There can not be many people who have never heard of a 'love triangle' and are not aware of the damage that one can cause.
It is generally accepted that adding a third person to a romantic relationship is a disaster foism – whether it is a betrayal or, at least, something kinky.
But there is a different kind of triangle, the female friendship, which can be just as toxic and, from experience, far away from the sister, healthy and fun image that it is often depicted as.
I have a long -term friendship with two women that I met in London in our small private girls' school 40 years ago. There were not many students in our small class, and over the years we fell in our friendship enjoyed weekend shops, clubs and parties.
Maybe it says that two of us – me and Belinda* – chose to sit next to each other at our double desk at school, while the other, Caroline*, had to sit with someone we found too boring and Frumpy to join our gang. Did this unconsciously set the tone for the two-plus one type of relationship we have had since then?
There has always been an undercurrent of the competitiveness between us. Caroline always considered herself the most beautiful. At the age of 15 she was the first to get a boyfriend and often poured about how they would get married and his rich family would buy a house.
However, she was dumped a few years later, and when Belinda became the first of us at the age of 23, Caroline burst into tears and later told me that she did not understand how someone like them instead of me. “
Caroline went on to work in the city in the city and started an affair with her boss, who accelerated her career in a way that Belinda and I agreed that it was most unfair when we discussed her behavior in detail. The truth was that we were jealous of her now eye-water salary more than we rejected her morality.
Carrie Coon, Leslie Bibb and Michelle Monaghan in the White Lotus. When I sat down to see the show, I noticed that I am in recognition, writes Lisa Taylor
We are all in fifty now and do our best to stay youthful. We fight against gray with regular hair appointments and the Flab with expensive gym memberships. At the moment I am the slankest, but it has not always been that way.
A few months ago Caroline showed up for a drink and grabbed a dress that she announced loudly 'was much too big for me, but will be perfect for you'.
What I tell none of my friends is that this bitchy remark has encouraged me to go from size 14 to a ten with the help of weight loss Jabs. I pretended it was running, which I almost never do.
I can't quite believe that we still compete so small in our 50s, but here we are.
The reality is that our lives are drastically varied as we are older. We currently live more than 100 miles apart. Belinda has had a successful career on TV, but struggled with infertility, while Caroline never wanted children and recently a passionate marriage with a much younger man started. I have two adult sons and I am desperately looking for grandchildren.
Belinda lives in London, I am in the suburbs and Caroline has been withdrawn to a large house by the sea during her investments. Belinda and I still have to work – no wonder that things are complicated.
It is why, when I sat down on the couch, glass of wine in my hand, to watch the third series of Sky's Drama The White Lotus, which uncovers the dark side of the rich wellness world, I noticed that I cheated in recognition before I clearly felt uncomfortable.
The representation of the show of the paranoid, competitive and often cruel dynamics of a female friendship triangle felt all too familiar.
The storyline contains three childhood friends, now of middle age, botoxed and bottle blond, 'enjoy' a girlish reunion in Thailand. Kate is a rich housewife, Jaclyn is a famous TV actress, and Laurie is a lawyer and single mother whose life is not as shiny as that of her friends. It does not take long before old rivalry appears and the passive-aggressive remarks to start flying.
Everyone who has our own triangle in an expensive restaurant, as we do several times a year – kiss and hug while we arrive, laughing while we order a second bottle of rose – may think that everything was rosy.
But if they look closer to what happens when one of us jumped to the toilet or noticed how we keep an eye on each other's signs to ensure that nobody is 'the greedy', they would get a very different impression.
I am not proud to admit that in my triangular friendship, as soon as Caroline is out of hearing distance, Belinda and I will probably lean inside and ask each other an 'innocent', but the leading question such as: “She looks great … But is that shade of blond really for her?” After lunch, Belinda and I will probably text each other, express our 'worries' before they go completely mid-life mean girls. “I couldn't believe how she flirted with that waiter. It was so embarrassing! '
“What did she do with her face? Is that filler, or has she just attended? 'We know that we are catty, but the debt only contributes to the adrenaline soot.
In this triangle I am not the 'third friend'. And I admit that my ego stimulates enormously. In some respects, especially financially, I am the bad relationship of the trio, but my complicity with Belinda gives me an important feeling. Even more because she has a glamorous career and a selection of celebrities friends that I know would like to cultivate Caroline.
Belinda actually mocked the social climbing ways of Caroline. I know that if Queen B bridge someone from our trio, it would be Caroline and not me, so I feel wonderfully self -satisfied. Sometimes I sometimes think that when I share unpleasant gossip with Belinda, part of my motivation is to stay in her job, because I am secretly terrified of being banned myself. What makes my behavior even worse is that I have been in Caroline's position.
After I had my first child, I was lonely and isolated at home. So I joined a national frame confidence group and came in with two women, 'Sarah' and 'Penny', who had babies at the same age. Both were successful professionals but did not know each other before they became mothers, which I naively assumed we would make ourselves equal.
In the beginning I was very happy that I had found a gang of nice mummies. But I soon noticed the uncomfortable silences when I came back from paying for my coffee, and one day she caught them together in the park when they both claimed that they were too busy to meet each other. Eventually I discovered from another mother that they had planned a weekend away without me and did not want me to know about it. It shattered my self -respect.
So why do I behave in this way, knowing firsthand how hurtful it is? I wonder the same.
Perhaps we are unable to spread our affection and attention equally among two people. Maybe we are looking for the comfort of a familiar friend, and a third feels like emotional multi-tasking. Whatever the reason, trio friendships often come with competition and subtle abysses.
Yet the glue of friendship is often more durable than that of a love affair. In a love triangle it is almost inevitable that the third party will either run away with the price, or will be dumped. But friendships like mine can continue for decades, with the person who suspects that she is at the bottom of the pecking order paranoid and petrified to be excess to the requirements.
I believe this is an exclusive female dynamic. Women often mock male friendships as superficial compared to our deeper, more emotional tires, but I am afraid that binding often means someone gossiping – and someone to gossip.
My husband heard me dissect the mistakes of a friend and asked, “Why do you keep seeing her if you don't like her?” It is a fair question. The truth is, gossiping and even downright character murder, is a hobby for many women, because football is for men on Saturday morning.
Interesting is that in this specific friendship, when we see one of the others individually, we have a completely beautiful time. This reminds me that something is toxic about the trio itself, especially with old friends. Sometimes I worry that without a third wheel to scapegoat, my friendship with Belinda can fall apart.
Looking at the White Lotus felt like I was holding a mirror in my life. Perhaps the solution is to stop pretending that a triangle is a healthy shape for a friendship. Or maybe I can see it as a master class in why we should cut the bitchiness and treat our female friends with respect.
Oh, who am I joking? I know from experience that I will never do that. If a medicine is my poisonous triangle terribly bad for me, but it is also sensitive addictive.
- Lisa Taylor is a pseudonym.
- All names and identifying details have been changed.
