Latest / Stuff Mom Never Told You / A Look at Modern Friendship: Part 2

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A Look at Modern Friendship: Part 2 · Stuff Mom Never Told You

• 0:05
  Speaker 1: Hey, Sanny and Samantha and welcome stuff. I never told
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: you prediction by her radio.
• 0:18
  Speaker 2: So we're back on part two of friendships. And if
• 0:21
  Speaker 2: you didn't listen to the early one, I guess you
• 0:23
  Speaker 2: can be you're you're okay, You're okay, because you could
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: go back after you're listening to this one. But if
• 0:27
  Speaker 2: you want to come in like a chronological order, I
• 0:30
  Speaker 2: would say go back, because we're going to jump in.
• 0:33
  Speaker 2: We just kind of talked about childhood stuff and now
• 0:35
  Speaker 2: we're going to talk about adult stuff. So what does
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: or how has it changed rather this friendship thing as adults?
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: How what is it like today?
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: Well, Samantha, I can tell you tell me. I will
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: say a lot of people have done so much research
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: on this, see our part one. But this whole idea
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: of making adults is making friends as adults? How does
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: that happen? How does that work? Oh? No, no one
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: can do it. So, yeah, people have looked into as
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: our changing times impacted what friendship looks like today, and yeah,
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: not in every way, but in a couple of important ways.
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: So there is a bit there has been a shifting
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: understanding of what women's friendships look like. Here's a quote
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: from Elle. Then things started to change. She began dropping
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: plans with me to do things with whomever she was
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: seeing instead, always a man. Of course, I didn't get it.
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: Why would hanging out with some guy she barely knew
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: be more important than plans with me. To her, disregarding
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: my feelings to promote romantic ones with someone else was
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: a totally fine thing to do. When I got mad
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: at her for spontaneously going with a guy she'd been
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: dating for two weeks to a local farm that we
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: had talked about visiting for age, she told me, matter
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: of factly, I was raised to look for the person
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: who I am going to share my life with, and
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: that's my priority. Okay, so obviously for contact. She's talking
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: about a friend very close to her who she started
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: noticing was dropping her for these kind of heterosexual relationships
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: with men, and it further goes on where they get
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: into a fight about it, and this friend said to her,
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: it's like, you think I'm your boyfriend or something. And
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: so this article actually breaks down the history of queer
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: coating friendships because her friend was essentially saying, I'm not gay. Okay, Like,
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: you know, the important relationship to me is the romantic one,
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: not the platonic one. I do think something we've discussed
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: a lot on this show. I think that's changing. I
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: do think that women's friendships have been demonized for a
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: while in media, and that has impacted real life friendships.
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: But we've seen so many examples of these positive portrayals
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: of friendships between women, and we've seen I personally have
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: seen a lot of media about like the commune, the
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: idea women just living in the commune together, all of
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: those things. But I also think that I went through this,
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: I'm sure a lot of you listeners did, but having
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: that friend who used to talk about how will never
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: be with boys, and then suddenly that's what they want
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: and you were I used to call it the old
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: tour on the shelf. That's how I felt. I was
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: like the one they came to when there was no
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: boy right then. I was the person they contacted, and
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: it was It's not a great feeling.
• 4:10
  Speaker 2: No, you knew when they were going through a break
• 4:14
  Speaker 2: and all of a sudden they wanted to hang out
• 4:15
  Speaker 2: and you're like, wait, oh, okay, y'all broke up, cools,
• 4:19
  Speaker 2: let's go. I will say I think it's interesting because
• 4:22
  Speaker 2: again I came I'm a I'm a late bloomer when
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: it comes to relationships, so for me, it was all
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: about my friends. And even coming later, I was like,
• 4:31
  Speaker 2: if my friends don't like him, then we are not
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: going to be cool, probably because I'm gonna need that.
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: You need to know. Yes, you are important my life,
• 4:43
  Speaker 2: but my friends are due mm hmm, and there's gonna
• 4:46
  Speaker 2: be if they need me, I'm gonna drop whatever to
• 4:48
  Speaker 2: go to there if at all positive, unless it's an
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: emergency on my end. But my loyalty goes in both
• 4:54
  Speaker 2: ways as well. But like my friendships always came first,
• 4:57
  Speaker 2: like of course being in a long term relationship, so
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: we actually live together and I have grown into a partnership,
• 5:03
  Speaker 2: like he has slowly become my best friend, like he
• 5:07
  Speaker 2: knows the most about me and he sees the most
• 5:09
  Speaker 2: about me now but when it was beginning, No, but
• 5:13
  Speaker 2: even now, I still try to maintain my friendships. To
• 5:17
  Speaker 2: be fair, it's because he also lives here, so it's
• 5:21
  Speaker 2: easier to maintain my friendship with a person I live with.
• 5:24
  Speaker 2: Am I right, But like all those things that, like,
• 5:26
  Speaker 2: my friendships have always been important as well, And he
• 5:31
  Speaker 2: also knows that. So he is also the first one
• 5:33
  Speaker 2: to be like, they need you, did you check up
• 5:34
  Speaker 2: on them? What's going on with them? Like he loves
• 5:37
  Speaker 2: the gossip just as much as like they do you
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: know what I mean, or any of those conversations and
• 5:42
  Speaker 2: following up make sure they're okay, and he wants to
• 5:44
  Speaker 2: know that they're okay. Like that's the only way this,
• 5:48
  Speaker 2: like this relationship has worked is because to him that
• 5:52
  Speaker 2: is also important, and he knows that's important. So he
• 5:56
  Speaker 2: respects that and is a part of that. He's a
• 5:58
  Speaker 2: part of the friend group and not like competing with
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: a friend group, which happens a lot. There are a
• 6:04
  Speaker 2: lot of people that I'm like, Okay, I don't like
• 6:06
  Speaker 2: that person you're dating. We I'm gonna have to let
• 6:08
  Speaker 2: you be yeah.
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: Yeah, And we'll get into that in a second a
• 6:14
  Speaker 1: bit more. But that is I think that me and
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: your partner, we're good friends. We hang out, we have
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: a great old time.
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: When you're like that you two have are wonderful, and
• 6:27
  Speaker 2: I'm like, I'll go to bed, y'all have fun.
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: Yeah, And I do think at least that's a visible
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: way it's changed. I don't think that it's necessarily new,
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: but a lot of these things we're talking about are
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: more visible ways that it's changed, as opposed to I
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: think it was always happening, we just weren't hearing about
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: it as much.
• 6:48
  Speaker 2: And also I think like we're learning from the older
• 6:52
  Speaker 2: generations of women who has been ostracized, specifically women ostracized
• 6:56
  Speaker 2: in their marriage to feel like my life has to
• 6:59
  Speaker 2: be my children and my husband and two being like, wait,
• 7:02
  Speaker 2: don't do this to yourself, because when they leave, you
• 7:05
  Speaker 2: start kind of falling apart. Like my mom didn't have
• 7:09
  Speaker 2: many friends while she was a mother and a wife,
• 7:11
  Speaker 2: but when everybody left, she was kind of like, oh,
• 7:15
  Speaker 2: my best friend's my sister. And then her sister introduced
• 7:18
  Speaker 2: her to a group of women and they are doing
• 7:19
  Speaker 2: more and more things together. I'm like, I love that great.
• 7:22
  Speaker 2: But she kind of had a moment that she didn't
• 7:25
  Speaker 2: have that because her daughter was her best friend type
• 7:28
  Speaker 2: of thing. And I think like she wouldn't say she
• 7:30
  Speaker 2: regrets that, but I know a lot of the older generations,
• 7:33
  Speaker 2: Boomer generations would say I wish I'd kept in touch
• 7:37
  Speaker 2: with my friends or I wish I had, you know,
• 7:39
  Speaker 2: kept this going because they felt really isolated and lonely
• 7:42
  Speaker 2: after the fact.
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, my mom was the same way. It was
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: a strange experience when her and my dad were having
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: such difficulties where I'm her adult child, but I'm her child,
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: and I was like, you know, let me talk to
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: you about these things. You know, you can make friends,
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: You've got life a of you. You don't have to.
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: It doesn't have to end here because this relationship has
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: defined you for so long that you have And she
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: has reconnected with her old friends, and yeah, I do too.
• 8:20
  Speaker 2: Get women outlive men statistically, so there's been a conversation
• 8:25
  Speaker 2: about what that looks like as well for the older generations.
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: Yes, and as we said in the last episode and
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: in previous episodes, friendship has positive health benefits and women
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: have more support systems after a divorce or breakup, and
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: that does help. Something else I ran into in a
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: lot of articles women's friendships being framed as resistance, as
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: power and strength. The ones who build you up, who
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: give you strength, who help you grow and learn, So
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: that touches on, you know, as we were discussing, the
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: friends who open you up to ideas you didn't know about,
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: or just show you the where you're lacking and you're learning,
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: or where you should really work work on. In that
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: positive I'm investing in you. I want you to grow way.
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: And when we're talking about protest or resistance and all
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: of that and how exhausting all of it can be,
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: having those friends who do help you keep going, who
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: are the ones that show up with you at the
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: protest or show up with you at whatever it is
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: that it is a form of resistance, and that is
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: something I is not new, It's not new at all,
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: but it is something that I think has become more
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: talked about visibly in recent years and is extremely important.
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: A recent study found that self identified feminists were less
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: likely to self silence in their friendships with women, which
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: we just talked about self silence, Yes, we did, yes,
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: and how that can be damaging to your health. So
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: I thought that was really interesting. Okay, when it comes
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: to marry and marrying later, because women are marrying later
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: in general, has it changed friendships? Uh? Okay, so many
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: of these things we could do entire episodes on. I know.
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: Here's the brief, here's the brief answer. Studies do show
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: that marriage does impact friendships and often leads to a
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: loss of friendship due to new priorities and scheduling constructions. However,
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: women are better at keeping friends after marriage as compared
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: to men, and there are tips online about how to
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: maintain friendships after marriage. And it echoes a lot of
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: what we've been talking about in this two parter, being
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: intentional and consistent including friends in new stages of your
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: life while being mindful about boundaries and being honest. Yeah,
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: as we talked about, sometimes life just gets in the
• 11:07
  Speaker 1: way and you wait until you have the right time
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: and proximity and that's when you meet up again. But
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: it does. It definitely is something we've talked about before
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: where like, oh you're married, now you move to the suburbs.
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: That's the top one for me. Yeah, I still want
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: to see you. I will do it.
