I’m somewhere in the middle. Big introvert (actually I’m autistic) and I really isolated after a bad friendship broke down years ago, not the first time. I just didn’t want to put myself back out there and keep getting hurt. I was also sick of the thing people say like “let’s hang out sometime” and then nothing ever happens. It’s just a polite saying apparently? So I stopped taking those statements as any interest in a friendship.

Relatively recently, a coworker said the whole we should hang out thing and I was sigh this again. We got along so well at work but I didn’t trust that let’s hang out sometime crap. Until one day she actually pulled her diary out and was like when are you free. Anyway now we’re actually friends and hang out quite a bit!

It’s the kind of person you let in I think. I was taken advantage of so many times and in toxic friendships I assumed that’s just what friendships were. They don’t have to be. You just have to know when to let those relationships go and how to recognize the friendships that are actually fulfilling!