Speaker 1: You're listening to I'm im a mea podcast.
Speaker 2: Hello and welcome to Unleashed podcast for gen X women
Speaker 2: who need a laugh.
Speaker 3: If you know Sheira is the princess of power?
Speaker 1: Yep?
Speaker 2: Have you every word to greet me? And had more
Speaker 2: fluo in your wardrobe than a road crew?
Speaker 3: Yes, you're in the right place.
Speaker 2: Yes, now, who is on the sofa this week?
Speaker 1: I'm Sally Hipworth and I'm an author.
Speaker 4: I'm Mary Kustas, I'm an actress writer.
Speaker 5: I'm Bruna Pependrea and I'm a film and TV producer.
Speaker 2: And I'm Cas Mahoney I'm a comedian. Wherever you're listening,
Speaker 2: unclenching your clinch your pelvic floor and get ready to unleash.
Speaker 3: Ye Okay, who's starting us off this time?
Speaker 1: I am busting to get this off my chest?
Speaker 4: Oh please do.
Speaker 1: Last week there.
Speaker 6: Was a number of messages on my daughter's school WhatsApp
Speaker 6: school Chats school chat for year eight, and the first
Speaker 6: message said something along the lines of my daughter Vanessa
Speaker 6: using fake names, had.
Speaker 1: Her blazer stolen from her locker. And I looked at
Speaker 1: it and thought, okay, fine, let's.
Speaker 3: All move on.
Speaker 6: And then the next thing, someone emojied the message with.
Speaker 1: A shocked face.
Speaker 7: Oh drama, Sally.
Speaker 6: And then someone else wrote back and said, I hope
Speaker 6: you've taken it to the school.
Speaker 1: This stuff has to stop.
Speaker 4: Stop it.
Speaker 6: And I was looking at it live thinking and then
Speaker 6: someone said, well, the other day my Duty's pencil case
Speaker 6: was stolen.
Speaker 4: No, I've stolen her name. Yes, please go ahead.
Speaker 6: I'm reading these messages and this is a new school,
Speaker 6: so I don't have a lot of mums to start
Speaker 6: a snarky side. But all I want to scream is,
Speaker 6: you know, Duty's pencil case was not stolen.
Speaker 1: She lost it, you know.
Speaker 6: And Vanessa's blazer it's on the train, you know, it's
Speaker 6: in the lost property. I don't understand why these people
Speaker 6: think that their things were stolen, Like if it was
Speaker 6: if it was a vape, you know, or if it
Speaker 6: was an air pods, perhaps it was stolen. But is
Speaker 6: there an underworld pencil case transfer business that I don't
Speaker 6: know about? And it got me thinking. I actually ended
Speaker 6: up going back to my kids and saying, kids, if
Speaker 6: you lost your pencil case or your blazer, and you
Speaker 6: could have sworn that you left it in your locker,
Speaker 6: what would you think had happened, and all three of
Speaker 6: them are.
Speaker 1: Like, oh, we lost it.
Speaker 6: Yeah, And I thought, okay, interesting and probably because I've
Speaker 6: taught them that most things in general in life are
Speaker 6: our fault.
Speaker 3: Correct.
Speaker 4: But sw there's two types of people victims, yeah, or
Speaker 4: there are people that want to have someone to blame
Speaker 4: for everything. Yes, the blame of adults.
Speaker 6: Like I'm actually quite shocked that no one chimed in
Speaker 6: and said it's on the train. Doesn't matter if she
Speaker 6: It's like Judge Judy says, how do you know that
Speaker 6: your teenager is lying?
Speaker 3: Because their mouths removing.
Speaker 7: Judge Judy. It always comes back to Judge comes back.
Speaker 5: I don't know about you, guys, but I find with
Speaker 5: most shall we say, school chats, that the same people
Speaker 5: tend to weigh in. Yes, it's always the same. There
Speaker 5: are those that just watch.
Speaker 7: And here's my problem with school group chats.
Speaker 5: I miss the important stuff because I couldn't give a
Speaker 5: toss about most of what's going on in there, which
Speaker 5: is always like, does anyone have the homework that my
Speaker 5: kid forgot to get? I mean, it's so kind of mundane.
Speaker 5: And then I have genuinely missed some important things because
Speaker 5: of all the stuff around it.
Speaker 2: Yes, I mute or archive chats like that, and it's
Speaker 2: exactly like Bruna said, then you miss the.
Speaker 6: Actual use the points that you need, and we need
Speaker 6: that stuff, we.
Speaker 3: Do, but the other stuff you just think you need
Speaker 3: to have a side group on this alway.
Speaker 5: Yeah, every group chat, you need a side group. But
Speaker 5: my funniest school story when I couldn't stop interfering is
Speaker 5: my kids went to this preschool in Los Angeles and
Speaker 5: they've been with all their friends through all the years,
Speaker 5: and then at one point in the preschool, you're either
Speaker 5: a blueberry or a raspberry, and all their friends were blueberries.
Speaker 5: And I get literally, something had happened that I think
Speaker 5: I had food poisoning. I was in hospital. They might
Speaker 5: have given me some morphine. And I get the email.
Speaker 7: And it says they're raspberries.
Speaker 5: And I go into you'd think someone had like said
Speaker 5: you can't ever leave the country. I was so upset,
Speaker 5: so I write the email of all emails and then
Speaker 5: just let me put it in context. Here they have
Speaker 5: released the class list at this point published from public
Speaker 5: to the other parents. So I have my moment and
Speaker 5: then there's tears involved, and the beautiful woman running in school,
Speaker 5: she writes back, and suddenly the lists are reput out
Speaker 5: into the world, and my kids in our blueberries and
Speaker 5: the greatest line that any other parent has said to me,
Speaker 5: and this is for those people who know The Godfather.
Speaker 5: I just got this email from another father and he said,
Speaker 5: we knew it was Eufredo.
Speaker 4: Very famous line, very famous line in The Godfather.
Speaker 5: And so I was publicly outed. Of course, it was
Speaker 5: so obvious what I've done. But guess what, no regrets,
Speaker 5: no regrets no.
