WEBVTT - Don't Call It A Breakdown With Julie Goodwin 0:00:00.080 --> 0:00:04.280 Hello, four five six club. This is Holly Wainwright. I 0:00:04.320 --> 0:00:08.080 am the host of MID and if you're discovering MID 0:00:08.240 --> 0:00:11.000 Conversations for gen X women who are anything but for 0:00:11.080 --> 0:00:14.840 the first time, you have a whole lot of episodes 0:00:14.880 --> 0:00:17.320 that you can go back and listen to. And you're lucky, 0:00:17.480 --> 0:00:19.400 if I say so myself, because some of them are 0:00:19.400 --> 0:00:22.400 bloody great. In fact, all of them are bloody great. 0:00:23.320 --> 0:00:26.160 While you might have stumbled across some MID episodes before, 0:00:26.840 --> 0:00:29.560 the one I'm sharing with you today is the very 0:00:29.600 --> 0:00:34.159 first one we ever recorded. It features the remarkable Julie 0:00:34.159 --> 0:00:37.080 Goodwin you know of originally Master Chef fame, but many 0:00:37.120 --> 0:00:40.280 other things since. And the episode is called don't call 0:00:40.320 --> 0:00:44.120 it a Breakdown. It's a story that you probably haven't heard, 0:00:44.240 --> 0:00:47.760 even if you've read a few headlines about it. It's extraordinary, 0:00:47.920 --> 0:00:51.720 very relatable, and it's about how Julie, several years after 0:00:51.800 --> 0:00:54.320 Master Chef and when she was apparently sort of living 0:00:54.360 --> 0:00:57.520 the dream, running her own business, juggling a lot of 0:00:57.560 --> 0:01:02.000 things at once, she had a full breakdown. How did 0:01:02.040 --> 0:01:04.880 she recover, how did she rebuild? How did she discover 0:01:04.959 --> 0:01:07.679 that she was taking care of everyone but herself? Does 0:01:07.720 --> 0:01:11.480 that sound familiar. This is one of my favorite conversations. 0:01:11.560 --> 0:01:15.280 Julie is warm and funny and very honest and vulnerable. 0:01:15.760 --> 0:01:18.160 I absolutely loved it. People talk to me about it 0:01:18.200 --> 0:01:20.440 all the time. So here it is where it all began. 0:01:20.920 --> 0:01:24.240 Episode one of season one of Mid. Don't call it 0:01:24.280 --> 0:01:28.280 a breakdown. You might know mid as an insult. 0:01:28.560 --> 0:01:30.840 I guess there's no way to have a good mid 0:01:30.880 --> 0:01:34.440 life crisis because it's gracious, an epidemic upon us of 0:01:34.600 --> 0:01:39.200 men on the internet calling women mid means poor quality, 0:01:39.280 --> 0:01:41.960 below average, not that attractive. 0:01:41.880 --> 0:01:44.680 And for the longest time, that's how midlife women have 0:01:44.800 --> 0:01:47.000 been seen and how we've been told to feel. 0:01:47.360 --> 0:01:49.600 The thing is, though we are. 0:01:49.600 --> 0:01:54.240 Anything, but my name is Holly Wainwright, and I am mid. 0:01:54.920 --> 0:01:57.960 By the time you've unlocked this seriously grown up level, 0:01:58.240 --> 0:02:02.600 you've seen some stuff, through some things, understand some stuff. 0:02:03.560 --> 0:02:07.840 You are wise and powerful, complicated and courageous, and yet 0:02:07.840 --> 0:02:10.640 the world is trying to trick you into believing that 0:02:10.720 --> 0:02:15.240 you're sad and small, uninteresting and unfuckable. 0:02:15.960 --> 0:02:19.600 Excuse me, but no, one hundred times no. 0:02:20.840 --> 0:02:21.480 Mid is a. 0:02:21.480 --> 0:02:24.760 Show for gen X women where we share thoughts from 0:02:24.760 --> 0:02:27.919 midlife and have the conversations that actually matter to us. 0:02:28.720 --> 0:02:30.959 Over the next eight episodes. 