Speaker 1: You're listening to a Mother of me A podcast. MoMA
Speaker 1: Mea acknowledges the traditional owners of the land and waters.
Speaker 1: This podcast is recorded on age differences. Do they really
Speaker 1: mean anything? You're only as old as the person you feel.
Speaker 1: Age is but a number, etcetera, etcetera. It doesn't matter
Speaker 1: when you're in love, right.
Speaker 2: I didn't know how I would explain to people that
Speaker 2: I had met him. I suppose I didn't give my
Speaker 2: friends enough credit, and I worried that they would be
Speaker 2: judgmental of his appearance and sort of ask me, what
Speaker 2: are you doing why? You know, you're young, and you're
Speaker 2: sort of in this peak of your life and you've
Speaker 2: settled for a bit of a dorky old man.
Speaker 1: That's Carlie. She'll be the first person to tell you
Speaker 1: age doesn't mean a damned thing when you find your one.
Speaker 1: But whether age is the problem or not, some love
Speaker 1: stories just don't the way we plan.
Speaker 2: So we just held each.
Speaker 3: Other and I just told him how much I loved
Speaker 3: him and how grateful I was that he had saved
Speaker 3: my life.
Speaker 1: I'm Georgia Love and this is everyone has an ex
Speaker 1: Come with me as we dive into a collection of
Speaker 1: unconventional stories about relationships past through the eyes and the
Speaker 1: hearts of the very people who lived them. Meet Carly.
Speaker 1: Her story starts a little differently than others we've told you,
Speaker 1: because at age thirty, Carly wasn't looking for someone at all.
Speaker 1: She was out looking for fun, autonomy, and money.
Speaker 2: So I suppose I ended up as a sugar baby
Speaker 2: at age thirty quite unexpectedly. I suppose I had a
Speaker 2: few incidents where I felt a bit like out of
Speaker 2: control of my body. I'd lost a pregnancy and experienced
Speaker 2: some other traumatic events where I felt like my body
Speaker 2: wasn't my own. And I got into this mindset of
Speaker 2: like I deserve to be paid for my body existing essentially,
Speaker 2: And I discovered like the sugar baby sugar daddy world,
Speaker 2: and I was like, this is great. Men can't treat
Speaker 2: me like shit anymore because I'm in control. I'm getting
Speaker 2: paid for my time and their experience. So it felt
Speaker 2: really powerful. After probably a really rough eighteen months of
Speaker 2: not having much body autonomy for quite some time, I
Speaker 2: found out about it through a friend who said that
Speaker 2: she had dabbled in the sugar baby industry. I think
Speaker 2: I had always heard about it sort of on and
Speaker 2: off terms of being thrown out. But I didn't know
Speaker 2: how accessible it was to become a sugar baby, so
Speaker 2: I just found a website online and signed up. The
Speaker 2: basis of it is men paying you for your time
Speaker 2: with them, so the dates I would go on would
Speaker 2: look fastly different. So I had one client in particular,
Speaker 2: like I'd just accompany him to his business dinners and
Speaker 2: he'd buy me new clothes to wear or get my
Speaker 2: makeup done, and I would spend the night at his
Speaker 2: dinners with him, or like fundraising events. There were men
Speaker 2: who just didn't want to be alone. I had one
Speaker 2: client who had broken up with his girlfriend and just
Speaker 2: paid me. He wanted to call me his ex girlfriend's
Speaker 2: name and just hug me and paid me for that time.
Speaker 2: So it was really different what every man is looking
Speaker 2: for in the sugar baby sugar daddy world. I loved
Speaker 2: how I felt like I got to have like this
Speaker 2: secret life, like this secret world where I got to
Speaker 2: meet all of these people and have lots of new experiences,
Speaker 2: and I was exposed to worlds that I'd never normally
Speaker 2: be exposed to, Like the line of work I do
Speaker 2: doesn't come with fancy dinners or corporate events, and so
Speaker 2: being exposed to those things was really fun for me.
Speaker 2: The things that were the highs were like I suppose,
Speaker 2: like unexpected generosity, like people who would just like shower
Speaker 2: you with gifts that was sort of unexpected, or those
Speaker 2: kinds of events. And the lows were people who would
Speaker 2: just be really degrading, like I've paid for this time
Speaker 2: with you, so we'll do whatever I want to do,
Speaker 2: and didn't take any time to get to know me.
Speaker 2: That was more just I won't see that person again.
Speaker 2: I never thought I would do it long term, but
Speaker 2: there were some really great clients too, like one named James.
Speaker 2: I'd been doing it for roughly six months, and I
Speaker 2: had been with a few who I had seen multiple times.
Speaker 2: Some were just one off and it really varied. But
Speaker 2: really immediately upon meeting James, I knew that was going
Speaker 2: to be really different. He was just lovely. From the
Speaker 2: first time we met. He was very awkward. He was
Speaker 2: forty eight. He is very tall, quite dorky looking like
Speaker 2: definitely not my type by any stretch of the imagination.
Speaker 2: Really just looked like a middle age man. Yeah, definitely.
Speaker 2: His height took me by surprise, like I came up
Speaker 2: to his shoulders. We just went out for lunch, and
Speaker 2: I remember him saying like, oh, you're never gonna want
Speaker 2: to see me again after today, But I at that
Speaker 2: point it was like, well, you paid me for my time,
Speaker 2: and why wouldn't I I got lunch and five hundred dollars,
Speaker 2: Like this is great, So I was like, no, of
Speaker 2: course I'd happily see you again. He was very recently widowed.
