Speaker 1: You're listening to a Mother Maya podcast.
Speaker 2: Mama Maya acknowledges the traditional owners of land and waters
Speaker 2: that this podcast is recorded on. Felt like I had
Speaker 2: no skin. Yeah, you felt like I was just raw.
Speaker 3: I was just an open I was just all Yeah,
Speaker 3: I had no protection.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I was just I was a friggin.
Speaker 1: Mess for Mama Maya. This is No Filter. I'm Kate
Speaker 1: lang Brook. Yes you are, Yes, I am. I'm going
Speaker 1: to introduce us.
Speaker 2: Okay, I'm Kate lane Brook.
Speaker 1: And I'm joined by someone who, when I have listened
Speaker 1: to No Filter over the years, I have wanted to
Speaker 1: talk to this person more than anybody else. I would
Speaker 1: like to introduce my very special Geest Maya Friedman.
Speaker 2: I was easy to get.
Speaker 1: Wow, you were not easy to get.
Speaker 2: Well, that's true. That's also true.
Speaker 1: In fact, part of the reason I think we're sitting
Speaker 1: here is that you've been very hard to get.
Speaker 3: I like playing hard to get. Yes, we did have
Speaker 3: an aborted attempt at this a year ago, didn't we.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we did.
Speaker 3: I've been thinking about that a lot when I was
Speaker 3: thinking about today and how this time last year we
Speaker 3: sat down before you were going to host the summer
Speaker 3: Summer's edition Summer Season of No Filter to see how
Speaker 3: you liked it, because I needed a rest.
Speaker 1: And well, you were hanging by a three. I was
Speaker 1: hanging by thread.
Speaker 3: And it wasn't, in hindsight, a very good time to
Speaker 3: do an interview. And I never sit down and do
Speaker 3: long form interviews, so I hadn't for a long time
Speaker 3: before that, like years, and I sat down and it
Speaker 3: you thought it went well.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it was great. It was absolutely fascinating. You would
Speaker 1: call it well at the time as well. Well, it
Speaker 1: didn't really think about a message afterwards.
Speaker 3: I tried to cancel a few times. You did try
Speaker 3: to cancel anyway. This is all boring, but this is
Speaker 3: all behind the scenes stuff. But I pulled the pin
Speaker 3: because it wasn't when I say it wasn't me at
Speaker 3: my best. I just I was a hot mess, and
Speaker 3: I mean I'm always a hot mess, but I was
Speaker 3: in a particularly fragile state this time last year, and
Speaker 3: I didn't I just didn't particularly want to put that
Speaker 3: out there because I was still in the middle of
Speaker 3: being in that.
Speaker 1: Fragile state because you were processing something which I know
Speaker 1: at the time, but I could tell when I was
Speaker 1: talking to you and do you remember the question that
Speaker 1: tricked your trigger? Do you remember what it was?
Speaker 2: I don't.
Speaker 1: I'll say it to you now because because you're in
Speaker 1: such a vastly different place. I said to you, because
Speaker 1: I've been reading your book. I've read your book, and
Speaker 1: you were on.
Speaker 2: The cusp then of waiting for strife to come out.
Speaker 2: So there was a lot of.
Speaker 1: There were a lot of shap that came in with you.
Speaker 2: I felt like I had no skin.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you were.
Speaker 2: I was just raw.
Speaker 3: I was just an open just I was just all, yeah,
Speaker 3: I had no protection.
Speaker 1: Yeah, But you were still as you do and as
Speaker 1: you have to do. You were still navigating your way
Speaker 1: through this world because you've got so many, you know,
Speaker 1: plates spinning at all times, and if you drop the plates,
Speaker 1: there's a world on each of those plates. So I
Speaker 1: get the feeling you're very conscious of not dropping those
Speaker 1: plates because you don't want to damage the people that
Speaker 1: are on the plates.
Speaker 3: That's very That's such an insightful observation, and you're right.
Speaker 3: It's like, I think I probably had some kind of breakdown.
Speaker 3: I had a sort of a slow moving, ongoing breakdown
Speaker 3: over the last around that time before that, and probably through.
Speaker 2: To about halfway through this year, which weirdly.
Speaker 1: Makes me ran half you know, well it is like.
Speaker 3: Let's just crack into it. Hey, we haven't even have
Speaker 3: no small talk.
Speaker 1: Well well you may as well laugh.
Speaker 2: Oh no, but it is funny.
Speaker 3: It's like, because I had this breakdown and I probably
Speaker 3: should have taken myself away somewhere, yes, but I couldn't.
Speaker 2: I just couldn't.
Speaker 3: You Hosting the summer season of No Filter was the
Speaker 3: first tentative step that I'd taken from stepping back from
Speaker 3: really anything since I wasn't the editor of Mamamea anymore.
Speaker 3: I know it, So yeah, it was it was, Yeah,
Speaker 3: I was just I was a freaking mess.
Speaker 1: Because you know, those of us who really just if
Speaker 1: we knew nothing about you other than your output, if
Speaker 1: we knew nothing other than that, that is extraordinary and
Speaker 1: that is exhausting to think about. So you were exhausted
Speaker 1: and this is this is the thing, and I wasn't
Speaker 1: doing It wasn't a gotcha, it wasn't whatever. It was
Speaker 1: like a genuine because I just wanted to work out
Speaker 1: what your driver was, what your engine, what, what what your
Speaker 1: engine takes? And I said to you because I'd read
Speaker 1: your book, and I said, it's really interesting because you
Speaker 1: you we talked about whether or not you ever reflect
Speaker 1: on the amazing thing that you've built things, and you
Speaker 1: said no. And then I said, you know what's interesting
Speaker 1: in your book and you talk about work that's still
Speaker 1: got to be done and you know what you could
Speaker 1: have done better? And I said, but you never talk
Speaker 1: about the concept of happiness. Do you remember that?
Speaker 2: Is that all I can see? I can feel?
Speaker 3: Yeah again, yeah, yeah, and it was it was just
Speaker 3: a yeah.
Speaker 1: And then that was like, I don't know, it's like
Speaker 1: someone pulled a little stitch, the last stitch that you
Speaker 1: were hanging by, and then you kind of just unraveled.
Speaker 2: A little bit. Oh yeah, a lot. Yeah, how to
Speaker 2: you cry? Yeah, it's true.
Speaker 3: It's like happiness kind of doesn't does really when you're
Speaker 3: running a business.
Speaker 2: It's not.
Speaker 3: Actually that's a luxury that sort of sits on the side.
Speaker 2: And not to be matter.
Speaker 3: Like, I also love my work. I think it would
Speaker 3: be easier if I didn't. You know, I didn't if
Speaker 3: I didn't love my work, I would go I'm so
Speaker 3: burnt out, I'm so exhausted, I need to back away.
Speaker 3: But Firstly, when you've built something this size, it's hard
Speaker 3: to extract yourself.
Speaker 2: But also I love it. I love what I do
Speaker 2: like I love what I do.
Speaker 3: And it's a question of working out when it's time
Speaker 3: to call time on certainty.