• 11:25
  Speaker 2: But yeah, I would love to see you, but I
• 11:27
  Speaker 2: also know you may have priorities with your husband, his family,
• 11:31
  Speaker 2: You have new obligations. One of the things that I
• 11:34
  Speaker 2: newly discovered is my partner's family that I actually really
• 11:37
  Speaker 2: get along with and like I consider now friends, Like
• 11:40
  Speaker 2: there'll be a moment we are again. But this and
• 11:44
  Speaker 2: Breff is like ever thought of, like if we break up,
• 11:46
  Speaker 2: what happens. I think I always try to remain friends
• 11:50
  Speaker 2: with the siblings. I don't know if that's allowed or not,
• 11:52
  Speaker 2: because it turns out we have a lot in common,
• 11:54
  Speaker 2: not just poking fun at my partner, but in a
• 11:57
  Speaker 2: lot and common to the point that we buy same
• 11:59
  Speaker 2: thing because we're on the same wavelength of so many things.
• 12:03
  Speaker 2: But like I kind of love that, Like I get
• 12:06
  Speaker 2: to build even more friendships. Again, he's friends with a
• 12:09
  Speaker 2: lot of my friends and keeps in contact with them
• 12:11
  Speaker 2: and knows about them, probably has their number as well
• 12:14
  Speaker 2: as like can tell happy birthday, are included in the
• 12:18
  Speaker 2: celebrations in those moments, so like those were amazing, like
• 12:22
  Speaker 2: some of if you're I think with the later friendships,
• 12:25
  Speaker 2: we all see like we kind of get into a
• 12:28
  Speaker 2: bigger group. So I have a lot of friends. I
• 12:30
  Speaker 2: had friends who are married, like as a group of friends,
• 12:33
  Speaker 2: Like they were my friends. The two of them are
• 12:35
  Speaker 2: my friends. I had two friends again, I had friends
• 12:37
  Speaker 2: that married within the friend group, which was like, oh no,
• 12:39
  Speaker 2: but okay, And after some like rearranging of priorities, we
• 12:44
  Speaker 2: became good friends. Like there's this level of like older
• 12:47
  Speaker 2: generations that as we wait to get like in relationships,
• 12:52
  Speaker 2: we mature and I think for the most part, and
• 12:55
  Speaker 2: because this is not something that I've read yet, but
• 12:58
  Speaker 2: my assumption is we're a little more mature and are
• 13:01
  Speaker 2: able to make better decisions and usually thoughtful decisions at
• 13:06
  Speaker 2: an older age because we've gone through a lot of things,
• 13:09
  Speaker 2: whether it's we've been able to live on our own
• 13:11
  Speaker 2: so know how to take care of ourselves. We probably
• 13:13
  Speaker 2: have a lot of our own stuff that we come
• 13:15
  Speaker 2: together we have to like shift through because we have
• 13:17
  Speaker 2: too many of those adult things and like we don't
• 13:19
  Speaker 2: need fifteen pots, we only need five calm down, you know,
• 13:23
  Speaker 2: like type of conversations. But learning to work through that
• 13:27
  Speaker 2: because we've already established ourselves socially in whatever realm, and
• 13:33
  Speaker 2: so we come in with more friendships. Again, there could
• 13:36
  Speaker 2: be dynamics where you don't like each other the new
• 13:38
  Speaker 2: significant other, but if everything goes as planned, hopefully with
• 13:42
  Speaker 2: the better decisions, because I would think you would want
• 13:45
  Speaker 2: to be a partners with someone who, like your friends,
• 13:49
  Speaker 2: are on the same wavelength. That could be a question marks.
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: What the Spice Girls taught me.
• 13:59
  Speaker 2: And they are not wrong. It still stands strong. But
• 14:04
  Speaker 2: with that I think that's yeah, I think the waiting
• 14:08
  Speaker 2: to like with all those decisions, it's very conscious decisions.
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I think so too. And as we talked about
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: in part one, there is an intentionality in adult friendships
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: that is not there necessarily in childhood friendships. So the
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: older you get as marriage is kind of delayed, I
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: feel like you get that foundation of maybe your new
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: adult friends before you get married, and then probably there's
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: a meshing of meeting people and other friend groups of
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: your spouse's friend group or whatever before that, So there
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: is I do think that probably has changed how adult
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: friendship looks.
• 14:57
  Speaker 2: I mean, like I have seen many a videos where
• 15:00
  Speaker 2: people will say, go look at the partner's friend group
• 15:04
  Speaker 2: and it'll tell you a lot about them. And I
• 15:06
  Speaker 2: think that is like those are warning signs or those
• 15:08
  Speaker 2: are good signs. And I think that in itself can
• 15:10
  Speaker 2: be a whole thing of like, oh, yeah, that's why
• 15:13
  Speaker 2: we are together or we aren't together. That intention Again,
• 15:16
  Speaker 2: some people don't care. Some people will care about the
• 15:18
  Speaker 2: red flags. I think more and more people do.
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: Yeah, And one thing I found interesting according to psychology today,
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: a lot of times the spouse are partner of a
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: friend will be a passive friend and not an active friend,
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: meaning that you find them pleasant enough, but don't go
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: out of your way to make time for them. I
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: feel that I've seen this a lot most of my friends.
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: I'm at least I'm on good terms with their partner, right,
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: But that makes sense to me. And the article I
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: was reading the Psychology today, she was like, I just
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: have to This is the person I want to give
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: my time to. If he is there, that's great, but
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: I'm not going to seek him out separately. But she
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: is the person.
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: Yeah, there's no reason for me to talk to you.
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a timing issue. Like you know, as we said,
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: this is the person you want to make time for
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: you like this other person, You're not mad that they're there,
• 16:18
  Speaker 1: but you're not mine, right. Yes, And there isn't too
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: much research on this that I could find, but anecdotal
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: stories online from newly divorced women report a loss of
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: friendships after a divorce. The speculated reasons range from fear
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: of grief as in, your friends don't want to deal
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: with your grief, choosing one partner over the other, feeling
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: threatened by a newly single woman, which I found interesting,
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: and stigma divorced stigma. On the other hand, I've spoken
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: personally to several divorced women who bonded with other divorced women,
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: So that's another instance where you might bond to someone.
• 17:03
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I've seen so many stories. I've seen many of
• 17:07
  Speaker 2: stories where people who have been cheated on by the
• 17:09
  Speaker 2: same person becoming good friends.
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 17:12
  Speaker 2: Those are my favorites, to be honest, because they're like,
• 17:14
  Speaker 2: this is that girl's girl level of like, oh no,
• 17:17
  Speaker 2: you me, Let's all just show up together and now
• 17:19
  Speaker 2: we're going to get drinks like that level of like,
• 17:23
  Speaker 2: those are my one of my favorites. Not that they
• 17:24
  Speaker 2: got cheated and I hate that for them, but they
• 17:26
  Speaker 2: got at least a friendship out of it.
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and that's something we, uh, we've talked about before.
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: I would much rather that happen than kind of the
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: tearing down of the quote other woman, when usually it
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: was the dude who.
• 17:39
  Speaker 2: Look trying that person being like, why are you giving
• 17:41
  Speaker 2: so much grief to the woman? Is the dude is
• 17:43
  Speaker 2: the common factor here, He's the enemy or the person
• 17:47
  Speaker 2: that's cheating rather sorry sorry, because women can cheat.
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: You indeed.
• 18:01
  Speaker 2: Does having children who change friendships, and I think you
• 18:06
  Speaker 2: already know I think most people already know. Yeah, Unfortunately
• 18:09
  Speaker 2: it can. It can change, and friendships are lost, and
• 18:14
  Speaker 2: it's nobody's fault. Again, it's everything about time and priorities
• 18:20
  Speaker 2: and a child being someone's priority is not a bad thing.
• 18:24
  Speaker 2: Actually it should be. It makes perfect sense as to
• 18:27
  Speaker 2: be that if you didn't have that child as a priority,
• 18:30
  Speaker 2: I would be concerned and ask why you have a child.
• 18:35
  Speaker 2: But yes, it does, absolutely it can change a friendship.
• 18:40
  Speaker 2: So there was an article in Essence where they talk
• 18:44
  Speaker 2: to a coach and I think she has our own
• 18:46
  Speaker 2: podcast to a friendship coach. Her name is Danielle Bayard Jackson,
• 18:49
  Speaker 2: and she talks about what changes, and she says, there
• 18:53
  Speaker 2: is research that shows a woman's physical makeup changes when
• 18:56
  Speaker 2: she has a baby, even your brain changes. I'm different.
• 18:59
  Speaker 2: So that's going to change the way that I interact
• 19:01
  Speaker 2: with people, the time I have available and my priorities.
• 19:05
  Speaker 2: It doesn't diminish the friendships that I had, but they
• 19:08
  Speaker 2: are going to change. We have to stop seeing change
• 19:10
  Speaker 2: as a side that it wasn't real or that they
• 19:12
  Speaker 2: were fake. So I think that's such a big conversations,
• 19:15
  Speaker 2: like things change, your priority changes, and it should it
• 19:19
  Speaker 2: absolutely should when it comes to being responsible for another
• 19:23
  Speaker 2: human that you have brought into this world, whether it's adopted,
• 19:25
  Speaker 2: whether it's you know, through your body, whatever whatnot. Yes,
• 19:30
  Speaker 2: you have new priorities and it's going to be that
• 19:34
  Speaker 2: child and not necessarily maintaining a friendship. Again, when we
• 19:38
  Speaker 2: talk about the things where we might not see each
• 19:40
  Speaker 2: other for days and days and days, months and months
• 19:42
  Speaker 2: and years, but we can come back together and still
• 19:44
  Speaker 2: enjoy it. Yes, but let's say having that child being
• 19:49
  Speaker 2: a part of that social interaction, it's going to change
• 19:54
  Speaker 2: the way you are interacting at that moment. Whether it's
• 19:57
  Speaker 2: you're going to try to be conscientious of what you're
• 19:58
  Speaker 2: going to say in front of a child, you're also
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: watching that the child is safe and okay and happy,
• 20:03
  Speaker 2: and maybe you're doting, and the friend's attention is going
• 20:07
  Speaker 2: to be on the baby as well. Like things do
• 20:09
  Speaker 2: change no matter what. I don't think it's unfortunate, but
• 20:13
  Speaker 2: it just happens. It will change. Especially again, I didn't
• 20:19
  Speaker 2: look at the gender reference, but you know it's true
• 20:21
  Speaker 2: for more for women, whether it's because of patriarchy expecting
• 20:26
  Speaker 2: women to only care for the baby and take the
• 20:28
  Speaker 2: baby with them everywhere, or child with them everywhere as
• 20:30
  Speaker 2: opposed to having the father take care of it. Oftentimes
• 20:34
  Speaker 2: we also talk about the father just babysitting instead of
• 20:37
  Speaker 2: actually caregiving. Yeah, and that's still a conversation that's up
• 20:41
  Speaker 2: for debate, which is really really annoying. And then there
• 20:44
  Speaker 2: was this article from the pnmag dot com about parenthood.
