To not understand why friendships change so much after kids?

[AIBU25]

I'm prepared to get slaughtered on this but I'm going to put it out there.

I really don't understand why friendships change so much after someone/a couple has children. I understand they have new priorities and less free time but why not make time for your friends? I don't understand how they expect to maintain friendships with absolutely no effort from their side. Most friends would be happy to do kid friendly activities, why not invite people along? People seem to just forget that there was a life before children.

Both my best friends have kids (they had them early, they were 22 and 23) and it hasn't changed my friendship with them. Admittedly one lives in England (I'm in Scotland) and the other lives 2.5 hours away so I don't see them very often but I love seeing them and their kids - the friend who's closest to me always says I'm one of her son's favourite people and he gets very excited when I come to visit if you're both willing to make the effort it will work.

@IcedPurple exactly this. I could make less effort with friendships for many reasons: l do shift work, l work a lot, lm busy with IVF, my mental health is poor etc. But everyone needs to make an effort. Friendship is a 2 way thing, well it should be.

I agree about the both sides of making an effort BUT one person's life hasnt usually changed significantly at that time

I think any reasonable person would expect to see very little - if anything - of a friend in the months after giving birth. But the fact is that if you choose to have children you are choosing to change your lifestyle radically for 10 years or more. Your friend has not made that choice, and isn't going to drop everything to accommodate you. Some of the time, maybe, but compromise is needed. That's why I say that friendships between parents and non-parents are just so very hard to maintain because their priorities and lifestyles are just too different and there's little point pretending otherwise.

@IcedPurple

Absolutely hence why I try and keep spare money aside to meet out for coffee. I put money aside for drinks also coming up. This does take a lot of financial negotiation on my part since reducing work hours but it is something my closest friend needs right now. So I aim to provide her with it.

Someone up thread mentioned childcare. I have noone that could watch my little one during the day and my partner and I cant afford childcare despite us both working. Shes not entitled to the free hours yet. So does that make me half a friend for not being able to focus fully on my friend? I'd never dream of asking her to come to a soft play area either. I cant leave my child at home unattended as partner works opposite to me.

There are limitations on what I can provide right now. My friends know I'm the same person but theres not as much of me to go round these days. I have good friends so I wont complain.

@Pipandmum that is me too, I was last and then saw no one after my DS was born as everyone just expected me to keep visiting, I lost loads of friends who didnt come to see me and then complained as I didn’t come round so much anymore. One friend visited me twice in my house in 5 years because she had a baby, I had mine and poof... I have no idea.

However that being said I am definitely not great at being a friend anymore, I have my bestie but we literally meet up 3 times a year (though we are both fine with that) and then life gets in the way. I have a 10 year old a husband, a very stressful job, parents and a dog once I get past that I don’t even have the mental capacity to watch TV I have not seen before never mind anything else. I cannot count how many times I have thought, must text XY and then two weeks later thought oh fuck.......

Shoot me

OP, When you have spent up to 2 years never sleeping for longer than 2 hours at a time, then you will understand.

I really don't understand why friendships change so much after someone/a couple has children. I understand they have new priorities and less free time but why not make time for your friends

We made plenty of time for our friends but they really weren’t interested.

It isn’t just the parents fault that friendships fail.

Someone up thread mentioned childcare. I have noone that could watch my little one during the day and my partner and I cant afford childcare despite us both working. Shes not entitled to the free hours yet. So does that make me half a friend for not being able to focus fully on my friend?

Of course not. As I said above, when you have children they absolutely must be your first priority. But given that children are so very demanding on their parents' time and energy, that inevitably means that friendships are going to be harder to maintain. It's nobody's fault. But equally, the childfree shouldn't be condemned if their idea of a fun time isn't a trip to the playground or a 'family friendly' restaurant full of other people's screaming kids.

One of my close friends had a baby recently and we had arranged to meet, which got put off and got put off and off. It took about just under 2 months.
However, I was happy to put off. I didnt want to push her into a meet up when she wasnt ready, she was obviously still recovering etc.
The way I saw it was she was my friend, she would continue to be my friend and we were still talking although a bit patchy. I would never have questioned her friendship.
I dont have kids, I'm not sure if I will or wont but I'm so happy for her, I loved meeting her daughter and I love the fact I get to be in this little girls life.
If it's a friend worth keeping, you'll keep them and adjust that their priorities are not the same...

l just don’t agree with people making no effort and expecting other people to accommodate them

To you, it looks like she is making no effort. To her, it might look more like sacrificing things she'd probably like to do herself for the demands of a 24/7 child. That might include finding the time and mental space to text.

I"m baffled by all these seasonal friendships where friends just get dropped because you have a child.
And all this eternal tiredness that means your social life comes to a grinding halt.

All that tells me is that if you have children, they were easier for you to manage than my children were for me to manage. All babies aren't the same. All mothers aren't the same.

For me there are a few big barriers that can impact friendships:

• the friend who is a new mother is going through a massive, massive change in her life. Her relationship is probably rocky. She will lose confidence. She will barely be functioning for weeks and only just into months. She absolutely does need a friend, but one who puts zero pressure on her for a while. And is very patient.

• the friend without a child might be feeling differently, be aching for the bar partner, or lunch friend she once had. She might put pressure on the new mum.

• the new mum may get over obsessed with her baby and family, and only talk about them, and find new baby and parent friends that become much easier to relate to.

If friends can overcome the above it’s really valuable. I think keeping up with friends not jut out of convenience to our lifestyles, is a priceless genuine friendship.

