Doree and Elise invite Laurel Braitman (What Looks Like Bravery, and NYT bestseller Animal Madness: Inside Their Minds) to talk about why she compares friendship to oxygen, how a serendipitous radio episode changed her life, why she hates the question “how are you,” and why whales (and animals) are the key to her happiness.

Mentioned in this Episode

• What Looks Like Bravery

• Animal Madness

• Cow Horsing

• Josie's Place Grief Support for Kids and Adolescents

• Enovid nose spray

• 32 Questions To Ask Instead of “How are you?”

• Click here to shop all of Forever35's ShopMyShelf recs.

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Transcript

Doree:                Hello and welcome to Forever35, a podcast about the things we do to take care of ourselves. I'm Doree Shafrir.

Elise:                   And I'm Elise Hugh. And we are two friends who like to talk a lot about serums.

Doree:                Elise, I have an update to an update for you.

Elise:                   Can't wait.

Doree:                Okay, hit me. So do you remember how you solved my waking up in the middle of the night problem or you proposed a solution and then I told you that I wasn't waking up in the middle of the night anymore because I had stopped drinking regular coffee in the afternoon.

Elise:                   Yes. This all happened in a casual chat a few weeks ago.

Doree:                Yes.

Elise:                   And we felt really accomplished I think after solving this mystery.

Doree:                We did, but I'm really sorry to report that it was short-lived. What? Oh no. So you're waking up in the night again? I've been waking up the past three nights. I've woken up in the middle of the night.

Elise:                   Oh no,

Doree:                I know. So I'm like, what is going on here?

Elise:                   Have you had any additional stressors

Doree:                Lately? I was just going to say I think I'm stressed. I think that's what's going on, so I guess I need to work through that.

Elise:                   When you get up in the middle of the night, do you start checking your phone?

Doree:                Well, I don't check my phone. I have my iPad and I usually start reading things on the iPad, which I know is not great. But

Elise:                   Yeah, I just wonder whether the glow would keep you up even longer.

Doree:                Well, I have it on dark mode.

Elise:                   Okay. Surely that's not damaging.

Doree:                No, not at all. It's on dark mode. Fine. It's in dark mode. I don't know. I mean I'm sure it's not ideal, but it's often like I will try to go back to sleep. I'll try to go back to sleep, I'll try to go back to sleep and then I'm like, Ugh, I'm so bored.

Elise:                   What is Matt doing this whole time? Is he not bothered by the dark mode glow

Doree:                In bed? Well, Matt has to sleep in the other room because he has a snoring issue.

Elise:                   Yes. My parents, yes, this happened with my parents around the time they were in their forties

Doree:                That he is. Hopefully he is going to do a sleep study and hopefully he will be able to get this resolved, but we'll see. But yeah, I am like a pretty light sleeper I think. But also his snores got wake the dead level of Snoring, So it was just not tenable

Elise:                   With my dad. He ended up getting one of those, what are they called? C?

Doree:                C Pap? Yes, C paps. I would love for Matt to get a CP pap. I'm dying to for Matt to, well, dad got one and he

Elise:                   Refuses to wear it so you could get one and then have a spouse that refuses to actually use it at night to solve the problem. And so my mom just dreads anytime they're on trips and they're in the same hotel room like, well,

Doree:                I'm

Elise:                   Not going to be able to sleep tonight. Awesome.

Doree:                I relate to this, I relate to this.

Elise:                   We were feeling so self-satisfied having solved this mystery of you getting up in the night and now it's returned. This is a

Doree:                Pesky problem. The answer is probably to get rid of the iPad, quite honestly,

Elise:                   Even though it's on dark mode.

Doree:                Look, I need this. Okay,

Elise:                   Maybe I don't have quiet time, but you're getting all your quality quiet time and reading. That's good. That's true.

Doree:                I mean, I don't know. I guess I could, I do have a reading light thing and I could just read a paper book if I really can't fall asleep, I could just read a paper book with my reading light. I do almost always fall back asleep. It just sometimes takes me over an hour and that's just a bummer. It's so frustrating. And this morning Henry woke me up at five 30 because sometimes my husband plays golf very early in the morning, so he had left and Henry had woken up and Henry wanted to watch baseball highlights on YouTube.

Elise:                   So dear, that is so dear. I love it.

Doree:                So he needed me to come put those on for him, and I was like, great. And then just as I was falling back asleep, he was like, mama,

Elise:                   Yeah, I need something to eat. I'm like, that's so annoying because you get your best quality REM sleep at the back half of the night, so towards the morning when you wake up. And so that's when you actually need the really undisturbed time when you first go to sleep, which is when you get the deep sleep, it goes deep.

