Make New Friends But Keep The Old

Photo by Duy Pham on Unsplash

I’ve lived in New York City for over 16 years, almost my entire adulthood. There have been many “eras” of my time here. When I first arrived in 2008, I had a group of my college friends that I used to hang out with all the time. Many have moved away, but a few of them are still here… although we see each other a bit less now that they’re married with kids. Then I had my UCB (Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre) era where I made tons of friends doing improv, but many of them have moved to LA. The pandemic was another major era where many friends moved away as remote work and buying houses became more of a thing. When the friends in our neighborhood moved away in 2023, our geographically closest friends became over 30 minutes away. These entire 16 years I’ve lived away from Texas, my constant and closest friendships have remained long distance. 

So, here in 2024, I’ve found myself feeling… kind of lonely.

A lot of people I’ve talked to have had a similar experience. I think there’s something about the nature of NYC too where so many of us are transplants and don’t often intend to stay here forever. There’s sort of this natural churn creating a constant need to find new in-person friends. And as I get older and older, it feels more and more difficult and exhausting to make those new friends. Why is it so hard? 

My mom had always said when I was growing up that it was easy to make friends because you could just meet the parents of your kids’ friends or get involved in things at school like the PTA. My mom didn’t go back to work until we were in middle school, so in our younger years, she and the other SAHMs (stay at home moms) in the neighborhood could get their kids together for playdates. I’m sure there are still women who do this, and that’s wonderful… but from where I’m sitting as a childfree woman in a major city, it sounds like advice from a long gone time. “If you don’t have cash at the grocery store, just write a check!” 

What if you don’t have kids? Then what? In a city like New York there are a million activities and ways to meet people (and tons of people without kids to meet), but with everyone so spread out in the city, the schlep of train rides, and busy work schedules, it isn’t always as simple as it would seem on the surface. 

It’s not just New York though. I believe everywhere right now we’re experiencing a loneliness epidemic. We’re spending more time on our phones and less time out in the real world connecting with people. It’s not surprising that many startups have seen opportunity in this space and decided to launch various apps and businesses to try to combat it. After seeing repeated ads on Instagram, I decided to give one a go and see if I could find more meaningful friendships with women in my area… I signed up for RealRoots. This is not a sponsored post in any way. I’m just sharing my real experience because I think it’s relevant here. Stay with me.

RealRoots introduces a group of women who live in a similar area to each other (currently operating only in parts of California and NYC) over drinks at a meet and greet led by a guide. After the meet and greet, they have the option to continue on with this group for a 6 week series of planned events and dinners designed to help them get to know their new friends better. It sounded like an interesting proposition, so I signed up.  

I was excited for the meet and greet. I walked in right on time and saw this group of super stylish, cool girls drinking wine at a hightop straight ahead. (Yes, this is exactly what I pictured!) When I checked in, however, I was directed to an empty table against the wall instead. (Oh, hmm.) As my tablemates arrived, I quickly understood what was happening. The table I’d seen when I walked in was the under 35 table and I was at the over 35 table. The women at my table were mainly in their 40s and 50s. Huh. I’m embarrassed to say that it was the first moment I truly understood that I was 37… over 35. 

I have friends in their 40s and 50s so this shouldn’t have been strange, but for some reason, being grouped this way right next to each other was jarring. It doesn’t help that my husband, who just turned 35 a month ago, would have been at a different table than me had it been an event we both attended. I work with 20 somethings all day long. I guess mentally, I saw myself at that other table and it was just a reality check that I no longer belonged there. 

And look, this was sort of an arbitrary split that I was on the cusp of, which made it seem more dramatic to me. It would have been ideal to just be at a 30-somethings table, but alas, I think the company is too new to have enough people to do this just yet. 

I’m sure I would have met some incredible ladies at that other table in their early 30s and we would have hit it off… But also at that table were 21 year olds, and so I see now how I have more in common with the women in my group. The women at my table were all great too by the way! This is in no way a knock to them, but rather a moment where I had to reckon with myself and how the world perceived me differently than I perceived myself. I wasn’t “young” anymore. Another reality check of where I’m at in life. 

