Speaker 1: Hey, guys, welcome to another episode of Two Jersey Jays.
Speaker 1: I'm Jackie Goldschneider. I'm Jen Fessler. Hi guys, Hi, Okay,
Speaker 1: and Jen. I have a question for you. Yes, this
Speaker 1: term sounds jump right and horrifying, but have you ever
Speaker 1: heard of invisible women syndrome?
Speaker 2: I have heard of it, But even if I hadn't
Speaker 2: heard of it, I think I would be just the
Speaker 2: title alone with clue me in to what it means.
Speaker 1: But please, Invisible woman syndrome is a theory that when
Speaker 1: a woman reaches a certain age, usually when they go
Speaker 1: through menopause around age fifty, the world stops seeing them.
Speaker 1: They become invisible. They stop excelling at the things that
Speaker 1: society says women are made for, which is beauty and
Speaker 1: raising children, and they therefore become invisible in society, in
Speaker 1: the workplace, and in the media. And you know, I
Speaker 1: have to say, I don't feel invisible, but I do
Speaker 1: feel at times like as I get older, I find
Speaker 1: it hard to figure out what my purpose is. When
Speaker 1: I was younger, I had all these big dreams, and
Speaker 1: now as I'm approaching fifty, it does feel like things
Speaker 1: are limited.
Speaker 2: Well, first, before I comment, on Invisible Women's Syndrome. In
Speaker 2: case you guys haven't guessed, our episode today is about aging,
Speaker 2: and we're talking about specifically because we happen to be women.
Speaker 2: We're talking about women and aging. Although like to throw
Speaker 2: in a few thoughts that we have on differences between
Speaker 2: men and women aging, but I relate to what you're describing,
Speaker 2: and I the most relatable part of it for me
Speaker 2: is the idea that women are not being looked at
Speaker 2: and in social situations. Not so much in the workplace
Speaker 2: for me, but that feeling that I used to have
Speaker 2: where I was very noticeable. I guess to men and
Speaker 2: to women. We are on reality television right now, so
Speaker 2: we do get noticed, maybe in a different way. But
Speaker 2: let's say, for me before Housewives, there is a difference
Speaker 2: now at age fifty five than there was at age
Speaker 2: even forty five and thirty five. And I don't know
Speaker 2: if it's partly in my own mind or I just
Speaker 2: have become less relevant to society.
Speaker 1: Well, do you know, I think? Can I just tell
Speaker 1: you this story when I was in my twenties, I
Speaker 1: still I remember this so distinctly. I was what it
Speaker 1: was like, not a club, but it was like a
Speaker 1: bar with music and everything, and there was this group
Speaker 1: of older women and they, when I say older women,
Speaker 1: they were like in their late forties, maybe early fifties,
Speaker 1: and they were at the same place as us. And
Speaker 1: the song who Let the Dogs Out came on and
Speaker 1: one of the women had a.
Speaker 2: Leash with her. Okay, I guess it was our favorite.
Speaker 1: Song or something. She had a leash and she was
Speaker 1: swinging the leash and dancing her ass off to Who
Speaker 1: Let the Dogs Out? And I turned to my friend
Speaker 1: and I said, if I'm doing that when I'm fifty
Speaker 1: years old, please kill me. And I'll always remember that,
Speaker 1: because I almost felt like this woman was too old
Speaker 1: to be having this much fun, like at that stage,
Speaker 1: calm the fuck down, sit down, like enjoy your grandchildren.
Speaker 1: Like I had all these distorted ideas of what life
Speaker 1: was supposed to be like. And I wonder now if
Speaker 1: when I go to because I still love to have
Speaker 1: fun and I love to go out, and I wonder
Speaker 1: if twenty year old or young thirties are looking at
Speaker 1: me and saying, wow, go home, go home to your
Speaker 1: family and live appropriately. And it bothers me so much
Speaker 1: that I thought that.
Speaker 2: The uh, well, I want to delve into this later.
Speaker 2: But the good news about hitting middle age and getting
Speaker 2: older is that all of that doesn't matter as much
Speaker 2: as it used to. Like what people are thinking, and
Speaker 2: what people are, how people are judging you, all of
Speaker 2: that starts to sort of fall under the category of
Speaker 2: who gives a shit? But we're ahead of ourselves. A
Speaker 2: little talk about that later.
Speaker 1: I don't know about that. I don't know about that,
Speaker 1: but I don't know. I feel like when I was younger,
Speaker 1: I really thought that fifty years old was old.
Speaker 2: Well, I mean the Golden Girls, the Golden Girls that
Speaker 2: we watched, right, they were representing old women in Florida,
Speaker 2: you know, over fifty community and we watched them and
Speaker 2: love them because they were older and yet they were
Speaker 2: still sassy. But I don't remember. I remember reading something
Speaker 2: about like their actual ages that they were supposed to be,
Speaker 2: and I'm older than that. Except for the mother what
Speaker 2: was her name? Not so yeah, not Sophia, Yes, I
Speaker 2: don't think. I think she was probably supposed to be
Speaker 2: a little bit older, but like absolutely right in that
Speaker 2: range Alice on the Brady Bunch, I think they said
Speaker 2: she was forty five, right, And the way they say
Speaker 2: ten years older than Alice, right, but.
