Hey everyone, I am here with Katie Herzog. Hello, Katie. Hello, Jesse. This is going to be

a different episode. Basically, it is going to be sad, it is going to be personal in a way

I'm not usually comfortable with. I will explain in a minute. This is not going to be a fun

episode. It's going to be possibly difficult listening and we'll be back to normal with

our next episode. This is going to be different. So, yeah, Katie, are you ready to get sad?

I have been looking forward to this. I haven't had a good cry in a long time. I'm hoping

that this will be the day. I think our podcast makes a lot of people sad, but usually it's

unintentional. So, this is maybe a change for us. Yeah. Grab the hand keys, everybody.

Okay. So, my mom died last week and this was not unexpected. It stemmed from a cancer

diagnosis in September and I have not told anyone except some friends and, I mean, obviously

family about that. I've recorded this podcast a bunch of times as a really nice escape

from that and not talked about it at all and felt progressively weirder. I continue

doing that even after she died because it was just nice to do work. Honestly, it felt

like a way to avoid this stuff. But I wanted to just explain what happened in part because

some of this is stuff people don't talk about and feel uncomfortable talking about. I

think that's part of the problem and I feel uncomfortable talking about it and my brothers

were a little bit hesitant for me to talk about some of it. Is that enough mysterious

thought clearing, do you think? Or should I just continue in this vein for like 40 more

minutes? I think we're good there. I thank you for doing this. I know this is going to

be difficult. It'll be difficult for you. It'll probably be harder for me. I don't

know if you know this about me, but I'm what you call an impasse. Do you know what an

impasse? And I really feel other people's emotions so I can argue for myself. I would have

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