traumatic chaos, to connect to others who have had relatively consistent lives. Not only because there's something untranslatable, but also because many people do not want to dive deep, explore dark realities, or be reminded of fragility. As more dark and heavy things have happened in my life, I find it even more difficult to reach anyone from across this chasm of deep grief and trauma. It can be so isolating. I feel you and feel for you, OSL.
I miss friendships that feel like home, like family: where you can just "be" without pretense or distraction. It's been a long time since I've had that. I do think I offer that to most anyone in my life: an open invitation to be who they are, to be candid, to deeply explore our human realities, to engage and share passions and wax philosophical but with a lot of humor and joy and levity.
Note: I almost always want to be friends with the letter writers and commenters on Ask Polly :)
Hey, LW, five years ago I could have written a letter very much like yours. Sending you some love because it’s fucking harrrrd to feel that lonely. There is a path towards more connection for you. You sound like someone who can make that happen. Go slow, have compassion for yourself, it won’t always be so hard.
I LOOOVE Heather’s prompts in this letter reply because I’m getting hyper obsessed about these kinds of questions and what I need in a friend right now includes someone who wants to talk about connection and friendships and what they need from people and how to build community and how we use it to defend ourselves and others against the fucking fascists determined to take over the world. Also I need a friend who makes me sing out loud with them in the car, friends who love marching bands (especially marching bands playing Rage Against the Machine), friends who cry during the rock scene in Everything Everywhere All at Once, friends who want to swim in lakes and rivers, friends who check in when I go quiet, friends who want to read my short stories, friends who can sit in silence and stare at the ocean, friends who make excellent cocktails and eat oysters, friends who can feel loved and cared for and not afraid, friends who secretly want to be spies and prime ministers. What I bring to a friendship is an embarrassing amount of earnest dorkiness, good boundaries, loyalty, and kindness. I’m smart. I’m not exactly funny in a general sense but I am very fun because I like to laugh. I’m very good in an emergency. If we go to a immersive art installation, I will try all the stations. I am an excellent letter writer. I will fight for a friend and have their back.
I love this invitation! I relate so much to loneliness of healing- and agree it doesn’t have to be like that! I stopped drinking about a year and a half ago, stopped using social media for empty compliments and basically burned down my old loud way of living in favor of a primary relationship with my best friend, books, plants, exercise and a rewarding job in child care which was a big surprise to me and everyone that knew me (I can be vulgar and was the life of the party too!). It does feel lonely to me also, when you decide to protect yourself from things that don’t help you, turns out a lot of things get eliminated!! At least in my case. But it’s made conversations richer, my relationships (if fewer) are better and more sustainable and consistent, I have more quality time to give than when I was casting such a wide net, indiscriminate in who I got close to, as long as I could see value in me through their eyes. A relationship tourist, if you will. Anyway, my heart goes out to LW, I relate but am excited for their path forward. Sometimes I too feel lonely but sometimes I think I’m mistaking the quiet for absence when instead it’s a holding space for so much more, for anything you want. I’m looking for friends who also want more out of life, the grand sense of MORE, more meaning, more connection, more searching, more peace. The friends who also Google “what’s the meaning of life” late at night. This feels like a dating ad and I’m happy with that, lol. Connection is so romantic!
There is no safe investment. To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly be broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket – safe, dark, motionless, airless – it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. The alternative to tragedy, or at least to the risk of tragedy, is damnation. The only place outside Heaven where you can be perfectly safe from all the dangers and perturbations of love is Hell.
LW, I was a little bit like you in my early 20s. But I also had someone in my life, someone kind, a good listener, similar interests, etc. Actually, multiple someones. 'Pulled me out of ditches when I was drunk' level of friend. But in my mind, these were people who could never understand my darkness and my pain, because they had grown up in healthy, functional families. I abused their kindness and treated them with contempt. Not surprisingly, I lost a lot of them! I also thought I was smarter than them because I understood Nietzsche, Jung, etc.
But I eventually learned my lesson and managed to treat one of these wonderful people properly, and today she is one of my best friends. (I also got sober. Not coincidentally.)
Not saying this is you or you are me, but there is a certain level of self-pity and self-importance bubbling beneath your words. And that will muddle your quest for friendship, if you let it.
I relate to what you wrote about treating healthy people with contempt because they can't quite understand. I also think in some cases we distance ourselves from good people who just aren't built to understand us -- not always due to their issues or lack thereof, but because they have a distaste for emotional complexity (a common trait, in fact!) that causes them to distance themselves from someone who's intense and sensitive.
I don't see the self-pity and self-importance in this letter -- just raw honesty and also a willingness to tell the truth about what really drives her and makes her feel more alive. Daring to be completely vulnerable and also unguarded about what she loves -- those are two of the things that appeal to me a lot about this letter writer, and they're also the things that I think will make her some pretty incredible friends!
I never really felt smarter than my friends, but I did feel very lonely among certain kinds of people who really favored concrete conversations over abstract ones. I think we sell ourselves short when we call these preferences arrogant or snobby because it's not about that. It's about discovering what you love and standing up for it, and yes, being picky at times. The fact is, the more you go for what you love in people, the more satisfying your relationships become, which makes you much more generous and open with everyone. Holding out for the people you can trust and also relate to is a good thing!
