Member-only story
Women/Friendships
I Was Repeatedly Skinny-Shamed By My Women Friends
How body image insecurity brings out the frenemy effect.
Forming new female friendships as a middle-aged adult woman is rough. Not only have most women already developed into who they are and what they believe as a person in the world, but they have likely already formed at least one meaningful friendship with another female.
In my experience, females are more fussy about who they choose to let into their lives once they pass the age of 25. This includes me.
Well, try finding new friends at 45. Imagine you haven’t made a single close friend in the last 2 decades and then, all of a sudden, you come upon a couple of women who embrace you into their lives, tell you certain secrets that you feel privileged to know, and you begin to feel a kinship with female companions for the first time in many years.
This was me a few years ago.
Through my daughter’s athletic sport, I met a couple of other moms with whom I became close for over a year. We became so bonded that we had a group text with just the 3 of us. Our kids got pretty friendly as well.
There’s one thing I didn’t mention before, which I never thought was an issue until it became so…