[00:00:00] Nina: Welcome to another episode of Dear Nina Conversations About Friendship. This is the first episode of 2024. I’m so excited for another season of in depth friendship conversations. It is hard to believe that. I have been writing about friendships since 2014. How could there be this much to say two and a half years of podcasting about it?

I started the podcast in the summer of 2021 yet there is, there is so much to say. The fantastic email I got for today’s episode, really a pitch for an episode that I said absolutely yes. It was such a great email. Is it on a topic I have not done before and I try really hard to have every single topic be totally new. Of course, they’re all related to friendship. I often like to give advice to people pitching to be on a podcast that they should look at past titles and make sure they’re not pitching something I have done exactly.

Sometimes I’ll get a really general pitch that says something like, I want to come on your show and talk about friendship. Well, that’s not going to work because they’re all about friendship. It has to be really specific. And today’s guest, Jenny Leon, did exactly that.

Jenny is a breast cancer survivor, a veteran lawyer, freelance writer, and mother of three living in Montclair, New Jersey. Her writing has been featured in The Globe and Mail, HuffPost Canada, The Buffalo News, Motherwell, Kveller, HerStry, among others. Her memoir and progress is about how being diagnosed with breast cancer during pregnancy led her to leave law and have a third baby.

Jenny’s email to me was touching, but also really interesting and full of examples and pop culture of the topic she wanted to address. And that topic is friendships that are formed in the trenches. Those very specific kind of friends you make, who you may not even stay in touch with. In her case, it was a friend that she met during chemo. They had overlapping chemo schedules that formed a very special kind of friendship. In her note to me, I’m going to read just a little snippet of it, not the part about the pop culture references because we will get to that in their interview, but in her note to me, it was so clear that she is an avid listener of the show that she understood how this very special friendship would fit into other episodes I’ve done and, also was just so touching.

She said: Dear Nina, Readers of early drafts of my memoir about surviving breast cancer while pregnant have commented on the poignant friendship I formed with Alli, a young mother whose chemo schedule overlapped with mine. Her death just nine months after we finished chemo is the turning point in my book. When I reflected on this experience, I realized that friendships formed out of an intense situation has some of the biggest impacts on our lives. I know you’ve done episodes on supporting friends in the midst of crisis or illness. Friendships during different life stages, friendships with co workers, I also remember your interview with Zibby Owens on the loss of her best friend on 9 11. I think this topic is at the intersection of many of those conversations and then she goes on to list for me different pop culture references to army friendships, working mom friendships, different things. I mean, that’s just a no brainer, yes. I have done an Instagram and a TikTok and an entire Substack post with a pitch I got last year from writer Kristin Nilsen.

We ended up doing an episode on childhood friends, different than this one, but one place it’s similar is in both cases, it’s not about staying in touch with these friends. The childhood friend, one same thing. It’s not about staying in touch. It’s about the impact that that friendship had on. Our lives, but I used Kristen’s letter on Instagram, tiktok and substack that’s dearnina.substack.com. You’ll see that there’s a title somewhere about pitching advice and how to pitch a podcaster. And I gave you the entire email and here I’ve given you some of Jenny’s. I didn’t. Put it all, but Jenny’s was just as great.

And there was no question that I wanted to have Jenny on the show. So why don’t we just get right to it? Hi, Jenny. Welcome to Dear Nina. I am so happy to have you and to finally, well, it’s not finally, we actually have had a book club together, maybe even two. Was it one or two?

[00:04:14] Jenny: It was two. Yeah, I’m so happy to be here.

[00:04:16] Nina: I run a Dear Nina book club quarterly, but back to our topic at hand, you wrote me an amazing email about a friend you met in a very tough period of your life when you were going through chemotherapy. I want to hear about that friendship, but to give that friendship a broader context, Would you be willing to share some of the thoughts that you shared with me in the email about this idea of the special kind of friendship, a connection that is formed at, you know, as we’re saying here, in the trenches. Doesn’t mean you see them all the time. Doesn’t mean you’re palling around best friends, but it’s a very certain kind of connection.