Speaker 2: He had lost his wife of twenty three years only
Speaker 2: two months prior, so he was seeking company. For the
Speaker 2: most part, on the first meeting, we didn't speak much
Speaker 2: about his wife. But I remember the second meeting, We're
Speaker 2: in a hotel room and was sort of just like
Speaker 2: cuddling on the bed and he was telling me about her,
Speaker 2: and I rolled away to not be facing him because
Speaker 2: I was crying. I was just devastated for him, and
Speaker 2: I remember thinking, this is horrendous, how can someone experience
Speaker 2: such a loss in their life, and feeling so much
Speaker 2: sadness for him as he spoke about her. And I
Speaker 2: think that me having such a big reaction definitely led
Speaker 2: to him wanting to continue the relationship because he knew
Speaker 2: that I was more than just sort of surface deep,
Speaker 2: like I really cared.
Speaker 1: It surprised Carly how much hearing about James's wife affected her,
Speaker 1: but she couldn't help feeling the injustice in it that
Speaker 1: this lovely, kind man didn't deserve to lose such a
Speaker 1: great love, and if he wanted her to, she was
Speaker 1: very happy to be there to help him feel a
Speaker 1: bit of comfort during such a sad time.
Speaker 2: I'm like an EmPATH through and through, so I feel
Speaker 2: everyone's emotions that I'm around, So that's not strange for
Speaker 2: me to feel what other people are feeling or feed
Speaker 2: off other people's emotions. But I knew. I knew in
Speaker 2: that moment how vulnerable he was and how much he
Speaker 2: needed to be protected, and I just wanted I just
Speaker 2: wanted to protect him straight away. He was just kind
Speaker 2: and gentle and really genuine, and he wanted to get
Speaker 2: to know me and what I wanted, and he was
Speaker 2: interested in my career aspirations, and we had spoken about
Speaker 2: like what UNI degree he had done thirty years prior
Speaker 2: and things like that, So it wasn't just a man
Speaker 2: sexualizing me because he thought that's what he had paid
Speaker 2: for and that's what he was entitled to. It was
Speaker 2: just a man who wanted to create a connection. We're
Speaker 2: seeing each other weekly to begin with, the first few
Speaker 2: months was probably weekly. I distinctly remember maybe like four
Speaker 2: or five dates in and we would text a lot,
Speaker 2: and I knew he was having a rough day and
Speaker 2: he was quite upset about his late wife, and I
Speaker 2: I text him one night saying can I give you
Speaker 2: a call? And he texts back saying like, oh my god,
Speaker 2: are you breaking up with me? And I said no, like,
Speaker 2: I just I know you've had a really rough day
Speaker 2: and I just want to talk. And from that point on,
Speaker 2: I think we would spend three hours a day talking
Speaker 2: on the phone every day. We would text all the
Speaker 2: time when we were apart, and it was just lovely.
Speaker 2: So when we had all this time together on the phone,
Speaker 2: it was really different for me. So I had been
Speaker 2: in a really long term relationship, which was a marriage
Speaker 2: that had taken a really rocky turn when we had
Speaker 2: lost our baby and we were grieving separately, I suppose,
Speaker 2: and myself and my husband had always lived like a
Speaker 2: very working class life, like we'd both worked full time
Speaker 2: for as long as we'd been together, and all of
Speaker 2: a sudden, I was seeing this retired man who me
Speaker 2: calling him was his world. So he had unlimited time
Speaker 2: for me, and I wasn't used to that because adult
Speaker 2: relationships are so constrained by work pressure and life and
Speaker 2: all of these other things that he didn't have. So
Speaker 2: when his kids were at school during the day, he
Speaker 2: was just constantly available to me, and that was something
Speaker 2: I had never experienced before, just that availability. And any
Speaker 2: time I wanted to talk to someone or needed to
Speaker 2: talk to someone, I knew I could pick up the
Speaker 2: phone and he'd be there anytime of the day. He
Speaker 2: would just buy me so much jewelry, gorgeous jewelry, and
Speaker 2: like we'd set prices for what he was going to
Speaker 2: gift me in exchange for my time, and he'd always
Speaker 2: give me like double what I had said I was expecting,
Speaker 2: or throw in like vouchers or like a beautiful bracelet
Speaker 2: one time. So he would just always go sort of
Speaker 2: above and beyond. It made me feel really valued, yeah,
Speaker 2: just valued. Maybe By the fifth time I saw him,
Speaker 2: I remember thinking to myself, like, this is as good
Speaker 2: as it gets in this world. So you're not like
Speaker 2: I'm not going to try anymore, I'm not going to
Speaker 2: go on any more dates, because like, I've reached the
Speaker 2: peak of what happens in the sugar baby world. In
Speaker 2: my thought processes, I thought, I've reached a peak here,
Speaker 2: like this is as good as it gets. I have
Speaker 2: been so showered with like generosity and love and gifts
Speaker 2: and affection I can't go back to like the tire
Speaker 2: kickers of the community. Like so, I made a decision
Speaker 2: pretty early on that he was going to be my
Speaker 2: last ever client.
Speaker 1: It didn't take long for both of them to realize
Speaker 1: this was more than just a client worker relationship. Yes
Speaker 1: he was paying her, but a genuine connection group for him.
