Hello all.
I’ve been in college since the end of August.
I have a lot of friends. I have two great friends on my floor, and a bunch of other friends who I can eat with. On the floor above me, I have two amazing friends who I do everything with, and I’m cool with almost everyone on that floor. Outside my hall, I have a handful of close friends and a bunch of less close friends. I have probably 15+ close friends and 100+ acquaintances/friends.
However, while everyone thinks I’m popular and have a lot of friends, I still feel really lonely and unwanted. I don’t belong to any one group, and I perpetually feel like I’m not wanted. I want to have those go-to people.
Will I find a group of friends? Am I a failure for not finding this yet? I’m so angry at myself for not having this figured out by now.
Relatively few college freshmen, if any, have this figured out by now. It actually sounds to me like you are doing really well.
You might want to talk to the counseling people at your school. However, I think that you will find that things get better over time, and that you are actually doing better in terms of making friends and getting settled that most students. Starting at university is a major transition. The classes and academics are only a relatively small part of the overall major change in a student’s life when they go to university.
It just seems everyone else has big groups already and I don’t. It feels like so much work to maintain all these friendships. I just want a core group of people who i know will always include and want me.
“I just want a core group of people who i know will always include and want me.”
Very sensible. However, that just doesn’t happen in two months.
People can surprise you in both good and bad ways even after you have known them for a year or two. If you for example were to break a leg or get sick next year you might be very surprised which of your casual acquaintances ends up being a huge help and which good friends just sort of disappear. We all get to figure these things out over time.
Maybe your life is more complicated this way, but its a compliment to you, really, that you are able to connect with people belonging to different groups. It’s comforting to have one big group with which you can identify…but people who subsume themselves into mostly one group run the risk of living in a bubble that doesn’t allow fresh ideas in. College is a place to expand yourself, and it looks like you have made an amazing start. Sometimes feeling uncomfortable and off-kilter can be a sign of growth 
Of course, feeling off-kilter can go too far if you begin to feel chronically and unremittingly lonely and anxious in the crowd…but it sounds as if some of these friendships you have made are somewhat rewarding (the fact that yo feel that around fifteen people are “close” friends is pretty telling.) Honestly, it’s early days yet in your college career. Many people would think that having two or three people to be comfortable with at this point would be a positive sign that things are going well. Not trying to trivialize your feelings (go see a counselor if you’re truly distressed) but, on the outside it’s seems as if you’re doing well. The fact that some people have one cohesive big group is not necessarily a sign that they are better adjusted. You simply may have a capacity for being a socially-complex person. It’s OK to embrace this admirable trait. On the other hand, if you’re feeling exhausted, maybe you’re trying too hard to find “your” group by fitting into all of them. Listen deeply inside yourself about what YOU need at this time. I do think you’re setting yourself up for disappointment and second-guessing to want a core group that will ALWAYS want you though…there is always going to be some social ebb and flow in life, even among good friends. It doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong with you OR your friends when the ebb-times happen. It’s just life.
Having these kinds of friendships is always work to maintain. People don’t just magically include you and want you because you exist; you have to put in the work to maintain those relationships. That’s going to be true for the rest of your adult life - if you don’t tend to a friendship, it’ll slowly die out. The friendships you form will change and grow even just over the next four years.
If you want to pare down your social relationships that’s totally within your control. You can turn down social invitations for people you don’t really want to cultivate relationships with and make an effort to invite out the people you want to get closer with. Host small group gatherings in your own space or invite a group out to eat or something.
I think the way you are feeling is just part of growing up and maturing, not really college life. You are figuring it out and finding out who you connect with and over time some friends you will become closer to. Dadtwogirls said it perfectly. You are doing really well. Try to relax and feel good about finding your place in your new environment.
I’m just worried @Empireapple @juillet @inthegarden @DadTwoGirls that everyone else is going to settle in and I won’t have my group. I’m afraid my friends won’t want to room with me next year and I’ll be alone while everyone else has a clique.
Boson21 please try not to worry. You are doing really well. Don’t borrow trouble. It sounds as if you’ve made lots of friends, are making connections are things are progressing nicely. It is still very early in the year. Let your relationships develop. I bet by February you will feel more secure in your friendships. Don’t forget, you can initiate asking who you want to room with for next year (but I’d wait until second semester to do so). You don’t have to wait for others to pursue you.
My roommate told me he’s going to live off campus next year with his friend today so it brought all these worries to mind. there are probably only four people so far who I’d want to room with next year. I just am afraid they’ll make other plans before I talk to them, but also afraid I’ll be desperate or shot down if I ask soon. @Empireapple
So talk to them. While you are eating with the couple of kids on your floor or those from upstairs, bring up housing for next year. It will help if you know about the options available - suites on campus, apartments off campus. You will be surprised how quickly the good places are gone immediately after Christmas break. Find out if there are suites for triples and ask two friends if they’d like to apply for those. Take the lead.
@Boston21 - It sounds like you have a lot of social anxiety; part of that is a lot of time spent ruminating. You’re planning out your friends’ reactions to your questions and requests before you even get a chance to fully form them; you predict that they will react negatively to every potential scenario, and that only increases your anxiety. It’s hard to tell over the Internet whether this is something that rises to a life-interfering problem, but everybody can benefit from a little counseling now and then. So I’d talk to a counselor at school about this, particularly if you find that you’re so stressed out about these social interactions that you are thinking about them constantly.
In my experience, most students start chatting about housing options for next year around November/December of the year prior. At some schools you have to have your ducks in a row that early to get off-campus housing, and in others being early and proactive is really useful for getting a good spot. So you’re not too early, and you won’t look desperate if you just pose the request in a normal way. “Hey, I was just thinking about housing next year - trying to get it squared away early so we can get a good spot and group of roommates! How would you feel about living with me, Aaron and Bob? I haven’t talked to them yet but I thought it may be cool.” And let them respond!
If they say no…no big deal. Just move on! Getting randomly assigned roommates isn’t the end of the world either.
The other thing that I think is in play here is the sort-of-myth about having one “go-to” group of friends that does everything together. A lot of movies and TV shows have perpetuated this - they feature a core group of 3-6 friends (commonly 4) who met in college or thereabouts and always hang out and do everything together. Note that these groups were created because every show needs to have a core cast of starring actors who are given a lot of screen time, not because that reflects actual reality.
MOST people have several different groups of friends that they move in and out of and get different things from, and different adults treat those friends differently. I’m kind of like you, OP - I have a decently large group of people I consider ‘close friends’ and then a whole bunch of acquaintances and people in my network that I hit up for different things. It works for me - when I want to play board games or talk about video games I have a different group of friends than the ones I want to go out to brunch or shopping with. I know folks with all kinds of different configurations. But I don’t really know anyone who’s got the Sex in the City/Friends dynamic going on where they kind of do EVERYTHING together. That would get really annoying after a while, I think.