Birds On A Wire: Is It O.K. to Leave Her Out?
Examining friendships among girls with the help of Glennon Doyle's "We Can Do Hard Things" Podcast episode on "left-outed-ness" (feat. Abby Wambach and Amanda Doyle, as well.)
There’s an intersection near my Shoprite where a massive power line runs through. The electrical wires are way, way, high up above the roads. The birds on the power line catch my eye when I’m sitting in traffic, little black dots against a blue sky.
I’ve noticed that the flock arranges itself in a large group in the center of the power line, while smaller groups of two-to-three birds cluster at the end of the line. There are always a couple of birds hanging out independently.
I wonder if the birds stay in the same groups every time? Or do they mix it up? I’m no ornithologist but…I’m thinking they change it up. When I consider moms, I certainly observe us “changing it up.”
…Sometimes we stand alone at school pick up, scrolling on our phones or jamming our hands into our puffer coats, face hidden behind a scarf on cold days. Sometimes you’ll find us on the playground hand-gesturing furiously and gabbing. Other times you see a large group of us meeting for drinks out on the town, or two moms sitting down for a heart-to-heart over a cup of coffee. Sometimes, you don’t see us at all—we have a babysitter or a partner on pickup duty.
Like birds, we fly through our days and every day looks different. In some seasons we find ourselves in the flock, and that’s where we’re most comfortable. Other times, being in the flock doesn’t feel right, so we choose to fly solo. Some days the sun is bright, the sky is calling, and we fly off with a new friend to explore the terrain.
From afar, and certainly at first glance, I look up at the power lines and I simply see “a flock of birds.” My brain registers this flock as a together because they sit near each other. On closer inspection though, it’s clear there are distinct alliances and the birds have made choices about where to sit.
In Glennon Doyle’s episode, “Being Left Out: Navigating the Lifelong Ache” on the podcast We Can Do Hard Things, Amanda Doyle tells the story of Alice, her elementary-age daughter, and Alice’s friendship with two little girls (“Sarah” & “Amy”), a classic story of triangular friendship with a surprising ending.
One day, Alice wants to have a playdate with just one of her friends (Sarah), but doesn’t want to invite Amy.
Amanda says, “Alice, if we don’t invite Amy she’s going to feel bad.” And Alice says, “Well if she isn’t invited she will feel bad, but if she is invited I will feel bad. Why should I feel bad to make her feel better?”
Wow. Let’s take this in for a minute.
…What I love about this conversation is that it’s happening in the first place. So often, we don’t stop to examine our motivations. We don’t want to feel vulnerable. But as a mom, Amanda takes a minute to have an important conversation with her 8-year-old daughter to better understand what’s at play deep down.
As a parent, Amanda is showing her daughter that A) your feelings matter B) it’s OK and even very good to talk about your feelings and C) I’m here for you and we will work this out. Simply by having this conversation in a caring and connected way, Amanda is modeling relational, inclusive, and compassionate leadership, no matter what Alice decides. Mindfulness, or self-awareness, is how we build compassion.
Amanda Doyle goes on to note that her daughter, “makes a valid point.” She says she’s grateful her kid can express her feelings so clearly.
Amanda says, “I should at least feel equally empathetic to my daughter's feelings as I do to other people's daughter's feelings.” So Amanda goes on to ask Alice, “Okay, could you share with me why? Because I know that this girl is nice to you and you like her and why don’t you want her to come? Why are you gonna feel so bad if she comes?”
And Alice replies, “I am scared that if Amy comes, Amy and Sarah will not want to play with me and I will be left out.”
Wow. Have you ever stood in Alice’s shoes? Have you ever been left out like Sarah? Been caught somewhere in the middle like Amy? Or taken the brave step of mediating and exploring these big feelings like Amanda did with Alice? It’s not easy. But it becomes easier to talk about feelings with practice, and learning how to be vulnerable with people we trust enriches our relationships. -Kay M.