Speaker 2: Quite early on, he was telling me that he loved me,
Speaker 2: probably within four weeks of meeting. And then he'd get
Speaker 2: confused and he'd say, I've got all of these feelings
Speaker 2: of love for my late wife and they've got nowhere
Speaker 2: to go anymore so and probably just thinking they belong
Speaker 2: to you when they don't. But he'd say he loved me,
Speaker 2: and I think we'd been seeing each other for like
Speaker 2: six weeks when he asked how I wanted to be
Speaker 2: proposed to, and then he sent me a message like sorry,
Speaker 2: I didn't mean to accidentally propose, like I don't even
Speaker 2: think I want to get married again. But he was
Speaker 2: just he was overwhelmed in his own feelings as well,
Speaker 2: so he would tell me he loved me, and I
Speaker 2: think after about two months I told him that I
Speaker 2: loved him too. We started having discussions about what the
Speaker 2: future would look like because it was really clear that
Speaker 2: above all else, we had this really great, genuine friendship
Speaker 2: that we both wanted to protect it all costs. So
Speaker 2: he had a conversation with me one day where he
Speaker 2: was like, look, I really want to keep seeing you,
Speaker 2: but this isn't financially viable and it's not smart, and
Speaker 2: I've got kids to think of, and like, I can't
Speaker 2: keep paying you the way I have been, And he
Speaker 2: was extraordinarily generous for my time. And that's where we
Speaker 2: started having conversations about what the future would look like
Speaker 2: if we moved away from sort of like a client
Speaker 2: based relationship where money wasn't being exchanged for spending time together.
Speaker 2: So they did it really just it happened. There was
Speaker 2: a few big hurdles that we needed to face, Like
Speaker 2: up until then all of our meetings had taken place
Speaker 2: in hotels, and he had I mean, I say kids
Speaker 2: one of them was an adult, one was an adolescent.
Speaker 2: Two kids he needed to protect in that space as well,
Speaker 2: And he was really mindful of not mixing me with
Speaker 2: his family because his wife had only been deceased for
Speaker 2: a few months at that point and the kids had
Speaker 2: lost their mum. So he was really respectful of not
Speaker 2: wanting me in that space just yet. So we had
Speaker 2: a few sort of teething issues about how we were
Speaker 2: going to work this hour. We also lived an hour
Speaker 2: and a half away from each so it wasn't simple
Speaker 2: geographically to work out how we're going to do this either.
Speaker 2: Not meeting his family in the early stages felt really appropriate.
Speaker 2: It's very different to his experience. But I was a
Speaker 2: child of divorce, so I do understand the pressures that
Speaker 2: adults face of their children meeting new partners. And that's
Speaker 2: definitely not to compare a divorce to someone passing away,
Speaker 2: but I did understand, like being a child of divorce,
Speaker 2: that parents have a lot of pressure to not introduce
Speaker 2: new partners to their kids really quickly. And I mean,
Speaker 2: on a side note, I'm also terrified of teenage girls.
Speaker 2: I think they're just the scariest breed of human possible,
Speaker 2: so not meeting his daughter that sat quite well with
Speaker 2: me for a while. I just thought, oh my god,
Speaker 2: she's going to tear shreds off me. Like yeah, I
Speaker 2: was okay with not meeting for a while. I think
Speaker 2: I ended up up going to his house for the
Speaker 2: first time. So we'd met in the May, and I
Speaker 2: think I went to his house for the first time
Speaker 2: in the July. So I remember going to his house
Speaker 2: for the first time. No one else was home at
Speaker 2: the time, so there was one day a week where
Speaker 2: one of his children was at work and one of
Speaker 2: his children was at school, so we sort of had
Speaker 2: a few hours where I could go over and spend
Speaker 2: some time there. And that for me was a really
Speaker 2: emotional experience because it was walking into a family home
Speaker 2: but knowing that the family had been broken. It felt
Speaker 2: really sad. It felt like I could feel the love
Speaker 2: for this wife and mother who they had lost. And
Speaker 2: the house was as warm and homely as you like.
Speaker 2: You could tell there was like that woman's touch in
Speaker 2: the house and that she had set it up beautifully,
Speaker 2: and there was lots of memories of her, lots of
Speaker 2: photos of her around the house and even on the
Speaker 2: kitchen table for for months. In this lasted months after
Speaker 2: the first meeting, was still like the pamphlets left over
Speaker 2: from her funeral, and there was sort of arrangements from
Speaker 2: the funeral home that obviously he was unable to deal
Speaker 2: with at the time, so he just left them on
Speaker 2: the kitchen table and I would see them all the
Speaker 2: time and just yeah, not know what to do with that.
Speaker 2: It made me feel guilty, probably because there was so
Speaker 2: much that he was showing me of his world, and
Speaker 2: I felt like, because of the way we met, we
Speaker 2: were both going to have these ideas of each other
Speaker 2: and who each other were that we couldn't take back, but.
Speaker 1: They couldn't deny what they had. And feeling this in
Speaker 1: James's home and him choosing to share it all with
Speaker 1: her only made Carly four for him more.
Speaker 2: Maybe six months in things had settled and that we're
Speaker 2: in a bit of a routine. There wasn't We'd got
Speaker 2: to know each other well enough, I think by that stage,
Speaker 2: and things were just feeling really settled. I just knew
Speaker 2: that every time I saw him, I felt so safe
Speaker 2: and so contained. He provided this safety. My life has
Speaker 2: always felt chaotic, like I just feel internal chaos all
Speaker 2: the time. That's just sort of who I am as
Speaker 2: a person. But being around him, he just calmed me.
Speaker 2: He contained me in a way i'd never been I'd
Speaker 2: never felt that safe before. I suppose I had like
Speaker 2: a pretty deep wound of feeling unloved by men. My
Speaker 2: father had taken his own life, and I had this
Speaker 2: gaping hole of feeling unloved, like feeling like people love
Speaker 2: me out of necessity. But I think having this relationship
Speaker 2: with an older man and was very healing for a
Speaker 2: lot of those wounds, Like I, you know, like the
Speaker 2: sugar baby with classic daddy issues was really coming out.