Speaker 1: They were like so, so what they were in there?
Speaker 1: They were supposed to be in their seventies, I guess, right.
Speaker 2: I don't know. I don't know that.
Speaker 1: And all they did was sit around and eat cheesecake
Speaker 1: and like do old lady things. And I feel like
Speaker 1: that's why, maybe that's why we think about getting old.
Speaker 2: Is not but fifty is not what it was, right,
Speaker 2: Like I said this, my business is sort of based around,
Speaker 2: loosely based around the idea of agism. So my heels
Speaker 2: that I make are for women who have reached a
Speaker 2: certain agent, can no longer wear heels and still want
Speaker 2: to feel sexy. But we say, one of the things
Speaker 2: we talk about when we're promoting f major is that
Speaker 2: you know, fifty, this is not your mother's fifty. And
Speaker 2: my mother did not like I do it fifty that
Speaker 2: is not I'm whatever to do my own horn. But
Speaker 2: she didn't have access to so much that we have
Speaker 2: access to now. So physically it's a different time, right,
Speaker 2: So we have access to everything from botox to fillers,
Speaker 2: to care extensions and keratin and all the bs and
Speaker 2: surgeries and the cur all things that really our mothers
Speaker 2: didn't have access to personal trainers, different ways to exercise.
Speaker 2: So I don't think fifty looks like it used to
Speaker 2: look right, and.
Speaker 1: I think that's a problem. So you take these women
Speaker 1: who people say defy age, right, like Jennifer Lopez or
Speaker 1: cape Beck and Sale both. You know Katee Beck and
Speaker 1: Sale's fifty. I think Jennfi Lopez a few years past that,
Speaker 1: and they're freaking gorgeous. They look very young, And we
Speaker 1: do have access to all this stuff, so I feel
Speaker 1: like it's it's almost like you fell apart if you
Speaker 1: don't do it right, and that's not true.
Speaker 2: But I don't think that. I feel like, I think
Speaker 2: it's great that we have access to these things. Whether
Speaker 2: or not you decide to use them is of course
Speaker 2: your own decision. But I love that I don't look
Speaker 2: like my mother and my grandmother did at fifty, that
Speaker 2: I have pools that they didn't have, for better or
Speaker 2: for worse. I'm grateful for that. But unrealistic expectations now
Speaker 2: that come along with aging, I think they have. They're
Speaker 2: way bigger those expectations than they used to be. Like,
Speaker 2: you don't really see.
Speaker 1: A woman when you see a woman with enough money
Speaker 1: to get botox? Who chooses not to? Don't you think
Speaker 1: to yourself, well, why would you walk around with all
Speaker 1: those lines on your face? Like Lisa Barlowe, famously on
Speaker 1: Real House Sizes of Salt Lake City, doesn't get botox.
Speaker 1: She says she wants she likes her face natural, and
Speaker 1: I always I think she's stunning, but I always think, like,
Speaker 1: why wouldn't you get botox?
Speaker 2: Well, you're asking the wrong girl. I'd been getting botox
Speaker 2: since botox was a thing, so I can't really answer
Speaker 2: that question. I think, though, how glorious it must be
Speaker 2: to be a woman who is really is embracing age
Speaker 2: and doesn't give a shit. I'm not one of those women,
Speaker 2: but I do like Justine Bateman so right, So she's
Speaker 2: come out recently. She doesn't looks like, she doesn't wear makeup,
Speaker 2: and she doesn't color her hair, and she has completely
Speaker 2: embraced that lot. Pamela Anderson like, these are women that
Speaker 2: are saying, you know, fuck all of you, this is
Speaker 2: what fifty something or hopever they old there looks like
Speaker 2: I think I'm beautiful. That's all that matters. And God
Speaker 2: bless them, fat not bless.
Speaker 1: Them, But they get torn apart in the media. Well,
Speaker 1: not so much Pamela Anderson, but Justine Bateman. She got
Speaker 1: destroyed in the media.
Speaker 2: It made her more likable for me, even though I
Speaker 2: have yeah, I'm not that person. I have no interest
Speaker 2: in letting my hair grow go gray and letting my
Speaker 2: wrinkle get wrinklear. But I definitely felt, uh this affinity
Speaker 2: towards her, like cool man, like, look at you doing
Speaker 2: you and not making excuses for it? Right you? How
Speaker 2: much time I would save if I just didn't give
Speaker 2: a shit about my looks? How much time?
Speaker 1: This is?
Speaker 2: What?
Speaker 1: This is what Pam Anderson said on Today dot Com.
Speaker 1: She said, I'm much more comfortable in my own skin.
Speaker 1: But I'm also in an industry that really focuses on beauty,
Speaker 1: and I thought, I'm going to challenge beauty. I think
Speaker 1: challenging ourselves is what keeps us young and beautiful. And
Speaker 1: I think, really genuinely, beauty does come from within and
Speaker 1: you don't have to play the game.
Speaker 2: So I love that.
