Before You Cut Bangs
Hosted by Laura Quick and Claire Fierman, “Before You Cut Bangs” is full of hilarious conversations about real life, common and uncommon crises, and possible cosmetic errors that come along with it. Through storytelling and therapeutic wisdom, Claire and Laura share how to NOT fuck up your hair (and life) while walking through similar situations,
Produced by Will Lochamy
Before You Cut Bangs
2.21 Childhood Friends, Adult Battles: When Cancer Changes Life Overnight (pt. 2)
Part two of what happens when persistent pain leads to an unexpected, life-threatening diagnosis? In this riveting conversation, Claire welcomes her childhood friend, Beau, to share the first part of his extraordinary health journey—from mysterious jaw pain to a rare cancer diagnosis that turned his world upside down.
Welcome to.
Speaker 2:Before you Cut Bangs, I'm Laura Quick and I'm Claire Fehrman.
Speaker 3:Hey guys, it's Will. We're about to hear the second part of our conversation with Claire's friend, Beau. If you haven't heard the first part, go ahead, go back to the last podcast and listen to that first and you'll be all caught up. It's right there underneath this episode. Wherever you get your podcasts.
Speaker 4:Just again, like you know, we finish up at at piedmont and I'll never forget sitting in there with grant and uh, and I was. I was like I kind of calmed down a little bit, we're. I remember we did the scan and we're waiting for the results to be read by the um, uh radiologist, and so I'm sitting in there I'm waiting for the radiologist to read the scan. Normally it takes a very, very long time to get those results back. Dr Nguyen fast tracked it for me. Um, but I remember sitting there it was just me and Grant and I remember looking at him and just saying, grant, and I remember looking at him and just saying, come into this, like crazy realization of my mortality and the fact that, like within the next 10 minutes, I'm going to get an answer as to, like, how long my life is going to be, and um, what causes your mind at that moment?
Speaker 4:Well, I remember looking at him and telling him, um, we're all going to die and and I think, like we all know that, but to be like force fed that in a in a very high, like intense situation. Um, it really was like almost like a peace came over me. Um, in a, in a strange way, where, where it was and I think I think it was God like calming me down and saying, regardless of the outcome here, this is going to be okay. Um, and that was almost when I um, I don't want to say gave up control because I'm like that's what I need to do. I think, practically, it's very difficult for me and my personality to do that, but I think I was given a piece and knowing that, regardless of the outcome, it's going to be okay.
Speaker 1:So you talked about faith a lot. I want to ask you a question about that because I do think was your faith a big part of your life before your diagnosis? Were you a very faith forward person? I mean, we talk about this as a big anchor for just stability in people's lives, to believe in something much bigger than yourself.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I think for me, um, I think it was something that, like, I think I have a much bigger, like or much, much like broader view of it now, um, because it's been tested and and so like. When I say broader, I mean I mean I can look back at at when I was growing up and you know, in high school and, uh, in college and then when I lived out in Denver and so on and so forth, and I've always, um, I would consider myself to have always been a Christian. I think, um, I had never really had my taste, my faith tested per se and um, and it got very real, very quick for me, um, and you think you got closer to your, to God.
Speaker 4:Well, oh, yeah for sure, and um, yeah, definitely. And. But what I will say is when I say, like, got very real, very quick. I have never been one and I've always had a really hard time with people who give their testimony, not because it's not their testimony is not true, but because it's never been my experience when somebody says, you know, I had some experience with God and I was immediately saved and my life was totally different from there on out to flex constantly and you have to work, not work at it, but you have to really try and seek God and be present and try and, you know, experience God on a personal level.