Speaker 2: It was like, Okay, I felt really abandoned by a parent,
Speaker 2: and now I was desperate for this older man to
Speaker 2: love me and to make that feel good. And he did.
Speaker 2: He made that all feel those holes were just getting
Speaker 2: filled up by him.
Speaker 1: There was no doubt there was a lot of love there.
Speaker 1: But when two people from such different lives meet in
Speaker 1: such a way, it wasn't all rosy.
Speaker 2: The first six months of our relationship was marked by
Speaker 2: pretty extreme feelings of jealousy from both parties. So I
Speaker 2: don't think he believed or accepted that I loved him
Speaker 2: He struggled with that, and he would struggle with who
Speaker 2: was texting me or you know. We got into this
Speaker 2: huge fight once about me saying I was going to
Speaker 2: the gym with this ill friend of mine, and he
Speaker 2: hung up the phone heid you know, text me it's over,
Speaker 2: like I can't deal with this, and I suppose I
Speaker 2: lived with I don't know what the feeling of jealousy
Speaker 2: is called, when you're jealous over someone who you can't
Speaker 2: compete with, but I definitely felt like I was often
Speaker 2: being compared to his late wife, and I would say, like,
Speaker 2: you have to choose me for me because I can't
Speaker 2: be her, and all the things that make me me
Speaker 2: I can't take back. So my marriage had always been
Speaker 2: a really open marriage. My husband and I had always
Speaker 2: dated other people, and my life had been really sort
Speaker 2: of like fun and free. And he was like, well,
Speaker 2: I don't understand that, because if you were in love
Speaker 2: with your husband the way I was with my wife,
Speaker 2: like I never thought about anyone else. So he didn't
Speaker 2: understand that, and he couldn't understand that I was making
Speaker 2: him a promise to say that was an arrangement in
Speaker 2: my marriage between two out of all who agreed to that,
Speaker 2: and now we're two adults who agree to something different.
Speaker 2: So he would always sort of say, you can't just
Speaker 2: have one person, you always need more, And it was
Speaker 2: hard for him to believe that he was the center
Speaker 2: of my world. By that stage, I felt like I
Speaker 2: couldn't escape my past, and I felt like I was
Speaker 2: having to hold shame for how we met. But we
Speaker 2: met because we were both mutually on the same website, right,
Speaker 2: So like it was bizarre that somehow I was the
Speaker 2: bad guy for being on that site, but he was
Speaker 2: like the innocent bystander and just sort of refuted his
Speaker 2: responsibility in being on that website as well. I didn't
Speaker 2: share much of my life with him for probably eight
Speaker 2: or so months before he met friends of mine. I
Speaker 2: think there was an element of probably not knowing how
Speaker 2: to explain to people the relationship. I was scared of
Speaker 2: judgment because just based on looks, there was quite apparent
Speaker 2: differences in our life. He was seventeen years older than
Speaker 2: I was, so it was apparent to look at us
Speaker 2: that were in different stages of our life. I didn't
Speaker 2: know how I would explain to people that I had
Speaker 2: met him. I suppose I didn't give my friends enough credit,
Speaker 2: and I worried that they would be judgmental of his
Speaker 2: appearance and sort of ask me, what are you doing,
Speaker 2: Like why you know, you're young, and you're sort of
Speaker 2: in this peak of your life and you've settled for
Speaker 2: a bit of a dorky old man, and just I
Speaker 2: suppose the way I had always met different people, it
Speaker 2: was different to that. He self admit that he didn't
Speaker 2: have many friends, Like his relationship with his wife, they
Speaker 2: just lived in this love bubble where he just said
Speaker 2: he didn't really have friends, she didn't, and they just
Speaker 2: all they needed was each other. And I had a
Speaker 2: huge friendship network. And he had also faced really significant
Speaker 2: health problems his whole life, and so his twenties and
Speaker 2: thirties looked really different to what mine did. His was
Speaker 2: faced with sort of like constant hospitalizations, whereas I was
Speaker 2: sort of really healthy and young and free and got
Speaker 2: to go out with friends and do whatever I wanted.
Speaker 2: So he wasn't exposed to the same world I was. Like.
Speaker 2: I remember one day, out of the blue, he just
Speaker 2: sent me a text message saying, is sex better on cocaine?
Speaker 2: She just had never experienced these things like he didn't
Speaker 2: drink alcohol at all, and he had never experimented with drugs,
Speaker 2: and he just had this really sheltered life in some elements,
Speaker 2: like of course his massive health stuff. He wasn't sheltered
Speaker 2: from that, but he had never experienced his twenties and
Speaker 2: thirties in the way I was. I think that he
Speaker 2: would look at my life and sometimes he'd be like,
Speaker 2: I can't believe you do these things. Like one time
Speaker 2: we met up. It was one of my friend's birthdays,
Speaker 2: and I was really reluctant to invite him, but I
Speaker 2: also really wanted him to meet my friends. But unfortunately,
Speaker 2: by the time he got there and I had way
Speaker 2: too much to drink and ended up vomiting. And that
Speaker 2: was like a first time for him of like experiencing
Speaker 2: like going to a pub and like, oh, you're with
Speaker 2: your girlfriend who you've got so drunk, she's vomited in
Speaker 2: her hair. Like he just hadn't had those experiences before,
Speaker 2: so it was new to him. And I think that
Speaker 2: even though he was like, well that was a waste
Speaker 2: of money, like why do I get Huber's there and back? Like,
Speaker 2: I think he had fun.