Speaker 1: But then again, she is Pam Anderson, and she looks
Speaker 1: like Pam Anderson, so i' mean, like, hey, do when
Speaker 1: you're Pam Anderson, you could do that? But when I
Speaker 1: wake up, and I have no makeup on. I am
Speaker 1: not showing my face to the world. But I do
Speaker 1: think that it is kind of like yesterday I heard
Speaker 1: this guy in his uh I think he's in his
Speaker 1: early thirties, and somebody asked him if he had a
Speaker 1: celebrity crush and he said, it'll always be Jennifer Aniston,
Speaker 1: and I love that, And then he followed it by saying,
Speaker 1: she's simply ageless, and I thought, like, why can't she
Speaker 1: just be Jennifer Aniston? Like why does what would happen
Speaker 1: if she did look, you know, fifty something.
Speaker 2: Well, let's let's turn that around for a minute, Okay,
Speaker 2: So I could tell you that whoever I was, whatever
Speaker 2: man I was in love with as a younger woman,
Speaker 2: when there are one hundred and ten, I'm gonna still
Speaker 2: love them. I'm gonna still feel attracted to them. And
Speaker 2: I can tell you that because I can look at
Speaker 2: men like I don't know the Clint Eastwoods of the world,
Speaker 2: even like, but I know he just had a baby,
Speaker 2: and that's a whole other subject and weird or whatever.
Speaker 2: But Rober Junior, I think he is so sexy. I
Speaker 2: could yeah, I do. Oh boy, no, not I I
Speaker 2: just think it's different. I think that it's different. Man,
Speaker 2: I don't have that like you know, Okay, let's stay,
Speaker 2: let's do someone simpler. How about a George Clooney. Yeah
Speaker 2: he's gorgeous, He's gorgeous, gorgeous.
Speaker 1: But I don't think men compare themselves to like George
Speaker 1: Clooney and Brad Pitt. They're in their fifties.
Speaker 2: Oh no, no. But but the point being that, like
Speaker 2: this guy said Jennifer Anderston is ageless, I don't care
Speaker 2: if George Clooney is ageless, aging over the hill, the
Speaker 2: hill follow of shit.
Speaker 1: What I'm saying is you wouldn't say I love George
Speaker 1: Clooney even at his age.
Speaker 2: Now, I know it's different from say that it.
Speaker 1: Is very different. For a Minute's different like the fact
Speaker 1: that Robert de Niro and al Pacino could have a
Speaker 1: baby in their eighties. I I don't think. I'm just
Speaker 1: gonna be honest, like, just because you can doesn't mean
Speaker 1: you should. I think it's horrible, I really, I mean
Speaker 1: there's something about like life is not guaranteed for anybody, right,
Speaker 1: but having a child when you know you're not going
Speaker 1: to live more than like I mean yes, there are
Speaker 1: outliers who live. I think it's I think it's an
Speaker 1: ego thing. I think it's horrible. I don't think you
Speaker 1: should be having a child in your eighties. I just don't.
Speaker 1: But you know, it is different for men. I think,
Speaker 1: you know, the midlife crisis for a woman and a
Speaker 1: man are very different. So for a man, they say,
Speaker 1: you know, reach a research shows that a man's midlife
Speaker 1: crisis is triggered by a feeling of being trapped in
Speaker 1: their life. And that's why I think it's the mentality.
Speaker 1: It's about right quality for men, right, But that's why
Speaker 1: you get these men who are trying to move backwards
Speaker 1: by like getting a bestorcycles or.
Speaker 2: Dying their hair.
Speaker 1: Women doing crazy right.
Speaker 2: So I actually hold my friends. And when I say
Speaker 2: I pulled my friends, I pulled a lot of my
Speaker 2: friends going into this episode. And I want to say,
Speaker 2: I talked to maybe twenty women and I ask them
Speaker 2: all the same question, and Jack, I'll ask it to you,
Speaker 2: but without overthinking it. Okay, just give me a sentence.
Speaker 2: What is what do you feel like is the best
Speaker 2: part of aging?
Speaker 1: Aside from the fact that I do appreciate that I'm
Speaker 1: healthy and have a healthy family and everything, and that
Speaker 1: aging is not you know.
Speaker 2: It's a gift.
Speaker 1: What do I appreciate about it? I have to be honest,
Speaker 1: I don't love too much about it. But what I
Speaker 1: do love is the feeling of I feel less pressure
Speaker 1: to be a people pleaser. I say no to more
Speaker 1: things that I authentically don't want to do. Yep, And
Speaker 1: I put people out of my life that I don't
Speaker 1: feel good being around. And that's been especially in the
Speaker 1: past two years. I've chosen to surround myself only with
Speaker 1: the people that I enjoy being around, and that includes, sadly,
Speaker 1: that included my sister too. I stopped, I really stopped.
Speaker 1: I used to try hard with her, but not hard,
Speaker 1: but like check in every once in a while and
Speaker 1: see if maybe she wants to talk.
Speaker 2: I've stopped. Well, so I will tell you that unanimously.
Speaker 2: I'm not making this up. I have my little journal
Speaker 2: here and I called about twenty women. I wrote down
Speaker 2: exactly what they said. I said, just give me a sentence,
Speaker 2: and I could read you. When I said the best
Speaker 2: part of aging, they almost said it in the exact
Speaker 2: same way. The best I'm just gonna read. The one
Speaker 2: is don't fucking care anymore, the best not giving a shit,
Speaker 2: the best not having my period and not giving a shit,
Speaker 2: not caring about what others think, not giving a shit,
Speaker 2: and being more confident. I mean, it was just over
Speaker 2: and over again. And it was the ability also to
Speaker 2: say no and not caring about what was going to
Speaker 2: come b at you. And it's funny because I was thinking,
Speaker 2: I have a funny story about that myself, because for me,
Speaker 2: that's the best part of getting older, is I am
Speaker 2: still I still struggle with people pleasing Having said that,
Speaker 2: it's way better than what than it was when I
Speaker 2: was younger. And for instance, so I have a friend
Speaker 2: and we had plans to go out on a Thursday night.
