Struggle with adult friendships? You're not alone

Our favourite TV shows will have us believe that everyone has the perfect gang of besties and that friendships are a breeze. So if we find friendships a source of stress, rather than satisfaction, it’s easy to think it's just us which makes it worse.

It’s also common to think that friendship problems only happen in the playground so if we still find them hard, we can judge ourselves and feel childish. 

However, I found friendships hard to navigate for most of my adult life and often brought it up in therapy sessions. It was only when I was on the other side of the therapy couch that I realised I was far from alone and there is a good reason why.

Why friendship problems are normal

You see, our brains have evolved with a need to be accepted by people, because in Stone Age times that would have kept us safe. So we have a part of the brain that makes us feel good when we are close to people and crave connection. But our brains are also built to protect us and will place us on high alert for rejection since that would have meant death to our Stone Age selves. So even though we don’t need this protection anymore, our brains are still wired to worry what people think and try to read minds.

Although we all do this to a certain extent, depending on our life experience, some people may be more prone to it than others. It can cause us to be preoccupied with whether our friends like us and feel rejected or jealous easily. It can occur with friends we have had for a really long time or can also get in the way of making new friends. 

Our minds will also make us compare ourselves to others and think we should be more popular. This can make us think there’s something wrong with us for not having a gang of friends, particularly if our social media feed tells us everyone else has. So we may force these types of friendships and then get stressed when they don’t work out.  

One way to describe this behaviour is having an "anxious attachment style" which makes us pull friends towards us for connection but push them away for protection. It’s also strongly linked to self-esteem so if we have a low opinion of ourselves it will impact how secure we feel in our attachments. 

But what I find interesting is that attachment problems in romantic relationships seem to have entered our common parlance (without people realising they are talking about attachments!). So we may discuss a jealous boyfriend, say a person has “trust issues”, describe someone as a “commitment-phobe” or openly talk about not finding “the one”. This is something we don’t mind being honest about when talking to our friends!

But, as friendships also represent close relationships, they can trigger our attachment style as well which means the very same problems will also show up there, yet it feels more shameful to admit it. This adds to the belief that everyone “should” find friendships easy and make it harder to deal with when we don’t.

For me, I remember this was particularly difficult when trying to find friends as a new mum. My mind was telling me that I needed to have a perfect group of mum friends, so I tried to make friends with the wrong people and then became overwhelmed with anxiety wondering if they liked me. 

Through therapy, and the use of mindful self-compassion tools, I was able to increase my self-esteem, work out what types of friendships worked for me and then regulate myself when getting to know people.

A big shift for me came in recognising that I had never been one for friendship groups and at school gravitated towards one-on-one friendships anyway. But later in life, telling myself there was something wrong because I didn’t have a group, meant I was trying to be something that I wasn’t based on a need for validation. Letting go of this need was very liberating and left me time to pursue deeper one-on-one friendships which I thrived on. 

How therapy can help

When a client sees me in therapy for friendship issues I explore their history to understand what might be at the route of their friendship patterns. We’ll then look together at how these patterns are showing up in daily life which includes identifying the automatic thoughts they are having, how this impacts their feelings and how this shapes behaviour.

As we continue to explore the client's beliefs and their origin in therapy, I will teach them skills to begin to respond differently to them in the present. This might include taking a step back from thoughts such as “my friends are mad at me” or being able to relate differently to strong emotions, such as fear of rejection, and offering themselves compassion. We might also look at friendship styles and friendship values so that we can work towards what's important and work towards that. 

How to help yourself overcome insecurity in friendships

If you recognise that anxiety and insecurity are getting in the way of having satisfying friendships, here are some tools to start helping yourself:

Challenge your assumptions

A common problem when struggling with friends is assuming we know what someone is thinking and that it’s usually negative. For example, if a friend doesn’t reply to a text we assume they are mad at us and this triggers anxiety. Or if we say “no” to a request or night out they will abandon us. However, our anxious mind will always automatically assume the worst and ignore any rational alternative.

Using a journal, note down whether your anxiety is based on thinking about the situation in a certain way. Then ask yourself whether this is a fact or just an assumption. Consider whether there is evidence to back this up (i.e. whether this is how your friend generally behaves or how you would react if the shoe was on the other foot) and try to come up with a more realistic explanation. 

Practice mindfulness

Mindfulness is a very useful skill to help us change how we relate to our thoughts and feelings. It can help us take a step back from all-consuming “mind reading” thoughts (as described above) and prevent self-critical spirals. It can also help you be more accepting of difficult feelings in the body that may be triggered when you have problems with friends which also paves the way for self-compassion (see below). 

Develop self-compassion

Self-compassion means turning towards our difficulties with a commitment to help. When we are struggling with friends we obviously don’t want to feel what we are feeling but this sets up a vicious cycle which means we feel worse because we are judging ourselves or we try to fix how we are feeling by overthinking the problem. But learning how to accept our feelings with empathy, is a simple but powerful step which helps us respond to ourselves more wisely. This is hard to do when we are caught up in trying to get rid of our feelings. 

Be honest about your friendship values

Reflect on whether you are trying to make friends with people because you think you “should” and be honest about what friendship style suits you. Do you thrive on large groups of different personalities or crave deeper connections from one-on-one?

Try to remember how you made friends as a child but also how different friendship experiences actually make you feel. Then use your new skills to work towards the kind of friendships you would like to have.