The Friendship Blog: The Source of Expert Advice on Friendship

Welcome to The Friendship Blog!

When I conducted an online survey of more than 1,500 women between the ages of 17 and 70 for my book, Best Friends Forever: Surviving a Breakup with Your Best Friend (Overlook, 2009), the promise of anonymity opened a floodgate of stories and emotions. Women poured out their hearts, revealing the details of friendship problems often kept secret because of the stigma attached to failed friendships. Using initials or pseudonyms, they felt comfortable sharing their stories with me. Their concerns and questions regarding the complexities and complications involved in female friendships suggested the need for this blog, a virtual roadmap for navigating the tricky terrain of female friendships.

Launched in May 2007, The Friendship Blog is the only destination on the blogosphere where women can obtain free, individualized advice and authoritative information to master the often-tricky etiquette of female friendships. In response to reader questions by email and online, The Friendship Doctor offers her unique blend of insight, experience, and wisdom in simple, straightforward language—and distills new research findings, tracks trends, and gleans insights about friendship from popular culture.

About.Com Reader's Choice AwardThe Friendship Blog received over 232K hits from 199 countries last year, and more than 321K hits in the first half of 2012. On the active Forums section of the blog, readers chat about friendship problems they encounter, and benefit by exchanging friendship advice and comments with each other. The blog was recently redesigned (November 2012) so its rich archival information could be better organized and made more easily searchable by users. In 2012, About.com (then part of the New York Times Company) awarded it the Readers’ Choice Award as the Best Blog about friendship.

Find out more here on how best to use this blog and the sage advice of a true friendship expert—and welcome.

“Friendship is born at the moment when
one person says to another: ‘What! You too?
I thought I was the only one!’ ”
— C.S. Lewis