Hi Heather, I liked your response in the sense that this LW is clearly very vulnerable and needs some hope to continue in life. But the way she casually referenced her DUI made my stomach flip over. Her comment at the end about having several weeks of sobriety (but cider doesn't count) also rang some alarm bells. She needs friends, yes, but she also needs some serious help. I get that my comment might seem rough on her and others who relate to her, though.
That makes perfect sense. I'm going to add something about the drinking, because I think you're right and in my pursuit of the overall theme I stepped over this too quickly.
Caveat with who the fuck am I to say for certain, but my experiences make me think you are definitely onto something. True connection requires authenticity and a huge amount of responsibility. Something like substance abuse actively endangers LW, and a DUI actively endangers others, both of which are antithetical to the kinds of connections LW wants to build.
I've seen many people use "darkness" and "complexity" used to mask an inability or unwillingness to take personal responsibility with exactly the kinds of behaviors you describe. Building meaningful connections is impossible when you're still choosing to hurt yourself and those around you.
Through a singular friendship, my definition has expanded exponentially. A deep connection with a friend is to feel safe enough to let them really see you, and someone who recognizes the work that you're doing on yourself and reflects that back to you. It's someone who can just be really happy for you and exclaim it out loud. Excuse the sailing metaphor but a good friend is ...A buoy. An anchor. A life raft. (And some mid-afternoon, one Aperol Spritz deep, sparkles on the water).
I of course love this column and the comments. I am deeply reassured by knowing there are so many intelligent, articulate people that are down with talking about emotions 'out there' as feeling all the things, and being honest about it, can be isolating. I'm also a bit self conscious about writing here as the caliber is high but since you have dared us to show our asses - I will. I can't make any guarantees about my punctuation or sentence structure however so please bear with me.
I'm braving it because I think I may have something useful to say that I was either reminded about or learned here from Heather. I've noticed there is a theme of loneliness and I have found a thread in your replies Heather that has served as a bit of a challenge or a mantra to myself. I'm in my 50s, divorced after 20 years and in a space of redefining myself and figuring out what is pleasurable. Of course connection is essential and it requires involving others which can be daunting. I remember reading something to the effect of how we are all sort of a mixed bag of delights and flaws (I'm paraphrasing) and we just have to be courageous, set out and show up knowing we aren't perfect and neither is anyone else. It challenged me to just go out and try to find a tribe or even a friend that fits for who I am now. I've noticed that over the years I have become quite spiritual without even really trying but feeling comforted by the support and trust that lives in that connection (with The Divine) for me. So, recently I went to church and I felt uplifted. I went back the following week and saw a friend from years ago and we had a real conversation and it was satisfying. I am now going to attend another group that follows Buddhist teachings that have always resonated. It is funny (in a duh kind of way) how when you go somewhere and show up for something you are interested in you can find people that seem welcoming there. I think I had fallen into a lie that I could create comfort and meaning for myself on my own and an inconvenient truth is - I can't. Heather's honesty just made me get over myself and show up and it has been worth it.
I also divorced in my late 50s after 25 years of marriage. Then moved 1000 miles away with a chronically ill teen. The enormity of my life's implosion was too much for many of my friends (fear of contagion and/or fear of saying the wrong thing, I guess), and the opportunities to meet new ones were at first limited and mostly unsatisfying. When I left, I was surprised by the handful of people (most of whom I wouldn't have considered "inner circle") that showed up for me. Seeing their fearless compassion and their insistence on connection made me look at them so differently. It didn't matter that we were different "types"; what mattered was our interest in being real, in sharing the ups and the downs, in truly getting to know each other. I'm 65 now and this handful of far flung friends, along with two that I have been so fortunate to find in my new location, are the most important people in my life. They are at the top of my gratitude list. Life is way too short not to be real.
Thank you for this invitation Heather! I have been thinking a lot about community and the kind of friendships I want to build after years of therapy and learning to be more vulnerable (a thing I am still regularly working on, because it’s hard!). I want friends who will be patient with me as I slowly unfurl into the real me. I want friends who care about movement and being outside and who understand how lovely it is sometimes to move your body through the world. I want friends who make things, who understand what it means to be an artist, who like to look at the world carefully. I want friends to be spontaneous with, I want friends who will come over for dinner regularly, I want friends to drink wine with in the sun. I want neighborhood friends. I have some lovely friends already that I am trying to invest more vulnerably in, but I want to make new ones too! I hope I can show up the way I want to and make their lives richer too.
I too classify myself as highly intense and sensitive.
I too was raised to be a people-pleasing-nice-girl lacking boundaries.
I too misused alcohol/drugs to mask/numb/treat my "very big emotions" that I couldn't share with anyone on the outside. Stuffing it way the fuck down only to inevitably bubble up while blacked-out every once and awhile.
There is a lot wrong with me but at the end of the day—I care deeply—I love hard—and feel very intensely.
I am finally at an age (40) where I feel like I am beginning to understand that some folx are just not going to like me and that is OKAY… I am an acquired taste.