Speaker 1: Apart from the old pub night here and there it
Speaker 1: was really just the two of them embarking on this
Speaker 1: relationship for no one else but themselves and working out
Speaker 1: if or how they could make it work long term.
Speaker 2: We knew from a really early stage that what I
Speaker 2: really wanted and craved was children, and I wanted to
Speaker 2: have a baby, And when he was in the chaotic
Speaker 2: I don't want to be alone desperate stage of grief,
Speaker 2: he was like, yep, I'll give that to you, like
Speaker 2: of course, like we'd talk about babies names, and he
Speaker 2: was like. We met at a cafe once and he
Speaker 2: said I'm all in, Like whatever you want, I'm one
Speaker 2: hundred percent in. And I was like, oh my god,
Speaker 2: like he's all in with me, like I can get
Speaker 2: this entire life with him. And then over time, as
Speaker 2: he waded through the grief he was feeling, he sort
Speaker 2: of came to me and he said, look, I'm actually
Speaker 2: never going to have a baby with you, and I
Speaker 2: don't want to get remarried. I didn't take him seriously
Speaker 2: for quite some time, and it was always a conversation
Speaker 2: we'd have and then we'd put it away. We'd just
Speaker 2: sort of very much sweep it under the rug, like okay, well,
Speaker 2: that's not a today issue anyway, We've got time. We
Speaker 2: don't need to work this all out now, you know
Speaker 2: what couple plants having kids in the first twelve months anyway,
Speaker 2: kind of think. So that sort of where things were
Speaker 2: at where I think we're both hoping the other person
Speaker 2: would negotiate, and he would he would come up with suggestions,
Speaker 2: I suppose, like he'd be like, why don't you use
Speaker 2: a sperm downer? And then the baby's not technically mine,
Speaker 2: but I'd still help you raise it. But it was
Speaker 2: just that he wasn't prepared to have another baby because
Speaker 2: there was lots of milestones in life he didn't want
Speaker 2: to experience with another woman like he had them with
Speaker 2: his wife, and he had a sense of loyalty to
Speaker 2: not doing them again. And also his age was a factor.
Speaker 2: He said, my kids have grown like I've nearly done
Speaker 2: my job as a parent. He's only got a couple
Speaker 2: of years left with his youngest, and he said, I'm
Speaker 2: not doing that. I'm not starting from scratch, Like I'm
Speaker 2: not young enough and I'm not fit enough, and i
Speaker 2: don't have it in me to be awake all night
Speaker 2: with a crying baby. So yeah, it was It was
Speaker 2: just a long time of both of us trying to
Speaker 2: negotiate and hope that the other would change their mind.
Speaker 2: I was convinced I could change his mind for a
Speaker 2: really long time. I thought, no, like, you're going to
Speaker 2: love me enough to want all of this with me.
Speaker 1: And he really did love her. They wouldn't go a
Speaker 1: day without speaking, and soon enough without seeing each other,
Speaker 1: which of course at a point meant also meeting his kids.
Speaker 2: But I met them, probably by the August. I think
Speaker 2: he introduced the idea to his kids as like I
Speaker 2: was just a nice friend, and they were so gracious
Speaker 2: in meeting me. They were lovely. I was very lucky
Speaker 2: in that space. I mean I was. We would always
Speaker 2: joke because I was actually closer in age to his
Speaker 2: son than I was to him. But yeah, his kids
Speaker 2: were really accepting of me. I think they knew, probably
Speaker 2: not straight away, but over time they became aware that
Speaker 2: we really cared for each other and that we were
Speaker 2: sort of in a relationship. I remember I felt like
Speaker 2: in my mind, I was like, it's too soon. But
Speaker 2: who was I to tell him what decisions to make
Speaker 2: with his own children. I was like, oh my god,
Speaker 2: Like he'd text me one day and he said, like,
Speaker 2: I told my kids about you today, and I was like, WHOA,
Speaker 2: Like what do you mean? You know this is wild, but.
Speaker 1: There was still something holding him back from bringing her
Speaker 1: into his life one hundred percent. It was pretty obvious
Speaker 1: to see the elephant in the room.
Speaker 2: I always felt a bit like an impostor in his
Speaker 2: life because I knew I wasn't the person he wanted there.
Speaker 2: So I always sat with that knowledge that he would,
Speaker 2: you know, like kick me out the door in an
Speaker 2: instant if he could get the person back he wanted
Speaker 2: in that room with him. I grew to live with that,
Speaker 2: and I grew to know that that was the all
Speaker 2: I could ask of him. I couldn't ask of him
Speaker 2: to reassure me that he would pick me over her
Speaker 2: or anything like that, because that was so unreasonable. So
Speaker 2: I just had to accept my space in his life
Speaker 2: and that was all he could offer me. But it
Speaker 2: was hard because for me, he was everything. He had
Speaker 2: a milestone birthday, his fiftieth birthday, and he was sort
Speaker 2: of planning it and he made a comment like, oh,
Speaker 2: you might be invited, and I laughed, and I thought,
Speaker 2: this man is joking. What do you mean I might
Speaker 2: be invited, and I thought he was being a bit silly,
Speaker 2: and then his son sort of like chuckled nervously, and
Speaker 2: I was like, are you serious, And he just said, like,
Speaker 2: I just don't know if I can face the judgment
Speaker 2: from all of my friends to know that I've partnered. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I'd always been very understanding and very respectful of my
Speaker 2: place in his life. But I was devastated, Like I thought,
Speaker 2: how can you not invite me? So he did end
Speaker 2: up inviting me, and I went to his fiftieth birthday
Speaker 2: and met all of his family and all of his friends.
