I Love My Boyfriend, But I Need Girl Time Too

My boyfriend is my best friend. We watch movies together. We play games together. We go shopping together. We drink together. We do everything together — and I like it that way.

I like having someone around who is excited to go on tiny adventures throughout the week. I like knowing that, whether there is a certain concert I’m dying to see or a shop I want to browse, I have a guaranteed plus-one. I like spending so much time together.

I would not change anything about my relationship. I am with the love of my life, my person, my soulmate. I realize how lucky that makes me. I would never take what we have for granted. I would never complain when there is so much to be thankful for.

I love my boyfriend with all my heart — but that doesn’t mean I want to be with him every second of the day. That doesn’t mean he is the only person who matters to me. That doesn’t mean he is my entire world.

There are times when I need my space. When I want some quiet, alone time. And when I want some drunken, laugh-until-we-cry, friend time.

As much as I love being with my boyfriend (and would choose him over anyone else), I want to spend time with friends too. The thing I miss the most about when I was younger is having girl time.

I feel like I barely see my female friends anymore. There are times when I feel like I hardly even have female friends. I feel like we have all gone our separate ways. I feel like our texts are getting shorter and more generic. I feel like our hangout sessions are becoming nonexistent.

I am not one of those girls who ditched her friends as soon as I entered a relationship. I tried my hardest to sustain my friendships. However, I have grown apart from most of my friends because they moved away for college, or because we are on completely different work schedules, or because as much as we want to see each other we have trouble finding a time that works for the both of us.

I’m busy with work and family and all the other responsibilities that come along with growing older. I don’t have that much spare time anymore. When I have a free minute or two, I usually spend it with my boyfriend because it makes the most sense. Because I never want him to feel neglected.

Even though I am happy overall, I miss hanging out with other girls and getting our nails done at the salon, talking about where we bought our outfits for cheap, gossiping about the dates we’ve been on. We don’t even have to do anything stereotypically girly. We could be playing video games or dancing to music or shotgunning beer. I just miss being around friends. I miss feeling like part of a group.

I love my boyfriend more than anything else on this planet — but he, alone, cannot make me happy. I need my friends too.