Speaker 4: So, Sally, you're the type of person that says it
Speaker 4: as it is, and you come with a fresh, honest transparency.
Speaker 4: Why didn't you pipe in and say something, Is it
Speaker 4: because it was a new school or you know.
Speaker 1: It's mostly because it's a new school.
Speaker 6: And also it's pretty much because I didn't want my
Speaker 6: daughter to be tainted. If I was the only mum
Speaker 6: that had any logical sense, I did. Actually, after some
Speaker 6: time had passed and it continued to escalate, people were saying, well,
Speaker 6: they should put cameras there to try and catch the thieves,
Speaker 6: and no one was chiming in. I did have one
Speaker 6: other mother who I knew reasonably well, and I started
Speaker 6: the snarky side chat, and she wrote back and said, clearly,
Speaker 6: these people don't have kids with ADHD. We lose three
Speaker 6: lunch boxes, not drink bottles, a blazer, and to set
Speaker 6: a beer ponds every week.
Speaker 1: And I thought, I found my people.
Speaker 2: Okay, it's time for a round of guilty or not
Speaker 2: guilty in our hands. We all have a paddle that
Speaker 2: says guilty on one side, not guilty on the other.
Speaker 2: Everyone has a question that they are sitting on that
Speaker 2: they do not look at until it's their turn. Okay, Mary,
Speaker 2: what is your question? We will answer it.
Speaker 4: Okay, here's the question. I've said, Hey, we should catch
Speaker 4: up soon to someone with zero intention of ever following through.
Speaker 3: That's guilty from.
Speaker 1: Me, guilty for mey guilty unanimous.
Speaker 4: I said something similar without I hope these people don't
Speaker 4: listen to the show. But my daughter was at a
Speaker 4: sporting event and I went to order a coffee and
Speaker 4: they recognized me and they said how they were huge fans.
Speaker 4: And then I got my coffee. I hadn't taken a
Speaker 4: sip yet, and they said, well, we see you again
Speaker 4: next week, and I said absolutely, and then I took
Speaker 4: a sip of the coffee. And it was so shite
Speaker 4: and I thought you will never see me never again.
Speaker 3: Shut down, guilty, shut down.
Speaker 7: Next question.
Speaker 5: Okay, guys, I've snooped through a partner's phone and I'd
Speaker 5: do it again.
Speaker 1: Guilty, guilty, guilty, not guilty.
Speaker 4: Never Mary, Mary is the only Mary. If I've got
Speaker 4: to look through their phone on with the wrong person.
Speaker 5: You've never looked through never Wow, in the past.
Speaker 4: I don't even think it was so long ago. I
Speaker 4: don't even think that they had phones. They probably did,
Speaker 4: but no, I just don't. I just don't question certain
Speaker 4: things are really just.
Speaker 1: Like I do.
Speaker 6: It's not necessarily because they're cheating or I think that
Speaker 6: they're cheating. I just like to keep an eye on
Speaker 6: what they're up to.
Speaker 2: Okay, right, looks like it's my question.
Speaker 3: Okay, ladies.
Speaker 2: I've bought a book put it on my bedside tables,
Speaker 2: so I look like someone who reads.
Speaker 3: But never opened it. It's guilty from me, guilty from me.
Speaker 2: I've got a nice stack that are color coded next
Speaker 2: to my bed, and the candle on that are just
Speaker 2: more of a feature.
Speaker 3: Is that for like? When? When?
Speaker 2: When I ever get lucky?
Speaker 4: And a bit like Kath, I've got them there either
Speaker 4: someone gave them to me with the hope that I
Speaker 4: would read them, or with you know, I think this
Speaker 4: could be nice. They either are someone that has written
Speaker 4: the book or someone that thinks I would like that book.
Speaker 4: But when I write, I know this makes no sense.
Speaker 4: I sort of can't read.
Speaker 5: People say that a lot of people when they're making movies.
Speaker 5: A lot of directors say that they can't watch other movies.
Speaker 1: When they're making a movie.
Speaker 2: I struggle to read when I'm trying to write Mary Coustas,
Speaker 2: We've got one from you.
Speaker 4: Yes, okay. My question is I've told someone their haircut
Speaker 4: looked great when it was a total disaster.
Speaker 3: Guilty, guilty, guilty guilty.
Speaker 1: What else are you supposed to say?
Speaker 6: Like you with the haircut, you have to comment on
Speaker 6: it because it's screaming at you.
Speaker 1: You can't say it looks bad saying that.
Speaker 2: I do love my friend Michelle, who after I spent
Speaker 2: a small fortune in the Sydney hairdressers that is so
Speaker 2: reputable as being amazing, and the guy was unwell when
Speaker 2: he did my color, I literally came out looking like
Speaker 2: you know, the gremlin spike that had like just one
Speaker 2: bit of color and everyone else. So it's fine, and
Speaker 2: Michelle went, I'm calling them now we're going straight back.
Speaker 3: So here's to the friends that tell truth.
Speaker 1: We all need a friend like that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, at Sally hepwis what is your question?
Speaker 1: The question is I think therapy is overrated?
Speaker 4: Oh not guilty, not guilty, guilty guilty? Yeah.
Speaker 2: Wow, there's two of us need to be getting a
Speaker 2: bit more therapy, and it's not us.
Speaker 1: I want to say.
Speaker 6: I have had a lot of therapy, and I all
Speaker 6: continue to read books and self help books and all
Speaker 6: of those things, and I've reached the point now that
Speaker 6: I think it's a little navel gayzy and sometimes we
Speaker 6: need to just get on with our lives.
Speaker 4: Yeah. Well, I, on the other hand, think if you
Speaker 4: think you've got a problem, then maybe you do. And
Speaker 4: if you can talk your problem out and hear yourself
Speaker 4: admit to it and literally be actively looking for a solution,
Speaker 4: then that's a good place to be.
Speaker 7: But you've had a less therapy than most people.
Speaker 3: I know.