0:02:30.680 --> 0:02:33.200 You're going to hear grown ups talking about big things 0:02:33.240 --> 0:02:36.480 and little things and some serious, heavy shit, because there's 0:02:36.520 --> 0:02:39.560 plenty of that in midlife, and some silly, stupid stuff too, 0:02:39.760 --> 0:02:43.200 because we've worked out that sometimes that's exactly what we need. 0:02:43.919 --> 0:02:46.440 We're going to be talking about our heads and our stomachs, 0:02:46.480 --> 0:02:48.919 and our drinking, and our sex life, and our friends 0:02:48.919 --> 0:02:51.280 and our job and our families and our divorces and 0:02:51.320 --> 0:02:54.480 our dating and you get it, all. 0:02:54.400 --> 0:02:55.120 The good stuff. 0:02:56.120 --> 0:03:00.000 And today for episode one, we are talking about our heads. 0:03:00.880 --> 0:03:02.960 One of the things about midlife is you're meant to 0:03:03.000 --> 0:03:05.720 have all your fluffy ducks in pretty little rows. 0:03:06.040 --> 0:03:07.320 But it's not always like that. 0:03:07.880 --> 0:03:11.280 Sometimes because of hormones, because of perry, because of stress 0:03:11.320 --> 0:03:14.639 and health and life, and because often we've shoved some 0:03:14.680 --> 0:03:17.720 tricky things from our pass away in hard to reach drawers, 0:03:18.240 --> 0:03:21.239 those ducks waddle out of line and start tumbling over 0:03:21.280 --> 0:03:24.919 each other and running for the exits. Mental health can 0:03:24.960 --> 0:03:27.639 sneak up on you when you're mid and that can 0:03:27.680 --> 0:03:30.560 have serious ripple effects because often by now we've got 0:03:30.560 --> 0:03:32.760 a lot of people depending on us. We're meant to 0:03:32.760 --> 0:03:35.920 be that steady leaning post and suddenly we're wobbling. 0:03:36.840 --> 0:03:38.640 And no one knows that better than the woman. 0:03:38.680 --> 0:03:42.560 I'm having my first mid conversation with, Julie Goodwin. I 0:03:42.600 --> 0:03:45.360 gave you a dish am. 0:03:45.280 --> 0:03:45.960 Nine out of ten. 0:03:47.400 --> 0:03:49.560 Well, Julie Goodwin's infectious. 0:03:51.240 --> 0:03:54.280 Proving to be one very strong lady. Julie is now 0:03:54.320 --> 0:03:55.040 back in the kitchen. 0:03:57.000 --> 0:03:58.560 You know Julie, we all do. 0:03:58.840 --> 0:04:01.320 She won the first ever seas of Australian Master Chef 0:04:01.600 --> 0:04:03.880 aged thirty eight and became one of the most famous 0:04:03.880 --> 0:04:06.880 people in the country. There have been cookbooks and more 0:04:06.920 --> 0:04:10.040 TV shows and appearances all over the place. And now 0:04:10.160 --> 0:04:14.680 there's Julie's extraordinarily good memoir. It's called Your Time Starts Now, 0:04:14.800 --> 0:04:17.560 and in it she explains how her ducks got so 0:04:17.800 --> 0:04:20.680 very far out of their rows that she found herself 0:04:20.800 --> 0:04:22.240 not wanting to live anymore. 0:04:23.200 --> 0:04:25.160 It's an extraordinary story. 0:04:24.920 --> 0:04:27.960 But a familiar one too, because when Julie found herself 0:04:28.000 --> 0:04:30.960 doing what many of us are doing everything and falling 0:04:31.000 --> 0:04:33.359 apart while she was doing it, she had to start 0:04:33.400 --> 0:04:37.160 making some serious changes, which for her started with a 0:04:37.240 --> 0:04:41.280 stint in the hospital. Please enjoy the very first mid 0:04:41.279 --> 0:04:45.240 conversation with the brutally honest, occasionally sweary, completely wonderful. 0:04:45.480 --> 0:04:46.279 Julie Goodwin. 