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Speaker 1: You're listening to a Muma Mia podcast. Mamma Mia acknowledges

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Speaker 1: the traditional owners of land and waters that this podcast

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Speaker 1: is recorded on Hi. I'm Claire Murphy. This is Mumma

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Speaker 1: MIA's daily news podcast, The Quickie. Before we kick off today,

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Speaker 1: just wanted to take a second. First of all, say

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Speaker 1: thank you for spending some time with us, and if

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Speaker 1: you'd like to make sure we get to hang out

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Speaker 1: every day and share these great stories, please make sure

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Speaker 1: you subscribe to the show. Earlier this week, we lost

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Speaker 1: an actress whose life has been just as dramatic on

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Speaker 1: stage as it has been off. American actress Shannondoherty, best

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Speaker 1: known for her role in the hit nineteen nineties TV

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Speaker 1: drama Beverly Hills nine two to one, oh and.

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Speaker 2: Charmed, has died at the age of fifty three, so

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Speaker 2: many actually remembering this feisty actress.

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Speaker 1: While Shannondohity was known as much for her roles in

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Speaker 1: the movie Heathers and the TV shows Beverly Hills nine

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Speaker 1: O two on, oh and Charmed as much as she

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Speaker 1: was for her troubled working relationships on most of those sets.

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Speaker 1: After her cancer returned, it was the behavior of her

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Speaker 1: now ex husband that was making headlines before we find

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Speaker 1: out why some partners choose to cheat when the other

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Speaker 1: is at their worst. Let's get the latest from the

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Speaker 1: Quickie newsroom. Thursday, July eighteen. Labour's national executive is still

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Speaker 1: deciding whether they'll continue to take donations from the cfme

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Speaker 1: USE construction division after state branches and the Peak Union

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Speaker 1: body suspended links. The union's construction division has been under

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Speaker 1: fire after a series of news reports alleging corrupt conduct

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Speaker 1: and links to organized crime. Cabinet Minister Bill Shorden told

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Speaker 1: the ABC seven thirty program that he fully expects the

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Speaker 1: executive to make sure there are no more donations received

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Speaker 1: from the CFMEU until their house is cleaned. Workplace Relations

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Speaker 1: Minister Tony Burke is in the process of appointing an

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Speaker 1: independent administrator to overhaul the construction arm of the Union,

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Speaker 1: warning he will introduce legislation to Parliament should the CFMEU

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Speaker 1: challenge the proceedings. Russia and Ukraine have exchanged nearly two

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Speaker 1: hundred prisoners of war in a seven weeks wap mediated

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Speaker 1: by the United Arab Emirates. President Vladimir Zelenski said all

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Speaker 1: ninety five Ukrainians who were freed were from the military,

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Speaker 1: thanking the UAE for their help in making the trade possible.

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Speaker 1: Russia's Defense Ministry said their returned soldiers would receive medical

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Speaker 1: checkups and physical and psychological rehabilitation. Since the start of

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Speaker 1: Russia's invasion of Ukraine in twenty twenty two, Ukraine has

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Speaker 1: secured the return of three four hundred and five people

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Speaker 1: from Russian captivity. The most recent to return home, including

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Speaker 1: seven officers and eighty eight soldiers, have been held since

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Speaker 1: twenty twenty two. Japanese historical drama Shogun has racked up

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Speaker 1: twenty five Emmy nominations, leading the contenders for this year's awards.

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Speaker 1: The FX series, based on the nineteen seventy five novel

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Speaker 1: by James Clavel and which was also a mini series

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Speaker 1: in the nineteen eighties, will be competing with Netflix's Royal Saga,

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Speaker 1: The Crown, Slow Horses, Three, Body Problem, The Morning Show,

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Speaker 1: Mister and Missus, Smith, The Gilded Age, and Fallout. Another

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Speaker 1: FX show, The Bear, earned twenty three nominations, a record

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Speaker 1: for a comedy, again competing for Best Comedy A category

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Speaker 1: one last year. This year, up against Abbott, Elementary and Hacks.

