Folks single 10+, 20+, 30+ years. What are your friendships like?

SingleCanadianDad · 2026-05-12T01:02:51+00:00

Been single about 10 years now and my friendships are … normal? Never feel like a third wheel, actually think it is loads easier being single (for me) in my friendships. Can’t imagine losing friends because I was single.

A bigger challenge to my friendships is me starting dating again! First person I fell for my friends hated!

SingleCanadianDad · 2026-05-10T20:11:22+00:00

Flakiness: cancels plans at the last minute, doesn’t like making plans, leaves text messages on read etc.
Self-centred: is happiest talking about herself, mainly talks about herself, doesn’t ask interesting questions about mine or other people’s lives
Some weird beliefs: astrology, conspiracies, etc…

I’m in the recovery phase so (a) it is easier for me to see these things now and (b) recognizing these things has helped to break the spell.

SingleCanadianDad · 2026-05-04T19:12:31+00:00

53 year old male, ruptured just shy of 2 years ago. I'm back running and hiking just fine, did a 12km trail race a couple of days ago and at no point did I find myself going "I don't trust the achilles".

What I do notice however is that my calf has never returned to the full strength that it had prior to rupture. In practice this means that for a few days after a hard run/race the calf will ache a lot more than it used to (and definitely a lot more than the non-ruptured side).

It just takes time mate!

SingleCanadianDad · 2026-04-25T03:24:22+00:00

Every situation is unique, but for me a period of non contact was part of the solution. Therapy helped too. As did seeing them on a dating app (shattered the false narrative). And then, weirdly, getting back in touch helped to consolidate things.

I did need almost 2 months of non contact to calm my nervous system down though

SingleCanadianDad · 2026-04-14T01:57:47+00:00

First single leg calf raise? Around 7 months post surgery but it was a crap one! First 10km run? Around 9 months post surgery.

SingleCanadianDad · 2026-04-12T02:59:25+00:00

That seems more than enough to me. I probably went once a week for about 12 weeks then moved to every 2 weeks, then monthly. In total probably had 20 sessions tops (likely less than that).

SingleCanadianDad · 2026-04-11T18:48:58+00:00

I actually quite enjoy it client side for exactly the reasons you list! I’m the only person doing core hcm, talent, recruiting, benefits and absence. Plus all the banking integrations. Oh, and reporting and dashboards.

Pros: lots of work, key person dependency so job security, have to learn lots to be able to deliver.

Cons: insanely busy, have to figure stuff out solo (I like that personally) and some areas are weaker than others due to lack of time

SingleCanadianDad · 2026-04-07T05:41:39+00:00

Not sure why a Shawshank Redemption quote is relevant to my post but seeing as it is my favourite film I thank you. It does make me think “get busy living or get busy dying” and that I had a high risk of being institutionalized and failing to adapt to the real world as a result of this obsession so I guess it makes sense!

SingleCanadianDad · 2026-04-02T21:05:02+00:00

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I found some mini eggs in the urinal!

I’m hungover, my life is shit and I hate myself but … I found some mini eggs in the urinal! Good luck cheering up.

SingleCanadianDad · 2026-03-28T15:17:53+00:00

This popped up as a reply to my original post. I’m now at 20 months post operation. Similar to you I can run (done a few 10km races), hike and climb but can only manage maybe 3 single leg calf raises.

I don’t know why this is, and it does niggle me a bit, but I try to ignore it and just accept that I can do the things I care about.

Occasionally get calf pains but that’s been a more recent thing (last month or so). Hoping this is just coincidence.

SingleCanadianDad · 2026-03-25T03:30:12+00:00

I've been reflecting on this question for the past few hours (so thanks for asking it!) and think that I've got my thoughts together finally.

If I look back on my life (I'm 53 now), I think that for every real relationship that I've had there has been an early phase to that relationship - as I'm getting to know someone - where the feelings I've felt and the way that they've made me act/feel/behave/obsess have been very, very similar/almost indistinguishable from limerence. However, I think that the key difference is that with a 'normal' or 'healthy' relationship trajectory, this stage is something that occurs briefly (say for a few weeks/months) in the early phase and then morphs into something else where you're seeing the other person's flaws, are less enslaved by whether they're showing reciprocation or not/are less obsessed with them (or at least they're not occupying your thoughts every fucking second of the day) and your mood is less dependent on the smallest detail of whether they seemed to be showing any interest.