0:04:48.279 --> 0:04:50.760 Julie, I want to start by reading a few words 0:04:50.760 --> 0:04:54.000 in your book that you actually wrote about your school friends, 0:04:54.279 --> 0:04:57.200 because when I read it, I was like, these are 0:04:57.200 --> 0:04:59.880 the women who are listening to mid she wrote. Now, 0:05:00.160 --> 0:05:02.400 through the magic of social media, I catch glimpses of 0:05:02.400 --> 0:05:07.280 their lives. We are doctors, professors, lawyers, town planners, CEOs. 0:05:07.640 --> 0:05:11.280 We are mothers and grandmothers, daughters and lovers. We are 0:05:11.320 --> 0:05:15.760 cancer survivors and entrepreneurs, artists and activists and travelers. We 0:05:15.800 --> 0:05:20.560 have lost parents, partners, friends, and children. We've strived and achieved, 0:05:20.680 --> 0:05:24.239 struggled and grieved, worked and played. We've faced the whole 0:05:24.279 --> 0:05:26.640 spectrum of what life has to give and to take 0:05:26.680 --> 0:05:27.880 away and prevailed. 0:05:28.360 --> 0:05:33.839 We are fucking glorious. And I was like, that is 0:05:33.920 --> 0:05:36.400 exactly who this show is for. 0:05:37.000 --> 0:05:41.960 People who have seen some shit yeah and are still 0:05:41.960 --> 0:05:43.880 here and are fucking glorious. And you are one of 0:05:43.880 --> 0:05:47.200 those people. Julie Goodwin. So thank you, thank you so 0:05:47.279 --> 0:05:48.440 much for writing this book. 0:05:48.800 --> 0:05:50.400 Oh, thank you, thank you. 0:05:51.120 --> 0:05:51.400 I was. 0:05:52.880 --> 0:05:54.280 Hard. I bet it was. 0:05:54.279 --> 0:05:57.039 Hard, because you've written cookbooks, right, lots of cookbooks. 0:05:57.120 --> 0:05:58.760 Yeah, lots of cookbooks, and there are. 0:05:58.680 --> 0:05:59.400 Recipes in here. 0:05:59.440 --> 0:06:01.560 I want to make sure everybody knows that every chapter 0:06:01.640 --> 0:06:04.400 has a slightly adjacent recipe. 0:06:04.920 --> 0:06:07.400 I feel like you need a little breather being too. 0:06:07.440 --> 0:06:09.680 Some of these chapters, it's just like, you know what, 0:06:09.800 --> 0:06:13.720 let's talk about piplots for a minute, exactly. 0:06:13.880 --> 0:06:16.480 Yeah, And that's real life, right some one minute we're 0:06:16.560 --> 0:06:18.080 laying it all out. In the next minute, we're like, oh, 0:06:18.200 --> 0:06:21.120 got to cook dinner. But I wanted to say how 0:06:21.240 --> 0:06:23.080 I think that for a lot of women reading this, 0:06:23.200 --> 0:06:26.719 although the details might be different of what they're going 0:06:26.720 --> 0:06:28.760 through in midlife and what you've been through over the 0:06:28.760 --> 0:06:31.599 past six years or so, they might not have been 0:06:31.600 --> 0:06:34.480 on reality TV and had this massive life change at 0:06:34.480 --> 0:06:36.800 about thirty eight is when you went on Master Chef, right, 0:06:37.720 --> 0:06:41.200 But a lot of this would be really familiar, being busy, busy, busy, 0:06:41.279 --> 0:06:44.680 putting everybody's needs above your own, committing yourself to work 0:06:44.720 --> 0:06:46.400 a lot that then takes you away from the family, 0:06:46.440 --> 0:06:47.640 and running, running, running. 0:06:47.960 --> 0:06:49.200 Can you tell us a little. 0:06:48.960 --> 0:06:52.159 Bit about what your life was like about six years 0:06:52.200 --> 0:06:54.960 ago when you were still trying to do it all 0:06:55.000 --> 0:06:56.000 in inverted commons? 0:06:56.040 --> 0:06:56.360 Sure? 0:06:56.560 --> 0:07:00.640 I'd never been very good at setting boundaries, so you know, 0:07:01.000 --> 0:07:03.480 and I know that's relatable. I know because a lot 0:07:03.520 --> 0:07:06.039 of my friends are the same. Basically off the back 0:07:06.080 --> 0:07:09.320 of Master Chef that's fifteen years ago. I just was 0:07:09.480 --> 0:07:12.120 frightened that if I didn't take all the opportunities they 0:07:12.120 --> 0:07:14.680 would sort of disappear and that, you know, And I 0:07:14.720 --> 0:07:18.360 even had someone say to me as the second season 0:07:18.440 --> 0:07:20.960 started to go to air, well done, You've had a 0:07:20.960 --> 0:07:25.119 good run, sort of like the years up. Your crown 0:07:25.240 --> 0:07:27.000 is going to be passed on to somebody else. And 0:07:27.280 --> 0:07:30.000 so I had this anxiety that the opportunities that had 0:07:30.040 --> 0:07:32.480 come my way were going to evaporate. So I had 0:07:32.480 --> 0:07:33.960 to take everything that came along. 