• 20:48
  Speaker 2: They said motherhood is an all encompassing mind and body
• 20:51
  Speaker 2: consuming experience. It changes you, and that is what it's
• 20:54
  Speaker 2: supposed to do. You navigate pregnancy, then you have to
• 20:58
  Speaker 2: figure out how to care for a tiny human. You're
• 21:00
  Speaker 2: inundated with information from doctors, families, friends, websites, and books,
• 21:03
  Speaker 2: but few people talk about how some of your close
• 21:05
  Speaker 2: relationships may be impacted once you become a mom, and
• 21:11
  Speaker 2: they go onto talking about that deeper level of understanding
• 21:16
  Speaker 2: that this a caa' this is your priority, This is
• 21:18
  Speaker 2: what you live in and breathe, especially the most formative years.
• 21:23
  Speaker 2: There are things that you have to care for and
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: you should. That is parenthood actually caring and loving the child.
• 21:30
  Speaker 2: Of course, there are things of like also socializing children
• 21:34
  Speaker 2: and adapting a child into normal behavior instead of adapting
• 21:39
  Speaker 2: environment to the child like that's also up for debate.
• 21:44
  Speaker 2: Attachment issues are a thing, and having a good social
• 21:47
  Speaker 2: circle is important as well. That's my social work side.
• 21:51
  Speaker 2: We're not going to go into there, but just you know,
• 21:53
  Speaker 2: put that out there as well. And that article actually
• 21:56
  Speaker 2: goes on to talk about the child free and mothers.
• 21:59
  Speaker 2: So this is what it says. Doctor Holmes, who is
• 22:02
  Speaker 2: one of the people they are interviewed for this article,
• 22:05
  Speaker 2: further explains, I think there's a vast gap, if not divide,
• 22:09
  Speaker 2: when it comes to women with children and child free women.
• 22:11
  Speaker 2: I was child free until I had my daughter as
• 22:13
  Speaker 2: thirty six years old, and I was left out of
• 22:16
  Speaker 2: many conversations about having children because that is what women
• 22:19
  Speaker 2: often find ease and bonding over. I would not say
• 22:22
  Speaker 2: that I felt left out. Rather I felt like I
• 22:24
  Speaker 2: existed in a different world. It wasn't until I had
• 22:27
  Speaker 2: my daughter that I realized the depth and breadth of motherhood,
• 22:30
  Speaker 2: essentially how all encompassing it can be. So even understanding
• 22:34
  Speaker 2: that when it comes to child free and mothers, when
• 22:39
  Speaker 2: they come together, the conversation can sometimes lack, especially when
• 22:43
  Speaker 2: it can feel like one side is understanding in the other.
• 22:46
  Speaker 2: I've told this story before and it's not funny, but
• 22:49
  Speaker 2: I made a bad call in saying referencing a stay
• 22:55
  Speaker 2: at home mom friend when she had made a passive
• 22:58
  Speaker 2: joke about ten minutes before my comment, and because I
• 23:02
  Speaker 2: do come off as really intense, but when she was like,
• 23:04
  Speaker 2: you know, I just stay home with the kids, mostly
• 23:07
  Speaker 2: because we were talking about the things that they'd done,
• 23:09
  Speaker 2: and so my translated my head translated into coming back
• 23:13
  Speaker 2: to that conversation and going, so what do you do
• 23:15
  Speaker 2: all day? That obviously came off very offensive, and in
• 23:18
  Speaker 2: my head I was like, no, no, no, that's not what
• 23:19
  Speaker 2: I mean. Like you said, you're the one who said okay.
• 23:21
  Speaker 2: Having to backtrack and realizing the way I said that
• 23:24
  Speaker 2: really was offensive, and I get why because I was like, oh,
• 23:27
  Speaker 2: I stepped at it. That's not how I meant to say.
• 23:29
  Speaker 2: I was referencing back to what you said in a
• 23:32
  Speaker 2: really bad way, in a really bad pause. I apologize,
• 23:35
  Speaker 2: but in understanding that she absolutely felt like I was
• 23:38
  Speaker 2: removing her importance and that's not what I'm meant to do.
• 23:43
  Speaker 2: It was more of like me coming back, so what
• 23:44
  Speaker 2: are you doing outside of this? Because I know you are,
• 23:49
  Speaker 2: But the way I said it was real bad, was
• 23:52
  Speaker 2: real bad, and I acknowledged that. I I acknowledged that
• 23:54
  Speaker 2: before then because I was like, oh, rightly so, and
• 23:56
  Speaker 2: I had to come back, and I don't think. I
• 23:58
  Speaker 2: don't think I recovered well enough because like, I'm not
• 24:00
  Speaker 2: saying that you don't. I'm trying to reference back what
• 24:02
  Speaker 2: you were hale. That conversation obviously has haunted me because
• 24:06
  Speaker 2: it's been over ten years, I believe. But all of
• 24:10
  Speaker 2: that to say is like, that's that level of like
• 24:13
  Speaker 2: her automatically thinking that I'm putting a wall up and
• 24:17
  Speaker 2: then me being like, oh, yeah, she's never gonna understand
• 24:21
  Speaker 2: how I'm trying to frame this because it's coming from
• 24:24
  Speaker 2: me who is not in that same world. So there's
• 24:28
  Speaker 2: this conversation of like what happened to that function of
• 24:30
  Speaker 2: friendship and our friendship, Like she and I went opposite
• 24:34
  Speaker 2: directions because she also made a statement to me it
• 24:37
  Speaker 2: was like, you don't understand what it's like to have
• 24:39
  Speaker 2: children when we were talking about a very heavy issue
• 24:43
  Speaker 2: about abortion, in which my response was like, yeah, you
• 24:45
  Speaker 2: don't understand what it's like to watch children who don't
• 24:48
  Speaker 2: have good parents and then they end up being murdered,
• 24:53
  Speaker 2: which is what kind of that conversation was, and it
• 24:56
  Speaker 2: really was a big divide because her made mine was
• 25:00
  Speaker 2: made up in that because I had not birth children,
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: I could not understand the depth of why she sees
• 25:07
  Speaker 2: this abhorrent thing. And for me as a child free
• 25:11
  Speaker 2: person who also sees the depth of like hell that
• 25:15
  Speaker 2: people put kids through, and then also the expectations of
• 25:21
  Speaker 2: women who don't have children like that level, like your
• 25:24
  Speaker 2: value is gone now because you choose not to have
• 25:26
  Speaker 2: kids like that level. So that there was just like
• 25:30
  Speaker 2: divide that really did break a friendship. I don't like
• 25:33
  Speaker 2: we haven't came back. I don't know if she'll ever
• 25:36
  Speaker 2: listen to if she's listening to the episode. Sorry, but
• 25:39
  Speaker 2: all this to say is like that it definitely was
• 25:41
  Speaker 2: a bigger issue that kind of came from my decision
• 25:46
  Speaker 2: not to have children, her decision to have children, And
• 25:48
  Speaker 2: both of those things are very valiant, Like I think
• 25:50
  Speaker 2: both of those choices are completely relevant to all the
• 25:54
  Speaker 2: things and the free will and having that choice is
• 25:57
  Speaker 2: beautiful and I love children. I don't want my own.
• 26:01
  Speaker 2: I've taken twenty years of my life to take care
• 26:04
  Speaker 2: of children other people's children because I want that value.
• 26:08
  Speaker 2: But I you know, see, like Okay, this is not
• 26:10
  Speaker 2: for me, This is not what I wanted, This is
• 26:12
  Speaker 2: not what I want. But all of that to say
• 26:15
  Speaker 2: is like when motherhood comes up or when parenthood comes up, rather,
• 26:20
  Speaker 2: it does make a difference. Things state it and as
• 26:23
  Speaker 2: it should, as I should not be a priority to
• 26:26
  Speaker 2: my friend who just had a child. Why would I?
• 26:28
  Speaker 2: Does that hurt my feelings? No? But also like it
• 26:30
  Speaker 2: leads to what I said earlier, like they have the
• 26:34
  Speaker 2: court in their ball because I have the free, yeer
• 26:36
  Speaker 2: schedule than you, because you have all of these obligations
• 26:40
  Speaker 2: that I don't have. So my mind as a child
• 26:43
  Speaker 2: free person on my ay, do you and then if
• 26:48
  Speaker 2: you want to hang, I'm down, let's go. But again,
• 26:52
  Speaker 2: if I don't like your child, which I haven't met children,
• 26:55
  Speaker 2: I haven't met many of Like most of my friends
• 26:57
  Speaker 2: who have kids, I usually really like them. So I
• 27:00
  Speaker 2: really haven't met any that. I'm like that with trying
• 27:03
  Speaker 2: to think, but there's just like I didn't like some
• 27:07
  Speaker 2: of my family members children. I'm like, yeah, I'm not
• 27:08
  Speaker 2: coming around to you.
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: See you, I have a friend's dog. Just like that.
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: I don't want to correct this. We're not going to
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: go back, but you definitely said, Court and your ball.
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: Oh did I believe it? I love it. I think
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: it's fantastic.
• 27:33
  Speaker 2: But yeah, so there's still much ship that like. It
• 27:35
  Speaker 2: is a conversation about how that does change friendships and
• 27:41
  Speaker 2: even people, even other mothers, whether like being able to
• 27:46
  Speaker 2: be friends with other mothers who that can get messy.
• 27:52
  Speaker 2: I just know my mom felt a certain type of
• 27:55
  Speaker 2: way about my friend's mom and they were not cool
• 27:59
  Speaker 2: until we came friends, and that still didn't like it
• 28:02
  Speaker 2: took a long time. Oh, and there were some judgments
• 28:07
  Speaker 2: about like how this person's raised this children's So I
• 28:10
  Speaker 2: was like, well, okay, so that also comes into play
• 28:14
  Speaker 2: as well.
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: That's true. My mom had a beef with my best
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: friend's mom when I was growing up. But you know,
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: I also was researching this and I ran across a
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: lot of articles written by women who were newly mothers,
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: and they were talking about like where did all my
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: friends go? And they have this quote that actually led
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: me to texting a friend of mine who just had
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: a kid that was like, please don't stop texting me, please,
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: even if I never say yes, please, please please. So
• 28:51
  Speaker 1: I texted this friend and they responded and were like yep,
• 28:55
  Speaker 1: let's hang out this week when so it does change things.
