It took me 26 years to learn how to be a good girlfriend. Not to the men I’ve dated but to the incredible women throughout my life that I’ve been lucky enough to call my friends.
From the time I was a small child, I glamorized the notion of romantic relationships, always chasing the affection and approval of boys. I found that being in relationships came naturally to me: I liked having another half to talk over important things with and I was a self-professed love junkie, constantly seeking the rush of endorphins that accompanied the beginning stages of dating.
Throughout my early twenties, I accumulated a few close female friends, but we always tended to be closer when I was single. Ladies’ nights and last-minute dinner plans were easy to accommodate when neither of us had a significant other, but the second a man entered my life I’d become flaky and unreliable, always canceling plans if it meant getting to see my boyfriend.
It was as if I didn’t know how to handle being in a relationship and being a good friend at the same time. Most of the men I was so eager to ditch my friends for were awful. They treated me poorly, were emotionally unavailable and never accepted me for who I really was — unlike the supportive women in my life.
After repeating the same toxic patterns with men over and over, I spent a few solid years in therapy untangling my codependent tendencies and was happily single for a few years. My friendships thrived again. I was no longer part of a “we” and was enjoying a life I was creating myself.