Speaker 1: You're listening to a MoMA Mia podcast.
Speaker 2: Mamma Mia acknowledges the traditional owners of the land and waters.
Speaker 2: This podcast is recorded on the power of this sisterhood.
Speaker 2: Isn't it glorious? Female friendships can really be the true
Speaker 2: great loves of our lives. Lucy certainly felt it with
Speaker 2: her bestie Holly.
Speaker 1: I'd never really had a girlfriend like that before. And
Speaker 1: there's something about female friendship that just like kills my
Speaker 1: heart dead, Like it's just so special, and you know,
Speaker 1: the relatability of everything. And I'd say, actually, soul sisters.
Speaker 2: The best thing about a girlfriend. They're there through everything,
Speaker 2: the good times and the bad, all the hurt and
Speaker 2: the harps, unless, of course they're the one who caused them.
Speaker 1: The last thing that I ever said to her was
Speaker 1: I know that you believe in karma. She just went
Speaker 1: really silent, and then she hung up with me, and
Speaker 1: that was that.
Speaker 2: I'm Georgia Love and this is everyone has an ex
Speaker 2: Come with me as we dive into a collection of
Speaker 2: unconventional stories about relationships past through the eyes and the
Speaker 2: hearts of the very people who lived them. Today, I'm
Speaker 2: taking you back to nineteen ninety seven, the year Princess
Speaker 2: Diana died, the very first Harry Potter book was published,
Speaker 2: and Titanic happened the movie, not the sinking, and well
Speaker 2: before Facebook, Instagram or any of the dating apps existed.
Speaker 2: So when Lucy met Tony, it was well and truly
Speaker 2: in the old fashioned way.
Speaker 1: I grew up in the far North Coast but moved
Speaker 1: down south to get an apprenticeship as a chef. All
Speaker 1: I wanted to do is travel, So I thought, if
Speaker 1: I can be a chef, I can use that to travel.
Speaker 1: And so yeah, I got myself an apprenticeship and every
Speaker 1: Friday night him and his mates would come in for dinner,
Speaker 1: and eventually we just started chatting and then one night
Speaker 1: we went out for drinks. He was like so hot
Speaker 1: and so funny and witty, and he just was like
Speaker 1: unlike anyone I'd ever met before, and the feeling was
Speaker 1: like very mutual. He was a year older than me,
Speaker 1: but he was also an apprenticeship, so we kind of
Speaker 1: clicked over that and talked about chefing and stuff and yeah,
Speaker 1: and that night we just went out and just it
Speaker 1: was just on. It was really cool, just like that
Speaker 1: he was like, um, like any man I'd ever met before.
Speaker 1: He was just we would talk light and dark, deep,
Speaker 1: and you know, he was really funny and witty, and
Speaker 1: we'd white stay up and watch Q and A. And
Speaker 1: it felt like a really mature relationship to me, and
Speaker 1: that is what grabbed me. But he could also be
Speaker 1: a massive dicker like me, and we could take the
Speaker 1: piss out of each other and it was just a
Speaker 1: really fun It was just exciting. It really excited me
Speaker 1: being with him. We'd only been together for like six
Speaker 1: months and we just started to move in and it
Speaker 1: was perfect. We had this little home. We were like
Speaker 1: all set up. My parents loved him, his parents loved me.
Speaker 1: It was cool. He was like, obviously the first man
Speaker 1: I'd ever lived with. So he was very domesticated, which
Speaker 1: I was really impressed with. He would always put the
Speaker 1: toilet seat down, like what, just little things like that.
Speaker 1: I just thought he's emotionally mature, and that's for me,
Speaker 1: was a big thing. Yeah, he was just yeah, really,
Speaker 1: it was a really cool guy. It was a really
Speaker 1: beautiful little love that we had. After about six months
Speaker 1: of living together, I started getting restless at the restaurant
Speaker 1: that I was at, so I applied for a role
Speaker 1: in the city that was closest to us, and it
Speaker 1: was like the top restaurant at the time, and I
Speaker 1: got the job. So we moved into the city and
Speaker 1: started a new life. For me, it was a dream
Speaker 1: come true. Like I was just a small country girl
Speaker 1: who had big dreams and I went for the big
Speaker 1: one and I got it. And yeah, he was super supportive,
Speaker 1: but he didn't want the relationship to suffer or to
Speaker 1: lose the relationship, so he kind of followed me in
Speaker 1: and yeah, he ended up getting a job at another
Speaker 1: top hotel, and so yeah, we were kind of like
Speaker 1: just cruising this insane wave. It was like, yeah, I
Speaker 1: was so young and our dreams were so big, but
Speaker 1: nothing could stop us. And it's just really good times.
Speaker 2: And they really were good times. Anyone who's worked in hospitality,
Speaker 2: particularly in their early twenties, well know.
Speaker 1: You start working like say two two thirty and then
Speaker 1: finish up service, clean up the kitchen, and by ten
Speaker 1: ten thirty you ready to go, and there's nothing to
Speaker 1: do at that time and you are wide awake, your
Speaker 1: buzz from like the adrenaline of a bus service, and
Speaker 1: so realistically, the only thing to do as a group
Speaker 1: of people who will all work together is to go
Speaker 1: to a pub or a bar and you start doing
Speaker 1: that and then that just becomes the norm, and then
Speaker 1: you don't start again till two o'clock the next day.
