Dear Annie: Please help, as I am out of ideas about what to suggest. I have a small group of friends whom I feel lucky to have known since secondary school.
Honestly, the list of complaints goes on and on, and we end up not doing anything. I understand that it is possible that I have poor timing when I suggest we get together, but every single time? We are all 34 years old with families and careers. It would be nice to go somewhere with the girls and have a giggle and finish a chat without children chipping in or having to change a diaper. We all change as we grow up, very often having different interests than we had when we were young.
If your friends are always making excuses, then they not be the right friends at this time in your life to explore and have adventures with.
If you are motivated to get together with friends, perhaps you should join a new moms group and see if you can find some like-minded people. The mother-in-law had just retired and was talking about selling her house. She may not yet know what to do with the extra time she has on her hands. Or she may talk about selling her house because she has financial issues.
Those and other possibilities could be explored in a gentle, lighthearted way when it fits into a conversation with her son alone or the son and wife together. Moving in with her son and his family will not fix the underlying issues in this new chapter of her life.