Doree:                Right? So night terrors, which is the sleep disorder that I have happen during deep sleep, they happen within half an hour of falling asleep.

Elise:                   That makes sense. Well, listeners call in. Call in if you have any fun times, other theories, fun times for why Doree might be waking up and how to get an undisturbed night's sleep. We might need one of those sleep doctors for you Dore.

Doree:                I might just need a vacation

Elise:                   That'll do it. I'll probably do it. I would like to go to bed earlier at night, but a lot of my quality work happens after my kids are down. I wrote most of my book in the hours between 9:00 PM and 1130 or midnight. And so I actually need that for deep work. Otherwise I am less productive during the waking hours and during the workday. And so my sleep could be better if I went to bed earlier, but no major complaints. Rob wakes up frequently in the middle of the night and then he reads his phone and he like, this is not really, this is even worse than just reading a book. He reads New York Times headlines.

Doree:                Oh yeah. I mean, I've done that

Elise:                   And then just ends up doom scrolling and I have to put up a pillow fort so that the light doesn't bother me. I don't like that glow.

Doree:                Yeah. Do you sleep with an eye mask?

Elise:                   No, I don't. I don't like it. I don't like anything on my face when I'm sleeping. Oh,

Doree:                That eye mask was kind of a game changer for me.

Elise:                   I do when I'm camping.

Doree:                Yeah. Okay. All right. Well Elise, we should introduce our guest because we had kind of an epic conversation with her.

Elise:                   We sure did. Today we have Laurel Braman who is a bestselling writer and professor. She's just like a soulful person, right, Dora?

Doree:                I mean, yeah, that's such a good way of describing her.

Elise:                   I enjoyed this interview so much. At one point I felt myself tearing up because I could just feel what she said. Her insights are not only drops, but also they're just, I can feel it in my body. If you haven't heard of Laurel, she's the author of the memoir, what looks like bravery and Epic journey through Loss to Love. And before that, she wrote the New York Times bestselling book, animal Madness Inside their Minds. She received her doctorate in history and anthropology of science from MIT and is the director of writing and storytelling at the Stanford School of Medicines Medical Humanities and the Arts program where she helps clinical students and physicians communicate more clearly and vulnerably. That is she helps doctors talk more like humans. It's for their own benefit and for their patients. And since March of 2020, she has helped over 10,000 healthcare workers share their personal stories. She lives on the ranch where she grew up in Southern California.

Doree:                And before we get to Laurel, I just want to remind everyone that we have a website Forever35 podcast.com. We have links to everything we mentioned on the show on that website. We are on Instagram at Forever35 podcast. We're also on Patreon at patreon.com/forever three five. If you just can't get enough of us. And we have our favorite products@shopmy.us slash forever three five. Our newsletter is at 35 podcast com slash newsletter. And please call or text us at five nine one zero three nine zero and email us at Forever35 podcast at gmail com. And here is Laurel. Laurel, we are so excited to have you on Forever35. I feel like I've been a fan of yours and following your career for so long, so it's just such a delight to get to talk to you. Welcome to the show.

Laurel:                I truly thank you so much. I can't believe you know who I am. I feel the same way about you, both of you and I just am so honored to be here.

Elise:                   Yay, Laurel. We start every episode by asking what you're doing for self care lately. So that can be self-care, however you define it.

Laurel:                I'd say today, today and many days, it's about both trying to befriend and battle animals where I live. So as soon as I get off this with you, I have to go buy some chicken food and some other bird food. And I just find it kind of keeps me from getting too wrapped up in my own dramas to hang out with the chicken dramas, that kind of thing. So mostly spending time in dirt, spending time with animals, trying to trap the rats in the garage. I don't know, it's not as fun maybe as a face mask, but it helps keep my mind off the other ruminations.

Elise:                   How many animals are you living with now? How many creatures and all? You're back on your family's ranch, right? If I recall?

Laurel:                Yes. Yes. We actually don't have that many animals right now, at least domestic ones. We have about 14 baby owls, which is exciting. We have a couple of very populated owl boxes around the ranch right now. And my brother has a blind and deaf pit bull named Mona. She lives here. We have a bunch of chickens, we have some peacocks. We have a barn cat named Pisces who's really here just as a employee to eat mice. And that's about it. We're donkey and mule list right now, which is kind of a bummer for me.

Doree:                I love how you're like, we don't have that many animals and then you proceed to list more animals than I've ever lived with or encountered in my life. So I think our impressions of what is a lot of animals is quite different.

