DEEP DIVE: Helping Kids Manage Their Friendships

21:34Amy Wilson:I don't care, you know? So picking up on social cues and again, we are in 2024 and the bad news is that we're probably over hovering but the good news is you can buy flashcards or you can make drawings what is this person's face saying to you they have social stories cards that i've used with some of my kids let's put these in order what order do you think these happen what do you think happens next when you're reading a story right how does the elephant feel that he realizes no one came to the party sad is the answer I'm thinking about that sad elephant yeah having conversations that really focus on social cues and social skills I just this morning had an example of a skill that I thought oh I need to make sure that my kids know to do this I was talking to somebody it was at like a morning parents school event and everybody's chit-chatting with their coffee beforehand I'm talking to a parent.

22:33Another parent comes over because they know the parent that I'm talking to and just barrels in and starts talking to the parent who I was talking to, but didn't stop and say like, I'm sorry, I don't think we met. My name's Jill, whatever. They just started talking and then they had a conversation. I'm like, I'm here. Like you came up and entered our circle, but now you're just sort of like, I'm only interested in this person, not in you. How to enter a conversation gracefully is something that I guess I don't always find easy. And so that's something else that our kids could probably use a little coaching around.

23:02Amy Wilson:Right. And similarly, these are sometimes hard to read cues and they will be much harder for some kids than others. In the other way, there's three kids and one of them is standing around and the two are talking only to each other. Oh, someone's not involved in the conversation. Noticing. Right. That noticing. Right. Right. Following social rules is a little bit more manners, right? How do you talk differently in a church than at the football game? You know, like really being able to kind of read the room. And this is something some people do really naturally and some people really need coaching on.

23:42Amy Wilson:Especially, I think, these are good to keep in mind when your kid is struggling. Where are they struggling? Are they struggling with starting conversations? Are they misreading social cues? Are they acting incorrectly in certain environments. And then the fourth is listening, which I think is a skill that sometimes my most socially skilled kids, this is where their struggle is, is it might be someone else's time to talk. You're talking too much. You're too good at entering conversations. You are too good at entering. And now everyone wants you to leave the conversation because you have been talking straight.

24:21Amy Wilson:And this is a lifetime of learning. And this is stuff that nobody gets. There's no finish line or bar. I mean, I am a overtalker. And I have occasionally said to my spouse, oh my gosh, was I talking too much at that party? And you know, especially I get a couple of the ginutonics flowing and I'm like, I think I'm hilarious. And I'll come home and I'm like, I have regrets. I have regrets. You get this stuff wrong. And so I think it's really smart to present it to kids as a constantly developing skill. What is the right age, do you think, to start talking about these things? Verbal. So 18 months old, basically.

25:02Amy Wilson:I mean, not really, but really, really young. You know, a three-year-old is going to have a tendency to just burst into the room. I found a truck. Oh, actually, we're talking. Hold on one second. I mean, we had a real growing up. You had to say, excuse me when you were entering a conversation. I'm still working on my children with that. who barge in, oh my God, look what I found. And so I think it's a hundred million lessons on this, but I think it starts very, very young. I sometimes will find myself saying to my kids, what is my face doing right now? Is this a good time to ask mommy to go to Target?

25:36Amy Wilson:Look at my face. Let's read the room, people. Mommy is in no mood. There is another thing that I see kids struggle with sometimes, kids in my life, kids I know, that they perceive somebody being mean to them when maybe they are just playing something else right now? Maybe they are deeply involved in playing trucks with Carson and they don't want to hear about Pokemon right now. That that's not mean. Maybe that's your overture being rejected, but nobody's being rude because you didn't read the situation correctly and the kids are being mean to me. When they're not being mean, they're just not. I have this conversation quite a lot right now.

26:14Amy Wilson:Like, it's okay for kids not to want to play with you and not to want to have conversations with you. And you have to find your own way. So if there's a group of kids and they're all doing something that you don't want to do, that's not their problem. That's a you problem. Like now I guess you have to bring a book. That's a bummer. But you've got to find something to do that works for you. And I think that it can feel in social situations. I mean, kids naturally, I think, define the world as something that is happening only to them. It is hard for them. They call it theory of mind. You and I have different minds and priorities.

