Sharon Naylor

Marriage is a milestone that often alters a couple’s relationship with each other, as well as with those around them. For the new bride, it can herald profound changes in her relationships with girlfriends.

In a recent post (February 9, 2008), I interviewed wedding expert Sharon Naylor about the challenges that planning “the big day” poses to the bride’s friendships. In this follow-up, I asked Sharon about the impact of marriage on female friendships.

How does the transition from being single to being married affect a woman’s relationships with single friends?

It changes the dynamics of the relationship a LOT. Depending on how frustrated the single friend is with her dating life, and how envious she is of your good fortune in finding true love, it can be a very trying time for her…and thus for your friendship.

If you’re the first friend of hers to get married, that can be traumatic because the issue of marriage is now Out There, bringing pressure to her life. And if many of your friends have gotten married, she may REALLY be feeling pressured because you’re another in a long list of her former single friends to ‘win the prize’ while she is still waiting for hers.

What can the new bride do to minimize tension?

The solution here is to nurture or create a dimension in this friendship that is not about dating or relationships at all. And this is a tough task, because some brides find that the only thing they had in common with some friends is the topic of dating, the drive to couple up.

It might be that these friends went out to clubs or had 99% of their conversations revolve around bad blind dates and online dating profiles, breakups and breakdowns. Some female friendships are bonded by the drama of dating life. And when you exit dating life, there’s a big void in the friendship. Yes, you’ve been out of dating world for the entire time you’ve been with your fiancé, but this sad single friend hasn’t heard the door slam closed until your engagement. Not that she was hoping you’d break up. It just wasn’t completely official yet. And she may feel abandoned in her singleness.

What responses might you anticipate from the girlfriend(s) you leave behind? How might she be feeling?

“You’re not going to want to go out anymore,” worries the single friend, who also might be slapping on a big, fake smile when you talk about your fiancé’s romantic birthday plans for you, or what you’re doing on Valentine’s Day. If this friend has been overly dependent on you, if you were the only egg in her basket, your marriage is bad, bad news for her.

Your friend is now alone in her quest, with no true allies, and may feel like she’s slipped to the bottom of the totem pole. And you might find that you no longer enjoy her sad-sack company, her complaints, her refusal to raise the bar and pursue men who are better for her. You might not want to entertain her pity parties anymore. So the friendship…like any relationship that has no common bonds…can fade away.

How can you minimize the inherent risks to the friendship?

If you do wish to nurture the friendship, start by subtly creating new shared interests, such as asking your friend to sign up for an aromatherapy class, or get a museum membership so that you can go to exhibits and lectures, or sign on for dance classes at the gym you both go to. Exchange novels you’ve both loved and talk about them over coffee. Add new facets to the friendship so that it can survive your change in status. Such variety and shared interests are healthy for any relationship, especially female friendships.

With new dimensions, you might not mind your friend’s occasional dating dramas so much…they could make you feel grateful for your new husband as well as give you a satisfying feeling of being a supportive friend. You’ve just transformed that into a smaller percentage of your relationship.

Can matchmaking efforts help keep a female friendship intact?

One mistake newlyweds make is wanting to set single friends up with all of their friends. Sure, the intentions are good, wanting your friend to be as happy as you are, but unless the friend is truly enthusiastic about your help, you might put too much pressure on her to endure the company of a guy friend who’s not right for her, and you two as a couple could get embroiled in their relationship issues.

It’s far better to invite your friend to events where she might meet someone. That’s where your newlywed life could be of great benefit to her. You’re not pushing, choosing, dodging news of a breakup, keeping secret the fact that the guy you introduced to her is also seeing three other girls, etc.

Why is it important to focus on friendships after your wedding day?

Having many healthy female friendships with positive women who inspire you and add many gifts to your life makes you a better spouse with a full life of your own. Your man is not the only egg in your basket, so to speak. You’re not overly dependent on him. Your circle of friends is a strength in your life, and studies show that having a great sense of community is good for your health, keeps stress down, strengthens your heart, and has many other perks.

Any other comments you would like to make about female friendships after marriage, Sharon?

The sad reality is that sometimes they don’t survive because you no longer have anything in common. Or, a bridesmaid acted so jealous and rude at your wedding that you never want to speak with her again. It was the last straw. Or you just drift from single friends, or some friends voluntarily get absorbed into their new husbands’ worlds and abandon their own friends as the incarnation of their New Life.