Speaker 2: This is going back I know a couple of years
Speaker 2: and another one of our friends got wind of it
Speaker 2: and she at the time was going out with someone
Speaker 2: that night coincidentally, so there were four of us going
Speaker 2: out that night. So my other friend, my third friend.
Speaker 2: So if you know, I'm going out one person and
Speaker 2: there are two others. So said, well, you know, guys,
Speaker 2: let's just put ourselves in the same reservation. We'll all
Speaker 2: go out together, the four of us. And I said no, uh, huh,
Speaker 2: And we were on sort of like a thread without
Speaker 2: the fourth person. But the fourth person, lovely woman, was
Speaker 2: not a good friend of mine, and it was going
Speaker 2: to change the whole dynamic of that Thursday night going
Speaker 2: out and being amongst like someone that I felt really
Speaker 2: comfortable with and sharing what's going on with me, and
Speaker 2: I didn't want for that dynamic to switch. It was
Speaker 2: a Thursday night. Knowing me, I probably didn't want to
Speaker 2: go out anyway, So I said, no, that's not going
Speaker 2: to work. And my friend said back, what do you mean,
Speaker 2: What do you mean no? And I said no, and
Speaker 2: she's so it just kept like, what are you talking about?
Speaker 2: Why not we're all going out? I said, because I
Speaker 2: don't want to, And he said, what do you mean?
Speaker 2: Why are you being like this? I said, well, if
Speaker 2: you want, I'll make up a lie. Okay, I don't
Speaker 2: feel good. Would you like me to lie to you?
Speaker 2: I don't want to. I'd rather just go out with
Speaker 2: me and this one person. With me and this one
Speaker 2: person and you, this other person who's a lovely woman
Speaker 2: changes the dynamic of the night, and I don't want
Speaker 2: to do it. And I know it may sound like
Speaker 2: a silly story, but it was so everything for me
Speaker 2: because like I'm not making excuses why I don't wanna,
Speaker 2: That's why. And at fifty five years old, I can
Speaker 2: say no, I don't want to and not have to
Speaker 2: make excuses for it. That's enough, my mom. It was
Speaker 2: just no is not a four letter word. That's part
Speaker 2: of like the not giving a shit thing. I mean,
Speaker 2: there are so many pieces of not giving a shit
Speaker 2: that are so satisfy, you know, satisfactory, satisfactory, that gives
Speaker 2: so much satisfaction. But like when I was younger, I
Speaker 2: just would have never been able to do that no
Speaker 2: because I said no, That's why, And that is I
Speaker 2: definitely has come with age, right.
Speaker 1: That that is the best part because you when you
Speaker 1: say no to things, like when I used to, I
Speaker 1: used to be like, well, what if am I going
Speaker 1: to not get invited to this thing next time?
Speaker 2: Right, this one's going to be mad at me.
Speaker 1: Now you know that, like, first of all, no one's
Speaker 1: thinking about you as much as you're thinking about you,
Speaker 1: but also like it just life is short, and you
Speaker 1: know that, like you've become aware of the fact that
Speaker 1: people around you are unhappy or they get sick, or
Speaker 1: they lose people, and like, you know that life is
Speaker 1: short and you have this like clarity.
Speaker 2: But I don't know that. I buy all of these.
Speaker 1: Women who say that they don't care what people think
Speaker 1: of them any more.
Speaker 2: I mean there are degrees of it. You know, it's
Speaker 2: not like you now you never ever care, But it's
Speaker 2: so much better than it used to be. I mean,
Speaker 2: that's right, that's the beauty of agent all these middle
Speaker 2: aged women on ozenbic. Not to go back to that,
Speaker 2: but I mean it is omnipresent. So like all these
Speaker 2: people don't care, then why are they all like drastically
Speaker 2: changing their bodies right now? But I don't think I'm
Speaker 2: not saying that. Well, okay, so great. So, remembering what
Speaker 2: you just said and what you just asked me, I'm
Speaker 2: going to ask you what's the worst thing for you
Speaker 2: about aging? The worst thing a quick sentence, don't get
Speaker 2: like even to love it, but like my face looks older? Okay,
Speaker 2: so unanimously all the friends I could go back and
Speaker 2: tell you the best thing was not.
Speaker 1: Giving a shit claiming I'm not claiming that I don't
Speaker 1: care what people think of my looks.
Speaker 2: No, wait, that's not what I'm saying. What I'm saying
Speaker 2: is not giving a shit about what people think is
Speaker 2: not the same as not caring, as not liking the
Speaker 2: physical changes that come along with aging. So what that
Speaker 2: means is that I want to look great. It's not
Speaker 2: about everybody else like it used to be. It's not
Speaker 2: because I want to catch a husband or I want
Speaker 2: to be the pretty girl said. I want to look
Speaker 2: in the mirror and like what I see and still
Speaker 2: feel sexy. So I don't think they're mutually exclusive, right, Like,
Speaker 2: you can not give a shit anymore and still feel
Speaker 2: badly about your body and your face aging. And I'm
Speaker 2: telling you that that was the unan of his answer.