Speaker 4:And if you, if you're not, for me personally, if I'm not consistently doing that, um, you know it's, it's difficult for me to to feel close to God and um, and so I think I was put into an incredibly intense, difficult situation, um, where I didn't really have any other solution or option outside of like, I mean, I was on my knees on my face like crying, screaming to God, and, and I don't think it was an immediate answer. I think it was okay, we're going to walk through this, which I'm certainly not out of the woods yet. We're still walking through it, um, but this is going to be a very, very long process where you're going to be tested and and, and I'm going to have the ability to experience who he is every single day. And that's been like a really cool thing for me because I think, quite frankly, up until this point, like I would consider my life relatively easy.
Speaker 2:Even with the spanking spin.
Speaker 4:Yeah, even with the spanking spin.
Speaker 1:Okay, and I'm going to say this because I wonder if somebody's listening, who might be thinking it. What if it were the opposite? What if the diagnosis, what if we weren't sitting here and you were having this like, okay, I'm not the same scared throwing up in the front yard moment, but what if the diagnosis would have been different and you're on a path in case somebody is listening to this and they didn't? They don't have the same hope lens that you have in this moment.
Speaker 4:Wait, sorry, I'm not sure Like if the scan had come back.
Speaker 3:Yeah, wait, sorry, I'm not sure. Like if the scan had come back worse.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean because I think where's God in the story when it's not the story that you have?
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Ask it in a different way.
Speaker 1:Are you saying if someone is still in like unknown or worse? I'm just saying, what if the diagnosis was it spread all over your body? Oh and then how you then in that moment, what would you tell somebody? Would faith still be a big part of the journey?
Speaker 4:Yeah, I think, I mean, yeah, I think it has to be. I think that I don't think those two things are mutually exclusive. I think that, like, the person in that situation is probably going to have similar feelings in both of those. Yeah, and you know. So, I think faith is going to play a role in every single situation, regardless of whether it's metastasized or not.
Speaker 1:You think your faith would have gotten stronger regardless? I guess my question.
Speaker 4:Yeah, yeah, I mean I think the short answer is yes, and you know, but the cool thing and my prayer from the beginning has been like I want God to use this for good. It doesn't make a difference. It's not up to me to determine what that means. It's up to me to do what I said earlier, which is show up every day, keep flexing that muscle, trying to be close to God and seek God and spend time in the Word and learn as much as I can and then be able to apply it to the situation that I'm in. And um, and by no means am I, you know. Uh, I mean, I'm not a theologian or I'm not super well versed in the Bible or anything, but you know the first, uh, well, I'll back up. So I was diagnosed on a Friday right, got the scan with Dr Nguyen the very next day. I call my best friend from Denver he was my roommate out in Denver, dan Burks um, just to tell him the news and what I was diagnosed with, and, and he, you know, stopped me, probably like a couple of minutes into my explanation was like hey man, I'm not super familiar with what you're talking about, but I think my sister-in-law, brittany, specializes in this and, um, keep in mind, this is 0.06% of all cancer. Okay so, and he is like she's sitting next to me, do you mind if I put you on speakerphone? And I was like. I was like, yeah, sure, I know Brittany, but I thought she was like an ENT doctor and she technically she is, but she's highly specialized apparently. And, um, so he puts me on speaker.
Speaker 4:Brittany, you know, is like ask me a series of questions. She's like send me your pathology report. I email it to her. They're in the car together and we have an hour long conversation. And she's like I'm, I'm a head and neck surgeon at the Mayo clinic in Arizona. We are a center of excellence for sarcomas. I specialize in exactly what you've been diagnosed with. Here's your prognosis, here's the surgery that you're going to have to have. We're going to get you scheduled for Thursday after you meet with Emory. So you meet with Emory on Tuesday, you fly out and meet with us on Thursday, and so again diagnosed on a Friday. I had all that. I had that entire conversation within 12 hours of being diagnosed. And again, 0.06% of all cancer. And Brittany Howard just happens to be sitting in the seat next to my best friend, which is just beyond any type of like networking I could ever do.
Speaker 3:What did he say? The?