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: But I think a part of that article is also like,
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: if what's holding you back is that you think I want,
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: like I've entered a new stage in life and want
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: nothing to do with you. Please don't let that hold
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: you back, right if it's something, But I mean that
• 29:15
  Speaker 1: could be the case, because it's exhausting to have a
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: child and care for a child. But if that's if
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: you're putting it in your head, don't put that on
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: on them. Is basically what I took from a lot
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: of the articles I read. And I had a lovely
• 29:30
  Speaker 1: lunch and it was great.
• 29:31
  Speaker 2: That's beautiful. But yeah, and that's kind of that thing too,
• 29:34
  Speaker 2: Like first time parents, there's a lot of conversation, but
• 29:39
  Speaker 2: I had a lot of friends, especially the younger you
• 29:41
  Speaker 2: are to this age does come into play, it seems,
• 29:45
  Speaker 2: and the support system you have, it might like if
• 29:48
  Speaker 2: you have a great support system, it might not be
• 29:51
  Speaker 2: so hard to go out with your child, you know
• 29:53
  Speaker 2: what I'm saying. And having that support system, you really
• 29:56
  Speaker 2: do need it, and that's wonderful. As you have more children,
• 30:00
  Speaker 2: it gets a little more difficult obviously, and you never
• 30:04
  Speaker 2: know because the no fault to the parent, no fault
• 30:06
  Speaker 2: to the child. They just may have a rougher time,
• 30:09
  Speaker 2: whether they have some kind of health situation they have,
• 30:12
  Speaker 2: like a feeding situation like that. So many things, and
• 30:15
  Speaker 2: it's harder to go out because it causes more anxiety.
• 30:20
  Speaker 2: Like if I was a parent with a newborn and
• 30:23
  Speaker 2: they were fussy, you would never see me out because
• 30:26
  Speaker 2: my anxiety could not Oh yeah, the focus I could not.
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: I would be the parent that thinks final destination is
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: gonna happen to my baby. I don't know how, but
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: I wasn't thinking of that. But okay, yeah, letting get
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: out something terrible will happens I put in place.
• 30:49
  Speaker 2: Let mean that do.
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: Well? Yah mannie. Yeah, well it was funny too. My
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: friend I was talking to was like, what how did
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: they phrase it? As they're lucky that they can afford
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: daycare and their child is just started daycare and he
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: was like, I had a friend who told me it
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: was better than any drug you could ever get, and
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: I laughed, and now I know it is. It's better.
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: You're buying time, that is what you're buying.
• 31:25
  Speaker 2: Okay, I mean, would I say, like having that support system,
• 31:30
  Speaker 2: whether it's having in law's grandparents who are able to
• 31:34
  Speaker 2: support you hopefully you're not abusing that system. And being
• 31:37
  Speaker 2: able to afford daycare, being afforded nanny, like all of
• 31:41
  Speaker 2: those things. It is important and it really should be
• 31:45
  Speaker 2: an automatic. It should be required for parenthood if you
• 31:48
  Speaker 2: want true parenthood, like if you want good parenting now,
• 31:51
  Speaker 2: not like I'm not saying it should be where no
• 31:55
  Speaker 2: one they don't have to parent anymore, right, but getting access. Yeah,
• 32:00
  Speaker 2: like getting respite. Respite is so important for every aspect,
• 32:06
  Speaker 2: and that could be just being able to sleep for
• 32:09
  Speaker 2: four hours, yeah, safely and comfortably.
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: Well, my friend said, you won't see me again until December,
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: so I oh contact.
• 32:21
  Speaker 2: I love that. I only see in people who don't
• 32:23
  Speaker 2: have kids but just have other like priorities and other responsibilities.
• 32:26
  Speaker 2: I see them three times a year.
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: It is beautiful. Yeah. I was so happy it worked out.
• 32:33
  Speaker 1: But that is this episode really made me reach out
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: to people.
• 32:38
  Speaker 2: I love that, Yeah, made me think about people I
• 32:41
  Speaker 2: didn't reach out, like, I'm still.
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: Wait to hearty for that. Oh okay, well we already
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: kind of briefly touched on this in the last episode.
• 32:53
  Speaker 1: I'm going to go over it because we're kind of
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: talking about how friendships have changed in these days and
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: how women being more empowered. Has that been better or
• 33:04
  Speaker 1: worse for friendships? I feel like I would say better,
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: but it has mental loss of friendships in some instances,
• 33:15
  Speaker 1: in other instances make you make your closer friends. So politics, yes,
• 33:21
  Speaker 1: politics from American Survey Center. Ending friendships over political disagreements
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: occurs more among liberal and Democratic leaning Americans. Democrats are
• 33:32
  Speaker 1: twice as likely as Republicans are to report having ended
• 33:35
  Speaker 1: to friendship over political disagreement twenty percent versus ten percent.
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: Political liberals are also far more likely than conservatives are
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: to say they are no longer friends with someone due
• 33:44
  Speaker 1: to political differences twenty eight percent versus ten percent, respectively.
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: No group is more likely to end a friendship over
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: politics than liberal women are. Thirty percent say they stop
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: being friends with someone because of their politics. In all,
• 33:58
  Speaker 1: twenty two percent of a Americans who have ended a
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: friendship sided Trump has their reason. So I think, sort of,
• 34:07
  Speaker 1: as we said, as you get older, you kind of
• 34:10
  Speaker 1: you cut some people out and you choose the ones
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: that you really want to be intentional with, and so
• 34:17
  Speaker 1: it can feel like you're losing friends and that is painful.
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: But on the other hand, you're probably going to make
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: friends who are more in line with what you're thinking.
• 34:26
  Speaker 1: Are you gonna are you going to make stronger friendships
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: with people that you already have?
• 34:30
  Speaker 2: Right, And I think it needs to be noted, like
• 34:32
  Speaker 2: I'm pretty sure you wouldn't probably jump into it that
• 34:34
  Speaker 2: but like when they delete it as just liberals, it
• 34:38
  Speaker 2: sounds like liberals are upset for myself as a person
• 34:41
  Speaker 2: of college, this is my livelihood. You are choosing when
• 34:44
  Speaker 2: we say that Trump is a reason is because his
• 34:47
  Speaker 2: policies are putting my life at risk. And you're okay
• 34:50
  Speaker 2: with it because it benefits you, and you're not since
• 34:53
  Speaker 2: it benefits you if you're of the Conservative party outside
• 34:57
  Speaker 2: of like it, outside of like it doesn't bother me.
• 35:00
  Speaker 2: I don't understand why you're so bothered. Literally like no,
• 35:03
  Speaker 2: but for me, I am waiting holding my breath to
• 35:08
  Speaker 2: see if that naturalization thing that they are already talking
• 35:11
  Speaker 2: about that Marco Robio has already like said that he's
• 35:14
  Speaker 2: going to do with fake reasons to take away visas
• 35:17
  Speaker 2: and citizenship and being like, yeah, so what you voted
• 35:21
  Speaker 2: for was literally me being left like everything is being
• 35:26
  Speaker 2: taken away from me, my rights as a woman, my
• 35:29
  Speaker 2: rights as a naturalized citizen, all of these things that
• 35:33
  Speaker 2: I never had a choice to begin with. Like it,
• 35:36
  Speaker 2: m it's a little different than just being liberal, Like
• 35:40
  Speaker 2: I understand what they're saying, being straightforward, but at the
• 35:42
  Speaker 2: same time, like, the reason is is not just because
• 35:45
  Speaker 2: you voted for somebody because I did not feel this
• 35:46
  Speaker 2: way about other candidates. Did I disagree with them, did
• 35:49
  Speaker 2: I not like them? Absolutely, but to this level that
• 35:52
  Speaker 2: I'm like, no, it is that serious?
• 35:58
  Speaker 1: Yeah, oh absolutely, Like it's that's and this, in my opinion,
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: this makes absolute sense because how can you square that
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: with the fact that, Okay, you actively voted for something
• 36:13
  Speaker 1: that is going to harm me physically, like people I
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: care about. Yeah, and it is frightening. So yeah, it
• 36:23
  Speaker 1: is definitely. That's why. It's not because.
• 36:26
  Speaker 2: We're good, I'm met at you. No, No, it's also
• 36:33
  Speaker 2: the reason why have the people on dating sites are
• 36:35
  Speaker 2: lying about voting for Trump.
• 36:38
  Speaker 1: That's true. What we've been meaning, we've been meaning to
• 36:42
  Speaker 1: talk about. We have been meaning to talk about that. Yeah, well,
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: a future episode, a future episode. One thing I pivoting.
• 36:53
  Speaker 1: One thing I find interesting is how the idea of
• 36:56
  Speaker 1: work friends has changed. Back when we were in office, Samantha,
• 37:01
  Speaker 1: we went to an office. You didn't have a dass,
• 37:04
  Speaker 1: but you still went. Sometimes.
• 37:07
  Speaker 2: I dressed up way more than everybody else.
• 37:09
  Speaker 1: You certainly did. I spent a lot of time with
• 37:14
  Speaker 1: my coworkers, and I count a lot of them as
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: true close friends. Some of them faded during the pandemic,
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: especially or if they got a different job, but a
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: lot of them are still in place. They're still my friends.
• 37:27
  Speaker 1: I've gone to their weddings, I've gone to the birthdays.
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: I've gone to their events, and they have gone to mine.
• 37:33
  Speaker 1: And it makes sense because you're spending a lot of
• 37:35
  Speaker 1: time together, you're sharing a similar work experience and generally values.
• 37:39
  Speaker 1: In this case, not always, but in our case, it's
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: where I met friends, and historically this is where most
• 37:45
  Speaker 1: people in recent generations have made friends. However, I've read
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: that gen Z has a different attitude, wanting to keep
• 37:53
  Speaker 1: their work life and personal life separate. That being said,
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: some reportings suggests that gen Z are looking to make
• 38:01
  Speaker 1: friends and are tired of everything being virtual, so they
• 38:04
  Speaker 1: are returning to the office and they are attending more
• 38:08
  Speaker 1: professional development events. Of note, they also came of age
• 38:14
  Speaker 1: without the social interaction and friendships of school that a
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: lot of us had, So that comes up in a
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: lot of the articles. I would love if somebody, if
• 38:22
  Speaker 1: people from gen Z would write in, because I got
• 38:24
  Speaker 1: a lot of conflicting information about this.
• 38:28
  Speaker 2: That's interesting. I've seen that as a demographic. I've seen
• 38:31
  Speaker 2: also like specific communities are like, no, I don't make
• 38:36
  Speaker 2: friends at work because I have my friends out here.
