Raina Cohen

We need other significant others.

And there's an overlooked kind of relationship that we can turn to.

Friendship.

I got the sense that friendship could be this stronger force in our lives because of a friendship that I stumbled into.

We would see each other most days of the week, be each other's plus ones to parties.

I went out and interviewed dozens of people who had a friendship like ours, and I wrote a book about them.

Natasha and Linda are the first legally recognized platonic co-parents in Canada.

Joe and John have been best friends for many decades,

When Joe was struggling with alcohol and drug use, John got him into recovery.

And then John decided that to support his friend, he would also become sober.

Joy took care of her friend Hannah during Hannah's six-year battle with ovarian cancer.

And that included flying out to New York, where Hannah got specialized treatment.

Joy had trouble actually sleeping overnight in the hospital because she was too busy watching to make sure her friend's chest was still rising and falling.

Some of the friends that I spoke to had this friendship occupy the space that's conventionally given to a romantic partner.

Some had this kind of friendship and a romantic partner.

It's not either-or.

As I spoke to these people, I realized that they were at the frontier of friendship.

helping us imagine how much more we could ask of our platonic relationships.

Hi, I'm Raina Cohen.

I'm the author of the book, The Other Significant Others, Reimagining Life with Friendship at the Center.