0:07:34.200 --> 0:07:38.120 That first season of Master Chef was so huge. You know, 0:07:38.240 --> 0:07:40.520 you were one of the most famous people in the 0:07:40.520 --> 0:07:43.800 country for a period of time, no question. So that 0:07:43.840 --> 0:07:48.040 completely changed your life. So then there was this pressure yeah. 0:07:48.080 --> 0:07:52.000 Yeah, and lots of expectations and you know that good 0:07:52.000 --> 0:07:54.520 old imposter syndrome and all of that. So I kind 0:07:54.560 --> 0:07:56.680 of had to learn a lot of stuff as I 0:07:56.720 --> 0:07:57.600 went along as well. 0:07:58.160 --> 0:08:00.840 And about eight or nine. 0:08:00.760 --> 0:08:03.200 Years ago, I just sort of thought, I've got to 0:08:03.240 --> 0:08:06.200 get off this treadmill, and I was very much in 0:08:06.240 --> 0:08:09.440 the wind, as in, if a food festival wanted me, 0:08:09.720 --> 0:08:11.840 then I had a job. If they wanted somebody else, 0:08:11.880 --> 0:08:14.480 I didn't have a job, you know. And so I 0:08:14.520 --> 0:08:16.920 felt really at the mercy of the ebbs and flows 0:08:16.960 --> 0:08:20.400 of the food industry and the exhibition industry and all 0:08:20.400 --> 0:08:22.440 of that sort of stuff. So I thought I need 0:08:22.480 --> 0:08:25.400 to take the rains a little bit, and so I 0:08:25.440 --> 0:08:26.920 opened my cooking school. 0:08:26.920 --> 0:08:27.960 So I opened my own business. 0:08:28.000 --> 0:08:32.000 And I'd already run a business with my husband for years. 0:08:31.880 --> 0:08:34.240 You know, business, Yeah, that's right, build it. 0:08:34.280 --> 0:08:36.320 And it was at a point of quite you know, 0:08:36.400 --> 0:08:39.320 solid success and everything when you went off to do masters. 0:08:39.360 --> 0:08:42.240 Yet absolutely, so I thought I'll do something that I 0:08:42.280 --> 0:08:44.280 love to do, and so I opened this cooking school. 0:08:44.320 --> 0:08:46.680 And that was such a labor of love and it 0:08:46.720 --> 0:08:49.520 was such a beautiful space and we had some amazing 0:08:49.559 --> 0:08:52.480 times there. But it is a small business, and anyone 0:08:52.520 --> 0:08:55.840 who's run a small business knows it becomes like a 0:08:55.880 --> 0:08:58.679 toddler and it needs all your attention and it takes 0:08:58.679 --> 0:09:01.960 all your energy and turn it back on it all 0:09:01.960 --> 0:09:06.120 the time you do. And not long after that opened, 0:09:06.120 --> 0:09:08.000 I was offered a job on the radio, and I 0:09:08.040 --> 0:09:10.000 guess I must have still had that sort of fomo 0:09:10.120 --> 0:09:13.440 going on because I just really loved the idea of 0:09:13.480 --> 0:09:15.680 doing the radio, and I gee, I loved that job. 0:09:15.760 --> 0:09:20.640 I loved it. But I guess the breakfast radio too. Yep, 0:09:20.679 --> 0:09:23.520 four am, milarm, And then it doesn't end at nine. 0:09:23.520 --> 0:09:25.600 When you go off, You've got to go meet clients, 0:09:25.640 --> 0:09:29.160 you've got to film content's podcasting, There's all sorts of stuff. 