• 38:39
  Speaker 2: I don't need work. I want that to be separate
• 38:41
  Speaker 2: and like to the point that if like people would
• 38:46
  Speaker 2: get offended, but you had to be like, oh, okay,
• 38:49
  Speaker 2: this makes more sense. And then also like the types
• 38:51
  Speaker 2: of interests that people have, and that's outside of work,
• 38:57
  Speaker 2: that's enough because if their interests are like a lot,
• 39:00
  Speaker 2: like they are something that's a common thing every week,
• 39:03
  Speaker 2: book club, all those things, then they don't need that
• 39:07
  Speaker 2: level of friendship at work. Also, sometimes when you work
• 39:10
  Speaker 2: make work friends, all you talk about is work, and
• 39:12
  Speaker 2: you don't want that either.
• 39:14
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I think that kind of goes back to what
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: we were talking about in part one though, when you
• 39:18
  Speaker 1: were breaking down the type of friendships. Yes, like a
• 39:20
  Speaker 1: lot of work friendships can be just the acquaintances I
• 39:23
  Speaker 1: like seeing you at work, but I've had several that
• 39:26
  Speaker 1: have become more than that have a slickview exactly. Well,
• 39:31
  Speaker 1: and that's the thing is like where our offices sort
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: of different than I would imagine a lot of offices are. Yes,
• 39:39
  Speaker 1: since it does involve a lot of collaboration and usually
• 39:43
  Speaker 1: people who have similar values, who are really curious and
• 39:48
  Speaker 1: interested in things.
• 39:49
  Speaker 2: Oh, we have creative outlets as so that opens up
• 39:52
  Speaker 2: for a lot more like personal touches. Yeah, in personal
• 39:57
  Speaker 2: opinions as opposed to like my job working for government.
• 40:01
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so I don't I can't really put what our
• 40:06
  Speaker 1: experience has been on others. So I would love to
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: hear from other people. But in our case, it was
• 40:14
  Speaker 1: we had a good we had a good office before
• 40:16
  Speaker 1: the pandemic. We really did. We still do, but we
• 40:19
  Speaker 1: just no one goes in the office right.
• 40:21
  Speaker 2: Well, also we are now messed with the radio side. Yeah,
• 40:26
  Speaker 2: and no hate to the radio side, but it's just different.
• 40:28
  Speaker 1: It's yeah, it is. It is. Okay, So we're not
• 40:33
  Speaker 1: going to go too in depth into this, but yeah,
• 40:36
  Speaker 1: we have discussed making friends through a pandemic. This is
• 40:41
  Speaker 1: something gen Z did experience differently than a lot a
• 40:46
  Speaker 1: lot of us did. Several studies suggest that the COVID
• 40:49
  Speaker 1: nineteen pandemic led to a decline in American friendships. Young
• 40:53
  Speaker 1: women reported higher rates of friendship loss, so this could
• 40:56
  Speaker 1: be because they had in general more friends to lose.
• 40:59
  Speaker 1: And I have to say, I wouldn't say I lost friends,
• 41:02
  Speaker 1: but I definitely lost touch with a lot of friends.
• 41:05
  Speaker 1: And we'll hear from each other every now and then,
• 41:10
  Speaker 1: but the pandemic really did cut down on a lot
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: of that interaction.
• 41:29
  Speaker 2: We did already kind of cover this with our Monday
• 41:32
  Speaker 2: mini which kind of spurred into this bigger conversation, but
• 41:36
  Speaker 2: is there a loneliness epidemic? So again, because I was
• 41:40
  Speaker 2: very confused by all the people talking about the male
• 41:43
  Speaker 2: lowliness epidemic, and I was like, is there a male
• 41:45
  Speaker 2: loneliness epidemic? What's happening? Is this because the COVID was happening,
• 41:49
  Speaker 2: And like I said, we talked about it and it's
• 41:51
  Speaker 2: not just men. Yes, there is a male lowliness epidemic,
• 41:55
  Speaker 2: but it's actually a loneliness epidemic in general. The numbers
• 42:01
  Speaker 2: weren't more. It's kind of interesting in that level of like,
• 42:03
  Speaker 2: actually women are just as lonely, if not more. If
• 42:07
  Speaker 2: we talk about marginalized people, they're even more lonely. If
• 42:11
  Speaker 2: we talk about the trans community right now, they feel
• 42:12
  Speaker 2: really lonely. Like there's so many things that we could say,
• 42:15
  Speaker 2: but for some reason, there's this honing end of the
• 42:19
  Speaker 2: male lonliness epidemic. And in that conversation, it's like, Okay,
• 42:22
  Speaker 2: so what's happening, what are we doing? What is going on?
• 42:26
  Speaker 2: Why are we worried about this? And the reason they're
• 42:28
  Speaker 2: focusing on the epidemic, as in focusing on males, is
• 42:33
  Speaker 2: mainly because of the violence that we're seeing out of that,
• 42:36
  Speaker 2: and that's why it's called an epidemic, Like this is
• 42:39
  Speaker 2: not just about everybody's lonely, No, this is about what's
• 42:43
  Speaker 2: happening because of them being lonely. So an article that
• 42:47
  Speaker 2: I read from twenty twenty four, by the way, so
• 42:49
  Speaker 2: I want to preface this. This is a year old,
• 42:52
  Speaker 2: so nothing is in reference to today, although we can
• 42:54
  Speaker 2: come back and talk about it because I just discovered
• 42:57
  Speaker 2: Groyper's the hell is that in transbax, which are things
• 43:00
  Speaker 2: that I'm like, why am I learning about this? Ih?
• 43:04
  Speaker 2: The internet is dark? But again, this is part of
• 43:09
  Speaker 2: the problem. So what essentially is being said is during
• 43:13
  Speaker 2: the lockdown, we all saw real big loneliness epidemic and
• 43:18
  Speaker 2: things came bursting out, and the solution became the Internet
• 43:23
  Speaker 2: and being critically online all the time. And we've already
• 43:30
  Speaker 2: talked about in cells and how pervasive they have become,
• 43:33
  Speaker 2: what the Reddit community has become, what four Chan community
• 43:36
  Speaker 2: has become. And I'm saying this as these are extremists,
• 43:40
  Speaker 2: but this is a result and why it's an epidemic.
• 43:44
  Speaker 2: And then the new stuff, which I just kind of
• 43:46
  Speaker 2: mentioned that I'm like, it's apparently not new, but it's
• 43:49
  Speaker 2: just getting more famous. And I know we've talked about
• 43:52
  Speaker 2: it with a red pill, we got to talk about
• 43:53
  Speaker 2: it with a black pill. Like there's so many things
• 43:55
  Speaker 2: that we need to come down to we've talked about
• 43:56
  Speaker 2: with Bridget and we have to keep talking about this
• 43:59
  Speaker 2: because this is why is kind of scary, and this
• 44:01
  Speaker 2: is what we're having in conversation that again earlier conversation
• 44:05
  Speaker 2: about the inner group concept and why that's important and
• 44:08
  Speaker 2: why we need that because we see that men do
• 44:11
  Speaker 2: not want to talk to other men about emotional things
• 44:15
  Speaker 2: or anything that's of depth, but they're willing to talk
• 44:18
  Speaker 2: about with women, but also this layer of masculinity, hyper masculinity.
• 44:23
  Speaker 2: You can't be friends with a woman. But all of
• 44:26
  Speaker 2: that to say is that they are finding their solution
• 44:29
  Speaker 2: online and this is the problem. So in this independent
• 44:32
  Speaker 2: article that they wrote in twenty twenty four, they write, this,
• 44:34
  Speaker 2: a vicious cycle emerges. Boys and young men are encouraged
• 44:37
  Speaker 2: by society to perform an unhealthy masculinity that sees them
• 44:41
  Speaker 2: withdrawal emotionally from friends and family. They feel lonely and
• 44:44
  Speaker 2: go looking for connection and support online. They get purposely
• 44:48
  Speaker 2: shunted towards content that reinforces those damaging gender stereotypes and
• 44:52
  Speaker 2: further isolates them from their peers. Told that women are
• 44:56
  Speaker 2: their inferiors and men their competition. So what we have
• 45:00
  Speaker 2: is they're lonely. So their solution is to go into
• 45:04
  Speaker 2: content that tells them they are lonely and that's okay.
• 45:07
  Speaker 2: Their loneliness is going to feel their masculinity because everything
• 45:09
  Speaker 2: else in society is bad and it's working against you.
• 45:13
  Speaker 2: So they feed into this. And of course we had
• 45:15
  Speaker 2: a giant picture of Andrew Tait as one of the
• 45:17
  Speaker 2: biggest examples, who has gone through several charges of sexual
• 45:20
  Speaker 2: violence and rape and harassment, and men who have been
• 45:24
  Speaker 2: his fans continue to be his fans, which is again
• 45:27
  Speaker 2: part of this problem. And this leads into is this
• 45:31
  Speaker 2: killing women? Yes, yes, it is honestly is killing a
• 45:36
  Speaker 2: lot of people, including Charlie Kirk. This killed him. The
• 45:41
  Speaker 2: level of this problem is bigger with the added disasters
• 45:44
  Speaker 2: of COVID again insel and red pill, and I say
• 45:47
  Speaker 2: added it is kind of the result of So that's
• 45:51
  Speaker 2: that big problem and there's a bigger picture that can
• 45:53
  Speaker 2: be seen through this epidemic. So why is called an epidemic?
• 46:00
  Speaker 2: This is where we are. So in that same article
• 46:03
  Speaker 2: they kind of talk about it a little deeper and
• 46:04
  Speaker 2: says many on the right have sought to associate manhood
• 46:07
  Speaker 2: with politics. If you're a man in this country and
• 46:10
  Speaker 2: you don't vote for Donald Trump, you are not a man.
• 46:12
  Speaker 2: Charlie Kirk, a conservative activist, recently proclaimed the real world
• 46:16
  Speaker 2: consequences of this were arguably evident this week as Donald
• 46:19
  Speaker 2: Trump shocked the world to win the US presidential election.
• 46:21
  Speaker 2: Some fifty four percent of men cast their ballot for
• 46:24
  Speaker 2: the Republican but perhaps one of the starkest demographics differences
• 46:28
  Speaker 2: was between young men and women. Just under half. Forty
• 46:31
  Speaker 2: nine percent of the former age eighteen to twenty nine
• 46:33
  Speaker 2: voted for Trump, compared to thirty seven percent of the latter.