Speaker 4: I know, but when I did have it, it was
Speaker 4: super powerful.
Speaker 3: I know.
Speaker 7: But you haven't had a ton of it.
Speaker 4: Do I need more? I'm saying no, no, no, But
Speaker 4: I had a problem I thought I couldn't overcome, and
Speaker 4: I went to a therapist and they gave me the tool,
Speaker 4: and then they gave me the bill.
Speaker 5: I I had a lot of therapy when I was younger,
Speaker 5: and like showering. I just have no time now the therapy.
Speaker 5: And I think that's what my girlfriends are for.
Speaker 1: I agree.
Speaker 4: I agree.
Speaker 3: We've got a sex therapist and I don't have sex.
Speaker 3: Friend of guys.
Speaker 1: It's been a big few weeks at the Hepworth house.
Speaker 1: I have been solo parenting.
Speaker 6: I have had my two parents in and out of hospital.
Speaker 6: I've moved into my new house and the gate's broken,
Speaker 6: the front door has needed three turns to get the
Speaker 6: lock fitted. It's been one thing after another, and the
Speaker 6: most recent thing was last week. I was on the
Speaker 6: way to pick up my daughter from school, got a
Speaker 6: flat tire. Oh no, and it was about twenty past three.
Speaker 6: I had to pick her up at three thirty. I
Speaker 6: am out of options in terms of how am I
Speaker 6: going to get her picked up? And I thought I
Speaker 6: can't get there, what am I going to do? And
Speaker 6: I had this moment in my head where I thought, imagine, Sally,
Speaker 6: you were one of those women who could change attire,
Speaker 6: you know, like I don't know many women like that,
Speaker 6: but imagine, imagine now what I would do is get out,
Speaker 6: get out some sort of winch.
Speaker 5: Yes, you know, you know, I don't know that the
Speaker 5: apparatus I need, but I know about a winch and
Speaker 5: and I and I got the wognuts or whatever they're called.
Speaker 2: It's it's getting confident with Spanish.
Speaker 1: Have any of these tools, right? Like, I don't even know.
Speaker 1: And so I pulled over to the side.
Speaker 6: Of the road and I did what every and I
Speaker 6: called my dad and he was able to pick up Clementine.
Speaker 6: And I then did the second part of what every
Speaker 6: girl would do, and I left the car on the
Speaker 6: side of the road, and I walked home and called
Speaker 6: my boyfriend and he came and tot with it. Now,
Speaker 6: as a single woman, single mother, feminist, all of those things,
Speaker 6: I spent quite a good amount of time thinking, is
Speaker 6: this something that you should have done? Should you have
Speaker 6: turned to your boyfriend and your dad in this moment,
Speaker 6: you know, should you have been able to take care
Speaker 6: of it yourself? And I decided on reflection, absolutely not,
Speaker 6: absolutely not. That was a moment that I was able
Speaker 6: to outsource that bit of my shit life to someone else,
Speaker 6: And actually I was glad that it was men that
Speaker 6: had to deal with it. I wasn't going to call
Speaker 6: any of my girlfriends, my lovely, smart, intelligent girlfriend, well
Speaker 6: dressed girlfriend and make them get on the ground and
Speaker 6: change a time. I wanted to call a man to
Speaker 6: come and take care of it, because how often do
Speaker 6: men actually come and take care of your problems?
Speaker 1: So I want to know, I feel really good about it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I really spent a lot of time on it.
Speaker 6: I want to know, what have you guys accepted that
Speaker 6: you're never going to learn to do?
Speaker 5: I mean, I don't think it's going to come as
Speaker 5: a shock to our listeners or to the friends I
Speaker 5: have here on the couch, but I've almost accepted that
Speaker 5: I'm never going to be able to put on makeup. Ah,
Speaker 5: I don't have you guys. I know, and I know
Speaker 5: we will go down to Mecca. We will try and
Speaker 5: do a lesson. We will, we will try. But I
Speaker 5: have tried, and.
Speaker 1: By the way, I can.
Speaker 2: I thought the other day, God, I can.
Speaker 5: Follow a recipe, I can cook. Yes, It's not like
Speaker 5: I'm totally useless. But when it comes to being a.
Speaker 7: Girl, as we perceive a girl to be.
Speaker 4: I just didn't get the gene.
Speaker 5: I didn't get the style, Geen, I didn't get the
Speaker 5: makeup Jean, didn't get the I can't even blow out
Speaker 5: my own hair, Ladies, I cannot. I'm incapable, And I
Speaker 5: think I just have to accept it an outsource.
Speaker 3: Wow.
Speaker 4: You know what I've accepted. I'll never do is assemble
Speaker 4: anything from my Keea. It is a recipe for divorce.
Speaker 4: I mean seriously. I went to my Ka twice, actually
Speaker 4: three times in three days. Bruner is witness to this.
Speaker 4: On the first occasion, I bought a beautiful glass cabinet,
Speaker 4: pale pink with glass bits and everything, and my daughter
Speaker 4: and I said, we'll do this together. And George, my husband,
Speaker 4: came out and said, now you're going to read the booklet,
Speaker 4: aren't you. You're gonna You're gonna read it all the
Speaker 4: way through, and then you're going to start at the beginning,
Speaker 4: knowing what steps are coming beyond the first step. And
Speaker 4: I said yes. And anyone that's seen me perform live
Speaker 4: knows that I love to improvise. This includes Ikea as well.
Speaker 4: While I got so stressed and my daughter is like
Speaker 4: I like this about her, and yet it's a problem
Speaker 4: because I do believe all our best qualities are our
Speaker 4: worst qualities as well. I got it, Mum. I know
Speaker 4: exactly what I'm doing, and I'm like, great, one of
Speaker 4: us knows what we're doing. Well, three steps in, something
Speaker 4: doesn't fit. Why doesn't this fit? Mama, I'm gonna ask neat, No,
Speaker 4: don't step, don't ask ned Dad comes in with his
Speaker 4: pre prepared monologue. Come on, girls, what did I say?