[00:04:54] Jenny: So yeah, I thought of this concept, friendship in the trenches, because I realized that my friendship with Alli, who I met in chemo, was so similar to many other friendships I’ve had in my life. And then I started to think about how these friendships were depicted, and you always see them in movies and on TV. So I’m thinking like in Forrest Gump, there was Bubba, and that was kind of like the classic one, the army friendship. And then you had working moms. Which was about moms groups and I’ve also had that experience when you have a first baby and you just think these moms are your lifeline and they’re everything and you’re exactly the same.

But then sometimes you go back to your real life and you kind of think, Oh, I didn’t really have that much in common with them, but it’s such a special friendship for what it is. And sometimes you stay in touch and sometimes you don’t, but they’re strong because of whatever you’re going through.

[00:05:41] Nina: Was Working Moms was on Netflix.

[00:05:43] Jenny: Yeah,

[00:05:44] Nina: I never saw it. Was it good?

[00:05:46] Jenny: It’s a Canadian show. It’s really, really good.

[00:05:48] Nina: There’s another Canadian show, I wonder if you’ve seen, Being Erika. Did you ever watch that?

[00:05:53] Jenny: No,

[00:05:53] Nina: Oh, it’s so good. It’s a time travel. And there’s some good friendships in there too.

[00:05:57] Jenny: And I’m from Canada, so I gotta support Canadian TV.

[00:06:01] Nina: Okay, couple other  examples you had, Between Two Kingdoms.

[00:06:07] Jenny: the author, Suleikha Jaoud, delves into the cancer friendship and what it means, I think what she does there, which is so brilliant, is she shows how this is a different kind of friendship, basically, because part of friendship sometimes is that you guys have this kind of shared understanding, and when you go through cancer, no matter who you are, no matter your best friend, will not understand.

What you’re going through. And , she really shows the uniqueness of that friendship. Another one that I had thought about is being a big law associate. I was a big law associate. One of the, people from my former firm, Helen Wan, I believe. She wrote a book that was translated into a Netflix called Partner Track.

And again, so identified with this, you know, you’re working all night and these people, All right. You just think they know everything about you. It’s like this weird time warp.

[00:06:56] Nina: feel I have this with, it used to be, fellow bloggers, it’s fellow podcasters, saying with your law associates. certain aspect of your life. It doesn’t really encompass the other aspects though. So I could talk to somebody about podcasting or writing for years and not know their kid’s names or their husband’s name. You do feel a connection because they understand an important part of life Your regular friends don’t really get or care about. And now with, with cancer, I mean, that’s like something much bigger and health issue, but I hear what you’re saying that, though people care, of course, your friends are going to care more about your health than they might about your job in a law office, but they still can’t necessarily understand the day to day experience unless they’ve through it.

[00:07:39] Jenny: the thing about cancer friendships and the thing about friendships that you had before you had cancer are There’s not a good way to say it You kind of hate everyone when you have cancer for a little bit because you’re like Why did this happen to me and we were all the same and now I’m different And so even if your friends are trying so hard, there’s this kind of sympathy about it that I found a little bit like pity. It wasn’t their fault. It was like completely inside of me something that I was like, this isn’t fair that I’m like this and now everybody’s kind of awkward around me and it’s not good. But then when you go to chemo, I loved going to chemo. It’s so weird.

[00:08:13] Nina: so interesting. I’ve never really had anybody tell me about, I’ve had other people on who have survived cancer and we’ve talked about, you know, that friends can help, but this is a really interesting, different angle. Tell me more about that.

[00:08:25] Jenny: Nobody treated you like you were different. Everyone there had the same thing, and so gone were the looks, everyone was just chill, the nurses were chill, they dealt with people like you all day, the people there were all chill, and I really felt alienated by my cancer, probably because I was 33 when I was diagnosed and had young children, so to be in a space where everyone Just thought like this was how it was was just a huge relief.

[00:08:49] Nina: That makes so much sense to me and even the way the nurse is I could see like there isn’t that sort of pity Sympathy, it’s like this is their job. They’re here to help you and someone after you there Someone came right before you it’s of the day. Would a little bit about the friendship you had in mind when you wrote to me and just the process of you met her.

