Book Club: Fighting for Our Friendships

Weekly on Tuesdays at 7 PM | February 11 - March 25, 2025

About Fighting for Our Friendships

Why are women's friendships so deep yet so fragile? Friendship coach and educator Danielle Bayard Jackson unpacks the latest research about women's cooperation and communication, while sharing practical strategies to preserve and strengthen these relationships. Fighting for Our Friendships is one part textbook, one part handbook. Readers will not only learn what the latest research has to say about the mechanics of women's friendships, but they'll walk away with real-life solutions for the most common conflicts that arise in their platonic relationships.

Author Danielle Bayard Jackson is a former high school teacher turned friendship coach who speaks nationally on the subject of female friendship. Her work and insight has been featured in such outlets as NBC News, Psychology Today, NPR and The New York Times, and she worked closely with Bumble as their resident friendship expert. Before she began coaching women across the country, Danielle worked as a high school teacher and spent time as an academic department chair in the eighth largest county in the United States. She now uses her education background to deliver practical, research-based strategies for women who are looking for ways to create and maintain healthy female friendships. Her ability to speak to women in various life stages has contributed to the growing popularity of her business, Friend Forward and podcast of the same name

About Book Club

Each Tuesday from February 11 - March 25, 2025 at 7:00 PM we will meet on Zoom to review what we've learned, discuss points of interest, and share how the text relates to our own experiences. The aim is to have space where everyone feels comfortable honouring our own and each other's vulnerability as friendship loves and heartbreaks can be a sensitive and sometimes traumatic topic. Though the book itself references women exclusively, I believe much of the text is relevant for trans and genderqueer folks and I will be incorporating queer perspectives heavily as we dissect the book together. To create an atmosphere of trust and closeness, we ask that you commit to attending each week as best you can to facilitate social consistency.

Kithship prioritizes the comfort, joy, and safety of Black and Indigenous people, Women, and Queer people. Allies that align with this value are welcome to participate.

Schedule

Week 1

  • Introduction

  • Chapter 1: Health, Wealth and Sanity: The Power of Female Friendship

  • Chapter 2: How We Come Together (and Why We Fall Apart): The Three Affinities of Female Friendship

Week 2

  • Chapter 3: Healthy Conflict and Platonic Intimacy: What Doesn’t Kill you Makes you Closer

  • Chapter 4: Stress, Loneliness, and Resentment: The Consequences of Conflict Avoidance

  • Chapter 5: Mean Girls: The Art of Relational Aggression (a.k.a. Sophisticated Stealth)

Week 3

  • The Flaky Friend

  • The Friend Who Doesn’t Reciprocate

  • The “Gossip”

Week 4

  • The Love-Obsessed Friend

  • The Controlling Friend

  • The Jealous Friend

Week 5

  • The Newly Changed Friend

  • The Clingy Friend

  • The Negative Friend

Week 6

Chapter 6: How to Write Your “Comeback” Story

Chapter 7: Moving On Without Her

Week 7

  • Chapter 8: How to Make Friends Worth Fighting For

  • Chapter 9: Loving You, Loving Me

Where to find the Fighting for Our Friendships:

  • Contact your local book store and order a copy to support local

  • If you have a library card from an Ontario library, you can log into the Libby app or website for free and borrow the audiobook or e-book!

  • If you have a Spotify premium subscription, this book is included in your subscription

  • FfOF is also available on Amazon