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The reunion reminded her of an especially difficult period in her life.

Back in May, HBO Max released Friends: The Reunion, a special event where the cast of the hit sitcom Friends reunited in entirety for the first time in many years to catch up and reminisce about their time on the show, all filmed on the original soundstage. However, while the event was a fun time for all involved, it was a bit of a rougher affair for one cast member in particular.

In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Jennifer Aniston, who played Rachel on Friends, confessed that filming the special was much harder for her than anticipated, as she was going through some heavy personal issues back when Friends was in production.

“I think we were just so naive walking into it, thinking, “How fun is this going to be? They’re putting the sets back together, exactly as they were.” Then you get there and it’s like, “Oh right, I hadn’t thought about what was going on the last time I was actually here.” And it just took me by surprise because it was like, “Hi, past, remember me? Remember how that sucked? You thought everything was in front of you and life was going to be just gorgeous and then you went through maybe the hardest time in your life?” It was all very jarring and, of course, you’ve got cameras everywhere and I’m already a little emotionally accessible, I guess you could say, so I had to walk out at certain points. I don’t know how they cut around it.”

"It just took me by surprise because it was like, 'Hi, past, remember me? Remember how that sucked?'" https://t.co/EOE8jEOwr0

— BuzzFeed (@BuzzFeed) December 8, 2021

On the subject of her expectations post-Friends, Aniston said that while her career went fine, she did go through some major personal hardships that were a little difficult to revisit. “That was what was jarring, that we all had an idea of what the future was going to be and we were going to go hunker down and focus on this or that and then it all just changed overnight, and that was it. But again, everything’s a blessing if you’re able to look at life’s ups and downs in that way. And if it all hadn’t happened, I would not be sitting here the woman that I am.”