[00:09:08] Jenny: I was in a Wednesday chemo rotation. The same people come every Wednesday at the same time and also a lot of us were doing cryo capping Which is a process where you freeze your hair so that it doesn’t fall out and they would take us out of the little cubicles where you went for treatment for cryo capping and you’d all sit together. You were high as a kite and you just have these people around you.

I knew everything about these people, right? We’re all sitting there , no filter. And so I became really close with them. I keep in touch with a bunch of them. but one person that made a real difference to me was my friend Alli. I met Alli actually in the young mother support group.

But she was on the same chemo rotation that I was. What struck me about Ali was we really had similar lives outside of cancer, and then the cancer kind of just made the bond that much stronger. So we had the kind of external bond, we’re young women in New York, we’re both in finance at the time, we have two kids, but then cancer came and ruined our lives or blew apart what we were doing. And so we had both things, which made it a very close friendship, and I felt like she could understand me in a way that no one else could at that time.

[00:10:14] Nina: so you and Alli would both show up on Wednesdays. And, how did you go from, because by the way, it’s almost like this little thing I’m about to say is like a separate topic. from like, yeah, it’s nice, to see you. It’s nice to see you regularly to having communication outside of those Wednesdays.

[00:10:29] Jenny: So I think when I met Alli, we exchanged numbers, and we used to text each other, kind of about chemo stuff, like, how are you feeling, and then towards the end of chemo, the texts were very directed, because we both wanted to be done. And we both kind of had, blood counts that were low, so we risked not being done.

And so we were strategizing, right? We were like, How are we going to get the doctor to let us do this? she was very funny. She was very, like, cunning like that. She was in business, so she would always be like, Okay, so we’re going to convince her that Monday is the same as Tuesday, so that we can do this.

So we were just like trying to get out of there. when it ended, we already were bonded, so then she continued, I had radiation first, she continued treatment right up till she got sick again. we would just, I don’t know, we’d just check in on each other.

[00:11:18] Nina: just feel that chemistry with somebody and you just know that, like, you want to keep talking to them. has to be extra special chemistry, because usually in most cases, even when you have a new situation like. I hate to, I have not had cancer, but just any new situation, you have a very full life. I assume. I mean, the sense that you are surrounded by community and you have your family so to have someone new, then be another person that takes time, it because something about that connection is, fulfilling a need that maybe you didn’t even know you had.

[00:11:51] Jenny: And I think for Alli, first of all, I remember the first thing she ever said in the support group, and it was about how she took off her wig. And showed her daughter that she was bald they had this cry together and I thought this woman is so real and that’s what I was looking for because again when you have cancer everyone’s so scared to say anything and she was just telling it like it is so I could tell it like it was that’s what kept us bonded that we both We’re just in a place where we are so raw that we wanted to bond with somebody, and we found each other.

[00:12:22] Nina: really beautiful. And I know you wrote a really moving piece in, what was the name of the magazine, if you remind me?

[00:12:29] Jenny: Sad Girl Diaries.

[00:12:31] Nina: so you talk a little bit about this friendship, and I’m going to link it in the show notes so people can read the whole thing, but, I would love if you would be comfortable telling us about, you know, finding out about Alli’s death.

[00:12:44] Jenny: Me and Alli both had a form of cancer, where If it comes back, there’s not a lot of treatment options. we both were kind of always knowing that that was a possibility. And unfortunately, how this works is, it either really isn’t going to come back or it comes back fast and furious. We both thought we were done.

We both had early stage. When we had follow up appointments, we would always talk to each other because you have tremendous fear and you want to talk to someone who knows what it’s like. But then one day it felt a little different with Alli, because she had fluid in her lungs. I was trying to think of all the things that could be right. I’m like, Oh, she has COVID. just trying it. I think that it was something else, but that’s what it was. It was a metastatic reoccurrence that had turned out to, affect her lungs and her hips and a lot of things that was not good. The friendship took a different turn because then the person who was just like me was no longer like me.