0:09:29.559 --> 0:09:32.360 This is how I calmed my life down by adding all. 0:09:32.280 --> 0:09:35.720 This stuff into it. Yeah, well it did, it did. 0:09:35.760 --> 0:09:38.240 I was still writing for the Weekly and doing a 0:09:38.240 --> 0:09:40.920 whole lot of other things as well. So what ended 0:09:40.960 --> 0:09:43.560 up happening was, instead of having more time for my 0:09:43.600 --> 0:09:47.320 family and being more available to the people I love, 0:09:47.880 --> 0:09:49.040 I just wasn't there at all. 0:09:49.280 --> 0:09:50.000 I wasn't there at all. 0:09:50.280 --> 0:09:53.280 I was less available to my family than when I 0:09:53.320 --> 0:09:56.319 was traveling all over the place because I was getting 0:09:56.360 --> 0:09:58.280 up at four in the morning, and when you get 0:09:58.320 --> 0:09:59.600 up at four in the morning, you've got to go 0:09:59.640 --> 0:10:01.760 to bed like eight o'clock at night. So not only 0:10:01.880 --> 0:10:04.560 was I losing my mornings seeing my people, I was 0:10:04.559 --> 0:10:08.640 losing that beautiful space after dinner where everyone collectively exhales. 0:10:09.160 --> 0:10:11.320 I was losing that as well, because I had to 0:10:11.320 --> 0:10:13.400 go to bed at night, and then on the weekends 0:10:13.559 --> 0:10:17.080 I had cooking classes, so I was literally working seven 0:10:17.160 --> 0:10:19.560 days a week and long days at that, and sometimes 0:10:19.600 --> 0:10:22.280 there were weeknight classes at the kitchen, which then means. 0:10:22.040 --> 0:10:23.199 I wasn't getting enough sleep. 0:10:23.240 --> 0:10:25.520 And it was just a recipe for disaster, you know, 0:10:26.280 --> 0:10:28.720 and then of course just a whole bunch of processed 0:10:29.040 --> 0:10:32.439 stuff from the past and some you know, there's some 0:10:32.760 --> 0:10:35.520 brain wiring I suppose it was already in existence that 0:10:36.040 --> 0:10:37.959 made that all really treacherous. 0:10:38.200 --> 0:10:40.280 You say in the book that you had this sort 0:10:40.280 --> 0:10:43.480 of calendar mapped out after Master Chef, and then up 0:10:43.520 --> 0:10:45.240 to this point, this calendar mapped out that was kind 0:10:45.240 --> 0:10:46.960 of color coded of like this is work time, this 0:10:47.000 --> 0:10:48.800 is family time, this is this, this is this, But 0:10:48.840 --> 0:10:50.720 there was no time for you on that right, which 0:10:50.760 --> 0:10:52.520 I think is something that a lot of women will 0:10:52.679 --> 0:10:56.280 very much, very much recognize. And then you also say, 0:10:56.320 --> 0:10:59.199 which is another very relatable point, at one point you realized, 0:10:59.840 --> 0:11:02.199 I'm really wobbly. I know some of the things I've 0:11:02.200 --> 0:11:04.200 got to do for my mental health, like exercise, so 0:11:04.240 --> 0:11:06.800 I'm going to set my alarm for three am so 0:11:06.840 --> 0:11:08.439 that I can get up and go to the gym 0:11:08.480 --> 0:11:09.439 before work. 0:11:09.679 --> 0:11:14.520 Yep, Like, yeah, it's like it is insane, right, that's insane, 0:11:14.520 --> 0:11:15.439 But it's the. 0:11:15.360 --> 0:11:19.120 Way we think because we we go it's my fault 0:11:19.120 --> 0:11:21.200 that I'm not coping. I've got to do more things 0:11:21.240 --> 0:11:23.520 to be coping. And you, right, you're running, running, running, 0:11:23.520 --> 0:11:26.200 And then when you'd be alone, you just felt hollow. 0:11:26.920 --> 0:11:31.200 Absolutely, there was nothing left, literally to the point where 0:11:31.400 --> 0:11:34.560 I actually I couldn't make my face do what it 0:11:34.559 --> 0:11:36.960 needed to do, you know, to even look normal. So 0:11:37.080 --> 0:11:40.960 sometimes I would just go away and find somewhere to 0:11:40.960 --> 0:11:43.360 be by myself because the muscles of my face are 0:11:43.400 --> 0:11:46.680 exhausted from trying to hold just an interested look on 0:11:46.720 --> 0:11:49.400 my face or a smile or a just a I'm 0:11:49.400 --> 0:11:50.800 a person who's coping face. 0:11:50.960 --> 0:11:52.280 Because I wasn't coping, you. 0:11:52.240 --> 0:11:53.160 Felt like a husk. 0:11:54.000 --> 0:11:57.240 So what happens then when you realize that this life 0:11:57.280 --> 0:12:01.439 you've built is untenable and you are wobbling. What happens 0:12:01.880 --> 0:12:05.600 if you really just need to fall apart. We're going 0:12:05.679 --> 0:12:21.240 to talk about that after this break. All of the 0:12:21.280 --> 0:12:23.480 stuff about your early life is fascinating too. You've had 0:12:23.480 --> 0:12:25.880 a very interesting life, Julie, You've done a lot of 0:12:25.880 --> 0:12:26.640 different jobs. 0:12:26.920 --> 0:12:29.280 I have done a lot of different You're in there about. 