Laurel:                Maybe so, maybe so. But I don't have a dog or my own cat right now. No rabbits, I don't know. And then, yeah, lots of wild creatures. We have a mountain lion around right now who's eating the neighbor's calves. Oh, no. Yeah, it's kind of a tax you pay to live

Elise:                   Here. And how is this self-care for you? Do you feel like, so it takes your mind off the problems of humanity, the earthly

Laurel:                Problems? Yeah, my other problems, right? I mean is I think something you guys talk about beautifully a lot, but I live with a lot of anxiety and trying to figure out what I'm supposed to be doing here and if I'm good at it and if anyone's going to pay attention and you can fall down those sort of rabbit holes of self-worth and concern and fear. And when I'm caring for somebody else, whether that's a cat or a chicken or something, I'm forced to just deal with what's at hand. And also compared to a creative life, it's really nice. You kind of know when the job is done, right? You're like, okay,

                             I emptied the traps, that's great, now I can go do something else. I never feel that way when it comes to writing or any other sort of creative endeavor. You're kind of never done. You never know if you've done a good job. The goalposts are always changing. So self-care for me, really is about just staying out of the bad neighborhoods of my own mind. And I need other beings to do that, whether that's other people or creatures. But I think self-care too often ends up being a solitary thing, yet another thing we're supposed to do or buy. And I love emotional purchases. I'm a big fan. I'm a big capitalist despite my best intentions, but actually the things that make me feel better are not those things. They're being of service to others. They're being responsible to something that's not myself, and they're doing a job that's very clearly done and done well and doesn't make me wonder if I'm living my purpose or some sort of other lofty goal.

Doree:                What does a typical day look like for you in terms of caring for animals?

Laurel:                Well, I have this weird sort of bifurcated life where half the time I'm on the road teaching or I'm working with healthcare professionals or I'm doing talks or I'm on book tour and then the rest of the time it's kind of split. I'm either in rural Alaska, my husband runs a salmon cannery up in Larson Bay, which is off the road system in a deep cut of Kodiak, Alaska.

                             And a day up there is very different. If I have a normal day on the ranch, it's usually waking up, letting the chickens out, doing something in the garden, going back and forth between calls and writing in my office and then ranch projects. So I'll treat myself with like, okay, you've done three zooms, you can go deadhead the roses now. And Mondays and Tuesdays, I took up a new sport in my mid forties This year I'm trying to learn how to cow horse, which is a kind of, that's not tennis show slash no rodeo writing, which is really fun. And I'm in the very kind of baby stages of it. I'm really just trying to stay on gracefully or just stay on. And so that's what I'm doing on Mondays now I have an amazing teacher and the rest of the time is just trying to write and respond to emails, all the bullshit administrative stuff we have to do to be a person in the world.

Elise:                   Laurel, you have lived such an expansive life with a lot of perspective and surprise, and so you were the perfect person to write a memoir. So I'd love to talk a little bit about what looks like bravery, because up until about 35, 36, your life was a lot of overachieving and checking off a lot of boxes of things that you wanted to accomplish by the time you were 35. A lot of us, and a lot of our listeners are remapping our relationships with work and the ideas of success. And so I'd love for you to talk a little bit about how you came to the realization that trying to check off all the boxes wasn't great for you.

Laurel:                Great question. Everything kind of exploded. I think if it had continued to go well, we probably wouldn't be having this conversation. What happened was that I did, I had a pretty set list for myself that was mostly inherited and I went down and I checked off all the things, and then at the end I felt pretty terrible. And if you would ask me, okay, if you do all of these things that your parents dream for you and then you get to the bottom of the list and do you think you'll be happy, do you think you will have brought dead loved ones back? Do you think you finally will have won the approval of those that you seek? I would've told you intellectually. Well, of course not. That's ridiculous. But emotionally deep in my heart of hearts, I think I really believed it. I think in some deep subconscious place that if I just worked hard enough, if I got enough shiny things, I would feel better. I would feel good inside, I would feel loved, my parents would be proud of me, and I could basically retire. And so I did. I got to 35 and I had done a lot of those things like be a bestseller, writing a bestselling book was on my list, becoming a professor. A lot of the stuff I didn't even dare dream of had come true. And yet I felt like I was always stuffed inside of an itchy sweater that was three sizes too small,

                             And I couldn't figure it out and I couldn't see the sweater, but I just felt really uncomfortable. And I had fallen in love with a woman who's now one of my best friends, Constance Lee Hockaday. And Connie loved me and I loved her, and I just was blowing up that relationship and I had blown up lots of other ones. I just felt like I couldn't stay with someone more than two months. And if they actually liked me, I was more likely to end it and stay in it. And I would've told you that what I really wanted was a serious relationship, and yet I was dooming them. I couldn't be in them. That was maybe the first flag. And she didn't settle. Everyone else I'd ever dated before, straight dudes. They would ask me what was wrong on questioning. Yeah,

