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Why I Still Prioritize Girls Trips as a Mom

I love my partner, Brett, our child, Dylan, and our dog, Jodie. We have built an amazing family together, and I treasure our outings and adventures. But sometimes when I am bogged down with the monotony of school lunches, laundry, and homework, I feel a tug on me to change my scenery and see new places with old friends.

Over the past few years, I’ve gone on several girls trips between 1½ and 5 days. I’ve enjoyed local weekends away in Healdsburg (hiking, wine tasting, and yoga) and Calistoga (relaxing resort time at Indian Springs, farther-away adventures in Cape Cod and Arizona, and even international trips to El Salvador and Mexico City. These trips help me reconnect with friends, and just as important, they also remind me of the person I was before I became a partner and a mom. 

 

My girlfriends all have jobs and lives, and many of them have families. In our normal day-to-day, it can feel impossible to carve out time for even a single phone conversation, but a weekend away allows for distraction-free time to space up with these people who mean so much to me. Once we find the time to get away, that time is sacred. It’s blocked off on the calendar and awaited with anticipation. Plane tickets are bought, Google Docs are populated with itineraries, and a group text thread kicks off.

I can count on one hand the phone calls I’ve had with my friend Alex since she moved to Seattle from San Francisco a number of years ago, but on our recent trip to Arizona in March, I got a deep dive on her life. As we hiked the Bisbee 1000, a scenic stair climbing route in southern Arizona, we discussed the evolution of the company she runs and where she might want to live in someday (she may even come back to SF)!

And in late 2025, I headed to Mexico City with my friend Katerina before she took a year off to travel the world with her sons. Before she took off on this adventure of a lifetime, I got three and a half precious days with her. During this time, she, two other friends and I discussed life over a taco tour, drinking chocolate, and a sunrise hot air balloon ride over Teotihuacan.

 

When my friends and I are together, we know our time is precious. We don’t know when the next gathering will be, so there’s no time to waste, our guard is down, and we speak freely. We do share small things, but we also chat about big things — relationships, children, and happiness or struggles with where we are in our lives. The time with my friends is precious, and an added element is the time away from home. Trips punctuate the monotony in our lives, by highlighting the memorable in the middle of the forgettable.

When I come back home, I feel a whirlwind of emotions. In those bittersweet moments, I’m caught up not only in the memories of my time away, but also also the love for my family. With my energy replenished, I’m a better mom and a partner. And when I feel that tug again, I know it’s time for another trip.

Location: San Francisco, CA, USA

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