No one bothered to tell me that shortly after buying the $300 bridesmaid dress and giving a tipsy but heartwarming champagne toast in front of hundreds that I was going to lose my friend to marriage.
Had I known, I definitely would have taken advantage of the open bar a bit more.
The loss began subtly. Phone calls tapered off. Weeks would pass before I saw her. She skipped lunches, brunches and any other food-related get-togethers.
But the greatest clue? The awkward conversations.
These included a lot of forced giggling while she regaled me – at length – about her crazy weekend at The Home Depot because, you see, she and her husband (a.k.a. friend thief) were preparing the spare room for – you guessed it – the anticipated baby.
This was the same woman who taught me how to take a tequila shot without ever touching the glass with my hands, and now she was Mrs. So-and-So, and, well, we didn’t have all that much in common anymore.
I lacked a husband, I didn’t own a townhouse in one of those multiconcept urban villages, and I wasn’t taking prenatal vitamins.
Things had changed.
We were both struggling to find a way to maintain our friendship without giving up and heading to our respective corners of single-with-cat this way and married-with-kids that-a-way.
“A hard time relating”
It turns out that this is not uncommon for friends who now stand on opposite sides of the marital fence.
Nadine Fluty, 28, saw six of her friends get married last year.
Nearly all of them have changed in some way, she said.
“I used to pick up the phone and call them all the time. But now I’ll call someone else mainly because I just can’t relate,” said Fluty, of Costa Mesa, Calif. “Everything totally revolves around the new marriage, complaining about the mother-in-law, house decorating and things I don’t really want to talk about.
“But I understand. People evolve and enter new chapters of their life,” she said. “I’m very independent and very single. So I have a hard time relating to married people. So I found a new group of friends.”
Murray Kaufman, a licensed marriage and family therapist based in Santa Ana, said that, like most relationships, there are peaks and valleys that people must weather. But he does encourage married people to keep their circle of friends active, and this includes their single friends.
“There is a feeling in society that when you get married, your life becomes focused only on your marriage,” he said. “Sometimes there is a sense that now their needs are going to be met by that one person. And that is a myth.”
It’s expected that married folks are going to want to focus on their spouse and their new life path, Kaufman said, but having outside friendships and interests from the primary relationship is key to a full and balanced life.
“There are only so much of your needs that can be met in a single relationship,” he said. “It’s important for all of us to have different support groups so we can make ourselves happy in life.”
Friendships must evolve
Support and understanding are what send married people veering toward others with similar lifestyles. Suddenly life is not about getting reservations at that new restaurant or taking a weekend jaunt up the coast. It’s about family.
Cordelia Stark, 30, married with two children, is a member of the North Huntington Beach Mothers Club, a group she sought out after she lost touch with most of her single friends.
“We just don’t have a lot in common anymore, and they don’t understand,” Stark said. “They call out of the blue and want to go out – and I have kids. They think that just because we are the same age I can still go out drinking and clubbing.”
Jennifer Edmonds understands.
“Your old life is over,” she said. “I can’t go out to the clubs anymore because I have to get up at 6 a.m. no matter what, and who wants to wake up with a hangover? With other moms and married women you can talk to each other and commiserate together. We have the same learning curve.”
But friendships don’t have to end. They just have to evolve.
Compromise and communication – the hallmarks of any good relationship – appear to be what it takes to move with the tides in these vacillating friendships. And if it turns out your friendship is worth it, so are the adjustments.
Christy Cornelison, 32, of Rancho Santa Margarita, said she and her group of friends have stayed close throughout the years even as some got married and others stayed single.
She was one of the first in her group to get married, but said she made it a priority to stay in touch with everyone.
“You have to find a middle ground,” Cornelison said. “You please your single friends by going out, and maybe you can bring your husband. And then the single friend comes over and watches a movie with you.”
Now all of her friends are married and have kids, and they have formed a group they fondly call “Hot Mamas.”
As for my friend and me, we did find a solution to make our friendship work. These days I go to her house, where we gossip and giggle mercilessly in front of her husband, who takes care of the baby and makes us dinner and drinks while we take time to catch up.
It’s different but definitely a compromise I can live with.
