Growing Apart from Old Friends
Dear Em and Lil,
There's a group of friends of mine that have been dear friends since high school, and even back to elementary school with some of them. The uncomfortable situation is that I feel like we've been growing apart lately, at least from where I'm sitting. We just seem to not be into the same stuff these days, and hangout time with them has become more difficult lately as a result. They are very important to me as old friends and I find it hard to picture a world where we're not still in each other's lives, but I don't think I'm very interested in spending regular time with the group anymore, at least if nothing changes. How are some ways I can approach the situation?
Sincerely, Lovely in Lemoyne
EM: Growing apart is hard… and it is a part of life. You may feel the desire to cling to old relationships out of sheer nostalgia, even if you know that these relationships no longer provide you with the connection or fun that you are looking for. That being said, nostalgia is a perfectly good reason to keep a person or group in your life. I see friendship as forming from two places: you hang out with someone because of your common interests and enjoyment or your time together, or you hang out with someone because over time you have cultivated a strong connection and learned to love the person for who they are. It strikes me from your letter that you no longer have the first type of friendship with your old friends, but you may still have the second type.
I encourage you to keep these relationships but take a small step back. You are not obligated to go to every hangout, but it wouldn’t kill you to take the time to make it to an outing once in a while. Remember: you can’t make old friends; you can only make new ones.
LIL: Like Em said, there’s something so special about old friendships. It’s this magical recipe of having laughed the hardest with them, knowing their biggest secrets before anyone else did, and seeing their mom yell at them that one time. Sometimes it feels like no one will understand you better than the friends you had in high school. As long as you still like them as people, I think you should really fight against growing apart.
You say you don’t want to spend regular time with them anymore. That might be the solution— see them once a month or less. Just be prepared: that will probably mean that you’ll spend your time on catching up and small talk. Maybe that’s okay with you. But if you want to get back to a deeper level, it may take actually seeing them more and pushing past the discomfort.
One thing I’ve noticed about old friends is it can feel kind of artificial to do adult things together. Like, oh we’re meeting up for a happy hour? We drank our first beers in your parent’s basement. We’re going to go to the museum together? When we were there on a 5th grade field trip I told you, “I hate paintings and I never want to come here again,” and now we’re really going to stand in front of an abstract and say hmm interesting brushwork like that never happened? The only way to get used to this is to do it more (it might also help to call out how much has changed, and make fun of yourselves for being old!)
Also, there can be pressure to hang out for THE WHOLE DAY and THE WHOLE NIGHT because that’s what you did when you were growing up, and shouldn’t it still be what you want? Meet up on a work night or schedule plans for right after so you can easily leave whenever you’re ready.
Feeling awkward with them is something you can work on, and it will help to think about how often you want to spend time together, and what you want to do. Then stick to that, until you notice it change. You don’t want to end up feeling resentful because they’re “forcing” you to go to trivia and you hate trivia. Get used to saying, “that’s okay, I’ll just see you next time!” The trade-off is you can’t be upset if they want more time together, and sometimes they hang out without you.