Speaker 2: That's what I got from over twenty women. It was
Speaker 2: really almost bizarre. So I think that it's great Adjustine
Speaker 2: Bateman of Pamela Anderson, like God bless them, good for them.
Speaker 2: But I think for the most part, the part of
Speaker 2: aging that is so hard for us is the physicality
Speaker 2: of it, right, that part of us that the first
Speaker 2: time I saw gray hair on my vagina, that was
Speaker 2: a tragic day. Okay, Now that's not necessarily about like,
Speaker 2: you know what I look like. Not many people were
Speaker 2: seeing that. Not many people would want to. But my
Speaker 2: point is like just knowing that my body is getting older.
Speaker 1: I know there are times when I stare in the
Speaker 1: mirror and I'll like use my fingers, my like middle
Speaker 1: fingers to like pick up certain parts of my face,
Speaker 1: like yeah, I look, and I wonder, like what fell
Speaker 1: on my face that makes me look thirty years older
Speaker 1: than I was at twenty, right, And I'll like pick
Speaker 1: things up and that little lift will make me look
Speaker 1: so much younger, and then I have to drop it again.
Speaker 2: And it's about acceptance, right, because my friends will say,
Speaker 2: no one understands why their knees look the way they do,
Speaker 2: so I have That's that's sort of like the topic
Speaker 2: recently is that everybody's legs having a lot to do
Speaker 2: with the people that are on ozembic. But your skin
Speaker 2: starts to sag. But even let's put ozembic aside for
Speaker 2: a minute. As you get older, your skin starts to
Speaker 2: sag on your knees. Jack, I don't know if you've
Speaker 2: this has happened to you, but they just sort of
Speaker 2: fold skin folds over itself on your knees, and so
Speaker 2: there's a lot of like why, so, like what is happening?
Speaker 2: Why are man of these do it? Here's the answer,
Speaker 2: Because you're old. We're getting old.
Speaker 1: It's funny that you say that. There was this woman
Speaker 1: once and I had a conversation. This is like ten
Speaker 1: years ago. I was a camp drop off and I
Speaker 1: was with someone to pick up my campers. My kids
Speaker 1: were little, and there was a counselor and I said
Speaker 1: to my friend, how old do you think she is?
Speaker 1: And she said fifties And I said, no, she looks
Speaker 1: so young. She looks so pretty, and maybe in her thirties.
Speaker 1: And she said no, look at her knees. And he
Speaker 1: looked at her knees she and I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: you're right. And I never thought about like people's knees before,
Speaker 1: but you could tell by the other parts of your body.
Speaker 1: Why does that happen to other women? On ozempiic, your
Speaker 1: skin folds faster.
Speaker 2: You lose muscle. Unless you don't, unless you're very diligent
Speaker 2: about it, you can lose muscle. So the skin, yeah,
Speaker 2: it starts to wrinkle and hang. So you know, for
Speaker 2: some women, that in and of itself is a reason
Speaker 2: not he's ozemptic. But it never me.
Speaker 1: No, I mean, I can't say that I mean, I'm
Speaker 1: so lucky, you know, to be aging with a healthy
Speaker 1: family and with a lot of support. But I don't
Speaker 1: I mean it's for me.
Speaker 2: I don't think it's I don't love it.
Speaker 1: I don't love getting older.
Speaker 2: I really don't know. And I used to say, and
Speaker 2: my mother used to make fun of me because I
Speaker 2: would say all the time, like, I don't mind getting older.
Speaker 2: I'm excited to hit forty I'm excited to hit forty five.
Speaker 2: And she was like, well, Jen, you're just gonna be
Speaker 2: ecstatic than when you hit eighty, Just like, hold your breath,
Speaker 2: it'll be here soon, Jen. But I really did used
Speaker 2: to say that, and I think part of that was
Speaker 2: because my twenties were so riddled with insecurity and maybe
Speaker 2: that was the best I ever looked physically, maybe my thirties,
Speaker 2: but it was mentally didn't matter. It was a misery.
Speaker 2: And I am so much more, not only self confident,
Speaker 2: aware of who I am, happy in my skin. And
Speaker 2: those are the gifts that come with aging. Right. Unfortunately,
Speaker 2: you wish that you knew then what you know now.
Speaker 2: The ideal, right would be to be like, look like
Speaker 2: I was twenty, but still be me at fifty five.
Speaker 2: Then I would I take the world.
Speaker 1: God. I remember, I used to always dread what other
Speaker 1: people that were older than me were going, like only
Speaker 1: a few years older, but what they were doing. And
Speaker 1: I used to say, like, for example, when my kids
Speaker 1: were in elementary school and people would graduate out of
Speaker 1: the elementary school and their last kid would graduate fifth grade,
Speaker 1: I used to say, thank god, I have kids that
Speaker 1: are still at elementary school. I'm still young. My kids
Speaker 1: are still babies. And then it was suddenly I had
Speaker 1: no kids at elementary school. Then it was the Barmit's
Speaker 1: for years. Thank god, it's not my kids yet. You
Speaker 1: know they all have teenagers. I still have little kids.
