Suleika Jaouad

speaker

1,033 appearances 4 recordings 3 series first heard Sep 2025 last heard 29 May

Suleika Jaouad’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.

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recordings per month · last 12 months

Recordings per month over the last 12 months — 2 in all, peaking in May 2026 with 1.

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Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky · Suleika Jaouad · 31 Mar 2026 podcast

How does it resonate for you?

And I will say the actual creative process of writing or painting or music has been so central, not just to surviving those moments, but figuring out how to heal and to live.

I'll give you an example that's captured a little bit in American Symphony.

But when I went through a second bone marrow transplant three years ago, I was in the hospital for about a month and it was during a COVID surge.

So the visitor policy was really strict.

I was only allowed to have one visitor a day for a very limited number of hours.

Wow.

And I think far harder than the side effects of chemotherapy and the physical pain was that sense of isolation.

And the creative process for me became a way of not just being in deeper conversation with myself at a time when

when I had no idea who I was anymore, but also of being in deeper conversation with the people around me.

So I started painting during that period for the first time.

I was having these really intense night terrors and medication-induced hallucinations that made me very afraid of my own subconscious.

And I decided to create a visual journal of these weird apparitions

And during that period of time, John and I couldn't see each other for about two weeks because he'd been exposed to COVID.

And the germ risk was too high as someone who had no immune system.

And so every day I would text him one of my paintings.

And in return, he started composing these little lullabies that he would send to me every day.

And I would play them on loop in my hospital room as a kind of...

counterpoint to the hospital's many noises, the beeping IV poles, the alarms that go off whenever your condition drastically changes.

And I felt so enveloped by his presence, by his love, but also by the healing melody of the lullaby, which is

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