Part 4 of Understanding Social Friendships for Kids
Welcome back! We’re over half way through our understanding friendships for kids series. If you missed any of the previous posts about strangers, acquaintances, or peers, go check those out and then come back to finally dive into how we covered friends.
As adults, we know that not just anyone is a “friend.” We don’t run and tell just anyone our hardships, or ask them to help us through tough times. We don’t vent about our marriage to just anyone. We don’t cough up our extra time or energy to just anyone. But, that wasn’t always the case. Do you remember being in middle school or high school, when you’d share your problems with what you thought was your friend, and soon the entire class or school knew? And, were all the people who knew, people who were willing to help you and recognize that nobody is perfect? No. It came with judgement, it came with being the brunt of the joke, it came with bullying. As an adult, I realize that the whole reason that happened is we were literally all just trying to keep our head above water, and the target off our back. Honestly, that’s a lot of what you learn in group children settings, especially public school. I’d be willing to bet that anyone I had issues with in those years, knew what they were doing was wrong, but they just didn’t want the target to land on them. However, what if we could teach our kids what we’re all coming to understand now that we’re rounding to our 40’s? I wonder how much they could save them come those middle school and teen years, especially as a girl. How many girls could be spared the phrase, “I’m not dramatic, drama just seems to follow me.” My hope, is that by starting these “categories,” for the people we meet at a young age, it will hopefully transfer through to L’s tween and teen years that we’re navigating. So, since we’ve covered previous 3 categories, let’s move into friends.
Friend is the upgrade that your peers get. Sometimes it’s the upgrade that an acquaintance gets if you see them frequently enough. Not just anyone falls into a “friend,” category, and the reason is because friends get extra access to us. This part is for social access, however I will do a second part to this with emotional access that we are starting to cover with our tween, and will be used for the rest of her life.
Because we don’t immediately make friends, rather than discussing who is a friend, let’s talk about what someone does to move from peer to friend.
- Treats you with kindness reliably
- Respects the boundaries you set for your body reliably
- Helps you follow the rules your parents set by not nagging you to break them
- You’ve spent enough time around them to get a good idea of if they’re the type of person you want influencing your life
- When you do spend time with them, you walk away not feeling bad about yourself
What kind of social access/information do friends get?
- These are the people that, if sleepovers are allowed, you do sleep overs with
- You see them outside of just school
- Chances are, your parents know their parents, and they have one another’s phone numbers
- You’ve been to one another’s house to play, or arranged a specific meet up at a public space to play
- These are people you can share your address and phone number with
- These are also people that you miss specifically when you don’t see them for a while
What it does not include?
At this point, there isn’t much information a friend won’t get. It’s up to you to decide if there are specifics you need to make sure your kids don’t discuss with friends. This might look like safe words, weapons in the home, access to rooms that are deemed off-limits (usually mom and dad’s room), etc. This list is usually more personalized to each family at this point.
Check over here if you want the emotional version of this geared towards tweens/teens.