                             Yes. They would ask me what was wrong, and I would say nothing. I'm fine because I didn't have words for it. But Connie was like, that's a lot of bullshit. Something is wrong with you. And she kind of forced me to answer her. She wouldn't go away. That's a kindness. Until I answered it, it changed me. It changed everything about my life. And I hope it changed who I am as a friend and partner now. It was at the time, deeply uncomfortable. I was kind of like, fuck you, let me be, everything is fine here. Because I'd been telling myself that for decades, but she didn't let me rest. And it kind of set me down a journey of like, well, I actually do feel like something's wrong. What's wrong? But that was the catalyst was, Hey, I think I kind of want a relationship, and yet I am doing everything I can in my power subconsciously to destroy them if there is any chance of success. And then also professionally from the outside, it looked like I was doing quite well, but I wasn't finding the kind of meaning and purpose in my work that I wanted to be.

Doree:                So we're just going to take a short break and we will be right back. Can you talk a little bit more about how you kind of found the meeting and purpose in your work and what that transition was like?

Laurel:                Yeah, I mean, I changed my work is the truth. What happened was Connie and I were breaking up. It was this big messy breakup, and I got in the car and I was driving down the 1 0 1 sobbing. It was just me and my dog. And I turned on the radio and I heard an episode of this American Life where the reporter was talking to a woman who ran a grief support organization for kids.

                             And he said, well, what happens if kids don't get this kind of grief support if they're young? And she said, well, intimacy can be really hard for them. And as soon as they get close to someone, they might be liable to run away. And I was driving over 90 miles an hour down away from someone who loved me, and it was just too on the nose. I was embarrassed even to write about it in my memoir. It just felt too obvious. But that's what happened. And I pulled the car over and I started making really embarrassing phone calls to people who ran grief support organizations for young people and said, Hey, I'm not a kid, but I was once a grieving kid and I'm a writer. Can I come be in your program? And they were all like, that's super creepy. No, you're in your thirties. You were trying to be a kid in one. Yes, I knew I needed it. I knew I needed it. And eventually I spoke to a lovely woman, pat Murphy, who runs an organization called Josie's Place, grief Support for Kids and Adolescents in San Francisco. And she said, well, you can come and be a facilitator and you can train. And that really changed a lot of what I was doing and feeling, and I didn't set out to write about it. I just knew I needed to do it for my own survival.

Doree:                And

Laurel:                I had had a lot of grief and loss in my life. And the way I had dealt with it was with overwork and pursuit of success and really kind of numbing those fears and anxieties by the chasing of prizes basically. And using the good feelings that you get from achievement really to try to knock out some of the negative ones. And so I just knew if only I could have had this as a kid, but maybe I can try it as an adult. And so that changed my work. So I became a volunteer grief facilitator for kids, and I started doing all of the things with them that they were doing. So in the end, I did get that hopefully not too creepy for them experience. I was there as sort of a camp counselor, but I got to do it all. And that really opened up a whole new world for me, which has a skeptic who's spent a lot of time living on the East coast. A lot of it felt way too and very uncomfortable, but I just forced my way in and did it. And really it did change me. So I stayed a writer, but I changed what I was writing about. I went from writing primarily about popular science and medicine and other creatures and other people's mental health to my own.

Elise:                   Let's talk about your grief and your loss, the loss of your father because your dad is such an outsized character in your book and obviously a driving influence in your life. I think you were 17 when he died. What made you decide to go there and really plumb that relationship with your dad for a book?

Laurel:                I think I needed to finally kind of grow up. One thing that I learned from the grieving kids and also the other facilitators and leaders of these is that oftentimes when a young person happens a trauma, they get kind of stuck like an aunt in Amber, emotionally at the age, which hard thing happened. And I really was forever 17 in some fundamental ways. And a kid who experiences early loss, it can go many different directions. In some ways, you can be very emotionally mature because you've experienced something that sometimes many adults around you haven't experienced yet or your teachers haven't experienced yet. And at the other hand, you can get a little frozen. And my dad died at a time where I healthily should have been rebelling maybe or arguing with him or figuring out how I felt about things and coming into my own.