I truly want to be a force of good in this world. I experience myself as actively wanting and working towards a better and more equitable future for my fellow community. I’ve always been attracted to equally obtuse and vivid personalities. It has been nearly impossible to maintain deep friendships, particularly with women. I’ve captured glimpses of what could be only to have my heart crushed.every.time. Most recently; she took my two other closest friends with her (that I had introduced her to) and then used them to land my dream job—a crushing disappointment that also felt like total abandonment and an abject personal failure (a bitter pill as my current job, which I love, fails to cover my bills/rent month-to-month, which fucks with my concept of self-worth). This fierce rejection, coupled with her saying some pretty brutal things about my personality (meant to hurt and make me feel ashamed). I guess it worked. This was 5 years ago now. I shut down. I shut down my social media too, and every friend prospect since I’ve kept at arms length. The walls I have erected around my heart would make Trump’s border wall jealous. I’m obviously still SO hurt and sad. I want terribly to let it go and move on but I ruminate, and even after all of this time, the pain/abandonment feels fresh. I wish to be understood like I try so deeply to understand others. I crave a friend who loves me for me, not just the best polished version of myself I package and sell to strangers. I bear witness to the evil decay around and try to sift meaning and beauty from what I am experiencing and turn it into art. But I am LONELY. Reading these stories helps me feel a little less alone and is a good reminder that my people are still out there. I will continue to be lonely until I open myself back up and become vulnerable. Now is a time where it is more important than ever to build community. I can do better. I will do better. Thank you.
So much in this I relate too and and many of the comments have me in tears. I feel you OSL.
I'm now 45 but at 24 my best friend suicided. She was an artist (as was I) and we fully accepted each other/loved each other in all our weird intenseness. She was beautiful, sparkling even - often the life of the party and also the one who would soon be out the back in a quiet spot wanting to talk. We would laugh, dance, cry and talk and talk. We were both deep curious passionate and often deeply sad types. We were different but had both had challenging growing up years. She also had pretty severe bipolar and ended up overdosing on her meds which was pretty bloody tragic. My heart broke. And then a few years later after the dissolution of a 7 year rship with my first true love - my heart broke again. I was desperately alone and lonely but chose to avoid hurt above all. From then on I shielded myself/withdrew - was friendly - particularly with work colleagues - but often not presenting my true self - more a work persona, a little teflon to keep me protected. I also stopped making art. I stopped painting and and only drew occasionally. I threw myself into 'respectable' work (not art). I spent the next 15 - 18 years trying to keep myself safe - buffered from heartbreak. Like most of you - empty relationships, drinking and in early days drugs offered easy escape.
Since about 40 I have found a way to begin to honour myself (in all my flaws). Meditation daily may have save me - and moving closer to trees, walking more. Slowly I started to move about with a more open heart. At 42 I met my now husband - a soul mate and my best friend - who knew it would take so long? - I sure didn't. I have started making time for my art practice - and now have a studio which has been brilliant and affirming.
For me it has been about expanding the space in my heart for goodness.
Only 2 weeks ago it really dawned on me that I had never fully grieved for the loss of this deeply special friend. I have been taking the time to honour the memories and her - with the intention that I can allow others to get close too. And then perhaps once again enjoy more mutually nourishing open and accepting friendships.
I think the pain never really goes and nor do the wounds, but we can weave in and around more of the goodness, softening the hurt, bringing in the gold that we find along the way, melding all together so that we can move through the world whole once more.
May you all find your path to trust and openheartedness.
Lol I haven't finished this letter yet but the timing was genuinely disturbing so I thought I'd pop on here. At like 6am on Saturday I was lamenting to a stranger-- who I had met hours before and who probably was trying to date or make out-- all of my feelings about the recent realization I'm in love with a close friend of mine. I was... definitely drunk, and sad because they had to leave this thing we were all at and their departure made me so sad.
I've been pretty confused about it for awhile. Why do I feel like I'm in love with them? I just watched them fall in love with their new partner who is amazing and makes them incredibly happy. I'm also really, truly happy with our relationship. I don't even want a romantic relationship right now, and I'm not pining to change what we have into something physical or beyond friends. The stranger lol'd and was like "well that's just platonic love then I guess". But it didn't feel right, that felt too small for what I've been feeling which is fucking huge. Tbh I've never felt like this about anyone, not past partners or crushes or friends.
Been trying to slow down, understand, reflect. What I feel (that hurts and is confusing me) is... a lack. I want more. We could spend like 2 full days together and I just want to keep seeing them. I know some of that is avoiding my own shit-- which is fucked right now. We see each other once a week to work on a long term creative project together where we're all kind of very vulnerable in different ways and if we didn't have that I would probably avoid them like the plague because of how bummed I get when they have to leave. It's terrifying.
AnyWaY. I do feel like healing is lonely. Frankenstein's creature is the most relatable character I've ever read in literature. It is definitely my favourite book of all time (like I said-- scary timing on this one). Healing has been a catalyst in losing some of the most amazing people on earth. As Polly describes above... you're never going to get either (healing, or close friendships) without excruciating vulnerability. A lot of that is going to be triggering and isolating-- how are you supposed to feel so much and honour those feelings when you have been systemically punished and made to feel small and insignificant?
Trust that you are safe. That the vulnerability doesn't mean someone is going to take advantage of the vulnerability (all the time). The unfortunate part of pain, and love, and growth is that it is excruciating and yet simultaneously the most important and profound parts of being alive. I also drink to stifle the hyper vigilance of social situations. I also drink to avoid this love and pain. In therapy you're going to get the space to feel your feelings and you're going to realize you can do that and survive, and as Polly says, even thrive.
Some resources for you: The Body Keeps the Score, Adult Child (podcast), It's Not You It's Your Trauma (podcast), Mental Illness Happy Hour (also podcast... i'm not even super into podcasts but these are special). All About Love: New Visions, The Artist's Way.
I am also feeling that love for you right now from many many miles away. Thank you for writing your letter and to Polly for her response.
