Are Friendships Hard or Just Overcomplicated?

Untangling Why Adult Friendships Feels So Damn Complicated

Let’s be honest adult friendships are hard, but maybe not for the reasons we think. We weren’t taught how to properly love. Not outside of romance anyways. Not without conditions or a blueprint that tells us who deserves our loyalty and what love should look like. We’ve labeled partnership as the highest form of love on the top chain of the hierarchy. I understand the religious context that often puts romantic partnership on a pedestal, but I still find myself questioning “when did love start needing a label to be valid?

We grew up under patriarchal blueprints of love. From the moment we were assigned a gender, we are taught that love was something you earn, prove or fight (for the context romantically). But what about the love that just is? The love that shows up quietly, consistently, and without agenda?

One of my favorite authors Bell Hooks talks about this in her book Communion. She breaks down how patriarchy harms not just romantic relationships, but our ability to fully know each other. Let’s be honest when you love through domination, control, and roles you’ll never unlock the freedom of genuine connection. It will keep us emotionally stunted, clinging to half truths, and fantasies.

And that brings me to friendships.

We rarely talk about the power of having a friendship in our life. We often deem friendships as a placeholder until we find the “one”. Often times friendship breakups holds the same weight we give to romantic ones, but we try to undermine that notion. The pain hits all in the same places in the body, soul and the memory core. The difference is society shuns the place to mourn it. We’ve been trained to believe that unless you’ve got that one person (specifically a partner) your life isn’t whole. However, what if the love of your friend, your community and your self was already enough? Why is that so weird or taboo to be fulfilled by the simple, beautiful act of being loved platonically?

Bell Hooks believed that all humans, regardless of gender, should explore love in every form. The soft truth is many of us desire a romantic partner, while still lacking self love. Many of us pour into others cups hoping they’ll give us what we haven’t given ourselves. That deficit shows up in our friendships too. We self abandon, overextend, or ghost (not always out of malice), but out of emptiness.

I was recently talking with one of my friends in our deep conversation over brunch and posed the question, do you think friendships are hard or do we make them hard?

She paused for a moment taking in the thought of asking such a simple question, yet have complexities intertwined. It made me think about how many friendships become difficult in adulthood because we’ve stopped being in spaces that naturally cultivate connection. If we think about it we don’t really know how to hold space for friendships or what it even means to be a friend.

In school, we never had to think about it. The built of friendship never cost us to give it thought. You didn’t have to work to build relationships it was just part of the environment. Yet, adulthood doesn’t offer the same proximity. The soft truth is that it requires intentionality.

And truthfully? A lot of us haven’t been taught to show up, be consistent, or say, “I miss you” without shame. We forget that friendship is also love. It’s part of our fulfillment in this survival of the world. However, the value of friendships gets torn into categorizes and weirdly intent. All of those complexities have made it hard for friendships to simply coexist.

It could be so simple. Friendship really is just defined by just showing up. Being honest. It’s not waiting for a milestone to celebrate each other. It’s holds each other in joy and grief. It’s being witnessed.

Community has been my saving grace. I’ve had friends whose presence healed wounds I didn’t even know I was carrying. Friends who didn’t need to fix me rather just be with me. And that, in itself, is sacred.

I use to binge watch Grey’s Anatomy as a teenager and now as an adult rewatching with my box of tissues. And no matter how many storylines came and went, I always found myself coming back to Meredith Grey and Christina Yang.

It was their friendship that got me choked up. That kind of unshakable bond that felt less like TV and more like truth. The kind of love where someone walks into your house, doesn’t say a word, and still knows something’s off. Whew… you don’t have to explain your silence, tears, and even your rage (they just get it). The famous quotes that we hold dear to our hearts as Grey’s Anatomy watchers is:

“If I murdered someone, she’s the person I’d call to help me drag the corpse across the living room floor.”

And of course, the moment that brought out all the tissues:

“You’re my person, You will always be my person.”