                             And instead, I felt, I did argue with him, but I felt like I couldn't. And I think deep down I worried that if I let myself grow up too much, if he came back looking for me, he wouldn't recognize me and he couldn't find me. And so to become someone new seemed scary in some way. And so I think I had kind of gotten stuck. And one thing I saw these brave seven year olds doing, and six year olds and 15 year olds was forgiving themselves for the fights they had as their final conversations with their parents

                             And giving themselves a little bit of grace and being with one another and kind of seeing, oh, we're only kids. We're not responsible for this. And I had not had that. And so I needed to kind of go back and I think just for me, look at some of the cosmologies I had inherited from my family and see which ones would serve me as I became an adult, and which ones I could leave by the side of the road that worked for them but might not work for me. And also memoir is such a fun way to hang out with the people that you miss. I got to be with them again for a couple years. I got to hear their voices. I ordered my dad's cologne on eBay and his pipe tobacco, and I would smell it and sit there. And I've lost my mom as well. And being able to be with both of them in the pages of this was healing and good, and also allowed me to have empathy for myself and for them, and also work out the stuff I was mad about. I just really felt that. Thank you.

Doree:                I also wrote a memoir and I found it both cathartic and really hard to constantly be reliving some painful episodes of my life and constantly reinterpreting them from various angles. So I would love if you could talk a little bit about that process specifically and how it affected you.

Laurel:                Well, I feel like you just peered into my heart and explained exactly how it felt. Interview's over, okay, we're done. No, seriously, it's the most uncomfortable, the most uncomfortable. And if you want to make it believable, you have to go live in it. You have to go sit there. You can't stand up. And you have to analyze it in a way that you never would if you just wanted to live it. Right?

Doree:                You

Laurel:                Live through a thing, it's uncomfortable. You move on, you have your story. I think if you are going to write about it in any way that can be trusted, you have to analyze that 10 x more than a reader could because you don't want them to have an insight you haven't had because they will put it down and be like, well, this person isn't insightful enough for me to be reading

Doree:                About.

Laurel:                And that's exhausting. And I feel like sometimes you don't want to spend time in those places. Our family, this is a spoiler, but our family home burned down. I lost all the things I loved, and that was even more painful and hard for me than writing about some of the other losses of people and creatures and stuff, because I had to go back and listen to all the fire scanner things and read the text messages and watch the live fire reports and all that. And I do think I kind of re-traumatized myself for a little while, and I had to have stuff that, I don't know if you did this, but at the end of a writing day when I'd been writing about something hard, I did have to go do something. I had to work it out. I had to go walk somewhere. I had to give myself a lot of little treats. I'm a big fan of bribing yourself through writing because it's horrible.

Elise:                   But I'm imagining you out there like fly fishing or clearing some brush after a long day of writing.

Laurel:                Sometimes I'm in a Best Western under a freeway overpass to do a keynote at a medical conference. You know what I mean? It's not always brush clearing. Okay, beautiful fly fishing. But yeah, always something like that. And the more moving of my body, which I don't really like to do, is the truth. I like the feeling of having exercise, but I hate doing it. Same. Oh, it's the worst. But I like moving always helps me. Something about the act of moving helps me move through the hard stuff emotionally too. So I did try to do that. I did a lot of walking while writing this book and just hoping that by the time I stopped moving, I wouldn't fall over.

Elise:                   Well, it turned out beautifully.

Laurel:                Thank you.

Elise:                   Let's talk a little bit about your day job, which you just mentioned because you have developed an expertise in helping people tell their own stories and helping doctors and scientists speak like human beings or with more humanity. What do you think are the ingredients for communicating with each other better and more deeply?

Laurel:                Well, I hate small talk. I will walk away. I hate hate when someone asks, how are you? Even if it's well intentioned, it just makes me want to run in the other direction. And I'm like, ask me something better.

Elise:                   What do you ask people instead of, how are you?

Laurel:                Well, I try to read the room. Sometimes you have to ask, how are you because you're going to make somebody feel really uncomfortable. But when my husband and I were first dating, we were long distance, and he would call me at the end of a work day and be like, so how are your day? And I started hanging up on him because I was just like, you can't ask me this anymore. We're going to break up because this is leading to the most boring conversations. And so we started a list of other questions we could ask each other. I'd say I like the ones that are like, what's the most, this is boring, but this is something you can do in an elevator. What's the most surprising thing that's happened to you today instead of, how are you with my students? We do a lot of, what's your internal weather system and just the old sort of, what's your Rose Rosen thorn plus your most surprising thing from today. Just like, I'm sure this is probably dinner parenting 1 0 1

Elise:                   Dinner. Yeah, we do it with the kids for sure,

Laurel:                But we should be doing it with each other and we should be doing it in social circumstances. I actually have a list if any listener wants it, I keep a list of 35 questions to ask instead of How are you?

Doree:                I just, hi,

Laurel:                I would like this

Doree:                List. I also,

Laurel:                I'll send it to you.

Doree:                Also, small talk stresses me out, so I would appreciate said list.