Monumentally alone. Just moved back to the city I grew up in (DC) after 14 years in California. I’m about to turn 39, single and have had endured lots of trauma throughout my life. Looking back, I do believe people who grow up in dysfunctional homes with abuse are more susceptible to trauma growing into adults as we never felt safe to be ourselves, and became doormats/caretakers/scapegoats for unstable people. While I feel the pain of this, I also have felt my heart has expanded so much. If someone can sink to into the depths of loneliness and understand it, imagine the value of meeting another human at the surface who understands it too! This is what keeps me sane. It’s alot of patience and grace. While I always feel deeply lonely, I know that there are people out there who understand the human condition and are vulnerable enough to get to know someone and ask for what they want (™️Ask Polly) unapologetically. So I have learned to do the same now! The space between deep friendship and romantic love feels like surface level conversations which is not ideal but something I’ve learned to enjoy more and more. Ps I’d love to be your friend.
My greatest frustration with my friendships is that it feels like none of my friends actually cares about me. I'm in my early 30s, I would say I have hundreds of acquaintances, and maybe a couple dozen people I would consider friends. But of all these people, only one bothers to reach out and ask me how I'm doing on a regular basis. I have plenty of people I could have fun with, or ask for favors, or who would let me crash on their couch, but no one who would miss me if I were gone. And I have no idea how to change that.
I used to think that no one cared that much about me, too. I think I was keeping it light with most people and I moved through the world with this assumption that nothing added up and no one really cared. I wasn't paying close attention to the people who *did* reach out to me, and I was usually trying to win someone over who wasn't all that invested in me. Starting to really appreciate and value friendships with a lot of sharing and emotions in them changed that. It took work for me to experience vulnerability in friendship and tolerate it.
I think if you're sort of self-protectively aloof, it's very hard to attract that kind of emotional connection and also show up for it in the moment. Connection is really about slowing down and noticing where people are emotionally and moving towards that rather than away from it. Lots of people find that challenging! But it's the source of deeper connections. If you want more closeness, I think it's crucial to know yourself well and accept and love yourself as much as you possibly can. The more self-acceptance and generosity towards yourself you feel, the more you'll be serving that up to others, strengthening your bonds.
It's not a simple thing, exactly. But when people tell me "no one cares" my first question is always "do you care about and for yourself?" I didn't have a strong sense that other people cared until I dared to give myself the acceptance I really needed to feel solid and strong in the world. I'm not saying "fix this by yourself!" I'm just saying get in touch with your guiding assumptions and examine how many of them spring from shame and a daily rejection of your core self.
Wow, this was very helpful. I don't think I've ever asked myself if I care about and for myself. And asking myself that, the answer was clearly a no. Or rather, I don't do the things that would show care for myself (even though I know exactly what they are). Caring about myself isn't something I learned growing up, it's not something that I saw (I never really saw my parents caring for themselves) and for a long time I really didn't know how to do it. I don't feel strong and solid in the world, and I haven't for a long time. To a large extent, that's because instead of accepting large parts of myself, I fought against them. I'm doing better now, on all of the above, and reading your answer really helped.
So much to relate to LW... and just as Polly said, I feel a desire to be your friend already! I had big relationship upheaval this last year, too, and am around your age. I also am unlearning the belief that to get closer to people means to suffer and that it costs an essential slice of yourself to be in one, whether that's in dating relationships or friendships.
What I am looking for in relationships these days is a feeling of ease; people who are as interested in sharing as much as they are in asking questions about me, people who don't give me such a hard time when I say "no." Instead of feeling like I get a "what's wrong with her?" I hear and feel "I totally get it." People who want to come over and sit on the couch, or in the back yard, and chat or not say anything at all, people who want to do dinner parties and go to the movies, people who you can call and celebrate good news with, and people who I trust because I know they'll set their own boundaries and be honest, too. People who aren't saying "save me," because I know they've taken responsibility for themselves.
The other day, I went on a hike with a guy I was romantically interested in, and felt anxious the whole time. I came back home and cried in my bed, and my friend was there and she laid there and listened to me as I said the worst things about myself-- that I get so frustrated when I don't show up as what I imagined my best self to be, that I alway feel like I fumble everything, that I hate how insecure I feel. Do you know the life saving thing she did? She held my hand and said "Any way you show up is worthy of being cared for and seen." That's love. I want more of that.
CRYING! THANK YOU!!!
❤️
“Any way you show up is worthy of being cared for and seen." So good. Saving it. For me and for friends.
❤️ yesss. let's pass it around like the nourishment we need!
