In a recent call-in, you spoke with a listener struggling to find friendships as a new mother.

You suggested looking out for red flags early on when you meet someone.

For romantic relationships, this makes sense.

Mistakes are high when choosing the future father of your children.

And I'm happy to say I picked an incredible man as the father of my kids,

met him through your community 10 years ago.

But with friendships, it feels more like a gray area. These are not people we live with or even

see every day. And community is supposedly incredibly important for raising children. Plus, as a mom of

three boys and no daughters, it would be nice to have some female friendships.

We homeschool, we're D-food, we're not Christian, so we don't have much of a built-in community.

I want to have good people around our family, but how good do our friends need to be?

For example, several of the women in my social

circle have recently become single moms or got dangerously close. And it's

difficult to stay friends with these women after such a huge clash and values.

They are not abusive to me, but I don't feel free to be honest and open with them anymore.

Part of me feels like I'm being too judgmental, like it's the 1960s and divorcees are banned

from social activities.

But another part of me doesn't want to be near the toxicity.

Ben, there is a mom friend who has a son who is supposedly on the spectrum for autism.

She's a long-distance friend who used to doves him to your show but doesn't anymore, and I've

never met her son in person, but everything she tells me about him sounds like typical boy behavior,

not autism.

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