Hugs , hon !

Hugs , hon !

If I include my girlfriend (and those friends of hers that like me) and people I know from real life but communicate with over the Internet: 7

If I only include people I interact with in real life: 3 including my girlfriend.

Just a handful.

Not many at all

Somewhere around a dozen real life friends. I don't talk to most them very often due to distance, but I have been friends with some of them for nearly 40 years. Since grade school and junior high.

I have a few close friends, and for the most part the internet is only a tool to touch base, as we will try to talk on the phone or get together when we can. My favorite thing to use though especially with friends who live far away is Skype or Face Time so at least we can have an actual conversation as close as possible to face-to-face.

I think friendship is all in how one chooses to define it. I have had really good friends, although they seem to come and go. We can be close for a while and then when circumstances draw our lives down different paths - we don't always stay close. But even families can be that way. It's good to enjoy a friend while they are a part of your life and move on if that's what it comes to later.

As for your situation, I'm glad you felt free to vent. That means you've moved on from one friendship to feeling like you have friends here and that's a wonderful thing

I don't have any friends. I have work acquaintances, a couple of which verge on friendship, but never really broke the boundary. Making friends as an adult is hard, IMO, especially when everyone has their own lives and challenges.

I have a lot of true friends (enough that o would feel guilty posting the number). And, some of that is luck, I happened to find a lovely secular homeschool co-op. But, a lot of it is work. I make an effort to reach out to and be there for my friends. In turn they do the same for me. A lot of people don't seem to realize that friendships don't just happen, they have to be cultivated and maintained.

I forgot to add "A true and trusted friend is someone who walks in, when the rest of the world walks out,

That is what is so great about this website being a place to vent. You chose a great place to start your thoughts all over and to look back, but don't stare. It was a lesson learned as you will find others on this site going through similar encounters that will make your beginning more thoughtful for both your post and those whom respond.

I've only felt I could trust maybe a half dozen people in my life. Unfortunately, none of them were a part of my family and all but one have let me down at least once in a really big way. I'm sure that one would have let me down if she were in my life a little longer, but it's highly unlikely we'll ever cross paths or even recognize each other at this point nearly 30 years later.

Well, the 1st thing we need to note is that the word friend is used way too loosely. Most of the people we call friends are merely acquaintances. And that's OK. That's as it should be. My actual friends, the real meaning of the word friend, is 3 or 4 people. Everyone else is a different level of acquaintance. I have close acquaintances, business acquaintances and people that are on the fringe of aquaintances.

I read these posts l, especially on Facebook, about people being upset because they don't have real friends or people are fair weather friends, those are acquaintances. And that's OK. I have close acquaintances. Those are the people I enjoy hanging out with and I go to the movies with that I might go to a night club with and I might go to a bar and catch a live band with. But I would not count on that person at 4 o'clock in the morning in a downpour to come pick me up and save me. There's only about 3 or 4 people that I know would drop everything and do that. if we stop being afraid of the word acquaintance and call people what they are, we'd all be a lot happier.

A whole bunch