Speaker 4: You've got to read it all the way through so
Speaker 4: you know what's coming. Long story long. We were under
Speaker 4: so much stress, my daughter and I because we knew
Speaker 4: he was right and we were wrong, and there were
Speaker 4: talks of between the tour then maybe we don't need
Speaker 4: to put the backbits in. Anyway, it was very, very,
Speaker 4: really hard, So I care is one of the things
Speaker 4: I will outsource from this point on. I have tried
Speaker 4: again and again and I've failed.
Speaker 6: Did you end up like thrusting the instruction guide at
Speaker 6: George and storming off?
Speaker 5: No?
Speaker 4: Because I like to get on the other side of
Speaker 4: a problem.
Speaker 3: We persisted.
Speaker 4: When pain persists, call a doctor. I didn't call a doctor.
Speaker 4: George got in there and we dismantled, and we began
Speaker 4: from the beginning and we did it the right way,
Speaker 4: and it took maybe two extra hours, but we got
Speaker 4: there in the air.
Speaker 7: That's just you can't get back.
Speaker 5: I've been brought to tears by trying to put together furniture.
Speaker 5: I just think you either have it not. I don't
Speaker 5: think it's male or female. I think you either have
Speaker 5: that part of your brain works or you do not. Guys,
Speaker 5: I've been avoiding something consistently my whole life.
Speaker 3: What's this, dentist?
Speaker 4: Oh, this would be common.
Speaker 5: This is no small thing for me. When I was younger,
Speaker 5: I had very traumatic experience at the local government dental
Speaker 5: hospital when I had to get braces and I went
Speaker 5: in and I feel like, without any kind of anesthesia,
Speaker 5: they ripped a couple of teeth out and I was
Speaker 5: traumatized for the rest of my life.
Speaker 3: It's horrendous.
Speaker 5: So several times in my life I've let some time
Speaker 5: pass before I visited a dentist.
Speaker 3: How much time we're talking?
Speaker 7: Okay, so the first time.
Speaker 3: Was ten years? What ten years?
Speaker 7: Yes, Cath, you did hear it correctly.
Speaker 5: I did let ten years pass before I set any
Speaker 5: one of my feet in a dentist's office at time.
Speaker 1: What period of your life was this that you didn't
Speaker 1: go for ten years?
Speaker 5: This was, you know, as an adult in my twenties thirties.
Speaker 5: But when it really hit me, I was in Los
Speaker 5: Angeles and married with kids, and my husband was often saying, oh,
Speaker 5: I just came back from the dentist, just another cleaning.
Speaker 4: Do you feel like he was underlining that dentist.
Speaker 5: Yeah, And at one point he did. He said to me,
Speaker 5: when was the last time you went.
Speaker 7: To the dentist. I said, all, oh, it's been a while.
Speaker 7: It might have been a while.
Speaker 5: So finally I was like, okay, Bruna, come on, now
Speaker 5: it's time your kids are going to the dentist. Maybe
Speaker 5: it's time you, you know, manned up and went to
Speaker 5: the dentist. So, of course, when you haven't been to
Speaker 5: a dentist for ten years, you go. There are some issues,
Speaker 5: you know. So there was a lot of work that
Speaker 5: got done, a lot of money spent, a lot of
Speaker 5: work got done. But no, and bear in mind, I
Speaker 5: have no pain threshold at all, so I have to
Speaker 5: be sedated for any kind of dental work. I'm talking
Speaker 5: valuum sedation or like having a Zadax for I going like,
Speaker 5: I have to have sedation.
Speaker 7: I cannot be conscious for any of it.
Speaker 1: So someone has to drive you in and pick you up.
Speaker 5: My husband would drive me in and pick me up anyway,
Speaker 5: so that's cut too. I go, oh, I'm back, okay,
Speaker 5: my teeth are good.
Speaker 7: And then COVID happens, and.
Speaker 5: Suddenly five years later, I'm in Australia and I'm like, oh,
Speaker 5: I haven't been to the dentist again in a few years.
Speaker 3: Five years, years, full five.
Speaker 4: I thought that was hand we check up, so.
Speaker 5: I hate going, but then suddenly I have some major issues.
Speaker 5: So now I'm paying the price. So I had to,
Speaker 5: unfortunately go and they said one of my tooth was done.
Speaker 7: It's dan skis.
Speaker 5: We're gonna have to take it out and put a
Speaker 5: pretend tooth in or what do they called it?
Speaker 7: A veneer.
Speaker 5: Now you might think that's a simple process, but apparently
Speaker 5: that's like a year and a very expensive process. As
Speaker 5: anyone else like knows, they have to deal with things
Speaker 5: and they just put it off.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I've got a medical situation, well a medical thing
Speaker 2: that I'm putting off. I mean, I'm a massive hypochondriac.
Speaker 2: Me too, but I was putting off, going, I have
Speaker 2: like a lump in my boom, so sure.
Speaker 1: They're not crystals that you've put hilarious.
Speaker 6: They're not.
Speaker 2: But I was really putting it off, like because I've
Speaker 2: got really into telehealth. It's COVID, you don't have to
Speaker 2: see the doc. Yeah, But I finally went this week
Speaker 2: and you know, she checked it. I'm going to have
Speaker 2: an ultrasound and stuff next week. She's not worried about it.
Speaker 2: She thinks it's something to do with, you know, perimenopause
Speaker 2: and different sort of whatevers. But we're going to check
Speaker 2: because at three in the morning, that's the I just
Speaker 2: like touch it and roll my hand over it and go, what.
Speaker 6: Is that I.
Speaker 3: Did two years ago? Okay?
Speaker 2: But then I felt like I was a hypochondriac because
Speaker 2: this thing kind of appeared and I was like, I'll
Speaker 2: put it off. But she's like, no, anyway, so have
Speaker 2: my mamogram booked in for next week.