Speaker 1: So going to bed early is not a problem. You're
Speaker 1: just like, yeah, let's keep going, let's whatever. And yeah,
Speaker 1: you formed some really great relationships, really great friendships. We
Speaker 1: both made new friends, and we got to a stage
Speaker 1: where we were so comfortable with each other and so
Speaker 1: happy with each other that we didn't really need to
Speaker 1: look outwards, if that makes sense. We were just kind
Speaker 1: of cozy in our home and our bond and all
Speaker 1: the other noise around was just that it was just noise.
Speaker 1: We didn't kind of if that makes sense, Like, I yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, like there was a lot of with all
Speaker 1: the partying and stuff, there was a lot of gossip.
Speaker 1: I guess you could say. That would go around and
Speaker 1: we would just laugh at it and get back to
Speaker 1: our own thing. You know. People would describe us as
Speaker 1: tight and probably unstoppable. I would say, just very in love,
Speaker 1: you know, really in love with each other, and yeah, happy.
Speaker 1: We were just so happy. It was just so exciting,
Speaker 1: and we both would meet up after work, we talk
Speaker 1: about service, and then all of our friends would come
Speaker 1: and then it would just get rowdy, and but I
Speaker 1: would always look over and he would always be watching,
Speaker 1: not a stalker, but just lovingly like you know, and
Speaker 1: vice versa. It was like everyone knew that we were
Speaker 1: in love. And he worked at this one and I
Speaker 1: worked at that one, and just yeah, it was it
Speaker 1: was just so cool, like, you know, it was a
Speaker 1: life that I didn't actually dream that I would have,
Speaker 1: and here it was. You know, it was a lot
Speaker 1: of fun. There was a group of us. There was
Speaker 1: probably like up to ten people, and a lot of
Speaker 1: them I'm still friends with. There was one girl, Holly,
Speaker 1: and she was she was so vibrant and she was,
Speaker 1: I would say, a people magnet. So she was always
Speaker 1: on the scene. And it wasn't even if she wasn't
Speaker 1: with us, she was with another group of hospay people,
Speaker 1: but she was always around and she was always hooking
Speaker 1: up with different dudes. It was this confidence that she exuded.
Speaker 1: But I was like, she's cool, Like I want to
Speaker 1: hang around her. And she was a lot of fun.
Speaker 1: She actually got an apprenticeship at the same restaurant, the
Speaker 1: Shiny One that I was working at, and we just
Speaker 1: clicked from day one. She brought this warmth about her.
Speaker 1: She was very, very confident, very beautiful, but not in
Speaker 1: an obvious way. She yeah. So we just started hanging out,
Speaker 1: and then over time we just became best mates. I'd say,
Speaker 1: actually saw sisters, and you know, my family were obsessed
Speaker 1: with her, and it was like I'd never really had
Speaker 1: a girlfriend like that before. And there's something about female
Speaker 1: friendship that just kills my heart dead, like it's just
Speaker 1: so special, and you know, the relatability of everything, and
Speaker 1: we just take the piss out of each other all
Speaker 1: the time, and it was okay. It was just fun
Speaker 1: and banterish, and she very quickly became one of my
Speaker 1: best mates. She introduced me to so many other people.
Speaker 1: She was from there, so she would take me horse
Speaker 1: riding and would just show me new beaches and it
Speaker 1: was like we're the little girls that had found each
Speaker 1: other and we were playful and fun, just so much fun.
Speaker 1: Like I just loved being around her. She had the
Speaker 1: personality that everyone just wanted to be around her. The
Speaker 1: amount of times that we would be just close to
Speaker 1: on the floor laughing, you know, just that joy, that
Speaker 1: real joy. I think That's what got me the most
Speaker 1: was the joy that she brought to me. All three
Speaker 1: of us were like peas in the pot, same sense
Speaker 1: of humor, same kind of outgoing nature. We loved anything active, snowboarding, bodyboarding, bodysurfing, riding,
Speaker 1: pushes around the beach, skateboarding, like you name it, we
Speaker 1: would into it. And the three of us did have
Speaker 1: a lot of fun together. And mainly it was Tony
Speaker 1: not mocking, but you know, taking the piss out of
Speaker 1: her for all the dudes that she would sleep with.
Speaker 1: She had a bit of a routine, I would say,
Speaker 1: where she would massage guys with her own massage oil
Speaker 1: and if she had that in a bag, you knew
Speaker 1: it was on. So, yeah, the three of us were
Speaker 1: just really good mates. He definitely was the third Whell.
Speaker 2: Lucy and Tony and now Holly just had the best life.
Speaker 2: But after a few years, bigger and better jobs in
Speaker 2: bigger and better cities came calling.