Thanks for this! Beautiful
Love this invitation. I appreciated what Heather said in another recent column, that friendships in your thirties can be a war zone, with people splintering off and doing all sorts of different things, moving to different places, and leaving the detritus of old friendships in their wake. I am in that place! What I am looking for in friendship now is a certain intensity that isn't about trauma bonding (had too much of that) but is just about an intensity of mind, and of spirit. People who are full of ideas and want to hear mine. Who are concerned with politics, art, spirit, their contribution to this world, the beauty of it. Who are FUNNY! Who love to go to great restaurants, and on road trips. Who will open up their homes, and come to mine. Who have a certain notion of family or community that doesn't just, by default, put ultimate primacy on their own nuclear family life, but is more expansive than that. Who will willingly engage in conversations about clothes, because I have literally no one in my life to talk about that with! And I know this isn't about making friends... but I live in London and Norwich, UK :)
All of the above! I hope to move to London one day, and if I ever do, I'll send you a message :)
yes please :)
Hi, LW, I’m in a very different moment in my lifespan from you right now, but I so strongly empathize with your desire for more and better intimate relationships! I’m much older, in my 50’s, but when I was your age I also used alcohol and drugs to make me and my social life feel brighter and better, and to tamp down feelings of… well… most feelings, really. These days I have good healthy romantic love and I’m close with my (adult) offspring. But as for friends, not so much. I couldn’t build good authentic friendships at all when I was young, and now I’m going through a friendship extinction event: people I became semi-close to, because we had kids the same age, are (many of them) sloughing off those connections, some leaving town and some just doing a slow fade, as all of our kids are growing up/leaving home. I’m realizing how I never got deep enough with these folks for our friendships to withstand this moment, and I feel like I wasted a good 15-20 years not really connecting to people. I have, really, one good friend right now, and though we plan to stay in close touch, she’s about to move 1000 miles away. So I just want to let you know that *it is amazing* that you are consciously getting going on this project now, at 24. You can plant and tend the garden of your life and not waste decades avoiding this work and missing out on joy and intimacy.
I appreciate your comment so much! My kids are 8 and 10. I feel like the majority of my friendships are with parents of kids the same age as my kids - which is not the same as connecting with people with the same interests (!) It can feel like we never get beyond the superficial and the dynamics of the kids' friendships can also make things extra tough sometimes. As an intense sensitive person, it's hard for me to feel like others aren't just always looking out for #1, their kids, their family, their next trip etc. These friendships tend to break down for me at a certain point and fade, I guess because they are really rooted in the kids not a shared love or kindred spirit. It seems I should be investing more into: 1) Myself and strengthening my ability to put my real *ass* self out for others to see and 2) people not connected to my parent life, preferably, who I can nurture the parts of me that a starved for attention - creativity, deeper connection.
I completely relate to the LW, both in terms of background (eerily similar to my own), and in terms of present feelings of outside-looking-in (and I am about 40, but feel 24 most of the time, whatever that means!).
It's really difficult, when you've endured decades of traumatic chaos, to connect to others who have had relatively consistent lives. Not only because there's something untranslatable, but also because many people do not want to dive deep, explore dark realities, or be reminded of fragility. As more dark and heavy things have happened in my life, I find it even more difficult to reach anyone from across this chasm of deep grief and trauma. It can be so isolating. I feel you and feel for you, OSL.
I miss friendships that feel like home, like family: where you can just "be" without pretense or distraction. It's been a long time since I've had that. I do think I offer that to most anyone in my life: an open invitation to be who they are, to be candid, to deeply explore our human realities, to engage and share passions and wax philosophical but with a lot of humor and joy and levity.
Note: I almost always want to be friends with the letter writers and commenters on Ask Polly :)
“I miss friendships that feel like home, like family: where you can just "be" without pretense or distraction.” Oh, I want this too. So much.
Hey, LW, five years ago I could have written a letter very much like yours. Sending you some love because it’s fucking harrrrd to feel that lonely. There is a path towards more connection for you. You sound like someone who can make that happen. Go slow, have compassion for yourself, it won’t always be so hard.
I LOOOVE Heather’s prompts in this letter reply because I’m getting hyper obsessed about these kinds of questions and what I need in a friend right now includes someone who wants to talk about connection and friendships and what they need from people and how to build community and how we use it to defend ourselves and others against the fucking fascists determined to take over the world. Also I need a friend who makes me sing out loud with them in the car, friends who love marching bands (especially marching bands playing Rage Against the Machine), friends who cry during the rock scene in Everything Everywhere All at Once, friends who want to swim in lakes and rivers, friends who check in when I go quiet, friends who want to read my short stories, friends who can sit in silence and stare at the ocean, friends who make excellent cocktails and eat oysters, friends who can feel loved and cared for and not afraid, friends who secretly want to be spies and prime ministers. What I bring to a friendship is an embarrassing amount of earnest dorkiness, good boundaries, loyalty, and kindness. I’m smart. I’m not exactly funny in a general sense but I am very fun because I like to laugh. I’m very good in an emergency. If we go to a immersive art installation, I will try all the stations. I am an excellent letter writer. I will fight for a friend and have their back.
People who cried during the rock scene in EEAAO is such a good north star for new friendships.
I love this invitation! I relate so much to loneliness of healing- and agree it doesn’t have to be like that! I stopped drinking about a year and a half ago, stopped using social media for empty compliments and basically burned down my old loud way of living in favor of a primary relationship with my best friend, books, plants, exercise and a rewarding job in child care which was a big surprise to me and everyone that knew me (I can be vulgar and was the life of the party too!). It does feel lonely to me also, when you decide to protect yourself from things that don’t help you, turns out a lot of things get eliminated!! At least in my case. But it’s made conversations richer, my relationships (if fewer) are better and more sustainable and consistent, I have more quality time to give than when I was casting such a wide net, indiscriminate in who I got close to, as long as I could see value in me through their eyes. A relationship tourist, if you will. Anyway, my heart goes out to LW, I relate but am excited for their path forward. Sometimes I too feel lonely but sometimes I think I’m mistaking the quiet for absence when instead it’s a holding space for so much more, for anything you want. I’m looking for friends who also want more out of life, the grand sense of MORE, more meaning, more connection, more searching, more peace. The friends who also Google “what’s the meaning of life” late at night. This feels like a dating ad and I’m happy with that, lol. Connection is so romantic!
