Friendaholic: Confessions of a Friendship Addict

Product Information

This is the argument made by the American historian Christopher Lasch. As a staunch critic of mass consumption, which he viewed as a threat to the integrity of the individual, Lasch was particularly attuned to the ways in which it discouraged “initiative and self-reliance” and promoted “dependence” and “passivity”. “Dependent” people, he wrote in The Minimal Self (1984), are easily converted into consumers of therapy, which is “designed to ease [their] ‘adjustment’ to the realities of industrial life”. Therapy-speak, then, is the language of the consumer, and consumers do not make for independent thinkers, let alone free ones. Blue Badge holders and those with access requirements can be dropped off on the Queen Elizabeth Hall Slip Road off Belvedere Road (the road between the Royal Festival Hall and the Hayward Gallery).

Likely, the book exists to provoke this sort of concern – to draw attention to an aspect of life that has gone unexamined because “we’ve spent so much time heroising romantic love”. Whether it’s wise to scrutinise friendship in the way we’ve scrutinised romantic love is debatable but Day does a good job of convincing us the topic is interesting and worthy of at least some analysis. You can also use the external lift near the Artists' Entrance on Southbank Centre Square to reach Mandela Walk, Level 2. Unfortunately, for me, the book is most interesting where it is least like a confessional and most like a scientific exploration of friendship. For example the discussion of Cicero's De Amicitia or Dunbar's friendship circles are fascinating. What's less fascinating to me is Day's hand wringing about what text message she should send a shitty friend who she doesn't really like. From exploring her own personal friendships and the distinct importance of each of them in her life, to the unique and powerful insights of others across the globe, Elizabeth asks why there isn’t yet a language that can express its crucial influence on our world.The book was creatively written, incorporating interviews, anecdotes, ideas, and research. It was thoughtfully done. And Elizabeth Day is pretty entertaining. She was also vulnerable and open with her story. I especially appreciated her chapter about her difficulties having a child. As a society, there is a tendency to elevate romantic love. But what about friendships? Aren't they just as - if not more - important? So why is it hard to find the right words to express what these uniquely complex bonds mean to us? In Friendaholic: Confessions of a Friendship Addict, Elizabeth Day embarks on a journey to answer these questions.

WH Auden wrote that “literary confessors are contemptible, like beggars who exhibit their sores for money”. We needn’t ask what he would make of the wellspring of confessional books on offer today, each hawking its own particular brand of self-laceration. Sam asked me what words would be on my plaque (which wasn't weird - she knows me well). Without hesitation, I said "Friend, swimmer, reader." Sam replied, "Not mother?" And no, 'mother' was not what immediately came to mind. Analyse that whatever way you want... actually, it has come up a few times in my own therapy and I'm no closer to understanding my response, short of saying that my friends always have been, and always will be extremely important to me. I think much of it relates to what I witnessed with my grandmother. Day describes herself as 'addicted' to friendship, and determined to be a 'good friend' because '...having lots of friends meant you were loved, popular and safe.' But the result of this was that she was exhausted (because she said 'yes' to everyone), and her personal boundaries were constantly tested. This lead her to consider the difference between quality and quantity. She goes on to explain how she rebalanced her friendships, alongside an exploration of the evolution of friendships, and the types of friendships we might have (the fun-night-out friend, the frenemy, and so on). Then, when a global pandemic hit in 2020, she was one of many who were forced to reassess what friendship really meant to them – with the crisis came a dawning realisation: her truest friends were not always the ones she had been spending most time with. Why was this? Could she rebalance it? Was there such thing as…too many friends? And was she really the friend she thought she was? She was determined to become a Good Friend. And, in many ways, she did. But in adulthood she slowly realised that it was often to the detriment of her own boundaries and mental health.Meet Elizabeth Day, recovering “friendaholic”. While she was no queen bee at school, Day became an indiscriminate collector of pals in adulthood, reaching her 40s before questioning the urge. This unabashedly personal book charts her attempts to “course-correct” by analysing the meaning of friendship. She’s helped by five of her closest confidants, including journalist Sathnam Sanghera and broadcaster Clemency Burton-Hill, with first-person takes from the likes of a neurodivergent Iraqi woman and the sixtysomething chairman of a Norfolk “men’s shed”. It’s a generous, companionable guide to a part of life every bit as crucial – and as fraught – as romance or family. The Women Who Saved the English Countryside We are experiencing delays with deliveries to many countries, but in most cases local services have now resumed. For more details, please consult the latest information provided by Royal Mail's International Incident Bulletin. Any sized item can be left in our cloakroom, including fold-away bicycles. We don’t accept non-folding bicycles. Items must be collected on the same day they are stored. From time to time, the cloakroom may not be available. You won’t be able to bring any bags over 40 x 25 x 25cm into the auditorium of the Royal Festival Hall or the Queen Elizabeth Hall, or into the Hayward Gallery, so please leave large bags at home.

In summary, you’ll end up wanting to be Elizabeth’s friend, but also being okay with the fact that that’s not going to happen. Rarely have I felt so much goodwill towards someone I’m unlikely to ever meet. As a society, there is a tendency to elevate romantic love. But what about friendships? Aren't they just as – if not more – important? So why is it hard to find the right words to express what these uniquely complex bonds mean to us? In Friendaholic: Confessions of a Friendship Addict, Elizabeth Day embarks on a journey to answer these questions." Day rightly points out that friendship as a subject has, for far too long, been treated as a Cinderella subject compared to romantic and even family relationships. Dealing with narcissistic lovers or recalcitrant teenagers has been deemed proper subject matter for academic psychologists and therapists for decades; how to cope with the potential ending of a friendship has, by comparison, been seen as rather trivial, just one of those things in life that we are supposed to navigate without guidance. I loved the structure of the book, with chapters about societal change e.g. "double tap to like" and "ghosting" interspersed with interviews with friends about friendship e.g. "Clemmie: Can friendships withstand big life shifts".

Author

I'm careful not to criticise books for not being what I wanted them to be. It states very clearly on the cover that it is the Confessions Of A Friendship Addict and this is very much a confessional. As such, everything is couched in the author's own experience and most topics are presented as the author trying to sort out a problem in her life.