0:12:29.120 --> 0:12:32.320 When you were basically almost like a prison guard in 0:12:32.400 --> 0:12:36.280 a used attention center and dealing with these awful men. 0:12:36.600 --> 0:12:38.520 Yea, not the children, but the other guard. 0:12:38.640 --> 0:12:41.120 Yeah, not the inmates that my coworkers. 0:12:41.200 --> 0:12:41.400 Yeah. 0:12:41.400 --> 0:12:43.480 I was the only female there and that was an 0:12:43.520 --> 0:12:44.400 extraordinary time. 0:12:44.600 --> 0:12:46.560 You certainly have a strong work ethic, and I've done 0:12:46.600 --> 0:12:49.800 a lot of things. But you write about there was 0:12:49.840 --> 0:12:51.960 a time in your late teens when your mental health 0:12:52.000 --> 0:12:54.600 is in trouble, but you put it in a box. Yep, 0:12:54.679 --> 0:12:57.160 you wrote that that was most likely the result of 0:12:57.440 --> 0:12:59.880 abuse that you've written about in here, just very top 0:13:00.440 --> 0:13:02.560 we're not going into it, As you write very beautiful 0:13:02.559 --> 0:13:04.120 in the book, You're like, this is what's happened, We're 0:13:04.120 --> 0:13:06.560 not going into it. And then you put that away 0:13:06.559 --> 0:13:08.480 in a box when you're like teens. And then when 0:13:08.559 --> 0:13:11.640 you had your first baby, I think it was your 0:13:11.640 --> 0:13:14.160 first baby, and you were struggling, and you went to 0:13:14.200 --> 0:13:17.560 tresillian and which is a center that helps mothers who 0:13:17.559 --> 0:13:19.960 a struggling with sleepless babies or collique babies. 0:13:20.160 --> 0:13:20.880 They got you to. 0:13:20.840 --> 0:13:22.920 Fill out one of those questionnaires, and I'm sure would 0:13:22.920 --> 0:13:25.640 be very familiar to a lot of our listeners about whether. 0:13:25.520 --> 0:13:27.640 Or not you might be struggling with postnatal depression. 0:13:27.800 --> 0:13:29.720 Yes, and I just want to read out this bit 0:13:29.760 --> 0:13:31.520 that you wrote because they got you to fill out 0:13:31.559 --> 0:13:32.280 this questionnaire. 0:13:32.280 --> 0:13:33.360 So this is all the way back there. 0:13:33.360 --> 0:13:34.920 But I'm just kind of painting a picture of how 0:13:34.960 --> 0:13:38.400 you're such a copra and pushing things down. They're like, 0:13:38.600 --> 0:13:40.800 I think, make Maria, I have got personatal depression, and 0:13:40.840 --> 0:13:43.360 you said, let me stop you there. I don't want 0:13:43.400 --> 0:13:45.319 to hear the word depression. I don't have a thing 0:13:45.400 --> 0:13:47.840 to be depressed about. I have a beautiful husband and 0:13:47.880 --> 0:13:50.120 a healthy baby and a house to live in. It 0:13:50.160 --> 0:13:52.880 would be ridiculous for me to be depressed. Give me 0:13:52.960 --> 0:13:53.959 the questions a game. 0:13:57.000 --> 0:13:58.200 I wanted to pass the test. 0:13:58.840 --> 0:14:02.199 And this is echoed later too, when you do go 0:14:02.280 --> 0:14:05.080 to another healthcare professional at one point, but you say, 0:14:05.720 --> 0:14:07.720 don't diagnose any depression and I don't want to talk 0:14:07.720 --> 0:14:08.480 about my childhood. 0:14:08.920 --> 0:14:09.719 Where do you think? 