I had, this guilt that it wasn’t me and we were supposed to be just the same, and I wanted to be there for her, but, it was hard because I was really trying to be there for myself in some sense, and so it really became very hard to watch what I had thought was this reflection of me go through this. And also to kind of be on the outside, because. I wasn’t her husband, I wasn’t her children, and she, she was dying.

[00:13:59] Nina: It’s interesting because when, This second bout of cancer for Alli. It’s like this time you were sort of put in the position that your own friends were in with you. A little different because you had been through chemo, so it’s like you had some sense. But, did it make you what to do more? I mean, I know you’re saying that it was hard to know what to do.

[00:14:17] Jenny: I think it does because you kind of understand why the other person might not be so receptive, and you’re aware that your need to have contact is about you, not about the other person often. if the person’s ignoring you, You don’t have to chase them down or something like that. You can give them space.

But then there’s the emotional part of it, I just kept on thinking I wouldn’t know when she died. So I just wanted to find her. But I think in my text messages, I tried to leave that space for saying, Just tell me you’re alive. I’m not coming over to your house with cookies I have an understanding of what it’s like to be where you are.

[00:14:49] Nina: how did you eventually find out?

[00:14:52] Jenny: So this is kind of a tragic and beautiful thing that happened. Her sister found my number in her phone. She found all the unanswered texts, because at the end there really were a lot of unanswered texts. she called me. And she said, I just wanted to tell you that Alli died because I know you meant a lot to her, which was everything I kind of needed to just feel like, it wasn’t all in my head and she wasn’t ignoring me and all the kind of petty stuff that you wish wasn’t there in this big situation, but still is. Then I became friends with Megan. And that’s a beautiful thing to come out of this, that we have this bond over this person. We both loved

Nina: so hold on Jenny just to give me a sense of time from where we are now How long ago were you first in chemo and you had met Alli?

[00:15:36] Jenny: I started chemo in… The summer of 2019, right after I’d had my second daughter, Alli died very quickly, as I said, I think she died September of the same year,

[00:15:47] Nina: wow

[00:15:48] Jenny: it really does come back really fast sometimes for some people, and then I had this friendship with Megan. One of the things that had bonded me and Alli Was that we both wanted to have a third child and Alli actually got the equipment to do, um, IVF, like to preserve her eggs so she could do IVF down the road.

I did not, but we always used to talk about would this destroy our chances? And so I decided that if I ever had another baby, I was going to name her after Alli. I went and I met with Megan and I told her that that’s what I was going to do once I got pregnant with my third. I didn’t want to take away from her like it’s, you know, it’s her sister and her family.

But I said, I need to do this tribute because it’s our shared experience of what we’ve been through. And this little baby needs to know how important and hard it was for her to get onto this earth.

[00:16:34] Nina: really gives me the chill. So what’s your daughter’s name?

[00:16:37] Jenny: Her name is Estee Alice,

[00:16:39] Nina: oh, that’s really beautiful. I mean, was Megan touched?

[00:16:42] Jenny: She was, she was very touched, the kind of funny thing was, So I said, I have something to tell you. And of course, her mind goes to the worst place. she’s like, Oh, Jenny, you can’t do that to me. And so she was touched and relieved and Totally overwhelmed.

[00:16:56] Nina: you, you’re healthy, right?

[00:16:57] Jenny: I’m healthy.

[00:16:59] Nina: that you’ve been through that experience of, having cancer yourself, you know, bonding with other people, going through the same thing and sadly losing a close friend, I have two questions. I’m thinking about your time when you were going through treatment know, what you learned from that, terms of friendship, how does it make you react differently when you have a friend going through a crisis?

[00:17:21] Jenny: I now like to pride myself on being the friend who’s been through it. you do have to be careful with that because you don’t want to over put your own stuff onto other people or kind of over sympathize. But basically I learned that let people ignore you, let people take it out on you, just keep showing up.

They’re always going to remember that you showed up. I had a lot of friends who showed, up and I had some friends who didn’t show up. The people who didn’t show up I’m not friends with anymore.

[00:17:47] Nina: Do they know that’s why?

