Speaker 1: You're listening to a MoMA Mia podcast. Mama Mia acknowledges
Speaker 1: the traditional owners of land and waters that this podcast
Speaker 1: is recorded on.
Speaker 2: We have this perception in the world, and I was
Speaker 2: guilty of it. I think too that there's two paths
Speaker 2: out of cancer, and one is fine and one is dead,
Speaker 2: and we make no room for the stuff in the middle,
Speaker 2: which I've also come to realize that so many people
Speaker 2: are suffering with, but they mostly have to pretend to
Speaker 2: be fine because that's a narrative. We want. That's easier,
Speaker 2: that's nice. How we want things tied up neatly in
Speaker 2: a bow. We want happy endings.
Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to No Filter. I'm Holly Wainwright, and
Speaker 1: I'm jumping into your feed today with a special extra
Speaker 1: episode of No Filter to mark the end of Breast
Speaker 1: Cancer Awareness Month. Now there's something a little bit selfish
Speaker 1: for me about this conversation because it's actually with one
Speaker 1: of my really good friends, Lucy Ormond. I worked with
Speaker 1: Lucy a long time ago. We're going to tell you
Speaker 1: a bit of the story of our friendship actually, and
Speaker 1: we'd stayed in touch, and eighteen months ago everything for
Speaker 1: her changed in her life when she was diagnosed with
Speaker 1: breast cancer. Now what I need you to know about
Speaker 1: Lucy before he listened to this conversation, because I don't
Speaker 1: think any woman in Australia hasn't been touched in some
Speaker 1: way by breast cancer. So it's both a very ordinary
Speaker 1: and completely upending, extraordinary experience to go through and even
Speaker 1: to support someone through. And I really wanted Lucy, who
Speaker 1: has been through a great deal over the past couple
Speaker 1: of years, to talk about the things that everybody doesn't know,
Speaker 1: like what's the most useful stuff you can do when
Speaker 1: somebody is right in that heat of finding out that
Speaker 1: everything in their life has shifted in just a few
Speaker 1: words to come out of their doctor's mouth, Why it's
Speaker 1: not over when it's officially over, and what really happens
Speaker 1: to your priority and your life when you go through
Speaker 1: something as profound as this. Lucy is one of the
Speaker 1: most generous, loving, also driven, busy, ambitious women I know,
Speaker 1: and she has struggled, like everybody does, through this with
Speaker 1: trying to figure out who she is, what it all means,
Speaker 1: and now, because of who she is, what she can
Speaker 1: do to help other women in the same situation. So
Speaker 1: please join the table with me and Lucy and our
Speaker 1: conversation about breast cancer. I want you all to meet
Speaker 1: my friend Lucy Ormond. Hello, Luce, Hey, Holly Waynwright. That
Speaker 1: is how she always addresses me.
Speaker 2: You know how some people have those names where it
Speaker 2: needs first name and surname. That's you, Hollywayne Wright.
Speaker 1: And Louse. How did we meet?
Speaker 2: Oh? We met at Mamma Mia. We did. I'm going
Speaker 2: to say twelve years ago. Thirteen, it's billing now, eleven eleven.
Speaker 1: I started at mom and Mia in twenty fourteen.
Speaker 2: Okay, that's too much maths for me.
Speaker 1: No, no, yes, so that's eleven years ago.
Speaker 2: We met a long time ago. Yeah, at Mama Mia.
Speaker 1: Yep.
Speaker 2: I had been there maybe a couple of years. It
Speaker 2: was the first ever of Mamma mea officers. I was
Speaker 2: a junior writer and you came in as the fancy
Speaker 2: magazine lady.
Speaker 1: And I was very intimidated by all the cool young
Speaker 1: people who knew what they were doing, Like you not cool.
Speaker 1: This is the early day. This is kind of the
Speaker 1: early days of digital media. It's crazy to think about now.
Speaker 2: It was insane. It was a crazy, amazing, beautiful, wonderful time. Yeah,
Speaker 2: where you came into this chaos of just a whole
Speaker 2: lot of women, and we sat around a table and
Speaker 2: talked about ideas every day and turned them into content.
Speaker 1: It was great.
Speaker 2: It was a good time.
Speaker 1: And then you left to go and do other things.
Speaker 2: I left to go and do other things. After a while,
Speaker 2: I moved back to Melbourne. I'm from Melbourne. Originally. I
Speaker 2: moved back to Melbourne, worked in the Mama Mea office
Speaker 2: down there for a while, and then eventually it'll be
Speaker 2: my five or six years and just wanted to try
Speaker 2: my hand at other things and made a bit of
Speaker 2: a sidestep, still in women's media, but into the events world.
Speaker 1: Yes, yeah, so tell everyone what you're doing. So we
Speaker 1: and we stayed in touch, right, We did in touch,
Speaker 1: and we would catch up when you'd come to Sydney
Speaker 1: with increasing regularity, and then we'd go and drink wine,
Speaker 1: a lot of wine dinner and put the world to
Speaker 1: rights and looses. As anyone would know if they were
Speaker 1: watching this video on YouTube. Is quite a lot younger
Speaker 1: than me. But we because friends. Well, it's true, it's
Speaker 1: called to have different generational friendships. Anyway. We digress is
Speaker 1: just a number. Describe to me where you were the
Speaker 1: life you were living in March twenty twenty four.
Speaker 2: March twenty twenty four, it's what are a year and
Speaker 2: a half ago, seems like a lot longer than that.
Speaker 2: So I'd left MoMA MAA or twenty sixteen or something
Speaker 2: like that, gone off and worked for an amazing organization
Speaker 2: called Business Chicks, working in corporate events, women's media, traveling
Speaker 2: the world.
Speaker 1: I was always trying to catch you when she was
Speaker 1: in between. I've been in La, I've been in the Bahamas,
Speaker 1: I've been in this place. In that she was always
Speaker 1: working a lot and traveling a lot.
Speaker 2: Yeah, working with some phenomenal people, making some really really
Speaker 2: incredible events for women with some really really big known
Speaker 2: like thousands of women in rooms with I can't even
Speaker 2: it was the most phenomenal For years, you.
Speaker 1: Didn't really I mean, your home is always Melbourne and
Speaker 1: always you know, that's where your people are, but you
Speaker 1: weren't really home for several years, right.
Speaker 2: I was totally nomadic, a little bit in Sydney, a
Speaker 2: lot in LA, occasionally coming back to Melbourne, New York, anywhere.
Speaker 2: Like we were making events around the country. Yeah, it was.
Speaker 2: It was fast paced. It sounds glamorous. I mean the
Speaker 2: reality of travel is very, very different. I never spent
Speaker 2: more than a couple of nights in one bed. That
Speaker 2: sounds weird, but you know what I mean. Yeah, it
Speaker 2: was a beautiful, beautiful time. COVID changed a lot of
Speaker 2: that obvious. The world came to a standstill and we
Speaker 2: couldn't do events anymore, and that very much changed the business.
Speaker 2: But I found myself sort of just after that. I'd
Speaker 2: started my own business in twenty twenty three and started
Speaker 2: working with a whole lot of amazing women, still in
Speaker 2: that space, but sort of operating on more of a
Speaker 2: contractor freelancer kind of basis and coming in and creating
Speaker 2: events and strategies for some really really cool people. So
Speaker 2: working with Jackie Oh and JM at Bestie's, working with
Speaker 2: Gwyneth Paltrow, we did that event the amazing lea Ye, Sarah,
Speaker 2: I know, I know we didn't get you there. Lee's
Speaker 2: and Sarah are we're creating disco clubs. I helped them.
Speaker 2: And then, you know, back to your question of March
Speaker 2: twenty twenty four, are in this beautiful, beautiful, full circle moment.
Speaker 2: I've been contracted back to Mama mea to produce the
Speaker 2: out Loud Tour, So Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane, bigger than you'd
Speaker 2: ever done before. We were taking it to the next
Speaker 2: level and got about two thousand women in each city
Speaker 2: living along. And I was just in this really really
Speaker 2: lovely place where back to working with you and MEA
Speaker 2: and I was flying up to Sydney a lot. My
Speaker 2: business was feeling like it was starting to get somewhere,
Speaker 2: but I was sort of happily settled in Melbourne thinking
Speaker 2: about the future. I don't know, it was a really
Speaker 2: nice time in life.
Speaker 1: I remember that we went out for dinner one night
Speaker 1: when you were in Sydney. We went to chester White
Speaker 1: and Pot's Point. We ate some pasta with cheese, and
Speaker 1: that's when you told me that you had something going on.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I mentioned it, you know, in a night
Speaker 2: where we jumped around to you know, your classic female
Speaker 2: dinner ding ding ding bermitt Bam. Somewhere along the lines,
Speaker 2: I said to you, Oh, I found a lump in
Speaker 2: my breast. Don't worry, it's nothing.
Speaker 1: We were sitting at the bar in chester White. I
Speaker 1: remember eating like cured meat.