Elise:                   Right. We will link that to hungry.

Doree:                My son taught me, my son taught me two more things to add on to the roses and thorns, which are feathers and buds. I don't know if these are things that his preschool made up or if these are widely known, but a feather is something that made you laugh and a bud is something that you learned.

Laurel:                Oh my God, what an amazing preschool.

Doree:                I like that. Yeah, that's

Laurel:                Incredible.

Doree:                So sometimes he'll be like, I didn't have a rose or a thorn, but I did have a feather.

Laurel:                I'm stealing that. That's so good. It's

Doree:                Good. And sometimes he actually does also really want to talk about something he's learned, which is interesting, five. So he's kind of just getting into the phase where he's realizing that he's learning new things. And it's fun for me to think about too. And also I think it's good. I know I'm preaching to the choir here, but for people to see that things aren't always great, and sometimes the thorns involve him. If he gets hurt, I'll say, yeah, my thorn today was when you tripped and fell. So I really like that practice as well.

Laurel:                That's awesome. There's an oncology chaplain I work with, and I was telling him about my hatred of How are you? And he said that he wanted to think of a new question too, to work with the patients, and he's now asking people what is true for you today too, which I also think is a nice one. Oh, wow. Yeah, which is fun.

Elise:                   Okay, let's take a break and we will be right back. Laura, let's rewind a little bit and talk a little bit about your other area of expertise, which was animals and mental health, which is, it's not like this expertise area has gone away. So you found that animals teach us a lot about the ways that we interact and can kind of remind us of how we are all connected to one another. So I'm curious if you have an anecdote or a story or a fun fact, maybe a bud perhaps, about another species that you think is particularly illuminating during this time that we're all feeling a little helpless. It feels like it's been a turbulent few years.

Laurel:                God, that is the truth. Whenever I'm bummed out, I think about whales. I do. And I'm not really that much of a beach person, and I was not a dolphin girl.

Doree:                Wait, are dolphin girls a thing?

Laurel:                Oh

Doree:                Yeah.

Laurel:                Yeah. Like horse girls.

Doree:                I was going to say, I know about horse girls. My former co-host on this podcast was a horse girl, but I didn't know that dolphin girls were also a thing. This is very interesting.

Elise:                   Yeah, maybe there was that period growing up where everybody wanted to be a marine biologist.

Doree:                Yes. And maybe also I as the blue dolphins, remember that book?

Elise:                   Yes, yes, yes.

Doree:                We

Elise:                   All had to read that.

Laurel:                Yes. Yeah. If you're

Elise:                   Of a certain

Doree:                Age,

Laurel:                Dolphin girl is a thing. Sorry.

Doree:                Please

Laurel:                Proceed. I mean, at least it was in the eighties and nineties, maybe no

Doree:                More. Right, right.

Laurel:                But yeah, I like thinking about whales. They're just an alternative cultural destination for us, I think, which is why I like thinking about that. I went actually out to the Channel Islands last week, which is where island of the blue Dolphins was set, and all of the blue whales are right off the coast right now of Southern California, and they're huge. The biggest animal to have ever walked, swam this earth is alive right now is that to me is the bud of all buds.

                             It's so cool. The biggest thing bigger, we think like a brontosaurus is big, or the dinosaurs were big, but a blue whale is bigger than all of them, and they're still here, and they may be matriarchal and they carry such wisdom and they live such a long time, and we really don't understand their consciousness. We know that they are capable of deep feeling, of complex cognitive thinking and memory and language and names and words, and we know that they have culture. We don't know if they think about themselves as an I or as a we. It could be that they have a different kind of consciousness, which could be true across a lot of different cean species because oftentimes they act like in concert, and we don't quite know why. Like a beaching of a bunch of whale pilot whales or dolphins, maybe only one is sick. And so it sort of makes you wonder, are they saying we sick? Is there no, I'm sick or anti sick, so I'm going to go with her. And I love thinking about non-human models for how we might be, for how we might be better, for how we might make different cultural choices. And they're here. They're all here, and they're doing okay. A lot of whale populations have really come back over our lifetime. So whenever I just feel a little hopeless, which is so often now, I think about whales. I try to see them.

                             I hung out with a cytologist, a person who studies whales once, and she studied orcas up off of the coast of Washington state, and she was musing to me once, and I just thought this was so funny. And she was like, I just love imagining that the whales are just hanging out under the surface talking about how weird it is that humans just scream all the time, that all they do is scream, start laughing. Because literally anytime a whale sees a person, that person is just losing it, right? No one sees a whale and doesn't go like with so much joy. That's so funny. Isn't that amazing? That's really funny. So it's how many animals are like this? How many other different species hold keys for us to be better humans, to treat each other differently, to think about how we act? Elephant sexuality, another great example, an elephant daycare. Basically, if a few female elephants are friends, they will lactate in order to watch their friends' babies so that because it's matriarchal culture so that those female elephants can go find the next watering hole or go do whatever. They have evolved this amazing way to care for each other's young God. I love these matriarchies, which is cool.