As I continued on the series of hangouts with my group, I realized that only one other person in my group is partnered and none of us have kids. I do think some women with kids sign up for RealRoots but I’m guessing not many. It would be much harder to commit to a 3 hour hangout once a week for 6 weeks with kids. I thought again about that younger table and how many of them might someday have kids but just weren’t there yet in their lives. It makes sense that childfree people are more available and maybe more motivated to focus on friendships in this kind of environment. 

It really got me thinking about these 3 “buckets” we’re in and the difficulty of moving between the buckets:

1. Unpartnered, no kids

2. Partnered, no kids

3. Kids (partnered or not)

What’s difficult about friendship at this older stage of life is that you have to navigate these buckets that you’re not thinking about as much when you’re younger. In college for example, everyone is pretty much unpartnered without kids. Sure, people might be dating, but they’re not married or usually living together, and so socially, they operate seamlessly with unpartnered people. Everyone’s the same age, same phase of life, and there for the same reasons. It’s easy! As you get older, buckets 2 and 3 start to come into play, and the landscape really shifts. 

As a partnered woman, I love to hang out with my husband! When a new movie or show comes out, I want to see it with him. If there’s a cool event going on, I want to go to it with him. A lot of my single friends are doing these things with friends. If I want to have a fun girl gang to galavant with (and I definitely do), I’m going to be doing some of these things with friends and not my husband… which is of course fine! But it can sometimes feel like a foot in each canoe. Like I’m dead center on a spectrum where one end is single people living childfree life to the max and the other is overwhelming parenthood where you barely leave the house. I’m floating somewhere in between. 

And of course finding other new partnered friends isn’t always easy either. You have to figure out if your partners get along and if it makes sense to hang out as a group of 4 or just keep the female friendship going separately. Or if you’re single, I’m sure there are challenges to coordinating with your partnered friends who must always seem to want to lounge on the couch at home with their partner (ahem, me).  

Then you have your friends with kids. Their time is no longer their own as life begins to revolve around strict routines. They’re navigating making friends with other parents just as my mom had in the 90’s. My best friend of 30+ years has 3 kids. Our friendship has had to evolve over the years to accommodate motherhood for her and various life changes for me. Our phone calls are different now. We pause frequently mid-story for her to give her kids various instructions or keep them from hurting themselves, and often the kids grab her phone mid-conversation because they want to talk to Aunt Val and tell me about school or how they live in a volcano (one is in her volcano obsession era right now). And I love it! Our job as childfree friends of child having people is to love and support our friends through this change and make room for things to look different… to lean into it and be part of it. We also need to understand that our child having friends want to feel like themselves again too. We’re really providing them a service by talking to them about literally anything other than… well, volcanoes and such. 

Even within bucket 3, it’s tricky! A friend who is a working mom said she sometimes struggles to coordinate with SAHMs. They’ll want to get together while she’s at work, and when she suggests Saturdays, they’re already making plans with their spouses and kids for that time. It’s tough! And that’s just the tip of the iceberg I’m sure. 

It’s wonderful to have friends in all buckets, but it can be challenging too. As friends move between buckets over time, it changes their lives in ways that change how they show up in friendships. Regardless of which bucket we find ourselves in at the end of the day, I think there’s value in thinking about how we support and show up for each other even when our lives are different. Friendship is really important to our mental health and happiness, and while it may feel more complicated or elusive today than for generations prior, it’s worth the effort. 

I’m happy I met these new ladies in my RealRoots group, and I’m glad I worked through the initial shock (trauma? jk) of no longer being under 35. As we get older, friendship gets more complicated and each connection feels more precious. I don’t expect friendship will be a driving force in anyone’s decision about whether or not to have kids, but I do think it’s worth imagining your social life in both circumstances and thinking of how you’ll ensure you make space for friendships whichever path you choose… and how you’ll grow and evolve your friendships when you and your besties don’t choose the same path. 

If you were intrigued by RealRoots but don’t live in an area where it operates, you may want to look into TimeLeft. It’s a service that matches 5 strangers of any gender for dinner at a restaurant. They operate in far more cities and countries. 

And on that note, coincidentally, one of my best friends just got to town to visit me this weekend with her husband, so I’m going to go soak up every minute of it! 

Valerie