Speaker 4:prognosis was yeah. Yeah, so osteosarcoma in general in the long bones is probably about a 50% cure rate. Mandibular osteosarcoma is better. It's still not great. Mandibular osteosarcoma is better it's still not great. 75% cure rate or survival rate, which is what I was diagnosed with and that was my prognosis and essentially still is.
Speaker 2:So it wasn't like that big of a deal.
Speaker 4:Yeah Well yeah.
Speaker 2:So I should only feel like 25%.
Speaker 1:bad for not taking the medication. Got it. Got it, okay, cool.
Speaker 4:Always. It's so funny, like like I remember flying out there and meeting with them. They're like prognosis pretty, is actually really good. You know 75 cure rate, survival rate. I was like so you're telling me if I take like four balls and put them into a bag and one of them's red and I just draw one, like I might die.
Speaker 3:Look at it, yeah yeah, 75 does sound really good, and then, as soon as, you think? Of 25 chance, like you told me, like you're gonna walk outside and you have a 25 chance, I'm like I'm not going outside yeah, I think I'm good I'll just stay.
Speaker 1:No chance I'm going out there, yeah exactly.
Speaker 4:And just to be clear, like I'm, that's still my prognosis, so I'm not like I need to make it to five years before, yeah, and after. You know, every 12 months it gets better and better.
Speaker 3:But yeah, so. So then what happened once you got like with the full team and met? But yeah so, so then what happened once you got like with the full team and met? What was the plan and what did you start doing?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so bullet point, the treatment cause. He's going to have 9,000 questions once we get to the um the tissue in the mouth.
Speaker 4:Yeah, okay.
Speaker 2:Cause we. Our last segment is laughter and I cannot wait to get to the.
Speaker 4:Oh, I got pictures if you want to see it so uh so, yeah, so that happened.
Speaker 4:Um, um, the only other like, the other thing I do want to touch on around, you know, faith is. So that happened on Saturday. On Sunday, I, you know, we get up, we go to church, um, as a family, like we always do. We get there, Um, and they just so happen to be preaching on, um, finding joy in in hard situations.
Speaker 4:And, in particular, exactly like what the sermon was on, was a meditative series by John Piper called do not waste your cancer. And uh, and I actually have the series in my car that I meant to bring and give to you guys, but, um, but it's basically 12 points that walk through how not to waste your cancer. And so, again, I'm diagnosed with this rare form of cancer on a Friday. Talk to Brittany. On Saturday, go to church on Sunday. The sermon is specifically about how not to waste your cancer and how to find joy in that specific situation, and so the whole thing was just like crazy. And, uh, and my, my cousin's husband I remember what he said to me that day, John Alexander, who I've become very close with I still, I mean, everything was still like super fresh.
Speaker 1:Um, were you crying in the middle of that sermon oh yeah, I would have been bawling out.
Speaker 4:Like did y'all do?
Speaker 1:did somebody call y'all and?
Speaker 4:tell them yeah, it was the whole, like my whole family and my cousin's family were. Yeah, there wasn't a dry eye and um, but I remember him looking over at me and saying, um, you know, something to the effect of you're 38 and you're going to look back on this and think you know, I'm very lucky to have experienced this at the age that you did, because a lot of people don't get to have this kind of realization until they're on their deathbed and, um, what's important and what to be, how to be grateful.
Speaker 4:And yeah, because everything matters when all of a sudden you find out 25% chance that you might not be here at the right time to see your children grow up to, to stand beside your wife through all the seasons, like yeah, and having a three-year-old and a six-year-old, um, and and a wife and uh, just being where we are right now in our lives. Like you know, I try and really really soak in where we are now, as opposed to before. It was a hundred percent, not a hundred percent, but very much focused on on work and moving forward and progressing and how much money can I make and getting the next, thing, the next deal.
