Girls for Life: On Female Friendships
“In order to highlight a healthy female friendship, I talked to Ms. Fried and Ms. Parcells. As a side note: isn’t it funny that Ms. Fried’s name keeps auto-correcting to Ms. Friend?”
Why is having a healthy female friendship so hard?
This is something I never understood and still don’t till this day. Why all the secret animosity if we’re supposed to be “friends”. The difference between male friendships and female friendships is striking. It affects how the connection is, what the deeper meaning is, what emotions are expressed, and what boundaries are named and stated.
In any type of friendship, boundaries are the most important factor and what keeps a friendship strong and healthy. Personal space is especially important. I wanted to see how different women view their friendships. And so, I asked other Comp Sci High students for their own perspective.
The first question I asked people was what healthy friendship looks like to them.
One of them said: “No fake energy, no secret animosity, and fake loyalty.” She continued and said “I don’t like when people are all buddy buddy in my face to act weird the next day or when others are around.” She shared a story of how “My best friend and I have been friends since the 6th grade and still are till this day because we dont let little issues get into our friendship. Our families are also really close so they would also be the reason we never fell out.”
Another student said that “Being able to have talks about serious topics” is what makes a healthy friendship.” She said: “Being able to handle a make and break talk and not let outside people get into the friendship.”
Then, I asked how you manage a toxic friend.
Both of them agreed to let them go. One student even asked: “why keep being friends with someone with that bad energy and negative aura. If they are toxic, why are we still friends?”
Another student explained: “I tend to distance myself because there is no need for me to be around that type of energy, especially in my life.”
In order to highlight a healthy female friendship, I talked to Ms. Fried and Ms. Parcells. As a side note: isn’t it funny that Ms. Fried’s name keeps auto-correcting to Ms. Friend? As many know Ms. Fried and Ms. Parcells (my two favs) are roomies and have been for a while.
The real question is how do they manage their personal friendship and work friendship while living together. How do they get through challenges and all the hard times?
I asked them themselves, to get that tea.
“It’s important that you know yourselves and know your friends, specially when it can make or break a friendship and mainly if being a roommate is involved,” they said. Ms. Parcells then said: “I was looking to move and Ms. Fried was looking for a roommate and we both had already talked about it because we had an idea of the possibility of moving in together. So we talked about future challenges and more. We’ve been roomies for almost 1 year.”
The two of them are good friends, and try to do their work at school, so they have time at home to enjoy. They also have a 30 minute rule to only talk about work, though they haven’t been the best at it. When things get rough, they either sit down and talk it out or just give each other some space. They are good at reading each other. And they treat each other to nice meals.
At home, they have little things they each do, like Ms. Fried cleans the fridge and Ms. Parcells cleans the bathroom. Here’s some advice they had for future roommates: “You have to be able to communicate and say things that irk you and be able to have actual sit downs about how you guys work.”
I could definitely say that the two of them seem like the most stress free roommates. Out of the interview with Ms. Fried and Ms. Parcells, I have realized that communication is a really important role in a friendship. Especially if you want to keep a healthy friendship.