“My friends warned me not to become a ‘boring mum’ — then they drifted away anyway”

Though I’m a New Yorker, I was lucky to have a tight-knit group of friends in London, and especially grateful because they’d been through my best times (travelling, uni parties, cooking and hanging out together)... but also my worst. These friends supported me when my mother died my third year of uni. Since I had no other family members, my friends became my everything.

My unexpected pregnancy changed the dynamics. Though it happened 16 years ago, I still feel emotional thinking about that night in my friend’s flat in southeast London. I was standing by the window, sipping a flat soda and massaging my achy lower back.

“You are not allowed to turn into one of those boring women who only talk about their babies once they’re born,” one friend instructed between gulps of prosecco.

“We can’t lose you to the dark side,” another added. All three were nodding vigorously in agreement.

“I promise I will be exactly the same person I am now… except I’ll be drinking prosecco, too,” I laughed. The smile remained plastered to my face, but I wanted to cry then and there.

It wasn’t that I didn’t agree with them: I sort-of did. But I knew the fun and spontaneous person they were thinking of – the girl who’d impulsively pierced a nipple in St. Petersburg, pranced around in tutu skirts and stilettos à la Carrie Bradshaw and moved to London from New York on a whim to see if my relationship would work out – was already gone.

Now, I was just scared, motherless and about to have a baby in a country where I had no stable income, legal rights and was still on my student visa. I needed advice and support, not judgement, but I’d heard my friends loud and clear. I pushed my considerable fears deep down, tucking them away beneath my elasticated maternity waistbands.

Looking back, I realise that night signalled the death knell of those friendships… but they didn’t spontaneously combust.

There was too much history. Instead, the demise was more like a slow trickle, mirroring the leaking tap of my emotions I could never turn off, but also never talked about out loud.

The few times those friends did meet up with my baby, they wanted to coo at her cuteness. (Fair enough.) No one wanted to hear I’d spent three hours making up a song about her cheeks… or listen to me moaning about how isolated I’d become as I wondered whether my relationship was going to survive this new phase.

I didn’t want to be “that boring mum person,” so I let myself disappear, and just asked them questions about their lives, their relationships and their jobs.

Losing those deep friendships felt like a really awful breakup.

So it makes sense that trying to make new friends at that stage gave me all of the nervous anticipation of early dating. I’d meet mums in the park, we’d exchange a few pleasantries and I’d rush back the next day, full of eager and hopeful butterflies that I’d run into my new mum crush again. (Never did.) My NCT mum group was lovely, and I did want to talk about sore nipples and green baby poops with other humans that I didn’t share a bed with… but once everyone went back to work after a year, those friendships became trickier to maintain, too.

I used to wonder if my old friends would “catch up” to me again one day when they decided to have their own babies. I’d get excited thinking about us rediscovering the beating heart of our relationships again and finding common ground. It never happened.

Whether it was a by-product of grief, hormones, some desperate attempt to try and create a version of the family I’d dreamt of in my youth (or some combo of all three), by 35, I had four children.

Those early years of motherhood were beautiful, joyful, messy, unpredictable, full of hope and gratitude, but also pain and fear. They remain some of my favourite snapshots ever, but I was extremely anxious and post-natally depressed for large swathes of time.

Also: lonely, like so many new mums. (One study found new mothers spend eight hours a day alone with their infants.)

I retreated into myself so deeply that I nearly lost my identity completely. I was scared to tell anyone the truth, to sound like I was complaining, ungrateful. I also blamed myself for messing up my friendships, because it didn’t occur to me that real friends shouldn’t make you feel judged about choices they don’t “agree” with. It took time to realise the loss of my friendships wasn’t something I needed to keep mourning or beating myself up for, because it wasn’t a reflection of my own failure, but my friends’ stubbornness.

Put more simply: we’d grown apart.

Motherhood cost me other friendships, too. I stopped going back to NYC because it was tiring and expensive to travel with babies. Even at home, I found socialising on broken sleep near-impossible.

But here’s the unexpected thing: becoming a mum is how I discovered some of my most gorgeous, deepest, friendships.

Since having my kids, I’ve met the friends I can tell anything and everything to.

Yes, these women’s children have grown up alongside mine, but it’s not the childcare support and late-night drives to A&E because my toddler shoved a pea up her nose that have bound us so intimately. They’re the people I want to confide in, giggle with, and, most importantly, feel happy leaving my kids for a night to go and see.

They inspire as much as support; I’m following in the footsteps of one by doing my yoga teacher training where she did. They brighten and lighten my load. In the past decade-plus, we have held each other through loss, relationship struggles, career highs and lows, illnesses and health. These friends are my family.

I can’t go back and tell my younger self that when friend loss after kids happens, it won’t always feel like the end of the world, and it does eventually get better. But I can tell my 15-year-old daughter a few things, and I do.

I stroke her hair and explain that no matter how much a friendship means to her, no matter how much history and love there might be, her friends should never make her feel small, or like she has to hide who she is. She should never have to pretend to be the version of herself she thinks they’ll want to see. Because the best friendships, the real ones, can only exist when you allow yourself to be exactly who you are.

For me, “proud mum” is one of my many identities. And yes, sometimes I do want to talk about my kids. And I’m not going to apologise for it anymore.