Speaker 1: Okay, which has led us to this today. How do
Speaker 1: you work that out? Because I mean, you are apparently
Speaker 1: the Meya in MoMA men well I used to be.
Speaker 3: I think there's a lot of people who wouldn't even
Speaker 3: know who I am anymore, who might experience Muma Mea
Speaker 3: through one of our other podcasts, not No Filter, or
Speaker 3: written content or social content that they might consume or something,
Speaker 3: and they wouldn't even know, particularly younger people gen zads
Speaker 3: and millennials who wouldn't even know who I was, Which
Speaker 3: is the way it has always which is what we've
Speaker 3: always wanted. Jason and I yess when we first started.
Speaker 3: Our last seventeen years have been about slowly backing me out.
Speaker 1: That's a long that's a long reverse.
Speaker 2: Day, that's long driveway suories.
Speaker 1: That's when you're back into the fence.
Speaker 3: Many which I've done many times, many many times.
Speaker 2: My old producer on.
Speaker 3: No Filter, Eliza Ratliffe, knows that I've been trying to
Speaker 3: quit No Filter for two years, and not because I
Speaker 3: don't love it, but just because it takes a lot,
Speaker 3: Like it takes.
Speaker 1: A lot, Yes, it's a lot, and for I mean
Speaker 1: people listening to it, I think they know intuitively, even
Speaker 1: if they haven't thought in a more academic since about
Speaker 1: how much it takes that if you're interviewing someone who's
Speaker 1: got a body of work, you pay them the courtesy
Speaker 1: of familiar you're rising yourself with their body of work. Well,
Speaker 1: that can be books, what is it can be TV shows, movie, yes, yeah,
Speaker 1: all the different things and even just getting to understand
Speaker 1: who someone is like to prepare for an interview, my
Speaker 1: process is just very immersive and I can only do
Speaker 1: it within about twenty four hours of actually sitting down
Speaker 1: with them. So because you've done so many new things
Speaker 1: over the last I don't know, Like you said, there's
Speaker 1: a plethora of new podcasts, it kind of feels like
Speaker 1: there's another You're going to another level, which might be
Speaker 1: the level at which you kind of get to.
Speaker 3: I think the business is getting bigger, but I want
Speaker 3: to get smaller, right if that makes sense?
Speaker 1: It does make sense. But do you know how to
Speaker 1: do that.
Speaker 3: Well, that's what the last sort of eighteen months to
Speaker 3: two years has been. It's been setting us up for
Speaker 3: Jason and I to be able to excel right, Like
Speaker 3: I don't want to completely building, but to go okay.
Speaker 3: There wasn't an option until sort of the last eighteen months,
Speaker 3: so that it's been finding the right people when new CEO,
Speaker 3: when you chief content officer, we've got a new chief
Speaker 3: revenue officer, all these different people to put in to say, okay,
Speaker 3: we now feel able to step back further to a
Speaker 3: point where we don't have to run the whole thing anymore,
Speaker 3: that they can take the baton from us. And you know,
Speaker 3: you want to hire people who are smarter than you.
Speaker 3: You want to work with people who are smarter than you.
Speaker 1: But after a while, when you've done something for a while,
Speaker 1: it's hard to find those people because you've been in
Speaker 1: the space.
Speaker 3: It's really hard to find those people. And also, I'm free.
Speaker 3: So you know the reason why I'm like, oh me,
Speaker 3: you can do it, me, you can do it. Me,
Speaker 3: you can do it, and I'll put up my hand
Speaker 3: is that I am.
Speaker 2: Free and I'm available of course.
Speaker 3: And you know, hiring really good people like you and
Speaker 3: other and the executives that we've got and all the
Speaker 3: people that work in our business, including our head of content.
Speaker 3: That costs a lot of money, and you have to
Speaker 3: be you know, people see the front, but they don't know,
Speaker 3: you know, it's like the dark gliding across the pond.
Speaker 3: They don't see what's going on under your surface. And
Speaker 3: there's a lot going on under the surface.
Speaker 1: It's like my husband who own nightclubs, and people always think, oh,
Speaker 1: you must get cheap booze. You don't, you don't. You
Speaker 1: actually can get it cheaper at Dan Murphy's. But also
Speaker 1: they don't know about rent and people and insurance and
Speaker 1: Capra and la la la and exactly exactly. So what Okay,
Speaker 1: So here's the thing with you and you're seventeen year
Speaker 1: reversing out of the driveway. But because it's not just
Speaker 1: a business, it's also your family. So that is just
Speaker 1: another mind bog Like when I was here yesterday and
Speaker 1: you were arriving with Luca and Jesse Jesse, which was gorgeous,
Speaker 1: and then someone made the joke, was at Luca that
Speaker 1: you just derived from the succession helicoptery.
Speaker 2: Yeah, because it's like it was.
Speaker 3: Like we bumped into each other in the car and
Speaker 3: they drove in together. It's like, yeah, it's a family business,
Speaker 3: Like there's one hundred and fifty people in it. But
Speaker 3: Jason and I are the co founders, Luca is the
Speaker 3: chief operating and product officer, and you know my friend
Speaker 3: and daughter in law, Jesse.
Speaker 2: I posted a podcast with her.
Speaker 3: And so yeah, everyone's various people are involved in the business.
Speaker 3: I mean, our two youngest children just want to get
Speaker 3: away from it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, they'll probably get sucked into it too.
Speaker 3: So yeah, that means that it's not a job you
Speaker 3: can easily quit.
Speaker 1: But also aside from the job, you've also as a
Speaker 1: human and as a woman and as a mother, you've
Speaker 1: become a mother in law. Yeah, and that's and a
Speaker 1: grandmother and that's all happened at the same time as well.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and I think that last year was a real
Speaker 3: unraveling for me, Like on every level of my identity.
Speaker 3: I turned, I turned, how old did I added whatever?
Speaker 3: I turned fifty fifty three, You start to hear blurred.
Speaker 3: I became a grandmother, my eldest son got married, Like
Speaker 3: all of these things happened my youngest child sort of
Speaker 3: you know, got beyond that age where you know, he
Speaker 3: turned sixteen, So it's like I officially moved into that
Speaker 3: age of your kids are growing up in a way,
Speaker 3: having their own families, and what does that mean? And
Speaker 3: at the same time, the world is telling you you're irrelevant,
Speaker 3: you're invisible, you're a carrying.
Speaker 1: Your socks are the wrong link your socks, yeah, you're.
Speaker 3: A loser, all of those things. And then it's like, well,
Speaker 3: and then what do you do with your face and
Speaker 3: what like? And I just I just lost it, Like
Speaker 3: I just felt really it was like you know when
Speaker 3: you're doing a software upgrade and you get like the
Speaker 3: spinning wheel.
Speaker 2: Right, the wheel was just spinning. It was like the
Speaker 2: spinning wheel.