It wasn’t just fiction. It was the blueprint to what friendship should look like if we really let ourselves throw away outdated ideologies surrounded by the value of friendships.

That show really shifted something in me. It played a part in changing the way I understood friendship and honestly, love as a whole. Watching Meredith and Christina friendship made me realize that deep, soul level love doesn’t have to be confined to romance. Those two women weren’t in a relationship with each other. Both of them had their own intimate partners, desires, and heartbreaks. Meredith was in love with Mr. Dreamy and described him numerous of times as her “soulmate”.

Here’s what moved me the most about their friendship believe it or not was actually her husband Derek, he was always supportive that Christina was Meredith’s “person” and never felt threatened or jealous by that. He didn’t try to compete or demand to be chosen. That man did quite the opposite he understood that loving Meredith meant honoring the people who made her whole. That love wasn’t a hierarchy, it’s a spider web. And Christina’s place in Meredith’s life wasn’t optional it was essential.

Roll in the tears.

That show maybe fictional, but it did shine a light about how often we’re taught to rank love. We believe romantic love should be at this imaginary top of the pyramid, then everyone and everything falls underneath including ourselves. I believe that actually does more harm than good.

Love should not be labeled or placed in a box to be valid. It doesn’t need to shrink to fit inside a patricharcal agenda. And maybe- just maybe-if we released the pressure to categorize and define love so tightly, we could give ourselves permission to be free and feel it. To embrace it in all ways it shows up. To honor it without shame, without needing it to look a certain way. That’s the freedom we all deserve because being human means needing love. In all forms. Friendships shouldn’t fall short of that.

Not ever.

One of my best friend’s relationship with me embodies that kind of friendship similar to Meredith and Christina. We have a beauty that is only between us. We spend a lot of time together (a-lot) and people started to notice. You would think people could see the beauty of two people showing up for each other, but instead we got labeled. We were called phrases that were hurtful and insensitive about the state of our sexuality. People assumed we were in a relationship. Some even said it outright, as if the closeness itself needed to be justified.

It pissed me off, honestly.

Because we were just coexisting in simplicity. We just enjoyed each other’s company, helped each other through hard shit, and felt safe enough to lean. That’s literally a legit definition of a friend.

Yet, instead of being celebrated, our friendship became something people questioned - our partners and our inner circle. All because we loved each other loudly and without apology. Heck we even started to second guess it ourselves. Like, is it weird that we talk every day? Are we too much? Hell nah.

But the soft truth is, there was nothing “too much” about it. It was just something uncommon to be seen. Our friendship watered us. It reminded us that chosen family is just as valid as the one you’re born into. It needs to be normalized more in our communities we were just two people showing up for each other daily and not taking a single second of it for granted. That presence of real friendship is rare and when you find it, you hold onto it.

I started to ask myself truly why this friendship between us stirred up some much ruckus.

Why is it inappropriate to feel connected to a friend, especially the ones that show up consistently, without performance, and without expectations?

It was a reflection of how uncomfortable people are with closeness outside of romance. How incongruous it is to see two people freely love each other without hierarchy, without apology, labels, without needing it to be anything more or less than what it is. JUST TRUE FRIENDSHIP!!!

Through reflection, I realized it wasn’t that our friendship was inappropriate rather simply illuminated a void in others they hadn’t yet acknowledged. We weren't making anyone feel less than. If anything, we were showing what friendship should look like when it’s prioritized. When it’s rooted in showing up, not showing off.

We didn’t have an issue being in constant communication until people told us it was a problem. And still, we kept choosing each other. She and I can spend hours on the phone, effortlessly talking about nothing and everything under the sun when time allows. For a while, we conversed about how we wish that our other friends could see just how simple and beautiful it is to love in this way.

But that’s the thing not everyone values or even understands friendship. Not everyone has the capacity to show up, to be consistent, to be present, I’ve learned that some people haven’t yet learned how to be a friend to themselves, so they struggle to be one to others.