I went to the cinema with my single friend today. A trip we had been trying to do for months because stuff kept on coming up for me. She arrived at 5 having just had a day off to do nothing to ‘use up’ some of her allowance (my holiday allowance is planned with military precision). I snuck out of work early rather than cancel again despite really just wanting to go to bed. I stuffed all the terrible food in my gob cos I wouldn’t have time for dinner - she had lovely healthy prepared snacks. When the film finished she went home to relax whereas I have just spent 3.5 hours trying to get my unsettled child to bed. I’ve done everything wrong tonight in terms of priorities. I’m now sitting under said toddler wishing I’d not mothers with the cinema and just come home.

Kids are just all consuming. It doesn’t mean those without aren’t tired or busy or might have other tough responsibilities . But those with often are. I juggle with a full time stressful job and sometimes replying to a text message really is too much. It won’t always be like this and it definitely gets easier as they grown so I’d hope my friends understand. But god I’m so tired. If I’m prioritising my friends realistically another part of my life is suffering as there’s just too many spinning plates.

I was the first to have kids of my friends but ive managed to keep them all. I think friendships are very important so I've worked hard to not lose them. Maybe it depends on your friends though. Mine understood i couldn't come out as often as before but we still met for lunch etc. When the kids were a bit older i was going out again (not lots but once every couple of months or so). Them everyone else was starting to have kids so we met up with them for the horrible softplay etc.

Could be a million reasons. Difficult baby, pnd.

Friendships come and go for other reasons too. I've not seen much of friends while they have, for example, been studying their phd, moved away. Then got back in touch when they finished studying/moved back.

However, and this will be a very unpopular opinion, I think sometimes part of the reason people have kids is they want their lives to totally change, and they just aren't interested in seeing friends anymore. Then if confronted they blame the kids. Really they just aren't bothered.

One of my friends travelled a long distance to be bridesmaid at my wedding with a breastfeeding 5 month old (and no I didn't pressure her, she was asked before getting pregnant, then when she announced it I told her she didn't have to do it, but she insisted)
At our wedding almost every guest had their babies/young children there, these people are our friends and we keep in touch, meeting up at least every couple of months or so.
I've also met up with girl friends with babies several months old for coffee/lunch when on visits to my home town. So all this "oh but I couldn't possibly reply to a message because I'm a parent now" seems to me like martyrdom and the quickest way to social isolation.
Then again it depends on what people class as "making an effort". I'm quite content to go a few months without seeing friends, but some people want to see their friends every week. That wouldn't really be doable for people with kids.

children truly have to be the centre of your universe in order to survive.

They don't.

But that's why parents lose friends. Truly.

She could ask someone to look after her child to go out one evening a month?
If she is ready to leave her child, and if she has someone she trusts to leave them with, here's a thought - maybe she might want to use that babysitter to go out with her husband?

My husband would probably be the one to look after her and he gets home from work at 7.30 I would then get to the pub at 9

I have taken her on the train to his work and dropped her off before so I can get there a bit earlier, and tbh it’s JUST what I need after a full week of work plus looking after a toddler who still wakes every two hours.

I don't know any mum willing to make a 3hour roundtrip for drinks with friends on a weekday especially if they have a baby, even if it was once a month.

Right?! And anyway I was doing this occasionally but when it’s clear no one will bend a little and make some time on weekends during the day ever, I kinda can’t be bothered anymore - definitely works both ways for many people.

Bit on the fence about this. My DC is just hitting late primary, so I have a bit more free time now, but I can still remember the incredible intensity and tiredness of the early years. I did still try to keep in touch with people by phone and text, but found when they had kids, that didn't always happen back and the friendships became very casual. I also wonder why people can't send a message and just concluded that the relationships had meant more to me than the other person, so when pushed for time, it was dropped.

I was dropped when I had my dd.

I asked them to come to mine, no one came. I would text in the group chat and was ignored.

Save this thread for when you have kids so you can look back and see how much of a you sounded

1.DH and I both work full time, so I drop at nursery, then at school breakfast club, then drive fast (in between traffic) to hope you get to work on time, walk very fast for 15 mins from car park to work, do my job til 5pm, run back to car park, drive fast home, hope there are no delays, rush to after school club, drive round to nursery, drive home, feed, homework, sort animals, wash children, bed, stories, out wash on, full dishwasher, empty it, make lunches for next day, go to bed exhausted
Youngest still wakes over night unfortunately and they are up again at 6am

^

Me.

So:

1. I don't know any mum willing to make a 3hour roundtrip for drinks with friends on a weekday especially if they have a baby, even if it was once a month.

Right?!

^

Right! No way I'm driving for 3 feckin hours mid week after having done all of point 1, hence my agreement with point 2!

In all fairness l wouldn’t do the 3 hour round trip on a day l was working. I did it last weekend for a friends birthday but that was for a one off special occasion

And people wonder why their husbands end up fucking their assistant

Funny how men seem to still have friends. If you can’t make an effort for life outside your children then what do you expect. No friends left.

@MotherofDinosaurs that’s patronising. Not all mothers don’t sleep for more than two hours at a time. It’s not only mothers that suffer or struggle with sleep. The OP may have children. The OP may have other reasons she doesn’t sleep.

Whether the people in them are parents, childless or childfree if a friendship is important to both people, it will survive because they will both compromise. If it’s not important to either or only important to one, it won’t survive because they won’t want to put themselves out/make effort/compromise.

why not make time for your friends?

How do you "make" more time? I wish I knew. After the school run, housework, dinner, homework, bedtime routine and cluster feeding the baby, I have zero time left and if I did have any (or could "make" some!), I would spend it with DH, who I hardly get to see, or use it to sleep, seeing as I'm up 5+ times every night feeding the baby.