Speaker 3: It's like it was before this new phase, I was
Speaker 3: just really lost. I was lost at work, I was
Speaker 3: lost at home. I was lost with my place in
Speaker 3: the world, all of those things. And part of the
Speaker 3: reason that I also wanted to find the right person
Speaker 3: to hand no Filter over to was I wanted to
Speaker 3: make some room creatively to do some other things, and
Speaker 3: there just wasn't any room. And I used to think
Speaker 3: that I could just take on more and more and
Speaker 3: more and more, and last year I realized, oh, I'm breaking.
Speaker 3: I'm broken, and I realized that, okay, I can't. So
Speaker 3: I had to make some space.
Speaker 2: Yeah and how okay.
Speaker 1: So in my experience, when you find yourself in situations
Speaker 1: like that, if you don't make the decision, your body
Speaker 1: will make the decision for you. Oh yeah. So it's
Speaker 1: like the actors will often say, if they've been in
Speaker 1: like a long run of a plan, they get sick
Speaker 1: on the last night they had their rap party, and
Speaker 1: then they got the down. So you had to call
Speaker 1: it before your body called it. My body's tried to
Speaker 1: call it for a really long time, like you know.
Speaker 1: Jason was talking to someone the other day and said,
Speaker 1: MAYA has passed the point of burnout so many times
Speaker 1: because it's like it's just not been an option.
Speaker 2: So it's been I've gone past.
Speaker 3: Burnout, past burnout, past burnout, past burnout. And I was
Speaker 3: sick quite a lot in twenty twenty four. I just
Speaker 3: got like, you know, the usual winter thing. Lots of
Speaker 3: people have just got sick.
Speaker 2: My immune system has.
Speaker 3: Been okay, but I've also been going through perimenopause and
Speaker 3: then menopause, and so it's been all in to know
Speaker 3: what yes, exactly, And I just I recover very, very easily,
Speaker 3: and I've got a really big engine, I think because
Speaker 3: I'm quite also forgetful, and I just forget that I'm exhausted.
Speaker 2: Like I don't I don't.
Speaker 3: Corinate in things long, Like I just sleep well, really well.
Speaker 1: Or what time do you go to bed?
Speaker 2: I probably I.
Speaker 3: Look at my phone until maybe fifteen seconds before I'm
Speaker 3: before I'm asleep, Like, I'll just look at it.
Speaker 2: I'm not one of.
Speaker 3: Those people that need to do special sleep hygiene and everything.
Speaker 3: I'm fortunate in that way. And then I will just
Speaker 3: literally turn my phone off, put it on the floor,
Speaker 3: and within fifteen.
Speaker 2: Seconds go to sleep.
Speaker 1: And how long do you sleep? For?
Speaker 3: Probably about seven between six to seven hours.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I wake up pretty early. Do you wake up
Speaker 1: and you're full of ideas? Or do you wake up
Speaker 1: slowly and step into the day.
Speaker 2: Oh I've never been like a jump out of bed person.
Speaker 1: No, but sometimes I wake up and I'm like boo,
Speaker 1: and it's like all these things have happened in my sleep.
Speaker 3: Oh no, all of those things happen in my way.
Speaker 3: Ye okay, yeah, no. So often what I've become very
Speaker 3: aware of is that I wake up, open my eyes,
Speaker 3: pick up my phone, and just saturate myself with stimulation.
Speaker 3: I think that's probably what most of us do, and
Speaker 3: from my brain, it needs that. But I've also become
Speaker 3: aware that that's not a very gentle weight away.
Speaker 2: It's a brutal or pretty brutal.
Speaker 1: Particularly if you're looking at news.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, you know.
Speaker 3: The first thing I'll do is look at my WhatsApp
Speaker 3: and if any of the chats have gone off, Like
Speaker 3: you know, sometimes I wake up and there'll be thirty
Speaker 3: messages and it might be that just one of my
Speaker 3: group chats has you know, gone off overnight about whatever,
Speaker 3: but it also could be breaking news that I've missed
Speaker 3: because you know, someone else was up before me. The
Speaker 3: day starts hard, and then on weekends Luca brings over Luna,
Speaker 3: so you're, yeah, I wake up to her, you know,
Speaker 3: I get up and she's she arrives pretty soon after.
Speaker 3: So yeah, I'm not a sort of lying around person.
Speaker 3: Like my brain just goes all the time, which is
Speaker 3: exhausting in itself.
Speaker 1: So you know how you were saying, Jason said you'd
Speaker 1: gone beyond burnout so many times. How did that manifest?
Speaker 2: Then? Great question?
Speaker 3: Just despair. I think just like cry most days. Sometimes
Speaker 3: i'd cry in meetings, which is bad.
Speaker 1: Sometimes I would out of just out of just.
Speaker 3: Full, full, overwhelmed. They're just overwhelmed, overwhelm, overwhelm, overwhelmed. I'd
Speaker 3: feel just overwhelmed a lot of the time. And then
Speaker 3: I'd have to, you know, come in here, and I'd
Speaker 3: lived because I had to live, sure.
Speaker 1: And also there's distraction then, and distraction is just so
Speaker 1: gratefully received when you're like that.
Speaker 3: I love coming in into the office and I love
Speaker 3: you know, I love recording the podcast that are out loud.
Speaker 2: And then no.
Speaker 3: Filter would often be a lot because when you have
Speaker 3: to meet like the conversations that you have on this show,
Speaker 3: not that they're always bleak or sad, but they're always deep,
Speaker 3: and you have.
Speaker 2: To called no filter correct. So you have to.
Speaker 3: Meet someone there every single time, and it's really intense.
Speaker 3: But I have this thing where I walk out of
Speaker 3: the studio and I won't be able to remember anything.
Speaker 3: So my poor producers would like try to sit down
Speaker 3: with me afterwards and like whatef, and I'm like, I
Speaker 3: don't remember anything.
Speaker 2: It's weird.
Speaker 3: It's like I'm so present at them at that time.
Speaker 3: But I've got a very efficient clearing system, like my
Speaker 3: hard drives just constantly being deleted, delete, delete, delete.
Speaker 2: Where you don't have the storage. I don't have the storage.
Speaker 3: So I'll walk out, and then I won't I actually
Speaker 3: won't ever want to listen to it again. I want
Speaker 3: to do won't even talk about it again. And this
Speaker 3: show requires a lot of you know, there's a lot
Speaker 3: of You've got to take really good care of the
Speaker 3: people that you interview, and you've got to follow through
Speaker 3: on that process. And I just wasn't able to do
Speaker 3: that justice anymore.
Speaker 2: And I felt what I love is actually I.
Speaker 3: Want to listen to you interview people like I loved
Speaker 3: over Summer.
Speaker 1: I love the girl I'm interviewing right now, your lover
Speaker 1: meor freedman.
Speaker 2: I know you're desperate to escape, but you shall not.
Speaker 2: I know where the exits are.
Speaker 1: Yeah, no you don't. We've changed them. You're staying put.
Speaker 3: I think you're the best interviewer in Australia. I think
Speaker 3: you are. Oh calm down, you have because you're playful.
Speaker 3: Even when we did that interview which we ended up
Speaker 3: not publishing, you will so seamlessly because I was being interviewed,
Speaker 3: but I was also observing you, not to judge you,
Speaker 3: but just because I was interested in your practice. And
Speaker 3: you did that really tricky thing which you took me
Speaker 3: from tears and then you knew exactly when to just
Speaker 3: bridge to something funny and we both laughed.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and complete gear change.