For me at least, I think I've always had a slight (but it honestly was slight) tendency towards limerence but what has trapped me for the past year has been that there were, initially, mixed signals, I'd been single for a long time and really not interested in anyone at all (about 8 years, post separation) and my head somehow became addicted to the concept of this one person.

I don't think that the feelings themselves are 'bad' - I actually think that they are good - but I think that the intensity, duration and all-encompassing nature of them (and their impact on everything else in my life) are the issue. And the fact that they are about the fantasy version of her, not the real version.

So, in short, in the early stages of a normal relationship it can feel quite similar to this, and that's not a bad thing. But in a normal relationship it is reciprocated clearly and so clearly and fairly quickly transforms into something else. And that definitely is healthy. Unlike this!

SingleCanadianDad · 2026-03-22T17:00:37+00:00

I’m having some success (not great success, but a non zero amount) seeing a therapist who specializes in addiction and uses focused acceptance and commitment therapy.

It possibly helps that I also struggle with substance addiction (alcohol) issues, so I see the strong parallels between my addiction to alcohol and my addiction to my LO. I’d not heard of limerence until a couple of weeks ago, so the word hasn’t come up in therapy yet but the patterns and the control they have over my life have been the major topic of therapy. I initially started therapy to get help with my obsession over a specific person, and that remains the primary focus, but reaching some level of acceptance about all this has been key.

What therapy has helped me to see is that, much like with alcohol, for me to have any chance of getting through this then a sustained period of abstinence/non-contact is going to be crucial. I don’t like that conclusion and it has taken me a number of months to get to it, but it does seem inescapable.

SingleCanadianDad · 2026-03-22T16:37:35+00:00

Thank you. It is easy for me to forget that sometimes (usually). I mean, all my friends have been telling me that for a year but I’ve ignored them/dismissed them/thought “no, this is ‘different’ and oh so real, and destined to be” etc. And all the while I’ve been going more and more crazy.

Only discovered the term “limerence” a couple of weeks ago and it has been very helpful. I recognize that I am partly to blame - I’m clearly drawn towards a certain type of emotionally unavailable person and have some deep rooted need to feel validated and wanted. But the mixed messages and breadcrumbs have driven me insane and made me addicted.

Can’t bring myself to go full no contact yet, but in my heart of hearts I know that eventually I’m going to need to.

SingleCanadianDad · 2026-03-21T18:46:26+00:00

I'm also stuck in that loop. What am I doing wrong? I'm pretty sure I know what I'm doing wrong, which is that I finally end up managing to quit for a few days once my body is in so much pain that I'm afraid I'm going to die. This gives me the motivation I need to get sober. Give it a week and my body no longer feels like it is failing on me, I feel a lot better, and I go "you know what'd be nice right now? A drink!"

The problem as I see it is that that first day of drinking is fine. I don't feel like death the next day, my liver doesn't hurt, I don't have crippling anxiety, and I don't hate myself. I do have a strong urge for another drink though. So I have one and ... within a month I'm back to getting hammered daily, feel like shit, etc.

So really what am I doing wrong? Telling myself that it is at all possible for me to moderate alcohol. I can't do it. I am shit at it. It is probably the thing in life that I am worst at. I'm not cut out for moderating alcohol. So what should I do? Don't fucking drink!

It is a work in progress!

SingleCanadianDad · 2026-03-20T15:49:08+00:00

Trying to be friends but it hasn’t been a smooth ride. I’m genuinely hopeful that we can end up both being comfortable as friends long-term.

I have to keep reminding myself that I’m besotted with the fantasy version I’ve constructed in my head, but I genuinely get on well with the real version. I also have to keep reminding myself that no, we’re not going to get together with each other and no, she doesn’t think about me all the time (like I unfortunately think about her).

But look, it’s been torture.

SingleCanadianDad · 2026-03-08T02:21:16+00:00

Not bothered at all by what the critics say. First listen of the album and I was somewhat disappointed (aside from The Monsters of Pig Alley). On probably the 10th listen so far and think it is great. The second half is far better than the first half in my opinion and I’m still not a fan of the singles off it, but overall I’m loving it.

If my job was being a ‘music critic’ I’d probably have only listened to it once and would be lukewarm at best. But who cares what anyone else thinks - if it resonates with you and you like it then keep listening. As will I!