26:51Amy Wilson:And that especially maybe kids on the spectrum, kids with intense interests, it is harder for them maybe to understand that like an hour long conversation on trains is not going to fly with every fourth grade social group. Or even just like the mean girls meme, Like I'm walking into this parents coffee this morning. There's those two over there holding court and they're the cool ones. Everybody's flocking to them and they're being exclusive. Well, not being exclusive. They haven't seen each other in a month and they have a lot to talk about that you perceive. I had a kid with a difficulty entering conversations.

27:24And I think that it's easy to see those turned backs and engaged conversation as a you are not welcome sign when really it's just like how to get in there is a little tricky. But they're not doing that to keep you out. They're not thinking about you at all. And to get over that can be hard. And so it's easier to just be like, they're mean, they're not nice.

27:44Amy Wilson:Yeah. And I think that those are the conversations with tweens and teens that we're having all the time right now from, oh, well, they're the popular kids. Well, what does it mean to be popular? Why are they popular? What's going on with that? Let's break it down. And does it really involve you or doesn't it involve you? And like maybe someone's going out of their way to target you, but maybe not. You asked before about when to start this. And this is a list of suggestions that I thought was really useful. And the number one is play board games. And these start very, very young because they teach us how to stop, how to wait and how to take turns.

28:23Amy Wilson:Simon says, bingo, zingo, whatever they are, encouraging listening skills and practicing conversation. and we were talking about this during the pandemic that the zooms were getting really old and so one of the things we suggested is do an activity zoom that the conversation is secondary to the activity right i remember you saying this and what a good idea it was at the time yeah i think sometimes for some of my kids they need an activity that's sitting and talking that's my favorite day i mean I have people come there like what should we do I'm like we're doing it we're sitting here no preamble required yeah we both have a beer and this is the day you know my sister-in-law is like a very active uh have you seen the tiktok that's going around she's a zoomer around her it's like a little kid's voice and it's a little kid on skis and he goes I'm just not a zoomer around like you I'm more of a layer around her and it's become like repurposed a million times people use the audio and they're just like sitting on the couch on their blanket.

29:27Amy Wilson:But I'm not a Zoomer around her. But yeah, I think that for some people, they are Zoomer around. Like it helps sometimes for kids to facilitate interactions, to have a secondary activity, because it's not just like your only hope here is the social skill of having a very long conversation that goes back and forth. And sometimes if you have a kid that that isn't a Zoomer around her, I mean, it isn't like you love to talk and you like to sit and chat. It isn't like kids who don't love to talk or necessarily Zoomer arounders, they can be sort of still and quiet too. And then maybe it's better to start with that one-on-one play date.

30:01Like what I realized for my kid who had a hard time entering social situations that we needed to be early for stuff, not the last one showing up at the party, but the first one showing up at the party so that they could chat with the birthday kid and get comfortable before 10 other kids came in or early for a soccer practice or whatever it was going to be so that they had a chance to get going and warm up with one person.

30:23Amy Wilson:And this is, again, just stuff you can practice. Let's practice going to the door because I know you're afraid the parent might answer and they're scary because they're a parent. Like, how do you come to the door and say hello and then go see your friends? You know, you can actually role play different situations and really work with kids. And I think that it's important and I am talking to myself, I can get very dismissive of it. It's not scary. Just go order a hot dog. It is scary if it's scary to the kid. And so kind of acknowledging, okay, well, let's practice. What would you say? And then I'm busy.

31:00Amy Wilson:I didn't hear you. Or someone cuts in front of you in line. Like, let's go through the things that could happen because your goal is to get the kid comfortable in that situation, not to convince the kid that they're an idiot for not being comfortable in that situation. Well said. Which is unfortunately sometimes my go-to. All right, we'll be right back. For some of us, tax season is one of the only times that we look at our finances fully. And once it's over, well, that was terrible. And it is completely understandable not to want to think about it for another whole year. But using Monarch and being intentional with your finances in an ongoing way helps you see where your money is going and how you can put your refund to best use.

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34:01Amy Wilson:And now, from the What Fresh Hell podcast, your ultimate kid friend breakup album. Breakup songs by kids for kids that capture the unique heartbreak when friendships go bad. You'll start with track one. Look, we talked a lot when we were in AYSO soccer, but now the season's over. Then it's on to track two. I'm not into Shopkins anymore, so I'm having playdates with Sarah who likes American Girl. And that's not all. The Kid Friend Breakup album brings you hit after hit. Songs like, Jeannie Says You're Weird and I'm Trying to Get In With The Popular Crowd, Sorry. You're still into YouTube videos, but I'm into girls now.