Speaker 1: But you know, it's an interesting it's really rare.
Speaker 2: Most people can't do that, but in friendships you do
Speaker 2: it all the time. Rue people do it all the time.
Speaker 1: That's how you get your friends through, and that's how
Speaker 1: you navigate those moments where someone's really raw.
Speaker 2: And then you're like, it's true.
Speaker 1: You know, I'm curious about Jay saying you've gone beyond
Speaker 1: burnout so many times, and because of your relationship with
Speaker 1: him as a husband and a lover and a business partner.
Speaker 3: I know everyone says, I don't know how you could
Speaker 3: work with your partner.
Speaker 2: I never could.
Speaker 1: What do you say?
Speaker 2: I would have said the same thing. I would have
Speaker 2: said the same thing, but.
Speaker 1: It wasn't your intention was it.
Speaker 3: Was not my idea and it was not my intention.
Speaker 3: But I certainly wouldn't be here with Mum and MEA
Speaker 3: wouldn't be what it was no, if it wasn't for
Speaker 3: the two of us, Like he wouldn't have done it
Speaker 3: without me, and I certainly wouldn't have done it without him,
Speaker 3: and I wasn't. I'd already been doing it by myself
Speaker 3: for eighteen months, and i'd, you know, made no money
Speaker 3: for eighteen months. I'd built an audience, but I didn't
Speaker 3: know how to monetize it. I didn't have the skills
Speaker 3: or the bandwidth to do it, and I didn't have
Speaker 3: the vision that he did for the business. It's not
Speaker 3: I've got a business brain, but not the big picture
Speaker 3: business and not the you know, I don't.
Speaker 2: I can't.
Speaker 3: I wouldn't say I can't read a spreadsheet. I remember
Speaker 3: Zoe Foster Blake said to me that when she first
Speaker 3: started go to and she has a couple of business
Speaker 3: partners co partners, and she said she'd sit in meetings
Speaker 3: at first and be like, I don't understand the numbers,
Speaker 3: and then she's like, and then I realized that wasn't
Speaker 3: cute anymore. I don't do it to be cute, but
Speaker 3: I also like, I just can't things that I I mean,
Speaker 3: I suppose I could, and she has had to teach herself,
Speaker 3: but there's no way I could do what I have
Speaker 3: to do if I also had to.
Speaker 2: Do the other stuff. And I'm just not that good
Speaker 2: at the other stuff.
Speaker 1: Okay, but how good are you at being a wife?
Speaker 2: In terrible of all the r so bad?
Speaker 1: So let's just have a moment's pause for poor jas.
Speaker 3: He's very He's the nurture in this in our run.
Speaker 3: It's not that I don't nurture the kids and I
Speaker 3: don't love him. I love him, Madling. We've just celebrated
Speaker 3: our twenty fifth wedding anniversary.
Speaker 2: How did you celebrate for the first time?
Speaker 3: We remembered, Oh, and we went out to dinner, and
Speaker 3: we've ever done that before. Really, we're not like that,
Speaker 3: Like when we don't give each other presents. We're not
Speaker 3: present people. It's not our love language. We're real homebodies.
Speaker 3: We love staying at home. So I often think that
Speaker 3: if you've got a certain if every relationship has a
Speaker 3: certain amount of petrol in the tank, yes, until it
Speaker 3: sort of just runs out. Yeah, working together just you
Speaker 3: you know, uses up that petrol.
Speaker 1: Well, that's why that's why I ask. Yeah, I can't
Speaker 1: even conceive of Like earlier last year, I was kind
Speaker 1: of in between managers. And Peter, my husband who I
Speaker 1: also love, who I've been with for twenty one years,
Speaker 1: he was kind of helping out for a while and
Speaker 1: it was really terrible, not because he's terrible, he's really
Speaker 1: good at business and is whatever sexy, but the marrying that, yeah,
Speaker 1: marrying a thing. The fantasy is that you're going to
Speaker 1: go in like do you ever go into Jason's office,
Speaker 1: shut the door behind you and just kind of take
Speaker 1: you up.
Speaker 2: Because that's great.
Speaker 3: Can you imagine if we touch each other in meetings
Speaker 3: or something, Everyone's like ew, mum and dad, ew, No,
Speaker 3: we don't do that. And that's why it's probably been
Speaker 3: the best thing for our business and probably the worst
Speaker 3: thing for our relationship is being in business.
Speaker 2: Although I've also seen.
Speaker 3: Relationships where both couples are pulling in different directions. Either
Speaker 3: one of them has a big job and the everyone doesn't,
Speaker 3: or they've both got big jobs or whatever, and there's
Speaker 3: that constant competitiveness of whose job is more important or
Speaker 3: whose role is more important.
Speaker 1: And a lot of actors, if actors go out with
Speaker 1: other actors, they have a very similar kind of imagine
Speaker 1: what that would be like terrible madness to go out
Speaker 1: with it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I think.
Speaker 3: You know, for us, we've at least always been pulling
Speaker 3: in the same direction, you know, and in that way
Speaker 3: it's very efficient. So we've been able to tag team
Speaker 3: with kids and with work. But it means that you
Speaker 3: can't like a couple of years ago, Jace had a
Speaker 3: tried to have a sabbatical for three months, and he
Speaker 3: could have a sabbatical from the business, but he couldn't
Speaker 3: have a sabbatical from.
Speaker 1: His wife, who is also part of the business.
Speaker 3: And so when I would bring him and you know,
Speaker 3: want to talk about something or be upset about something,
Speaker 3: that was really hard.
Speaker 2: So it's like he.
Speaker 3: Couldn't get away from me and from me. And since
Speaker 3: we've appointed a new CEO this year and he has
Speaker 3: moved into this role of executive chairman and he is
Speaker 3: not we don't work together day to day anymore. That's
Speaker 3: been so good, Oh my god, we've rediscovered each other.
Speaker 2: Wonderful. Yeah, it's been wonderful.
Speaker 1: Because there are aspects that you I mean, you just
Speaker 1: can't serve us all parts at the same time.
Speaker 3: And it's really hard to be in meeting with someone
Speaker 3: you know, so like you behave a certain way at home,
Speaker 3: and like you know, when you're partner shitting you, you
Speaker 3: give them a look across the table or you whatever.
Speaker 2: Fact.
Speaker 3: And then we're in meetings and some people here have
Speaker 3: been in those meetings, you know, many years ago when
Speaker 3: we would have discussions, we'd have Barney's about work, and
Speaker 3: they'd be sort of uncomfortable. People get used to it
Speaker 3: pretty quickly, but one time I had to say, you
Speaker 3: know that other people can see the look that you're
Speaker 3: giving me across the table, and he would have to
Speaker 3: say the same to me, because you kind of just
Speaker 3: forget that you've got to behave in a way in
Speaker 3: front of other people. Yes, and it's yeah, it's really
Speaker 3: it's been really challenging. But I'm very proud that we
Speaker 3: are still married, yeah, and that we have continued to
Speaker 3: build the business together. And hopefully now that we're able
Speaker 3: to you know, bring in new people and take a
Speaker 3: step back, it means that we'll be able to be
Speaker 3: married again and also just have some space from each other. Yes,
Speaker 3: you know, yeh, Like it's quite nice to get home
Speaker 3: and go how is your day and not know, yeah,
Speaker 3: you know, that's quite nice.
