#because Jackie is truthful in that she wants O'Hara in her life and NEEDS that friendship and is touched that O'Hara is extending a hand

[backjustforberena]

NURSE JACKIE - 3.06 "When the Saints Go"

[backjustforberena]

took a break from getting drowned in uni stuff to doomscroll and saw your Nurse Jackie gifset and I just gotta say, it's painful for me to watch Nurse Jackie as a friend who's just like O'Hara. really just watched it for Eve but watching Jackie be, well, can I say an awful friend? just really pains me and I have to pause the episode at times to tell myself everything's alright 🫂

like I can understand Jackie and why she's acting that way but at the same time, it's really painful af (•⁠﹏⁠•⁠) just wanna give O'Hara a big, warm hug

All of the people who Jackie interacts with suffer. She is selfish with them, manipulates them, lies to them and hurts them. What cuts me up is that it's because the addiction outweighs the friendship. The priority becomes about maintaining the .

And, even, in some cases, it's done in a perverse way to maintain the friendship. Because Jackie does love and want and need O'Hara. It's not that she thinks O'Hara is someone easy to dupe or it'd be more work to maintain the lies if O'Hara was gone or even that she wants to completely give into her disease and having O'Hara around makes that do-able, despite what O'Hara does do to enable Jackie. We see that in S3: Jackie wants O'Hara to stay because she wants O'Hara to stay. Sometimes her intentions are pure. Or, at last, not consciously impure, even if her methods are: lying, guilt-tripping, pretending at showing vulnerability.

Jackie does rely on O'Hara and love her. Just not fully. She's not trusted fully. But she's as close as anyone gets. And O'Hara, particularly in S3, which is where this set is from, is clever enough to recognise the behaviour and hold a little bit of herself back after being burnt over the money and the MRI. She knows the ramifications of her actions, even as the friendship gets back on track and despite successful manipulation by Jackie. It's small lies. There remains some transparency.

At the very least, when it gets to a point where O'Hara becomes "all-in" (when she agrees to help prescribe Jackie the painkillers in the hopes to manage her addiction and help her get clean), it's a deliberate and difficult decision for her and she makes sure Jackie knows that. For O'Hara, I think there are moments where she is given reason to feel like the future of the relationship is in her hands. Not dependent on Jackie.

But that can be for good or ill from O'Hara's perspective because she doesn't want to lose Jackie. She's dependent on Jackie as well. Jackie occupies a space in her life that isn't able to be filled with anyone or anything else, until her son.

And Jackie is there for O'Hara, at times, or in ways. She just misses the mark a lot. She just gets very defensive and calculating. It doesn't do particular direct harm to O'Hara - like . I'm reminded of a line by Kevin or Eddie (although I paraphrase) where he says that even when Jackie is telling the truth, she's lying. Something like that. I tend to apply that to Jackie and her friendship. Even when she's being a good friend (or nurturing or prioritising the friendship/relationship), she's being a bad one. She doesn't even know she's doing it.