I have struggled with making friends my entire life. My mind is always toxic positive or a complete no-show in this matter. I’ll be over the moon after making a friend and planning everything with them and spending time with them. I’ll give them advice and look out for them.
But, the moment I notice a slight change in tone, body language. Or just anything. I’ll wanna cut off everything. I’ll start keeping things to myself. I won’t reach out to them. I won’t ask their opinion on anything. I’ll gatekeep stuff.
I do think that this behaviour of mine is toxic too. I’m working on it. It’s okay to let people explain. Or not. I dont care. I haven’t worked out that part yet.
Anyways, with the bad luck of having had bad friends since middle school up until university, I completely gave up making friends. For my one year mandatory internship at a dental hospital, I just wanted to do my work and go home. Which i did. For like 3 months.
Then, one day, we had fewer patients, and the OPD was nearly empty. I was sitting by myself scrolling on my phone.
I was also listening to a group of girls talking near me. They were 5 of them. One of them saw me looking over to them and called me over. I went and sat with them. Which turned out to be good for me because we had to make groups next month. 6 people in each group or something. That God send girl asked me if i wanted to join their group as it would even them out. I said yes.
The rest of the year, I was found around them. They were nice to me. Not awkward. Or anything. Just normal friends. We did have fun on a lot of occasions. This one time, there was no power. In the entire hospital. We were told to reschedule patients. We were free for the rest of the day. We couldn’t go home early as they kept track of your check-in and check-out time. So we spent the rest of the day playing random games and talking and laughing. It was fun.
We would help each other during patient work. We would defend each other in front of the supervisor. If one of us didn’t have any equipment, we were happy to lend and share. If someone was feeling sick, we would share her patients or ask her to do half the work and leave the rest for someone else. If someone was going to the cafeteria, they were happy to bring food and tea for the rest of us, too. We were laughing about annoying patients. Consoled each other if there were rude patients. Typical friends stuff.
But, after that year ended, it was basically radio silence until I reached out to them. I did a little small talk with one of them, and she updated me on everything about everyone. I was feeling very optimistic that maybe this friendship would work out.
Fast forward to last weekend, she texted me to meet at a cafe. And she said others were coming too. I was pumped. I ironed my favourite outfit. Then I took out my favourite purse. I put on some makeup and thought it looked a bit too much. Then I washed it. Then I applied sunscreen and a brown lipstick and left.
At first, it was a bit awkward. We were laughing nervously, and there were some silences, too. We waited for one girl. She was running late. When she came, we talked a bit. But the vibe wasn’t there. Something was missing. I could feel like they wanted me there but also didn’t. We sat for 45 mins or an hour. A couple of us are thinking of sitting a postgraduate exam. I’m thinking of taking that test as well. We discussed the books for it and the exam itself. But nothing else. Just superficial stuff.
Maybe I’m overthinking this, but I can’t see another hangout or this friendship being a long one. Today, I ordered the books for the exam and took a picture of the pile to send to one of them. She just sent me a good luck sticker. I tried to crack a joke, and she laugh reacted to it. So I think I should stop.
Is it possible to make friends in your 20s?