Speaker 2: Looking forward to seeing each other.
Speaker 1: Okay, So if your plan is to make some more
Speaker 1: time for yourself, really, and how would you feel that?
Speaker 1: And it's not gonna be empty time if I.
Speaker 2: Know you, No, But is that.
Speaker 1: Commensurate with what Jace wants for himself as well?
Speaker 3: The difference is that he loves Muma, Mea, and and
Speaker 3: our core purpose being to make the water a better
Speaker 3: place for women girls actually came from him. I couldn't
Speaker 3: articulate it, which is very embarrassing because I'm the writer
Speaker 3: in the family, but he was the one. And I
Speaker 3: remember he wrote it down on a piece of paper
Speaker 3: and he's like, I think it's this and because I
Speaker 3: was more just like it's the vibe, yes, the women
Speaker 3: and the vibe because I've like, it's the water ice women.
Speaker 3: I couldn't even articulate it, but he could. So he
Speaker 3: obviously feels very strongly about our core purpose, but he's
Speaker 3: got lots of interests and hobbies and things that he
Speaker 3: wants to do outside of Mumma.
Speaker 1: We're so well.
Speaker 3: The problem is that my hobby, it is my work,
Speaker 3: which is I think been one of the big drivers
Speaker 3: of mum and Maya. But it makes it very hard
Speaker 3: to rest it really does. And so for me, the
Speaker 3: time that I get closest to resting is I have
Speaker 3: a day a week with Luna, which being a grandmother
Speaker 3: is so different to being a mother in that you
Speaker 3: just can be very present.
Speaker 2: Because it's like one day. I know people say that, Yeah,
Speaker 2: I know, I never understood it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I don't understand. I still don't understand that.
Speaker 3: You know, it is all of the same amount of love.
Speaker 3: It's actually really weird because it's all of the same
Speaker 3: amount of love, except they don't live in your house,
Speaker 3: which is kind of wonderful, but also.
Speaker 2: You're coming to them devastation every time.
Speaker 3: But there's no mental load. There's not one bit of
Speaker 3: mental load. There's no guilt, you know, like I'm not like,
Speaker 3: oh no, what if she hasn't eaten enough vegetables? Yeah right,
Speaker 3: bake beans again, like she hat a bicky likes just love.
Speaker 2: It's just love.
Speaker 3: And it's not like she stayed the night. She stays
Speaker 3: night a lot now, but the first time she said
Speaker 3: the night, and if she does stay and she wakes
Speaker 3: up in the night when she was a little bit younger,
Speaker 3: and you know that feeling when your baby wakes up
Speaker 3: in the night, or you totally wakes up the night
Speaker 3: your kid. You've got like there's a lot of feelings.
Speaker 3: It's like irritation and resentment and a bit of panic
Speaker 3: and what if this never what if I never sleep?
Speaker 1: But then you're also pleased to see them in.
Speaker 3: A weird well yeah, and then I scanned my body
Speaker 3: for any feelings of any negative feelings.
Speaker 2: Not one. It was just like, yay, I get to.
Speaker 3: Sniff a little face, I get to like give her
Speaker 3: a little cuddle and give her a bottle, and what
Speaker 3: you Oh, that's been fraught. She calls me nana, So
Speaker 3: I thought I didn't want to be called nana and
Speaker 3: whole anxiety, which I think is really common in people
Speaker 3: when they become particular grandmothers. Yeah, because it's about your
Speaker 3: identity and grandma. Like it suddenly seems very important not
Speaker 3: to be called nana or grandma because I think what
Speaker 3: it meant for us was a little old lady with
Speaker 3: gray hair whose wife was over and we don't hear
Speaker 3: she like that. I don't think she you know, like me,
Speaker 3: so I don't.
Speaker 2: Really.
Speaker 3: This is when I was going through my whole identity crisis.
Speaker 3: I didn't want to be that and so it became
Speaker 3: very important to not be called that and to be
Speaker 3: called maybe me and me, I would decide, babies decide, don't. Well,
Speaker 3: she just didn't call me anything. But what you don't
Speaker 3: realize is that, for the first I don't know until
Speaker 3: they can talk, it's not about what they call you,
Speaker 3: or not about what you call yourself. It's about what
Speaker 3: everyone else calls you, because it's like here, you know,
Speaker 3: let's here's nana or here you go to And so
Speaker 3: every time they'd say grandma, I die a little bit inside, right,
Speaker 3: And then I just realized, stop sucking making, trying to
Speaker 3: make me happen. It's not gonna happen. No one's calling
Speaker 3: you that. It's like trying to give yourself a nickname.
Speaker 1: It doesn't work.
Speaker 2: Yes, And so I just went, you know, I loved
Speaker 2: my nana so much. My kids call my mum Nana.
Speaker 2: I'm like, I'll be Nana.
Speaker 3: There's only two people who could be Nana, and I'll
Speaker 3: be one of them. And then I had my latest
Speaker 3: neuroses was that she also called Jesse's mum nana.
Speaker 1: Oh, so how do you different?
Speaker 3: I went into a panic, and I'm like, then I
Speaker 3: tried to get her a call because Jess's mum's so
Speaker 3: so cruisy, and so I'm like, maybe call her Nan.
Speaker 3: And I was trying to control what she called her
Speaker 3: and was just like, knock yourself out, whatever you want
Speaker 3: to be called. But now she just I tried to
Speaker 3: get her to call and Nan, but she won't and
Speaker 3: so we're both nana and I'm just like.
Speaker 2: Who gives a shit? And you can tell he well, lots.
Speaker 3: Of people I said it on out that and lots
Speaker 3: of it was very funny conversation. Everyone was telling me
Speaker 3: how they they had two nana's, but one was like.
Speaker 1: Husband's got old Nana, We've got old Nana, Lil, we've
Speaker 1: got Nana ree his mum Marie.
Speaker 2: So kids work it out. They know the difference.
Speaker 3: But that speaks to my insecurity because I'm all about leaderboards,
Speaker 3: and I was worried that I would be low down
Speaker 3: on the leaderboard of who she loved. This is how
Speaker 3: I think about things.
Speaker 1: Do you think that, because I honestly, if there was
Speaker 1: anyone to delight a child, it's your elf and energy.
Speaker 1: Like seriously, well maybe in security.
Speaker 3: It's insecurity, I guess, but it's also how I make
Speaker 3: sense of the world because I'm sort of chaotic and
Speaker 3: I need to I like rules and I like to
Speaker 3: know where I stand. I like feedback, I like I
Speaker 3: like knowing things. So I was very much well at
Speaker 3: the top of the leaderboards Jesse and then Luca, and
Speaker 3: then Claire, Jesse's twin sister, and then Anne, Jesse's mum, and.
