If you're one of the 'lucky' ones among us, you might have multiple groups of friends that you've collected over your lifetime. School friends, work friends, family friends, mum friends even your partner's friends. Look at you go, you little social butterfly.

Now, what if I told you that you had a big event coming up — let's say your birthday. How would you feel if someone threw you a surprise party with all of those people in attendance?

If you're like me, at first you would feel super chuffed that every one of your friends turned up to celebrate you. You would then have this weird feeling of dread because you never thought these groups of people would ever mix, and if you were in control, you would've kept them separate for the rest of your life (with them preferably meeting for the first time at your funeral).

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Look, this is probably an extremely dramatic exaggeration of what would actually happen, but you're not alone in never wanting your friend groups to mingle.

A Reddit post went viral after someone asked if people keep their friendship groups separate or if they have one big one.

The user said one of their friends mentioned she was keen on meeting their other friends. The user stressed that they liked keeping their groups separate because they act a bit differently with each one.

"I'm more bolshy with my former school friends as I've known them since I was 11. I'm much more delicate with my other friend, whom I've known since I was about 25. Things are 'lighter' and less intense. It would be too weird for me to combine the two — I almost wouldn't know how to behave," they wrote.

After giving in, the user said merging the two groups was not a great idea.

"When we all met, my newer friend started making comments about what she thought of my character ('she's always like X' — a compliment) and my other friends looked flabbergasted, as if they didn't know that side of me. Prior to this event, I don't think they even knew about each other. That wasn't on purpose, it just never came up."

The majority of the comments were in agreement with the user, saying they would prefer keeping their friendship groups separate.

"Yes, I keep my friend groups split. We often have slightly different kinds of humour or discussions and I can switch up and enjoy them all," one said.

"I'm sure many of my friends would get on with others but I don't wanna force it, just like I don't particularly want to meet my friends' friends," another said.

"I hate mixing my friend groups. They come together very occasionally and I'm happy for them to stay separate. I would find it so weird for some of them to start hanging out tbh," added a third.

I call this fear of merging groups the 'friendship fence'.

What is the friendship fence?

You have multiple groups of friends that are all gated off in their fractions by a metaphorical fence that you've mentally built yourself.

There are many reasons why you wouldn't want your friendship groups to mingle. Like the Reddit user, you might act slightly differently with each group because they fill your cup in different ways and you don't want to "expose" that side of you to the other.

You also might be annoyed that you make these attempts to introduce your friends to each other and build their social circles while those same friends still friendship fence you.

And my favourite (speaking from personal experience), you might be afraid that if you introduce your friends to each other, they might like each other more than they like you and will try to phase you out of the group— pep, this happens… a lot.

Because of the last point, in particular, I was a chronic friendship fencer. I would avoid any occasions where my friends could meet. I would have separate birthday celebrations, I would make up lies and I would straight up avoid speaking about each one of them, even though all my friends are the most important part of my life and the only people I want to speak about.

It got exhausting so I made the decision to drip-feed a friendship merge. I started being more self-aware of how I acted with each group and if I really did alter my personality when I was with them.

I also realised that although they each filled my cup in different ways, it didn't mean that was also completely lacking what another group provided.

Eventually, my friends began hanging out with each other. It's not one big group, we still have our separate fractions but they now know a lot about each other and it's never awkward when I have a birthday or a celebration where I want everyone I love to attend.

It is an absolute privilege to have multiple friendship groups and it seems like a waste of great social connections by implementing a friendship fence.

By all means, if you love your fence then layer on that lacquer bestie, but remember that all of these friendships have one thing they agree on — that you're a really good friend.

If you want more culture opinions from Emily Vernem, you can follow her on Instagram @emilyvernem.