Love Letters: Can married people have friends of the opposite sex?

I hope you and your loved ones survived the holidays. And with the new year upon us, now’s a perfect time to drop the drama and start your relationships off on the right foot.

If you need some help, holla at your boy.

Send your inquiries to soulinstereoblog@gmail.com, or find me on Twitter @etbowser. Just provide your initials, or a fun nickname. 

Here’s today’s question:

What do you think of Mary J saying that she and her hubby aren’t allowed to have friends of the opposite sex?

KJ

In an interview last month, between releasing the surprisingly good Think Like A Man Too soundtrack and the surprisingly boring London Sessions album, Mary J revealed in an interview that she doesn’t allow her husband to have female friends, and she doesn’t allow herself to have male friends:

All females for me, all guys for him,” she expressed. “There’s none of that, ‘Oh, that’s my female friend. Oh, that’s my guy friend.’ No, not in a marriage, I’ve never seen that work.”

Well, allow me to introduce you to a marriage where that DOES work. I have several female friends and my wife has male friends too.

And, as shocking as it may sound to some, those friends aren’t all trying to hop in our beds and destroy our marriages.

I met most of my females friends decades before I even knew my wife existed (and the same goes for my wife and her male friends). They’ve been by my side since grade school, graduation and college. I know their families personally. And they were there to advise me when I dated the parade of chickenheads before finding my future wife.

They were down with me before the hype — wouldn’t be unfair to suddenly cut off years of friendship just because I’m now married. I mean, it’s not like they’re trying to get in my draws. If that was their intention, they had a 20-year head start on my wife.

Don’t get me wrong — while I think it’s OK for married folks to have platonic friendships, there have to be rules. Those friends have to respect your marriage — that means, no late-night phone calls or texts unless it’s an extreme emergency (and I mean like “family member death” emergency, not “lemme tell you what happened on my date.”) Also, there should be no underminding the relationship. In a marriage, two become one. So if those friends ride for you, they should ride for your spouse as well. It’s a level of trust that has to be earned by both married couples. If one person is distrustful of that friend, it ain’t gonna work.

Maintaining platonic friendships is fine, as long as you respect the boundaries of your marriage. Simple as that. If you’re not comfortable with your spouse having friends of the opposite sex, that’s fine. And I’d definitely advice against your spouse hanging around folks you don’t know — my wife knows all my female friends, and vice versa. Just don’t let insecurities kill strong friendships. They’re hard to come by.

QUESTION NUMBERO DEUX:

Do you think you can ‘grow to love’ someone?

Next Level

Eh, this is a tough one. Yes, I think you CAN grow to love someone but not in the way some of y’all think. Some people will misinterpret that, thinking that if you’re in love with someone’s abs you can eventually grow to love their disgusting personality.

Those abs will mean nothing once that beer gut settles in. And you’re still stuck with the nasty personality.

Growing to love someone means overlooking some of their more superficial flaws and embracing those qualities that lie under the surface. So yeah, you can grow to love someone, just make sure you’re loving the right things.