I’m a 54-year-old man without any male friends
10 September 2026 · first published in The i Paper
Men don't end friendships. We hide from ever having them in the first place
All of my close friends are women. I’m 54 and I don’t have a single male friend I could call late at night. Not because something went wrong, but because men don’t have friendships like women do.
The women I know build their friendships in the open, sharing details, hiding very little, and work hard at maintaining them. The men I know build their friendships around an interest, like cars or football, sharing very little. It’s a different thing entirely.
A few years ago, midweek, my phone lit up at 11pm and I thought: ‘Oh shit, this must be bad.’ It was bad.