Once you have written your paragraph, you are to respond to two of your peers’ paragraphs in at least 100 words each.In your reply, respond to all 5 parts in your peer’s initial post,making sure to explain what you relate to and your judgment about yourpeer’s experience with their friends and family.

Classmate 1 :

1. Ibelieve that I used to have a rather strong need to belong, it hasgotten a lot better over the last year or two but I believe that itstems from being picked on and having very little friends as a child. Ibelieve that I now am more appreciative of my own company than I was afew years ago, but when I used to have a really strong need to belong Iwould play sports that I wasn’t interested in and listen to music Ididn’t really like in order to fit in. Now I try to be as authentic tomyself as possible so when I do make new friends they are actuallyinterested in similar things to me and I have to do very littlecompromising. The only area I usually have to compromise is going out toeat at places that don’t usually have a large vegetarian selectionbecause my friends picked the restaurant which I don’t usually mindbecause I can (most of the time) find something on the menu.

2. I believe that currently the biggest costs to maintaining myfriendships are the gas and money spent on gas from all of the roadtrips we have done together and the cost of going out to eat dinner. Ialso I work with a couple of my friends and they always call me in on myday off when we get a call out so I have made compromises going intowork on my day off to help out my friends. I used to have a friend that Iwas really close with, we even moved in together but when she and herboyfriend were going through a tough breakup she ended up gettingevicted for not paying rent and cut me out of her life altogether. Iwould constantly reach out to see how she was doing, I would ask abouther family, school, and invite her out to dinner but eventually Irealized I was the only one reaching out and I wasn’t getting the sameeffort back. Unfortunately I don’t like having one sided relationshipsand I stopped putting in more effort than she was putting in untileventually we stopped talking because I would no longer message herfirst.

Classmate 2 :

1. I have a strong need to belong. I love my husband and I feel soprivileged that I found such a good partner, but I do not fit into hisfamily very well. I Cuss like a sailor and use a lot of humor, and Iknow that I have gotten on my mother-in-law’s nerves because of this. Itry to be respectful by watching my language and them, which makes mefeel like I cannot be myself. I find myself calling my aunts, sister,and mother to feel that feeling of belonging. I know that I do not haveto censor myself around them and I feel more at ease because of that.

When I was in my early twenties I lived in Arkansas with myGrandmother. I found that I did not like living in the south because ofcultural differences. Most of the people there liked Country music andwere very conservative. Through, there is nothing wrong with those twothings, I just did not feel like I fit in as a liberal heavy metalenthusiast.

2.I think some of the biggest cost associated with maintainingfriendships is to remember to take the time to see each other. There isnot the same pressure to see friends as much as there is family. So itis harder to prioritize it. I found that after high school I had to sendmany of my friendships because I felt like many of them were toxic. Ifelt like I was going in a different direction than most of them and assad as it was pretty easy to end those friendships.