In a society where girls are constantly tearing each other apart and knocking each other down, somehow I stumbled across something pretty magical.
March 9, 2017. It was a Thursday morning like any other, I was just getting out from my Business Law class when I came across a tweet from a popular account I followed and tended to retweet from (a lot). It was a tweet from a girl named Ali and if you've ever seen a Dory tweet, there's a good chance it was hers first. Chad From Sigma Apple Pi? That was Ali. So on this day, she tweeted that she was starting a huge group chat with a bunch of super awesome Girl Bosses who just hype each other up and spread love and positivity and that if anyone wanted to join, DM her and she'd add you. Super excited to find out how to become a part of something like that, I sent a DM and waited for a response. After a while, I figured she probably had hundreds of DMs and it was fun to think I'd be in something like that but I probably would get lost in all of her messages (for context, she has like 13k followers, so it's totally possible). A few hours later, there was a ping and I was sent a link to join a GroupMe. Within a day there were over a hundred girls in the chat. This, of course, was really overwhelming at first, but then throughout the weeks passing, girls dropped like flies leaving the group. I don't blame them. With that many girls, it really drains your phone battery and it's constantly pinging. For some reason though, I stuck around.
From the moment I joined the group, I knew there was something special about this group of girls. Just like Ali had promised, they all seemed to be super friendly, super awesome, Girl Bosses. Twitter Girl Gang was something I was a part of and it was amazing. Within less than a week, a small group of us really clung to each other and we started telling each other everything. Within less than a month, these girls became some of my closest friends. They were the girls I could tell everything to and talk about anything knowing that there would be zero shame. Knowing that nobody was judging and that ultimately, we all were in this kind of crazy ride together.
In the beginning of June, a group of us started to realize that out of the 90something women that lasted the first 3 months, really only a small portion of us talked frequently and shared. We weren't looking for women to tell us their whole lives or to talk every day, but because we shared personal things, we didn't like the thought that some people may just be spectators. We felt like it would be better to have a smaller group where those who really wanted to talk could talk and feel safe. It was then that we created Twitter Girl Gang 2.0. We left the link to the second chat in the original so that anyone stumbling by the original chat could join if they wanted, and we switched over to the new group.
From there, I feel like our bond as a group just strengthened. Because we were a smaller group and pretty much everyone participated in it at one point or another basically every day, we really became like a family. These girls became like the older and younger sisters I never had. We look out for each other and we've been there for all of the highs and all of the lows. I knew I could share anything with these girls. They were the people I told first when good things happened and when bad things happened. I told them things before I told my own friends and family. They've been there with happiness and pride when I found out I passed a class I thought was impossible and they've been there with words of encouragement on days when I've had really bad anxiety attacks and felt the weight crushing down on me. We've been there for each other's break ups, make ups, engagements, and endless cycles with that one person they can't seem to shake. Why? Because that's what Girl Gangs do.
We talk about everything from boys, to makeup recommendations, to school, to life, to friendship issues, to family issues, to what makes us happy and what makes us sad, to the great debate of Is Almond Milk Really Milk, to conspiracy theories, to work, to tv shows and music that we like and hate, to politics, to just basic, "Hey hype my tweet/IG pic. Thanks!", to the day we all met in the chat, to just about anything you could imagine. We talk about any and everything because that's what we're here to do for each other. It was what Ali intended and it worked.
The greatest thing is that we're not all one age. We are anywhere from recent HS grads to recent Grad School grads and we all talk to each other on the same level. We are there to help the younger girls just as much as we look to the older girls for help. I've said it twice and I'll say it again, we are a family.
You never think that the people who mean so much to you would be people you've never met before. You never think that just a few months ago, we were all strangers sitting in whatever class we were in, not knowing that everything would change in a matter of a few short months.
