Making Mommy Friends

by Dani Hamblett

“Hey girl, can I get your number?” If you are a parent, as I suspect most of our readers are, chances are good that your days of hearing or speaking lines like this are over.
Or, so you thought.

At a recent yoga class, I struck up a conversation with a woman before the class started. She was nice, easy to talk to and seemed funny. Our conversation was interrupted when the class started and I found myself wanting to know more about her while attempting to maximize my hip lift in downward dog. Hoping our paths would cross again, I ran a few potential lines through my head, “Come here often?” Ugh, that won’t work. Should I ask for her number, or is that weird? I don’t want her to think I’m desperate or a stage three clinger.

In the end, I took the plunge and gave her my card, and she texted me her number when she got home. Success! But, the whole episode left me thinking about making friends as an adult – why does it feel so much like dating?

When you were in high school, college and immediately after, making friends felt a little more organic. A friend of yours invited another friend somewhere and you got along, so you asked both if they want to go shopping or do lunch the next day. Boom- that new friend is in your circle.

Two kids might become friends because they both have belly buttons. Two teens bond over a love of Bieber. College students gravitate toward others in their classes, sororities or fraternities. Beyond that, it gets more complicated. There’s certainly more at stake for an adult. In our late twenties and thirties, our priorities generally shift away from social interaction and more towards career and/or family. This means less opportunity to make friends in casual social environments.

If you are married, and especially if you have kids, there are a slew of other factors involved in making new friends because your time is not just your own. Rather than simply liking the same bands or shopping venues, we look at whether or not a person is married or has kids, too, what part of the family life cycle they are in, whether our values align, and more. Beyond that, we wonder if our schedules will mesh with family, kid and work obligations, and if you’re like me, you look at the opportunity cost of spending an evening having dinner with a new friend over, say, getting caught up on reading or just sitting alone and staring into space (needed weekly). Phew, I’m exhausted already.

This planning and calculation is, for me, what makes making friends as a grown-up feel like dating, or almost even a sport. It’s complicated. In a New York Times article
titled, “Why Is It Hard to Make Friends over 30?” writer Alex Williams coined the term KOF’s – kind of friends. These “situational” friends are the new reality for adults. They are the people you come across in your everyday life, the coworker, the mom whose child is in the same Mother’s Day Out class, the person whose workout schedule jives up with yours; you see this person enough and say “Hi” regularly, so you start to feel a kinship. You’re KOF’s.

My yoga friend is hovering somewhere near KOF, stalled on the way to full-blown F. She and I have texted about birthdays, travel plans and intentions to meet for coffee that haven’t yet panned out – our schedules just have not aligned, but I’m not giving up. Unlike dating, I’m not going to assume that our failed attempts to meet up mean she’s just not into me. It just means we’re grown ups. But, at least we’re still trying.