Speaker 2: I reckon in this game of that night we spent
Speaker 2: thirty seconds on it, probably because it was too scary
Speaker 2: to talk about and I was evincing myself that it
Speaker 2: wasn't anything. So we passed by that very very quickly,
Speaker 2: and we moved on to the next thing.
Speaker 1: And then the next time we talked about it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: in my memory is when we came down for the
Speaker 1: Melbourne show and we caught up quickly before the night
Speaker 1: before the show, and you said.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I finally let you into what was really going on.
Speaker 2: And it's something that I've realized about myself, is that
Speaker 2: I try and shield people from what's happening, to protect them.
Speaker 2: But the truth of what would happen, what had happened,
Speaker 2: is that i'd actually to that point of that night
Speaker 2: where I told you that I'd found a lump, had
Speaker 2: actually been about three or four months earlier, end of
Speaker 2: twenty twenty three. I was thirty six at the time,
Speaker 2: and I stumbled across a lump in my right breast.
Speaker 2: And I say stumbled across because I wasn't checking for it.
Speaker 2: I can't tell you exactly what happened, but at some
Speaker 2: point I sort of grazed across my boob, felt a
Speaker 2: sort of rid and a tenderness in that area. My
Speaker 2: mum was with me at the time. I said, do
Speaker 2: you feel what I feel? She said yeah, and I
Speaker 2: booked him to the GP straight away. GP sent me
Speaker 2: off for an ultrasound and I went for that ultrasound
Speaker 2: pretty quickly, and I remember lying there and saying to
Speaker 2: the ultrasound technician or the soamographer, I think we call them,
Speaker 2: can you see what I'm feeling? And she said no,
Speaker 2: I can't, so she out relief. She said, I can't
Speaker 2: find it what you're feeling, and she checked it with
Speaker 2: her supervisor and she said, we can't see anything here.
Speaker 2: But here's what we want you to do is give
Speaker 2: it a few months. If the lump is still there,
Speaker 2: if you can still feel it, go back to your GP,
Speaker 2: and then we'll reassess. And what we put it down
Speaker 2: to that point, I don't know. I had done a
Speaker 2: couple of rounds of elective egg razing that year, two
Speaker 2: rounds of it, and we thought it might be hormonal,
Speaker 2: and I'd done one really recently, so we thought that
Speaker 2: it just might be something to do with that. So yeah,
Speaker 2: I put it away, locked in a little box, and
Speaker 2: I'd say the next few months I thought about it,
Speaker 2: but not too much. I didn't because that was still scary, yeah,
Speaker 2: because if it was still there, I'd have to do
Speaker 2: something about it. So maybe I'd sort of go off
Speaker 2: live my life, do fun things, and then resolf and
Speaker 2: I'd be like, oh, I should check. And some days
Speaker 2: it was really really present. Other days I sort of
Speaker 2: struggled to find it a bit more. I reckon in hindsight,
Speaker 2: that might have been again hormones with your cycle, you know,
Speaker 2: get bigger for a bit in this small life, So
Speaker 2: it might have just been where I was with my cycle,
Speaker 2: that it was maybe sort of masking in there. Eventually
Speaker 2: I got to a point, and this leads us back
Speaker 2: to when we were, you know, on tour we'd just
Speaker 2: done Sydney, where I kind of couldn't deny it anymore.
Speaker 2: There was a lump there. It was still there, and
Speaker 2: it started to sort of consume every single part of
Speaker 2: my life, like I couldn't think or concentrate about anything
Speaker 2: on anything because I kept thinking about this lump. So
Speaker 2: so again not telling anyone one friend, I told I
Speaker 2: may went back to the GP, who sent me off
Speaker 2: to a specialist, and I went to see that specialist
Speaker 2: who sent me off for a mammogram as the first step.
Speaker 2: That mammogram fell the week after our Sydney show, just
Speaker 2: before we did our Melbourne show. So by the time
Speaker 2: I saw you on the Wednesday, I was kind of
Speaker 2: in the thick of the process of getting diagnosed, I
Speaker 2: would say. And so that night I shared with you
Speaker 2: that I had gone to get a mammogram and a
Speaker 2: notious sound had a just pretty standard to me. That morning,
Speaker 2: left there, going home, was on a call with some clients.
Speaker 2: I was having a rollicking good time with them. She
Speaker 2: was just chatting about our plans and I looked down
Speaker 2: at my phone and there was a text from the
Speaker 2: mammogram technician and said, Halo c this is blah blah
Speaker 2: from the blah blah hospital. We'd like you to come
Speaker 2: in for some additional images, either this afternoon or tomorrow.
Speaker 1: Oh gosh.
Speaker 2: And at that point you're like, they're not fucking around.
Speaker 1: When they say no, they say this afternoon or tomorrow.
Speaker 2: They're like and then I Okay, So my clients, I'm like,
Speaker 2: I gotta go. I gotta go. Jumped in the car
Speaker 2: and called the hospital on my way there because I'm like,
Speaker 2: I'm not waiting I'm going to go right now, got
Speaker 2: back to the hospital, walked into the waiting room, said
Speaker 2: who I was. I didn't even get to sit down
Speaker 2: before they came out and got me and took me
Speaker 2: straight back into the room for more mammograms. And I
Speaker 2: say more mammograms because they put me in one time.
Speaker 2: And then she said, I'm going to take these images
Speaker 2: and go and show my supervisor. And then she came
Speaker 2: back in and she said, I'm just going to take
Speaker 2: a few more images, and then she took them out,
Speaker 2: and then she came back in and she said, IM
Speaker 2: going to take a few more images, and then she
Speaker 2: went back out, and then she came in and the
Speaker 2: radiographer came in with her, and that's when they said
Speaker 2: to me, there's something suspicious here and we'd like to
Speaker 2: do bilpsi.
Speaker 1: So the words were at that moment it wasn't it's cancer.
Speaker 2: No, no, And that's the thing I've come to learn,
Speaker 2: like through speaking to a lot of women, it can
Speaker 2: be lots of things. You know, there's cis, there's benign lumps,
Speaker 2: there's ridges of tissue. So yeah, biopsy was the next
Speaker 2: stage in that. Well, you know it's something, yes, and
Speaker 2: they said to me, we'd like to a biopsy. They
Speaker 2: said we need a refer or. I said, can you
Speaker 2: do it now? And they said, oh, we need a
Speaker 2: referral from your specialist to do it now, so that
Speaker 2: might take her some time. And I was like, call
Speaker 2: it okay, cool, call her okay. Yeah, no, so they called.
Speaker 2: They said go away for an hour and we'll get
Speaker 2: this organized. At that point, I turned that one of
Speaker 2: the women who was helping me earlier. Her name was Hannah,
Speaker 2: and I said, do you think I should call my mum?
Speaker 2: And she looked at me in the eye and said,
Speaker 2: I would want my mum here about you. So at
Speaker 2: that point I'm going outside the hospital and just called Mum,
Speaker 2: called one of the girls from Mom and me are
Speaker 2: actually because I was like, I can't.
Speaker 1: You were meant to be.
Speaker 2: I was supposed to be working out, doing a lot
Speaker 2: of work, and we were doing this. Bless her. She's like,
Speaker 2: don't worry about a thing, I've got this and just
Speaker 2: sort of walked around the hospital in a days for
Speaker 2: a couple of hours. Mum got there pretty quickly and
Speaker 2: we waited and had a biopsy.
Speaker 1: And that was the day when everything really changed.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I would say so, and then that was so
Speaker 2: that was the Monday. Sorry I'm jumping around here. It
Speaker 2: gets very very detailed in this world. By the time
Speaker 2: I saw it was the Wednesday and had the biopsy.
Speaker 2: I'd had an MRI. I'd met with my specialist who
Speaker 2: was sort of like, there's something, but until we get
Speaker 2: the results of that MRI and the biopsy, we don't know.
Speaker 2: So when I saw you, I was like, hey, hoole,
Speaker 2: all this stuff happened in the last few days, and
Speaker 2: tomorrow morning before you go on stage and we do
Speaker 2: the out loud show in Melbourne, I'm going to go
Speaker 2: in and get some results. Yes, is their heads up?
Speaker 1: Yes, that's all I remember, Yes, and yeah, and tell
Speaker 1: me what they said on that morning.
Speaker 2: I went in. Weird experience to go in knowing that
Speaker 2: you kind of know at that point, when you've gone
Speaker 2: through all those things, you've had enough time to sort
Speaker 2: of get your head around it. You sort of know
Speaker 2: what's coming, and you know that once you go through
Speaker 2: that door, your life is going to be divided into
Speaker 2: the before and after. But I went and I sat down,
Speaker 2: and they don't beat around. There's no niceties when I'm
Speaker 2: talking about the weather. She gets out of his paper
Speaker 2: and she says, so it is a breast cancer.