We've recently hit the 4-month mark, which is what sparked this whole reflection of what this whole group has meant to me. We found each other right when I really needed something like this. I was in the middle of my Spring Semester of Freshman Year and I was taking 18 academic credits with only one elective (despite all warnings from my parents and advisor), it was right near the midterm mark, and I felt like I was drowning. My anxiety had begun to rise day by day, (little did I know it would hit an all-time peak in a few short months) and I felt so horrible about myself and I didn't want to burden my friends or family with my issues. Then, I found this group of girls one Thursday morning after my Law 101 class and everything started to change. It started to become a little more bearable because without even having to tell them I needed them or why I needed them, they were there with words of love and support. These are 35 girls I may never meet in my lifetime, but they are girls that became something so important in my life and they didn't even know it. But we proved something without even trying.
We have proved that girls by nature don't have to be catty. We are a group of 35 women with all different political and religious views and we can still hold a conversation. We are 35 women that all matter equally in a chat and there is no tier of who's more important or "popular" than anyone else in the group chat. We interact as equals and not superiors and inferiors. We have not excluded anyone and have left that original chat alive with a link should any girls want to join. And some have joined and just choose to read everything and not talk, and that's okay. We have proved that we as women can hype each other up and emotionally support each other and encourage each other for no reason other than because we care. Coming into this, we owed nothing to anyone else, we could have left at any time and nobody could have really gotten offended in a way that would "matter" because nobody really knew us in real life. But we stayed. We were 36 out of about 150 girls in the initial chat who stayed. We all came from different places and had different interests, none of us knew who we were getting thrown into a group with. Some of us have brought in our real life friends along the way, but for the most part, we are all strangers. We are 36 strangers that all happened to stumble across a tweet around the same time on a Thursday morning in March and somehow became something magical.
There's something magical about internet friends. You've never met, you've probably never spoken on the phone, but you've become an integral part of someone across the country's day-to-day life. You become someone important to people you've never had a face-to-face conversation with, and when you're not around as much, your absence is felt. It proves that geographical connection is not necessary to form a human bond. We are just 36 women who set our mind to spreading positivity and it blossomed. They are my secret keepers and my strongest allies. When we band together, there's literally nothing we can't do.
There's no telling what our future may hold and how long Twitter Girl Gang 2.0 will last, but that doesn't matter. What matters is that we all were a part of something bigger than ourselves, even if it only mattered to 36 people. Even if it only matters for a few months. It changed us, It changed me. I am in a much different mental health state than I was 4 months ago, and I owe a lot of that to these women. I hope one day you all find your own Twitter Girl Gang because it's one of the greatest things I've ever been a part of and it's the greatest thing I am a part of.
We'll probably never meet in real life, the closest I may ever get to talking to them face-to-face is a group video chat or a FaceTime, but they were exactly what I needed at the exact right time. I hope this thing we have going lasts a long time. I hope I can say in 8 months that we lasted a year and are still going strong, but you never know. There's always that uncertainty of when a group chat will end. When people will just casually inch out of messaging often because life gets in the way. Those things happen slowly and quietly, without you ever noticing, and then, all at once, it's gone. One day these girls that mean so much to me may be a fond, distant memory. One day I may never speak to these girls again or ever know how their lives turned out.
But here, "in this moment, I swear, we are infinite."
Sincerely Yours,
Twitter Girl Gang 2.0
Ali M, Ali A, Ali C, Autumn, Carly, Chaise, Erika, Genevieve, Gracie, Hails, Haleigh, Hales, Haley, Hannah (Hanmar), Jess, Jessy, Josey, Kayleigh (Kale), Karina (FBI Agent Kari), Kelly, Kendall (Ken), Kendall (Madame President), Lauren (Lolo), Mackenzie, Madi, Makenzie, Meg, Mia, Natalie, Patrycja, Sarah, Sav, Sam (Schwam), Sophie, Taylor .
(And of course, none of this would be possible without the 4 members of TGG that were never actually in OG TGG or TGG 2.0, but were mentioned enough daily to warrant being honorary members: Jordin (aka Bae), Mama Lisa VPump, Ellen DeGenerous, and OF COURSE- The Power Of MacDaddy Guy Fieri)