Friendships have a life cycle, and they do depend on mutual commitment and shared evolution to survive as long as they’re meant to---for as long as they’re healthy for both parties. A wedding, being such a huge life transition, naturally tests all manner of female friendships, with some friendships getting stronger and some falling away.

When I got married in April, my closest friends from college were my bridesmaids. They all traveled from distant states to be there, and our friendships were strengthened partly because we stayed so close through phone and e-mail conversations for years…we saw each other perhaps once a year due to our busy lives, but the connections we’ve always had were strong.

Being together, walking through my neighborhood as cherry blossom petals came raining down on us, then sharing the wedding day and seeing our husbands bond like brothers has reignited our need to see each other more. We’re all turning 40 this year, so we’re meeting at a resort town halfway between our home states, staying in a haunted bed-and-breakfast, shopping, going to wineries, and having a fabulous couples’ getaway to mark the big 4-0. Fortunately, my friends’ tenure as bridesmaids, even from a distance, further solidified our bond, and now we’re adding more dimension to our friendship by making it a priority to plan more face-time.


Sharon Naylor is the author of over 35 wedding books, including The Bride’s Survival Guide, and has been featured on Good Morning America, Lifetime, ABC News, The Morning Show With Mike & Juliet, and in InStyle Weddings, Martha Stewart Weddings, Brides, Modern Bride, Southern Bride and many additional magazines. She is the iVillage Weddings expert and Planning in Peace blogger, as well as a top columnist for Bridal Guide.

Weddings can be taxing to any bride’s friendships. The ceremony and all the planning that leads up to it mark the beginning of an emotionally challenging life transition, and brides-to-be are often placed in the uncomfortable position of having to make choices that can hurt people’s feelings, including that of their closest friends. What are some ways to improve communication, to reduce tension, and to keep things in perspective?

These issues can be so volatile that they can make friendships implode. So I couldn’t think of a better person to talk to about them than my colleague, wedding expert Sharon Naylor). Sharon is the author of over 35 wedding books, including The Bride’s Survival Guide, and has been featured on Good Morning America, Lifetime, ABC News, The Morning Show With Mike & Juliet, and in InStyle Weddings, Martha Stewart Weddings, Brides, Modern Bride, Southern Bride and many additional magazines. She is the iVillage Weddings expert and Planning in Peace blogger, as well as a top columnist for Bridal Guide.

This is the first in a two-part dialogue with Sharon about friendship and marriage.

What are some of the ways that planning and executing a wedding challenge female friendships?

When a bride invites her female friends to be in the bridal party, it’s a huge honor (“I’m one of the chosen ones!” thinks the bridesmaid, activating old memories of wanting to ‘fit in’ and be accepted as part of a group in junior high school). It’s a big validation both emotionally and publicly, since this bridesmaid will walk in an all-eyes-on-you processional as a Near-and-Dear friend.

Make no mistake. No matter how mature a bridesmaid is, there’s still the thrill of being chosen. But here’s where it gets tricky. Being in a bridal party has a service element to it. It changes the whole dynamic of the bride-bridesmaid relationship because there is now a list of responsibilities included in the title. And expenses. And a personality change in the bride, who – to some degree or other – may want more in the way of support from and control over said friend.

In many ways, the friendship takes on a Boss and Subordinate dynamic, depending on how power-hungry the bride gets. Some brides who have felt powerless in their lives before they get engaged take advantage of the All About Me nature of wedding-planning, and their bridesmaids feel the brunt of her neediness. And all Bridezilla behavior is just neediness. Bridesmaids entwined in a circle around a needy, pushy, controlling bride find that the friendship is tested because the bride is a different person while she’s in this role.

Many bridesmaids who have to deal with drama queen or bossy brides say, “If this was the person I met in high school/college, etc., would I have chosen to be friends with her?” When the bride is texting fifty times a day, yelling at friends, complaining about her groom, being disrespectful to her mother and other heinous actions, bridesmaids are often shocked and offended. Where did THIS person come from? It often makes enough of an impression that the bridesmaid not only questions the friendship but distances herself from it. And then the bride gets angrier, feeling entitled to behave any way she pleases, and a nice big wedge is inserted in the friendship.

You’ve addressed some of the ways that brides can become pathological over their great day, what can happen to bridesmaids?

To be fair, there are plenty of bridesmaids who get power-hungry and controlling in the circle of other bridesmaids, having a persona of being the Alpha Female or Queen Bee who immediately divides the bridal party into her In Group and the Out Group, causing all kinds of drama and hurt feelings, not to mention pressure on the bride. Some women just don’t grow out of a juvenile mindset, no matter what their chronological age. They’re troublemakers, and the bride knew it. But she felt she HAD to name her bully sister or best friend to a bridesmaid or maid of honor role, out of a sense of friendship or familial obligation.