• 46:37
  Speaker 2: So this is a twenty threety four article that was
• 46:41
  Speaker 2: a quote from Charlie Kirk, and this concept was part
• 46:47
  Speaker 2: of the reason for his death. And we see this
• 46:50
  Speaker 2: is also the reason for many women's death and that
• 46:53
  Speaker 2: has heightened in itself as well. When we talk about femicide,
• 46:56
  Speaker 2: when we talk about grape culture, so much fear that
• 47:00
  Speaker 2: comes against women is this loneliness epidemic because men are
• 47:04
  Speaker 2: told you can't have friendships and whether it's men or women,
• 47:09
  Speaker 2: and that's such a dangerous, dangerous place to be obviously,
• 47:13
  Speaker 2: and this is where we're having this conversation of why
• 47:17
  Speaker 2: are we calling is an epidemic? And then we make
• 47:19
  Speaker 2: it a joke, and as a feminist who is sarcastic
• 47:23
  Speaker 2: and tired of this world, I've also made this as
• 47:26
  Speaker 2: a joke of like, what is happening though that he's
• 47:28
  Speaker 2: not lonely enough type of thing. But the real problem
• 47:32
  Speaker 2: is that we're teaching young boys to not trust anyone.
• 47:36
  Speaker 2: So therefore the internalized anger and guilt just comes out
• 47:40
  Speaker 2: in violence because that is told that it's the only
• 47:42
  Speaker 2: solution for true men is to be violent or volatile,
• 47:47
  Speaker 2: which is unfortunate because y'all, there's a lot to have
• 47:50
  Speaker 2: a good good night of wine or whatever dreams you want,
• 47:54
  Speaker 2: and conversations about things that you hate or love or
• 47:57
  Speaker 2: things you cry about or don't cry about. It's so fun.
• 48:02
  Speaker 2: Y'all are missing out. This is a part of being human.
• 48:05
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I noticed this growing up where I felt
• 48:14
  Speaker 1: like I had a really good group of friends and
• 48:16
  Speaker 1: my brothers didn't. Like my brothers had almost bullies, yes,
• 48:22
  Speaker 1: as friends.
• 48:25
  Speaker 2: Or they were the bullies, Like the entire time they
• 48:27
  Speaker 2: were doing jokes, are like prays on each other that
• 48:29
  Speaker 2: would really violent, like humiliating. I'm like, why is this
• 48:36
  Speaker 2: y'all's friendship? This is really odd.
• 48:40
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I saw that too, And they would tell me
• 48:43
  Speaker 1: about it, and I'm like, that's not your friends, that's.
• 48:47
  Speaker 2: And they would tell me like, you don't get it,
• 48:49
  Speaker 2: you're so sensitive, You're just a girl.
• 48:51
  Speaker 1: I'm like, I'm I'm a girl with friendships that don't
• 48:56
  Speaker 1: do that.
• 48:57
  Speaker 2: But I trust. But that's the thing. This is that
• 49:02
  Speaker 2: conversation that we need to have more of again about
• 49:05
  Speaker 2: that childhood level of understanding. That is okay, this is
• 49:09
  Speaker 2: what happens when we have this gender difference in gendered
• 49:12
  Speaker 2: makeup in childhood and we say boys need to be
• 49:15
  Speaker 2: with boys, boys will be boys, girls need to be
• 49:17
  Speaker 2: with girls, and this is your stereotype, and this is
• 49:20
  Speaker 2: your stereotype. Make sure you stay in this, and then
• 49:22
  Speaker 2: we have a lot of frustration.
• 49:25
  Speaker 1: Yep, I'll say it before I've said it before, I'll
• 49:30
  Speaker 1: say it again, adolescence that the whole show is about this.
• 49:35
  Speaker 2: Hey, they got a lot of awards, So.
• 49:37
  Speaker 1: The whole show is about how he doesn't have He
• 49:41
  Speaker 1: has friends, but they're not really good friends. He doesn't
• 49:44
  Speaker 1: have any friends who are girls, and he's online all
• 49:48
  Speaker 1: the time.
• 49:50
  Speaker 2: I mean, this is that would be exactly. I guess
• 49:53
  Speaker 2: it just feels too dark, but I probably should watch it.
• 49:57
  Speaker 1: It's very dark, but it has a fun thing. I
• 50:02
  Speaker 1: shouldn't phrase it that way because it's so much talent.
• 50:04
  Speaker 1: It's amazing. Everything is in one shot. Every episode's in
• 50:07
  Speaker 1: one shot, so it's very visually interesting.
• 50:10
  Speaker 2: It's very like, all right, I'll work myself up to it.
• 50:14
  Speaker 1: It's okay if you don't, but I'll tell you all
• 50:17
  Speaker 1: about it.
• 50:18
  Speaker 2: With all of that, with that happening, and then that's BLib.
• 50:21
  Speaker 2: We should talk about how technology has influenced friendships.
• 50:25
  Speaker 1: Yes, and this is also another one. I think we
• 50:28
  Speaker 1: should come back and go more into depth because I
• 50:32
  Speaker 1: didn't get to go into There are now a lot
• 50:36
  Speaker 1: of dating dating apps for friends, putting.
• 50:39
  Speaker 2: Clotes, y'all, she's putting clothes. You're saying it, but you
• 50:43
  Speaker 2: don't see They don't see it yet.
• 50:45
  Speaker 1: I've heard there's a quote voice and I'm trying to
• 50:48
  Speaker 1: do it, but I think so. But anyway, Yeah, there
• 50:52
  Speaker 1: are apps for making friends and even best friends, like
• 50:56
  Speaker 1: the bumble b f f app. It was really fun
• 51:00
  Speaker 1: reading accounts from people who have used these apps who
• 51:04
  Speaker 1: were like, well, that one didn't work out. I could
• 51:06
  Speaker 1: tell we weren't compatible, but it was for a friendship.
• 51:10
  Speaker 1: So that's something we're going to have to come back
• 51:13
  Speaker 1: and talk to because I actually got consumed by this
• 51:16
  Speaker 1: other aspect that has impacted my friendships, I have to say. So.
• 51:22
  Speaker 1: The pandemic really highlighted just how important tech can be
• 51:25
  Speaker 1: for maintaining friendships. I am assuming most of you downloaded
• 51:30
  Speaker 1: so many different apps and browser extensions during the pandemic.
• 51:34
  Speaker 1: To keep in touch with people. But one thing I've
• 51:38
  Speaker 1: noticed in my friendships that can cause some tension is
• 51:40
  Speaker 1: texting and texting habits. Does someone never text back oh no?
• 51:48
  Speaker 1: Or did they never text at all? If you're trying
• 51:52
  Speaker 1: to make plans and they never respond, what do you do?
• 51:55
  Speaker 1: Oh no? I have a friend that says no response
• 51:59
  Speaker 1: to the response, the response being no. But if that's
• 52:04
  Speaker 1: the case, then we need to establish a timeline.
• 52:06
  Speaker 2: Okay, my response is me, I'm thinking on.
• 52:09
  Speaker 1: It, which is fair. I do that too. But if
• 52:14
  Speaker 1: you're if the no, if the non response is no,
• 52:17
  Speaker 1: when can I accept it as a no? Because sometimes
• 52:22
  Speaker 1: I've done that and then later they'll they'll text me
• 52:24
  Speaker 1: and be like I want to go, and I'm like,
• 52:25
  Speaker 1: well it's sold out and I've already given the ticket
• 52:27
  Speaker 1: to someone else, and then they get mad at me.
• 52:29
  Speaker 2: Okay, well on them, like that's a fine line. Like
• 52:33
  Speaker 2: if you don't respond and it's closing the time and
• 52:36
  Speaker 2: you never say let me think about it, or any
• 52:38
  Speaker 2: of those situations, then that's on me, Like I because
• 52:41
  Speaker 2: I am that one. I am that person who does
• 52:43
  Speaker 2: not respond. If I one, if I don't immediately respond,
• 52:48
  Speaker 2: you're probably not going to get a response for a
• 52:50
  Speaker 2: while because I forgot, or I'm assuming it doesn't have
• 52:55
  Speaker 2: anything to do with me, even though I'm in this
• 52:56
  Speaker 2: group text. I really hate group text, y'all. Or I'm
• 53:01
  Speaker 2: thinking about it and I will let you know, but
• 53:03
  Speaker 2: before the time.
• 53:05
  Speaker 1: So we should establish a time. Listeners write in what
• 53:08
  Speaker 1: what is the acceptable time before? I mean, I guess
• 53:13
  Speaker 1: I could. I could text and be like, if you
• 53:14
  Speaker 1: haven't responded.
• 53:15
  Speaker 2: To me, I do. Yeah, if I've missed having to me,
• 53:19
  Speaker 2: I will ask you before I do it.
• 53:21
  Speaker 1: Because sometimes it's tickets are on the line and they're
• 53:23
  Speaker 1: going to sell it out, so I need to know.
• 53:26
  Speaker 1: I need to know. And yes, I have stopped inviting
• 53:30
  Speaker 1: people to stuff. If I never hear from you, I
• 53:33
  Speaker 1: do stop. Uh, And then I have found out they're
• 53:37
  Speaker 1: mad about it, typically through someone else. So I through
• 53:43
  Speaker 1: this research. I found an article again. I think it
• 53:45
  Speaker 1: was about the childhood, like a motherhood having a kid.
• 53:50
  Speaker 1: If you've just texted me and said no, but please
• 53:52
  Speaker 1: don't stop inviting me, I would appreciate that.
• 53:55
  Speaker 2: Actually I usually will. I'll be like, hey, I'm sorry,
• 53:59
  Speaker 2: I know I've an out interverted, don't come out, but
• 54:02
  Speaker 2: don't stop inviting me.
• 54:04
  Speaker 1: I would be happy, I'd be thrilled. But if you
• 54:07
  Speaker 1: never respond, then at a certain point I'm just like, Okay,
• 54:14
  Speaker 1: I'm picking up what you're putting down and it's nothing.
• 54:18
  Speaker 2: Disappeared.
• 54:19
  Speaker 1: Yeah. And in recent years there has been a lot
• 54:23
  Speaker 1: written about this and even studies done. The general consensus
• 54:27
  Speaker 1: is that a friendship that almost entirely relies on texting
• 54:30
  Speaker 1: is still a friendship as long as the exchange is
• 54:33
  Speaker 1: valued by all parties, especially when done frequently and when
• 54:36
  Speaker 1: you're sharing like mundane life stuff. Many people have also
• 54:42
  Speaker 1: reported enjoying it because it's easier. It can help ease
• 54:45
  Speaker 1: social anxiety for some. Some people have texting anxiety, and
• 54:49
  Speaker 1: there's more time to formulate your response, which I do appreciate.
