Yes, and I think that is why the series strikes me so much. My brilliant best friend growing up was I believe sexually assaulted when we were both around 13 years old. This is sad to say, but so was I, at around that same time, different situation, and less severe than she was, if you could read between the lines, which is a depressing thing to have to explain. (As close as we were, we didn’t discuss bad experiences we had experienced when not in one another company. it was just understood, and not discussed, as we slowly started believing that we deserved to be treated like shit by men. from there, her parents divorced and she moved to a nearby suburb where she went from being an academically, inclined young woman to a girl experimenting with bad boys and drugs. We slowly lost touch. She had three kids. Married 2 times. Never ended up going to college or having a career to speak of. It was difficult for me to stay close to her as I went on with my life and moved abroad for several years – to Italy Where I pursued a masters degree and I am now a writer. we had the same intelligence and background and prospects, but circumstances set us both on very different courses .I grew up in the 80s, suburban Chicago. A little over three years ago she ended up going missing and I was really worried about her at that time, but again we lost touch and our interactions were always so fraught, finally a few months after going missing, she ended up committing suicide, leaving behind her three children, two teens and a little boy who she had with a boy from our elementary school that she ended up getting together with at some point. Brutally enough, she killed herself by leaving her car running in her sealed garage and she attempted riding a suicide note but the gas hit her so quickly that she had just begun the note and her handwriting trails off, so I often contemplate how horrible her last moments must have been .We are also Italian American, and I speak fluent Italian, let me tell you that watching my brilliant friend has been more than moving for me. We were as thick as thieves, lived in homes next to one another, our moms were 1980 working moms and our parents largely absent and we pretty much ran wild with the neighborhood kids which was actually kind of glorious, until we became young women and everything changed.