Jumping to Conclusions Sometimes girls jump to conclusions and tell themselves emotionally colored stories about what’s going on in their friendships. A girl may notice her friend frowning. She thinks, “She doesn’t like me.” Or, when she realizes that she wasn’t invited to the mall with other girls, she thinks, “They’re jealous because I was chosen to represent our school in the leadership forum and they weren’t.”
Helping Your Girl to Distinguish As wise mentors of girls, part of our job is to help them distinguish between facts and stories they tell themselves. Here is a tool you can use to help your girl pull apart what really happened from what she is making up about it:
Fact
Story
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1.
2.
2.
3.
3.
You might start by asking questions like:
Tell me what happened?
What do you think this means?
What else might it mean?
Take notes of what she is saying, and together figure out which column the information goes in. We provide a Helping Your Daughter Filter the Facts worksheet as part of our Quick Assist package.
Getting Clear with an I-Message Once your girl has opened to the possibility that she is making assumptions about what happened, she may be ready to clear up what is really going on with her friend. An effective way to do this is with a combination of the Get Clear strategy and the I-Message strategy: asking her friend what is going on without being accusatory… “I’ve noticed you frowning today and it makes me wonder if you’re upset about something. Are you OK?” Or, “I felt confused when we were having so much fun last weekend, then I wasn’t invited to go to the mall with everyone on Wednesday night. Is there a reason I wasn’t invited?”
What’s Her Friend’s Intention? The goal is to get clear about what her friend’s intention was. Was it to be hurtful? Was it a misunderstanding? Being this direct with her friend may feel uncomfortable at first, but by giving your girl the words to use and by practicing them together, she can feel confident. The Get Clear strategy and the I-Message strategy are described in further detail in our When Girls Hurt Girls™ Parent Guide.
If your girl is trying to be a mind reader with her friends, help her break down information into facts and stories. Once she gets clear on what is really happening with her friend, she can decide how she wants to proceed.
Blair Wagner is the co-founder of A Way Through, LLC , a company devoted to helping parents and educators guide girls in grades K – 8 through painful friendships. If you liked this article, you'll love A Way Through, LLC’s transformational When Girls Hurt Girls™ products! They will help your girl(s) attract healthy friendships that feel good and help you coach her from the sidelines. You can learn more about A Way Through, LLC and their products, programs, and services at www.AWayThrough.com .