Speaker 6: Good girl, Well I have one that I have been
Speaker 6: putting off. I actually also have health hypochondria. And I
Speaker 6: went to the dermatologist yesterday to get my skin check,
Speaker 6: which was great. I got that off my list. But
Speaker 6: while I was there. The dermatologist said, do you want
Speaker 6: to do anything about your facial hair? Oh? And I
Speaker 6: said what I said, because I have a beard since menopause,
Speaker 6: and and I had been thinking about doing it, but
Speaker 6: you know, it ended up, you know, down the list
Speaker 6: of things because there's a few things going on. And
Speaker 6: I actually really like her, so you know, it wasn't
Speaker 6: that bad. But and she said, you've got to get,
Speaker 6: you know, a move on it before and I'm like,
Speaker 6: before they turn gray and you can't lazer them anymore.
Speaker 1: And it's true o'clock. Yeah, I've finished it off for
Speaker 1: it because I already knew.
Speaker 6: And that's why all of us here, I know, so really,
Speaker 6: So essentially, what she said is that if they're dark,
Speaker 6: or if they're pigmented, go now because you can.
Speaker 1: Do because it's it's it's cheaper. This is there works
Speaker 1: very well.
Speaker 6: But as soon as they're gray, you're on the electrolysis,
Speaker 6: which is much more painful and invasive and expensive.
Speaker 7: Mary, what have you been putting off.
Speaker 4: Dealing with my super?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean I do feel like it could be
Speaker 4: working harder for me. I feel like my super is
Speaker 4: like a cleaner that I've ignored, you know, like how
Speaker 4: cleaners always clean the best on the first time they
Speaker 4: clean your house, and then they start cutting corners, like
Speaker 4: before my cleaner comes and I like this cleaner, but
Speaker 4: I'm still pulling things away from the sides of the walls.
Speaker 4: Like I'll pull out every you know, chopping board away
Speaker 4: from where it leans on the wall so they can
Speaker 4: get behind there and clean there. And I'll pull furniture
Speaker 4: away from the wall so that they get behind the furniture.
Speaker 4: I feel the same with my super that I've you know,
Speaker 4: it's not working for me to the degree where it
Speaker 4: should and I need to sort of manage more of
Speaker 4: my super so that it earns more.
Speaker 7: I don't understand. Can you control your that you can.
Speaker 4: You can go in and you can control and you
Speaker 4: can make some cash and some you know like this,
Speaker 4: there's stuff like this. I do believe for many, many women,
Speaker 4: and I'm speaking very generally, that how we deal with
Speaker 4: our money is a blind spot for us.
Speaker 3: Just super.
Speaker 6: I mean, there are so many things like that that
Speaker 6: if you just ring up with your mortgage, you can
Speaker 6: get you know, just one phone call can get a discount,
Speaker 6: or your or your energy companies or that is a
Speaker 6: constant thing that's on your list, thinking of insurance, the
Speaker 6: car insurance, you know what else? I've been putting off
Speaker 6: a wool wash. Just got this pile of jumpers sitting
Speaker 6: there like they've gone there to die.
Speaker 1: And I look at them every.
Speaker 6: Now and then and I'm like, I know I need
Speaker 6: to do a wool wash, but like I pretty much
Speaker 6: should just put them in the bin because.
Speaker 4: I never winters. Where were we're in winter?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I know, I'll get to it.
Speaker 7: Mary.
Speaker 1: It's been a pretty few weeks.
Speaker 3: I think it's fair.
Speaker 5: So I've never heard the words wool wash.
Speaker 2: What do you mean?
Speaker 1: What about don't I don't like wool.
Speaker 7: I don't. It doesn't.
Speaker 5: It just grades on my skin. So I don't have
Speaker 5: a lot of wool, so I don't have to do
Speaker 5: a wall wash.
Speaker 1: You don't have your cash me or your marine or wool.
Speaker 3: You can't just put it in the.
Speaker 1: Machine because it felts.
Speaker 2: Oh, and I've got a wool cycle on my machine.
Speaker 1: This has motivated me. I'm going to go home and
Speaker 1: wash those wooly jumpers.
Speaker 4: Okay, bit of a gear change here. Speaking of things
Speaker 4: we're trying to avoid, here's one thing we can't avoid death.
Speaker 4: I mean, we can take better care of ourselves and
Speaker 4: we can try not to think about it, but it's
Speaker 4: not really listening to us. What I was listening to
Speaker 4: was Roy Valentine's eulogy for his beautiful father, James Valentine,
Speaker 4: who died recently. For those of you that don't know,
Speaker 4: James Valentine was an incredible broadcaster. His parents came from
Speaker 4: broadcasting as well, and he was on the ABC for many,
Speaker 4: many years. But he was also a horned player that
Speaker 4: played for the Models, and he had a whole big
Speaker 4: music career prior to this. He died recently and his
Speaker 4: beautiful son, Roy Valentine, gave one of the most incredible eulogies,
Speaker 4: and what I loved about what he had to say
Speaker 4: was what his father would say to him and his
Speaker 4: sister most days, which was how do you want to live?
Speaker 4: Which is a really interesting question. Here's a little of
Speaker 4: what his son Roy said at his memorial service.
Speaker 8: How do you want to live? How do you want
Speaker 8: to live? My dad figured out how to ask us
Speaker 8: this question rather than what do you want to be?
Speaker 8: The first question suggests a way of living that could
Speaker 8: be fast or slow, rich or poor city or country.
Speaker 8: It also implies doing it now. The second question ignores
Speaker 8: all that stuff that matters and focuses on some endpoint.
Speaker 8: Happiness will be yours when you reach it, but you
Speaker 8: never do. The person who aspires is not the person
Speaker 8: who attains. How do you want to live? My dad
Speaker 8: lived exactly how he wanted to live. His days consisted
Speaker 8: of conversations, friends, family, music, laughter, cooking, bushwalking, swimming, A
Speaker 8: life prioritizing joy, A life insisting on silliness while finding
Speaker 8: the depth in the mundane, A life prioritizing what nurtured
Speaker 8: his soul. My dad lived exactly how he wanted to live.
Speaker 3: Brilliant, isn't it?
Speaker 6: Oh?
Speaker 8: Wow?
Speaker 3: That's I love it.