And still, despite everything, one truth remains that friendship is rich with emotional depth and meaning.

It’s important to recognize that not everyone possesses the emotional capacity or depth to meet you where you are. Each friendship is distinct and every connection carries its own unique dynamics.

And I know….

In the same breath your probably reading this like, yeah right that type of friendship exist.

Yes, it does.

Still, I can’t talk about the beauty of friendships without also naming the pain of it. Honest moment friendship breakups are the worse! Sometimes even worse than romantic ones.

So, I get it.

I get why some people protect themselves, why they tap out of friendship altogether. Because I’ve been there too.

Truthfully, I was scared to even get close to my friends because I was still healing from a past friendship breakup that gutted me. Like, an arrow through my chest type of pain. It was brutal y’all.

The way I grieved didn’t fit the usual script, mostly because it was over a friendship, not a breakup. Let me be crystal clear there wasn’t anything outside of a platonic friendship. There was never an ounce of attraction (No shade, just facts.)

Till this day it amazes me that people ask if my ex best friend were together intimately. That alone says so much about how little our culture understands the depth and intimacy of platonic love. What I was grieving wasn’t a breakup in a romantic aspect. It was a slow realization that my friendship was beyond repair.

This friend and I had once been inseparable. We were the 2am “come get me” duo. That “bissshhh, I’m crying over my man and need you” tag team. We were the broke besties who had our own table at the crusty ass Denny’s faithfully ordering off the $2 and $4 menu like it was fine dining. We had a million of pointless adventures, and not a single one needed a reason. I cherish them very much today.

We just loved each other. I still love him honestly, love just doesn’t die. He was family. My brother. There was never a question of what we meant to each other-until there was.

And here’s the thing I had to learn the hard way. If I hadn’t done the healing work of properly grieving, reflecting and growing, then I probably wouldn’t have had the capacity to love friends again the way I do now. I would’ve completely shut it down. Straight up blocked myself from the closeness that now I share with some incredible people. (If you know, you know!)

Meredith didn’t just ride for one person, but the whole crew. Her character was about community, not putting all the weight on one relationship. That’s what I’ve come to understand about friendship: each one is looks and feels different. The way I show up in one friendship might not be the same in another, and that’s okay. I’ve got my Christina Yang, my Alex Karev, George, Maggie and Amelia. The whole gang. I feel so blessed to have friendships where we each bring something different to the table, but the love and value are always mutual.

We all need those friends that see you, checks on you, let you be YOU. And sometimes, heartbreak teaches us how to protect the heart without closing it.

Before I wrap this up, I’ve gotta share one of my closest friends and I have this thing where books aren’t just books, they’re doorways to deeper conversations. One Christmas, I got her a copy of one I had just finished reading. If you’re into that kind of thing, I definitely recommend giving it a read too (no pressure, though).

In Jennie Allen book on community titled “Find Your People”, she writes

“the people around us help shape our identity. They remind us who were are when we forget. They sharpen us, soften us, and grow with us.”

And that’s exactly what true friendship does. It reflects, refines, and reveals who we are becoming.

So, maybe it’s not that adult friendships are too hard. Could it be that we just have to unlearn everything we were taught or believed love should look?

The Unwind

Today, I challenge you gently to ask yourself “What do I believe about love and where did I learn it?

Whose love have I underestimated because it didn’t look like a romantic partnership?

What kind of friend do I need and what kind of friend am I becoming?

And when you think about your life…

what if your wholeness was never dependent on a partner, but always found in the arms of community?

Because friendship is love.
And love, in all its forms, is still love.

Love doesn’t always come with romance.

Sometimes, it walks in through the side door, wearing sneakers, with snacks and soft eyes saying, “you good”?

That’s real love, too.

That’s enough!

Until Next Time

-Trinity H.