                             Yes. It's like I have a friend who's a writer who wanted to be writing about some contemporary matriarchies, and he asked me, and I was like, no, but animals. But go talk to some hyenas because they have it dialed, dialed. All the women have the power, and the clitoris is bigger than the penis too, which is another amazing thing. Whoa. Anyway, for Elephant? No, no hyenas.

Elise:                   Oh, hyenas. Okay.

Laurel:                Yeah, female hyenas. They rule the roost as it were.

Elise:                   The thing that I don't want to be, when I think about different animals, it's just the elephant gestation period is so long. Yeah. I wouldn't want to be a pregnant elephant because isn't it like two and a half years or something like that? Can't

Laurel:                Remember. I can't remember. But I know it's longer than us, and they're so heavy. Those babies are heavy. Can you imagine just sloshing side to side as you're walking a hundred miles to get a glass of water? I just,

Doree:                Yeah, 22 months.

Laurel:                22

Doree:                Months.

Laurel:                Oh, that just, oh boy. Amazing. Amazing. But that's why they're also such incredible moms. You've invested that much energy and time like, oh my God.

Elise:                   It's the cost fallacy.

Laurel:                Totally. Totally. Although I'm guessing they also get very depressed. I'm sure postpartum depression exists in certain elephants too.

Elise:                   Yeah. Laurel, the way I first came to know you, and one of the things that I admire about you from afar is that you seem to have really strong friendships, because I know you through Wendy McNaughton, Wendy Mack, the illustrator, Wendy has talked about your sisterhood and your bestie, and I find it so lovely and inspiring. So we asked this, I think we've asked this of a few of our guests, and I like to ask this question because tends to yield such great answers. How are you thinking about friendship and how do you keep your own friendships strong?

Laurel:                I mean, the loves of my life is the truth. I have loved romantically men and women. I am currently married to an absolutely incredible person, but he'll never catch up. We met when I was nearly 40, and if I look at the span of my life, the true loves of my life have been my friends. And when you talk about loss or grief, the only way I have been able to scrabble through some of those experiences is knowing that there's someone there to give me shit and bring me some gummy worms and tell me it really sucks. And well, thank God you're a writer. Maybe you can write about this one day and then be fine. When I get annoyed when they tell me that, it's that it gives my life, meaning my friends are my people. I don't have kids. And I think even if I did, maybe my friendships would be my primary relationships in my life. So I think about it. I think about oxygen. I wouldn't want to be here without them. I would do anything for them. And let me say that does not mean I'm always a good friend. I am terrible, terrible at texting and emails and returning phone calls. I'm so bad at it. It gives me a lot of anxiety. I was just diagnosed this year as having a DHD, and it explains so much, and I'm learning so much about my own brain in my mid forties. I'm part of this wave of women who just got diagnosed.

Elise:                   Yeah, you're probably masking your whole life.

Laurel:                Yes. And now I understand. Okay, I could show you, but my phone is an airplane. My assistant was just teasing me last night. I have over 1600 unread text message things on my phone. So it's like I open it up, it overwhelms me, and I close it back down again. And I'm not going to lie. That gets in the way of my friendships and the people that I am able to maintain long-term friendships with, understand this about me and give me a bit of grace and know that I love

                             And are kind of like plants that do okay without watering. On the weekly, I really can only have maybe half a dozen friends I talk to regularly, as in once a week or every other week. But I have lots of people that I love, like a rabid, matriarchal hyena and maybe talk to them once a month or every couple months. But I do. I try to visit everybody. I try to show up for things. I try to remember stuff. I try to be there in a crisis. I'm not great at remembering birthdays and that kind of stuff, but I do think the people I love know that I would die for 'em.

Doree:                Well, I think that is a lovely note to end on. Laurel, thank you so much for coming on the show. I feel better after talking to you. So maybe this conversation was my self-care for the day. Laurel, where can our listeners find you?

Laurel:                They can find me@laurelbreman.com. It's just my first name.my last name.com. Or they can find me on Instagram, which is really the only social media I can handle, which is Laurel Breman at Instagram. And before I go, can I just thank you guys for making a midlife survival guide, because I think that's what you've been doing and you've been doing it so beautifully, and we need you so badly. You are like a roadmap to what matters in midlife that is so kind, and I'm just so grateful.

