I don't know what your friendships are like however my friendships fall into two categories: those that reciprocate contact and initiate catch ups and those that don't.
For those friends who reciprocate, where I contact them and they contact me in return, I am thankful. For those that don't contact me and always wait for me to do the contacting I'm confused. I honestly don't understand what is going on or why it's happening.
What does "We should catch up sometime" really mean???
A little bit of subject research (aka testing) is not beneath me so at the end of last year / the start of this year I contacted a handful of friends that don't contact me and initiated a catch up - even though I was the one who initiated the last X amount of catch ups with them. Then I waited. I wanted to see how long it would take for those people to contact me and initiate a catch up in return. Come December, 12 months into the year, a couple finally contacted me and said let's catch up while the others.... well, let's just say I'm still waiting.
It's a bit silly, this testing thing I do, because I've lost friendships this way. I tend to do this thing where I'll contact my friends several times in a row - around 3-5 times - then I'll stop, because quite frankly I feel like some crazy, stalker vying for their attention. When I stop something interesting happens. These people don't contact me in return and for some of them it's been about 2+ years since I've heard from them. After that amount of time I don't consider it friendship anymore yet these people will happily wave and ask how I'm doing, and even sometimes say we should catch up. While I'm thinking, if you really cared you'd be in contact, right?
Having spoken to a number of people this seems to be a growing trend. I'm not sure if it's a global thing or a more personal thing as in it relates to certain people only. Perhaps it's me and they don't want to catch up because I'm awful to be around - hey anything is possible - except that if I contact them and say let's catch up they'll say yes. Perhaps, and this is a more likely scenario, they're busy with their lives and don't have or make the time. Trouble with that scenario is they magically have time to see other people (the magic of social media means I get to see their other outings and ruefully wish they were doing something with me).
A little bit of subject research (aka testing) is not beneath me so at the end of last year / the start of this year I contacted a handful of friends that don't contact me and initiated a catch up - even though I was the one who initiated the last X amount of catch ups with them. Then I waited. I wanted to see how long it would take for those people to contact me and initiate a catch up in return. Come December, 12 months into the year, a couple finally contacted me and said let's catch up while the others.... well, let's just say I'm still waiting.
It's a bit silly, this testing thing I do, because I've lost friendships this way. I tend to do this thing where I'll contact my friends several times in a row - around 3-5 times - then I'll stop, because quite frankly I feel like some crazy, stalker vying for their attention. When I stop something interesting happens. These people don't contact me in return and for some of them it's been about 2+ years since I've heard from them. After that amount of time I don't consider it friendship anymore yet these people will happily wave and ask how I'm doing, and even sometimes say we should catch up. While I'm thinking, if you really cared you'd be in contact, right?
Having spoken to a number of people this seems to be a growing trend. I'm not sure if it's a global thing or a more personal thing as in it relates to certain people only. Perhaps it's me and they don't want to catch up because I'm awful to be around - hey anything is possible - except that if I contact them and say let's catch up they'll say yes. Perhaps, and this is a more likely scenario, they're busy with their lives and don't have or make the time. Trouble with that scenario is they magically have time to see other people (the magic of social media means I get to see their other outings and ruefully wish they were doing something with me).
For e.g. I messaged a friend their FB home page and said, "Let's catch up. I'm free on X days". I get a 'like' with no commitment. Another mutual friend messaged her the same thing just hours later and her response was to say, "I'm free Thursday." So one friend got a day and time to catch up while I was left hanging. Unfriend!
Another e.g. I bumped in to a friend in a shop around Nov and said, "She you next year." She said we'll catch up before then. More than a year later (I'm not kidding) and I've not heard from her (I arranged the last few catch-ups). Bumped into her again, well over a year later, and she's smiling and friendly and asking how I am, saying the usual, "We should catch up soon" and when I messaged her to ask when she's free she never, ever replied. Another friendship dies.
I message friends and say let's catch up X weekend, they say they're busy that weekend, yet do not proffer another time when they're free and do not initiate a catch up with me. I'm just left hanging until the next time I ask if they're free (and they never seem to be) - (and again, the magic of social media means I get to see them catching up with other mutual friends, leaving me feeling rejected because they didn't include me). When they make that irrelevant fob off comment "We should catch up sometime" I feel resentment and think "Yeah right!" It's always sometime, never a specific time. After a while I stop asking if they want to catch up and more friendships die.
To be honest, I feel really miffed. There is RUOK day and people talk about suicide prevention and being there for friends, yet I have 'friends' who don't contact me, let alone ask me if I need anything. Then there are those who know I need contact, claim to want to catch up, want to go out, have a good time, and still never say yes to invitations or invite me out. This is why I think RUOK day is a joke. No i'm not ok... and very few people actually seem to care. RUOK day is more about getting people to seek help as appose to others actually reaching out to find out if those around them need anything, such as a day outside going for a nice walk. Human contact!!!!
Is it because of social media? It is a situation where because we can see what our friends are up to on social media we no longer feel the need to see them to know how they're doing? Is it a case of because we see them regularly on social media we become unaware of how long it's been since we saw them in person? Have people become collectively lazy and selfish and unaware of other people's needs to be around others, to ease their loneliness and depression?
Is it because of social media? It is a situation where because we can see what our friends are up to on social media we no longer feel the need to see them to know how they're doing? Is it a case of because we see them regularly on social media we become unaware of how long it's been since we saw them in person? Have people become collectively lazy and selfish and unaware of other people's needs to be around others, to ease their loneliness and depression?
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