Growing Apart

What happens when your best friend doesn't feel like your best friend anymore?Childhood friendships can feel like they will last forever. Best friends play together, laugh together, share their favorite things, and create memories side by side. But as children grow, their interests, personalities, and relationships can begin to change-and sometimes friends begin to grow apart.Growing Apart is a gentle children's story that helps young readers understand that changing friendships are a normal part of growing up. Sometimes friends develop different interests or make new friends. Sometimes disagreements create distance between them, while other friendships simply change quietly over time. These changes can feel confusing, scary, upsetting, or sad, especially when a child does not understand why a friendship no longer feels the way it once did.Through an approachable social-emotional lesson, Growing Apart encourages children to recognize and talk about their feelings while understanding that growing apart does not always mean that the friendship was bad, that someone did something wrong, or that the love and memories shared between two people have to disappear.Part of the BBS Books Social-Emotional Learning Series, this story gives parents, caregivers, educators, and counselors an opportunity to discuss changing friendships, emotional growth, grief and sadness, communication, acceptance, and new beginnings.As children continue discovering who they are, their relationships may grow and change alongside them. Some friendships last, some friendships change, and some eventually come to an end. Even when letting go feels difficult, there can still be room for new friendships, new experiences, and continued growth.Sometimes people grow apart without the love disappearing-and growing in different directions can still lead somewhere beautiful.