[00:17:49] Jenny: One of them does, the other one probably suspects. they were two very good friends and to me there was just no excuse for not showing up. And I’m sure you have your own personal stuff and some people say, Oh, I didn’t know what to say. Like, be awkward. I’m, in the moment I might be mad at you, but what I’m going to remember is you showed up.

[00:18:07] Nina: What does not showing up look like? I know what showing up looks like and I think I’ve been on the receiving end of not showing up too. I, I like in my own way, I know what that looks like, not for health reasons, but for you, like what seems obvious, but I think people need to hear it.

[00:18:20] Jenny: Was very specific. I had a friend who made a schedule for visitors. When I went through chemo, and they’d come to the chemo ward and, hang out and that was really nice experience. Someone told me that would make it a lot better. They didn’t come.

[00:18:33] Nina: put their name down, but

[00:18:34] Jenny: they didn’t put their name down, but they both lived in New York.I had four months, didn’t come.

[00:18:40] Nina: mean, that’s quite literal. Not showing up.

[00:18:43] Jenny: They really didn’t show up.

[00:18:45] Nina: especially when somebody is organizing it for you. of all, that’s a nice friend. I always think the friend who stands up to do the organizing is really thoughtful because that’s the person who has to field all the text from the people who are like, Oh shoot, I thought I could do Wednesday, but now I can’t do Wednesday, , then it kind of becomes that person’s job to, right. It’s like a, it’s a coordination that is

[00:19:07] Jenny: Yeah. She was my trenches friend too. She was, from my first time mom’s group and you know, I’m in this group and then a year later I get cancer. And so these people. It’s a good testament to the Trenches friendship, because she, we weren’t that close, but she really took an active role in it, as you said, doing the administration of it all.

[00:19:23] Nina: if you both have like tiny kids, obviously, if you’ve met a year before in the first month. You know, I’m really glad we brought this up because this, it is such a good example. This is someone you became close with because you both were new moms at the same time. But this act of being the administrator for all the visits probably brought you closer. Are you still close?

[00:19:44] Jenny: Yeah, and actually she might be moving to my town, and so when she found a house, she texts me, and we have boys the same age, and I hope we can get them together. So yeah, like, it’s, that one is enduring, and I think I’m so receptive to it, because I was like, you’re a true friend, you did it. You know, you stepped up in a way that was so helpful, and also not in a way that required anything of me, and that’s a very good thing to do.

[00:20:09] Nina: some people not like having visitors? Is some people rather listen to a book or watch a show?

[00:20:14] Jenny: one girl I talked to said that she never had visitors, it was her and her husband and they’d watch a movie, and sometimes it’s like a special time for you and your husband, which is, again, one of those like surreal aspects of chemo, Some people say their marriage has never been better because their husbands were just, there and there’s nothing else going on.

So I think some people like to keep it private. Some people don’t want people to see them so vulnerable. A lot of people also are worried. , what I did that wasn’t great is I never napped because I had these friends there. And you’re supposed to nap. And I was like, no, I need to entertain my friends. And then if I napped, I’d be like, no, I’m, I’m entertaining.

[00:20:48] Nina: Plus just having little kids exhausting in the best of circumstances. So if you were to be, you know, really in treatment, your body’s fighting, you come home and you have two little kids, hard.

So back to sort of the original question of, you know, other things that you learned from the experience of people showing up, people not showing up and, and what it taught you.

[00:21:09] Jenny: I think what it taught me is that for one, it taught me that I had so many friends. Everyone came out of the woodwork and that’s just a fabulous feeling to be like. I am loved, it taught me, more importantly, that I don’t need to impress all my friends. I’m a big people pleaser, and I was always like, oh, you know, I thought my friendships were about, like, my hair, and my witty intellect, or whatever, and I was none of those things when I was going through chemo. They were still there, and they still loved me, and I think that really shaped the vulnerability I knew I could have with my friends afterwards. I’m like, wow, people just like me for me. It was something that I think people underestimate.