'Mistaking the quiet for absence' - oof, I will remember this one!
There is no safe investment. To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly be broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket – safe, dark, motionless, airless – it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. The alternative to tragedy, or at least to the risk of tragedy, is damnation. The only place outside Heaven where you can be perfectly safe from all the dangers and perturbations of love is Hell.
C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves
LW, I was a little bit like you in my early 20s. But I also had someone in my life, someone kind, a good listener, similar interests, etc. Actually, multiple someones. 'Pulled me out of ditches when I was drunk' level of friend. But in my mind, these were people who could never understand my darkness and my pain, because they had grown up in healthy, functional families. I abused their kindness and treated them with contempt. Not surprisingly, I lost a lot of them! I also thought I was smarter than them because I understood Nietzsche, Jung, etc.
But I eventually learned my lesson and managed to treat one of these wonderful people properly, and today she is one of my best friends. (I also got sober. Not coincidentally.)
Not saying this is you or you are me, but there is a certain level of self-pity and self-importance bubbling beneath your words. And that will muddle your quest for friendship, if you let it.
I relate to what you wrote about treating healthy people with contempt because they can't quite understand. I also think in some cases we distance ourselves from good people who just aren't built to understand us -- not always due to their issues or lack thereof, but because they have a distaste for emotional complexity (a common trait, in fact!) that causes them to distance themselves from someone who's intense and sensitive.
I don't see the self-pity and self-importance in this letter -- just raw honesty and also a willingness to tell the truth about what really drives her and makes her feel more alive. Daring to be completely vulnerable and also unguarded about what she loves -- those are two of the things that appeal to me a lot about this letter writer, and they're also the things that I think will make her some pretty incredible friends!
I never really felt smarter than my friends, but I did feel very lonely among certain kinds of people who really favored concrete conversations over abstract ones. I think we sell ourselves short when we call these preferences arrogant or snobby because it's not about that. It's about discovering what you love and standing up for it, and yes, being picky at times. The fact is, the more you go for what you love in people, the more satisfying your relationships become, which makes you much more generous and open with everyone. Holding out for the people you can trust and also relate to is a good thing!
Hi Heather, I liked your response in the sense that this LW is clearly very vulnerable and needs some hope to continue in life. But the way she casually referenced her DUI made my stomach flip over. Her comment at the end about having several weeks of sobriety (but cider doesn't count) also rang some alarm bells. She needs friends, yes, but she also needs some serious help. I get that my comment might seem rough on her and others who relate to her, though.
That makes perfect sense. I'm going to add something about the drinking, because I think you're right and in my pursuit of the overall theme I stepped over this too quickly.
Caveat with who the fuck am I to say for certain, but my experiences make me think you are definitely onto something. True connection requires authenticity and a huge amount of responsibility. Something like substance abuse actively endangers LW, and a DUI actively endangers others, both of which are antithetical to the kinds of connections LW wants to build.
I've seen many people use "darkness" and "complexity" used to mask an inability or unwillingness to take personal responsibility with exactly the kinds of behaviors you describe. Building meaningful connections is impossible when you're still choosing to hurt yourself and those around you.
Through a singular friendship, my definition has expanded exponentially. A deep connection with a friend is to feel safe enough to let them really see you, and someone who recognizes the work that you're doing on yourself and reflects that back to you. It's someone who can just be really happy for you and exclaim it out loud. Excuse the sailing metaphor but a good friend is ...A buoy. An anchor. A life raft. (And some mid-afternoon, one Aperol Spritz deep, sparkles on the water).
I of course love this column and the comments. I am deeply reassured by knowing there are so many intelligent, articulate people that are down with talking about emotions 'out there' as feeling all the things, and being honest about it, can be isolating. I'm also a bit self conscious about writing here as the caliber is high but since you have dared us to show our asses - I will. I can't make any guarantees about my punctuation or sentence structure however so please bear with me.
I'm braving it because I think I may have something useful to say that I was either reminded about or learned here from Heather. I've noticed there is a theme of loneliness and I have found a thread in your replies Heather that has served as a bit of a challenge or a mantra to myself. I'm in my 50s, divorced after 20 years and in a space of redefining myself and figuring out what is pleasurable. Of course connection is essential and it requires involving others which can be daunting. I remember reading something to the effect of how we are all sort of a mixed bag of delights and flaws (I'm paraphrasing) and we just have to be courageous, set out and show up knowing we aren't perfect and neither is anyone else. It challenged me to just go out and try to find a tribe or even a friend that fits for who I am now. I've noticed that over the years I have become quite spiritual without even really trying but feeling comforted by the support and trust that lives in that connection (with The Divine) for me. So, recently I went to church and I felt uplifted. I went back the following week and saw a friend from years ago and we had a real conversation and it was satisfying. I am now going to attend another group that follows Buddhist teachings that have always resonated. It is funny (in a duh kind of way) how when you go somewhere and show up for something you are interested in you can find people that seem welcoming there. I think I had fallen into a lie that I could create comfort and meaning for myself on my own and an inconvenient truth is - I can't. Heather's honesty just made me get over myself and show up and it has been worth it.
