How can you know if a person really care about you?

Why do you feel this way?

Are you the one who is always calling them to make plans or do they include you and invite you to do things with them??

Personally I would confront the situation and just ask them, where it may be hard to do sometimes just knowing where you stand with people gives you the perspective you need to make a decision whether or not its time to find a new friend/s

Welcome to Fluther.

The only way to know who your friends really are is through their actions. It’s easy to be “pretend friends” with someone, to say the right things and smile and appear to be “friendly”.

But if you’re excluded from their activities, if you’re ignored when you ask for help, if they never seem to have time to spend with you, then they’re probably not real friends.

We’re usually friendly, though. Sometimes in that easy-to-act-that-way capacity, however.

1. They call you or otherwise contact you to get together.

2. They tell you they like you or that you are their friend.

3. they do nice things for you or say nice things to you.

They truly care about you if they seek your company despite your faults. When your good traits and your ugly traits are in the open, and people still want to talk to you and spend time with you, they are true friends. At least, that’s how I judge who my real friends are.

Simply ask if they would hide you from either the police or a deranged ax murderer. If they answer yes then they care, if they answer no then you are alone….. so alone.

@Mr_Paradox LOL! You can also ask if they would help you hide a dead body. That usually works for me.

@WillWorkForChocolate If you need to hide a dead body than you have bigger problems…. like staying alive.

Keep moping around. If they’re your real friends they’ll tolerate it a little longer. But not forever, this is the 21st century afterall

This answer is mostly sarcastic

A real friend will often consider your needs and interests as well as their own. They will, at times, do things to show that they value your company and friendship.

Be a good friend and you will discover which of your acquaintances are good friends.

@Mr_Paradox I never said it had to be a human body…

oh…. if its a body of a pet that you killed you’re still going to have to run from PETA.

In my life, it has mostly been the bodies of spiders, snakes and other various ickies that I’ve been forced to terminate. I haven’t typically needed help with those, though.

than why bring that up!?!?!?!?!?!?

There’s always the off chance that one may need help with something like that. You never know. Plus I’m high on too much coffee and thinking out loud. Sorry.

Ever tried decaf?

A few times. It felt like blasphemy.

I drink caffinated in the morning and half-caf throughout the day. Trust me, it’s better that way.
Then again, I take my coffee black so…...

If they tolerate, and even claim to sometimes enjoy, your own personal brand of bullshit then, well, they care.

There has to be a decent level of give and take. Give and take does not always come and go in equal doses, but if you are the one who always calls them up, or always has to initiate conversations and make plans to do stuff, or if you always do stuff for them (like helping them to move, or helping them set up their computer, or giving them rides or whatever it is) and they never or rarely do anything helpful or nice for you, then you have to ask yourself, why you would want those people as friends.

Do you notice that these people go off and do fun things like seeing movies, going to the mall, taking a road trip, going to a party (or throwing a party and not inviting you) with other people, but not you? Not good friend material.

Do you notice that these people ignore you, constantly interrupt you or blow you off when you are trying to engage them in a conversation? If so, they may either not be good friend material, or you may have some type of annoying conversational style, or you may appear to be desperate. That doesn’t make for being liked.

There is a very big difference between having friends and simply having acquaintences. There’s also a huge difference between really knowing people for real, in real life, seeing them often, talking to them in person, interacting with them in person, than there is with people you simply chat with online. It’s unfortunate that Facebook uses the term Friend because some of those people might be real friends, but most of them aren’t. They’re just causal or even super-ficial cyber-buddies. I don’t think it’s likely that people have thousands of friends, or even hundreds of friends, although you might actually know that many people.

The other thing that I’m concerned about, is that you are unsure of whether these people are your friends. Unless you have some type of situation, like having Aspberger’s Syndrome or something else that would make you unable to easily have regular social interactions (or to be able to interpret regular social interactions) it seems like you would know pretty readily whether people like you or not.

Why do you feel unsure?

People who are there for you when you’re down. People who care about you without any certain set of conditions being met. Unfortunately, throughout my life experiences most people, whether it was during the course of a relationship or friendship, were only fair weather friends or partners.

You can tell how someone feels about you by interaction with people who are strictly/more their friends. Your friend may veil their feelings about you, but their friends will reflect what they are told about you.