Speaker 2: I was just introduced as Carli. I wasn't introduced as
Speaker 2: like this is my girlfriend or my friend. He just
Speaker 2: introduced me by name, and that was all there was
Speaker 2: to it.
Speaker 1: James also never fully committed to have Carly move in
Speaker 1: with him, not even after more than a year together.
Speaker 2: In the early days, he was like, just pack up
Speaker 2: and move on in and I was like, no, that's
Speaker 2: not reasonable. And then after about twelve months he was
Speaker 2: sort of like, I don't actually know if I'll ever
Speaker 2: want to live with you, but I have. He owned
Speaker 2: multiple properties and he said I've got this one property
Speaker 2: it's really local, and I'll let you live in it
Speaker 2: and you can just pay two hundred dollars a week
Speaker 2: rent so we can live near each other. And I'm
Speaker 2: self employed for work and all of my clients and
Speaker 2: my work is really close to home. And I said, well,
Speaker 2: that means giving up all of my clients, and I'm
Speaker 2: giving up living in the same sort of regional part
Speaker 2: of town as all my family and all my friends
Speaker 2: to live alone in one of your units, but not
Speaker 2: with you. So I was like, no, thank you, you know, respectfully, no,
Speaker 2: you know, And I know that that was him trying
Speaker 2: to compromise, but I don't think he saw the bigger
Speaker 2: picture that I wasn't moving an hour and a half
Speaker 2: away to live by myself.
Speaker 1: Carlie understood the intricacies of the relationship they were in.
Speaker 1: She knew it wasn't cut and dry and was never
Speaker 1: going to be as simple as meeting someone her own
Speaker 1: age who hadn't recently lost someone. But she knew they
Speaker 1: were deeply in love. If she could be patient and understanding,
Speaker 1: so would he. He was her future and she is.
Speaker 2: The baby conversation had been one that was ongoing, and
Speaker 2: another conversation that wasn't ongoing, but just for context, was
Speaker 2: that he is a multi millionaire and has a very
Speaker 2: vast property portfolio and sort of lives just off the
Speaker 2: interest of his investments. He doesn't need to earn money,
Speaker 2: and he lives a very comfortable life. And he had
Speaker 2: always said to me from the start that that money
Speaker 2: was for his children and that no matter who he
Speaker 2: ended up partnered with or in a relationship with like
Speaker 2: that money would be protected from any partner in the future.
Speaker 2: And he was always very clear about that as well.
Speaker 2: And so it got to a point where I probably
Speaker 2: shouldn't have done this, but I had sent him a
Speaker 2: screenshot of like a period tracking app saying my p
Speaker 2: was one day late, and I sort of jokingly said like,
Speaker 2: oh god, what have you done? And he just went
Speaker 2: straight into panic mode. He called me and is like, well,
Speaker 2: what are you going to do? And then he accused
Speaker 2: me of sort of like baby trapping him into this,
Speaker 2: into having a baby, and he said, I'm going to
Speaker 2: put all of my assets into the trusts that are
Speaker 2: in my kids' names, and you're the baby won't see
Speaker 2: anything from me, Like you're not taking my money for
Speaker 2: this baby. Oh, and then he also said and also
Speaker 2: I'd need a paternity test. And I was just like ropeable,
Speaker 2: and I said, you know what I will do is
Speaker 2: I will fuck your life up. You have no idea
Speaker 2: how much I will fuck your life up. And I
Speaker 2: will fuck up your perfect little trust funds. And if
Speaker 2: you've got three kids, there will be three trust funds.
Speaker 2: There won't just be two any more. And We've hung
Speaker 2: up the phone, enraged, in rage really each other and
Speaker 2: didn't speak for days. It felt awful because I felt
Speaker 2: like he was reducing all the love I had for him,
Speaker 2: was just coming down to his money. And I was thinking, like,
Speaker 2: I spend six hours a week in my car to
Speaker 2: see you. How could you say this is about money,
Speaker 2: or if it was, like I would have stopped seeing
Speaker 2: you ten months ago when you stopped paying me, Like
Speaker 2: I was so offended by the whole suggestion. Really, I
Speaker 2: never questioned the rest of our relationship. I knew that
Speaker 2: he just had big reactions to things when they happened,
Speaker 2: and that was a theme, like he would just blow
Speaker 2: up and then get over it really quickly. So I
Speaker 2: didn't question the rest of the relationship or how he
Speaker 2: felt about me. But it made me mad because I
Speaker 2: didn't like what else was I meant to have done
Speaker 2: to have proved how much I loved him. This is
Speaker 2: where I'm going to cry. We didn't speak for a
Speaker 2: few days, and we spoke again and he said, I
Speaker 2: think it was like, how would you feel about going
Speaker 2: out for dinner or something? And we didn't end up
Speaker 2: going out for dinner. We ended up meeting at his house,
Speaker 2: and we just knew it was the end going there.
Speaker 2: I knew that that was it for us.
Speaker 3: So we just held each other and I just told
Speaker 3: him how much I loved him, and how grateful I
Speaker 3: was that he had saved my life and put it
Speaker 3: back track, and that he had healed me in so
Speaker 3: many ways, and everything was forgiven and there was no anger,
Speaker 3: and we just left loving each other but knowing ultimately
Speaker 3: that we wanted and needed different things in life and
Speaker 3: that was just how it needed to be. He was
Speaker 3: amazing during that conversation, so I just sort of lay
Speaker 3: in his arms, just crying. And it was the first
Speaker 3: time that.
