Relationships October 29, 2017
*Platonic high-five of friendship*
Everyone and their mother have a different response to the following question:
“Can girlfriends have guy friends?”
It might seem like a no-brainer, but this is still a subject of contention within many monogamous couples. If a girl is in a committed, long-term relationship, is it okay for her to still hang out with her guy friends? Well, in short, our answer is ABSOLUTELY YES. In fact, we would even encourage such a venture…to an extent.
Here are a couple of ways your girlfriend’s guy friends can actually benefit your relationship.
She used to freak out when a guy would send you “K” in a text message. Does that mean you hats her? Does that mean you already started an anti-her campaign on Facebook and you are currently handing out flyers? Thanks to her guy friends, she knows that this literally just means “K.”
You may not understand how cryptic guy texts can seem to girls, but it’s insane. We can analyze the content of a text for days at a time, the time it took you to send that text for weeks, and even the punctuation around that ext for months. Sometimes we need a guy’s eye to ease our pointless worries.
Just in case you’re worried about the guy friends hitting on your woman, she will literally be their main wingman. Girls *love* giving girl advice. She’ll get a total kick out of her guy friends thinking she knows everything about the collective consciousness of our gender (which we pretend exists when you ask us questions about women in general).
So can girlfriends have guy friends? Yes, because they will literally be the spirit guides to all of their guy friends’ romantic inquiries.
Guys, you’re impossible to get gifts for. With girls, there are a myriad of options. You can give girls clothes, gift cards to her favorite clothing & interior decoration stores, perfume, jewelry… the list is endless.
But you guys are so difficult. You don’t really shop for clothes as often, and when you do, you don’t shop at one store consistently enough to warrant a specific gift card. Your apartments are usually decorated minimally, and you can be pretty picky about what looks normal and what looks kind of girly.
You literally wear one cologne, so buying you a new scent would be pointless. You don’t wear jewelry (except maybe a family heirloom, like your grandfather’s dog tag from World War II). At this point, girls are often at a loss.
And this is where guy friends come in.
“Dude, just get him like, a bunch of beer.”
“What?”
“Yeah like four twelve-packs. And a bucket of jerky.”
“You’re kidding me.”
“Trust me, he’ll like, marry the crap out of you if you get him beer and jerky. It’ll, like, seal the deal.”
Lo and behold, her delicately wrapped craft beers & dried beef will win you over in a heartbeat.
So yes, this is why your girlfriend’s gifts are awesome. They are 400 percent guy-informed.
Gal friends, as much as we love them, can be a handful. Although it’s not always visible on surface level, there is always an underlying layer of “I need to be somewhat presentable” when you’re hanging out with a bunch of girls. It’s not super stressful, but the feeling is always somewhat present.
With guys, however, your girlfriend can be as gross as she wants. Since she’s dating you, she has basically no motivation to look attractive to the opposite sex. She can belch, yell at sports on TV… you name it. Now, granted, some girls have one or two best buds with which these behaviors are acceptable. But with large groups of women, we don’t always feel the freedom to be our gross “au naturale” selves.
Trust me, once you see your girlfriend in her inhibition-free zone, you’ll never ask, “Can girlfriends have guy friends?” again.
Girls tend to be salad-happy at work, which is fine. Health is good. But once in a while, your girlfriend wants to pig out on some almost-expired See’s Candy chocolates without the slightest hint of potential judgment.
Guy friends give girls the opportunity to stuff themselves guilt-free, without a single calorie being counted. Now, this can happen around girls and you, too. It’s just less stressful around a bunch of dudes.
So the next time someone poses the question, “Can girlfriends have guy friends?” show them a picture of your girlfriend before eating two pounds of chocolate and after. The peaceful joy across her face will be proof enough.
So your girlfriend likes to hang out with you, and she likes to hang out with them. Odds are, you guys would probably get along. Especially if you guys get a secret handshake. That’s how you know it’s real.
Basically, it all depends on trust. If you trust your girlfriend enough to hang out with other guys (especially if you all hang out together) then there really shouldn’t be an issue. But when answering the question “Can girlfriends have guy friends?” it all really depends on the couple.
If you’re uncomfortable with the prospect of your woman investing in her male friendships, communication is always key. If there’s a problem you have with one of her guy friends, feel free to ask your girlfriend about it. Honesty is always the best policy.
Unless you stalked her on Facebook for seven months before you asked her out. That you should probably keep that to yourself.