Speaker 2: Then maybe me. So I'm like, okay, I'm number five.
Speaker 3: So Anne suggested that I just be called five, and
Speaker 3: I was like, I got really upset about that, and
Speaker 3: because anyway, it's just I told you I've been how
Speaker 3: I lost the last two years, like it's been, I've
Speaker 3: been all over the shop.
Speaker 2: And I've not known who I am.
Speaker 1: I think because I've seen you a little bit fleetingly
Speaker 1: in those times and always lovely actually, but it's felt
Speaker 1: to me like you're rebuilding.
Speaker 2: Yes, that's exactly right.
Speaker 3: I could see it like being in a crystalis yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 3: and not that I was a caterpillar and now in
Speaker 3: Butterfly it's not like that.
Speaker 2: But it was like it was.
Speaker 3: A different phase of my life and a different you know,
Speaker 3: it doesn't You don't just go from one chapter to
Speaker 3: the next chapter.
Speaker 1: And transitions are very painful and no matter where they are,
Speaker 1: a new job, new, like anything.
Speaker 2: That's very hard, that's very what you leave behind and fear.
Speaker 1: But stepping into the unknown is always uncertainty.
Speaker 2: I'm not good with any of that. I'm really not
Speaker 2: good with. But criminals, I don't.
Speaker 1: I think most people aren't.
Speaker 2: Really.
Speaker 1: I just think you expect more of yourself. I don't
Speaker 1: know what I mean. I get very impatient. I'm like
Speaker 1: when I again, I know I'm the side.
Speaker 2: Are we there yet? Are we there yet? Am I
Speaker 2: in this new phase? Yet? Do I understand who I am? Yet?
Speaker 2: And it was years of not.
Speaker 3: Not knowing what I wanted not knowing, and I just
Speaker 3: find that very inefficient.
Speaker 1: Mayor Friedman, please stay to laugh to this wheat break
Speaker 1: twisted my own. I'm just thinking about what you've built,
Speaker 1: and I mean you built it for women, women and girls,
Speaker 1: but I think the woman and the girl that you
Speaker 1: built it for was yourself, because do you know what
Speaker 1: I mean? If you think about if you think about
Speaker 1: the conversations that happen every day and the things that
Speaker 1: everyone's exposed to and that you bring to people, and
Speaker 1: the little nugget of cheese or the dead mouse that
Speaker 1: the cat leaves at the doorstep. All of that seems
Speaker 1: like it might have been for you to find yourself
Speaker 1: or to bring something to yourself.
Speaker 3: Yes, I think because I am so basic, I'm very common,
Speaker 3: and I say that in a way like I'm very.
Speaker 2: I am very ordinary.
Speaker 3: And the thing that I feel and the things that
Speaker 3: I'm interested in are not the things that everybody feels
Speaker 3: and they're interested in, But a lot of people feel
Speaker 3: and are interested in those things too. So often I'm
Speaker 3: always an observer of my own behavior, and I know
Speaker 3: that when my behavior is shifting from a consumer point
Speaker 3: of view, a content more likely that correct. So like
Speaker 3: when I didn't know how to start a business and
Speaker 3: I started a lady startup, or when I was interested
Speaker 3: in perimenopause but there was nothing out there and it
Speaker 3: felt very uncool, and we started the very we did
Speaker 3: the very Perry Summit. And it's kind of like, what's next,
Speaker 3: What's next?
Speaker 1: What is next? I'm working on something.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm working on a little secret thing. Oh yeah,
Speaker 3: And it's not secret because I'm being koy.
Speaker 2: It's secret because I just want to see what it is. Like.
Speaker 3: One of the things I find I'm not suited to
Speaker 3: being in a business of this size.
Speaker 2: I'm just not.
Speaker 3: I don't have the patience for it. I don't have
Speaker 3: I just I don't want to be in meetings and
Speaker 3: I have to go through layers, and you need all
Speaker 3: of that at a company the size. You need processes
Speaker 3: and layers and strategies and schedules. I just want to
Speaker 3: work on a couple of little things and it's still
Speaker 3: a bit embryonic.
Speaker 2: And until it's done, I don't commercialize it. I don't
Speaker 2: want to, and don't jinx it. It's not even jinxing it.
Speaker 3: It's just that I'll kind of lose energy for it
Speaker 3: and lose interest in it, because you know, the economics
Speaker 3: of making content is that it'll have to be sold,
Speaker 3: and it will have to be sponsored, and we'll have
Speaker 3: to you know, we'll have to work out when in
Speaker 3: the schedule it should happen, and blah blah blah, and
Speaker 3: all of that. I completely understand, because I think a
Speaker 3: lot of people don't get that content costs money to create.
Speaker 1: You know why now, because we're used to getting it
Speaker 1: for nothing. Yes, people don't even buy a newspaper anymore.
Speaker 2: But do you know what we pay money for water.
Speaker 3: We understand that water cost money, and yet content is
Speaker 3: really undervalued. And I think that's both the best and
Speaker 3: worst thing about the Internet. You know, it's democratized who
Speaker 3: can make content, which I think is wonderful. I couldn't
Speaker 3: have built a media company without the Internet with Jays,
Speaker 3: but you know I couldn't.
Speaker 2: I couldn't buy a TV license or you.
Speaker 3: Know, start my own magae buy a TV license now exactly,
Speaker 3: get one for a hundred.
Speaker 2: But that's been good.
Speaker 3: But the bad thing is that people think that it
Speaker 3: doesn't take time and effort.
Speaker 1: And expertise to create good quality content. Yes, and this
Speaker 1: is good quality content, really good quality content. This is
Speaker 1: like if I think about the things that I've got
Speaker 1: through Mamamera, and I've not been the most avid consumer
Speaker 1: of anything online, particularly not through those years of intense
Speaker 1: child rearing and stuff and leukemia and all of that.
Speaker 1: So I wasn't I've just been like a.
Speaker 3: How do you think that that experience of having your
Speaker 3: eldest get leukemia? How do you think I know you're
Speaker 3: not a very online person. No, how do you think
Speaker 3: it would have been made either better or worse by
Speaker 3: having the Internet at that time, both for community because
Speaker 3: I know a lot of people who've either the loved
Speaker 3: ones with cancer of cancer themselves who whether it's group chats,
Speaker 3: you know, what was your village through that time.
Speaker 2: Because you're also to keep it secret.
Speaker 1: Yes, well secret, not to our friends and not to
Speaker 1: our neighbors, and not to in fact, most of the
Speaker 1: people in the media knew about it.
Speaker 2: I found that extraordinary.
Speaker 3: Yes, I didn't know about it, and not that we
Speaker 3: knew each.
Speaker 2: Other well then, and I was in Melbourne, you're in city, yes,
Speaker 2: But the.
Speaker 3: Fact that the media, particularly the Melbourne media, knew and
Speaker 3: it was such an open secret and everybody kept it
Speaker 3: quiet for the years, I thought was such a tribute
Speaker 3: to how you're the esteem in which you're held in
Speaker 3: our industry because that.