Speaker 2: I didn't try to change myself to make things better,
Speaker 2: like every other time we'd fight about a baby, I
Speaker 2: would say to him, I've been living without a baby
Speaker 2: I don't have one now, and I'm okay, but I
Speaker 2: have you, and I can't be okay with you. So
Speaker 2: I used to say, look at me, I'm already living
Speaker 2: without a baby, but I couldn't live without you. And
Speaker 2: the last time we saw each other was the only
Speaker 2: time I realized I needed to get what I wanted
Speaker 2: out life. I think that he had built me up
Speaker 2: enough that I didn't need him, and I think he
Speaker 2: was a bit of like a safety net for me
Speaker 2: because he did. He just always made me so calm.
Speaker 2: I didn't want to let go of any of it.
Speaker 2: The safety and the security and the containment and everything
Speaker 2: that I had never felt before. I couldn't imagine life
Speaker 2: without him, because more than anything, he was just my
Speaker 2: very best friend. He was the person I could talk
Speaker 2: to about everything, and he was the biggest part of
Speaker 2: every day of my life. The drive home was rough.
Speaker 2: I remember needing to leave. It was sort of at
Speaker 2: the point where it's like there's nothing left to say
Speaker 2: and there's nothing left to do. I need to leave,
Speaker 2: And the thought of leaving his house knowing I was
Speaker 2: never going back was sickening, Like I was like my
Speaker 2: legs were shaking, and I just felt like I couldn't
Speaker 2: walk to his front door. Of course, we were still talking,
Speaker 2: not every day and not consistently, but I would still
Speaker 2: reach out to him. I think I was reaching out
Speaker 2: to him to try to get those feelings of being
Speaker 2: safe back. So after we stopped speaking, I started experiencing
Speaker 2: horrendous anxiety at nighttime, just horrendous, like I was feeling
Speaker 2: like nauseated and I couldn't sleep, And it was debilitating
Speaker 2: every or to get this anxiety. So some nights I'd
Speaker 2: call him just to make it go away.
Speaker 1: It was the worst heartbreak she'd ever experienced, but she
Speaker 1: didn't even feel like she had anyone to lean on.
Speaker 2: It was difficult. So because of his jealousy and some
Speaker 2: of the fights we had, he could be quite insensitive
Speaker 2: at times as well. He would just make comments without
Speaker 2: thinking about them. So one time, if we're sitting on
Speaker 2: the couch, I got put my legs up on him,
Speaker 2: and he referred to my legs as feeling like concrete
Speaker 2: stumps or all of the trust issues we had, a
Speaker 2: lot of my friends were sort of like red flag,
Speaker 2: like you need to leave him, Like this isn't good,
Speaker 2: Like he's mean about your appearance, and he doesn't trust
Speaker 2: you and you don't deserve that. But I just I
Speaker 2: saw through all of that because I saw no malice.
Speaker 2: Like I didn't think he's got trust issues because he's
Speaker 2: a red flag. I thought he's a man who hasn't
Speaker 2: dated in thirty years and he's come from the comfort
Speaker 2: of a I think it was a twenty three year marriage.
Speaker 2: Of course, he's going to be jealous when he's dating
Speaker 2: a thirty year old who's attractive and young, and like,
Speaker 2: I just felt like almost a compliment that he was jealous.
Speaker 2: Like I didn't see it as like a red flag
Speaker 2: that all my friends did. So by the time it
Speaker 2: came to an end, my friends were well and truly
Speaker 2: over hearing about what was going on. Anyway, they were
Speaker 2: sort of like, you know, you deserve better. And it's
Speaker 2: not that I didn't think I deserved better, because I
Speaker 2: think he is amazing, But it was just like they
Speaker 2: didn't see what I saw. I guess no one knew
Speaker 2: what he meant to me.
Speaker 1: The weeks went by with Carli trying to heal on
Speaker 1: her own and look ahead to a life without James.
Speaker 1: Over time, she stopped calling him. She knew she had
Speaker 1: to do this on her own and she had to
Speaker 1: let go, and soon enough he helped her do that.
Speaker 2: One thing was that we had always sort of made
Speaker 2: an agreement that neither of us would ever go back
Speaker 2: on the website where we found each other, like it
Speaker 2: was so detrimental to both of us, and were like,
Speaker 2: we can neither of us can ever go back there.
Speaker 2: And he sent me a text after maybe three weeks saying,
Speaker 2: so I had asked for space. I said, I'm not
Speaker 2: going to be able to sort of let go of
Speaker 2: this if we keep being best friends and we keep talking.
Speaker 2: And he texted me saying, you know, I know you
Speaker 2: asked for space, but I just want to I think
Speaker 2: you should know that I've signed up to RSVP, And
Speaker 2: that was like relief for me, Like I felt like, okay,
Speaker 2: like he's really closing the door. Now I can move
Speaker 2: on with my life because he is. And I think
Speaker 2: because he always had that jealousy and he, you know,
Speaker 2: never quite believed that I loved him. I didn't want
Speaker 2: to be the first one to make a big move
Speaker 2: in life because I could just picture him thinking in
Speaker 2: his frain like oh she had that planned all along,
Speaker 2: or and I just I was really a relief when
Speaker 2: he told me he was going to start dating again.
Speaker 2: I thought, great, like you've set me free, Like I
Speaker 2: can be free now because you are. There were a
Speaker 2: few times where we'd gotten into our fights and I
Speaker 2: had felt relief when we had said, Okay, well we
Speaker 2: want different things, we'll just break up, And in the moment,
Speaker 2: nearly every time i'd feel relief. I think because I
Speaker 2: knew that I would never get the whole big picture
Speaker 2: of what I wanted out of life with him, and
Speaker 2: so I knew that I was giving up giving up
Speaker 2: some really big things to be with him. It felt
Speaker 2: really freeing, and it felt like the relationship had served
Speaker 2: a purpose, and that purpose was going to be lifelong,
Speaker 2: like he had helped me for the rest of my life.