[00:21:45] Nina: That really speaks to me. I feel like you and I have a lot of similar personality traits. It’s maybe why you like the podcast and like, maybe you can relate to me and some of the things I say, cause I’m relating so much you. such a pleaser. I’m and the entertainer and I could totally feel what you’re saying this Kind of like the visitor thing.

You’re really just receiving like you’re just receiving Friendship and community and love and you don’t feel that you have to equally Bring something to the table. You had already brought so much to the table that the love is just there and you can just Receive it and instead of having to be the one providing it.

[00:22:21] Jenny: And it makes you uncomfortable if you’re like us. But over time, I learned that that was all I could do. at first, I’m like, you came to my chemo room, do you want a drink?

[00:22:31] Nina: know I would be the same way and I’d be like, oh, was the traffic bad and you probably have so many things to do and I’m sorry you had to come here and it’s like, yeah, all that.

[00:22:40] Jenny: And one more thing I should add about being a good friend to someone going through treatment is the person may not want to see themselves as a sick person and this has to do with kind of this idea that I felt like I had to entertain my guests and so people would buy me all this stuff and I, I’m, I’m grateful for any present, don’t get me wrong, I love presents, but that made me feel just so sick and I was like, do you think I’m Dying here?

I don’t want, fuzzy slippers, and coloring books, I have a baby, like, it made me feel so old. and I also, like, sometimes when people delivered meals, so I think there’s something to, if the person wants to be functional, and that’s what’s keeping them going, you probably know your friend and you don’t have to, Do something that’s gonna make them, like, I remember, like, throwing the presents, I was like, this is not me, this is not my life.

[00:23:29] Nina: What would be a good present for someone who’s, you know, going through chemo. So there’s times they don’t feel good, but they’re, up and out, they can run some errands and they could talk to friends and visit, but somebody wants to give something. I get this desire to give. We want our friends to be able to give us stuff. what are some non patronizing gifts? Maybe that’s what we’re saying.

[00:23:50] Jenny: Nobody bought me books, really, I can think of one friend who bought me books. I read a lot of books. So if you know the person’s a reader, you can buy them books If you know they like a certain treat or dessert, anything to kind of brighten their day. I think that’s the problem, that Somehow gift giving has to do with the fact the person has cancer instead of who the person is, and you still want the same kind of gifts when you have cancer. maybe not like bike shorts, but, you know, generally.

[00:24:15] Nina: Right. Did you like if people brought gifts for the kids or do you think it made the kids feel funny?

[00:24:20] Jenny: My kids were so young, it, it didn’t matter. my son was 13 months when I got diagnosed and my daughter was just born. The great thing was they had no idea something was wrong with mommy.

[00:24:31] Nina: then you have your third child that you can explain, you know the name and you know Why she got the middle name she got so that’s

[00:24:37] Jenny: And my second, my baby who was born right after I got diagnosed, four weeks after I got diagnosed, I named her Lila Orly, so she’s the light in the night. So she knows that this is a special story for her.

[00:24:50] Nina: I just got the chills. So I wanted to play a voicemail, when I’m doing an episode and I have time to organize myself I will put it on the Facebook group, which anybody is welcome to join It’s just dear Nina the group when you’re looking on Facebook, or I’ll put it in my newsletter.

I have a newsletter on substack Dearnina.substack.com Substack is just a place where a lot of people have newsletters. A lot of people are like, what’s a substack? It’s just a website. That’s all. It’s a website where people have their newsletters because it’s laid out so nicely. Well, anyway, if I know I have an episode coming up where I want a little bit of input, I’ll Put ways that people can participate.

It’s either voicemails or emails. It could be anonymous. One of my longtime listeners and friends, Renee Schuls Jacobson in Rochester, New York. She’s the author of a memoir called Psychiatrized, Waking Up After a Decade of Bad Medicine. And she shared the following voicemail. And then I just want to talk to you about it for a minute, and then we will wrap up.