Speaker 2: Was a big story.
Speaker 1: It was a big story, really, and at the time
Speaker 1: I think, I mean talk about hanging by three and
Speaker 1: I don't think I had the energy to even address it,
Speaker 1: and it was twofold. It was partly that it was Lewis,
Speaker 1: our eldest son, who was six when he was diagnosed,
Speaker 1: and partly it was not our story to tell. We
Speaker 1: were like the custodian of him through this terrible time.
Speaker 1: But also I didn't have the energy. I didn't even
Speaker 1: have the energy to like sometimes if I'd bump into
Speaker 1: someone I saw and they'd go house Lewis, I didn't
Speaker 1: even have that. Oh, so the thought of taking on
Speaker 1: then the media aspect of it was completely.
Speaker 3: You had this circle that closed around you. But similar
Speaker 3: to you know, so self indulgent me saying I was
Speaker 3: so burnt out and it was so hard deciding what
Speaker 3: to be called. You had a child that was battling
Speaker 3: cancer and you had to turn up at work on
Speaker 3: breakfast radio every single day. It's not like you could
Speaker 3: say I'm taking a year off.
Speaker 1: No. But also this is why I understand what you're
Speaker 1: saying about work. Work is a salvation. Work is a
Speaker 1: salvation for us. I mean, yeah, it is for us,
Speaker 1: and it was for me, and it just to have
Speaker 1: a place where and I didn't tune up every day.
Speaker 1: And there were a couple of people that were just
Speaker 1: so fantastic, other comedians who were like call us any time,
Speaker 1: you know, Mick molloy and Halliah and.
Speaker 2: Will be there.
Speaker 1: They had your back. Yeah, they were fantastic. I was
Speaker 1: doing breakfast Radio with Hughesy in Melbourne at the time,
Speaker 1: but there were times when it would be the only time.
Speaker 1: Sometimes I'd only get in there once for the week, right,
Speaker 1: and it would be the only time in the week
Speaker 1: that wasn't about cancer, the only time. And so even
Speaker 1: though I was a bit wobbly, I was very hollow inside.
Speaker 1: But the muscles that you train, and I think this
Speaker 1: in life anyway. I always say it to my children.
Speaker 1: The muscles that you train will be your strongest muscles.
Speaker 1: And because I had been doing breakfast radio for so
Speaker 1: many years, and doing breakfast radio you have to wake
Speaker 1: up whistling and it's like you coming into the office here. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So my muscles to be optimistic, to be cheerful, to
Speaker 1: be funny, yeah, just and to be and to enjoy
Speaker 1: the world are very strong muscles. And so I get
Speaker 1: really annoyed in my household when people are grumpy. I
Speaker 1: hate fucking bad mood people.
Speaker 2: Yep, but you're not. That's interesting because the downside of
Speaker 2: that is toxic positivity. But you're not that.
Speaker 1: What is toxic positivity?
Speaker 3: That's kind of like look at the bright side.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, yeah, no, no, no, I no, I don't
Speaker 1: think I'm that.
Speaker 3: It's like forcing everybody to not be able to experience
Speaker 3: their full range of emotions. You're not that, because that
Speaker 3: can be quite controlling and quite toxic.
Speaker 1: No, but I think it's more about, certainly breakfast radio,
Speaker 1: which is probably a metaphor for life. You're waking up
Speaker 1: to the world. My job is to give listeners the
Speaker 1: gift of faith. Faith in the day, faith that everything
Speaker 1: will be all right, Faith that you are not alone
Speaker 1: going through this, Faith that once you get out there,
Speaker 1: it's going to be great. It'll be fine. It won't
Speaker 1: be without challenges, but you're going to be fine because
Speaker 1: you've got me, you've got him, we've got us. And
Speaker 1: that also things in the world that might be ludicrous,
Speaker 1: that might be frightening if you stop, if you don't
Speaker 1: walk into the dark room with your eyes shut because
Speaker 1: you're scared of what you see. But if you actually
Speaker 1: open your eyes and you look across the room, there's
Speaker 1: someone else there. You can turn that moment into something humorous.
Speaker 2: So who is that for you?
Speaker 3: If you were that for everyone during that dark time,
Speaker 3: who is that for you?
Speaker 1: My mother in law, Marie Peter's mum Peter to a
Speaker 1: certain extent, but that was also very hard, that was
Speaker 1: you know, a lot of relationships break up. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: and kids also, I'm very you know, cognizant of the
Speaker 1: fact we had a good outcome.
Speaker 2: So and was touching.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and the people that didn't, the children that fell
Speaker 1: along the way.
Speaker 3: Would you sometimes in breaks just cry or you would
Speaker 3: just be in there and you would be like, right,
Speaker 3: the shutters are coming up or they're coming down, but
Speaker 3: I'm like no.
Speaker 1: In the break, we'd be talking about what was going on.
Speaker 1: Hu's at some point go say, how are things?
Speaker 2: How's it? Louis?
Speaker 1: We talk about it, and then you.
Speaker 2: Would just clicking to gear and click out.
Speaker 1: Sometimes sometimes that was not not so much clicky, but
Speaker 1: you just have to start the scene again, what are
Speaker 1: you going to do? Four years?
Speaker 2: In my head, it was two four years.
Speaker 1: So for boys because of the lakini he had, because
Speaker 1: it hides, it hides in the lining, in the in
Speaker 1: the spinal cord and in the brain lining, and in
Speaker 1: boys in the testicles. So for girls the treatment is
Speaker 1: some good news. For girls, the treatment's much shorter. The
Speaker 1: girls four years boys, yeah, four years four years of
Speaker 1: chema yeah yeah, lumber punctures.
Speaker 2: You had more children in that time, didn't you.
Speaker 1: Know, I'd had I'd had Yarny. My youngest was five
Speaker 1: months old when Lewis was diagnosed, so we had four
Speaker 1: under six, and so when Lewis was diagnosed, I had
Speaker 1: to stop feeding Yarny, obviously our youngest. And like it
Speaker 1: was just like our daughter went to school too soon,
Speaker 1: because it was like, everybody's got to get out of
Speaker 1: the house because we're going to be at the hospital.
Speaker 1: Everyone's got to get on with things. Chop chop. Like
Speaker 1: it was a bit like that, and we didn't mean
Speaker 1: to be brutal, but it did. There was a period
Speaker 1: in which anyone else's ailment.
Speaker 2: A lot of sympathy.
Speaker 1: Yeah, because at one stage, Yanni, this is the worst
Speaker 1: thing in the world, had a broken wrist for two
Speaker 1: days and we didn't realize it because it wasn't lukem here.
Speaker 1: And it was only when Ray came over and she
Speaker 1: grabbed him to swing him around by his you know,
Speaker 1: grabbed him his hands swinging in a circle, and he
Speaker 1: let out this blood curdling yelp and it had a
Speaker 1: broken wrist from where he jumped off the bottom stamp.
