Welcome back to Friendship Therapy, the podcast where psychotherapist, author and podcaster Emma Reed Turrell looks at your friendship experiences through a therapy lens. This week, Emma chats to Jemima, who reached out to Emma to talk about the impact that neurodivergence has had on her friendships.

Diagnosed at just six years old, dyspraxia has affected every aspect of Jemima's life since she was a small child, from being put into remedial classes at school, to throwing and catching balls with her brother so she could be more like the other children. Jemima's family just wanted to keep her safe from a world that didn't necessarily understand her, but Jemima wanted to reject her dyspraxia diagnosis altogether. Now, as a woman in her forties, she has come to learn a lot about herself and the way she exists in the world as a neurodiverse woman with her own unique experiences in life and in friendship.

In this episode, Jemima generously shares how she navigates friendship and dyspraxia. We hear about her experience of being neurodivergent in a world that doesn't always celebrate difference, struggling with burnout and feelings of rejection and abandonment, and through it all, the unwavering support, love and encouragement that her friends and family have shown her.

Jemima's story reminds us that when we mess up, as we inevitably will, having grace for ourselves and for our friends can be an incredibly powerful metric of friendship.

To find out more about Eric Berne's Parent, Adult, Child theory, click here:  https://www.simplypsychology.org/transactional-analysis-eric-berne.html

Information on dyspraxia from the NHS website: https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/developmental-coordination-disorder-dyspraxia-in-adults/

Exceptional Individuals - https://exceptionalindividuals.com/

Some book recommendations from Jemima:

The Lion Who Wanted to Love - https://www.amazon.co.uk/Lion-Who-Wanted-Love/dp/1860399134/ref=asc_df_1860399134/?tag=googshopuk-21&linkCode=df0&hvadid=697208928393&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=9929041182393392105&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9046002&hvtargid=pla-537898099083&psc=1&mcid=36f7310928af3f02b640a4340b0442d0&th=1&psc=1&gad_source=1

Autism in Heels - https://booksplea.se/autism-in-heels-the-untold-story-of-a-female-life-on-the-spectrum-by-jennifer-cook-otoole/?setCurrencyId=1&gad_source=1&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIqanE7ZXbhgMVspVQBh3j_QLDEAQYASABEgL6MfD_BwE

Rhinocorn Rules - https://www.theworks.co.uk/p/picture-books/rhinocorn-rules/WKS_9780008617103.html?gad_source=1&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIyLf5iZbbhgMVw4hQBh2_rAo8EAQYASABEgJYv_D_BwE

If you’d like to apply to appear on the podcast in season two, please click the link below to fill out the form:   

https://forms.gle/owsfs6DVxVdTMFo46  

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Friendship Therapy is hosted by Emma Reed Turrell, produced by Chris Sharp and Lauren Brook.

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Social media:  

Emma Reed Turrell @emmareedturrell

Friendship Therapy @friendshiptherapypod

Email: [email protected]

Welcome back to Friendship Therapy! This is the bitesize episode, where Emma discusses her therapeutic takeaways from her conversation with this week's guest.

This week, Emma met Charlotte, whose fear of losing a treasured childhood friend has her questioning how to keep the spark alive in long-term friendships. When Charlotte and her friend see each other, they can pick right up where they left off: but are they spending too much time down memory lane, rather than updating their friendship into the present?

In this bitesize episode, Emma digs deeper into the impact of nostalgia in long-term friendships, how our childhood friends are caretakers for past versions of ourselves, and why passivity or non-confrontation in friendship break-ups can cause us to reinforce our blind spots and fill in the wrong blanks.

If you’d like to apply to appear on the podcast in season two, please click the link below to fill out the form:   

https://forms.gle/owsfs6DVxVdTMFo46  

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Friendship Therapy is hosted by Emma Reed Turrell, produced by Chris Sharp and Lauren Brook.

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Social media:  

Emma Reed Turrell @emmareedturrell

Friendship Therapy @friendshiptherapypod

Email: [email protected]

Welcome back to Friendship Therapy, the podcast where psychotherapist, author and podcaster Emma Reed Turrell looks at your friendship experiences through a therapy lens. This week, Emma chats to 32-year-old Charlotte about how to keep the spark alive in long-term friendships.

In this episode, Charlotte opens up about her fear of a childhood friendship 'fizzling out' as they both move into different phases of life and embrace new friendships. She describes how even though their opportunities for connection have lessened over the years, she and this long-term friend can pick up right where they left off when they do see each other, often spending their time together reminiscing about their shared past rather than bringing their friendship into the present.

Emma and Charlotte discuss the role that our childhood friends play in being caretakers of our past selves, passivity and lack of clarity in friendship break-ups, how to allocate our friendship energy, and why avoiding confrontation or not updating our friendships into 2024 often causes us to fill in the wrong blanks or reinforce limiting beliefs about ourselves.