Speaker 1: We'd actually moved to Sydney and we both started in
Speaker 1: even better restaurants, and again we'd found a crew down
Speaker 1: here that was fun and everything. But the whole thing
Speaker 1: was that both Tony and I wanted to travel and
Speaker 1: he wanted to go to Canada for the snowboarding and
Speaker 1: I was like, cool, I'm in. So we left our
Speaker 1: little life and packed it all up and put into
Speaker 1: a storage container and spent the first three months. We
Speaker 1: flew into the East coast, bought a three point fifty
Speaker 1: gmc hotted up car, and we drove from Toronto up
Speaker 1: to Montreal and then across the coast to Whistler. I
Speaker 1: remember when we were on the plane and we like
Speaker 1: looked at each other and we had the biggest grins
Speaker 1: on our face, like we are actually doing this, Like
Speaker 1: we talked about it for so long, and we were
Speaker 1: just like stoked to little kids, you know, just like
Speaker 1: ah shit, we're here. We made a really tight group
Speaker 1: of friends over there, another couple, and these were all
Speaker 1: in the same restaurant that we worked at, the same
Speaker 1: restaurant together. There was about twelve of us and we
Speaker 1: would yeah, just go snowboarding every day and cooking and
Speaker 1: then partying, and then it was just on repeat.
Speaker 2: Lucy and Tony did the whole travel, work party thing
Speaker 2: for a year and loved every minute, but it was
Speaker 2: never going to be forever.
Speaker 1: My older sister announced that she was pregnant and I
Speaker 1: very tight with my family and I didn't want to
Speaker 1: miss the birth. He really wanted to stay, He really
Speaker 1: wanted to go down through the States into Mexico, but
Speaker 1: I was just I just wanted to be home. You know,
Speaker 1: it had been a year, and like I said, I
Speaker 1: did not want to miss the birth. And yeah, so
Speaker 1: we moved back to the city that we met in
Speaker 1: or first lived in, and basically caught up with all
Speaker 1: of our old friends and resumed life as it was
Speaker 1: pre Canada. I took over a restaurant in the original
Speaker 1: town that we were at, and over time he eventually
Speaker 1: became my soux chef, so second in charge, and then
Speaker 1: after a little while, Holly became my line chef, one
Speaker 1: of my line chefs, and so the three of us
Speaker 1: were just back on dick as thieves. She'd been out
Speaker 1: of town, so she'd come back and we just reformed
Speaker 1: that connection we'd had years ago, and man, we just
Speaker 1: started having fun again and it was all great, but
Speaker 1: it wasn't.
Speaker 2: Exactly the same.
Speaker 1: There was distinct shift in his attitude. I don't think
Speaker 1: he wanted to be back where we were, but he didn't.
Speaker 1: He wasn't vocal about it. There was a bit of
Speaker 1: a spark gone. And I do think we had worked
Speaker 1: so hard to prove it to ourselves that we could
Speaker 1: get over there, and we did it. And I think
Speaker 1: he just wanted to keep traveling and I did too.
Speaker 1: But again I was like, we've got a baby coming,
Speaker 1: like this is huge, And yeah, he just wasn't hisself.
Speaker 1: It's hard to explain. He was just very he was
Speaker 1: a bit more drawn back. He retreated to the pubs
Speaker 1: to play the pokeis a lot, which was really concerning
Speaker 1: for me. But I couldn't control it. I couldn't control him.
Speaker 2: They'd been together for five years at this point, and
Speaker 2: there was one big thing on Lucy's mind.
Speaker 1: When we were first together, we'd always talked about having kids,
Speaker 1: and he was always open to the idea of it.
Speaker 1: But we were so young and we had other plans
Speaker 1: to do, you know, we had other travels and adventures
Speaker 1: to experience. But then over the course of when we
Speaker 1: got back from Canada, it was a distinct shift in
Speaker 1: what he wanted said he didn't want to bring kids
Speaker 1: into this world. I think maybe I pushed too hard.
Speaker 1: I thought that if we just traveled some more, we
Speaker 1: were still so young. If we traveled some more and
Speaker 1: kind of got that travel bug out of his system,
Speaker 1: maybe that would suffice. And I truly believed that it
Speaker 1: was all going to be okay and that we were
Speaker 1: going to stay together and make that family and have
Speaker 1: that life by the house, you know, the whole dream
Speaker 1: that you know a lot of women want. And I thought,
Speaker 1: I think to myself, well, what am I going to
Speaker 1: do with my life? There was definitely an undercurrent within
Speaker 1: me that was swelling through me that I wanted to
Speaker 1: travel by myself before I had a baby. And yeah,
Speaker 1: I knew I wouldn't forgive myself if I didn't do it.
Speaker 1: So that's when I kind of patched this idea to
Speaker 1: do a little bit of around the world by myself
Speaker 1: and then meet Tony over there after three months in
Speaker 1: the UK. So I planned a trip to Mexico by myself.
Speaker 1: Three months Mexico, Central America, New York, London. It was
Speaker 1: decided that he would come and meet me in London.