Speaker 4:And um, and now it's, it's like my entire perspective has changed to man, I just want to sit down and watch my kids play in the backyard and chase each other and laugh and have fun and uh, you know, and we live a very modest lifestyle and uh, and I've learned to like really, really appreciate that and just um kind of rest in what we have and be super thankful for everything that we have. Um, and and really like the ability to to raise our kids in in a house where they feel super secure, very safe. They come home, they play with each other in the backyard every single day, my wife and I get to make dinner together and sit down at a kitchen table with those things that are different.
Speaker 1:because this happened?
Speaker 4:I think those things are um. I don't think they're different, I think that they they mean a lot more.
Speaker 1:You're awake.
Speaker 4:I'm very much awake and aware of um, much awake and aware of um. So this is funny I made a post on LinkedIn two weeks ago that the first thing I've ever done that ever went viral, and the the opening line of it was was I do not own a Rolex and you know, and I remember thinking you know, I used to be so into. You know, just like my outward appearance and just stuff.
Speaker 1:What you could get.
Speaker 4:Yeah, and you know there's nothing wrong with that. But, like when you idolize those things, you kind of lose perspective on everything else. In my opinion, or for me at least, I did, and and so you know I I just go back to like being able to really appreciate the life that we have, even even if it is, you know, we, we don't live in a 4,000, 5,000 square foot home. I mean, we have what we have and I have two happy, healthy little kids and an amazing wife that love me and that's like, and a God that loves me and supports me and that I can really lean on my faith.
Speaker 2:Like that's awesome, that's a great life. So how'd they fix? You up, Okay, so uh and wait, is your tongue still sewn to the side of your mouth today?
Speaker 4:Okay, it's free, came apart, yeah, it released. Yeah, so, uh, so, yeah, so treatment had to go through um, six rounds of chemotherapy. The chemo was every third week, monday through Friday from nine to five, and um, yeah, so, and it was, it was not fun. It was, um, yeah, it was, it was just not fun. Um, so, anyways, made it through that that. That was about four and a half months, and then on January 21st I had what's called a fibular flap reconstruction, and so, okay, wait and just as a heads up he just showed me this.
Speaker 1:Actually, claire said show her your shark bite and I said holy shit, did that not build your faith enough when you got bit by that shark? But actually it's just from the reconstruction.
Speaker 3:It wasn't a real.
Speaker 1:Yeah, show will.
Speaker 3:I saw it as we were walking out, but here's the thing I told my wife as I walked outside. I was like, yeah, annie got bit by a shark. I'm about to find out about that, because I was just walking out the door.
Speaker 1:And you said show your shark bite. I know I literally was like god, you're a walking miracle, a shark bite and you beat cancer. I tell you what. What a year, what a year, what a year. But I very seriously.
Speaker 4:So we so we were down at the beach, uh, in grayton recently and I can't the number of really children but I've had like two adults. Be like what happened to your leg. I'm like who asked that?
Speaker 1:not that it offends me, but it would be me or will probably would be those people but I thought about him on the beach.
Speaker 4:He would but I thought about getting just like shark bite tattoo at the top, so people will just stop asking.
Speaker 1:I like it.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 1:It does make you seem very tough.
Speaker 4:I was extremely impressed. So, yeah, the you know, january 21st had, after chemo, had fibular flap reconstruction. The way that works is um, so they went in, they you've probably seen the scar on my neck um, they did a definitely looks like someone tried to cut your throat when you turn to the side.
Speaker 3:Yeah and uh, it's almost like your to adam's apple like a cut, like as if someone was slicing your neck. That's what happened, Essentially that's what they did.
Speaker 4:And they turned your face up, oh my God. And then, oh yeah, sorry, sorry. So they do the incision, basically invert your face, and they made a resection right at the midline of my jaw, removed essentially from here to here it's like chin to mid jaw yeah, gone, gone um, and then they take your fibula um that's in your leg which is, yeah, the small bone in your leg that stabilizes your knee and your ankle. It's really non-weight bearing, so they don't replace it.
Speaker 1:So shark bite, no bone Use that to rebuild your jaw oh my God.