If you’d like to apply to appear on the podcast in season two, please click the link below to fill out the form:   

https://forms.gle/owsfs6DVxVdTMFo46  

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Friendship Therapy is hosted by Emma Reed Turrell, produced by Chris Sharp and Lauren Brook.

--- 

Social media:  

Emma Reed Turrell @emmareedturrell

Friendship Therapy @friendshiptherapypod

Email: [email protected]

Welcome back to Friendship Therapy! This is the bitesize episode, where Emma discusses her therapeutic takeaways from her conversation with this week's guest.

This week, Emma met another Emma, a psychotherapist who found herself questioning her place in her childhood friendship group after becoming a mother at 19, going through a divorce in her thirties and persuing a new career as a therapist later in life.

In this bitesize episode, Emma takes us through the Nursing Triad, healthy first order symbiosis and Eric Berne's Parent, Adult Child ego states theory within Transactional Analysis, and how Emma's friends played a practical and emotional co-parent role in Emma's life as she navigated becoming a mother when she was still a child herself.

Emma also reflects on Emma's therapy journey, her growing curiosity and defiance against decades-old patterns, and how she found herself challenging the boundaries and renegotiating her friendships to find out if she could be accepted unconditionally.

To find out more about Eric Berne's Parent, Adult, Child theory, click here:  https://www.simplypsychology.org/transactional-analysis-eric-berne.html

If you’d like to apply to appear on the podcast in season two, please click the link below to fill out the form:   

https://forms.gle/owsfs6DVxVdTMFo46  

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Friendship Therapy is hosted by Emma Reed Turrell, produced by Chris Sharp and Lauren Brook.

--- 

Social media:  

Emma Reed Turrell @emmareedturrell

Friendship Therapy @friendshiptherapypod

Email: [email protected]

Welcome back to Friendship Therapy, a brand new podcast where psychotherapist, author and podcaster Emma Reed Turrell looks at your friendship experiences through a therapy lens. This week, Emma speaks to fellow psychotherapist, also called Emma.

Emma became a mother at 19 and subsequently went through a divorce in her thirties, eventually finding herself in training to become a psychotherapist much later in life than her peers. Through it all, her close-knit group of childhood friends were a guiding light for her - becoming not just a support system, but a partner who showed up for Emma and her daughter practically and emotionally.
 
The friendship dynamic shifted when Emma started having therapy as part of her training, encouraging her to seek authenticity in herself and in her friendships. She found herself wanting to lift lids and have difficult conversations with these childhood friends, seeking to understand them better and make sense of her role in their lives.
 
In this episode, Emma and Emma discuss the impact that therapy can have on our relationships, how to navigate changing dynamics and different life stages, why it’s okay to live with discomfort in our friendships, and how we can sometimes leave the lids where they are and trust that our friends want the best for us.

If you’d like to apply to appear on the podcast in season two, please click the link below to fill out the form:   

https://forms.gle/owsfs6DVxVdTMFo46  

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Friendship Therapy is hosted by Emma Reed Turrell, produced by Chris Sharp and Lauren Brook.

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Social media:  

Emma Reed Turrell @emmareedturrell

Friendship Therapy @friendshiptherapypod

Email: [email protected]

Welcome back to Friendship Therapy and our first bitesize episode, where Emma shares her therapeutic takeaways from her conversation with this week's guests, Janine and Julia.

In this bitesize episode, Emma dives into the concept of yin and yang, a term that Janine and Julia use to describe themselves and their friendship. Emma explains how the contrasting dots of colour in the yin and yang symbol represent the need for chaos and control to exist harmoniously, and how this concept can help us to identify what we might need more of in our own lives.

Emma also encourages us to think about what we can and want to offer in friendship, why we don't have to tick every single box on someone else's friendship application form, and how our childhood friendships can be updated and nurtured to reflect who we are in the present.

If you’d like to apply to appear on the podcast in season two, please click the link below to fill out the form:   

https://forms.gle/owsfs6DVxVdTMFo46  

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Friendship Therapy is hosted by Emma Reed Turrell, produced by Chris Sharp and Lauren Brook.

--- 

Social media:  

Emma Reed Turrell @emmareedturrell

Friendship Therapy @friendshiptherapypod

Email: [email protected]

Welcome to the first ever episode of Friendship Therapy, a brand new podcast where psychotherapist, author and podcaster Emma Reed Turrell looks at your friendship experiences through a therapy lens.
 
This week, Emma speaks to best friends for 25 years, Janine and Julia.   Describing their personalities as ‘yin and yang’, these two women were thrown together in the school playground, becoming friends by default rather than design. In the years that followed, they worked to grow and nurture a deeply meaningful, complex friendship that has seen them through some of the most challenging and joyful moments in their lives.  

From school sleepover dramas and Sunday night phone calls after Dawson’s Creek, to relationship breakdowns, motherhood and changing priorities, Janine and Julia have remained the constant in each other’s lives for more than two decades.  

