Mean Girls Grown Up

Mean girls grow up to be mean women. I am so saddened by this fact. I wish we could be more of a true sisterhood. Watching out for each other, not watching each other fall. Or worse pushing each other down. I wish we had each other's back instead of stabbing it. I try to be a good friend. I try to be the one who is the cheerleader for others. Why am I so shocked when I am the target? Here is how it went down. I have been with a group of women online for quite some time now. Women who have been at the very least my acquaintances and some I considered good friends. We "met" online on a forum for women who only have sons. We are a rare breed. There are things that a mom of boys will understand that no one else really will. It has been a bumpy ride at times. Yet for the most part we all seemed to weather it and go on as friends. It is amazing how fast those tables turned. Turned on me! As a Facebook group we had a little stuffed animal that we were sending around to each other. It was fun to have it and take pictures of it with our families. To give a little sample of our daily lives in a fun way. I had her the longest. To be honest I had her during a really rough patch and it was nice to think that while I had her I had a piece of all my "friends" with me, to help me through. I sent her to her next destination with a box full of goodies from me to the next person, along with an album and some pics of her time with me. I go on about my merry little life. I am not able to check in on this particular page daily. Or even weekly sometimes. Imagine my surprise to find out that I am the object of such excitement! Apparently there was a little book, a journal of sorts in the box sent to me. Honestly I didn't even remember seeing it. The fact that I did not send it on to the next person was horrific! It was meant to be a journal to write in about her time with each person. I had no idea since no real instructions come along with the stuffed animal. In my absence on this particular page I had been shredded. Vile aspersions were cast upon me for keeping it. This kept these women in quite a titter, my having kept this little book. Their hackles were quite raised I am told. You see I have no first hand knowledge of the real goings on because, gasp, I was deleted. Facebook deleting and unfriending. The adult equivalent to "you can't sit at the cool kids lunch table anymore". Really? This is what we are? Adult women behaving like middle school children? Over a little book. Not a Bible, Torah or even a Koran. Not even The Joy Of Sex! It didn't shoot lasers or anything cool. Just a little journal note book. A little book so powerful that it can divide and destroy. Because we allowed it to. How can we raise strong, confident young women when we behave so awfully to each other? How can we expect to be taken seriously in the world when the world sees us doing such things to each other? Our mothers or grandmothers burned their bras so we could treat each other like dirt? Or worse? How do we stop it? How do we stop tearing each other down and start building each other up? Imagine what we could accomplish if we did.