I’m not really trying to make this a gender debate, because I don’t think this is strictly gendered. Different people value friendship differently and the closeness of those relationships varies a lot from person to person.

But as a woman my friendships heavily shape what I consider “effort,” care, and emotional investment in relationships.

And this is not about friends’ opinions on your dating life. I mean the actual way your friendships function day to day. It’s also not about whether male or female friendships are deeper.

For example, my friends and I:

-don’t argue over splitting the bill down to the cent

-organize surprises for birthdays, do Galentine’s, Friendsgiving, etc.

-Take a few trips through out the year

-find new fun things to do even though it for sure does get harder as you get older

-take care of each other when we’re sick

-invite each other over for dinner regularly or even just chill out in each others houses (my best friend has a key she literally just walks in).

-randomly buy each other little things because we saw something the other person would love

-celebrate each other’s accomplishments, graduations, promotions, new homes, all of it

And so on…

So when I see men describe certain relationship expectations as “jumping through hoops” or when women describe certain things as “princess treatment”, it sometimes surprises me because… this is already normal in my friendships.

If my friends naturally show up for me with thoughtfulness, consistency, generosity then like duh “damn what type of low effort boyfriend do I have” would be a conclusion I could easily reach.

I think sometimes when men hear women talk about the “bare minimum,” they assume women are always comparing them to other men. But honestly, for a lot of women it’s about the care they already get from their friends.

What prompted this post was seeing a comment about women “waiting for Prince Charming,” the other day and today a screenshot of a threads post of man refusing to do anything for Mother’s Day. My first thought was do you have friends ? Like, what do you mean you did absolutely nothing for your wife for Mother’s Day? It wasn’t even a second thought for my friends to arrange flowers for the mom in our group.

These to me aren’t fantasy level standards/expectations it’s the care already being received.

So yeah do your friendships shape your expectations in romantic relationships? Do you expect more or less? That type of thing

Additional: please no “what if I don’t like beans” memeing, if you don’t have or want friends.