Speaker 2: I think it's just because we crammed so much into
Speaker 2: sort of eighteen months of healing for each other. The
Speaker 2: version of him that I met was so far away
Speaker 2: from the version of him that we left each other
Speaker 2: at as well. He was okay to be alone by
Speaker 2: the time we stopped seeing each other, whereas at the
Speaker 2: start he was paying women frequently for their time. And
Speaker 2: he's okay alone now, which is really nice.
Speaker 1: It's been two years now since James and Carly split
Speaker 1: and she's doing well too. They still speak from time
Speaker 1: to time. That's one thing she doesn't think will ever change.
Speaker 2: So I think that the love I have for him
Speaker 2: is it's just something I'm not willing to compromise on
Speaker 2: at this stage. You'll probably ever Like you know, I
Speaker 2: feel quite assertive in all of my relationships and that
Speaker 2: I'm able to say the important people who I sort
Speaker 2: of non negotiables in my life, and here's one of them.
Speaker 2: It's just knowing he's there that's nice, and knowing that
Speaker 2: I know that if I called him, he'd always be
Speaker 2: there for me. On that last time we saw each other,
Speaker 2: he did say like when I do have a baby,
Speaker 2: like he'll come and see my baby and he'll be
Speaker 2: so happy for me. Healing from him occurred while I
Speaker 2: was still with him, because the experience I had with
Speaker 2: him built me up to being a stronger person. I
Speaker 2: think he helped me with multiple things, But one of
Speaker 2: my biggest takeaways is that I realized how many people
Speaker 2: I probably never gave the time of day two I
Speaker 2: know for sure, like if he had just met me
Speaker 2: in a bar and asked to buy me a drink,
Speaker 2: like I would have said, no, I'm not interested, just
Speaker 2: based on his appearance. I had to do a lot
Speaker 2: of reflection on like how I got to that point,
Speaker 2: How many people have I missed out on amazing opportunities
Speaker 2: with because I was I wouldn't call myself shallow, but
Speaker 2: I definitely had a type that I would pay more
Speaker 2: attention to than others. And unfortunately, if our relationship hadn't
Speaker 2: started by him paying me, I wouldn't have got to
Speaker 2: know him as a person, and I wouldn't have found
Speaker 2: one of my soulmates in this world. So he's definitely
Speaker 2: taught me to give everyone a chance in life. Because
Speaker 2: we didn't have similar interests or hobbies or definitely didn't
Speaker 2: have similar political or social views at all, but he
Speaker 2: was my best friend. And you know, I'm a believer
Speaker 2: that you have sort of like multiple soulmates in your life,
Speaker 2: and I like, I'm really confident that he was one
Speaker 2: of mine and that we needed to meet. I think
Speaker 2: that my story is important because of how much I
Speaker 2: learned about beauty only being skin deep and all of
Speaker 2: those other sayings that you hear growing up. But I
Speaker 2: didn't realize how true they were until this relationship, and
Speaker 2: I didn't realize how much I needed to reevaluate my
Speaker 2: own morals and my own values and looking at the
Speaker 2: importance of relationships for me, because if I had missed
Speaker 2: out on this one, I would just hate to think
Speaker 2: where things would have ended up. I think I healed
Speaker 2: a lot by knowing him, by knowing that there is
Speaker 2: this like, there's feelings of safety that I can achieve,
Speaker 2: and if I achieve them with him, then I can
Speaker 2: do them by myself or with other people. So it
Speaker 2: was nice. I definitely feel a lot more secure in
Speaker 2: who I am that I don't have this need for
Speaker 2: everyone to love me like I used to. It used
Speaker 2: to be so consuming that I didn't believe people could
Speaker 2: ever love me enough. I felt like people loved me
Speaker 2: out of obligation to love me, and he definitely showed
Speaker 2: me that that wasn't true. Life since has been pretty
Speaker 2: pretty good. I just try and keep really busy and
Speaker 2: look forward to the future. Really, I think that I
Speaker 2: definitely have a lot more gratitude for for life. When
Speaker 2: I wake up every day, I know that good things
Speaker 2: are just like unexpectedly around the corner. I don't worry
Speaker 2: about not finding friends or being lonely. I just know
Speaker 2: that everything's going to be okay. We've sort of made
Speaker 2: an agreement like that will never sort of block each
Speaker 2: other on Facebook, so we can sort of see what
Speaker 2: each other's doing from time to time. And I think
Speaker 2: we'll always chat intimittently. Like I said, you know, when
Speaker 2: you get a new girlfriend, you have to make sure
Speaker 2: she's fine with you talking to your ex because I
Speaker 2: don't want to get booted when he finds someone new.
Speaker 2: That scares me a lot. Just the thought of not
Speaker 2: having him in any capacity is scary. I think I
Speaker 2: will love him forever.
Speaker 1: Everyone has an X is a Minti Media production and
Speaker 1: proudly part of the Mumamea Network. Is written and narrated
Speaker 1: by me Georgia Love and produced by Linda Scott. If
Speaker 1: you have a story you'd like to share, email podcast
Speaker 1: at momamea dot com dot au. You can support us
Speaker 1: by following the show in your favorite podcast app and
Speaker 1: leaving a five star review. We'll see you for the
Speaker 1: next episode.