34:41And I'm moving to Guam because my dad got a job there. Maybe we can FaceTime.

34:45Amy Wilson:The Kid Friend Breakup's album also brings you deep cuts, like, Sheila Told Me That You Told Debbie that Carly said that you hated my friend Rachel. The ultimate kid friend breakup album is here. Don't let your kids navigate a friend breakup without it.

35:06Amy Wilson:Amy, I'm ready to skip to my spoiler. Okay. And then we'll discuss it. What is your role in helping your kids make, keep, and manage their friendships? Extremely little is your role. Your role is to support them when they are away from the friendships, but you really have a very, very small role in who they make friends with, how they make those friendships, why they make those friendships and how they manage those friendships. Whether those friendships are maintained, reciprocated. I mean, you're twisting the knife right now. Sorry, but it's true. You can support the kid, but you can't intervene to improve situations.

35:48What about like when you and I are best friends and our kids just aren't cut from the same cloth? They're just extremely different 10 year olds. That's a situation that you can massage and work on and try. But if one likes comic books and one likes basketball, maybe they're not going to be great friends. Yeah.

36:07Amy Wilson:And that's I think every aspect of your child's friendships have very little to do with you. And that's the good news in a lot of ways so that your role. And I mean, this was harder when my kids were younger and when. Oh, but you're best. You guys have been besties for three years and we go to the parents house every Friday night because we're all besties. What do you mean? it's not my job it's not my role we may still go and you may not speak to each other the whole time that's fine my parents had friends growing up who they were extremely close to and then they ended up moving together and the kids we were like grown by that point and we had nothing in common with their kids really nice kids nothing wrong but there was nothing about us that was ever going to be friends.

36:56Amy Wilson:Like I was like goth weirdo and their kid was like popular cheerleader. It was insane. It was like putting a lion and a ostrich together and be like, be besties. It's not going to happen. And I think the gift that you can give yourself is that your job is let them play the game. You're the sideline coach. You know, when they come back to the huddle, you can give them a little advice and send them back out, but you're not running out onto the field and you're not like, no, no. Now, here, let me show you how to throw the ball to this one. You're the sideline coach only. And you really, even if you decide you want to get in the game, you just don't have that much control over how it's going to go.

37:37Amy Wilson:You cannot make other people like your kid and you cannot make your kid have successful relationships or pick who they're going to be friends with. It stinks. It's really hard to watch your kid going through struggles with friendship or not, you know, not being able to make friends or sort of join in the reindeer games kind of thing. It's really hard to watch that. It is. That's true. And that kid is having a hard time. And I don't disagree that there might not be that much you can do about that and less and less as they get older. And what you really don't want to do is let your disappointment and frustration be the second arrow for them.

38:14You know what I mean? That my mom really wants me to just go over to this group of jocks and start talking to them and I can't do it. And they don't understand why I can't do it. And then she's going to be lecturing me on the way home about why can't you just walk up to them? My mom thinks I'm a loser. Yeah, exactly. It becomes like that you don't think they're doing it right becomes like another thing for the kid to be mad at you about. It's something to be wary of for sure.

38:36Amy Wilson:I think that the best thing that you can do for your kids is be a really safe haven. I have talked about this before. Or my sister had a horrible social upheaval as a young kid and was involved, basically had a friend group who dropped her. This happened to me as well. I will say it happened a little bit worse to my sister, but I'll use myself as an example. Seventh grade, I was running with like a group of 12 girls, maybe. Something went wrong. I was at a bar mitzvah. I like danced with the guy who one of them liked. Whatever happened, it was like a wolf pack. They turned on me and they cast me out.

39:14Amy Wilson:And that was it. I basically didn't have a friend for the next 18 months. And every day at school, I mean, it was seventh grade, they went out of their way to, I mean, they would do bits almost where like, I would walk up and they would all walk away together. It was a social conditioning thing. And it was awful. And I know that my mom wanted to call all of them on the phone and tell them what terrible people they were. What my mom and dad did instead, which was a million times more useful, is every night at dinner would say, that's terrible. I'm sorry that's happening. Seventh graders are just total morons.

