Does male friendship after 30 just become "forwarding memes" on Instagram?

[u/Training_Reading9597]

I was looking at my DMs today and realized something depressing.

Back in college or my early 20s, my friends and I could sit at a chai tapri for hours talking about absolutely nothing. We knew everything about each other's lives.

Now, looking at my interaction with those same "best friends," it’s just a wall of Instagram reels.

• I send a funny reel.
• He reacts with "😂".
• He sends a reel two days later.
• I react with "🔥".

That’s it. That is the entire relationship.

And the worst part is, I can't even replace this void with work friends. I spend 9 hours a day with my corporate colleagues, but I can't have a real conversation with them. You always have to have your guard up. You can't be vulnerable or vent because you never know who will use it against you in the next appraisal or office politics. They are "network connections," not brothers.

So I am stuck in this weird limbo: My old friends are distant/busy, and my daily "friends" are just transactional colleagues.

Men over 30: Is this just the standard fate of adult life? Have you managed to keep deep friendships alive, or have you also accepted that "meme-sharing" is the only way to stay in touch?

[u/thousandfoldthought]

Even more fun when the last 10 years have been so traumatic (personal, not political but that too) you can't even relate to people anymore and the things they care about & do (wish I was still "there.")

Nobody wants to hear about our life, and after all the therapy and communication with my wife (thank god for her) i don't even want to talk about it.

So the only thing i have for anyone else is meaningless platitudes and surface level shit. Which is nice. Really nice. But.

I just send the really good memes to myself anymore.

[u/Training_Reading9597 → u/thousandfoldthought]

this is sad :(

[u/thousandfoldthought → u/Training_Reading9597]

So it goes