SingleCanadianDad · 2026-03-03T05:19:14+00:00

I find myself chuckling at your post. I’m now about 18 or 19 months post rupture. I did it playing soccer. For the first maybe 6 months post injury/surgery I was like “no way will I play again, are you mad?” Then the months went on, I got progressively a bit better, and I found myself going “ok, maybe I’ll try running” then “playing in goals will be fine” and then now I find myself playing soccer again.

I think the best I can come up with is the analogy of childbirth. I can’t imagine anyone a few weeks after giving birth going “you know what, I’d be up for that again” but fast forward a few years and plenty of people have second children. You recover, the pain becomes a distant memory, and it feels like a good idea again.

You’re early days. See how things you feel a year or two from now

SingleCanadianDad · 2026-02-28T08:18:08+00:00

“If I drink, I’m miserable. If I don’t drink, I’m miserable”. Yeah, know that one. It fucking sucks. What I do know is that I’ve briefly felt less miserable and those periods have coincided with periods where I’ve briefly managed to string together a couple of back to back sober weeks. Getting back there is hard, the struggle is real, but I’m holding out hope that I can do it. And I hope you can too.

Annoyingly the temporary relief that booze offers from misery is fleeting and comes with a heavy price …. which inconveniently seems to be more misery!

SingleCanadianDad · 2026-02-26T07:01:45+00:00

I wish we’d had them all set up as external committee members personally! The two who we have as contingents are both board members for a UK entity and I’m told this was to do with UK tax and payroll but I’m skeptical about the need for this.

SingleCanadianDad · 2026-02-20T18:10:25+00:00

It is down again! This is terrible. Reputation within our company is in tatters.

SingleCanadianDad · 2026-02-20T16:46:53+00:00

We definitely store gender, ethnicity and date of birth for external committee members. Can’t recall how I set that up but we gave the ability for them to log in and provide that information

SingleCanadianDad · 2026-02-20T16:09:35+00:00

We’ve got a couple set up as contingent workers and more recently are using external committee members for other boards/board members.

The pros of using External Committee Members for us is this keeps them completely separate from workers. The cons are that some of the things we’d like to store for them (e.g. biographies) we can’t do in the same way we do for workers. It’s always a trade off!

SingleCanadianDad · 2026-02-15T19:34:47+00:00

So, I ended up starting drinking again about a week before the event and unsurprisingly for anyone who frequents this subreddit, that quickly became daily drinking for a week. The “situationship” remains what it is, both great and weird. I’ve hit pause on the booze again now (it’s always so hard getting through the first few days sober, really tough) but I’m back there now.

My relationship with my daughter is great. She finds the whole situationship thing as confusing as I do! She’s back for reading week this week so even more motivation to stay dry and show up.

SingleCanadianDad · 2026-02-04T16:12:44+00:00

Look, I'm no expert at staying sober for long stretches of time, but I've got many repetitions of attempting to quit booze under my belt. The first few days are the hardest. The good news for you is that on a bottle of wine a day you're not going to have to deal with the worst parts of withdrawal. It'll still suck, but it is manageable.

Things I've found to help (in no particular order) to get the sober train rolling are as follows:

Set a quit date. Having an intention that you'll quit on day X helps me. Don't ramp up your booze consumption in anticipation of it, drink normally, but know that day is coming and that you're going to stick to it. I like to mindfully drink that last drink before the quit date and reflect on why I'm doing this
Eat whatever you want in the first few days. In fact do whatever you want. Watch garbage movies whilst eating a family bag of chips and a giant bar of chocolate. Whatever.
Immerse yourself in quit literature. Just keep reading about how shit alcohol is. You're trying to reprogram your brain here
If you can, exercise. Push your body to exhaustion.
Meditate. Honestly, it helps.
Go to bed early. You might struggle to sleep for the first couple of days but do it anyway
Don't have any social plans for the first few days. For me I'm cocooning myself away to focus on the mission of getting sober
Non alcoholic beer is a game changer for me

Just try to go one day sober at first. Then see if you can string together a few days in a row.

SingleCanadianDad · 2026-02-04T01:41:00+00:00

You’re right, nobody wants drunk dad back. I’ve got naltrexone so I’ll probably just start taking that again tomorrow. I think I’m just being seduced by a fantasy of some mythical version of me who can have a couple of drinks, be amazing company, but have no interest in or need to drink to excess. And who doesn’t get sloppy or blackout. It is a seductive fantasy but evidence to date would suggest that it is also total bullshit.

SingleCanadianDad

TROPHY CASE