Speaker 4: It's just such a great reminder of, you know, just
Speaker 4: being true to yourself and having you know, a vision
Speaker 4: that you can actually execute, you know, like the all things,
Speaker 4: our little passions, scattering passions throughout our days and our lives,
Speaker 4: and stop waiting for that moment where everything has to
Speaker 4: perfectly align in order for you to achieve what you
Speaker 4: need to achieve in terms of how you want to live.
Speaker 4: I just love that. Also, you know you're gonna ask yourself,
Speaker 4: how do you want to die, you know, because I
Speaker 4: used to work with a very famous entrepreneur and producer
Speaker 4: called Harry and Miller. I don't know whether most of
Speaker 4: the listeners remember Harry, but Harry used to go to
Speaker 4: a lot of funerals, as we all do, and he
Speaker 4: kept a file on his computer of how he wanted
Speaker 4: his funeral to be, and you know, and said, this
Speaker 4: is where I want the speakers to be, this is
Speaker 4: who I want to speak, this is how I want
Speaker 4: it to look. And you know, we don't think about
Speaker 4: that because it's a hard thing to think about death,
Speaker 4: and yet it's the thing that's the one thing we
Speaker 4: all share in common. Brunna and I went to our
Speaker 4: good friend's mother's funeral a few days ago, and.
Speaker 3: It was beautiful.
Speaker 4: It was beautiful to see a whole life put together
Speaker 4: for what was an incredible service. The three daughters got
Speaker 4: up and spoke, as did the grandchildren, and we learned
Speaker 4: more about their mother in that like small little service
Speaker 4: that was beautiful and intimate and personal than we'd known.
Speaker 4: We'd known this woman for the last thirty thirty five years,
Speaker 4: and there was so much we didn't know.
Speaker 5: Yeah, Mary has this great line in her stage show,
Speaker 5: which is like death that has one billion followers and
Speaker 5: zero likes, which is the last something that is.
Speaker 7: So kind of profound.
Speaker 5: I love that eulogy, and it's something I've been thinking
Speaker 5: about so much. And we've all lost people over the years,
Speaker 5: some old, some way too young, and I've got to
Speaker 5: be honest, like, I don't drown now in sorrow. I
Speaker 5: just asked myself that same question that he talks about,
Speaker 5: how we're going to live, and it is this thing
Speaker 5: we talk about it exactly like you said, it can't
Speaker 5: be an idea you aspired to.
Speaker 7: It has to be something that you're actually doing.
Speaker 5: Yes, And so that's what I keep thinking about all
Speaker 5: the time, and thought about that same as Mary at
Speaker 5: the funeral the other day, looking at how she lived.
Speaker 5: I'm not interested in thinking about how I die or
Speaker 5: what that funeral looks like. I couldn't care less. I'm
Speaker 5: interested in what we do when we're kind of on
Speaker 5: this earth.
Speaker 6: So it occurs to me that when people are close
Speaker 6: to death or they know that they're going to die,
Speaker 6: often their minds seem to turn to what am I
Speaker 6: going to leave?
Speaker 3: You know?
Speaker 6: And it might be financially, what am I going to leave?
Speaker 6: What am I going to leave my children with? You know,
Speaker 6: both emotionally as well as you know all of those
Speaker 6: other things. But to then flip that on its head
Speaker 6: and go, how am I going to live? Instead of
Speaker 6: sort of working your whole life to what you're going
Speaker 6: to leave behind, by thinking how I'm going to live,
Speaker 6: you end up leaving so much more, don't you get?
Speaker 6: Hundreds and living for yourself? I think that sometimes the
Speaker 6: circle of life can be that you're always trying to,
Speaker 6: you know, to leave something and to do better for
Speaker 6: the next people that are coming, and to look after
Speaker 6: your children. But actually our lives are for us, and
Speaker 6: by living completely fully and so earnest, doesn't it, But
Speaker 6: we are actually leaving such a richer kind of generation.
Speaker 7: I think too.
Speaker 5: Isn't it like this idea that you can't sell anything?
Speaker 5: I have to leave it. You have to build this
Speaker 5: legacy or financial stability for my children. And I'm like,
Speaker 5: why we built it?
Speaker 2: Then?
Speaker 5: Why not let them build it themselves? And why not
Speaker 5: live and enjoy those experiences. I prioritize experience above all else,
Speaker 5: I think financially.
Speaker 6: Bruna, you told me something the other day about just
Speaker 6: speaking of death and about if you.
Speaker 1: Ended up on life support, can you share that with us?
Speaker 5: Yeah, maybe I'm an outlier here because my husband and
Speaker 5: I have completely different directives. You know, We've talked about
Speaker 5: all that stuff and maybe it's selfish, and I think
Speaker 5: it is. But I am the person who says, keep
Speaker 5: me alive at all costs, and.
Speaker 3: That's kind of what I mean. Like, I've worked hard
Speaker 3: my whole life.
Speaker 5: I hope I'm in a position where I'm like my
Speaker 5: husband's like, so you would be fine becoming a financial burden,
Speaker 5: and I was like, yep, because I believe medicine is
Speaker 5: moving at such a fast pace then maybe something will
Speaker 5: come along.
Speaker 2: So save me.
Speaker 6: Your brain did and you are on lot. You're on
Speaker 6: a machine that's keeping you alive, no brain function. They're
Speaker 6: all saying that she will never wake up. You want
Speaker 6: to keep your whole family in limbo and financial distress.
Speaker 1: I really hope to get your whim.
Speaker 5: But if you saw my Google history, it literally is
Speaker 5: like cry it.
Speaker 7: What's it called criogenics?
Speaker 5: Like I'm literally always trying to find out, like what's
Speaker 5: the cost of, you know, putting yourself on ice and
Speaker 5: tell something shifts? Listen medicine is changing faster than any
Speaker 5: of us can ever imagine.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, sorry, but.
Speaker 5: I like being in the world and I am that person.
Speaker 5: I'm not brave enough to be the opposite.
