• Making Friends

The Friendship Blog Is Back! Welcome!

Published: May 6, 2020 | Last Updated: July 30, 2020 By | 21 Replies Continue Reading

Welcome back to The Friendship Blog!

The Friendship BlogFor ten years, this blog was a unique space on the web where people of all ages could solicit advice, and talk about the tricky dilemmas entailed in making and keeping friends. After 2200 blog posts that elicited some 30,000 reader comments, I had to close down the site in June 2017, now almost three years ago. I was stretched too thin with other writing commitments, mostly related to travel writing.

However, my world and yours has changed markedly over the course of just the last few months. I live in Westchester County, one of New York State’s COVID-19’s epicenters and like many of you, I’m sheltered in place at home, depending on family and friends for social sustenance. Being grounded has afforded me a bit more time so I’ve decided to use whatever training and experience I’ve acquired about friendship over the years to relaunch this site.

Now, more than ever, most of us realize how vital friends and social connections are to our well-being. Some of the friendship issues we’ve grappled with in the past, before the pandemic, remain the same. But social distancing, soaring unemployment, increased work-at-home, school closures, and other monumental changes in our lives—including experiencing death and illness among friends, family and neighborshave thrown a curve ball in making and keeping friends.

With the relaunch, I hope to focus on some of the new, emerging friendship issues as well as the ones that are of perennial interest.

Sharing our stories

On a personal level, I’ve missed interacting with you here and hope you feel the same way, too.

Please return to visit us often both to give and receive advice! Some of the crowd-sourced reader comments received in the past are as valuable (or more) than the initial posts. Please join in.

If you have a friendship dilemma that you think may be interesting and relevant to a wider audience, please send it to me for response on this blog (using the CONTACT link is at the very bottom of this page). While I can’t respond to questions privately, I’ll try to answer as many questions as I can on the blog.

A newsletter update  

If you are reading this post online and don’t want to miss future posts, I hope you’ll sign up for the weekly newsletter by entering your email address in the box labeled “advice in your inbox” on the right sidebar of this page.  

If you are receiving this post via my Mailchimp Newsletter, it means that at some point in the past you signed up to receive it. I hope that this topic will continue to be of interest to you but I understand that circumstances change over time. If you are no longer interested, just unsubscribe.

I sincerely hope you and you loved ones are healthy and coping as best you can during this challenging time..

Irene

Irene S. Levine, PhD, Producer of The Friendship Blog


Please note: The searchable archive of past posts is also available again as a resource to readers.  

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Category: How to Use This Site, MAKING FRIENDS

Comments (21)

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  1. Heather says:

    I’m so pleased this blog is back! Friendships can be so rewarding, but so challenging. Looking forward to more insights about these (sometimes thorny) relationships.This is a terrific resource!

    • Irene says:

      Welcome back, Heather!

    • Denise says:

      idk if people are still here in 2022 but im glad this is here for more recent posts 🙂 its real helpful so i can feel comfort knowing im not the only one having like problems or whatnot with friendships. hehe

  2. Jo says:

    Love this. How do u handle this pandemic while your friend goes about her business and doesn’t take it seriously. I can’t talk to her now. Should I tell her. 🙏thanks

  3. Lotte says:

    So glad you are back. Hope everybody is well.

  4. Sheryl says:

    Welcome back! So comforting for so many, especially now.

  5. Irene Rawlings says:

    Yes, this is so timely and so necessary–especially now. Thanks much!

  6. Kathy says:

    Awesome news!! Thanks Irene😊

  7. Olga Stewart says:

    What a pleasant surprise it was to see your newsletter in my inbox today.

    So welcome back. *big smile*

  8. Nancy says:

    What a nice surprise to find this in my inbox! Glad to have it and you back.

  9. Elizabeth says:

    Welcome back! I used to read the blog and am very glad to see it up and running again.

  10. Jacqueline says:

    WELCOME BACK!!!

    Thank-you for bringing the Friendship Blog back, Irene. It was always one of my favourite places to visit. There were so many amazing women here. I hope everyone will return, so we can all catch up.

    In the meantime, I hope everyone is safe and healthy. Xox

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