39:55Amy Wilson:And this is the kind of stuff they do. And when you find yourself on the losing end of it, it is the worst feeling in the world. And this is not forever. But right now it stinks. And I think that that is how I walked through those times without. In fact, I think it made me feel stronger than if they had gotten on the phone and started calling people and met with the principal and they really have to be nice to her and they were such good friends. They basically said, you can handle this. You have very little control over what other people do. And this is terrible. And that, I think, is the correct way to handle these situations.

40:35Yeah. And just swallow your own pain about it. Let your kid know that it's being seen. What about when your kid is being sort of pulled under by an Eeyore? That's to say that's very close friends with them. Maybe you're the kind of parent that's like, we're nice to everyone. And you are going to invite like the loser with weird pants to the party because that's what we do in this family, right? And then your kid becomes, I'm coming up with an extremely complicated hypothetical situation, but I think we all recognize this as something we either have been in or a kid has been in, that your kid is sort of stuck with the kid who's really dragging them down.

41:16Lots of late night phone conversations about the boyfriend breakup or whatever, that they're being sort of pulled down by a kid and they need to take a step back and they feel like they can't.

41:26Amy Wilson:That's where you are the sideline coach. I think you can say they come to you. Yeah. You don't call the kid. You don't intervene. You don't call the kid's mom and say, you know, your kid really needs to stop dragging my kid down. You say, here are the parameters of this. Is this a situation where you're going to be unkind to someone else because your friends tell you to do that? Like, is that a good choice for you? Does that feel like a right choice? and honestly the answer may be yes and then that's what they choose and I've been having a lot of conversations now that I have tweens and teens about text chains and you know the kind of behavior that goes on on the phones and I have said to all my kids I don't look at their phones I don't monitor their phones but I said you better be sure that anything that you ever put on a phone you better be sure you're ready to read out loud in the school office in front of me and your school principal because that is real that will at some point happen if there's nonsense going on somebody's going to raise a red flag and are you sure that this is something you're comfortable and it puts the decision back on them but it involves a strong influence from me i don't check their phones and it does come up.

42:42Amy Wilson:If stuff is going on on the phones and this happens in school, someone is going to get wind of it. And are you using your phone? And this is something that I'll ask them once every couple of weeks at dinner. Is there anything going on in the phones? Is there anything you're struggling with? How's the group chat going? Is it getting, and we had one that we had to shut down. Is that, are we getting near that again? And all right, we're going to the football game this weekend. What are we preparing for? That the football game is also filled with moms? Like what behavior? Don't get up to stuff because I'm going to hear about it.

43:15And you have

43:18Amy Wilson:a wide range of friends who have very different house rules than maybe we have. But our house rules are our house rules, no matter where you are. So I don't buy too much into, I mean, having seen this play out in my own life, that friend is no good. That friend is pulling you into trouble. You can be friends with whoever you want. Just understand that we have different rules and that if you get engaged in activity that is beyond our house rules, you're going to be in trouble, you know, and like just really helping them. I think kids, they don't need us to run. You know, we've said before, you're not in the boat with them.

43:59Amy Wilson:You're on the shore as they drive the boat. And hopefully sometimes they drive the boat by and you're like, you're going too fast. Be careful. There's rocks over there. but you don't want to be in the boat. You want them to figure out how to drive the boat. And I think friendships is a huge area where you have to understand your locus of control and how much control you have. And I think we get very easily sucked into, I'm gonna call her mom, they can't treat you like that, that kid is trouble and they're gonna bring you down. Those are all the things you can't control. You can control how your child is ready to be a person in the world who's going to face this like really tough, challenging, improvisational scene with a lot of unexpected stuff that comes up.

44:45Amy Wilson:And then I think you lay out a bunch of rules like this is what you text me if you need to come home. This is you get a free pass. If you make a stupid mistake, you can call me and say free pass and just come home and you won't be in trouble. We'll get you, you know, we'll help you figure it out. We're on your team, but we expect good choices. We get it so wrong. I mean, just think about the amount of popular culture ink that has been spilled. And I always use like the most old Deluxe Alert example of Eddie Haskell back in my day, which was on the show Leave It to Beaver. That was from like, I think the 50s, 60s.