I also divorced in my late 50s after 25 years of marriage. Then moved 1000 miles away with a chronically ill teen. The enormity of my life's implosion was too much for many of my friends (fear of contagion and/or fear of saying the wrong thing, I guess), and the opportunities to meet new ones were at first limited and mostly unsatisfying. When I left, I was surprised by the handful of people (most of whom I wouldn't have considered "inner circle") that showed up for me. Seeing their fearless compassion and their insistence on connection made me look at them so differently. It didn't matter that we were different "types"; what mattered was our interest in being real, in sharing the ups and the downs, in truly getting to know each other. I'm 65 now and this handful of far flung friends, along with two that I have been so fortunate to find in my new location, are the most important people in my life. They are at the top of my gratitude list. Life is way too short not to be real.
Thank you for this invitation Heather! I have been thinking a lot about community and the kind of friendships I want to build after years of therapy and learning to be more vulnerable (a thing I am still regularly working on, because it’s hard!). I want friends who will be patient with me as I slowly unfurl into the real me. I want friends who care about movement and being outside and who understand how lovely it is sometimes to move your body through the world. I want friends who make things, who understand what it means to be an artist, who like to look at the world carefully. I want friends to be spontaneous with, I want friends who will come over for dinner regularly, I want friends to drink wine with in the sun. I want neighborhood friends. I have some lovely friends already that I am trying to invest more vulnerably in, but I want to make new ones too! I hope I can show up the way I want to and make their lives richer too.
I too classify myself as highly intense and sensitive.
I too was raised to be a people-pleasing-nice-girl lacking boundaries.
I too misused alcohol/drugs to mask/numb/treat my "very big emotions" that I couldn't share with anyone on the outside. Stuffing it way the fuck down only to inevitably bubble up while blacked-out every once and awhile.
There is a lot wrong with me but at the end of the day—I care deeply—I love hard—and feel very intensely.
I am finally at an age (40) where I feel like I am beginning to understand that some folx are just not going to like me and that is OKAY… I am an acquired taste.
I truly want to be a force of good in this world. I experience myself as actively wanting and working towards a better and more equitable future for my fellow community. I’ve always been attracted to equally obtuse and vivid personalities. It has been nearly impossible to maintain deep friendships, particularly with women. I’ve captured glimpses of what could be only to have my heart crushed.every.time. Most recently; she took my two other closest friends with her (that I had introduced her to) and then used them to land my dream job—a crushing disappointment that also felt like total abandonment and an abject personal failure (a bitter pill as my current job, which I love, fails to cover my bills/rent month-to-month, which fucks with my concept of self-worth). This fierce rejection, coupled with her saying some pretty brutal things about my personality (meant to hurt and make me feel ashamed). I guess it worked. This was 5 years ago now. I shut down. I shut down my social media too, and every friend prospect since I’ve kept at arms length. The walls I have erected around my heart would make Trump’s border wall jealous. I’m obviously still SO hurt and sad. I want terribly to let it go and move on but I ruminate, and even after all of this time, the pain/abandonment feels fresh. I wish to be understood like I try so deeply to understand others. I crave a friend who loves me for me, not just the best polished version of myself I package and sell to strangers. I bear witness to the evil decay around and try to sift meaning and beauty from what I am experiencing and turn it into art. But I am LONELY. Reading these stories helps me feel a little less alone and is a good reminder that my people are still out there. I will continue to be lonely until I open myself back up and become vulnerable. Now is a time where it is more important than ever to build community. I can do better. I will do better. Thank you.
So much in this I relate too and and many of the comments have me in tears. I feel you OSL.
I'm now 45 but at 24 my best friend suicided. She was an artist (as was I) and we fully accepted each other/loved each other in all our weird intenseness. She was beautiful, sparkling even - often the life of the party and also the one who would soon be out the back in a quiet spot wanting to talk. We would laugh, dance, cry and talk and talk. We were both deep curious passionate and often deeply sad types. We were different but had both had challenging growing up years. She also had pretty severe bipolar and ended up overdosing on her meds which was pretty bloody tragic. My heart broke. And then a few years later after the dissolution of a 7 year rship with my first true love - my heart broke again. I was desperately alone and lonely but chose to avoid hurt above all. From then on I shielded myself/withdrew - was friendly - particularly with work colleagues - but often not presenting my true self - more a work persona, a little teflon to keep me protected. I also stopped making art. I stopped painting and and only drew occasionally. I threw myself into 'respectable' work (not art). I spent the next 15 - 18 years trying to keep myself safe - buffered from heartbreak. Like most of you - empty relationships, drinking and in early days drugs offered easy escape.
Since about 40 I have found a way to begin to honour myself (in all my flaws). Meditation daily may have save me - and moving closer to trees, walking more. Slowly I started to move about with a more open heart. At 42 I met my now husband - a soul mate and my best friend - who knew it would take so long? - I sure didn't. I have started making time for my art practice - and now have a studio which has been brilliant and affirming.
For me it has been about expanding the space in my heart for goodness.
Only 2 weeks ago it really dawned on me that I had never fully grieved for the loss of this deeply special friend. I have been taking the time to honour the memories and her - with the intention that I can allow others to get close too. And then perhaps once again enjoy more mutually nourishing open and accepting friendships.
I think the pain never really goes and nor do the wounds, but we can weave in and around more of the goodness, softening the hurt, bringing in the gold that we find along the way, melding all together so that we can move through the world whole once more.
May you all find your path to trust and openheartedness.
Lol I haven't finished this letter yet but the timing was genuinely disturbing so I thought I'd pop on here. At like 6am on Saturday I was lamenting to a stranger-- who I had met hours before and who probably was trying to date or make out-- all of my feelings about the recent realization I'm in love with a close friend of mine. I was... definitely drunk, and sad because they had to leave this thing we were all at and their departure made me so sad.