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Speaker 1: Netflix's Baby Reindeer has also been nominated for Best Limited Series,

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Speaker 1: ending up with eleven nominations in total. The Emmys will

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Speaker 1: be held on September fifteen in the US. The mayor

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Speaker 1: of Paris and Hidalgo has splashed into the river send

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Speaker 1: to prove it's clean enough for competitors at the upcoming

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Speaker 1: Paris Games. Daily water tests last month showed unsafe levels

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Speaker 1: of the Ecoli bacteria, but that has since improved. Idelgo

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Speaker 1: in a wetsuit and goggles, jumping in alongside several other

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Speaker 1: officials and members of local swimming clubs. The swim was

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Speaker 1: delayed due to the recent Paris elections. President Emmanuel Macron

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Speaker 1: had also promised to take the plunge, but did not

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Speaker 1: end up in the Sean. That's what's happening across the

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Speaker 1: globe today next. Shannon Dougherty lost her battle with cancer

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Speaker 1: this week, but her battle against a husband who cheated

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Speaker 1: when she was sick was happening right up to the

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Speaker 1: day she passed. We speak to a woman who knows

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Speaker 1: all too well exactly how that feels. Shannondohty was not

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Speaker 1: ready to leave this world. Just days before her death

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Speaker 1: on her podcast, Let's be Clear with Shannondoherty speaking to

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Speaker 1: her friend and former Charmed co star Holly Combs, she

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Speaker 1: revealed her long term plans.

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Speaker 3: I'm in the mindset now of I need to make

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Speaker 3: as much money as humanly possible over the next two years.

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Speaker 3: Bank it like build that so that A I don't

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Speaker 3: have to work, and I only work when like I

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Speaker 3: really want to, and I can also you know, go

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Speaker 3: on a lot more vacations as you should. And also

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Speaker 3: like when I pass away and my mom's got like

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Speaker 3: a you know, nice little ness egg and I don't

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Speaker 3: have to worry about her.

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Speaker 1: But those plans would have to be pulled aside. The

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Speaker 1: actress passing away aged fifty three on July thirteen, the

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Speaker 1: very same day her husband finally signed the divorce papers.

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Speaker 1: It would be almost poetic this timing, as on the

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Speaker 1: very same day that Shannon Daherty went in for surgery

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Speaker 1: to have a brain tumor removed in twenty twenty three,

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Speaker 1: she found out that her husband of eleven years had

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Speaker 1: been having an affair.

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Speaker 3: I had brain surgery, which was the most frightening thing

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Speaker 3: I have ever been through in my entire life. I

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Speaker 3: was positive that I was going to die, and the

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Speaker 3: best case scenario in my head if I didn't die

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Speaker 3: was that I would lose the ability to walk. And

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Speaker 3: I went in to that surgery early in the morning

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Speaker 3: after I found out, you know, my marriage was essentially over,

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Speaker 3: that my husband had been carrying on an affair for

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Speaker 3: two years.

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Speaker 1: They separated not long after, and the battle to end

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Speaker 1: their marriage began. The US justice system allows journalists since

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Speaker 1: states to see court documents when people are filing for divorce.

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Speaker 1: Dougherty claimed she needed spousal support to get her through

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Speaker 1: a time where she's been unable to work and issue

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Speaker 1: many dealing with the cancer diagnoses' faces.

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Speaker 4: While I have been unable to work, incurring exorbitant medical

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Speaker 4: expenses not covered by insurance, to undergo experimental treatments in

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Speaker 4: hopes of prolonging my life, Kurt has been utilizing the aeroplane,

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Speaker 4: spending thousands of dollars at medical spas, jewelry stores, Gucci,

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Speaker 4: and on flights for his agent, while simultaneously claiming that

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Speaker 4: he has insufficient funds with which to support me.

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Speaker 1: She also claimed that her husband was simply waiting for

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Speaker 1: her to die.

