The importance of friendship

My heart went out to a friend who dropped by today, who has unfortunately up to this point been unlucky in love. It is easy to see from the outside that he perhaps makes some unwise choices. It's his journey and not mine to judge. I just don't like seeing him hurt - again.

Yet at the same time I felt incredibly grateful that I have a family - a husband, a daughter, and a cat! I didn't get here overnight though as I had my own trials and tribulations with love for quite some time. I dated the wrong guys - the bad boys, the cheaters, the commitment-phobs as a twenty-something. Each time my heart got broken, I found it hard to be around those who succeeded in love. Once when I was down and out about love, I had to dip out of attending a wedding as it seemed I had a whole Summer of weddings to go to. It felt like a selfish thing to do but the last thing I felt like was being around yet another gooey-eyed newly wed couple. Even though they were my friends.

So when I tied the knot myself four years ago, I did understand that my happiness could be hard to take for those who hadn't yet found love.

Watching others having babies and falling pregnant when it seems doubtful whether that may happen to you is a similar process. On one hand there is hope, and on the other pain, depending on what head-space I am in on any given moment.

Yet what I've realised today is that although no-one in my world of friends and family has experienced secondary fertility (to my knowledge - that's the thing, it's not so readily shared), it doesn't mean that they can't be a form of support. Dailystrength has provided me with some new friends in the same boat. I am grateful for that. But I need my real life, old friends too. Because I was there for my friend today who is in a very different place to me. And it didn't matter that I was the surburban house-wife as I sat there listening to the dating woes of a singleton.

I think sometimes when we are battling through hard times in life, it is easy to think we are alone and then isolation starts to happen. But if we can understand that those who love us sincerely do want the best for us and give them half a chance to support us, chances are we'll feel less alone.