A stressed-out bride often blames herself for being ‘a wimp’ and naming that steamroller friend to the bridal party when she wavered over doing so. It can become quite a mess when anyone from the bride to the maid of honor to the bridesmaids do not operate under the Golden Rule, when the circle of honored ladies turns into a rugby scrum for domination. It might be full warfare and social snubbing, or it might be a specific issue such as a power struggle over bridal shower plans.

How does money factor in---particularly in an economy like this one?

Another element of the friendship strain between brides and bridesmaids is the fact that money is now involved. Lots of money. It’s expensive to be a bridesmaid, especially if the bride has pricey tastes in potential gowns or is planning a destination wedding that requires airfare and lodging the couple isn’t covering. The honor of being in a bridal party can put quite a squeeze on your wallet. Especially now.

We’ve all read enough magazines to know that money is a loaded issue, the cause of many fights in relationships. The same is true for female friendships in wedding world. “But you should be willing to spend $300 on the dress I chose for your wedding!” says the bride, feeling entitled to anything she wants or in a misinterpreted comment because a $300 dress is actually on the lowest budget end for formal gowns at a place where alterations are included and accessories are half-priced. See how miscommunication can occur? When a bride requires a bridesmaid to spend hard-earned cash, there’s conflict afoot. With weddings, expenses mount up. It’s not just the bridal shower, the dress, the shoes, and the travel…there are gifts and additional expenses, such as a new dress to wear to the rehearsal dinner. When each unforeseen expense pops up, that bridesmaid may be simmering a fresh dose of resentment toward the bride and groom.

How can a bride minimize these problems (e.g. involving your friends in planning, choosing a maid-of-honor and bridesmaids, asking friends to pay for things they can't afford)?

The most important step a bride can take to minimize ALL of these problems is to remember who she is in her friendships, and be the same person. Realize that being the bride is not a Free Pass to be demanding or to get people to jump when you say so. That said, many brides don’t realize they’re being bossy or demanding. They have a ton of things to do, they’re stressed, they’re experiencing conflict with their parents or their in-laws…being a bride is very taxing, and even the most centered bride can lose focus out of sheer exhaustion.

So all of the bossy behaviors might spring from the fact that the bride is running on fumes, not intentionally treating anyone badly at all. So I suggest that the bride find a way to keep her stress in check, and nurture her friendships by planning regular girls’ get-togethers during which there will be NO wedding talk. If the bride and her friends have always gotten together for Friday post-work happy hour, keep that going as often as humanly possible. Make a note to e-mail your friends on a regular basis, just to say hello and ask what’s going on in their world. This simple step will comfort the bridesmaids, letting them know they haven’t ‘lost you,’ that you’re still in there, and that you care about them as friends, not just for what they can do for you as bridesmaids. The human element is ultra-important when you’re in wedding season with your bridesmaids.

Throughout the plans, make sure you’re taking every opportunity to keep your bridesmaids’ expenses low, searching for sales, letting them know about great outlet stores or craft stores you love. Give them plenty of time to get their tasks done, and when it comes to deadline tasks such as paying their gown deposits, set earlier-than-needed deadlines to allow stragglers to deliver without stressing everyone out.

At the same time, realize that there are some things you can’t control, such as a bridesmaid’s envy or bad behavior. So don’t add fuel to the fire by trying to change her. Just work around her. Communicate with her in the way you always have throughout your friendship, since you know how to handle her personality quirks. This might include saying directly to her, “I’d rather you didn’t criticize the other bridesmaids’ ideas. They don’t know you as well as I do, they don’t understand your sense of humor, and I’d hate for them to get the wrong idea about you. So please just rein it in a little bit when you’re planning with them, okay?”

Always focus on *your* preferences, avoiding saying ‘everyone’s hurt’ or ‘everyone’s mad at you.’ Keep the focus off of the group dynamic or her Outsider Status and just present what you do want from her. And do it as quickly as possible. To the others who may have a problem with her, just say “I’d rather you didn’t focus so much on (bridesmaid’s) attitude. I know she can be a bit blunt, but she’s a very good friend to me – as are you – and I’d love it if you can all just get along for this brief time that you’re working together.”

The bottom line: In all aspects of the wedding plans, think back to what YOU didn’t like about being someone’s bridesmaid, and vow to make the experience better for your friends.