Doree:                Oh, thank you so much for saying that.

Laurel:                I mean it.

Doree:                Thanks, Laurel. Thanks Laurel. You guys are the best laurel's. So

Elise:                   Cool. So cool. And I really do want to go hang out on her ranch with her and the 12 owls and the brush cutting or whatever you need to do to tend to a ranch,

Doree:                All those things,

Elise:                   The horseback riding. She's just a multi-talented, multi-skilled and brilliant person. So thanks Laurel.

Doree:                Elise, how did it go telling people you love them?

Elise:                   It went really well with younger people, so I was really more intentional about talking to my kids and telling them I was so lucky that I was their mom. And they returned it. They were like, thank you for being my mommy. And I was like, thank you for being my daughter. And so we had some nice tender moments, but still not so great. When it comes to my friends, I'm hanging out a lot with my business partner, Rachel and her husband Tim, who was my dorm mate in college. And it just feels awkward for me to be like, Tim, I love you, man. But I did put it out into the universe that I want to do this. So I'm going to continue to try and tell people that I love. But what about you to your intention was just to stay cool, right? Because it's July.

Doree:                Yes, because it's July and it's been hot. I think I'm doing a reasonably good job at that. I'm really trying to wear light colors. My instinct is to just wear black all the time, but that is not great in the sun. So just trying to be someone who manages the sun and I'm doing a decent job this week. I just want to get a good night's sleep.

Elise:                   Yes. That's a great one. And let's all support Doree in this intention. We're putting out the good vibes.

Doree:                Thank you.

Elise:                   Thank you. So Muchs a good one. Mine. What's yours? Mine to slow down. Oh, just to slow down because Rob had this talk with me today in the car, and he was like last week when we went out to So-and-So we went to dinner and then we went to karaoke after. And then he wanted to go get a nightcap at something else. He's like, we don't always have to do the thing after, because then we have less time for just you and me. And it seems like every time we go out, it's like we're going to the concert and then we're going to go to the comedy show, and then we're going to do this other thing. And he's like, let's just slow down. And so I realized that I wasn't tending to my relationship very well because I do have this tendency to pack my calendar really tight and want to try and do everything. So my intention is just to slow down and I think it'd be better for not only my romantic relationship, but just my relationships with my kids too.

Doree:                Yeah.

Elise:                   So slowing

Doree:                That's really

Elise:                   Nice is the intention putting out there.

Doree:                So Elise, once a month, we like to thank our $10 and our $35 tier patrons. We are very grateful to all of you. So I'm going to read these names and yeah, thank you. Thank you to Amy. Amy Schnier, Heather Hale, Megan Donald Brew, Jr. Devlin, ESCO, Jen, Jen, Helen, de Mo, Shelly Lee, Kim Beagler, Amelia Dela, Sarah, Sarah Boozy, Alison Cohen, Susan Eth, Lisette, Lynette Jones, Fran, Kelsey Wolf, Donna, Laura. Eddie, Pam from Boston Tel Apti, Valerie, Bruno, Jane, Thoreau, Katie Tron, E Jackson, Amy, Mako, Liz, rain. JDK, Hannah, M Julia Putt, Marissa, CE Bee, Diana, Coco Bean, Laura, Hadden, Josie, Zi, Nikki, Boser, Juliana Duff, Angie, James, Tiffany, Griffith, Diane, m Martin, Emily, McIntyre, Stephanie, Ana, Elizabeth Anderson, Kelly Dearborn, Christine, Beis, Zulema, Lundy, Carrie, gold and t, Nikki, Catherine Ellingson, Kara Brugmann, cc, Sarah Egan, Jess Kobin, Jennifer Olson, Jennifer Hs, Jillian Bowman, Brianne, Macy, Elizabeth, Holland, Karen Perelman, Katie, Jordan, Sarah, M Lisa, Travis, Kate, M, Emily, Bruer, Josie, Alquist, Tara, Todd, Elizabeth Cleary, Monica, and Joanna Stone. Thank you so much. Thank you all so much. We're so grateful to you. If you would like to join their ranks, you can do that at patreon.com/forever three five.

Elise:                   And I just have to say, I am enjoying hanging out with the Patreon community so much. We mix it up in the comments. Sometimes we're hearing from you with your recs and your questions there, so it's really great to have this community. Thank you for welcoming me as I fill in this summer. So yeah, thanks patrons

Doree:                And Forever35 is hosted and produced by me, Doree Shafrir and Elise Hugh, and produced and edited by Sam Junio. Sami Reed is our project manager, and our network partner is Acast. Thanks everybody. Time.

 *Transcripts are AI generated.