• 54:53
  Speaker 1: It can help maintain otherwise unlikely friendships. I know some
• 54:57
  Speaker 1: people who still text people they have seen in person
• 55:01
  Speaker 1: for years. Texting has even been cited as potentially easing
• 55:05
  Speaker 1: the male friendship crisis and has been scientifically studied for
• 55:09
  Speaker 1: its positive benefits, which there are positive benefits. Recent research
• 55:14
  Speaker 1: has shown that even a brief check in with a
• 55:16
  Speaker 1: friend you haven't contacted it in a while has measurable
• 55:19
  Speaker 1: benefits especially if it's unexpected. So while a lot of
• 55:23
  Speaker 1: us me hesitate to text it first, science backs up
• 55:27
  Speaker 1: the plus size. And this is where I texted two
• 55:30
  Speaker 1: people I haven't texted for a while, and I've seen
• 55:32
  Speaker 1: both of them this week.
• 55:34
  Speaker 2: Wow, I'm loving that this episode has spurred your friendship times,
• 55:41
  Speaker 2: face to face times.
• 55:43
  Speaker 1: I love it.
• 55:43
  Speaker 2: I will say like that for me, that whole level
• 55:46
  Speaker 2: of anxiety when you have really smart, witty friends and
• 55:49
  Speaker 2: then you're all on a text threat and you're not
• 55:51
  Speaker 2: as funny as them or not as quick as them.
• 55:53
  Speaker 2: I stop and I Caroline is a part of this
• 55:56
  Speaker 2: group and they are so quick witted boom. We used
• 56:00
  Speaker 2: to do it on email. They used to do an
• 56:02
  Speaker 2: email chain where they would send complaints and gifts. Took
• 56:06
  Speaker 2: me forever to figure out how to do gifts, as
• 56:07
  Speaker 2: in fact, I don't think I still I still don't
• 56:09
  Speaker 2: think I know how to do it on email. And
• 56:11
  Speaker 2: so it would just come up as like you know,
• 56:13
  Speaker 2: an attachment, yeah, or it would blow up and do
• 56:15
  Speaker 2: the whole email. So I was like, I was fearful.
• 56:18
  Speaker 2: After that, I'm like, I cannot send, I cannot get
• 56:21
  Speaker 2: on par I'm not as funny as them online. I'm
• 56:24
  Speaker 2: funny in face to face online not as witty, so
• 56:28
  Speaker 2: like for me, that is my anxiety because they're so
• 56:32
  Speaker 2: funny and so quick and so like Quippi that I'm like,
• 56:36
  Speaker 2: that's funny, and then I move on and it's been
• 56:38
  Speaker 2: And also because other people's phones are iPhones and minds
• 56:42
  Speaker 2: and Android, they were not combatible for the longest time,
• 56:46
  Speaker 2: so sometimes they would not even get my messages, or
• 56:49
  Speaker 2: if I was sending us something, they couldn't read it.
• 56:51
  Speaker 2: It would just be an X and the same vice versa.
• 56:53
  Speaker 2: So it was just frustrating at that point.
• 56:56
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that says also caused a rift in some not
• 57:01
  Speaker 1: a riff, that's that's a serious term. But it's caused
• 57:04
  Speaker 1: a misunderstanding of friendship.
• 57:06
  Speaker 2: Group communications for sure.
• 57:07
  Speaker 1: Where they're like you never But it turns out it
• 57:10
  Speaker 1: was because we had an Apple group and an Android
• 57:14
  Speaker 1: group and they weren't getting older's messages.
• 57:17
  Speaker 2: I'm telling you what. That market they want you to
• 57:20
  Speaker 2: not be friends anymore, and they like, we don't like Android,
• 57:24
  Speaker 2: and Android's like, who who's appened?
• 57:29
  Speaker 1: That is a thing, and it's it's I've gotten caught
• 57:32
  Speaker 1: up in it before, where I'm like, is this friend
• 57:34
  Speaker 1: mad at me, she hates me. Everything is ruined, and
• 57:37
  Speaker 1: I try to look into That's one of the first
• 57:39
  Speaker 1: things I check. Is there a problem with the compatibility
• 57:43
  Speaker 1: of right now the text messages between Apple and Android.
• 57:47
  Speaker 1: Sometimes it is, sometimes it has been. So all of
• 58:02
  Speaker 1: those positive things being said, there are some things to
• 58:05
  Speaker 1: watch out for. One is generally try to be present
• 58:08
  Speaker 1: with the people you're with. So if you're hanging out
• 58:10
  Speaker 1: with someone in person and it isn't one of those
• 58:13
  Speaker 1: we're gonna chill and do our own thing hangs, then
• 58:17
  Speaker 1: hang out with them and try not to text someone
• 58:20
  Speaker 1: else so much. This is a huge pet peeve of mine.
• 58:24
  Speaker 1: I hate it. It makes me wonder why I'm there
• 58:28
  Speaker 1: at all, Like I could be doing something else instead
• 58:31
  Speaker 1: I'm at a dinner table and you're texting someone else.
• 58:34
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 58:36
  Speaker 1: No, But if you're just hanging out and you've kind
• 58:38
  Speaker 1: of established like, yeah, I'm just gonna do my own thing,
• 58:41
  Speaker 1: you do your own thing, that's its own. But if
• 58:44
  Speaker 1: I have made plans and we've gone to a place
• 58:47
  Speaker 1: and that's what happens, no, I hate that. I hate it.
• 58:51
  Speaker 1: Not news to anyone, but some emotional nuances can get
• 58:55
  Speaker 1: lost in text emojis, gifts or not. This can lead
• 59:01
  Speaker 1: to some misunderstandings. I have a friend whose messages read
• 59:05
  Speaker 1: is so terse. I'm always like, is she mad? But
• 59:12
  Speaker 1: then I saw her texting in action and she does
• 59:14
  Speaker 1: a lot of it through voice to text in her car,
• 59:16
  Speaker 1: and I'm like, got it.
• 59:20
  Speaker 2: I'm also very abrupt, like I don't need I just
• 59:24
  Speaker 2: like yes, no, and I don't mean it. But that
• 59:27
  Speaker 2: was just the I'm not trying to be abrupt. I'm
• 59:29
  Speaker 2: just like yeah, yeah, okay, fine.
• 59:33
  Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I've had to I've had to learn this
• 59:35
  Speaker 1: with you. I feel confident no, no, I feel confident
• 59:39
  Speaker 1: in our friendship where I'm like no, I get her
• 59:41
  Speaker 1: and you respond if I'm like asking you, I want
• 59:45
  Speaker 1: to do this, You're pretty good at like okay, yes, yeah, I.
• 59:53
  Speaker 2: Don't respond with gifts. But eventually it also is partially
• 59:57
  Speaker 2: someone has to end this. I'm a stuff.
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 1: It's all good.
• 1:00:01
  Speaker 2: I've thought that before all, not just not with you
• 1:00:03
  Speaker 2: in general. But it goes back to four of the
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 2: like you hang up, no, you hang up.
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 2: It feels like with a text there's no nothing, so
• 1:00:08
  Speaker 2: i'mike I'm done.
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 1: Someone does have to end it. I agree, I don't
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 1: think you're wrong. It is usually me sorry, yeah, no,
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 1: it's okay, it's okay, thank you. I love it too.
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 1: Speaking of the male friendship crisis, as beneficial as texting
• 1:00:25
  Speaker 1: can be for men, other articles highlighted how men aren't
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 1: the best at texting back, not just men. To be clear,
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 1: most notoriously bad textures in my group are women. But
• 1:00:37
  Speaker 1: I also have more women friends that have men friends.
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 1: So being worried about being too available or enthusiastic, so
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 1: waiting to respond to a group text because you don't
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 1: want to be the first one to say yes, even
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 1: if you're excited and want to go. I run into
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 1: this all the time, or I'm like, I have my answer.
• 1:00:53
  Speaker 1: I don't know if I want to be the first
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 1: one to respond, though.
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 2: I'm more of the opposite of like, who's gonna say
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 2: no first? I can't be too eager to say no,
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 2: you know, But.
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 1: To be honest again, if you just like were up
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 1: front and told me no, I'd be like, okay, it's
• 1:01:12
  Speaker 1: the non response that really goods.
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 2: But the thing about that is, and I'm gonna put
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 2: this out here, I know that my moods change, so
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 2: I don't want to respond till it's closer to time
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 2: to know how I feel, because it might change. I
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 2: might be ready to go. I'm so roaring, let's do this.
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 2: This is the one time a year I'll stay past
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 2: eleven PM. But I don't know about it until that
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 2: closer time. I don't want to change my mind.
• 1:01:37
  Speaker 1: Oh, I get you. I also I have what I
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 1: would say, enthusiastic Annie and depressed Annie. Neither of them
• 1:01:46
  Speaker 1: should be answering the text immediately. I need a more
• 1:01:51
  Speaker 1: stable one to be like, Okay, I am not I'm
• 1:01:55
  Speaker 1: in a good place, and yes I want to go. No,
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 1: I don't want to go because, yeah, husiastic me, you
• 1:02:00
  Speaker 1: might screw me over depress me.
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 2: Exactly exactly both both of those things. And I feel
• 1:02:06
  Speaker 2: like I'm being very defensive in this category and I
• 1:02:09
  Speaker 2: did my friends.
• 1:02:09
  Speaker 1: I'm sorry, this is all about you, Samantha. I just
• 1:02:14
  Speaker 1: wanted to confront you. I come to you. There are
• 1:02:21
  Speaker 1: tips online about how to keep friendships healthy if you're
• 1:02:23
  Speaker 1: a bad Texter me Samantha or our friends with a
• 1:02:28
  Speaker 1: bad Texter. And there are also people like my previously
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 1: mentioned friend who have a very strong opinion about not
• 1:02:37
  Speaker 1: responding being Okay, they don't think it's a problem. There's
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 1: also some handwringing about digital friendships in general, but a
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 1: lot of it feels really outdated. A lot of the
• 1:02:47
  Speaker 1: stuff I was reading about it felt really outdated. I
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 1: was like, it's like a chat one. They were basically
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 1: just like, this isn't real. And I feel like you
• 1:02:57
  Speaker 1: can have a good friend that you interact through through
• 1:03:00
  Speaker 1: digitally and it's real. It's a good friend. Yeah. Yeah,
• 1:03:05
  Speaker 1: but I feel like a lot of it was out
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 1: If you want to look up those tips, you can
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 1: find them online. I'm not going to go overrom but
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 1: they exist all right, and very briefly, to wrap this up,
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 1: childhood friendships to adult friendships, which I have some experience
• 1:03:20
  Speaker 1: with you.
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 2: I have one remaining from your held second grade.
