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Gone are the days of taking a new boyfriend home to your mum and dad and discreetly leaving the room so that the trembling, lovesick young man on the sofa can be grilled about his intentions. These days, the ones to impress are your friends.
When a new partner is introduced into my friendship group, they become the main topic of conversation among the rest of us. Did they hold their own at the pub? Are they compatible with our best pal? Are they, well, good enough? For many of us, it’s our friends who set the highest standards for us, our friends who know us best – and who could end up spending many a holiday and night out with us and our new partner for decades to come. But what happens when our friends and a new love interest just don’t click?
Keira, 34, knows this feeling all too well. “One of my good friends has been with her partner for years, and he has never made any effort at all with us as a group,” she says. “Whenever he’s around, he literally sits with headphones in to avoid being part of the conversation, and he often uses the excuse of watching sport on his phone.”
While Keira and her friends were at first sympathetic, and assumed he was shy, “the lack of effort really rankled after a while, and it just started to seem more like rudeness than anything”. Keira’s friend has since married this man, but he’s continued to “blank” his wife’s mates. “It’s all very strange,” she says, “and it’s got to the point where he now has this weird feud against two of my friends, who’ve known her for 20 years, and it’s like an odd shadow over the friendship.”
Keira’s story is probably one of the worst-case scenarios – as we’re not discussing abusive or coercive partners here – but even when the new partner is genuinely making an effort, they’ve got a difficult task ahead of them. “The expectations are high,” says Jess, 32. “I probably have even higher standards for my friends’ partners than my friends do themselves – because I can see that it takes someone quite special to actually match how amazing they are.”
It’s even more tricky, she’s found, for a partner to come into a longstanding, tight-knit friendship group. “There are so many in-jokes, so many quick, one-word references to something that happened six years ago that will make the whole group laugh, and lots of nuances and taking the piss.” Plus, there’s a fair bit of juggling to do. “Ideally, the new partner will be confident and chatty, but not arrogant. You want them to be warm and relaxed and put your friend and you at ease. You want them to be asking questions but willing to listen. It’s a hard balance to strike.”
Alivia Rose, a senior psychotherapist, says the most important thing to remember if you’re a new partner being introduced into a friendship group is that age-old piece of advice: “Just be yourself.” It can be a nerve-wracking situation, but she says people mustn’t “put on a persona” in an attempt to “impress”, because things can “go badly when people feel they need to perform” – and it’s hard to make the performance last. “Be calm,” she says, “and know that your partner is going to have to also meet your friendship group at some point.”
There can be long-term impacts when a group of friends and a new partner just aren’t feeling the spark. Scan Reddit and there are countless posts from desperate people asking “What do I do?” as they try to deal with a friend’s partner who they just can’t get on board with. Among the infractions? That they’re too snobby, they have different politics, they are shallow, or, in one case, they won’t stop bragging about “making their therapist cry”.
“It’s just sad,” says Jess, “because as a friend you inevitably stop asking the partner along to things and tend to see your pal individually instead, and as a result you lose touch with that whole part of their life.” She has also noticed some friends starting to change around their partner as they can feel the tension in the room. “It’s not nice when a friend looks on edge, or they’re making excuses for their partner and trying to manage the conversation.”
I’ve certainly had relationships where I’ve felt embarrassed by something a partner has said, leading me to try to edit them, or been frustrated after they’ve shown little interest in bonding with my mates. The feeling of knowing your friends don’t like your partner is an uncomfortable and lonely one.
She’s quite wary of what she says about her husband in front of us, because she knows that there’s this weird vibe
Keira
“Some people feel they have to teach their new partner how to behave,” says Rose, “but I suggest they don’t, and just try to let them be themselves, because otherwise the partner might feel criticised and questioned and judged. You’re with somebody because you respect them and trust they are enough as they are, and if it doesn’t work, it doesn’t work.” She says it’s better to let things play out naturally – and act on the consequences rather than trying to meddle along the way. “You’ve got to just trust the process.”
Keira says that her friend who married the watches-sport-on-his-phone guy is definitely aware of her mates’ disapproval. “She’s quite wary of what she says about her husband in front of us, because she knows that there’s this weird vibe and so we would probably take a more critical view.”
It isn’t such a terrible idea to hold back on disclosing some of the bad stuff, though, especially if it’s trivial. Those offhand remarks we sometimes make about our partners – that we wished they weren’t so neurotic, say, or that we were irritated by the way they ate a particular food – are likely to lodge themselves in our friends’ minds for much longer. “I think we’re definitely slower to forgive our friends’ partners than they are, because all we’re hearing is the bad stuff,” says Jess. “We don’t see all the intimate, funny or kind moments.” People don’t tend to share the good stuff that much, either, because it can come across as boastful and, let’s be honest, it’s just not as interesting.
“The more you say, the more your friends will start to have an opinion about your partner,” says Rose. “And your friends then get caught between a rock and a hard place, because if they tell you the truth about not liking your partner, they could lose your friendship, or make you feel you’re in a position to split between your partner or your friend.” She says we should be “cautious” about how many negative feelings we share, especially with friends who have a vested interest. Some things, she adds, are better shared with a therapist. “That way, you’ve got somewhere to take it, but productively. A therapist would question why you’re dating somebody that you’re so negative about, whereas your friendship group might just enjoy a good gossip.”
When your partner and your friends do hit it off, though, it’s perfect. “It’s amazing when it’s just right,” says Jess. “I really love one of my friends’ boyfriends, and when I met him, it was like, ‘Oh my God, a whole new friend for me!’” Of course, we don’t have to be best mates with our friends’ partners – after all, they’re dating them, not us – but it does help if you can sit through a meal together while enjoying eye contact and stimulating conversation. But patience helps – especially with all those nerves flying around at the start. “Hopefully good friends will be generous,” says Rose, “and be kind and loving towards the person you’ve chosen.”