Speaker 4:And then I'm definitely still in the process. I have to have a debulking procedure where they go back in and they remove all the tissue, and then I'll get my fancy new teeth which I'm going to have.
Speaker 1:God for that. After this, for that fibula, you're gonna be able to get those nice ones that they drill in. So after which, hang on time out shout out to vulcan dentistry. That is a plug, because they're doing it actually they're gonna have to pay us c for that, caitlin.
Speaker 4:Grimes, who is a dentist in Birmingham that I've known for a long time. To put a number on this, I went to Emory and I was quoted between $50,000 and $70,000. Because UnitedHealthcare is awesome and they deny. They say it's not medically necessary to have teeth, which is great. What?
Speaker 1:Thank God for our medical insurance arena. Yeah, it's so bad so anyways, Caitlin Grimes in Birmingham, amazing dentist doing great work, and I feel like when you like, just to swing back, because I remember when this all went down and Claire shamed me for never having the call with you she was like way to go.
Speaker 1:I hope you heard about Bo's diagnosis, but then I know that your community really mounted up around you and wanted to make sure that you guys were and I I loved seeing that. I mean, it was really. You know, you think it's not going to happen to you, but to know that people really will show up, like you said, was just like amazing.
Speaker 4:Yeah, it was pretty crazy. I mean like to really like touch on that. I mean the amount of family and friends and people in our church and just from everywhere that rallied around me was truly incredible. And you know, it was super scary time cause I I wound up just working through the entire thing but at the time I didn't know if I was going to be able to keep my job. Um, I you know my insurance is tied to that, so just the whole thing was very much up in the air. My best friend, um, started a go fund me and um and raised almost a hundred thousand dollars to you know to, because, again, insurance doesn't cover a lot of this and um, well and you don't think about that like.
Speaker 1:But even if you even keeping your job like it's those unexpected because it costs a lot and a lot of this will want to impact your credit If you can't pay for I mean, there's like all this stuff you don't think about.
Speaker 4:There's a huge ripple effect that comes with a cancer diagnosis.
Speaker 1:Well and the treatment because of all the other areas of your life that it affects which is a sole other episode, sorry.
Speaker 3:I couldn't go rabbit trail down that too. So they do the reconstruction. They have to tie your tongue to the side of your mouth it was.
Speaker 4:It was the whole situation was crazy. So, um, yeah, like when I woke up, I had a tracheostomy so I couldn't talk.
Speaker 4:Um, I just had a whiteboard that I could write on for like a week literally my nightmare my, my tongue was tied or sewn to the side of my mouth so I was just like and I also can't feel anything over here anymore, including the right half of my tongue and um, and so the whole entire thing was just very confusing, like trying to relearn how to talk, learn how to eat, um, you know, I was like in super swollen I still am um, but initially, like for the first two or three months, was just like trying to learn how, like the basics again, um, so yeah, I'll say this because like and people can see this on youtube if they check it out, or on instagram or whatever.
Speaker 3:But like when clear said, yeah, he's had his jaw removed, like when you came in, I was expecting you to have like half of a face kind of situation.
Speaker 1:So you look great, you look great.
Speaker 3:No, we're honestly, it's much more like oh wait, you've had some procedure, like you really can't tell much right, and even that scar we described you have to lift your head up to even show that. So it's not like looking at you. It's obvious something's happened, it's not.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you don't look like what you've been through. So I want to say a couple things so many, but I'm going to try to narrow it down because we're almost out of time. But, um, first, if you're a friend that is going through something with someone else, if you're tier one to somebody, um, so I was in the midst of a training the day that beau got his diagnosis and I was with his mom and I remember feeling so helpless and I was like all I can do is sit by her and drink this terrible box wine, like that was like the best I could do. And then the next day she went to go be with beau. I was gonna stay at her house and I went into this training and I was just like zombie, because it's a really helpless feeling. And this woman came up to me and I told her I was like hey you know, my friends went through this.