0:14:09.760 --> 0:14:13.560 Because I think that this sort of denial, or rather 0:14:13.640 --> 0:14:18.560 this insistence on gratitude can actually be quite toxic for 0:14:18.600 --> 0:14:22.120 women sometimes. Where did that come from and how have 0:14:22.200 --> 0:14:23.400 you learned to understand that? 0:14:23.400 --> 0:14:25.520 That kind of like, my life's great? What are you 0:14:25.560 --> 0:14:26.040 talking about? 0:14:26.720 --> 0:14:30.120 You know, especially I imagine postmaster chef when you've been 0:14:30.200 --> 0:14:31.440 handed the keys to the city. 0:14:31.520 --> 0:14:35.320 Kind of Yeah, it comes from everywhere, It comes from everywhere. 0:14:35.360 --> 0:14:38.400 So it certainly came from family. 0:14:38.560 --> 0:14:40.960 You know. My men grew up during the war. 0:14:41.440 --> 0:14:44.400 My mum was raised by my men, and rightly so 0:14:45.320 --> 0:14:48.640 we're taught to be grateful and to countter blessings and 0:14:49.160 --> 0:14:51.040 to see how lucky we are compared to how other 0:14:51.080 --> 0:14:53.920 people are. The problem is that if you take that 0:14:54.000 --> 0:14:57.160 on board so much, like I know nothing by halves, 0:14:57.800 --> 0:15:00.680 it can become really crippling when it comes time to 0:15:00.720 --> 0:15:04.280 actually say I'm not coping because. 0:15:06.000 --> 0:15:08.040 What right do I have? And I'll tell you what. 0:15:08.280 --> 0:15:11.520 Society, the Internet, Facebook, they all join in on that. 0:15:11.520 --> 0:15:15.120 That's all a pylon. If you say anything is. 0:15:15.080 --> 0:15:17.840 Not right, people are like, oh, first world problems, and 0:15:17.920 --> 0:15:20.200 how can you complain about that when this just happened 0:15:20.240 --> 0:15:23.280 over here? And how can you complain about that when 0:15:23.320 --> 0:15:25.480 you've got food on your table and you know you 0:15:25.480 --> 0:15:27.720 can afford a phone to even be writing this on it, 0:15:27.920 --> 0:15:29.840 you know what I mean? So there's that whole idea 0:15:29.840 --> 0:15:34.120 that we should be grateful always and when you're not, 0:15:35.000 --> 0:15:37.360 you should be shamed of yourself. Yeah, and you should 0:15:37.440 --> 0:15:39.440 take a good hard look at yourself, and you should 0:15:39.520 --> 0:15:41.400 have a cup of concrete, get up and keep going 0:15:41.440 --> 0:15:46.080 because you live in this magnificent country and you are 0:15:46.120 --> 0:15:48.320 lucky enough to have people around you, and you're lucky enough. 0:15:48.240 --> 0:15:48.720 To have a listen. 0:15:48.840 --> 0:15:51.280 And that is all true, and it's all valid, and 0:15:51.280 --> 0:15:53.920 it's all important to acknowledge. But we have to take 0:15:53.920 --> 0:15:57.520 the shame out of saying I can't do this. I'm 0:15:57.560 --> 0:16:00.200 not coping. Please don't ask me to put I was 0:16:00.200 --> 0:16:03.560 seeing on my plate right now. I'm too busy, I'm 0:16:03.640 --> 0:16:07.440 feeling sad. I can't make my face into an appropriate 0:16:07.480 --> 0:16:11.120 expression anymore. You know, I feel like I want to die. 0:16:11.600 --> 0:16:14.480 We have to be allowed to say these things out 0:16:14.520 --> 0:16:17.120 loud without being made to feel ashamed about it. 0:16:17.400 --> 0:16:20.600 So there is the moment where you walk away from 0:16:20.600 --> 0:16:22.200 a football game you're supposed to be going to with 0:16:22.280 --> 0:16:25.320 me after this period of time where you're just feeling, 0:16:25.840 --> 0:16:28.400 as you say, hollow inside. Every time you're alone, you cry, 0:16:28.800 --> 0:16:31.600 but the rest of the time you're being mum, being 0:16:31.680 --> 0:16:35.560 good employee, being wife, being friend, And I wanted to 0:16:35.640 --> 0:16:38.480 ask you because you have spoken a bit about this, 0:16:38.560 --> 0:16:40.600 so I don't want you to relive the moment entirely. 