The number of newly wed women who think that their husbands are their bestfriends and they do not need anyone else concerns me. I have seen many beautiful buds of beauty, wilt away without the nourishment of fellowship with females. Even in the realm of Singles ... be sure to cultivate friendships with other women, even if you are dating.
21 comments:
Try not to worry too much. Just keep encouraging them. Sometimes it just takes them time to catch on.
I have been married for over 13 years now and I have a fabulous husband...but we both need friends other than each other. I think it took me about 3 years to really understand that. It was when I had my first baby about 11 years ago and I joined up with a mothers of preschoolers group. From then on I never looked back! Now a days you can find me hanging with my girlfriends at Community Bible Study (CBS) or in a kitchen over cups of coffee.
My husband on the other hand always seemed to have friends that he golfed with or went mountain biking with, etc.
It's a good point Christine. Guys and girls both need to cultivate same-sex friendships at every stage of life.
I think it's really important to have friends of the same sex. Marriage is great - and my hubby is my best friend - but God has created us for relationships, and it can be really unhelpful to be too insular in your marriage...and I think it can also be really selfish. Other women might need you to be their friend, but you're just being with your hubby.
I am very thankful to God for my female friends, who encourage me to be a better mum, wife, woman - and who I love to hang out with. Isn't God good!!
So you're saying that in every lonely housewife is a closet lesbian? That's not what Christine is after.
I'd go nuts if my fiancee wanted to spend every last second with me. A man can only take so much estrogen at one sitting. She needs her friends just as much as I do.
It has been difficult for me at times when friends of mine at my chruch have married. I lose them as friends. No matter what they may say, things will be different after friends say, "I do." Some have shrunk from virtually all social interaction, but what has really stung me in the past was when they ditched their old circle of single friends, having gained admittance to a new circle of marrieds. I think many of our churches are couples-centric, to the detriment of the unity of the body. All too often in churches, singles have to really make an effort to make themselves known; young families get mobbed the first time they visit.
ha ha ... i was wondering the same thing, S.N.
I've been married for 2 1/2 years now and although my husband is my best friend, we do our best to free each other up to spend exclusive time with friends of the same sex.
Even though my husband is extraordinarily compassionate, he just cannot understand my heart like a woman can. that's interesting reapolitiklr, I find my single friends have all drifted away!
Mainly because they have moved, but I make as much effort to contact thema s they do me, and sometimes much more...
I ahve amde several new single friends since being married, but obviously also have married friends.
I find living as a married couple with another married couple is very helpful.
We have a big house, so we have lots of space, but when the other girl and I have issues, decisions to make, or just want to natter, we are there fo each other.
We are not 'best friends', but we like each others company and we can understand each other well.
Of course, in my first year of marriage I foudn ti very hard to leave my hsuabnds side and found myself rather lonely. As my husband could not fill my social needs fully. It topok me learning the hard way of course!!!
In my first yr of marriage, my single (uni)friends didn't know how to relate to me anymore...so they just left me out of their fun. It was a really hard yr for me. My single church friends still included me.
As my hubby and I were 19 when we married, perhaps some of my friends reactions were just based on immaturity. It was hard though.
Now I'm love single friends - so much easier to have over....that sounds kind of selfish ( i suppose it is) - I just enjoy hanging out with them, doing more girly things.
Is Rowdy for real or is he just trying to stir up some drama??? I agree with you Christine. I dont understand when married people or single people say they cant relate to them anymore. We still work, pay taxes, rent or own property. I mean, there are so many other ways we can relate to each other just because we are christians. I have to say that I love hanging around my married friends. Especially when you want to know what a cute guy is thinking, its nice to have the over analyzing girl talk but then their husbands are there to give you the real deal. :) Usually!!
I have been married about a year now - we moved to a new town shortly after we married. It seems like the single girls at my church like to stick together. I even had a friend tell me they were going to out to the movies 'with my single girlfriends'. I think it is important for sinlge people to know that married people need friends too, and not to shy away from befriending them. It is a strange time to be newly married - you are without children (so you don't fit in with the family type couples) but you are married (so the singles think you have better things to do).
"Can't we all just get along?"
-- Rodney King
8-)
This is Harvey Brown.
Rowdy: Wow.
welcome back, harvey brown
Howsy, I think you mistook me. I meant that when i ask my married girlfriends about a guy, it sometimes helps when thier husbands chime in and puts stuff into prespective. By the way, you just want to start something dont ya??
ha ha ... did you have brothers when you were growing up, Sajini? You know how much they're just after a reaction. If you don't give it to him ... or if you give them something different than what they expect, it can either make the game miserable or more fun for the brother.
yeha I got 2 younger brothers... I saw this one coming!! :)
sajini is HOT!
This has been an interesting discussion. I married and after that, I saw very little of my single friends anymore. Oh...once in a while...but not regularly. First of all, I moved an hour away. That doesn't seem like much, but it was. It seems the only time I saw them was when I traveled back to go to weddings. And when I saw them, we loved each other and had fun. Little by little, they all went their separate ways. Some married, some moved away to jobs in other states, some went away to grad school...some did a combination of these things. The fact is, the single years are very transient years. A lot of changes going on. Moving, school, jobs, mission trips, marriage. It's no one's fault...and it's nothing to get too upset over. It's just life. Sometimes these changes are misinterpreted as someone not caring anymore. It's just not true.
I found it most difficult in those early marriage years. I still felt young and like I could relate best to singles and young adults...but I wasn't single anymore. I didn't quite fit in anymore in the singles fellowship group. I didn't have children and the married women seemed so established as "full-fledged adults" (whatever that means)...and I didn't fit in there either. I found it most natural to hang around with the other newly married couples. Again, this is nothing to take personally. I always loved my old friends...and I still do!
Well, being married for only five months, I feel I do understand this predicament. My single friends are still in college (to which I never went), I work, and they work. So this leaves us to weekends to see each other and if we work on weekends then we never see each other. A valiant effort might be made, but after no success, and some feelings of failure and rejection, one might tend to either try less often, or give up... leaving both sides unsatisfied and drifting in their friendship. Although, whenever you do see each other again, joy and happiness abounds, in which satisfaction in the friendship, can be found. Am I making sense? Also when you live an hour away from most friends (prior married-life friends), that does put a damper on things... like spur of the moment nights out, or grabbing a cup of coffee and dessert together. It's also more convenient, at times, to get together with your married or engaged friends... so your hubby also has someone to talk with... See what a mess getting married gets one into?
but one of the nicest messes in the world ... so i hear.
true :)
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