Speaker 1: How do you feel in that moment, Like, as you say,
Speaker 1: you've had the time and a way to stress, worry
Speaker 1: panic about this, know that it's not nothing. But when
Speaker 1: they say those words to you, how what happens?
Speaker 2: Do you know what? I perflect on this a lot
Speaker 2: and thought about that moment. It's not what I thought
Speaker 2: it would be. It's not this like yet there's an
Speaker 2: absolute pity in your stomach and nerves like I've never experienced.
Speaker 2: At the same time, it's not that sort of like
Speaker 2: harrowing cry kind of there's not a lot of shock
Speaker 2: in it. Like I said, because you've sort of had
Speaker 2: the time for me, this weird thing happened, and I
Speaker 2: can only talk to my own experience that I felt
Speaker 2: an insane amount of clarity in that moment, clarity in
Speaker 2: how I wanted the next phase of my life to look,
Speaker 2: and almost how I wanted the rest of my.
Speaker 1: Life to look, and what was that Who.
Speaker 2: I wanted to be with me was really really clear,
Speaker 2: Like I sort of had this vision. It was almost
Speaker 2: like I got like a circle where I knew who
Speaker 2: I needed to let know who was going to be
Speaker 2: part of this. When I said journey, people have a
Speaker 2: big problem with the word journey. I don't it's a journey.
Speaker 2: I don't know what else to call it, wild ride, adventure, fuckery,
Speaker 2: I don't, you know. But also how I wanted to
Speaker 2: go through whatever it was that was to come. I
Speaker 2: knew straight away I didn't want to be angry and
Speaker 2: I didn't want to be too sad. Something in me
Speaker 2: was saying fun and love. I just want to try
Speaker 2: for the best part. I'm not just SAT's not to
Speaker 2: say that there hasn't been moments of extreme sadness and
Speaker 2: anger and frustration, and it has been really really hard.
Speaker 2: But I knew that I wanted to somehow try and
Speaker 2: harness some element of love and joy in it. So
Speaker 2: that was kind of happening. At the same time, there's
Speaker 2: something you're knowing what it is, and I've learned through
Speaker 2: this whole process, and I know we'll get into it
Speaker 2: that when I have a plan and I know what's coming,
Speaker 2: I'm okay. I can deal with that. It's knowing that
Speaker 2: is the worst. So that lead up to the diagnosis,
Speaker 2: or you know, after surgery, you get you know, you're
Speaker 2: waiting sometimes seven ten days for the results or before scans,
Speaker 2: after scans. That is the part that is so incredibly
Speaker 2: uncomfortable and horrendous, and you know you can't I can't
Speaker 2: function in those moments. But when she said it's breast
Speaker 2: cancer and here's what we're going to do, I'm like, Okay, cool,
Speaker 2: let's go do it.
Speaker 1: We're going to take a break, but please come back,
Speaker 1: because Lucy has a lot more to share about this
Speaker 1: extraordinary time. One of the reasons why I really wanted,
Speaker 1: obviously to talk to you for Breast Cancer Awareness Month
Speaker 1: was because your story is like ordinary and extraordinary at
Speaker 1: the same time right now, as in you know, this
Speaker 1: happens to a lot of women. It happened to so
Speaker 1: many And one of the things I wanted to get
Speaker 1: across right is that on that day when you found
Speaker 1: that out, and it was the day of the Melbourne show,
Speaker 1: obviously you did tell me like the time we had
Speaker 1: to spend together that night. No one else knew, well
Speaker 1: one of the person knew on our tour, so I
Speaker 1: kept like holding your hand of you okay, all those things,
Speaker 1: but you got through it like the pro that you
Speaker 1: are not that that's anything to be fated, but that
Speaker 1: was just your situation. But what I wanted to get
Speaker 1: to is the like I remember obviously being super worried
Speaker 1: for you, super anxious for you. But also, and I
Speaker 1: think a lot of people have this, I kind of
Speaker 1: probably had a level of complacency about it too, because
Speaker 1: I thought, she'll be fine, She'll be right, Like it'll
Speaker 1: probably just be a little bit of maybe radio therapy
Speaker 1: or whatever, which is not nice, but you know whatever,
Speaker 1: it'll be all right, Like this is and when I
Speaker 1: think about that now, I'm like idiot. But also I
Speaker 1: think that people who aren't close to breast cancer for
Speaker 1: lots of reasons, kind of think it's solved. You'll like
Speaker 1: or that it's not. It's you know, we've got so
Speaker 1: good at it now.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 1: You just hear people saying that all the time if
Speaker 1: you catch it early and so on, which I know
Speaker 1: we'll get to that, but like, no biggie kind of
Speaker 1: and obviously it's a biggie for you.
Speaker 2: When I was scared, but you.
Speaker 1: Know what I mean. And then so I want to
Speaker 1: go to the day a little later. In that time,
Speaker 1: it was a time when you were about to find
Speaker 1: out kind of what was going to happen, and you know,
Speaker 1: we'd all been saying, and you'd been saying, and you
Speaker 1: know it would probably just be a little it won't
Speaker 1: be a big deal. And I remember that I was
Speaker 1: waiting for a call from you about that, and I
Speaker 1: was in Sydney, New and Melbourne and the call didn't come,
Speaker 1: and I was like, oh. And I messaged a mutual
Speaker 1: friend of ours, Mon's, and I was like, I don't
Speaker 1: like this. I don't like this. And she called me,
Speaker 1: She's like, what do you mean. I was like, it's
Speaker 1: taken you long. I don't like it. And that was
Speaker 1: the day again where you found out that what was
Speaker 1: ahead of you was not like, well just a little
Speaker 1: bit of this or that, not that there's any such thing.
Speaker 1: I know that, and being close to you and you're
Speaker 1: explaining to me lots of different kinds of cancers. I
Speaker 1: know that. But the day that that all shifted again, Yeah,
Speaker 1: tell me about that.
Speaker 2: I mean I think that I was the same. I
Speaker 2: didn't think it was I knew it was big, but
Speaker 2: I didn't realize how big it was. And I think
Speaker 2: as a society or a world, we are aware of
Speaker 2: breast cancer but we're not really aware of breast cancer.
Speaker 2: And I even think about what I was initially diagnosed.
Speaker 2: Like back to that conversation, I said to this specialist.
Speaker 2: She told me, like, we're going to start with surgery,
Speaker 2: we will definitely need to do radiation, question mark on chemotherapy.
Speaker 2: It's definitely some other stuff, you know, and you only
Speaker 2: hear a little bit. But I said to her, I'm
Speaker 2: going to the US in July. And I said, is
Speaker 2: that still okay? And she said to me, if you're
Speaker 2: not doing chemo, you'll be doing radio. And it was like, oh, okay,
Speaker 2: it's a bit more serious.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you're not going to the US.
Speaker 2: And but to your point, the day that you're talking
Speaker 2: about is post surgery. So they go in and they
Speaker 2: take the lump out. For me, it was a lumpectomy
Speaker 2: rather than a full mistectomy. It depends on the patient.
Speaker 2: And after the surgery, you go in and you find
Speaker 2: out the results of the surgery, because what they do
Speaker 2: is they take out the lump and then they'll often
Speaker 2: test the area around the lump to see if there's
Speaker 2: any residual cancer there, and they'll also test a couple
Speaker 2: of your lymph nodes to see if the cancer is spread.
Speaker 2: And so I've gone in for this results. I went
Speaker 2: on my own. I was very I just wanted to
Speaker 2: go on my own. I don't know why I wanted to, Like,
Speaker 2: I was like, I'm going on my own. I don't
Speaker 2: know what it's about. And I went in there and
Speaker 2: I knew from the start, from as soon as I
Speaker 2: walked in. And you can just tell, you.
Speaker 1: Can tell from the energy in the room, look on
Speaker 1: the doctor's face.
Speaker 2: And they basically said that they tested those margins and
Speaker 2: there was still cancer in those margins and that the
Speaker 2: two lymphonones they had tested were both positive as well.
Speaker 2: And what that meant, and she kept reassuring me, she
Speaker 2: was so beautiful. You know, it's still curable. It's just
Speaker 2: going to take a little bit longer. And I've got
Speaker 2: you know, we've got this. It's all manageable. But what
Speaker 2: it meant was that the road out of this just
Speaker 2: went from maybe some surgery and some radiation to like, Okay,
Speaker 2: this is going to take a while, and this is
Speaker 2: like life is fully on hold while we figure this out.
Speaker 2: And that's when they start talking about whole body treatment,
Speaker 2: which means chemotherapy. But they ease you in in a
Speaker 2: really beautiful way. So we're going to do some whole
Speaker 2: body treatment and I'm like, is that chemo? When she's like,
Speaker 2: that's chemo, and I remember saying, oh, that's a dang,
Speaker 2: and she goes it is indeed a dang. Quite a
Speaker 2: long road of huge yeah. Yeah. So from there we
Speaker 2: were looking at it was we'd definitely have to do
Speaker 2: more surgery to get that cancer out. Five months of
Speaker 2: chemo on the cards almost straight away, then looking at radiation,
Speaker 2: then looking at more therapies after that, intend tablet form.