0:16:40.640 --> 0:16:44.840 But you were seriously considering taking your life, and then 0:16:44.920 --> 0:16:47.960 you met sitting by some water on the Central coast 0:16:47.960 --> 0:16:50.320 where you live. You met Larissa, Derek and Bonnie yep, 0:16:50.680 --> 0:16:52.960 who you thank in your book. Who are the strangers 0:16:53.000 --> 0:16:56.680 who spoke to you and very likely saved you that day? Yes, 0:16:57.040 --> 0:16:59.720 what I wanted to ask you, rather than about the 0:16:59.760 --> 0:17:02.440 debt of that, was about how you found the hope 0:17:02.440 --> 0:17:06.320 in that moment to go home to your It has 0:17:06.359 --> 0:17:09.000 to be said, amazing husband. No, I don't say that. 0:17:09.040 --> 0:17:11.040 It's like, oh, you look like you know you deserve 0:17:11.080 --> 0:17:14.240 an amazing husband. But how did you find the hope 0:17:14.480 --> 0:17:17.720 to go home and finally say to him I'm not coping. 0:17:18.440 --> 0:17:21.600 It was an incredible couple of hours, you know, And 0:17:23.359 --> 0:17:27.000 it wasn't a blinding flash. It was simply that these 0:17:27.040 --> 0:17:33.359 strangers sat next to me and chatted about ordinary things. 0:17:34.000 --> 0:17:35.440 A young couple and their dog, right. 0:17:35.400 --> 0:17:37.400 Yep, young couple and their dog, and they just said, 0:17:37.480 --> 0:17:40.320 you look like you needed company, So we decided to 0:17:40.359 --> 0:17:43.199 come back and have a seat here, and we're just 0:17:43.200 --> 0:17:46.160 going to hang here. They just chatted to me and 0:17:46.200 --> 0:17:48.640 they told me about their kids and about their dog, 0:17:48.680 --> 0:17:51.359 and I told them about my kids and about my dogs, 0:17:51.400 --> 0:17:59.439 and just that ridiculously ordinary stuff. And I found in 0:17:59.480 --> 0:18:01.359 the telling of a few of these things, and in 0:18:01.359 --> 0:18:03.359 the hearing of a few of these things, I laughed 0:18:03.400 --> 0:18:06.639 a couple of times, And at the end of that 0:18:06.720 --> 0:18:09.199 couple of hours, it was like, I can laugh. 0:18:10.000 --> 0:18:12.680 I didn't know. I didn't know that was still in there, 0:18:12.720 --> 0:18:12.919 you know. 0:18:13.800 --> 0:18:16.919 And so then I rang Mick and I had him 0:18:16.960 --> 0:18:19.359 come and pick me up, and that's when I told 0:18:19.440 --> 0:18:23.919 him where I'd been and what I've been doing, and 0:18:23.600 --> 0:18:25.960 he drove me to the hospital. 0:18:26.800 --> 0:18:29.800 I thought he said something really amazing, because a lot 0:18:29.800 --> 0:18:31.720 of men, well not only a lot of men, but 0:18:31.760 --> 0:18:33.639 a lot of people, would be like, we'll fix this, 0:18:33.800 --> 0:18:37.320 but he kind of deeply understood that he couldn't fix this. 0:18:37.720 --> 0:18:41.080 Yeah, it is a knee jerk reaction to be the 0:18:41.440 --> 0:18:43.760 night in Shining Armor, but that's what he needed to 0:18:43.760 --> 0:18:45.840 do to be my night in shining armor on that day, 0:18:46.640 --> 0:18:50.880 not to say, you know, well, you're all right. 0:18:50.720 --> 0:18:52.679 Now, let's go and have ice cream. 0:18:52.760 --> 0:18:55.880 You know, it was I am not equipped to deal 0:18:55.960 --> 0:18:56.960 with what you're going through. 0:18:57.000 --> 0:18:59.800 I need to call in somebody who is. And I 0:19:00.000 --> 0:19:03.000 didn't want to go to the hospital. Come on, I'm tired, 0:19:03.080 --> 0:19:05.119 it's going to be day. Can we go home? But 0:19:05.240 --> 0:19:06.640 he wouldn't. He wouldn't take me home. 0:19:06.720 --> 0:19:09.919 So that and that's that was the start of, you know, 0:19:10.400 --> 0:19:11.520 trying to sort it all out. 0:19:13.040 --> 0:19:16.600