4 Reasons You Need To Take A Girls Trip
Grab your best girl friends and go, now.
By: Natalie Miller-Moore
I just got back from a trip to Florida with the women who were my college roommates, and we aren’t girls anymore – as evidenced by our conversations about mammograms and colonoscopies and LASIK procedures– but our commitment to friendship and health is strong AF. Message your girls and set a date, and pick a place and go.
Here's why:
avoid the breakdown
There’s always a reason not to, but life moves fast and if you don’t commit to taking a break, you might find yourself breaking down instead. Take a break, and aspire to do nothing but pack a suitcase full of dresses with pockets, flip flops and bathing suits. Yes, it’s a time and money commitment, but it’s worth it. Even if you just leave town and read some books and do nothing but take care of yourself.
remember who you are
Old friends make the best mirrors, because they know you, and let’s just assume since they haven’t ghosted, that they also love you. They can reflect back to you, who you've always been, even if you have a new role as stay-at-home mom, director, stepmom, saleswoman of the year, lunch lady, boss lady, et cetera. It can be hard to remember when you feel like you are what you do. Your friends know the real you, and can tease you about how you are always spilling your drink, flirting with the waiter or taking too many pictures. (Who, me?)
You need to tell the truth
You need a safe space to spill it. All of the things you are holding together. Is parenting teenage girls terrifying? Is managing ADHD medication for your kid a challenge when you suspect you have it yourself? Are you not having as many orgasms as you’d like? As we age, the grief accumulates – our parents are aging and driving us crazy because they won’t change, our relationships with work are intense, relationships with neighbors, kids and friends are complicated. It’s all hard and we are often scared to admit when something we thought would be amazing is just…” really hard right now.”
female friends are for life
I hope and pray that this is true, and because I have maintained a number of decades-long friendships, Our relationships have grown and deepened. We laugh about things from 20 years ago, and make new inside jokes to keep us going. We look at old pictures of ourselves from college and thought about all the insane things we did (drinking in the dorm laundry room? Why?) and how we cut our hair because some boy disappointed us. The nitty gritty work of continuing to be alive and have people rely on you is heavy, and having people to talk it through, cry with, ask for advice and just sit with, can remind you that you don’t have to do it alone.