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Speaker 4: Although Kurt's income is substantially more than mine, he has

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Speaker 4: not made any temporary spousal support payments and has made

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Speaker 4: no contributions to my attorneys or these and costs since

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Speaker 4: the time our divorce action was filed. It is abundantly

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Speaker 4: clear to me that Kurt is intentionally delaying settlement in

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Speaker 4: hopes that I will not survive the divorces.

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Speaker 1: The divorce proceedings would not be finalized until the very

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Speaker 1: day she died. Vanessa Mendico knows well how Shannon Dougherty

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Speaker 1: felt during that time. She'd moved to the Gold Coast

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Speaker 1: in twenty twenty two to start a new job and

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Speaker 1: soak up the sunshine that makes a more rarer appearance

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Speaker 1: in her hometown of Melbourne. One day, she noticed blood

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Speaker 1: in the toilet. Knew it wasn't a good sign, so

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Speaker 1: she went to have a colonoscopy to see what was

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Speaker 1: going on. She said, at that point her then boyfriend

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Speaker 1: was really supportive.

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Speaker 5: We got into the room and they said to me,

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Speaker 5: I'm so sorry you have cancer, and I think I

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Speaker 5: completely shut off. I remember my whole body just going

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Speaker 5: into this wave of sweat. It was almost like my

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Speaker 5: body was sweating, and I remember like trying to pull

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Speaker 5: my clothing off like it was too tight, like was

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Speaker 5: restricting me, and he was really paying attention, and he

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Speaker 5: was asking questions like I had completely dissociated. I wasn't listening,

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Speaker 5: and I kept saying, can we go home? And he's like,

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Speaker 5: just wait a minute, like I need to ask another question.

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Speaker 5: And they were showing him the tumors, which is what

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Speaker 5: I needed, and I saw that. I was like, Wow,

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Speaker 5: this person really wants to be here.

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Speaker 1: She says after her bowl cancer diagnosis, she gave him

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Speaker 1: the option to leave, knowing that it might be a

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Speaker 1: tough road ahead.

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Speaker 5: I had said, if you don't want to be in this,

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Speaker 5: it's so fine. You don't know if I'm terminal, we

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Speaker 5: don't know where I'm at. And we had this really

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Speaker 5: deep connection of what I felt was a really deep

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Speaker 5: connection on my end anyway, you know, he was like

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Speaker 5: I'm not going anywhere. I don't want to go anywhere.

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Speaker 5: And then leading into treatment, there was just like these

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Speaker 5: things that we need, like these little sort of milestones

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Speaker 5: that we needed to sort of overcome. So it was

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Speaker 5: first it was about egg retreatable, and I did that,

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Speaker 5: and then the really big one was the big surgery.

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Speaker 5: So I had my tumor removed and I had an

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Speaker 5: iliostomy formed, and that really scared me because I was like,

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Speaker 5: you're in this new relationship, you're young, and then you've

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Speaker 5: got this bag that's going to be hanging off your body.

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Speaker 1: He put her feelings at ease, saying he wasn't put

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Speaker 1: off by the bag or her condition, but she realized

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Speaker 1: that something was off with him, and later learned that

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Speaker 1: he'd been cheating on her while she was undergoing chemo treatment.

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Speaker 5: Having, you know, a sick girlfriend isn't really appealing to

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Speaker 5: some people, and it happens so very often. I have

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Speaker 5: at least I don't know, maybe five friends within the

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Speaker 5: bow cancer community who've been cheated on. And that's just

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Speaker 5: in one state. If we reached out to other people,

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Speaker 5: how many people in their networks would And that's scary.

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Speaker 5: Like someone going through the worst part of their life,

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Speaker 5: the most horrible, vulnerable, sick time where you're not at

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Speaker 5: full capacity because your body's literally being injected with poison,

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Speaker 5: and then you've got someone who's supposed to be the

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Speaker 5: most loyal person to you is being disloyal, which adds

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Speaker 5: another layer of trauma.

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Speaker 1: Vanessa says, going through cancer treatment and heartache at the

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Speaker 1: same time will now always be a double trauma for her.