Speaker 2: So yeah, really really long road I wanted. I didn't
Speaker 2: let you know because I just didn't know what to do,
Speaker 2: I know, but then you.
Speaker 1: Did, and I remember, I remember really clearly, not that
Speaker 1: this is about me, but I hope that some of
Speaker 1: the people listening to this as well as obviously women
Speaker 1: who were thinking about themselves and their journeys, but friends
Speaker 1: and loved ones. That's what I want to ask you
Speaker 1: about now, because I remember very clearly where I was
Speaker 1: when you told me that. It was in our old
Speaker 1: office downstairs, and I was trying to find a corner.
Speaker 1: I remember, I remember really clearly. Anyway, when you get
Speaker 1: that news and you have a beautiful inner circle has
Speaker 1: discussed and your mum, and so the news goes out. Yes,
Speaker 1: this is going to be a hell of a year,
Speaker 1: half a year, more than a year. Whatever happens. This
Speaker 1: loose is this is it. Can you tell me a
Speaker 1: little bit about what helped what didn't help? You know?
Speaker 1: You know how people always say I don't know what
Speaker 1: to do. Like, so you know, I was listening to you,
Speaker 1: and obviously in another city whatever I mean, I decided quickly.
Speaker 1: I just wanted to let you know that I was
Speaker 1: thinking of you, and we established a little rhythm of that.
Speaker 1: But like, what's helpful? What do you want people's villages
Speaker 1: to know about moments like that.
Speaker 2: In those moments when they've just found out someone they
Speaker 2: love has breast cancer or cancer or any big shitty
Speaker 2: life thing, big shitty life thing. Yeah, do something. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I know that we can get really really lost in
Speaker 2: I don't know what to say. I don't know what
Speaker 2: to do. I don't know what she needs. I don't
Speaker 2: know if I should be dropping around, I don't know
Speaker 2: I should be calling. I do something. Just let that
Speaker 2: person know that you love them, and you don't have
Speaker 2: to find the perfect words, I don't think. I remember
Speaker 2: one friend texted me and after a couple of days
Speaker 2: and she said, I heard through you know, another friend,
Speaker 2: and I didn't want to text you on that day
Speaker 2: because I thought you might be doing this. And then
Speaker 2: I wasn't going to text you the next day because
Speaker 2: it was Mother's Day, and then I thought I won't
Speaker 2: text here, and then in the end, I just wanted
Speaker 2: to say I love you and I'm thinking of you,
Speaker 2: and that's all you need to do. And I'm not
Speaker 2: saying like if people don't text you, nothing is personal
Speaker 2: in this world. Like we're all just trying.
Speaker 1: To well, you've got something very big in front of you.
Speaker 2: To deal with your I'm not worried about thinking to him,
Speaker 2: just trying to get through and think about what is next,
Speaker 2: which is huge, like trying to come to terms with
Speaker 2: you know. At that point, I think I also like
Speaker 2: I was just I was really really worried about my
Speaker 2: fertility and all that, and I'd said have said to
Speaker 2: them I did have some eggs on ice, and they
Speaker 2: were like, if you want to do one roll round,
Speaker 2: you can do it now. So like you had a
Speaker 2: lot of yeah, just one thing happens, and then suddenly,
Speaker 2: like you're on the phone and you're getting injections, and
Speaker 2: then you're getting organized to get ports put into your
Speaker 2: chest so that they can administer the chemo easily, and
Speaker 2: then you're you know, within a week. It's all just
Speaker 2: it's all moving suddenly. It is moving so fast, and
Speaker 2: at the same time, you're sort of trying to tell
Speaker 2: the right people. I didn't tell the whole world for
Speaker 2: a long time, like in terms of like putting out
Speaker 2: to my wider circles, but I chose who I wanted
Speaker 2: to know, and I called them all one by one.
Speaker 2: I think what I really learned is that the person
Speaker 2: who's at the center of that circle doesn't know what
Speaker 2: they need or want. So a question like how can
Speaker 2: I help or let me know is so well intended.
Speaker 2: I don't know the answer. So statements are amazing. I'm
Speaker 2: going to come by your house at three pm and
Speaker 2: put this on the doorstep. I could do. I've got
Speaker 2: an afternoon free here. I can do X y Z
Speaker 2: for you, like I can either A come and lie
Speaker 2: in bed with you, B take you shopping, or see
Speaker 2: do this choose also the words no need to reply, yeah,
Speaker 2: we love those words.
Speaker 1: Ye always put the no need to reply on.
Speaker 2: I just think you can't go wrong. Really just do something,
Speaker 2: and it's not about you. If you don't, if someone
Speaker 2: doesn't right back, or they don't acknowledge whatever, it's not
Speaker 2: about you. But they probably really love you and they're
Speaker 2: really grateful. They just don't have the capacity at that point.
Speaker 2: There is just so much going on in their world.
Speaker 1: Of course I could.
Speaker 2: Talk about that stuff forever, but yeah, it's a it's
Speaker 2: a really tricky one. But I just have learned through
Speaker 2: all of this about the goodness of people and how
Speaker 2: there are so many ways to show up for someone.
Speaker 2: And it isn't just still as I now or flowers like,
Speaker 2: but they're great too. I love flowers. Everyone's like, don't
Speaker 2: send flowers, Please send flowers. It's so nice. I loved it.
Speaker 2: But there's so many ways that you can show up.
Speaker 2: And can we talk about glimmers?
Speaker 1: We can talk about glimmers because I didn't know how
Speaker 1: to show up for you necessarily after I sent you
Speaker 1: a box of biscuits.
Speaker 2: That's a whole other.
Speaker 1: Time, whole other stories, and then joke between us about
Speaker 1: these particular type of biscuits. I send your box of biscuits.
Speaker 2: Send me like, just to be clear, she sent me
Speaker 2: like a hundreds. It wasn't just a box of biscuits.
Speaker 2: It was like this like sort of big Australia post box.
Speaker 2: It was just feel like I couldn't get to the
Speaker 2: bottom of the biscuits, which it just made me laugh,
Speaker 2: you know.
Speaker 1: Idea or kind of like okay, but anything candle. But yeah,
Speaker 1: so people obviously, but beyond that, glimmers is what we
Speaker 1: decided to do. Tell me about the glimmers.
Speaker 2: I mean, it was the most beautiful thing I think
Speaker 2: anyone's ever done for me. And when I love it
Speaker 2: about it is that it's free. So we also, like
Speaker 2: when we're showing up for someone who's in crisis, we
Speaker 2: didn't have to spend a lot of money either. You
Speaker 2: sent me a text just after i'd suld have found
Speaker 2: out that big news that the road was going to
Speaker 2: be really long and the cancer was pretty dang serious.
Speaker 2: You said to me, I'm going to send you glimmers.
Speaker 2: You can send them back if you'd like, but there's
Speaker 2: no pressure to. And you started with and the glimmer
Speaker 2: was just little things from your day that were making
Speaker 2: you happy or showing you about the simplicity of life,
Speaker 2: the beauty of life in the little, tiny moments. And
Speaker 2: you sent me a picture of flowers that were on
Speaker 2: the on the ground and they looked pretty Bryan neg flowers,
Speaker 2: and I was like, I love this, let's do it. Not.
Speaker 2: I don't think either of us fully knew what we
Speaker 2: were signing up for in that moment, or you especially,
Speaker 2: but you just kept sending glimmers. Every single day. You
Speaker 2: would send me something from your life that was bringing
Speaker 2: you joy. But it was never like a flex like
Speaker 2: you don't listen, we've learnt about glimmers and what's okayted Ascent.
Speaker 2: But you would never be like, oh, you know, here's
Speaker 2: like the amazing holiday that I'm going. Here's the cup
Speaker 2: of tea that I had. Exactly. Glimmers are simple. They
Speaker 2: are like dogs and flowers and tea and a tree.
Speaker 2: And some days I would send them back to you, yep,
Speaker 2: you know, and it might be like but there was
Speaker 2: no expectation, no expectation if I didn't, And often it
Speaker 2: was just you coming at me with the glimmers and
Speaker 2: that's okay. Sometimes you'd get a double double tap heart
Speaker 2: from me. Sometimes you got nothing. Some days it was
Speaker 2: like glomma tanness were like back forward, back forward. Some
Speaker 2: days it would be like my piece of veggie might
Speaker 2: toast in bed, or my friend's dog coming to visit,
Speaker 2: you know, really really simple stuff. But it was just
Speaker 2: this way of us staying connected, very very connected, because
Speaker 2: you and I like in our relationship. I think you know,
Speaker 2: we'd had moments over the years or we wouldn't talk
Speaker 2: for months, but then we'd come back together and that.
