A New Friend

Making new friends as an adult is tricky. Friendships require time. Time is something a lot of people don’t have.

My family and my career take up so much of my time! I have pets and a house to take care of too. I barely have time to enjoy my solo hobbies inside my own home, never mind find the energy to execute a plan that involves leaving my house to see others.

To make things even harder, I’m a little bit neurospicy with multiple pseudo food allergies and a fragrance allergy. I can’t just “go” places. I cannot eat at restaurants right now. I cannot even get a drink somewhere because my body can only handle water for now. I have to be mindful of scents and crowds. I’m so thankful for the friends I do get to see because I can’t imagine accommodating me is easy.

Imagine my delight when I was able to make a brand new friend! I met the most amazing woman this weekend. She shares my name and my celiac diagnosis! How cool is that?!

She was so fun and easy to be around, we clicked immediately. I felt like I’d known her for years, but we had literally just met. It was crazy! It felt so good to hang out.

There is a lot of executive functioning required to actually see people and maintain friendships. My closest friends ironically all live really far away from me. It takes so much effort and planning (and sometimes money) to see these people. We all have careers, families, obligations, and some level of introversion, executive dysfunction, or both. Maybe that’s why we’ve remained such good friends? I don’t know.

This new friend, she’s special. And she’s already friends with my other friend, so it’s like an instant friend group! We’ve made plans to hang out again in June. (The key to adult friendships is to plan your next meetup while you’re standing in front of each other so you don’t have to muster the energy to figure it out later.)

Adulting is so hard, like never-ending drudgery, but it’s moments like this where I feel young and excited for the future. I made a friend! That’s exciting and worth celebrating because it’s seriously hard to do these days.