How important is it to have friends on here?

I don't think I'd be as productive if I didn't have the support and motivation of all my friends on here!

It works for me. This go around is the first time I've done it with MFP friends and it's very motivating compared to going it alone.

Feel free to add me. And don't be scared to add people, the worst they can do is not accept it

I haven't figured out how that works yet... a couple of people have wanted to friend me but until I know more about what it actually is, I'm afraid I'm not going to appear very friendly. (Yeah, I'm old... I don't do Facebook either.)

Tiamo719 wrote: »

I only have 3 friends mainly because I don't ask anyone to be my friend. I feel like I'm being a bother, I mean, what if they have over 100 friends? Do they really want another?

I also feel it's easy to look at my profile and keep up with my friends because I only have three

Anyway, do you feel it's beneficial for success to have many friends?

It depends on the type of friends. I have a wonderful group currently who are focused on eating healthfully and exercising, but I've gotten requests from a couple who either don't eat (as in set their goals to 900 or less per day and fill the news feed with obsessive thoughts about their bodies and eating etc) those people I quickly delete. I even had one who started out OK but then made her goal 700 and ate half that. If you're going to be....for lack of a better term bat$&$% f#$#4 crazy, I don't need you. Go take that to a dietician and a psychiatrist.

does not bother me to have no friends here. i mostly just stay on the main forum and groups.

I like having lots of MFP friends because I find some are very consistent with logging in and checking in and others are not. Having friends has not necessarily aided in my success thus far, but posting in the forums and joining specific groups have. Knowing there are people out there struggling with the exact same things as me has made me feel less like an outcast IRL and on MFP. Talking about my issues, even minor ones, has helped because there's an audience that understands because they've been there. It's in the groups where I first started making friends. Group friends can sometimes be more meaningful for me because I then have multiple ways to check in with them.

Honestly, I don't think many people find friend requests annoying. When I friend request someone, I try to include a little line about where I saw them post or if we seem to have something in common (goal, inspiration, habits) and that helps to break the ice.

To repeat what everyone here has said, it depends on what you want, to each his own, etc. But here are some ways friends on this site have helped me:
- I do not have many "real life" friends who I'm comfortable discussing weight loss with. It is really nice to have people who I can talk to about what I'm going through.
- This is a personal thing, but I really didn't want to become one of those people who talks about weight loss all the time. It's good for me to have people who I can talk talk talk to about calories, exercise, meal logging, and I know they don't find it boring and understand why I'm thinking about it a lot.
- Similarly, I don't want to post the details of my weight or weight loss on Facebook or whatever, feels kind of "braggy"--really good to have a place where you can share your accomplishments without feeling that you're being obnoxious. Same goes for setbacks. I know my MFP friends understand when I whine about a couple of weeks without scale movement.
- I was able to find people with very similar start weights and goals to me, at various points in their journey. I can now look at posts from someone who started out at my start weight and has lost 50 pounds, see how she's doing, look at her food diaries for tips. One of my biggest problems has been feeling frustrated and giving up easily, but when I can see "this person was in the same exact position as me and DID IT," it makes it easier to believe I can do it too.
- I have found really great friends whose progress I'm genuinely interested in, and that keeps me logging into the site every day. I'm at a 30 day streak now, which is (sadly) at least twice as long as I've ever lasted into a "lifestyle change" before. The social networking aspect makes me more likely to actually keep doing this, because I WANT to.
- I benefit a lot from motivation. A few weeks ago, I weighed in and saw a good loss, posted it, and then went to the treadmill. Really amazing to be working out and seeing popup notifications from my friends congratulating me on the loss as I continued working. Warm fuzzies all around.
- Having friends, seeing people around the same weight as me, going through the same stuff, makes me feel more...normal. Not that I don't need to work anymore, but it makes me go a little easier on myself when I'm discouraged.