Speaker 1: We get our work visas we do to use there
Speaker 1: take it from there. I always wanted to do some
Speaker 1: kind of travel by myself, and I just I knew
Speaker 1: that if I didn't get out of my system. I
Speaker 1: would never forgive myself. It was just an important thing
Speaker 1: for me to do. So what happened is he became
Speaker 1: the head chef and Holly became his soux chef, and
Speaker 1: we all thought that was an awesome plan, just because
Speaker 1: they worked so well together and she knew what she
Speaker 1: was doing and I could trust, you know that they'd
Speaker 1: be fine. We'd been together about seven and a half
Speaker 1: years at this point, and I was really worried about
Speaker 1: how he was going to be because he'd never really
Speaker 1: been alone. I said to her, please look after Tony
Speaker 1: because I'm really worried about him, and she was like,
Speaker 1: of course, of course, and then you know, we gave
Speaker 1: our hugs and it was a hard goodbye because I
Speaker 1: wasn't sure when I was going to see her again.
Speaker 2: So off she went. But it didn't start out exactly
Speaker 2: as planned.
Speaker 1: I flew into Mexico City and I went to Wahaka,
Speaker 1: which is silver jewelry town, beautiful, beautiful, and then went
Speaker 1: down to Porco and then from there I made my
Speaker 1: way down to Porto Escondido, which is a little surfing village.
Speaker 1: So it was mainly surfers, backpackers and locals and I
Speaker 1: stayed in this hostel anyway. It was my third night there.
Speaker 1: It was a Saturday night and there was a group
Speaker 1: of English backpackers, the lads, and they wanted me to
Speaker 1: go and watch the football and then the girls are like, yeah,
Speaker 1: come on party, and I don't know what came over
Speaker 1: me or what had happened. I was like, no, I'm
Speaker 1: just going to go to bed, which is not me.
Speaker 1: So at seven point thirty on a Saturday night, I
Speaker 1: went to bed. I woke up the next morning and
Speaker 1: lent over to get my phone and I couldn't feel
Speaker 1: anything on my bedside table and I was like, what
Speaker 1: is going on? And I like opened my eyes and
Speaker 1: it was empty. And then I looked under my bed
Speaker 1: when my backpack was and every single thing that I've
Speaker 1: when overseas with was gone. I was surprisingly calm. I
Speaker 1: fell on my mom's birthday back in Australia, so I
Speaker 1: was like, I can't call home. I don't want to
Speaker 1: ruin her day. So Doris gave me five hundred paces,
Speaker 1: the boys gave me beers, and the girls gave me
Speaker 1: some clothes. Obviously, I phoned Tony and he was like,
Speaker 1: you've got to come home, like that's crazy, and I'm like, look,
Speaker 1: no one hurt me, it's just stuff. And I don't
Speaker 1: want to ruin this trip because of one bad incident,
Speaker 1: you know. So yeah, I left it a couple of
Speaker 1: days and then called the parents get home now. I's like, no,
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna you know, same thing with Tony. It's fine.
Speaker 1: So I jumped on a bus back to Mexico City
Speaker 1: with not a shred of IDA on me. They issued
Speaker 1: me an emergency passport and I stayed in Porto for
Speaker 1: I think close to four weeks, just because I had
Speaker 1: to order stuff, you know, backpack, you know, clothes, everything.
Speaker 1: And then when I was there, I met this girl
Speaker 1: and we became really really good mates, and she ended
Speaker 1: up coming with me down through Honduras and down to
Speaker 1: Costa Rica. And then the whole time though I was yearning,
Speaker 1: really yearning Tony, and so I decided to skip New
Speaker 1: York and go straight to London so that could like
Speaker 1: speed up the time that he would get there. And
Speaker 1: over the time that I was in Central America, I
Speaker 1: recall like a distinct pulling back almost not as many emails,
Speaker 1: not as many, and I put it down to him
Speaker 1: just kind of trying to get on with his life
Speaker 1: and stop because he would always tell me how much
Speaker 1: he'd miss me and stuff. I got the job in
Speaker 1: a bar, and I met beautiful people and we had,
Speaker 1: you know, a lot of fun, but I just wanted
Speaker 1: to be home with him, or him with me over here.
Speaker 1: And one day I said, look, I think I'm just
Speaker 1: going to come back and surprise you one day. And
Speaker 1: he was like, don't do that. You know, I don't
Speaker 1: like surprises. Do not do that. And I said, look,
Speaker 1: why aren't you excited about this. He's like, I can't
Speaker 1: afford it.
Speaker 2: It meaning coming to London.
Speaker 1: It was just before Christmas, and I was like, I
Speaker 1: can't do this anymore. I'd been a way around five months.
Speaker 1: I was just missing him too much and I had
Speaker 1: to go home and see him. So I jumped on
Speaker 1: a plane and away I went. Yeah. So I remember
Speaker 1: rocking up to our old flat and he opened the
Speaker 1: door and he pulled me in and pushed me against
Speaker 1: the wall in a way that he'd never done before,
Speaker 1: like to hug me. And he just hugged me and
Speaker 1: sobbed and sobbed and sobbed, and I've missed you so much.
Speaker 1: I can't really remember much more about that except to
Speaker 1: say that it was a weird hello for us. Anyway,
Speaker 1: went into the lund room and his mattress was on
Speaker 1: the floor out there, and I was like what He's like, Oh,
Speaker 1: I've just been watching TV out here. It's just easier.