45:21I mean, it was on in reruns when I was a little kid. And Eddie Haskell would come over and Beaver and Wally were brothers and Eddie Haskell would come over and he would always be like, oh, you know, Mrs. Cleaver, what a lovely dress you have on today. Oh, it's so nice to see you again. And Mrs. Cleaver would always say like, why can't you be more like that boy, Eddie Haskell? That's really somebody that you should be friends with. And then as soon as Mrs. Cleaver would say like, well, it's nice to see you boys. And she'd leave the room and then Eddie Haskell would be like, tonight, behind the gym, firecrackers.

45:51He was in so much trouble and the parent was totally missing it. And I think we can miss it both ways. And I think about like my spouse wanted to not be so nice to somebody recently at a party for reasons that had to do about friendship issues between their kid and ours. And I was like, I guarantee you that parent would be completely bad, like has no idea this beef is going on. And just because you're getting a one-sided readout doesn't mean that that's the real readout and don't get involved. You could only make things worse.

46:21Amy Wilson:Yeah. I wanted to just cite this line, Huffington Post article, what to do when you don't like your kid's friends, which goes into something you said before. And it's something that we've talked to you about in other realms. But I was like, this is a touchstone. I don't want to leave without saying, judge the behavior, not the person. So when you're the Eeyore or the bully or the kid who's lighting firecrackers behind the gym who your kid is hanging out with, I don't like that behavior because it stays away from a trap that I think we get into with our kids. They're a bad kid. You shouldn't be with them.

46:55Amy Wilson:Your kid has a very different experience with them. They're so nice. They're so fun. They're so creative. I bet there's lots of things about this. That kid was great, but you only see them lighting firecrackers and you're smoking cigarettes. Oh, they're vaping. I can't have you be around them. Judge the behavior. What I don't, I hate to see them vaping. And I would hate to think that has an influence on you because you guys spend a lot of time together. And I find that behavior really a problem because it causes these health problems or whatever. Or what I see is a behavior where that person has a tremendous need for you and I see it having a detrimental effect on your homework or your day or your tiredness or whatever.

47:34Amy Wilson:Keeping all the conversations that you have with your kids about behavior versus the person, I think is such a good touchstone. I think that's well said. And I do want to say before we end that we're saying like, stay out of it. You'd never help. It's never that there are times, there are times that your kid does need you to get involved, that the friendship is a problematic situation that your kid needs support around. And when it gets to that point, you'll know, and maybe you do. It's not never true. But I would say 95 % of the time, it's not true. The kids are being mean to them. Well, maybe, maybe you're not getting the whole story.

48:14And maybe your kid just needs to learn some skills.

48:16Amy Wilson:Ask yourself hard questions when that comes up. Do I really need to intervene? And yes, I've said before, I have friends who have real PTSD and issues as adults from bullying and things that happen to his children. Do not completely ignore what is going on because it's not your business. But I think just we push back against involvement because I think that's our default and a lot of parents default. So just ask yourself hard questions. But if it's becoming, you will know, I think, certainly if there's anything physical, violence, anything like that. And I think if there's a sustained pattern of behavior that is causing a marked problem with your child, call the school counselor, get involved, call the other parents, start helping.

49:02Amy Wilson:But for the overall, let your kid play football and drive the boat and be coaching from the sidelines. Football in the boat. You're in the sidelines. Listen, for some reason, your kid is playing football on a boat. That is not a good idea. It's not a terrible idea. Could be fun. Bumper football boats. That one's free, guys. Take that. Solved it, friends. We solved it. That's how to help your kids and their friendships. Well, Hellions, you've heard me mention it a few times. My book, Happy to Help Adventures of a People Pleaser is coming out January 7th. It's available for pre-sale now. You can check the links in the show notes for this episode.

49:41You can go to our website, whatfreshhelppodcast.com, where there's a link or just go to wherever you buy books and type in happy to help. You'll find it.

49:49Amy Wilson:You don't know this, but you can't wait to read this book. It is fantastic and you can't wait. So go get it. Pre-orders, big deal. They make a big difference. So please go get it today. Don't wait for it to come out. Order it now. And with that, friends, we'll talk to you next time. Thanks, everybody.

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