The Upside of Losing Touch During the Pandemic

When the pandemic first hit, I was surprised to notice an immediate silver lining: I was having a lot more contact with my inner circle. As an American expat then living in Paris, I’d gotten used to conducting many of my friendships long-distance, but suddenly everyone’s friendships had become LDRs, and my calendar filled with rambling catch-up calls and newly-invigorated text threads with close friends who had more time to talk. With the few people I saw in person, conversations deepened and connections strengthened, bringing a sense of safety and comfort. A year and a half later, the trend has continued. I talk more frequently with fewer people, and have let the weaker relationships fall away rather than working overtime to sustain them. It’s always bittersweet when friendships fade, but in this case, it’s been more sweet than bitter.

There’s no doubt that the pandemic has altered our social lives, changing the ways and frequency with which we connect. For many, that’s manifested as loneliness, isolation and anxiety; but for some, it’s also offered a rare opportunity to review and reset our existing friendships. Much like COVID has accelerated changes to our work culture, it may have illuminated relationships we’ve outgrown, expediting natural shifts in our social circles.

“While we used to maintain friendships by running into friends at school, work, or around town, we now have to be more intentional about connecting,” says Angela Bahns, associate professor of psychology at Wellesley College. “This means it takes a more deliberate effort—we have to schedule a Zoom meeting, or carefully plan a socially distanced coffee date or cocktail hour—and with all the added stress, worry and family obligations the pandemic has brought, many of us just don’t have the time or energy to maintain all of the friendships we had pre-pandemic.”

For Joyce, 32, of the Bay Area, weekends before COVID used to be filled with social events, gatherings and travel, but she still felt something was missing. “I felt a pervasive sense of emptiness and a lack of true belonging to a community,” she says. “When the pandemic hit, San Francisco became a ghost town, and I experienced a falling-out with ancillary friends, who I realized were more superficial connections and activity partners than friends. At the same time, through the power of technology, I’ve since fostered new friends who share similar journeys in life. Over the last year and a half, I’ve built richer friendships than I have in the three years prior, with new people with whom I can share my deepest truths about burnout, trauma, fears and challenges.”

During stressful times when we have less emotional bandwidth, experts say we’re more inclined to put friendship quality over quantity, focusing on the most rewarding bonds, whether it’s because they’re more organic, authentic or supportive. “People prioritize friendships that meet their needs,” says Bahns. “People are brought closer together by the shared experience of COVID-related worries—we want to be able to find comfort in knowing we’re not alone in our loneliness, grief, anxiety and exhaustion.”

On the flip side, we’re also likelier to be OK with letting certain other friendships fizzle, whereas in normal times, we might have gone the extra mile to stay in touch. “People may be more selective about which friendships they maintain, because they recognize that there are fewer opportunities to meet new friends,” says Bahns. In other words, we’d rather invest in existing strong connections than new or weaker ones. That’s not to say we should close ourselves off to new people, but rather a reminder to periodically take stock of which relationships are most fulfilling and proceed accordingly. “In a pandemic, friends become less exchangeable, and some research in psychology suggests that this makes people more selective,” she adds.

That was the case for Colleen Gwen, 44, of Brooklyn, New York. “Before 2020, I was that friend you could call any time of day or night,” she says. “Once I had time to sit and think about everyone in my life during the pandemic, I realized I needed friends that were more uplifting. I decided to cut down on interactions with people who only call me to vent about their own problems.”