Speaker 1: Then I was there, and now all my friends are
Speaker 1: doing college admissions and like now I'm in this phase
Speaker 1: of like, oh, thank god, I'm not at the college
Speaker 1: admission phase yet. And then I know soon enough, like
Speaker 1: I'm going to be there also, And it's just, you know,
Speaker 1: I gets scared. I get scared of getting older because
Speaker 1: my kids give me so much purpose and I know
Speaker 1: that no matter what happens in my career, listen, this
Speaker 1: show that we're on that can go away at any moment,
Speaker 1: and that has to end some time for everybody, right,
Speaker 1: I mean, you're not going to be on the Housewives forever,
Speaker 1: so that kind of like explosion of relevancy that's going
Speaker 1: to go away. And no matter what happens in your life,
Speaker 1: you know that, like raising your kids is you know
Speaker 1: that gives you purpose. You know they'll only have one mother,
Speaker 1: so I just I get nervous about them getting older
Speaker 1: and independent with it and not needing me.
Speaker 2: So this is a great, a great sort of segue
Speaker 2: into the whole empty nesting thing in terms of aging
Speaker 2: and women. And I don't feel like you do. And
Speaker 2: I didn't feel like you do in the sense that well,
Speaker 2: first of all, I love being an empty nester, so
Speaker 2: I love it, oh my god. Now, And I don't
Speaker 2: know sometimes I feel like sometimes that what you just
Speaker 2: said is part of it. Like you feel like the
Speaker 2: kids make you relevant, and.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I elevant, and like they give me so much
Speaker 1: to do and watching them and like molding them and guiding.
Speaker 2: But all of us, listen, this doesn't mean it's funny.
Speaker 2: Because when I would send my kids to Sleepway camp
Speaker 2: in my town, that was always the Jewish women that
Speaker 2: did that, and the non Jewish women didn't. And it
Speaker 2: would feel like the non Jewish women. Maybe it was
Speaker 2: in my head or the heads of my friends, but
Speaker 2: they were judgmental about it, like, how could you send
Speaker 2: your kids away? I don't. I'm not to buy into this,
Speaker 2: Like you love your kids more because you keep them home,
Speaker 2: or if you're walking by their bedroom after they've left
Speaker 2: for college and crying, that means that you must really
Speaker 2: love your kids. When kids come out of you or
Speaker 2: when they become yours and you become a mother, we
Speaker 2: all love them, maybe not the same way, but that
Speaker 2: level of love is like nothing else. And being a mother,
Speaker 2: no matter if I like my time or loved my
Speaker 2: time in the summer when my kids were away, knowing
Speaker 2: that they were having the time of their life, you
Speaker 2: know that didn't make me any more or less of
Speaker 2: a loving, doting mother. And I will tell you that
Speaker 2: in terms of like I love empty nesting, the truth
Speaker 2: is I love being alone. So there's that. I way
Speaker 2: prefer Jeff to go into the office, but whatever, that's
Speaker 2: my I'll talk to my shrink about that on Thursday.
Speaker 2: But anyway, but the point is that like I have
Speaker 2: no qualms as long as they're happy and I know
Speaker 2: they're away and they are living their best life. When
Speaker 2: my kids are unhappy, either one of them, then everything
Speaker 2: sort of stops right dead in its tracks, and I
Speaker 2: become mama bear and I can't, you know, enjoy myself.
Speaker 2: And that's, you know, it's a very difficult thing, because
Speaker 2: if they're suffering as mothers, I think that we suffer.
Speaker 2: But in terms of being in my house, I never
Speaker 2: was crying walking by their bedrooms. They come home a lot,
Speaker 2: and when they do, and the house gets to be
Speaker 2: a mess, and you know, there is there are other
Speaker 2: people's needs. And I'm fifty five and I sort of
Speaker 2: really enjoy just attending to my own needs and Jeff's needs,
Speaker 2: and I don't know, it's it is so fabulous and freeing.
Speaker 2: I think, though part of that is because I have
Speaker 2: so much going on, and I reinvented myself a bit
Speaker 2: right when I turned fifty. I started a business, when
Speaker 2: I turned fifty three, became a friend of a housewife.
Speaker 2: Maybe without that, I wouldn't feel so fulfilled and so
Speaker 2: at ease with having my nest be empty. But you know,
Speaker 2: as much as I there's no one I love more
Speaker 2: than I love those two people and my husband. But
Speaker 2: having said that, I'm good, like I'm very very happy
Speaker 2: to walk around my house to have it be everything
Speaker 2: is neat and I have stuff to do and there's
Speaker 2: nobody asking me what's for dinner as long as they're good.
Speaker 2: I'm loving that. Aspect of getting older.
Speaker 1: I really hope that I am like that, because I
Speaker 1: really do. I'm afraid of it. My house right now
Speaker 1: is very full. It's very busy. Listen, I had my
Speaker 1: children so close together because of my fertility issues, ended
Speaker 1: up having four children in three years, so I brought home.
Speaker 1: I brought home my infants when my older ones were
Speaker 1: two and a half, so I had four kids in
Speaker 1: diapers for a while. For a good six months, I
Speaker 1: would change thirty two diapers a day.
Speaker 2: It was wild.