Speaker 1: And the place looked it was just a mess, and
Speaker 1: I'm like, what is going on? Like just all the
Speaker 1: pieces of the puzzle just weren't fitting. And so he
Speaker 1: wouldn't kiss me, definitely was not going to have sex
Speaker 1: with me. He just wanted to talk about my trip
Speaker 1: the whole time, and I just was like, I don't understand.
Speaker 1: Like in my mind, I was like it was like
Speaker 1: there was a ghost in the house and he was
Speaker 1: the ghost, Like he was just a shell of himself.
Speaker 1: And I didn't I didn't know how to even approach
Speaker 1: it because he was just so down. And so we
Speaker 1: lasted like that for two days, and then one day
Speaker 1: I went into the bathroom to find a find some
Speaker 1: moisturizing cream and I opened up the bathroom cabinet and
Speaker 1: it was like my head rolled off my body and
Speaker 1: I was blind, like it was like being bludgeoned. And
Speaker 1: I saw one of Holly's massage oils. So I picked
Speaker 1: it up really calmly, which for me at that time
Speaker 1: was not a thing. And I walked out and I said,
Speaker 1: you've been fucking holy haven't you? And he just burst
Speaker 1: out crying and he's like, yeah, yeah, I have. I
Speaker 1: knew straightaway there was no other scenario that that would
Speaker 1: be in that shelf, you know, there was just no reason,
Speaker 1: and I just knew. And then I'm like, oh, that's
Speaker 1: why the mattress is out there. He doesn't want it
Speaker 1: in the bedroom. That's why you won't kiss me. That's
Speaker 1: why I went up sex with me. It was all
Speaker 1: very like, oh, it's like the dominoes just crashing. I
Speaker 1: said to him, had this been going on before I left?
Speaker 1: And he swears no, but really only they would know.
Speaker 1: I don't know. I'll never know, but it's really doesn't matter.
Speaker 1: It happened. And for two days it was back and forth,
Speaker 1: me trying to understand what had happened and how and
Speaker 1: when and why, And you know, when you're in it,
Speaker 1: you want all those details, which are very bad for you,
Speaker 1: but you just want to know as much as you can.
Speaker 1: And it just got to the end of the two
Speaker 1: days and he just said, look, we're going to be together,
Speaker 1: and I'm going to move to NUSA, And that's kind
Speaker 1: of it. She had moved to NUSA because she found
Speaker 1: out that I was coming home. Yeah, so I didn't
Speaker 1: know that until I got home, and she'd changed her number,
Speaker 1: so she was well aware that there was going to
Speaker 1: be a very upset person coming back to Australia. So
Speaker 1: I basically begged Tony to give me the number and
Speaker 1: I said, I just I just need some form of closure.
Speaker 1: I just need to speak to her. And so I
Speaker 1: called her and I just said, what the fuck? How
Speaker 1: could you do this? And she's like, but you guys
Speaker 1: were in trouble for a long time. And I'm like,
Speaker 1: but it was never your place to jump in and
Speaker 1: take it. It was never your place. And she just said,
Speaker 1: you know, it just happened, and you know all the bullshit.
Speaker 1: But I do remember the last thing that I ever
Speaker 1: said to her was I know that you believe in karma.
Speaker 1: She just went really silent, and then she hung over
Speaker 1: with me, and that was that. It was brutal. I
Speaker 1: left that day and I had my sister's car and
Speaker 1: I sat in that driver's seat for thirty minutes, and
Speaker 1: he was up at the balcony and I just looked
Speaker 1: at him for thirty minutes, crying, and he just was
Speaker 1: shaking his head and driving away. Obviously was I didn't
Speaker 1: think that was going to be the last time I
Speaker 1: saw him, but it was. I feel like that day
Speaker 1: tilted my world on its axis just by one degree,
Speaker 1: that nothing would ever be the same again for me.
Speaker 1: I understand that we had had our problems, but what
Speaker 1: I couldn't understand and I never will, was Holly being
Speaker 1: able to do that, like literally allowing herself to do
Speaker 1: that to her best mate. I retreated to my mom's
Speaker 1: for six months, and I was a mess. I was
Speaker 1: drinking too much. I felt like I was going crazy
Speaker 1: because Tony and Holly were both kind of playing it
Speaker 1: off like it's just happened, just you know, and it
Speaker 1: consumed me. It was just sucker punch after suck a punch.
Speaker 1: It's like, you don't just lose one person, you lose two.
