I haven’t been able to watch Friends since Matthew Perry’s death

It’s been exactly 367 days since I last watched an episode of Friends.

I know because today marks one year since Matthew Perry died of an accidental ketamine overdose, and his body was discovered in the hot tub of his Los Angeles mansion. 

Like many millennials, I went through a period of watching Friends every single day – usually the same episode twice at 5pm on E4 and again when it was repeated on E4 plus one.

No one could ever have imagined how appropriate that title, Friends, would become. Sure, the show was built around a tightly-knit gang of six, but for fans like me, Rachel, Ross, Monica, Phoebe, Joey and Chandler always felt like real pals.

I am fully aware that is delusional. If anyone else said the same thing about any other fictional character I would be sure to keep a safe distance away from them.

But like The Rembrandts sang in the now infamous theme song, they were there for all of us.

They were there when school was rough; they were there through first heartbreaks, through fall outs with friends who really existed. Whatever the trauma, they were there in a DVD box set or weekdays at 5pm.

I never met Matthew Perry. I couldn’t pretend to have any emotional connection to Perry beyond being a huge fan of a TV show he finished filming 20 years before his death. But his death hit me really hard. It was the greatest grief I’ve ever felt for someone I’ve never actually had any direct contact with.

I was in a nightclub when I heard someone gasp over the thumping music: ‘Oh my god, Chandler died.’

In total disbelief, I went outside got a taxi home where I just lay in bed feeling completely numb.

I felt embarrassed to be so affected by the death of a celebrity, but whether it’s rational or not, stars like Mathew Perry and characters like Chandler Bing can be an emotional rock whether you’ve met the actor or the character even exists.

For me that’s never been truer than the characters of Friends and subsequently the affection I feel for its leading actors too.

Throughout the years, my favourite of the Friends gang has fluctuated. I never thought the day would come when I would say Monica is my numero uno but here we are.

Growing up though, it was Chandler. I never read into that too much, I just assumed it was because he was undisputedly the funniest but actually in hindsight, we were quite similar.

We were treated as being distinctly average. The gang were always surprised if Chandler managed to date an attractive girl, assuming they would instead be lured into bed with Joey. Even though Ross literally spent all day playing with dinosaurs, Chandler was really seen as a bit of a ‘loser’ among the others.

His best friend was clearly Joey but in some ways he was a bit of an outsider. Rachel and Ross clearly had the main character energy, Joey literally went on to have his own spin-off series, Phoebe was just on another planet entirely and Monica was the host that held the group together.

Chandler didn’t have an established place in his pack. It wasn’t until season seven when Chandler and Rachel bonded over a stolen cheesecake we really saw them having any monumental experience together at all. I’m not sure he even had one at all with Phoebe.

I guess as a gay teenager I felt the same. When my friends were hooking up with each other I was more reserved, watching as spectator as they started confidentially growing into the adults they would become.

But part of the reason I still can’t watch Friends is because also in my teenage years I learned more about grief than anyone that age ever should.

When I was 15, my sister Posy died very suddenly on Christmas Eve. It was a thunder of pain I would never wish on anyone; life has never been the same and I knew life could never be as bright as it would have been had she survived.

Posy was an actress. I’m obviously biased, but as her biggest fan, I was always in awe even when watching her in some questionable productions, to put it politely.

This was before we documented life on camera phones like we do now. The only footage of Posy readily available to me is on YouTube, of a trailer for a short film she starred in before she died.

It took a long time to be able to hear her voice again without grief hitting me like a bus and even 22 years later, hearing Posy breaks my heart as much as it fills it with joy.  

When you’ve experienced a certain level of grief I think it’s only natural to hear about the death of anyone and feel a greater pain than you may have otherwise. It just hits differently having even a vague idea of the subsequent suffering felt by those close to someone who has just died; the gaping hole left in their absence.

When Perry died, my heart just ached for everyone who had ever been moved by him in any way, but of course mainly for those who truly knew the real man off camera.

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Like I wasn’t ready to hear Posy so soon after she died, I’m just not ready to hear Chandler‘s classic one-liners, which were ultimately the highlight of Friends.

Hearing the voice of a loved one, feeling their presence again, might be the one thing that gets a person through, and I get that. Why wouldn’t you cling to the last part of them still available?

But for a long time, just hearing Posy’s voice was just a reminder that a video was all I had left.

To be clear, I’m not in any way equating the experience of mourning Perry to losing Posy. But the death of anyone of any significance in life, no matter how great or small, is a gut-punching reminder that life is short, when it’s over it’s over and that person has gone.

Yes, they live on in the memories, or in Perry’s case in Chandler, but it doesn’t take away the hurt that a memory is all they have become.

Hopefully, I’ll be able to watch Friends again soon and be able to laugh with Chandler instead of sob over Perry because there is something inherently special about the familiarity of characters you’ve loved your whole life, particularly when in reality so many people come and go.

When I’m much older, I hope Chandler and his five best friends will still bring me the same comfort then as they have done for the last 30 years.  

That day will come, I’m sure. But even one year to the day Perry died, it’s not come yet.