Speaker 2: But then suddenly we're in contact every single day, which
Speaker 2: could be a lot, but it wasn't. And you just
Speaker 2: kept showing up and it just was the most beautiful
Speaker 2: show of support. Because as cancer goes on and the
Speaker 2: treatment gets harder, people do drop off, and it's not intentional.
Speaker 2: Life gets busy and that real drama part of the
Speaker 2: diagnosis is over and it's the hard stuff and other
Speaker 2: stuff's come up and that's okay. But in you committing
Speaker 2: to Glimmers, you had to kick shall we up?
Speaker 1: Look? The reason that's the most beautiful, the reason why
Speaker 1: Glimmers were right for us is as we say, we
Speaker 1: weren't in the same place. I couldn't be there doing
Speaker 1: But also to be really honest, there'll be people listening
Speaker 1: to this too. I'm not very good at that kind
Speaker 1: of thing, Like I mean, if you live around the corner,
Speaker 1: of course I would be shutting up.
Speaker 2: But like you're so far away.
Speaker 1: Sending lasagnas and doing all that stuff is not really
Speaker 1: my love language. I mean, I can make a good
Speaker 1: look that one day, I would definitely do it. But
Speaker 1: I was thinking of you every day, and when we
Speaker 1: were in the rhythm of the Glimmers, which we ended,
Speaker 1: we did for a full year, the thing I would
Speaker 1: see would make me think of you, and I knew
Speaker 1: that sometimes more than other times you were having a
Speaker 1: shit time, sometimes you weren't sometimes, and I just wanted
Speaker 1: you to know that I every day, at some point
Speaker 1: at least I remembered Lucy, and I was sending you love.
Speaker 1: And that was all, like, it's not about really what
Speaker 1: the picture is. Although the other great thing about Glimmers
Speaker 1: is it ends up being good for you too, because
Speaker 1: you start to notice the Glimmers, which is good.
Speaker 2: And I did. And there were days where I was
Speaker 2: so sick, like where you can't lift your head up
Speaker 2: from the pillow, kind of sick like just feeling so
Speaker 2: insanely crappy. But I would think about it, like what
Speaker 2: is that glimmer and like, you know, one of my
Speaker 2: and it just made me say the goodness there was
Speaker 2: goodness everywhere, but it you know, like I'd look across
Speaker 2: to my bedside table and it'd be the most beautiful
Speaker 2: rose that one of the neighbors had picked and put
Speaker 2: on the doorstep, and then Mum would come and put it.
Speaker 2: I moved back in with mum, Mother, this is all happening,
Speaker 2: and I'm still there. Now, Well we'll get to that,
Speaker 2: and you know, the roads would be next to my
Speaker 2: bed or even the glimmer was like, oh my god.
Speaker 2: I was like I was going through a treatment right
Speaker 2: at the Olympics were on. My glim was that I
Speaker 2: was awake at four am when the athletes will winning
Speaker 2: the gold medals one. No one else was absolutely awake
Speaker 2: because I couldn't sleep because of the drugs. So my
Speaker 2: glimmer as I watched that live, I.
Speaker 1: Am watching the Olympics in the drug you.
Speaker 2: Know, on the on the TV that my cousins had
Speaker 2: so beautifully said, We're going to put a TV on
Speaker 2: your wall because you're going to be in bed a
Speaker 2: lot and it was. It was the most amazing gift.
Speaker 2: If anyone wants a real flex gift to give someone,
Speaker 2: that's amazing. On the wall, Oh my.
Speaker 1: God, this is the range. This is like a bridal registry.
Speaker 1: The range is like glimmers are free, is a free
Speaker 1: mount wall on the you know, I said.
Speaker 2: To the other day, there's so many good free things,
Speaker 2: like you've got someone in crisis gift. Then the logins
Speaker 2: to your streaming services. That's a great, such a help.
Speaker 1: I know that we could. I don't want to rush
Speaker 1: through this, but at the same time, I want to
Speaker 1: get to the point where so you, as you discussed,
Speaker 1: you're going through this very, very grueling period and you've
Speaker 1: just said some of the things that helped you a
Speaker 1: little bit through that time. A typical if there was
Speaker 1: such a thing day week about time, what was it
Speaker 1: like what might be happening in your world when your
Speaker 1: whole world is cancer at that time? Because it was
Speaker 1: like it's.
Speaker 2: Your whole world. Yes, yeah, I mean everything grinds to
Speaker 2: a whole really really really really quickly.
Speaker 1: You had to obviously stop working.
Speaker 2: Oh I stopped working. I gave my client, you know,
Speaker 2: got people to step in and take on the work
Speaker 2: that I was doing.
Speaker 1: The phone to me sometimes going like I think I
Speaker 1: could maybe do this job in between this and this
Speaker 1: and this, and then they're like stop it.
Speaker 2: Anyhow, Yeah, everything came to a whole, moved home to
Speaker 2: mum's house, simplified life massively. And it's a weird feeling
Speaker 2: like that just before came. I starts like, you've had
Speaker 2: so surgery. I didn't find too bad in terms of recovery.
Speaker 2: It's big, and it's it's messy, and it's yucky and
Speaker 2: it's a bit sore, but it wasn't it wasn't terrible.
Speaker 2: But then when you know that chemo's coming, you're like
Speaker 2: getting ready to be sick, which is a really really
Speaker 2: interesting feeling. And you know, even I remember on that
Speaker 2: drive two chemo on that first day, it's like it's
Speaker 2: a yeah, getting yourself ready for that.
Speaker 1: But is there any part of you? This might sound
Speaker 1: like a really silly question, but this is an experience
Speaker 1: that thankfully most of us will not have. But you've
Speaker 1: all seen it on the telly, right, We've all seen
Speaker 1: what chemo therapy looks like on the telly. Is there
Speaker 1: any part of and we know it makes you sick.
Speaker 1: That's what that's mostly what we know. The things I
Speaker 1: would have known. It makes you lose your hair, and
Speaker 1: it makes you sick. Is there any part of you
Speaker 1: that's like, it's not going to make me sick.
Speaker 2: I will be the one who doesn't. And you know what,
Speaker 2: I sort of. They tell you so many things, but
Speaker 2: you can't attach to a lot of it. And one
Speaker 2: of the things they tell you is that we give
Speaker 2: you steroids. At the same time that you're getting your chemo,
Speaker 2: we're giving you steroids. And the technology has come so
Speaker 2: far these days that they can offset a lot of
Speaker 2: the side effects with other drugs. But I remember I
Speaker 2: came home from the first chemo and I woke up
Speaker 2: the next day and I'm like, I'm fine, I'm good.
Speaker 2: This does not affect me. I am I am okay.
Speaker 2: And I went for a walk and about twenty minutes,
Speaker 2: you know, Muther called Mum when I was like, my
Speaker 2: chest hurts, and I ended up at home on the
Speaker 2: phone to the doctors at the GP getting acgs. And
Speaker 2: the next day I just came crashing down. And so
Speaker 2: what I learned is that you've got a couple of
Speaker 2: days of feeling okay, and then it hits you. So
Speaker 2: back to your question about what though that time looked like.
Speaker 2: I started with four rounds of very very intense chemo
Speaker 2: they call it the Red Devil. That was every two weeks,
Speaker 2: and so you sort of would go in, have your
Speaker 2: treatment for a couple of days of feeling okay, and
Speaker 2: then it would sort of hit. So I've had treatment
Speaker 2: on the Thursday. By the Sunday, I was really starting
Speaker 2: to feel it. By the Monday, I couldn't get out
Speaker 2: of bed. And that was a few days of that,
Speaker 2: and then you to de fine. After about a week,
Speaker 2: you're sort of starting to feel yourself again. You have
Speaker 2: a couple of days of grace where you like, let's
Speaker 2: fucking live for a couple of days, and then you
Speaker 2: get yourself ready to go back in and do it again.
Speaker 2: And so I did four doses of the very very
Speaker 2: intense chemo and then twelve doses which became weekly. Still
Speaker 2: an incredibly intense chemo, but not quite as as like that.
Speaker 2: That part I found excruciating. It just felt like I
Speaker 2: think I remember at dose five or six, I kept
Speaker 2: saying to people, I feel like I'm running a marathon
Speaker 2: where the adrenaline of the start has worn off. I'm
Speaker 2: like at a kilometer of fourteen or something, you know,
Speaker 2: like I cannot see the finish line for the life
Speaker 2: of me, and I'm just in it. And that part
Speaker 2: was really hard. Yeah, And it was just monotonous and boring.
Speaker 2: And you know, I remember I probably said to you, like,
Speaker 2: don't most people like write books or something while they
Speaker 2: have cancer? Like I'm not doing enough? Was watching TV.
Speaker 1: This is very classic Lucy.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so long hard time.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know how I said. What we all know
Speaker 1: about chemo is it makes you sick and you lose
Speaker 1: your hair. You've got hair? What did you do?
