Why Not Both?
This week we are discussing the age old debate of ‘Why Married people and single people can’t be friends.’ I have had COUNTLESS conversations with people about this topic. I suggested this topic to Morgan and Jen and I’m sure many others have thought about it for this series so here I am chiming in.
So way back in October I went to the Allume Conference. Before the conference I met a TON of bloggers on twitter and facebook that were attending. One of the bloggers I met was Aprille from Beautiful In His Time. We had tweeted each other and commented on facebook posts about the conference and other blog related things. Then the conference came and we NEVER saw each other! Every time I saw her she was on the opposite side of the room and vice versa…which is bound to happen in a room of 450+ people.
After the conference we reconnected online and started chatting about this very topic. She’s even linked up with us here and here.
While we were talking it really made me think on a deeper level about this topic. It’s this huge stigma almost like the stigma that went on in grade school girls on one side boys on another…now that everyone is “grown up” a new stigma is in town…married people on one side and single people on another.
For years I’ve been trying to figure out WHY?!!? Why can’t we be friends even though we’re at different stages of life?
I think one issue for me is that what I know is healthy and what I see are two totally different things. Most of the married people I know or people just in relationships aren’t really in healthy ones. What I see is two people so obsessed with each other they never see anyone else and do every single thing together and are never apart. Now is that necessarily true? For some of them yes but probably not all of them. Maybe I’m assuming a little bit too much but when I talk to a lot of these people they tell me things that make me feel that way like always having plans with that person no matter what it is…sometimes I wonder if it’s me and they just don’t want to do things with me. I really don’t know.
What I do know is that we all need friends no matter what their stage in life. Married women need single women and single women need married women and widows and divorcee’s need married women, etc. etc. One thing I’ve always thought interesting is some married women talk like everything that happenned to them before marriage disappears from their memory once they get married and they can no longer “relate” to us. Why? You weren’t born married so at some point in your life you were single and you dated and you struggled.
When my married friend asks me if I’ve ever thought about why I’m still Single….and I’m like

I think that married women and single women all struggle with similar issues and we all like to do similar things. Your relationship status doesn’t change the fact that you might like to shop, go to a movie, go hiking, go bowling, go to the beach, etc.
Like Jen wrote in her post we live in a FAST and BUSY world. We have to make an even harder effort to get together with others and meet people. We all have our schedules so jammed pack it’s hard to make time for our relationships but it’s important. I think sometimes just hanging out at home and having a girls night in can be just as fun. If your married friend has a baby and can’t find a sitter go to their house and hang out. Contrary to what you see on TV people without kids aren’t afraid of kids. We might take some time to warm up to them but we’re not totally against it. I would actually prefer go to someones house
See you next week…our topic is Single Life Bucket List. I’m looking forward to this I LOVE Bucket Lists!
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