Speaker 1: That I You're everything, and the whole in my heart
Speaker 1: was just so big. It changed me for sure. It
Speaker 1: consumed me for years, this feeling of how could you
Speaker 1: do that? I truly felt like I had an arm amputated,
Speaker 1: and I was learning to live without that arm. You know,
Speaker 1: it's your best mate, you confident, you go too. And
Speaker 1: there was that element, But then there was also the
Speaker 1: element of the other arms missing too, and those arms
Speaker 1: are holding hands together like bad metaphor, but that's what
Speaker 1: it was like. I'm like, they've got each other and
Speaker 1: they're talking each other through all of this, or they're
Speaker 1: ignoring it and pretending that nothing's wrong, and I'm here
Speaker 1: just cocooned in this bubble of pain. Like it was
Speaker 1: truly truly painful, the heartache where you can feel it
Speaker 1: in your chest. It was horrible and it stayed with
Speaker 1: me for a very long time, lost a piece of me,
Speaker 1: and I didn't know how to function without it. He
Speaker 1: was all I knew. We got together in such formative years,
Speaker 1: and we grew into adults together and not having him
Speaker 1: part of my life and part of my family was
Speaker 1: just truly devastating. And it's a pain that I never
Speaker 1: ever want to feel again ever, And I would not
Speaker 1: wish it on anyone. I mean, what happened. It's so cliched,
Speaker 1: the friend and the partner, but until you truly walk it,
Speaker 1: you can't describe to people. There are so many different layers.
Speaker 1: You know, there's shame, there's embarrassment, there's hurt, there's jealousy.
Speaker 1: You know, I was jealous of her for a long time.
Speaker 1: The list is huge. When Tony and I were in Canada,
Speaker 1: we traveled for a while with really good twin friends
Speaker 1: of our and they knew Tony very well. One night
Speaker 1: we all cried and they were like, we just can't
Speaker 1: believe he did this, you know, like we've lost a
Speaker 1: really good friend too. And you know, breakups aren't just
Speaker 1: about the individuals, you know, they're far reaching. And it
Speaker 1: was sad. I have my sister and my mom and
Speaker 1: the friends like the twins, but they weren't her, And
Speaker 1: it's like the only person that I know would make
Speaker 1: me feel better is her. So I did a lot
Speaker 1: of crying alone. I also went through my laptop and
Speaker 1: deleted every single picture I ever had of her. I
Speaker 1: didn't want any evidence of her. I just And it's funny,
Speaker 1: because I'm usually quite a nostalgic person. I keep everything,
Speaker 1: you know, notes and letters and which there was heaps
Speaker 1: of from her, but I just I didn't want any
Speaker 1: reminders because the other thing that happened was I compared
Speaker 1: myself to her so much that it became, I think
Speaker 1: a little bit sick for me.
Speaker 2: Lucy couldn't keep living like this. Tony and Holly were gone,
Speaker 2: taken off to their new life together without so much
Speaker 2: as a glance back. But there were too many ghosts
Speaker 2: in Lucy's life and even her career, so she decided
Speaker 2: to pack her bags and start afresh again, this time
Speaker 2: leaving Cheffing behind for good.
Speaker 1: It was never going to be an industry where I
Speaker 1: could have children. For me personally, that wasn't the lifestyle
Speaker 1: I wanted to be living with children, and I made
Speaker 1: a decision that before I was thirty, I was going
Speaker 1: to get out. And it was twenty nine and a
Speaker 1: half when I got out. After six months, my younger
Speaker 1: sister and I decided to move to Sydney start fresh.
Speaker 1: The friend that I made in Mexico got me a
Speaker 1: job in her advertising agency, which was so good for
Speaker 1: my self esteem. I moved into something that when my
Speaker 1: brain was being used and I felt valued. So I
Speaker 1: built this really cool little life in Sydney. Had a
Speaker 1: great group of friends, very social, got at gigs all
Speaker 1: the time, just do really cool stuff. And even though
Speaker 1: I loved it, they were always there. They were always
Speaker 1: sitting on my shoulder. I was always thinking about them,
Speaker 1: and I would watch over the years on Facebook, and
Speaker 1: over time she stopped really posting about him or their marriage,
Speaker 1: and I just put that down to him being very
Speaker 1: not into social media. So the day that I found
Speaker 1: out that they got married, I went onto her Facebook
Speaker 1: page and saw their wedding photos. You ever get that
Speaker 1: feeling where you feel like your heart's dropped into your stomach. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it was gut wrenching. They got married on the eighth
Speaker 1: of the eighth of the eighth, a very auspicious good
Speaker 1: luck date, which at the time I was like, yeah,
Speaker 1: she's trying to protect herself from karma. We as a
Speaker 1: couple had our problems. That was ours, but I will
Speaker 1: never get over the pain that she caused me. I'm
Speaker 1: really big on female friendship and the power of sisterhood,
Speaker 1: and I just I'll never get my head around it.
Speaker 1: I never will, And unfortunately I'm never going to get
Speaker 1: those answers because obviously I don't want anything to do
Speaker 1: with them. I have thought over the years about reaching out,
Speaker 1: and just because over time I did a lot of work,
Speaker 1: obviously many therapists, and I was like, I need to
Speaker 1: get to a place where I can forgive because I
Speaker 1: don't want to hold onto this bitterness, because that's just
Speaker 1: so unhealthy in my eyes. So I worked really, really,
Speaker 1: really hard, and I got to a place where I
Speaker 1: was like, you know what, they were obviously meant to
Speaker 1: be together, and even though it sucked that I was
Speaker 1: the conduit, at least they found each other. And I
Speaker 1: had thought, you know, several times reaching out to her
Speaker 1: and just saying, look, I know it was really shitty
Speaker 1: and it was a horrible time, but I hope that
Speaker 1: you're really happy. I never did. I think I just
Speaker 1: chickened out because I was I don't know. And then
Speaker 1: you know, of course my girlfriends are like, why would
Speaker 1: you do that? Just leave it in the past, Leave
Speaker 1: in the past. But for someone who thinks the way
Speaker 1: that I do, it's always there. It's always just you know, haunting,
Speaker 1: like caspar just around the corner.