Speaker 1: But you know, I have a very full, busy house,
Speaker 1: and I feel like, because they are so close in age,
Speaker 1: I'm going to lose everything within a matter of years,
Speaker 1: you know, not lose everything, but like it's just going
Speaker 1: to go from like bustling to quiet. And I'm really scared.
Speaker 1: I am scared of that. I don't know how a
Speaker 1: lot of because but unlike.
Speaker 2: Camo members who feel like that, yeah, well we're gonna.
Speaker 1: Say I'm scared of it, but no, I was gonna say,
Speaker 1: unlike you, like my my big you know, explosion in career,
Speaker 1: And of course I don't know what's going to happen
Speaker 1: in the future, and I have big dreams and everything,
Speaker 1: but my big explosion of career came when my kids
Speaker 1: were still small, you know, so so I don't know it's.
Speaker 2: Going to career aside though, even without even without career,
Speaker 2: because without everything that's gone down, the business, the housewives,
Speaker 2: the podcast. I mean, I feel very blessed by, you know,
Speaker 2: all the things that I have going on right now
Speaker 2: and that I would not have been able to manage
Speaker 2: when the kids were little. But even without all of that,
Speaker 2: I never found myself. Even when the kids were at
Speaker 2: Sleepway Cat, I was never bored. Really. I know a
Speaker 2: lot of women do get bored without that purpose of
Speaker 2: like having the kids around, getting them to sports practice,
Speaker 2: getting dinner on the table. I never felt really bored.
Speaker 2: I can occupy myself very easily. I'm lucky in that way.
Speaker 2: I'm unlucky in a lot of ways, but that's I
Speaker 2: don't never really worried about being alone. I am loving
Speaker 2: empty nesting, and I think that as like things are
Speaker 2: changing in this world, and in twenty twenty four there
Speaker 2: are more opportunities. There's a little bit less agism when
Speaker 2: I think that it's going to be easier and easier,
Speaker 2: But I don't know. For me, it's another phase of
Speaker 2: my life that I I'm actually really loving.
Speaker 1: It reminds me when Don Lemon, who I really like, actually,
Speaker 1: but Don Lemon said that Nikki Hiley was pissed her
Speaker 1: prime and that was kind of horrifying. I understand why
Speaker 1: you did not go over. Well, yeah, yeah, because how
Speaker 1: old is she? She's in her fifties, right, younger than me. Yeah,
Speaker 1: she looks younger than me. So, but menopause, menopause the
Speaker 1: big really unfamiliar for me. I have not yet gone
Speaker 1: through it. Now that being said, here's a little TMI.
Speaker 1: Because of my anorexia, I had not gotten my period
Speaker 1: in a good twenty years. I've gotten so for me,
Speaker 1: that's not going to change. But I am scared of
Speaker 1: many things about menopause, one of them being because of
Speaker 1: all the homeowne changes. I know that people in menopause
Speaker 1: do tend to gain some weight, and for me that's
Speaker 1: a very loaded issue because I gained a fair amount
Speaker 1: of weight in my recovery from anorexia, and I don't
Speaker 1: I don't want to gain even more. But you know
Speaker 1: that's for another time, another discussion. But you know, it
Speaker 1: just feels to me like I don't know how I'll
Speaker 1: handle all of those, like hormonal changes.
Speaker 2: I mean, there's so much to talk about when it
Speaker 2: comes to menopause. And I actually, you know, I've spoken
Speaker 2: about doing menopause like our own exceparate, like our just
Speaker 2: one menopause, right, and we both have a common friend
Speaker 2: that is an expert in this area, so that'll be fun. Well,
Speaker 2: I don't know if menopause is ever fun, but I
Speaker 2: can tell you that, yeah, fun, I do miss. I
Speaker 2: certainly don't miss cramps. I certainly don't miss bloating you
Speaker 2: mean for your period. Yeah, But in terms of it's
Speaker 2: it's a weird feeling to know that I, even if
Speaker 2: I wanted to, I don't have ovaries. I had them.
Speaker 2: They had to come out. I had have surgery. But anyway,
Speaker 2: really I had a tumor, not cancerous one, but I
Speaker 2: had a really large tumor on my ovary, and so
Speaker 2: they had to take them out along with my fallopian
Speaker 2: tubes anyway, but that I can't even if I wanted
Speaker 2: to have a baby, I can't have a baby is weird.
Speaker 2: You know, it's weird to know that feeling of being
Speaker 2: all dried up quote unquote. You know it's I associate,
Speaker 2: you know, having the fact that I'll never buy tampons
Speaker 2: for myself again. There is something kind of sad for
Speaker 2: me about it. And menopause is not an easy ride.
Speaker 2: There's so much more that goes along with it than
Speaker 2: people used to actually even think or give women credit for.
Speaker 2: It's the hormonal changes, obviously, the physical changes, the emotional changes.
Speaker 2: The sweats alone are enough to make you want to
Speaker 2: put a bullet through your brain. I mean, it's just
Speaker 2: not for everybody. Everybody's different. Maybe you will sail through that,
Speaker 2: but they suck, They really suck. And I used to
Speaker 2: have I'm on hormone replacement now, but I have used
Speaker 2: to have the most horrible pains in my joints. This
Speaker 2: feeling of constant fatigue is how long it varies. I mean,
Speaker 2: everybody's different. You know some people I have friends who
Speaker 2: have gone through it. It never had sweats. But you know,
Speaker 2: I think it's just I'm not a doctor, but for me,
Speaker 2: the symptoms of menopause years years for sure. I mean
Speaker 2: there's perimenopause and then there's then you're in menopause.