Speaker 2:I don't really know what's going to happen. I don't feel great because I don't know what to do and she came and sat by me and she was like just sit in it, like with that person, and we would like face. Do you remember FaceTime?
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And that's what I would tell people. And don't be scared, be like what do you need? Like do you want me to call you, do you want us to come over? And that person can tell you what they need. So after both surgery, I drove with my mom and his mom when he was back in Atlanta because he had the surgery here, and that was a trip just riding with them. They're like answering spam calls and I'm like, oh my God, like God, please don't. So we get there. And y'all have seen me gag. I got that from my mother. I did not gag over any of this, but I'm like well, let me see it. You know, and that the shark bite was very new and fresh. It was just this like purple scab and my mom's in the corner going and I was like just leave the room. Like how rude.
Speaker 2:Okay, next day we go to breakfast. Beau wants to like go eat public and he has stopped chemo Hair's starting to come back. And remember they have taken skin from his leg to create a new jaw. Well, my mom kept saying. I heard her on the phone to my dad saying he's got a lot of tissue still in his mouth so they have to take the tissue out and I'm thinking she thinks gauze and it's skin and I knew what they meant. So we go out to breakfast and we have finished eating and he's like, well, my hair's growing back, but this is it's skin from his leg and so it started growing like man leg hair in his mouth even more than is normally on your leg.
Speaker 2:And he's like y'all want to see, and I'm like hell In your mouth. Stop All of that was leg hair.
Speaker 4:So this isn't something I'm comfortable talking about. I'm just joking.
Speaker 1:April Fools. We didn't talk about April Fools.
Speaker 2:So I'm like, let me see. I'm like, oh my God, god, that's crazy. And mom's like, well, I'll see, I thought she was in a vomit at the diner like she's like like, could not tolerate it and I'm like she this way I'm like he has been through a lot. He's just got like look at the leg hair, lighten up a little does that go away?
Speaker 3:does it stop happening so?
Speaker 2:so katie shaves it every night so.
Speaker 4:So the way that works is they they take your fibula and they also take all of the tissue um that's with it including. So, like, if I open my mouth, what you see in there is is a big what's called a flap of tissue um, that is the exterior of my leg and so including the hair and everything um, the next procedure that I have, which is the debulking procedure, they go in and they take out all that tissue. Then they have to do laser hair removal while they're in there.
Speaker 2:Um, so if you thought we're gonna make out now, yeah, you were wrong, katie is a very lucky lady.
Speaker 3:The things she gets to experience that none of us will, but they'll do a laser.
Speaker 4:Yeah, so by the time they finish they'll all be gone, but right now, yeah, I have to open my mouth. This is a hairy mess.
Speaker 2:Last question, because we have less than a minute. What did this do to your marriage?
Speaker 4:I mean, like, I think, I think like going through something like this with somebody. Uh, I thought the other day about like how long Katie and I we got married in 2018. Um, like, how long we've been married and just where we started, where it was like, you know, super fun and and just what being, you know, young and married and love is like you add two kids to the mix, you add a mortgage, you, you know, add daycare, and then you throw a cancer diagnosis onto it and it's like just, it's almost like something you can't even really put into words. It's just you're super, super connected to that person. Um, and and it's, you know, I'm just so fortunate that God put her in my life, because I think she is deaf, like the definition of the yin to my yang. I mean, I'm like heart, like go hard, drive hard, you know high hard, you know high, highs, low, lows, and she's just like super steady and and so, yeah, I just I love her a lot.
Speaker 1:Obviously. Ok, wait, I do have one more question.
Speaker 4:I know, we're out of time.
Speaker 1:What? How did you laugh through the last since your diagnosis here? What, what role did laughter and levity play in making it through? Um cause we talk a lot about how important it is to like man. Sometimes you just got to laugh it out.
