Your friends are going to live their lives. The ones who are true friends will respect your decision to live by your own principles. Anyone who won't do that isn't a friend who'd stick around when you really needed them, anyway, so let them think what they want and go where they want.
It's your choices about your marriage and your family that you're trying to decide. Friends are great, but these aren't their choices.
There have been times I've pulled away from friends to sort things out on my own because I didn't want to feel later that my friend(s) convinced me to choose something if the choice turned out badly. Filing for my divorce was one instance. I didn't want to feel later that I was somehow "pressured" by well-intentioned friends into making the wrong choice for me and my family. I don't feel now that I was pressured, and I'm at least at peace with the choice I made for the reasons that I made it.
That was my choice. That use of solitude worked (and in some areas of my life, it still works) for me.
So if there are friends who want to tell you how to live your life as if they have the answers, instead of recognizing that you are making difficult choices about important parts of your life, maybe you need some time away from those friends? If that's what works for you, go for it. If not, you'll find what does.
Thanks,
Joe
My sitch More importantly, Light A Million Candles