In this very special debut episode, Emma explores the evolution of Janine and Julia’s friendship over the decades, the roles that these two friends filled for each other, and the enduring power of unconditional love, acceptance and consistency in friendship.  

If you’d like to apply to appear on the podcast in season two, please click the link below:   

https://forms.gle/owsfs6DVxVdTMFo46  

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Friendship Therapy is hosted by Emma Reed Turrell, produced by Chris Sharp and Lauren Brook.

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Social media:  

Emma Reed Turrell @emmareedturrell

Friendship Therapy @friendshiptherapypod

Email: [email protected]

Friendship Therapy is a brand new podcast coming soon, in which psychotherapist and author Emma Reed Turrell talks to real people about real friendships and looks at these pivotal relationships through a therapy lens. 


Subscribe now and don't miss the first episode when it drops on Monday 3rd June.

Well, here we are. Emma is firmly in denial and Elizabeth is busy looking for silver linings because this week's episode of Best Friend Therapy is our LAST ONE EVER. Probably. 

We have loved every minute of these last two years, as we've curated this collection of conversations to share with you, our wonderful listeners.

Thank you so much for having us and we hope you'll join us for one last look back, at the journey we've been on together... 

We talk about our favourite episodes and look back on some of the memorable moments that made us laugh and cry. We'd love to hear from you about your favourite episodes and what you'll take away from this series and, remember, the back catalogue is there for you whenever you want to dip in and hear some words of comfort and support, or just enjoy hearing us lose it over that pesky rustle in the bush. 

Elizabeth shares her heartfelt thanks for the space you've given to her feelings on fertility and Emma will forever be grateful for the confidence she's gained to speak her truth more widely. 


Finally, know that we see you. We hear you. We understand you.
And you are not alone. You will always be welcome here.

Oh, and watch this space for what comes next...

Love Elizabeth and Emma xx

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We are so looking forward to seeing some of you IRL at our live finale show on Thursday 4th April, at the Bloomsbury Theatre in London! And if you couldn't get a ticket, or you just fancy watching from the comfort of your own sofa, you can now join us via livestream. Book a ticket to watch live, or on demand for a week after the event, here: https://www.fane.co.uk/best-friend-therapy 

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Best Friend Therapy is hosted by Elizabeth Day and Emma Reed Turrell, produced by Chris Sharp. 

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Social Media: 

Elizabeth Day @elizabday 

Emma Reed Turrell @emmareedturrell 
 
Best Friend Therapy @best.friend.therapy 

Email: [email protected]

We begin this episode with the announcement that this... sniff... will be... sniff... our last season of Best Friend Therapy but DON'T PANIC because there are good reasons which we'll go into and plenty of exciting new projects in the pipeline!

Which also means there's no time to lose and so this week we take a deep dive into the work Emma has been developing around her unique model of "blind spot therapy", and which she's sharing with us all in her upcoming book, What Am I Missing?

If you have ever wondered why you end up repeating patterns of unhealthly behaviour, in the wrong relationships, caught up in conflict in your family or held back at work, you might be acting out of a blind spot - an area of low or no awareness that means you can't see things clearly and end up tripping over the same obstacles in life.

Emma has developed a brand new psychological theory to translate ideas of unconscious bias, learned behaviours and cultural conditioning into four clear and relatable blind spot profiles:

Listen along this week and find out whether you might be:

THE GLADIATOR, determined but missing trust
THE BRIDGE, easy-going but missing authenticity
THE HUSTLER, charming but missing self-worth
Or THE ROCK, resilient but missing boundaries

Elizabeth explores how being a Bridge/Hustler, or a "Bristle" as we affectionately like to call her, has affected her in the past and Emma explains how her inner Rock led her to become a therapist.

Published by Penguin on 4th April, What Am I Missing? will teach you how to overcome the blind spots that are holding you back and explain why, when they said "what you don't know won't hurt you", they couldn't have been more wrong!

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EXCLUSIVE PRE-ORDER OFFER: You can get £5 off your copy of What Am I Missing? if you pre-order online at Waterstones and use the code WHATAMIMISSING before the 4th April. https://www.waterstones.com/book/what-am-i-missing/emma-reed-turrell/9780241624982

And if you do pre-order a hardback, audiobook or e-book edition from any UK retailer, you can also enter a competition to win an online 1:1 Blind Spot Therapy Session with Emma! Just visit https://penguinrandomhouse.eu.research.net/r/WhatAmIMissingComp to enter your details.

Malcolm Gladwell talks about the "10,000-Hour Rule", in his book Outliers, it's an excellent take on what makes us successful: https://amzn.eu/d/2Or36uE


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Best Friend Therapy is hosted by Elizabeth Day and Emma Reed Turrell, produced by Chris Sharp.

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Social Media:

Elizabeth Day @elizabday

Emma Reed Turrell @emmareedturrell

Best Friend Therapy @best.friend.therapy

Email: [email protected]