Speaker 2: I do have hair.
Speaker 1: I remember. I remember, like you being having a lot
Speaker 1: of thoughts about that, feelings about that.
Speaker 2: I still do. Yeah, you know, I was convinced I
Speaker 2: was going to our good mate Sally Hapworth took me
Speaker 2: a wig shopping. She did, yeah, preemptive wik shopping, and
Speaker 2: I still have the week that we bought in my carpet.
Speaker 2: I there's a technology they offer some rest cancer patients
Speaker 2: called a cold cap, which is essentially what it does
Speaker 2: is it's a it's a cap or like almost like
Speaker 2: a helmet that you wear on your head. During chemo,
Speaker 2: and it pumps freezing cold liquid across your head.
Speaker 1: That sounds awful. It was awful, but it's probably the
Speaker 1: least a few problems in that minute.
Speaker 2: It's probably one of the harder parts. I really love it, yeah,
Speaker 2: and it really hurts. But the way it works is
Speaker 2: that it essentially freezes the hair follicles so that the
Speaker 2: chemo doesn't hit them because the chemo is attacking cells
Speaker 2: that are multiplying which hair hairs. True, so I decided
Speaker 2: to give it a go. It never is one hundred
Speaker 2: percent effective. They say fifty sixty percent if you're lucky.
Speaker 2: And so I still lost a lot of hair, like
Speaker 2: the cap of my head, and I've got this like
Speaker 2: weird re growth going on at the moment. I spent
Speaker 2: a lot of time pushing it down and the sides,
Speaker 2: but I did keep my hair a lot of it,
Speaker 2: And I don't know if it was worth it, to
Speaker 2: be honest, Like you have to wear it for an
Speaker 2: hour before camo, during camo, on an hour after. So
Speaker 2: when I was in the chair for five or six
Speaker 2: hours at a time with this cap, it's like having
Speaker 2: a really bad brain free.
Speaker 1: But you must have felt strongly enough about not wanting
Speaker 1: to your head to put yourself through that was that
Speaker 1: an identity thing?
Speaker 2: I think at the start, you're trying to hold on
Speaker 2: to everything who you were. And I remember very very
Speaker 2: clearly at the start, like I've got journal entries where
Speaker 2: I was so scared of losing myself in all this
Speaker 2: and who I would become afterwards. So I think, yeah,
Speaker 2: they're giving you the option to lose your hair, which is,
Speaker 2: you know, like how you look and how you present.
Speaker 2: I thought I may as well give it a go.
Speaker 2: About three or four sessions in I almost let it
Speaker 2: go because it was so painful because my hair was
Speaker 2: falling out anyway, and I kind of was like, I've
Speaker 2: come this far in hindsight, if I had my time
Speaker 2: over again, would I do it? I mean, it's hard
Speaker 2: to say, but I mean it did. During treatment, to
Speaker 2: be able to go out in public and not feel
Speaker 2: like you were the cancer patient was quite a beautiful thing.
Speaker 2: You know, I looked, I didn't look well. Let me be,
Speaker 2: I did not look well, but it sort of allowed
Speaker 2: me to sort of pretend like I was a regular
Speaker 2: person in the world. But yeah, just if anyone's wondering,
Speaker 2: that's that's why I have here, and it's it's another
Speaker 2: thing that they don't always mention it, the doctors. I've
Speaker 2: got other friends who do wasn't off at his adoptions,
Speaker 2: so it's something to ask.
Speaker 1: About coming up. Lucy tells us why it isn't over
Speaker 1: when it's over.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 1: As I said, I don't want to rush to no.
Speaker 1: I know I get the end in inverted comments because
Speaker 1: it's not the end, because that's what I want to
Speaker 1: talk about.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: You've told me in many ways that the end of treatment.
Speaker 1: The perception is right. This is my perception again, back
Speaker 1: to my perception of the things I don't know about.
Speaker 2: But my perception too going into this is despite us
Speaker 2: being i would say, reasonably smart.
Speaker 1: One yeah, right, reasonably empathetic, silly, sometimes you get you
Speaker 1: get to the end of treatment and hopefully you get
Speaker 1: good news or the hope the promise of some good news,
Speaker 1: and everything's fine. Everything, everything's fine. Back to now, I
Speaker 1: want you to talk to me about this part because
Speaker 1: I know I'm not as you just described. It's not
Speaker 1: like this bit's worse than this bit or whatever. You've
Speaker 1: been through a no unbelievable thing. But what we've been
Speaker 1: talking about a lot lately. And what your substack that
Speaker 1: you've started a year of healing is about is kind
Speaker 1: of what happens when it's over in inverted commers, because A,
Speaker 1: it's not really over and be everything has moved around. Yes,
Speaker 1: So talk to me a bit about that. Talk to
Speaker 1: me a bit about the snow globe.
Speaker 2: Oh, the snow globe. The snow globe. Look, there's so
Speaker 2: many parts to this. I think the thing you learn
Speaker 2: when you're in treatment is that it's ever changing. I
Speaker 2: think you have a treatment plan, but then with every surgery,
Speaker 2: with every scam, with everything, it changes, you know. So
Speaker 2: for about a year, I mean the thick of it,
Speaker 2: you know, and just like I end up having three surgeries,
Speaker 2: six months of chemo, five months of chemo radiation and that.
Speaker 2: So I come to the end of the radiation and
Speaker 2: you're kind of like you're like headed for that line.
Speaker 2: Like I'm just like everything in me is going towards
Speaker 2: that line and being done with radiation or what they
Speaker 2: call the active treatment, and I hit it expecting to
Speaker 2: fully be like amazing, cool, I'm done, you know, we
Speaker 2: can move on with life. And everyone around you is like,
Speaker 2: you did it, You've you know, you've climbed the mountain
Speaker 2: or you've beaten the thing, and I just can't stop
Speaker 2: crying because you go from this life that you've thrust
Speaker 2: into so incredibly quickly, which is then completely taken up
Speaker 2: with hospital visits and doctors and scans and whatever. It
Speaker 2: is like you know, for a while, and still my
Speaker 2: Google Maps thinks that the hospital is work because we
Speaker 2: go there so often, like that is your life. And
Speaker 2: then suddenly you're done, and everyone's like, cool, well done,
Speaker 2: and it's like, I don't know who I am anymore.
Speaker 2: I don't know how to be. I don't know. I
Speaker 2: don't know where I belong. I don't know, like do
Speaker 2: I work. My body doesn't feel like it used to.
Speaker 2: I'm still overcoming all the you know, the physicality of
Speaker 2: it all, like all the surgeries, all the chema, all
Speaker 2: the radiation.
Speaker 1: And you still also on a lot of medication, medication.
Speaker 2: And so I don't know. My body doesn't feel like mine.
Speaker 2: It's not really capful of much. And my head is
Speaker 2: just starting to catch up with what just happened. But
Speaker 2: will let's go on with life? And I just sort
Speaker 2: of did that. I was like, okay, let's go started
Speaker 2: taking meetings with clients, moved home to my house with
Speaker 2: my gym that had become my like sanctuary, like somewhere
Speaker 2: to go and to move through everything gently. Just was
Speaker 2: all in at the same time. I just started on
Speaker 2: this very very quite growling, ongoing treatment ragime like so
Speaker 2: for certain types of breast cancer, and you do learn
Speaker 2: a lot. There's so many different types of breast cancer
Speaker 2: that affect treatment plans and you know, survivorship and everything
Speaker 2: like that. To start on this big treatment regime of
Speaker 2: drugs that will go on for many, many, many years,
Speaker 2: and I'm off, like let's go, and I just came
Speaker 2: crushing down completely. I ended up in hospital with a
Speaker 2: fever sicker than I've ever felt, but supposed to be better,
Speaker 2: and I couldn't quite marry up at all, like what
Speaker 2: was going on here? But my head was just spinning
Speaker 2: and I, yeah.
Speaker 1: Do you get offered as a patient, because this must
Speaker 1: be what happens to so many people? Do you get
Speaker 1: offered counseling to deal with this? And what kind of
Speaker 1: things do they say to you?
Speaker 2: I say, this is incredibly normal, and I'm so lucky,
Speaker 2: Like I was just the public hospital system, like I
Speaker 2: went through public. There was a question of whether I'd
Speaker 2: go private. I didn't have enough cover for that, but
Speaker 2: I was considering paying for it. And then actually a
Speaker 2: conversation with me as friend who's a research and she
Speaker 2: was like.
Speaker 1: Oh my god. At the sidelines of the.
Speaker 2: Side Sydney show, I was in this Oh my god,
Speaker 2: my head was spinning about do I go private and
Speaker 2: have a surgery like five days before the option of
Speaker 2: the public surgery. It was going to cost me a
Speaker 2: shit ton of money, but I was like, I need
Speaker 2: to get it done now, right, you know, and all
Speaker 2: the public option and mea said cave achat to my
Speaker 2: bait and she was like, you are fine to wait
Speaker 2: for the public system. Best thing I could have ever done.
