How has children affected your friendships?

First and foremost, I wouldn’t exchange my children for all the friends in the world. I love my children with every bone in my body, and they will always come first. But that being said, I do miss friendships and parts of my pre-baby life. Before Little Bean and Beanie Boy came along, we had a pretty good social life. We would go out clubbing just as a couple, on work nights out, and with other couples, and we missed that. I certainly wouldn’t want to go out all of the time now. I’d be too tired, for one thing, but I don’t understand why some people automatically write you off their invitation lists when having parties and get-togethers. Is it that we are now too boring to party with? Do we only have one topic of conversation? I don’t think we talk incessantly about our children, yes they are a major part of our lives, but we have other interests too, and we still know how to have a good time.

Last weekend we were lucky enough to be invited to two parties, sadly like a bus, you wait for ages for one to come along, and then you get two at the same time. Last Saturday we were invited to two 40th Birthday Parties on the same night and not even in the same town. Because we loved both the birthday people, we decided to both, and thankfully both had invited the children. Despite having to drive an hour in one direction for the first party, stay for just over an hour and then drive an hour back for the second party, we all had an excellent evening. The children were brilliant and had lots of fun despite their very late nights, and Hubby and I enjoyed being part of an adult social event again. Heck, Hubby and I even got to have our first slow dance since our ‘First Dance’ at our wedding four years ago because our friends looked after the tiddlers!! We danced, we chatted, and we let our hair down; we were all shattered the next day, but who cares? Isn’t that what Sundays are all about?

We are fortunate in that my Mum will often tell us to have a night out. She will look after the children, but most of the time, we end up just going to the cinema or out for a meal on our own because we don’t have friends to do things with or those we do/did have are off enjoying themselves with other childless couples. Some friends I haven’t seen since before Beanie Boy was born, and that makes me so sad; I know that everyone is busy with their lives, but sites like Facebook rub it in when you see that they have had parties or nights out where once upon a time you would have been invited, and this time you didn’t even get a look in. Is it time to say goodbye to old friendships and start looking for new ones, I wonder?