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crowd, while others are unique and it will take them longer to find their own tribe.

‘‘We don’t need a lot of friends – it’s reported that women only need one person with whom they feel a sense of belonging to feel significantly happier in their everyday lives.’’

If one friend is considered enough, then Nicola from Tauranga hit the jackpot when she attended one of Sarah’s events last year, ending up with a small gang of likeminded companions.

Nicola and her husband abandoned Auckland’s overheated housing market for Tauranga four years ago.

For a long time, she thought she’d made a mistake. In Auckland, she’d had plenty of friends she’d made through her children’s school, and at work. However, in her late 40s, with grown-up children and an illness that left her unable to work, she felt isolated.

While her husband is ‘‘lovely and supportive’’, he works away a lot, she tells me on the phone. This took a toll on her mental health and her marriage. ‘‘I was terribly depressed. I thought about leaving him and going back to Auckland to live with my kids.’’

Last September she signed up for a local speed-dating event. She was excited, but when the day came she nearly bailed out.

The thought of putting herself out there was terrifying. ‘‘I said to my husband, I’m so nervous, I don’t want to go. What if nobody writes my name down? What if no-one’s interested in meeting up with me again?’’