The Friend Who Sucks at Friendship | Episode 4 🎙️
Finding Your People in the Second Half of Life with Alisa Marie Beyer
My friend Alisa said something in the first few minutes of our conversation that really moved me.
“I suck at friendship.”
Not apologetically. Not in hesitation. Just as a plain, true thing.
And what amazed me wasn’t just the admission, it was how honestly she could look at herself. How she could talk about the friends she’s lost, sit with what her role was in it, and tell me what she’s learning to do differently now. That kind of self-reflection is rare and beautiful.
Alisa is a birth doula, founder of Let’s Talk Birthy, amateur cattle rancher, and the woman who became my founder doula during the hardest years of building Pumpspotting. She loves people deeply. She listens in a way that makes you feel completely seen. But for Alisa, friendship has always meant something really specific: a depth of connection, a level of knowing, the kind where you’d give someone a kidney without thinking twice. And when she measures her friendships against that, she’s honest about where things haven’t worked out.
There’s grief in this conversation—real grief for friends who mattered deeply and are no longer there. But there’s also so much hope and possibility in where she is now.
Alisa is in a beautiful new moment in midlife. Her kids are grown, her calendar has space she’s never had before, and for the first time, she’s choosing friends with real intention. People who match who she actually is in this season of life. She calls them intentional friendships, and describes what they feel like: lighter, more honest, nobody performing. It made me think about what that kind of friendship could look like for all of us when we finally give ourselves permission to choose.
We also get into the teenage daughter years. Alisa’s relationship with her daughter was brutal for a stretch—she doesn’t sugarcoat it—and she made it to the other side. They are now, genuinely, best friends. She told me what a child psychiatrist told her that changed everything, and gave me hope that Emma and I, too, can survive our season.
This conversation stayed with me long after we stopped recording. Stay with it all the way through: it gets richer as it goes.
Have a listen:
"If you have two people you can call at 2am, you're already ahead of the game."
In this episode:
Why Alisa says she sucks at friendship, and the specific, unsparing way she means it
The grief of losing friends you loved and sitting honestly with your own role in it
What intentional friendship looks like in your 50s when you’re finally choosing people for who you actually are now
The kidney definition: who would you give one to, and what that tells you about your friendships
“If you have two people you can call at 2am, you’re already ahead of the game”
The teenage daughter years: the advice that changed everything, and gave me so much hope for friendship on the other side
Alisa’s Friend Pick: She cannot stop gifting the Besque Magic Body Oil — the one she says 400 million women apparently discovered before her. High recommendation from a woman who has never met a beauty product she didn’t like.
Join the campfire:
Who would you give a kidney to? Drop their name in the comments and tag them. Let them know they made the list.
There's someone in your life who needs this conversation.
Maybe they've lost a friendship and wonder what their part was. Maybe their friendships don't quite fit who they are anymore. Maybe they're surviving the teenage daughter years and need to hear it gets better. Send them this episode.
Follow the show and come find us on Instagram @theyeahnoforsureshow.
*Alisa was one of the first people who knew this show was coming: she’s been cheering it on from the very beginning. Getting to have her on the couch felt like exactly the right kind of full-circle moment.