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Speaker 5: There is no separation for me in personally in this matter,

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Speaker 5: especially for people who've been cheated on during an illness

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Speaker 5: or cancer, especially like there's medical trauma that's always going

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Speaker 5: to be lingering, and that my medical trauma's now attached

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Speaker 5: to this trauma of being cheated on. So there is

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Speaker 5: no one in the other you know, you'd go to

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Speaker 5: the hospital in your life like, oh, well I was

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Speaker 5: at the hospital in the chema chair. Was he off

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Speaker 5: doing this? Or you know, I was actually gone to

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Speaker 5: visit my family because I was so unwell and so

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Speaker 5: sick and I wasn't going to see them for six months.

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Speaker 5: But he was actually off doing this while I wasn't

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Speaker 5: in the state. So for me, there wasn't a way

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Speaker 5: to come back from that. If you could do that

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Speaker 5: at my worst, how are we going to grow from this?

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Speaker 1: So why does this happen? Why do some partners feel

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Speaker 1: the need to stray when their significant other is at

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Speaker 1: their lowest and in need of their support more than ever.

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Speaker 1: Elizabeth Shaw is the CEO of Relationships Australia and New

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Speaker 1: South Wales and a practicing clinical and counseling psychologist Elizabeth.

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Speaker 1: We are quick to judge someone who cheats on a

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Speaker 1: sick partner, But what's going on with them that they

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Speaker 1: feel they have to turn to someone else at that moment.

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Speaker 2: Well, there's often a lot going on, and there are

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Speaker 2: as usual variations according to the trajectory of the cancer

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Speaker 2: diagnosis and then the treatment. So to start with, certainly

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Speaker 2: there are studies that say that in terms of say

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Speaker 2: separation and divorce, it's more common that men will leave

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Speaker 2: women under these circumstances, and that women, if anything, can

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Speaker 2: be a bit more likely to stay, you know, as

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Speaker 2: a result. So I think there's some data there, but

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Speaker 2: that doesn't really tell the story either. So if we

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Speaker 2: look at it just in terms of then those gendered consequences,

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Speaker 2: it's certainly true that men are not generally trained into

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Speaker 2: being caregivers in the way that women are. Than we

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Speaker 2: do know from other situations, for example, having a child

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Speaker 2: with a disability, that it can be men who are

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Speaker 2: more likely to leave and not up for the challenge

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Speaker 2: of it. But it would be very untrue and unfair

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Speaker 2: to say that all men are incapable. So looking at

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Speaker 2: it then in more detail, if the relationship was not

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Speaker 2: traveling well in the first place. That can also be

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Speaker 2: a factor.

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Speaker 1: Elizabeth, how much does the dauntingness of a long treatment

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Speaker 1: plan play in all of this, because it's not like

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Speaker 1: when someone you know breaks a leg or has a

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Speaker 1: virus with a fairly short recovery period. The long journey

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Speaker 1: that some people face is that something that some partners

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Speaker 1: just can't handle well.

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Speaker 2: The type of treatment and the amount that a partner

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Speaker 2: has to put to one side, say initial oncology appointments

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Speaker 2: or operations, that's one phase. But for some people they

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Speaker 2: might be in for years of cycles of treatment, and

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Speaker 2: that's where a partner could appear to pull away. Saying look,

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Speaker 2: I just have to work or I just can't take

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Speaker 2: more time off can look like a betrayal or that

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Speaker 2: they're kind of giving up, and it's true enough, they

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Speaker 2: may be really overwhelmed with the amount of their life

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Speaker 2: they put on hold. That's where looking at a variety

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Speaker 2: of supports is just practical and makes sense. It can

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Speaker 2: be also the case that if you are told that

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Speaker 2: your partner is going to die, if a person is

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Speaker 2: afraid of being alone or is really challenged by living

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Speaker 2: for a long period with the threat of death, possibly

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Speaker 2: an affair is also a quick fix in the moment

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Speaker 2: to feel something life affirming, or I'm not going to

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Speaker 2: be alone, or I just need something for myself. I think.