Speaker 2: But as it does, life went on. Lucy moved on
Speaker 2: and tried the best she could to forget and heal
Speaker 2: from the trauma her partner and best friend had left
Speaker 2: in their wake, and years went by without hearing a
Speaker 2: thing about or from the ghost of her past until.
Speaker 1: It was only in August last year. So twenty twenty three,
Speaker 1: and one of the original original original girlfriends from the
Speaker 1: first restaurant in the city called me and we're just
Speaker 1: having a chat about another apprentice that we used to
Speaker 1: work with, and it was all casual, and she said, oh, oh,
Speaker 1: I've got some news, and I'm like, what's that. She goes,
Speaker 1: Tony in Holly broke up and I was driving my
Speaker 1: car and I thought I was just going to have
Speaker 1: to slam on the brakes. I was so shocked, and
Speaker 1: there was a part of me that was sad for them,
Speaker 1: and a part of me that was, huh, maybe that's
Speaker 1: the karma. I don't know how it happened or what happened.
Speaker 1: And she's like, you okay, and I was just bawling
Speaker 1: my eyes out and I said, I just can't you know.
Speaker 1: For years I was waiting to hear this, and now
Speaker 1: that it's here, I feel so confused about how I feel.
Speaker 1: I am genuinely sad that they broke up because I
Speaker 1: did think that they would last. And I said, you
Speaker 1: know what happened and she said, yeah, So they spent
Speaker 1: ten plus years in the minds both of them big money,
Speaker 1: and he had gambled it all away. And then I
Speaker 1: just got so sad, you know, so sad for him.
Speaker 1: He'd be what forty eight this year, so his wife
Speaker 1: has walked out at me him. He's got no house,
Speaker 1: he's got a job, but no money. I'm like, you
Speaker 1: don't work that hard for so long to have nothing.
Speaker 1: And so that was in the August, and then in
Speaker 1: February this year. It wasn't pre planned. I hadn't thought
Speaker 1: about it, but I picked up my phone and I
Speaker 1: searched him through Messenger and I sent him a message
Speaker 1: and I said, hey, Tony, I heard that you and
Speaker 1: Holly had broken up, and I'm really sorry to hear that.
Speaker 1: I really hope that you're okay. Lucy. Anyway, the next
Speaker 1: day I got a message and it said, yeah, I
Speaker 1: heard you. You've gone through hard things too. Life's tough. Hey.
Speaker 1: I said, I'm really sorry to hear that, but I
Speaker 1: genuinely hope that you're okay. And he said, well, Lucy,
Speaker 1: she was my best friend. And I was like, I
Speaker 1: have no idea what that feels like. Oh my god,
Speaker 1: I'm so sorry. And he said, so, I guess we
Speaker 1: should catch up for a beer sometime and I just
Speaker 1: left it and we never spoke again.
Speaker 2: But she did hear a one more thing.
Speaker 1: Two weeks ago, I caught up with another of the friends.
Speaker 1: We went out to dinner. She said, oh my god,
Speaker 1: I got a bit of an update about the breakup.
Speaker 1: And I'm like what, and she said, well, Tony was
Speaker 1: speaking to my brother and told him that Holly had
Speaker 1: actually been having an affair on him for a year
Speaker 1: or two. He's not sure of the timeline. Holly picked
Speaker 1: up all of her stuff one day when he was
Speaker 1: at work, left and that was that. But the kicker
Speaker 1: for me is that the guy that she had the
Speaker 1: affair with like two weeks later dumped. I know it's
Speaker 1: also messing and gross, but there's part of me that's like, girlfriend,
Speaker 1: I told you, Carma will get you full circle. Feel
Speaker 1: like I've got my closure. Now there's no weight on
Speaker 1: me in terms of what happened. I really tried hard
Speaker 1: to show some grace and forgive and reaching out to him,
Speaker 1: and what he said just made me think, Wow, you
Speaker 1: have not grown one iota, and nor has she clearly,
Speaker 1: which is sad for them, But I mean that's where
Speaker 1: it goes. I'd spent so many years picturing them being
Speaker 1: so happy and almost having to ret that in my
Speaker 1: brain just to put the picture right, if that makes sense.
Speaker 1: She wasn't perfect, he wasn't perfect. You know, when you
Speaker 1: break up to I think you idealize things. It's not
Speaker 1: actually like that, but I think your brain does it
Speaker 1: because it's trying to hold onto some good memories. So yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, I just despair for both of them, to
Speaker 1: be honest, there are some things that happened I'm like, oh,
Speaker 1: she would crack up at that, or you know, certain
Speaker 1: situations that I've been through, and I do miss her.