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 1: Yeah, mine is generally I would say we solidified in
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 1: middle school, but we still we hang out every year,
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 1: We text each other pretty often. When it comes to
• 1:03:39
  Speaker 1: keeping childhood friendships into adulthood, one of the biggest factors
• 1:03:43
  Speaker 1: is that thing proximity that we've been talking about. According
• 1:03:47
  Speaker 1: to the American Survey Society quote, childhood friendships are ubiquitous
• 1:03:51
  Speaker 1: among the public. Two thirds of Americans say they have
• 1:03:54
  Speaker 1: a friend whom they have known since childhood. Yet, despite
• 1:03:57
  Speaker 1: the prevalence of these types of friendships, they have become
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 1: less common as Americans age. More than three quarters of
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 1: young adults have a childhood friend, compared to sixty percent
• 1:04:06
  Speaker 1: of seniors. Childhood friendships are particularly prevalent among Black Americans.
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 1: Nearly eight and ten Black Americans report having a friend
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 1: whom they have known since childhood. These types of friendships
• 1:04:18
  Speaker 1: are significantly less common among white and Hispanic Americans. I
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 1: was kind of surprised to read. I don't know why.
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 1: I thought they were rarer than all that.
• 1:04:29
  Speaker 2: I wonder again, like you have the one and I'm
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 2: wondering how many are reconnected because I really feel like
• 1:04:35
  Speaker 2: Facebook really brought on a new era of connecting. So
• 1:04:39
  Speaker 2: when Facebook first came out, that was the whole thing,
• 1:04:42
  Speaker 2: was going to see what happened to your school mats
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 2: or your college friends, like that was the intent MySpace
• 1:04:47
  Speaker 2: even but Facebook was the big one. I feel like
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 2: my Space was different and I think it came out
• 1:04:52
  Speaker 2: did it come after Facebook?
• 1:04:55
  Speaker 1: I feel like my Space was first, but I'm sure
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 1: I can't remember.
• 1:04:58
  Speaker 2: But for some reason, because Facebook really was the Twitter
• 1:05:02
  Speaker 2: of that time, you just did status where you didn't
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 2: even tell you where you were, I think, but you
• 1:05:07
  Speaker 2: had to be a part of college. That was it
• 1:05:10
  Speaker 2: was a college associated group. When the kids are like, what,
• 1:05:14
  Speaker 2: it's just a misinformation machine now, Well, once upon a
• 1:05:17
  Speaker 2: time it was about connecting two different groups within colleges.
• 1:05:21
  Speaker 2: So uga like grads, you had to be in college.
• 1:05:24
  Speaker 2: You had to show what school you were with when
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 2: it first happened, and I remember it really connected to
• 1:05:30
  Speaker 2: all of my high school, middle school people and going
• 1:05:34
  Speaker 2: back to trying to find people reconnecting, which by the way,
• 1:05:37
  Speaker 2: is a whole joke by the way in uh thirty
• 1:05:41
  Speaker 2: rock about that sites like that are only used to
• 1:05:44
  Speaker 2: reconnect or hook up with your crushes from high school
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 2: type of thing, which was funny, but like it really did.
• 1:05:50
  Speaker 2: You kind of went and checked and that opened up
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 2: seeing childhood friends which you may have last lost touch with,
• 1:05:55
  Speaker 2: especially if you went to different colleges and moved on.
• 1:05:58
  Speaker 2: What that looked like. And I wonder how many of
• 1:06:01
  Speaker 2: these friendships may be based on reconnecting.
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a good point. Uh. Any listeners write in
• 1:06:11
  Speaker 1: if you have that, I've the friend group I'm thinking of.
• 1:06:16
  Speaker 1: We mostly stayed in touched. We didn't connect over Facebook
• 1:06:24
  Speaker 1: like reconnect, but that makes a lot of sense.
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 2: So my friend and I, he and I have been
• 1:06:30
  Speaker 2: friends for a long time. We were in the same area,
• 1:06:33
  Speaker 2: so we often saw each other and then just kept
• 1:06:36
  Speaker 2: being connected because I think we both were like minded
• 1:06:39
  Speaker 2: and saw how people were changing and through Facebook as well,
• 1:06:42
  Speaker 2: and that kept us connect because like, we're like another
• 1:06:45
  Speaker 2: person like me that's different from this group of people,
• 1:06:48
  Speaker 2: and it was nice to see. And then his partner,
• 1:06:52
  Speaker 2: who I like very much, really loved our friendship and
• 1:06:55
  Speaker 2: for her to see that, it like encouraged She encouraged
• 1:07:00
  Speaker 2: him to keep more connected with me, and he was
• 1:07:02
  Speaker 2: like me, like, I love every time they come through
• 1:07:04
  Speaker 2: we see each other, but like, yeah, like we weren't
• 1:07:07
  Speaker 2: necessarily because I don't even think they he was ever
• 1:07:10
  Speaker 2: on Facebook. I've been thinking about it, but like we
• 1:07:14
  Speaker 2: were outside of that, but there was another person. We
• 1:07:17
  Speaker 2: never hung out, but we would reconnected through messages and
• 1:07:19
  Speaker 2: be like, oh my god, again, you and I are
• 1:07:21
  Speaker 2: like minded. What everybody else is this though it was
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 2: it's nice to see, but it's hard to keep it.
• 1:07:27
  Speaker 2: But because if we only see each other a couple
• 1:07:28
  Speaker 2: of times a year.
• 1:07:29
  Speaker 1: If that, yeah, Well, it's also interesting you say that
• 1:07:34
  Speaker 1: because my mom, when I was talking about how she
• 1:07:38
  Speaker 1: after my dad died, test like found friends or reconnected
• 1:07:42
  Speaker 1: with friends. She doesn't have Facebook, but she did reach out.
• 1:07:45
  Speaker 1: She somehow found like her high school friends and got
• 1:07:51
  Speaker 1: back with them. So it wasn't like they had been
• 1:07:56
  Speaker 1: talking to each other anything for years that she reached
• 1:08:01
  Speaker 1: out and now they hang out a couple times a year,
• 1:08:04
  Speaker 1: And I'm like, okay, yeah, yeah, I would say if
• 1:08:10
  Speaker 1: your general values and path on life are compatible, that
• 1:08:13
  Speaker 1: is one way you're going to keep your childhood friends.
• 1:08:18
  Speaker 1: Studies show that childhood trauma and friendship fights during that
• 1:08:23
  Speaker 1: time period of childhood can be hard to let go of,
• 1:08:26
  Speaker 1: which means that it can be difficult to keep that
• 1:08:30
  Speaker 1: childhood friend. But if you can, and if as adults
• 1:08:35
  Speaker 1: you're still combatible friends as in your support of friends,
• 1:08:39
  Speaker 1: these friendships can be incredibly valuable and rewarding. You basically
• 1:08:43
  Speaker 1: have an entire friend elect and all of these Yeah,
• 1:08:49
  Speaker 1: you have all of these memories, you have all of
• 1:08:51
  Speaker 1: these things. That being said, if a relationship is toxic,
• 1:08:55
  Speaker 1: don't exhaust yourself fighting for it. Just don't do it different.
• 1:09:00
  Speaker 1: That's a different episode. Yeah, but I feel like a
• 1:09:03
  Speaker 1: lot of us have been told like you need if
• 1:09:06
  Speaker 1: you fail this childhood friendship, your failure. If you failed,
• 1:09:11
  Speaker 1: it's not if if it's not working, it's not working.
• 1:09:14
  Speaker 2: It's changes happen.
• 1:09:16
  Speaker 1: Changes happen, and life is short. And I think being
• 1:09:21
  Speaker 1: intentional with your friends is great. I think being like
• 1:09:25
  Speaker 1: be okay, this is not for me anymore. Uh, and
• 1:09:29
  Speaker 1: yeah it with my childhood friend group, we do try
• 1:09:31
  Speaker 1: to do too, one or two trips a year where
• 1:09:34
  Speaker 1: we catch up with each other and then random things
• 1:09:36
  Speaker 1: in between. But it is that thing we've been talking
• 1:09:38
  Speaker 1: about where we might not see each other that often,
• 1:09:41
  Speaker 1: but when we do, it feels like, oh, hasn't been
• 1:09:45
  Speaker 1: that long at all. We just connect, So, oh my goodness.
• 1:09:51
  Speaker 1: We had a lot to say about friendships.
• 1:09:53
  Speaker 2: Yes, and we have a lot more to say, but
• 1:09:55
  Speaker 2: we're going to do this on a different episode because
• 1:09:57
  Speaker 2: we unexpectedly, kind expectedly ended up saying a lot. Because
• 1:10:03
  Speaker 2: there's a lot to be said when it comes to friendship,
• 1:10:05
  Speaker 2: and it's why it's so important. We haven't even talked
• 1:10:07
  Speaker 2: about that, more like we didn't talk about any of
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 2: the benefits, but we have talked about some of the
• 1:10:11
  Speaker 2: detriments of not having good friendships, and I think that's
• 1:10:15
  Speaker 2: part of the reasons that we need to make sure
• 1:10:18
  Speaker 2: we are encouraging that in our culture.
• 1:10:23
  Speaker 1: Yes, and I would really love to hear from listeners.
• 1:10:26
  Speaker 1: During this research, I really was I was motivated to
• 1:10:31
  Speaker 1: reach out to people, but I also read about a
• 1:10:33
  Speaker 1: lot of interesting things people do to meet new friends
• 1:10:39
  Speaker 1: or yeah, just find find new people, and I've I
• 1:10:44
  Speaker 1: just thought it was so fascinating. So I would love
• 1:10:47
  Speaker 1: to hear from listeners about any of that. If you
• 1:10:51
  Speaker 1: would like to contact us, you can. You can email
• 1:10:53
  Speaker 1: us at Hello at stuff Whenever Told You dot com.
• 1:10:56
  Speaker 1: You can find us on blue Sky at mom Stuff podcast,
• 1:10:58
  Speaker 1: or on Instagram and TikTok at stuff will Never Told You.
• 1:11:00
  Speaker 1: We're also on YouTube. We have new merchandise at Cotton Bureau,
• 1:11:05
  Speaker 1: and we have a book you can get where we
• 1:11:06
  Speaker 1: get your books. Thanks as always to our superduced grosine
• 1:11:09
  Speaker 1: or executive producer My and your contributor Joey. Thank you fan, Yes,
• 1:11:13
  Speaker 1: and thanks to you for listening. Stuff un Ever Told
• 1:11:15
  Speaker 1: You is Prediction by Heart Radio. For more podcast from
• 1:11:17
  Speaker 1: my Heart Radio, you can check out the heart radio app,
• 1:11:19
  Speaker 1: Apple podcast, or where you listen to your favorite shows.