[00:25:46] Renee: In 2013, I came off of clonazepam, a powerful and commonly prescribed anti anxiety medication. And at that time, the symptoms that I experienced upon withdrawal were just unrelenting, pure torture. 24 hours. Hours a day, seven days a week. And it lasted for over four years. There was no one else in my entire world that I knew who had ever gone through something like this.And it was very, very scary. While bedridden and mostly disabled, I actually found a Facebook group and I met a woman there named Bobby. And the two of us initially started talking about our symptoms. And we talked about what was working and what wasn’t working and what brought us to medication in the first place. Anyway, 10 years later. We still talk every single day. We talk about relationships, politics, food, our families. We’ve moved beyond just talking about our past illness. And I consider her to be one of my closest friends, even though we’ve only met once in real life.

[00:26:48] Nina: So that speaks to something that I have talked about on the podcast a lot internet friendships are legit and especially one like that, that is based on not just, Oh, we have the same job or we’re, you know, after the same goal of like publishing a book, let’s say, but really going through a hardship

[00:27:05] Jenny: yeah, I think I actually, I participated in a lot of cancer Facebook groups. You see these people go through their lives, right? Because then you become friends and you see them outside the group. It really gives you the same thing that we’re talking about where you feel these people are just like you.

I feel like I know you from your Instagram, right? Like, there’s this thing where you’re like, find someone who’s similar to you, and then if you talk to them on social media, it does feel real, it does feel intense. I was at a retreat recently, I was at the Christy Tate retreat, and these two people met each other who only knew each other online, and it was like, fabulous and surreal, and they knew so much, but they’d never seen each other in person.

[00:27:42] Nina: I love that. I don’t think I knew that you were going on that. You know, I went to the one in Palm Springs. Yeah. So you were the one, was closer to you, right?

[00:27:50] Jenny: Yeah, it was in, um, the Hudson Valley.

[00:27:52] Nina: Oh, that would have been so fun.See, that would have been us.

[00:27:55] Jenny: i would have freaked out!

[00:27:56] Nina: would have too. That would have been us. We would have met in person. It would have been so fun. Um, but you know what, Renee, I could totally see how she would get so close to this person because what she went through was. would say even more, very much more unique than chemo, which sadly, you can find now, I mean, too sadly, I know like so many people who have have been through it, but what she went through, again, her book is called Psychiatrized and like, could totally get this idea that they bonded over.

First of all. the withdrawal and, um, I mean, she really went through a really tough time and to like, have somebody who could understand, like, it really wouldn’t matter anything else that person knows about the rest of your life.

It wouldn’t even matter, I don’t think, if you disagree on politics and different things. It’s have this really difficult thing in common. Like, all that matters in those moments.

[00:28:44] Jenny: just to have one friend who kind of understands the specifics. For me, that would probably be pregnant with cancer. That’s a very small group. and I have another friend who was diagnosed right after me, and then she had a baby, it’s this feeling of, I’m not alone, it’s okay. And that’s what I heard with Renee. She kind of had a person who made it feel like this wasn’t just her, she wasn’t in her own head.

[00:29:07] Nina: so glad Renee shared that. I’m so glad you wrote to me. I love a great pitch. I really do. And I know it when I see it. And I’m sorry for your loss of Alli as a friend. And, just really appreciate you sharing like Megan and your daughter. Just everything was really beautiful.

[00:29:23] Jenny: Thank you so much for having me, this has been a dream of mine since I started listening to your podcast, so this was everything and more.

[00:29:30] Nina: Oh, yay. Thank you. I cannot wait for your book. So when the book comes out, we’ll relaunch this episode. I do sometimes do reruns because, sometimes I need a break. So that’s what we do. right, everybody, you can find everything about Jenny and my show notes and come back next week or two weeks.

Cause sometimes I’m going every two weeks cause that’s just life. Uh, when our friendships are going, well, we are happier all around. , one last moment of your time. If you got anything out of this episode, and I hope you did, I would love if you left five stars and a review wherever you listen, but you could even pop over to Apple , even if that’s not where you listen. It helps others when they’re looking for shows about friendship to see that there are people listening to this show if this is your first episode, welcome. If you’ve been around, thank you for being with me.

[00:30:17] Nina: We’re all just out here trying to be better friends, better people. Those are Usually one in the same. See you in a couple of weeks. Bye.