Speaker 4:Well, I had a lot of people around me that, um, they're just hilarious and and just good, like keep perspective people, um, and they would came, they came from all over. Dan Burke's drove in from Huntsville, adam Newquist came from Athens. I had our entire group that we do an annual football trip with all my friends from Denver. We were supposed to go to Wisconsin. They canceled plane tickets, hotels, everything and instead we went to go see Georgia tech and uh, play Miami and um, and you know, and they and they all, all these people would come and sit in, uh, the chemo suite with me and and it was great.
Speaker 4:I mean it like totally. I don't want to say normalize what I went through, but definitely um, lightened it up a little bit and um, and so I don't know if we were in there, like you know, cracking jokes, but well, I mean oftentimes we were. I mean like having Dan come down, who's like one of the funniest people I know, like sit there and have, you know, just conversations with me and spend time with me like we always have, was amazing.
Speaker 2:Hi, hi, I have shorts for you, you're okay.
Speaker 1:Welcome, okay, okay, one more, one more, one more. What would you say to the friend who has a friend who just got a diagnosis? They're going through something really hard. What was the most helpful thing that your friends did?
Speaker 4:Um, probably what Claire said, which is, you know, when something like this happens, most people don't have answers. Brittany Howard happened to have answers and that was great and she helped me and that was amazing, and Dan facilitated that and it was awesome. Um, a lot of people Hunter Williams, adam Grant, they just they drove in town and just and just stayed with me and just sat with me, they showed up, showed up kept showing up at like they were there the day I let my kids shave my head, we all took turns, all my buddies were shaving my head.
Speaker 4:We made it a thing, and to know that you have people that are there with you, that are going to walk through it with you, good or bad, regardless of the outcome, it was just really, I want to say, like humanized the entire experience. It like made you really, really feel deeply who cares about you and and how strongly they care about you.
Speaker 1:Um, which was amazing I feel like some of the things that I've heard over the years of people who have gone through big diagnoses is like or somebody loses a child or whatever, people disappear because they don't know what to say and so they just don't show up. And I think like the importance of just showing up and doing literally nothing, just be there. But I also like it's why I love having friends like claire, because I know she's going to talk shit to me.
Speaker 1:It doesn't matter what I'm going through she, she will crack a joke, it doesn't matter. And I love it. Same thing with Shelly, like Shelly's going to be like oh, your mom's sending more cat pictures, got it.
Speaker 4:Never talked to you, but she sent you that picture of that cat?
Speaker 4:I'm like well, I think Claire is an awesome example of that. I mean, I, I struggled big time Like I would wake up in the middle of the night at like two or three in the morning and would just like be overcome with what I was diagnosed with. Um, and you mentioned it earlier like I remember FaceTiming at three o'clock in the morning, just melting down in the bed. Um and I and I had I can't tell you how many people offered that to me and were like call me any time of the night. I have my phone next to the bed. It is not on silent.
Speaker 1:Like I will answer if you want to clear, was actually up already drinking coffee actually I was pretty close to it, but actually um.
Speaker 2:His mom had this house sitter that was staying there and she died while she was watching her mother, his mom's dog, and it was in this bed and I was like well, diane, did you get a new mattress?
Speaker 2:she's like bo asked me the same thing, they're so expensive. It really wasn't a mess and I was like I had been listening to like a murder mystery at night. And then I'm like in this room and so like I was up because I was scared out of my fucking mind and then when his mom left to go see him, I had to go sleep in her bed because I was like like I really couldn't do it.
Speaker 2:Hey, we're really thankful you shared your story with us awesome thanks for being here thanks for giving me the opportunity before you cut bangs is hosted by Laura Quick and Claire Feerman and produced by Will Lockamey. Follow along with us everywhere.
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Speaker 2:We talk so much on the podcast about seeking therapy, getting help, finding resources. I would love to be able to help you with that. My website is up and running and beautiful. It is goodgrowthwithclairecom. So whether you're in the state of Alabama or not, I want to be able to help direct you to the right resources. Goodgrowthwithclairecom.