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Speaker 2: The other thing for those of us that are perhaps

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Speaker 2: quick to judge is to think about that sickness and

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Speaker 2: in health idea that we have. It is often something

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Speaker 2: you'd expect for later in life. It's not something you

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Speaker 2: expect in your twenties, thirties, forties, or even fifties, and

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Speaker 2: that can be very challenging. The other thing is that

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Speaker 2: it also can change things for the person with cancer.

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Speaker 2: Sometimes women in particular might batten down the hatches, might

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Speaker 2: become more distant, might lock away their feelings, or think

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Speaker 2: I don't want to be a burden to anybody, so

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Speaker 2: they try to say less, try to be less needy,

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Speaker 2: less demanding, and it can feel to their partner that

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Speaker 2: they're backing away and they're not emotionally available. It can

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Speaker 2: mean the couples not having sex for a whole variety

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Speaker 2: of understandable reasons. And we need to remember that even

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Speaker 2: those of us who are judging in our friends, even

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Speaker 2: friends back away and relatives back away because being around

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Speaker 2: someone who's unwill for a long time scares everybody.

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Speaker 1: Elizabeth, what advice do you have for couples who might

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Speaker 1: be going through this right now, because it is a

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Speaker 1: really intense time and maybe not something that you're able

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Speaker 1: to give a lot of time to because you've given

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Speaker 1: all your time to the hospital and the doctors and

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Speaker 1: the treatment.

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Speaker 2: Well, there's a lot in it to consider. It is provocative,

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Speaker 2: and some cancer journeys might be a matter of three

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Speaker 2: months or six months or a year, but others could

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Speaker 2: go for years. And couples who get through it together

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Speaker 2: still need to do a lot of rebuilding because there

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Speaker 2: can be longer term physical struggles. It Maybe your sex

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Speaker 2: life is not what it was because the type of

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Speaker 2: cancer has had physical ramifications, and couples need to develop

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Speaker 2: a lot of new skills. Sometimes they might need to

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Speaker 2: learn how to have sex Differently, they might need to

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Speaker 2: know how to relax again and have a so called

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Speaker 2: normal life. But you know, sometimes they have to rebuild

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Speaker 2: friends and say, well, who was here for us as

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Speaker 2: a couple, because, as I say, you often look around

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Speaker 2: and find a lot of people don't have the fortitude

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Speaker 2: to get through this struggle.

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Speaker 1: Vanessa's come out of the other side of her cancer journey.

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Speaker 1: That says seeing the news about Shannon Doherty has been

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Speaker 1: really triggering for those who might be in the midst

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Speaker 1: of something like this right now, who are worried that

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Speaker 1: their partner might not be able to handle the journey

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Speaker 1: they're currently on. She says, remember you have more people

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Speaker 1: on your side than just one.

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Speaker 5: When you're going through a cancer diagnosis, having people around

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Speaker 5: you is a massive part of it. And I think

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Speaker 5: for me when I was going through it, all I

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Speaker 5: could think of was, you know what, I beat cancer.

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Speaker 5: You cannot break my heart. I was literally faced with

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Speaker 5: the descent and it's like, you have cancer. You might get

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Speaker 5: at this, you might not, and you're so much stronger

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Speaker 5: than you think. And I was like, you know what,

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Speaker 5: I beat chemo and I did that every single day

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Speaker 5: without your support. Really, so you know what, I'm going

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Speaker 5: to keep doing my life without your support. But God

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Speaker 5: hurts absolutely for the person that doesn't love you, or

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Speaker 5: the person that's hurt you, or this husband, partner, whoever

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Speaker 5: that might be, there's twenty thirty forty other people that

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Speaker 5: love you in your corner. That's what you lean into.

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Speaker 1: The quickie is produced by me Claire Murphy and our

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Speaker 1: senior producer Taylor Strano, with audio production by Tom Lyme.