Speaker 2: Well, I mean bringing it right back to the living,
Speaker 2: the very much living. My seventeen year old son just
Speaker 2: hearing Roy Valentine's speech, that's really filled me with because
Speaker 2: we are right in the what am I going to
Speaker 2: do when.
Speaker 3: I leave school? We're right in the what do you
Speaker 3: want to be?
Speaker 2: And that has just totally reframed how I want to
Speaker 2: have that conversation with him. Yes, about It's not the
Speaker 2: end game or being the astronaut or the mechanic or
Speaker 2: the footy star.
Speaker 8: Is it.
Speaker 2: It's about how you want to show up? Is your
Speaker 2: life fast or slow?
Speaker 3: Do you want to.
Speaker 2: Live it here or oversee? You know what a what
Speaker 2: a fabulous waiter. Yeah, it's great to repaint the kind.
Speaker 3: Of the chat. So that's that is my takeaway from this.
Speaker 4: I think you could equally substitute how do you want
Speaker 4: to live with how do you want to love? Too,
Speaker 4: and then that might inform the other because I think
Speaker 4: at the end of the day, and that day will
Speaker 4: end for all of us. It's how you've loved. That's
Speaker 4: what you've left behind more than anything. And going to
Speaker 4: our friend's mother's funeral, you know, it was all about that,
Speaker 4: nothing more. And that's a simple reminder. Sometimes we need
Speaker 4: to keep it simple for ourselves.
Speaker 3: We get so.
Speaker 4: Overwhelmed with bigger ideas and concepts and more achievements and
Speaker 4: more this and more that. How do you love and
Speaker 4: how do you want to be loved? I think is
Speaker 4: an equally important question.
Speaker 6: I know that I haven't known you guys all that long,
Speaker 6: but I really love you guys.
Speaker 3: We love you.
Speaker 4: I love you. It's so bad. I feel like we
Speaker 4: fell in love on the first date. I feel like
Speaker 4: that mental person that the minute we all got together
Speaker 4: for that photo shoot at the beginning, I was like,
Speaker 4: has my heart just expanded with time?
Speaker 5: I'm not sure I'm in love completely head over heels.
Speaker 3: I'm only kidding.
Speaker 2: Big week in the Mahony John's household.
Speaker 3: Last week, lou my.
Speaker 2: Son had his year twelve formal. Oh that deal, it
Speaker 2: was a big deal.
Speaker 1: Has he got a girlfriend or did he take a date?
Speaker 2: Or a boy took a date? You know they're not
Speaker 2: boyfriend and girlfriend. There were strict rules around you know,
Speaker 2: not talking to her because.
Speaker 3: I don't are you talking to her?
Speaker 2: Yes?
Speaker 3: It was very clear.
Speaker 2: So this is all new to me. There's there's things
Speaker 2: called prieze have you.
Speaker 3: Heard of those?
Speaker 1: We had PRIs so a pre.
Speaker 2: For those that don't know is where all the parents
Speaker 2: get together with the kids before they go in formal.
Speaker 2: So we had our lovely friend Lusette god bless Her
Speaker 2: hosted about sixty people forty year twelve couples.
Speaker 3: And then their parents.
Speaker 2: You know, you get the photos before they go off
Speaker 2: in the sort of bus or whatever they go on
Speaker 2: to the year twelve formal and lou was very specific
Speaker 2: that we basically don't make eye contact or speak to
Speaker 2: his date to to dad and I, which was difficult
Speaker 2: when you're having a group photo.
Speaker 1: Did you go with his dad?
Speaker 3: Yes, yes, we did that. So it was lovely.
Speaker 2: We've got some great photos, some awkward family photos and
Speaker 2: for me like so obviously if I had a daughter,
Speaker 2: we would have gone dress shopping and there would have
Speaker 2: been makeup.
Speaker 3: I'm sure there would have been a spray town.
Speaker 2: There would have been some hair situation, makeup shoes like
Speaker 2: the lot where it comes to boys.
Speaker 3: Dad was on suit duty. So the only thing that I.
Speaker 2: Could get involved with was to buy the corsah. They
Speaker 2: still do the yes for his date, and so I
Speaker 2: inquired what color dress she was wearing and.
Speaker 3: I was told it was black.
Speaker 2: And I was so then that the florist was like,
Speaker 2: do you want a black ribbon with the flowers? And
Speaker 2: I was like, I don't know if I should make
Speaker 2: that choice for her, you know, like, Luke, can you
Speaker 2: ask her? He didn't want to ask her. I was like,
Speaker 2: can I have a number? Absolutely not, So to be safe,
Speaker 2: we went with white in case she didn't want that
Speaker 2: so or in case she didn't wear the black dress.
Speaker 3: But when I picked up.
Speaker 2: The corsage, I just thought I never had a formal.
Speaker 3: I never went to a formal.
Speaker 2: No one Zeba bought me a corsage like I wanted
Speaker 2: to have, like a Mother of the Sun formal corsage
Speaker 2: made so that I could just wear a little cheeky corsar.
Speaker 1: Why did you not did they not do that in
Speaker 1: the UK? Or why did you not go to a formal?
Speaker 3: They didn't do it in the UK, you know.
Speaker 2: So the pain of growing up watching American movies and
Speaker 2: prom and grease and pretty and pink and just wanting
Speaker 2: the dress and the hair and the dance, and yeah
Speaker 2: we never had it.
Speaker 1: So do you feel like you've been jypped? You know,
Speaker 1: you haven't been able to you know, because you would
Speaker 1: have been the perfect girl to go to a formal.
Speaker 1: You're so beautiful, you love the frogs. You could have
Speaker 1: got the hair done. Like, how do you feel?
Speaker 3: I feel really ripped off? Yeah, I feel really ripped off.
Speaker 2: And like I just I don't have a care memory
Speaker 2: of the taffata one shoulder dress.
Speaker 1: Oh, you would have looked so beautiful in.
Speaker 2: I think, looking back with my very very sort of
Speaker 2: tweezed eyebrows, A don't how good I would have looked.
Speaker 1: Tapeta blue Tapeter with the eyebrows would have been great.
