My Friend is AWFUL at storytelling

So I have a friend (let’s call her Jenny) who I get along with well and I enjoy hanging out with. There’s one problem though; Jenny is the worst storyteller I’ve ever met.

Example; we have a group of girls who like spilling tea, telling funny stories about our dating lives etc. Jenny is the oldest of our group but only very recently started dating (due to a very strict religious upbringing) and is beginning to enjoy herself - good for her! - she’s started sharing stories about these experiences during our tea sessions (also fine - we all love gossiping).

But if Jenny wants to tell us about how she made out with a guy (Chris) on their second date; she has to tell us about the two other guys she was talking to, the dates they went on, everything they said on those dates, everything they did on those dates, everything she was thinking of those dates, why she stopped talking to them, when they messaged her again, when they ghosted her, how she felt about that, when Chris came into the picture, every single message they sent, every single thing they said in person, every single thing they did on date one, everything she was thinking, the entire journey to the second date, everything they did, everything they spoke about, all her family stuff, how they set up plans for another date, going back to his place, every thing they Chris said, everything she said, the fact he has a dog, everything the dog did, everything the dog didn’t do, and then finally getting to the point.

By the time that happens, I and several others have completely zoned out. Unfortunately, any efforts to try and prompt her to get to the point fail.

If she’s talking about date 1 and someone says “it sounds like you guys had a great time, what was your second date like?” She’ll go “oh yeah good” and then immediately go back to waffling.

And she does this for every story. Every. Single. One. It’s gotten to the point where I dread hearing about her stories because I don’t know if I can pretend to be interested anymore.

The other day, myself, Jenny and another friend went out for dinner and Jenny started talking about her latest date and I just completely switched off. Our other friend commented on how quiet I was and I played it off as feeling a bit under the weather. But I just couldn’t bring up the energy to pretend to be interested.

I’m reaching my wits end.

I do genuinely like Jenny and so does everyone else. But this is something we all agree on. Unfortunately, Jenny seems completely oblivious to the fact that everyone’s expressions are glazing over when she spends nearly 30 minutes getting to the point.

Telling Jenny bluntly doesn’t seem possible because it would really upset her. And none of us want to do that or make her feel like she’s the only one being excluded from sharing stories at ‘tea time’.

So Reddit, is there anything we can don to politely tell her this?