Speaker 2: I have had the most phenomenal care and treatment across
Speaker 2: all that. So yes, they offer counseling, Yes they offer everything.
Speaker 2: They are the most. I cannot could not fault them.
Speaker 2: I call them my happy hospital. It has been absolutely incredible.
Speaker 2: But what they tell you is that everything you are
Speaker 2: experiencing is incredibly normal for cancer patient. But I've come
Speaker 2: to realize that I think we have this perception in
Speaker 2: the world, and I was guilty of it. I think
Speaker 2: too that there's two paths out of cancer, and one
Speaker 2: is fine and one is dead, and we make no
Speaker 2: room for the stuff in the middle, which I've also
Speaker 2: come to realize that so many people are suffering with,
Speaker 2: but they mostly have to pretend to be fine because
Speaker 2: that's that's a narrative. We want that, that's easier, that's nice.
Speaker 2: How we want things tied up neatly in a bow.
Speaker 2: We want happy endings. And it is a happy ending.
Speaker 2: It just kind of hurts a bit on the inside.
Speaker 1: It's not over that thing is really the ending.
Speaker 2: It's not the ending at all. And I didn't answer
Speaker 2: a question there about snowglows, but the snowglobe theory is
Speaker 2: one that my psychologist shared with me when I was
Speaker 2: in one of these these phases of going I just
Speaker 2: don't know where I fit in anymore. And I'm still
Speaker 2: in that phase, to be honest, Like I'm six months
Speaker 2: out of active treatment, but only eighteen months since diagnosis.
Speaker 2: Not even every day. It's still occupies so much of
Speaker 2: my thoughts and my beings and just my life. I'm
Speaker 2: still in appointments all the time, even though I'm clear out.
Speaker 2: The snow globe theory, she said, you know. I was
Speaker 2: talking to her and she picked up a snowglobe and
Speaker 2: she held it to the camera. We do our sessions
Speaker 2: on zoom, and she said, I want you and imagine
Speaker 2: that your life is this snow globe and you're in
Speaker 2: the middle of it, and you know, you're going about
Speaker 2: your day and then boom, and she shook the snow
Speaker 2: globe quite vigorously, and she said, all those little flakes
Speaker 2: that are that are flying around now, they are your
Speaker 2: values and they're your priorities, and they might be the
Speaker 2: same as what they were before, but she said, they're
Speaker 2: all falling into different places. So the things that you
Speaker 2: once cared about, maybe you don't care as much anymore.
Speaker 2: The things you didn't think you cared about, they're kind
Speaker 2: of more important now. And you're kind of just stepping
Speaker 2: your way through the snow and trying to figure out
Speaker 2: where you belong in it all. And when she said that,
Speaker 2: that was the most helpful thing I've ever heard, because
Speaker 2: I was like, Okay, it makes sense now the snow
Speaker 2: is still falling.
Speaker 1: Stop putting the pressure on yourself answers, and not to
Speaker 1: be back to normal is normal?
Speaker 2: There is no normal. We call this the re entry
Speaker 2: wobbles and they're going to go on for a while.
Speaker 2: And she says, you know, typically two years is probably
Speaker 2: from end of treatment is what it will take a
Speaker 2: cancer patient to figure out what their new normal.
Speaker 1: Is, you know, in that snow globe analogy, because the
Speaker 1: other thing, which all not preconceptions is an experience like yours.
Speaker 1: It is absolutely life changing, but that it changes your
Speaker 1: perception of everything and what you want and clarity. Now
Speaker 1: you said you got that clarity in the room when
Speaker 1: they diagnosed you. Sitting here now like, do you feel
Speaker 1: like this is a different Lucy. I want different things
Speaker 1: and I know what I want.
Speaker 2: Do you feel that? Yeah? I mean I'm not sure
Speaker 2: of myself, you know, classic self doubta imposter syndrome through
Speaker 2: all of it.
Speaker 1: Are you proud of yourself?
Speaker 2: I'm really proud of myself. Yeah, I'm really really proud.
Speaker 2: And I think when I look back at cancer treatment,
Speaker 2: it's the one thing in my life that I didn't
Speaker 2: have a roadmap for how to do it. I wasn't
Speaker 2: able to look at other people and so of say,
Speaker 2: not that I've fit my life or my career following
Speaker 2: other people.
Speaker 1: Kind of like I'm very pit and ambitious.
Speaker 2: But it was sort of the first time in my
Speaker 2: life that I'd been really able to go this is
Speaker 2: only me going through this with a huge amount of support,
Speaker 2: like I am just the most beautiful family and network
Speaker 2: of people who were behind me, but it's I'm the
Speaker 2: only one in there, and how do I want to
Speaker 2: do this? You know? And I was able to do that.
Speaker 2: And back to that point where I said that I
Speaker 2: wanted to find the fun and the love in it.
Speaker 2: And I know people might roll their eyes at that
Speaker 2: and be like, cancer fucking sucks, because it does. Somehow
Speaker 2: through it, we were able to find that fun and
Speaker 2: that love. Not all the time, but you know, that
Speaker 2: night after I found out that I had chemo, I
Speaker 2: called my family. I said, please come over. I'm making
Speaker 2: pasta I don't know, And they came over and we
Speaker 2: had dinner and we put the music on really loud,
Speaker 2: and we just danced. That's one of my favorite memories
Speaker 2: from my whole life, which is crazy, and you know,
Speaker 2: just through it all, I just learned so much about
Speaker 2: people and humans and our capacities to be there for
Speaker 2: each other and to support each other and just to
Speaker 2: like I just at the end of the day. I
Speaker 2: just people are all the matters to me. Now I'
Speaker 2: just nothing else really, So my whole world now has
Speaker 2: become I've always had a very very close family, but
Speaker 2: I'm leaning in harder and going I just want to
Speaker 2: spend time with you, and I just want to spend
Speaker 2: time with my friends, and I want to I want
Speaker 2: to be present with people. I've got no desire to
Speaker 2: rush through life anymore, so I don't over and never don't.
Speaker 2: I don't like to overschedule anymore. I like to have open,
Speaker 2: open days, or like, you know, if I'm seeing a person,
Speaker 2: I'm not there's not something straight after us, so I
Speaker 2: want to stay and hang for a while. I'm going
Speaker 2: to do that and really really be with them. I've
Speaker 2: also let the people I've had these huge networks, and
Speaker 2: I was still like the first time in my life
Speaker 2: I was able to kind of the world. But there
Speaker 2: word boundaries is actually one that I don't love. I
Speaker 2: have a complex relationship with it, but I will, for
Speaker 2: the first time in my life to be like, actually,
Speaker 2: I can't do that, or I don't want to do that.
Speaker 1: Or it's given you a clearer filter and what to say.
Speaker 2: Kind of hide behind cancer in a way because I
Speaker 2: shouldn't say, but it was there. It gave me a
Speaker 2: way to say no to things that I hadn't had before.
Speaker 2: I hadn't had the ability to do the.
Speaker 1: Extreme people pleasing behavior to need cancers.
Speaker 2: You're extreme. You know you get to play the card
Speaker 2: a little bit. I need to.
Speaker 1: I've got two more things, yeah, okay, to ask you right.
Speaker 1: One of them is about the Year of Healing, Yes,
Speaker 1: because I remember when that came about. But tell me
Speaker 1: how that's going, yeah, and how we extended it to
Speaker 1: two years of healing.
Speaker 2: It's going to be a lifetime, yes, I think it is.
Speaker 2: It's like for you, Yeah, I mean the Year of
Speaker 2: Healing came about, you know, about that time that I
Speaker 2: had that full on extreme breakdown and you were there
Speaker 2: for part of that. There was a night I was
Speaker 2: in Sydney and I just lost it and I was somehow, Holly,
Speaker 2: you may seem to be around for the big points.
Speaker 2: We have this hotel, this hotel that we both stayed
Speaker 2: at and we now call it the Breakdown Hotel, and
Speaker 2: I'm not going back there, I know, Dar.
Speaker 1: I'm staying there tonight, the Breakdown Hotel tonight.
Speaker 2: Yeah, everything was coming crashing down, and I realized that
Speaker 2: I couldn't keep going at that pace and I wasn't
Speaker 2: going to go back to normal. And so a very
Speaker 2: very wise friend had said to me, who sort of
Speaker 2: deals in this sort of sort of stuff, had said
Speaker 2: to me, you need to take a year. You need
Speaker 2: to stop for a year and do the work and
Speaker 2: just get.
Speaker 1: Yourself better, you know, And you've been writing about it.
Speaker 2: And then I knew what happened because you the most
Speaker 2: so loose.