Amanda goes on to say that hearing her daughter express herself was “such a revelation to me” and Amanda went on to help mediate a solution for the girls. She talks first with her daughter Alice and Sarah (the chosen friend):
“So I look at this girl Sarah, and I'm like Sarah, Alice is clearly worried about Amy coming because she's gonna feel left out. Like do you think you could work together to make sure everyone's being included? And God bless this little girl. She puts her hand immediately around Alice, and goes, ‘of course.’ It was so sweet. And then I…look at Alice, and she expresses that if she knows she's not going to be left out, she actually would love to play with both of them. Oh my God, I have the chills. It's crazy.”
Amanda then brings together all three of the girls (and their parents) to talk about the whole thing, and a beautiful solution emerges, that results in the all 3 of the girls playing together, and being even more deeply connected than they ever were before.
Amanda says, “Amy, you're probably having a lot of feelings because you heard that Alice didn't want you to come over to our house. And I just want to say that that is true. Alice didn't want you to come over to the house, but I need you to know why. And that's because she was worried about you two playing and leaving her out. And so both of you were having the exact same fears at the exact same time that both of you were worried about being left out right now. And I think that we can actually solve that all together by making sure no one feels that way. And we all play together.”
Amanda continues, “And they were like, Oh yeah, I know how that, oh yeah, that really stinks when that happens. I feel that way too. So then they all went home to the house and they also, because we have just put it out in center, they were negotiating it themselves for the next four hours. It's amazing. Every 20 minutes they'd be checking on each other like, is this good for you? Are you having fun? Do you want to play this game? Because we're only going to play a game, we're going to all play together. And it just made me think like, I wonder how many times that the things that we do, the things that I do that impact others that are experienced as meanness to others are actually just acts of self-preservation.” (Amanda Doyle on the We Can Do Hard Things Podcast).
While this story illustrates how and when the choice to be inclusive can be constructive, there are certainly other times when choosing not to include someone may be healthy, reflecting personal boundaries, which I look forward to unpacking in a future post.
…. I think the choice to exclude another woman becomes toxic when one girl/woman (X) forms a group (XABC) of another’s girl/woman’s (Y) friends or shared friends, and then deliberately leaves that woman (Y) out.
Did you like Amanda’s story? Why or why not?
…How do you handle hurt feelings or left-outed-ness? Do you have a daughter who has ever been left out?
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Disclaimer: the content on Substack’s The Mom Diaries posted by Kay M. (@themomdiaries and https://substack.com/@themomdiaries) and on YouTube (@TheMomDiariesbyKayM) or any other medium or social media platform (the “information”) is for educational and entertainment purposes only and is not intended to be a substitute for clinical, medical, legal and professional advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Reliance on any information provided by Kay M. or The Mom Diaries is solely at your own risk. Always seek the advice of your licensed mental health professional, medical doctor, or other qualified health provider.
Oh, this is a tough one, especially as I have a very different view. I love how the mother reacted and would have done somethibg similar. Having an autistic kid like mine means talking through a lot of things, explaining especially social things. We did that from a very early age without even knowing he is autistic. But being autistic and therefore strange in the eyes if others meant that my kid was often left out. And most of the times he was fine with it as even three kids together would have been difficult. Now as a teenager he has a selected group of friends and this works really well. I learned to trust the process and to trust my kid to tell me, when something doesn’t feel right.
My daughter is 4. I haven’t noticed a time she was left out, and she hasn’t mentioned feeling left out to me yet. I was in her classroom (I work as an infant teacher but have worked in all classrooms over the years so they sometimes have me cover for a bit in the 1s, 2s, 3s, or 4s) toward the end of the day for a couple weeks back in October, so I would be there during outside time. She always seemed to be playing with one or two friends, and they were mostly running around or rolling around in the leaves.
I of course have had times in the past where I felt left out, but it really hasn’t happened all that often since becoming a mom yet. I am curious about the dynamic change once she starts kindergarten in August of 2025 when it will be a whole new group of moms and kids.