Just a note before we jump into today's episode, we wanted to give you guys a trigger warning.

We do mention self-harm, suicide, drug use, and addiction in this episode.

Hey, Alyssa. Hey, Sam. Hey, Leanne. Hi. Are you guys both ready for today?

I'm ready. I'm ready. Let's hit it.

Okay, so today we have a very special guest, Leanne Sharbono. Leanne is a long time approachable listener.

I wanted to promote ourselves in the intro.

Leanne had actually reached out to us when we did the chronic pain episode with Rob Eudichristi,

if you guys remember from I think that was one. Yeah, that was.

And she was really moved that we were talking about chronic illness, and specifically invisible illness.

And Leanne, you have, let me pull it up here, neurofibromatosis. Yes.

And Leanne has graciously agreed to come on the podcast and talk to us about NF, which is what I'll

be calling it, because I messed that up three times. So sorry, Sam editing this later.

And talk about her experience with invisible illness and kind of like everything that it entails.

And Leanne and I had connected last week, and I basically interviewed her then because I was just

so moved by your story, honestly. And I was asking question after question, and I was like, okay,

I'll stop. Stop and choose. Like save it for the podcast, bitch.

I'll stop interrogating you. So yeah, I did look up NF a little bit after we spoke, just because I

didn't want to be like completely clueless as to like what you've been going through and stuff like

that. But why don't we kind of just jump in from the beginning? When were you diagnosed with NF?

Is it genetic? That sort of thing. Yeah. So NF, neurofibromatosis, is technically genetic, but

I'm the first one in the family that carries the gene chromosome 17, which is mutated to give me.

I was diagnosed when I was four. My mom noticed I had like what looked like swollen. You can't even

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