Speaker 1: Also, I know you don't want to hear deal with compliments,
Speaker 1: but you are the most beautiful writer. And I hadn't
Speaker 1: read anything that you'd written for so many years because
Speaker 1: sifted right, and you've been doing other things, and so also,
Speaker 1: you know, you've been writing about this journey the word Okay,
Speaker 1: let's do it on the air of healing, and it
Speaker 1: is so beautiful and it's connecting so beautifully. That's a
Speaker 1: gift to peop.
Speaker 2: I mean, I kind of had this inkling when I
Speaker 2: decided that I was going to give myself a year.
Speaker 2: I don't know what came over me, because you know
Speaker 2: me as well. I've spent my whole career in the background,
Speaker 2: like I've always been the producer or the behind the scenes.
Speaker 2: Even coming here today, I was like, Holy, I've never
Speaker 2: done this before. But for some reason, I wanted to
Speaker 2: do it publicly, and I thought that if I put
Speaker 2: a name to it and I told the world that
Speaker 2: I was doing it, that it might hold me to it.
Speaker 2: It's not really complex. It meant going back to mum's
Speaker 2: house for a while and just being taken care of
Speaker 2: while I figure it out. And it meant looking after
Speaker 2: your body, looking after my body. Yeah, taking time like
Speaker 2: health is a big priority for me, going to the gym,
Speaker 2: trying all kinds of weird and wacky therapies. Wo woo shit.
Speaker 2: I'm also into it. Let's do it more time with
Speaker 2: the people I love. Let's focus on needing to get
Speaker 2: back into the work or the stress or that any
Speaker 2: of that. And yeah, it's just about time and writing
Speaker 2: about it and just reflecting. And there's a lot of
Speaker 2: healing in the writing. And instead of putting those thoughts
Speaker 2: to paper, I've been able to kind of figure out
Speaker 2: how I feel about it all to you.
Speaker 1: And for other people, I think, Okay, let's we've got
Speaker 1: to leave people with this. I want you to tell
Speaker 1: me what you want every woman hearing this to walk
Speaker 1: away thinking about because we're releasing this at the very
Speaker 1: end of Breast cancer Month, right, Breast Cancer Awareness Month.
Speaker 1: And I think in the same way that I was
Speaker 1: saying at the beginning that I think that in lots
Speaker 1: of ways we've become quite complacent about breast cancer. I
Speaker 1: think even in Breast Cancer Awareness Month is like this
Speaker 1: haze of pink and we're like, yeah, yeah, yeah, But like,
Speaker 1: what's the thing you really want people to hear from
Speaker 1: this conversation?
Speaker 2: Yeah. Like I said before, I think we're all aware
Speaker 2: of breast cancer. The month has on its job. We
Speaker 2: know that breast cancer exists, but do we really know
Speaker 2: what it entails. I don't think we do what I
Speaker 2: want people to know. And this is you know, I
Speaker 2: think October is amazing because it does give us a
Speaker 2: reason to talk about it and a focus. But you know,
Speaker 2: this is ongoing. What I've learned is that early detection
Speaker 2: to save lives is there's a line they say. I
Speaker 2: think it's really easy to think that it's not going
Speaker 2: to be me. I didn't think it would be me.
Speaker 2: You know, I'm too young for breast cancer. I have
Speaker 2: no family history, I'm not too young for breast cancer.
Speaker 2: I've got a whole lot of new friends, you know,
Speaker 2: I mean a support group that's all young people with
Speaker 2: breast cancer. We're not too young for breast cancer. And
Speaker 2: most of us don't have family histories. And we've also
Speaker 2: you know, come to know that. I think it's over
Speaker 2: ninety about ninety percent of people who are diagnosed don't
Speaker 2: have a family history. There's a real misconception on that.
Speaker 2: I just want people to this beautiful campaign at the
Speaker 2: moment out by Breast Cancer Network Australia. It's all about
Speaker 2: knowing your breast. So you could head to their website
Speaker 2: and have a look and they talk you through how
Speaker 2: to know your breasts and that's through look so by
Speaker 2: looking at them, also by feel so that if something
Speaker 2: does change, whether it is you can feel a lump,
Speaker 2: there can be other signs like your nipple can be inverted.
Speaker 2: There can be god a rash or indent or something
Speaker 2: like that that you're aware of it. And then also
Speaker 2: if you're eligible and it's over forty in Australia, you're
Speaker 2: eligible for a mamogram. I don't think that necessarily means
Speaker 2: you have to run off and get one, but talk
Speaker 2: to your GP about whether you should be getting one.
Speaker 2: And if you're over fifty, you'll actually get letters from
Speaker 2: the government to say, hey, have you been lately. I
Speaker 2: want us all to be asking our friends. So, Holly,
Speaker 2: when was your last mamogram?
Speaker 1: I go religiously now, so it was about six months ago.
Speaker 1: I'm over fifty, so I get my letter in the mail.
Speaker 1: It's amazing, it's free, it's quick, it's easy. The women
Speaker 1: there are great. And I have an am sometimes guilty
Speaker 1: of ignoring my body and what it's telling me because
Speaker 1: I'm like, busy, busy, busy, busy, too busy, But this,
Speaker 1: I don't fuck around with this, especially not since you
Speaker 1: and I know that you talking about this, which doesn't,
Speaker 1: as you said, doesn't come naturally. But you've already really
Speaker 1: helped some people who found things because you've nagged them
Speaker 1: about it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I was telling you earlier. Two women have now
Speaker 2: come to me and said, like I said, it's not
Speaker 2: natural for me to be the one to talk about
Speaker 2: staff and to share my story. But two women have
Speaker 2: now come to me and said, either they have been
Speaker 2: diagnosed or a relative of theirs has been diagnosed, because
Speaker 2: they've read something that I've shared or something you know,
Speaker 2: heard something that I've said, and I sort of had
Speaker 2: this realization that Okay, I can do something with this
Speaker 2: and we can make a bit of a difference, and yeah,
Speaker 2: check you Boob's girls. Because as aware as we are,
Speaker 2: there's still I think it's over twenty thousand women. Man
Speaker 2: actually today, actually on the day we record is male
Speaker 2: breast cancer Wednesday.
Speaker 1: It's not even something you think about.
Speaker 2: But they're getting diagnosed her and that's really important to know.
Speaker 2: And there's a real shame that comes with it, come
Speaker 2: with a man. And I really feel for them because, yeah,
Speaker 2: so the man and the women just check and beware
Speaker 2: that goes for all parts of your body. Just if
Speaker 2: something's not right, I really really urge you just to
Speaker 2: go to the doctor, to the GP. And I heard
Speaker 2: something beautiful on a podcast the other day from a
Speaker 2: woman in the US who has breast cancer. And she said,
Speaker 2: because I think it's easy for gps to often be
Speaker 2: like no, you know, to say you're too young. Well
Speaker 2: that's probably not that. If you are really worried, she said,
Speaker 2: pretend that you know me, Like, don't just say I
Speaker 2: heard this thing. Say my friend Lucy was thirty seven
Speaker 2: when she was diagnosed, so I'd really like you to
Speaker 2: send me for an ultrasound or to refer me to
Speaker 2: the right places, like please don't dismiss me and say
Speaker 2: it's probably not right. And I thought that was really
Speaker 2: helpful if you can sort of put a name to
Speaker 2: it and say my friend. So please, I'm your friend.
Speaker 1: Well I'm lucky enough that you really are my friend.
Speaker 2: That's nice, isn't it.
Speaker 1: So thank you Lucy Ormond for coming on and telling
Speaker 1: us your story, because you know, I love you and
Speaker 1: I'm I'm so proud of you and in awe of you.
Speaker 1: And also I just can't imagine what you've been through,
Speaker 1: even though I've been there, like to a point, I
Speaker 1: can't imagine it. And I just want everyone listening to
Speaker 1: this to do what Lucy tells them to do.
Speaker 2: Thank you, hollywaen Right, I love you.
Speaker 1: I love you too. Thank you so much for listening
Speaker 1: to No Filter today. This episode means a great deal
Speaker 1: to me. I'm sure you know why, and I'm sure
Speaker 1: it does to you too. And just sending enormous love
Speaker 1: to anybody listening to this who's been touched by cancer
Speaker 1: of any kind. If you want to find out more
Speaker 1: and find some resources to help you or anyone you
Speaker 1: know or love. We're going to put a link to
Speaker 1: the National Breast Council Foundation and to some other really
Speaker 1: useful sights in our show notes. Sending enormous love to
Speaker 1: you all. The executive producer of no film What is
Speaker 1: nam A Brown? The senior producer is Bree Player. Audio
Speaker 1: production is by Tina Mattaloff, and video editing is by
Speaker 1: Josh Green. I'm Holly Wainwright and thank you as always
Speaker 1: for listening to nofeld Mamma Mia acknowledges the traditional owners
Speaker 1: of the land. We've recorded this podcast on the Gadagal
Speaker 1: people of the Eora Nation. We pay our respects to
Speaker 1: their elders past and present, and extend that respect to
Speaker 1: all Aboriginal and Torrestrate islander cultures.