Speaker 3: And how did you find the because you know, the
Speaker 3: squeaky wheel gets the oil. So you know, you are
Speaker 3: biologically programmed to focus all your attention on the weakest
Speaker 3: link and the most vulnerable, which was for four years.
Speaker 3: So at what point did that stop? Like, how did
Speaker 3: you get to the point where you trusted his recovery
Speaker 3: and you could look at your other kids and go mmmm.
Speaker 3: I mean, I'm sure it wasn't like a click up thing,
Speaker 3: but how did you navigate that?
Speaker 1: So when Lewis finished treatment, we stopped doing breakfast radio
Speaker 1: after twelve years men Hughsey, and he wanted to do
Speaker 1: more stand up, which is the opposite of you.
Speaker 2: Know, did you want to keep going?
Speaker 1: No? No, I didn't want to keep going, but I
Speaker 1: was happy for him to make the decision. I went unhappy.
Speaker 2: Whatever you want. Why didn't you want to keep going?
Speaker 2: The money's amazing.
Speaker 1: Because I wanted to have a time at home with
Speaker 1: yarny apropos boy to school, Yes exactly, because he had
Speaker 1: been like from the womb untimely ripped or from the
Speaker 1: boob untimely ripped. And I was always conscious of the
Speaker 1: fact that we had this little one who I had
Speaker 1: really not got to spend much time with her. If
Speaker 1: I did, it was in between hospital visits, and you know,
Speaker 1: so I took that. It turned out to be a year.
Speaker 1: I didn't know how long it was going to be.
Speaker 1: We finished during breakfast Radio, had a gorgeous fee Well,
Speaker 1: it was just beautiful, and I thought it might be forever.
Speaker 1: You know, when you worry you, No, it didn't worry me. No,
Speaker 1: it didn't worry me.
Speaker 3: But you went from making all of this money like
Speaker 3: the breakfast Radio particularly then not so much now, but
Speaker 3: then big best and biggest and most high profile job.
Speaker 2: You guys were iconic.
Speaker 3: Yeah, did you feel the need or you just felt
Speaker 3: I need to just catch my breath now, I think so.
Speaker 1: And then Peter uttered a phrase which as a modern woman,
Speaker 1: I had never heard in my life, and it was
Speaker 1: one of the greatest things any man has. It is
Speaker 1: the greatest thing any man's ever said to me. He said, darling,
Speaker 1: you don't have to work. I can look after both
Speaker 1: of us. My wowd God, suck it suck. It's like so,
Speaker 1: and I remember at the time you been the breadwinner
Speaker 1: before that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you wear a lot of bread.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and you need a lot of bread for six people,
Speaker 1: Yeah you do. And so we'd made one of those
Speaker 1: decisions you know, the you know, practical decision that because
Speaker 1: I would earn more money than him, that he so
Speaker 1: he did that. Probably he was at home for probably
Speaker 1: about eighteen months, and then it just wasn't good for him.
Speaker 1: It was never a point of he was never like
Speaker 1: I don't want to do this. He was never resentful
Speaker 1: or whatever. But I'm just like working man wasn't enough
Speaker 1: for he needs to work. Yeah, like a working dog
Speaker 1: needs to work.
Speaker 2: Yeah. So I'm like, I'm working, I need to work.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So anyway, so it actually gave me the liberty to
Speaker 1: say I'm going to be at home. I'm going to
Speaker 1: be at home, and it was such a great only
Speaker 1: ended up being one year, and it was a very
Speaker 1: challenging year from what I recall, Well, because I was
Speaker 1: at home.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I was going to stay careful.
Speaker 1: What you wish I was at home?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Did you feel irrelevant?
Speaker 1: I probably felt more irrelevant when we went and lived
Speaker 1: in Italy when we were in an Italian class and
Speaker 1: I said, and I thought, I was so proud with myself.
Speaker 1: I said, I'm I'm Molieria Cassa or whatever, I'm housewife.
Speaker 1: And if I said that in Australia at least a
Speaker 1: couple of people.
Speaker 3: In the road laugh and go, oh yeah, catlin Brook
Speaker 3: because they're like, yeah, it wasn't ironic.
Speaker 1: She is she's a housewife. Yeah.
Speaker 3: Interesting, So that was like a stripping back of ego
Speaker 3: because nobody knew you.
Speaker 1: That totally very great. I heartily recommend it, heartily. That's
Speaker 1: why I do yoga, because I need I need the humiliation. Yes,
Speaker 1: that's true.
Speaker 2: I have to having teenagers. What do you do? We're
Speaker 2: having teenage I don't count them.
Speaker 1: I don't count that. I don't count the steam's too high,
Speaker 1: terrible time. No, yeah, you grown up children. I know
Speaker 1: I bring, but I just don't. I can't take that on.
Speaker 1: It's like women, you know, when you go shopping with
Speaker 1: a teenage daughter. You see it all the time at
Speaker 1: any Westfield and there's a woman with a certain posture.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, and the girls with it, and I'm just like,
Speaker 1: what are we doing?
Speaker 2: You do get through that?
Speaker 3: Like I'm now at the point because I know what
Speaker 3: you mean, I've done. I didn't realize that you would
Speaker 3: ever get through it. But my daughter, who just turned nineteen,
Speaker 3: now we can go shopping and it's delightful.
Speaker 2: I think our girls are the same.
Speaker 3: It's delightful and I will actually ask her advice and
Speaker 3: she'll give it to me without making me feel like
Speaker 3: a piece of shit.
Speaker 1: Yeah, because I noticed, because I'm always, I think too
Speaker 1: maybe too aware of not giving them too much power,
Speaker 1: because you don't want to end up being one of
Speaker 1: those women whose self esteem has just been totally strip
Speaker 1: mind like a sloth scratching at a tree truck. There's
Speaker 1: nothing left because they've had years of should I where this?
Speaker 2: And the door's going? Where the gray one? Yeah? No, No,
Speaker 2: can't give away too much. You can't.
Speaker 1: Can't. Power is very important, and no matter where you
Speaker 1: find that power like you might be the nurturer, you
Speaker 1: might be the cook, you might be the one who's
Speaker 1: magical with the grandchildren. You might be doesn't matter. But
Speaker 1: you need to have a little patch of territory that's yours.
Speaker 1: And now I've got your fucking patch of territory. God,
Speaker 1: thank god, no one will try not to break it.
Speaker 2: You're so good at this.
Speaker 3: I can't think of anyone who is going to be better.
Speaker 3: I can't wait to be listening every single week. And
Speaker 3: what an honor to be your first guest. Literally, no
Speaker 3: one else in the building.
Speaker 1: Anyway. I love you, I love you. Enjoy your secret
Speaker 1: square well and some sunsha.
Speaker 2: You'll be the first one to know.
Speaker 1: So Maya has left the building and you are now
Speaker 1: in my culpable hands. Come back, Maya, Oh no, she's gone.
Speaker 1: I'll see you next week. The executive producer of No
Speaker 1: Filter is Naima Brown, Senior producer Grace ruverret producer Charlie Blackman,
Speaker 1: Audio production and sound design by Jacob Brown. And I'm
Speaker 1: your host Kateline Brook.