Should You Talk To Your Friends About Your Relationship?
Balancing Privacy and Community
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You and your partner have a bad fight. You've patched things up, but you're still struggling to make sense of it. You grab your phone to text a friend. And then you pause.
How would your partner feel if they knew you were sharing this information with your friend? Is it a breach of privacy to tell your friend what your partner said and did during this fight? What about what you said and did? What about how you feel?
People have STRONG opinions about what sort of privacy can be expected in a relationship. And of course, everyone is different, and whatever two partners genuinely agree to can be just fine, even if it's not what would work for everyone.
But I'm going to take a stand here and say, for the average couple, there is actually a "right" answer.
I strongly believe that everyone should have at least a few people with whom they can share very freely about their relationship. That doesn't mean "tell whoever whatever" but that you deserve at least a couple close friends with whom you can share most things (yes, there are some exceptions, I'll go into those).
In today's post, I'll walk you through:
- why it's so important that both partners have somewhere outside the relationship to go for connection and support,
- why that support network shouldn't only be your therapist.
- where the line between support and gossip or trash-talking falls,
- and how to set reasonable expectations in your relationship for both connection and privacy.
Let's dive in.