Speaker 1: But maybe the way that she was supposed to evolve
Speaker 1: as a person and the way that I was supposed
Speaker 1: to evolve as a person just weren't aligned. And that's
Speaker 1: just that's just the way life goes. It was my
Speaker 1: first friend break up. Like you know, you lose friends
Speaker 1: through life for whatever reasons, and there that was pretty
Speaker 1: brutal throughout this whole journey. It put a spotlight on
Speaker 1: female friendship for me and how devastating it can be
Speaker 1: when you lose them. It's an emotional relationship that you
Speaker 1: have and it's emotional intimacy, and just because it's not
Speaker 1: physical does not mean at all that it doesn't feel
Speaker 1: the same way when you lose it. Breathing of her
Speaker 1: it took me years, years because you know, you know,
Speaker 1: back in the day we would talk about having kids
Speaker 1: at the same time raising them to be like great
Speaker 1: little humans, and it was just a given that we're
Speaker 1: going to be in our lives each other's lives forever,
Speaker 1: which again went back to how you could do that,
Speaker 1: you know, just you know, I could get back on
Speaker 1: the circle of why and how, but it's all just
Speaker 1: for me. One huge lesson for me. My lesson is
Speaker 1: about being resilient and trying to accept that not everyone
Speaker 1: will act or behave the way that you want them to,
Speaker 1: and you have to make choices. I guess about who
Speaker 1: you let into your life and who you don't. And
Speaker 1: sometimes they just lessons that you don't see coming, really
Speaker 1: just just life. I was very lucky in that when
Speaker 1: I went to Sydney, I did have a good group
Speaker 1: of friends around me, and they were fully aware of
Speaker 1: the situation and they cuddled me and took me through
Speaker 1: some pretty rough nights, and yeah, I mean, that's the
Speaker 1: thing about heartbreak is when you're in it, this is
Speaker 1: the forever. But when you walk through it, like walk
Speaker 1: through the fire, and you get to the other end,
Speaker 1: there is such a sense of oh, wow, like I
Speaker 1: did it. It's satisfying in a weird way. You know.
Speaker 1: It's like proving to yourself that yeah, I'm okay. I've
Speaker 1: spent so long trying to get closure that I think
Speaker 1: the more I think about it moving forward, it's just counterproductive.
Speaker 1: So I'm like, I just that's the story. Let's just
Speaker 1: move right on. And if anything, you know, I just
Speaker 1: hope that for anyone that's listening really really knows, for
Speaker 1: any heartbreak that you're going through, you're going to come
Speaker 1: out of it and you're going to come out of
Speaker 1: it stronger and better. And that's kind of what I
Speaker 1: really hope people feel. Because it's possible, you just have
Speaker 1: to really do some hard work.
Speaker 2: Lucy did do the work, and life did move forward.
Speaker 2: Not only that, but it became really wonderful were than
Speaker 2: she ever imagined it.
Speaker 1: Cooked moving to Sydney for a start, making a really
Speaker 1: good bunch of friends, and exposing myself to a life
Speaker 1: that I'd never lived before. I'd never lived in Sydney before,
Speaker 1: so it was just fun and advertising is you know,
Speaker 1: super social and fun and you know, going on photo
Speaker 1: shoots and TV shoots and it was a really good
Speaker 1: distraction for me, and that's what I needed. And then yeah,
Speaker 1: I met a boy and we very quickly settled down
Speaker 1: and moved back to the city that it all started.
Speaker 1: And yeah, I had our two little girls. So I
Speaker 1: split from turning in two thousand and seven and didn't
Speaker 1: meet my fella until twenty thirteen. So I was single
Speaker 1: for quite a while. And it was in those years
Speaker 1: that were really defining for me in terms of my
Speaker 1: mental health and learning how to deal with everything that
Speaker 1: had happened. Very formative, very formative. But you know, I
Speaker 1: look at my girls and I always think I've got
Speaker 1: so much to teach you. If you ever need it,
Speaker 1: I've got like a suitcase full of it. Life is good.
Speaker 1: Life is really good. So the fella and I split up,
Speaker 1: which is fine, and the three of us have this
Speaker 1: beautiful of life. I own a home, we've got a pool,
Speaker 1: we're close to the beach. Their healthy, happy, Their dad
Speaker 1: and I and his wife are all good friends. And
Speaker 1: I'm satisfied. All I've wanted to be was happy, and
Speaker 1: I finally got there, and I look at those two
Speaker 1: girls and I'm like, man, have I got some stories
Speaker 1: for you?
Speaker 2: Everyone has an EGGX is a Minti Media production and
Speaker 2: proudly you're part of the Mum and Mea Network. Is
Speaker 2: written and narrated by me Georgia Love and produced by
Speaker 2: Linda Scott. If you have a story you'd like to share,
Speaker 2: email podcast at momamea dot com dot au. You can
Speaker 2: support us by following the show in your favorite podcast
Speaker 2: app and leaving a five star review. We'll see you
Speaker 2: for the next episode.