[throwawayallday]

I'm a 34 year old male. I've had a few close friends, and a handful of acquaintances over the years.

Three years ago, after moving to a new state for work I met my best friend. We have a ton of things in common and I truly have never felt such a close connection with someone. Something I've never shared with anyone else before. We hang out often and he's always great about giving me his undivided attention when we're together.

When we're not in person, he's very difficult to reach throughout the week via text etc. He has a lot of friends and is always busy hanging out with his other friends. He's also married. It makes total sense he can't be my everything.

Here's where I'm struggling. I feel like I don't have anyone else in my life that's close. Other people annoy me and I've often found it difficult to make other friendships since I've been here. I'm struggling to not feel jealous or hurt, since those feelings shouldn't be warranted but I am feeling them.

I just really don't want to tax our relationship or feel hurt anymore. I'm looking for advice on what I can do to have healthier thoughts about my friend when he's unavailable and ideas of how to have two friends at the same time. (assuming I'll one day be able to make one)

[Skeezyks]

Hello allday: I noticed this is your first post here on PC. So... welcome to PsychCentral! I hope you find PC to be of benefit.

Unfortunately, I'm probably not the best member, here on PC, to be replying to your post. For one thing, I'm an old man. Plus I'm pretty-much thoroughly reclusive... no extended family, no friends or even acquaintances of any consequence... by choice. I've never had the kind of relationship you have with your friend. So congratulations on having the friend you have. That's great!

Since you're struggling a bit with some jealousy & hurt regarding this relationship, another forum, here on PC, that may be of interest to you would be the coping with emotions forum. Here's a link:

https://forums.psychcentral.com/coping-emotions/

Here are links to 2 articles, from PsychCentral's arachives, on the subject of how to deal with feelings of jealousy:

https://psychcentral.com/blog/8-heal...with-jealousy/

https://psychcentral.com/blog/8-ways...nd-envy/?all=1

And then here are links to a bunch of articles on the subject how to make new friends. This probably looks like a lot of reading! But the articles are short. So it's not as much as it may appear:

https://psychcentral.com/lib/buildin...friends/?all=1

https://psychcentral.com/lib/how-man...s-do-you-need/

https://psychcentral.com/blog/10-ways-to-make-friends/

https://psychcentral.com/blog/10-mor...-make-friends/

https://blogs.psychcentral.com/two-m...-make-friends/

https://psychcentral.com/blog/how-to...-more-clearly/

https://psychcentral.com/blog/8-tips...aking-friends/

https://blogs.psychcentral.com/thera...ends-for-life/

https://psychcentral.com/blog/a-shor...nding-friends/

https://psychcentral.com/lib/the-car...of-friendship/

My bests wishes to you...

Hello, and welcome to PC.

I am a female, but I can relate very well to what you are feeling. Years ago, I had one close girlfriend in my life, yet she had a ton of other friends... not married though. I was definitely not her one and only, and felt neglected when she was too busy for me. I felt the same exact way as you do now.

The problem with this scenario is relying on just one close friend. I also understand and relate to the fact that you're saying it's hard to relate to many people... and that many annoy you. I was in the same exact position. I felt like this one woman and I could relate SO well....
but not others so much.

It's hard to find those kind of close friends in general, I have found in life. I am 47 years old, and I have a small handful of very close friends now, both male and female. It took time to develop those friendships over the years, but I made the effort and did.

The thing is, your friend has a lot of friends and a wife, so he's occupied a lot of the time. He devotes his energy and time solely to you when he is available, though. Try to always maintain this perspective when you feel hurt or neglected. Try to tell yourself, Ok, I just have him as a close friend here, it's not personal and he's just simply very occupied and is spread thin.

What I encourage you to do is to try and keep yourself busy and occupied. And perhaps join some social or interest groups. Friendships are more easily formed that way through mutual interests. Meetup.com is great for this purpose in the U.S. There's a social meetup for every possible interest you could imagine. They typically meet once per month, so if you join several, you can be pretty busy on most weekends, or sometimes weekday nights.

Once you are busier yourself socially, it won't feel as bad. And getting out just to meet new people can be very fun & interesting! Even if they don't become your closest friends.

Just my two cents!

[Bill3]

How did you meet your friend?

[ShadowGX]

Ugh, I know those feelings... I have a lot of trouble with "sharing" my friends, especially when I rarely hear from the ones I like the most. The only real advice I have is to try to distract yourself with other things that you enjoy. Other than that, I personally haven't been able to work through, it so I'm hoping you have better luck than I do. >.<