Speaker 4: Kath you are the most stylish woman I know. I
Speaker 4: feel like you're dressing from a prom every single day exactly,
Speaker 4: the only thing that's missing is the corsage, the rest.
Speaker 4: You always look immaculate, like every day's a prom for you.
Speaker 6: Guys, I went to quite a few jimals, Yes I did. Yes, well,
Speaker 6: we had one in year eleven and year twelve, and
Speaker 6: then I was invited to guy I went to an
Speaker 6: all girls school, so then I was invited to a
Speaker 6: couple and I can just give you the quickened dirty. Basically,
Speaker 6: you go to a dress shop. In my day, you
Speaker 6: would buy a dress. We all went to this one
Speaker 6: called Memphis in Melbourne.
Speaker 3: You'd go and.
Speaker 6: When you bought a dress, they they would write down
Speaker 6: in a book, in a paper diary, which dress you'd
Speaker 6: bought and which ball you were going to, so there
Speaker 6: wasn't two people wearing the same. And then you'd have
Speaker 6: your hair appointment and you'd go in there and you'd
Speaker 6: end up with some Betty Boo hair and they'd assure
Speaker 6: you that it would drop, and it never completely dropped.
Speaker 4: That was in the years of Moose and Dray and.
Speaker 1: Never ever dropped.
Speaker 6: And then the makeup artists would come and do like
Speaker 6: fifteen artists.
Speaker 1: She was absolutely not an artist.
Speaker 6: She had pancake, remember that, like orange pancake, a lort
Speaker 6: of eyebrows.
Speaker 1: Actually she might have been good for you, Cath and
Speaker 1: we all looked like Dolly Parton.
Speaker 6: Yeah, anyone with boobs had them pushed up to their necks.
Speaker 6: I didn't, and then you got your corsage. But one
Speaker 6: of my core memories actually it was my very first.
Speaker 6: It was my year eleven ball. It was the first
Speaker 6: one i'd been to. I had a boyfriend, which was
Speaker 6: one of those year eleven type boyfriends that we didn't
Speaker 6: really talk to each other much, and we kissed a
Speaker 6: couple of times, but you know, and I thought we
Speaker 6: were going to get married. He was very handsome, and
Speaker 6: he arrived at the we caught it before parties, the
Speaker 6: pre which was at my house. He arrived late in
Speaker 6: a taxi with a bag of McDonald's.
Speaker 1: And he had a little bit of ketchup on his
Speaker 1: fail and came in, didn't talk to me, didn't have
Speaker 1: a corsage, and then.
Speaker 6: We got to the ball. We went in our limos.
Speaker 6: We got to the ball, he broke up with me,
Speaker 6: kissed another girl, interesting twist, married her and they have three.
Speaker 1: Kids together, so that's nice for them. Were heartbroken on
Speaker 1: the night, Not really, I wouln't kiss someone else too.
Speaker 1: We did, okay, but that was the kind of thing.
Speaker 6: That would happen at these balls. But that was getting ready,
Speaker 6: the shopping for the dress. All of those things were
Speaker 6: so lovely and I'm.
Speaker 1: Sorry that you didn't.
Speaker 6: I have that like it feels like of all people,
Speaker 6: kath you were the one who should have had this
Speaker 6: formal experience, or at least had a daughter to you
Speaker 6: could go and do all the frock I've got two nieces.
Speaker 3: I'm just gonna yeah exactly.
Speaker 6: And you can take my daughter, Clementine dress shopping when
Speaker 6: she goes to her ball. She actually looks a lot
Speaker 6: like you, so they'll mistake you for mother and daughter
Speaker 6: for sure.
Speaker 3: Lock me in is Memphis still open?
Speaker 1: I think we can do better.
Speaker 7: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Well that is all we have time for today.
Speaker 2: Now, before you go back into the world, can we
Speaker 2: ask you one tiny thing. If you have that one
Speaker 2: friend that you know needs a bit of unleashed in
Speaker 2: her life, share the show, Share the show, share the love,
Speaker 2: send her the link. We don't have a big budget
Speaker 2: for any billboards or any advertising, so you ladies out
Speaker 2: there are our walking share the love. And I just
Speaker 2: have to say before we go, I had one of
Speaker 2: the loveliest things happened to me on the weekend. I
Speaker 2: was getting my hair blow dried and there was a
Speaker 2: beautiful lady who was sat at one of the other
Speaker 2: chairs just having her hair finished, called Melissa, and Melissa
Speaker 2: I could see was kind of looking at me, and
Speaker 2: then when I sat down and she was.
Speaker 3: Like, you have my home said yes, I'm so excited.
Speaker 3: I never support it before, and she said I knew
Speaker 3: it was you.
Speaker 2: She said, I was just texting my daughter because I
Speaker 2: love Unleashed and she was like, whatever you do, don't
Speaker 2: fan girl the lady mum, but she said so, I
Speaker 2: just can't help myself. Anyway, we had a chat. She
Speaker 2: told me about how she loves all of us. Tuesday
Speaker 2: is a favorite day and anyway, she was kind of
Speaker 2: done before I was. And then she left, and a
Speaker 2: lovely lady that runs the salon came in and said,
Speaker 2: she's just paid for your blow dry. I've never done
Speaker 2: anything like that. Very lovely. I love that.
Speaker 7: Thank you.
Speaker 3: Thank you Melissa very very much.
Speaker 1: And if you ever visit Melbourne, I like to go
Speaker 1: to this.
Speaker 2: Honestly, you guys are why we make the show. We
Speaker 2: bloody love you back.
Speaker 3: We do.
Speaker 2: You can DM us anytime at Unleashed dot show on Instagram.
Speaker 3: We love getting messages.
Speaker 2: Don't we, ladies do we see them all And as
Speaker 2: we like to say, ladies seeing it Tuesday. Until then,
Speaker 2: stay unfiltered, stay unreasonable, Stay unleashed by Mamma Mia acknowledges
Speaker 2: the traditional owners of land and waters that this podcast
Speaker 2: is recorded on