I just feel like..my friends, my friends, are better than your friends.

Date: August 16th, Time: 3ish in the morning, Location: Undisclosed hospital in Houston.

I woke up in a foreign bed. I was in a room with ugly but clean tan walls, a television the size of a shoe box on the wall, and weird machines making beeping noises connected to me by tubes. I was in the hospital. A place I haven’t been a stranger to for a lot of 2018. Literally since the first day of this year I’ve been in and out of the hospital for health issues, but this time was different. The other times I had driven myself, or had someone else drive me to the hospital. I was up, awake, conscious, aware of everything going on. This time I couldn’t tell you how I got there, how long I had been there, or what exactly was going on. After I was fully awake and completely brought up to date on what happened, the disbelief set in. I had almost died. The details are personal, but nevertheless, I almost lost my life in the wee hours of the night in that hospital bed.

I came home the following morning, partially upset and embarrassed because honestly my near death experience could have been avoided. I am super critical of myself so naturally I blamed myself. I wanted to shut myself out from everyone until…well I didn’t know what I was waiting for exactly, but I knew I wasn’t ready to face everything. Initially I decided to keep everything that happened between those 4 walls between myself and whoever else was there that night, but that excluded a giant part of myself…my core group of friends. I couldn’t go about my life faking it until I made it with these women. There is no faking it. They know me. They can sense when something is off, don’t ask me how, they just can. You know how you were little and you broke something in the house while your mom was at work but she already knew before you even told her? Yeah, my friends have that same super power. It gets annoying. [eye roll].

My friends. Wow. Where do I start? These crazy women. For starters, most of us met in 6th grade in Houston, Texas. But now, as late 20-somethings, we are scattered across the map literally from one coast to the other. I casually typed into the group chat what happened and rolled over attempting to start my hibernation from the world (dramatic much Roni?) I woke up a few hours later to my phone blowing up. Not anything out of the ordinary. Of course any good friend would check up on their buddy after they get out of the hospital. I responded sporadically, when I felt like it. Remember I was determined to tackle this by myself, I’m a strong, independent woman, and I didn’t need no…friends? Yes that felt ridiculous typing out so I know it was ridiculous to read. lol Back to me being superwoman.

I was straight up ignoring most of them. I wasn’t ready to talk. Very water sign-like behavior. I finally caved in and answered the phone, giving just enough information to keep the savages off my back. Shortly after, I got a text from one of these lovely ladies advising me to let her know when I was ready for company because she was waiting at my door. I looked at my phone in disbelief, like no this girl did not just invite herself over to MY place. My cocoon. My safe place where I would be spending the rest of an undetermined amount of time. So I go to my door, open it, and she just comes waltzing in. And as if that wasn’t bad enough, 5 more friends piled in after her. Turns out, my friends got into formation from California to New York and had the Texas squad pull up on me. THE NERVE!

I played it cool for as long as I could but as soon as the first one hugged me, I completely lost it. I think we must have back and forth hugged while I cried for at least 5 minutes straight. My bulletproof armor fell all the way off and I was just the vulnerable, awkward, skinny 11 year old girl they met  in the 6th grade. SIXTH GRADE! Not many people can say they have 1 of 2 friends from childhood, let alone 14. 14 women who would literally drop everything they’re doing to check on little old me. I can’t lie, it felt good because at the very time I had never felt more alone I was reminded that I was far from it. The entire weekend, they were there. I went to the gym, they were at the gym. I went to sleep, one was in my bed. I decided to chill and hang with my dog, they came and brought their dogs. I decided to have a movie day, they showed up with popcorn, chocolate, and enough wine to feed the southwest side of Houston, Texas. They successfully inserted themselves into every aspect of my life for about 3 days straight, before we all had to go back to being grown ups. lol

This incident just reinforced the importance of real and true SISTERHOOD. I hate when I hear women say “I don’t hang with women, they’re too messy.” I’ve got news for you sis, I hate to break it to you but it’s you…the problem is you. Women are healers. We are divine energy. We have the power to start and end wars. We bring life into this world. We are actual magic. This world stops spinning without women. None of us would be here without…exactly, WOMEN.

And MY tribe? One of a kind. Aside from them completely dominating their respective professional fields, they are kind, giving, SELFLESS, amazing, and IRREPLACEABLE. They’ve been by my side through the good times like new careers, personal milestones, and self discovery. They’ve also been by my side through the bad times like breakups, miscarriages, and self-doubt brought on by the former. And more important than just being by my side, they never switched up on me, EVER. Do we get on each other’s GOT DAMN nerves sometimes? Absolutely. But we are honest and loyal to one another. You will never catch us speaking ill of another to someone outside of the group, and we have no problem telling each other exactly how we feel (Our GroupMe chat is proof of this LOLOLOLOL). Another H-Town queen said it best “they pray pray for me, see better things for me, want better days for me.” She also said “my friends are goals, your friends are foes.” When I tell you guys, I felt that IN MY SOUL! Actually, just go listen to the entire “Friends” song by The Carters right now. THAT’S us.

Were they the only ones who came through for me that night, the next day, and the following weekend? No. But that’s another blog post for another time. 🙂 If you have a group of women around you, love on them. Be patient with them. As women often times we have patience with men, our careers, our kids, but then neglect our friends or never really give them their flowers. We choose other people and things over our friends, taking them for granted, assuming that they’ll always be there because that’s their job, they’re supposed to be there for me. But the truth of the matter is friends don’t HAVE to do anything for us, they’re with us because they CHOOSE to be there. We don’t pick our families (Lord, again, another blog post LOL), but we choose our friends and every day they choose us. Let’s keep each other lifted up, check on each other, LOVE EACH OTHER. Love through friendship is some of the most genuine love there is and I’m thankful every day and indebted for life to my squad.