I've been pretty confused about it for awhile. Why do I feel like I'm in love with them? I just watched them fall in love with their new partner who is amazing and makes them incredibly happy. I'm also really, truly happy with our relationship. I don't even want a romantic relationship right now, and I'm not pining to change what we have into something physical or beyond friends. The stranger lol'd and was like "well that's just platonic love then I guess". But it didn't feel right, that felt too small for what I've been feeling which is fucking huge. Tbh I've never felt like this about anyone, not past partners or crushes or friends.
Been trying to slow down, understand, reflect. What I feel (that hurts and is confusing me) is... a lack. I want more. We could spend like 2 full days together and I just want to keep seeing them. I know some of that is avoiding my own shit-- which is fucked right now. We see each other once a week to work on a long term creative project together where we're all kind of very vulnerable in different ways and if we didn't have that I would probably avoid them like the plague because of how bummed I get when they have to leave. It's terrifying.
AnyWaY. I do feel like healing is lonely. Frankenstein's creature is the most relatable character I've ever read in literature. It is definitely my favourite book of all time (like I said-- scary timing on this one). Healing has been a catalyst in losing some of the most amazing people on earth. As Polly describes above... you're never going to get either (healing, or close friendships) without excruciating vulnerability. A lot of that is going to be triggering and isolating-- how are you supposed to feel so much and honour those feelings when you have been systemically punished and made to feel small and insignificant?
Trust that you are safe. That the vulnerability doesn't mean someone is going to take advantage of the vulnerability (all the time). The unfortunate part of pain, and love, and growth is that it is excruciating and yet simultaneously the most important and profound parts of being alive. I also drink to stifle the hyper vigilance of social situations. I also drink to avoid this love and pain. In therapy you're going to get the space to feel your feelings and you're going to realize you can do that and survive, and as Polly says, even thrive.
Some resources for you: The Body Keeps the Score, Adult Child (podcast), It's Not You It's Your Trauma (podcast), Mental Illness Happy Hour (also podcast... i'm not even super into podcasts but these are special). All About Love: New Visions, The Artist's Way.
I am also feeling that love for you right now from many many miles away. Thank you for writing your letter and to Polly for her response.
Hi, OSL.
Monumentally alone. Just moved back to the city I grew up in (DC) after 14 years in California. I’m about to turn 39, single and have had endured lots of trauma throughout my life. Looking back, I do believe people who grow up in dysfunctional homes with abuse are more susceptible to trauma growing into adults as we never felt safe to be ourselves, and became doormats/caretakers/scapegoats for unstable people. While I feel the pain of this, I also have felt my heart has expanded so much. If someone can sink to into the depths of loneliness and understand it, imagine the value of meeting another human at the surface who understands it too! This is what keeps me sane. It’s alot of patience and grace. While I always feel deeply lonely, I know that there are people out there who understand the human condition and are vulnerable enough to get to know someone and ask for what they want (™️Ask Polly) unapologetically. So I have learned to do the same now! The space between deep friendship and romantic love feels like surface level conversations which is not ideal but something I’ve learned to enjoy more and more. Ps I’d love to be your friend.
My greatest frustration with my friendships is that it feels like none of my friends actually cares about me. I'm in my early 30s, I would say I have hundreds of acquaintances, and maybe a couple dozen people I would consider friends. But of all these people, only one bothers to reach out and ask me how I'm doing on a regular basis. I have plenty of people I could have fun with, or ask for favors, or who would let me crash on their couch, but no one who would miss me if I were gone. And I have no idea how to change that.
I used to think that no one cared that much about me, too. I think I was keeping it light with most people and I moved through the world with this assumption that nothing added up and no one really cared. I wasn't paying close attention to the people who *did* reach out to me, and I was usually trying to win someone over who wasn't all that invested in me. Starting to really appreciate and value friendships with a lot of sharing and emotions in them changed that. It took work for me to experience vulnerability in friendship and tolerate it.
I think if you're sort of self-protectively aloof, it's very hard to attract that kind of emotional connection and also show up for it in the moment. Connection is really about slowing down and noticing where people are emotionally and moving towards that rather than away from it. Lots of people find that challenging! But it's the source of deeper connections. If you want more closeness, I think it's crucial to know yourself well and accept and love yourself as much as you possibly can. The more self-acceptance and generosity towards yourself you feel, the more you'll be serving that up to others, strengthening your bonds.
It's not a simple thing, exactly. But when people tell me "no one cares" my first question is always "do you care about and for yourself?" I didn't have a strong sense that other people cared until I dared to give myself the acceptance I really needed to feel solid and strong in the world. I'm not saying "fix this by yourself!" I'm just saying get in touch with your guiding assumptions and examine how many of them spring from shame and a daily rejection of your core self.
Wow, this was very helpful. I don't think I've ever asked myself if I care about and for myself. And asking myself that, the answer was clearly a no. Or rather, I don't do the things that would show care for myself (even though I know exactly what they are). Caring about myself isn't something I learned growing up, it's not something that I saw (I never really saw my parents caring for themselves) and for a long time I really didn't know how to do it. I don't feel strong and solid in the world, and I haven't for a long time. To a large extent, that's because instead of accepting large parts of myself, I fought against them. I'm doing better now, on all of the above, and reading your answer really helped.