Speaker 1: You've probably how old you jacks A forty seven? You
Speaker 1: may even be in period, probably am, But I don't
Speaker 1: know because I still I don't.
Speaker 2: Do period periods. I stop when I was fifty is
Speaker 2: the last time I got my period, so, which is
Speaker 2: pretty early. I think for menopause, maybe it's average. But yeah,
Speaker 2: it's a hard thing to kind of get your head around.
Speaker 2: But I think in a way, it's like kind of symbolic, right,
Speaker 2: Like it's kind of free, Like you don't have to
Speaker 2: worry about your period anymore, and you don't have to
Speaker 2: you don't get cramps that you used to, so we
Speaker 2: can like kind of spin it like that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'll need you to help me spin it.
Speaker 2: I'll help you spin it.
Speaker 1: You have to stick around in my life life. So
Speaker 1: you know, I was talking to Evan this morning and
Speaker 1: I asked him because he's turning fifty in August, and
Speaker 1: I asked him how he feels about reaching midlife. You know,
Speaker 1: I think we're been in midlife for a while. You know,
Speaker 1: I don't know. I'm not living to one hundred. I mean,
Speaker 1: I hope we do. But and he said to me
Speaker 1: that he's really really looking forward. He thinks the best
Speaker 1: years are yet to come. And I said, hold on, explain.
Speaker 1: He said, well, when you're you know, life goes in
Speaker 1: three phases. When you're in your you know, when you're
Speaker 1: around like you know, a late teen, early twenties, you're selfish.
Speaker 1: You're doing whatever makes you feel good. You're building your
Speaker 1: own life, your own career, you're doing your own thing.
Speaker 1: But you're not like secure yet. You don't have financial security,
Speaker 1: you don't know what you're going to do with your life.
Speaker 1: So there's that fear. Right next phase of your life,
Speaker 1: you're totally selfless. You're having kids, you're trying to make
Speaker 1: everyone happy, you're raising your children, dealing with aging parents, right,
Speaker 1: and then you get to you're, you know, fifty five
Speaker 1: to seventy, and he said, those are the years when
Speaker 1: you get to go back to being selfish. But you
Speaker 1: have the financial security, You've worked your job, you're in retirement.
Speaker 1: You know what matters. You know what you want to do,
Speaker 1: you want to see the world. You have that inner
Speaker 1: peace and I just thought, Amen, And you're so lucky
Speaker 1: that you see life like that and that you have
Speaker 1: that clarity because I'm just living with all this fear
Speaker 1: of what's to come, and he's living with all of
Speaker 1: this like excitement of what's yet to come. And I
Speaker 1: think there's a real difference. Yeah, it's a real different.
Speaker 2: Same exact question. And he said, well, I asked him
Speaker 2: the best and the worst, right I wanted to get
Speaker 2: I asked a couple of men though, the best and
Speaker 2: the worst, and what they thought. I wanted to kind
Speaker 2: of compare it to the women. But anyway, I said,
Speaker 2: what's the best part of aging for you? And he said,
Speaker 2: knowing that I'm not full of shit? I think not
Speaker 2: as much as worrying about what people thought, what people think,
Speaker 2: but doubting himself when he was younger. I think a
Speaker 2: lot of that is attached to his career, right, Like
Speaker 2: he knows when he knows something, he knows it. There's
Speaker 2: no real arguing with him. And if he's imparting wisdom
Speaker 2: to a client or to his son, like he doesn't
Speaker 2: have to die. He doesn't doubt himself. He is very
Speaker 2: sure of who he is, what he knows, and sort
Speaker 2: of there's no insecurity. I don't know. Maybe that's more
Speaker 2: a more attached for him to his career. And I said,
Speaker 2: you know, what's the what's the worst thing like about
Speaker 2: getting older? And he said, because I'm getting closer to death.
Speaker 2: I mean it's literally that mortality piece, right, and it's
Speaker 2: it's which I feel too. Not I don't feel it
Speaker 2: all the time, but some of the like all of us,
Speaker 2: I get I get scared. But you know, it was
Speaker 2: a little different. He didn't say anything about the physical changes, right,
Speaker 2: he doesn't care if he's he's gone completely bald, which
Speaker 2: I like one of mine.
Speaker 1: I asked him and said, do you compare yourself to
Speaker 1: younger men? And he said no, because I know I'm
Speaker 1: not a younger guy anymore, so there's no point. He goes,
Speaker 1: but I think I look great for fifty eight.
Speaker 2: He does, like I can't lie to you. I mean
Speaker 2: he does. I mean, I don't know, but he's doing good,
Speaker 2: you know, And that's.
Speaker 1: Hard for me too. Evan's always like in shape, and
Speaker 1: that makes me worry also, like if there are changes
Speaker 1: that I can control, right, you know, I had this
Speaker 1: horrendous eating disorder for so long because I felt that
Speaker 1: it was something that gave me absolute control over my body. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but you know, now I'm in recovery, but I'm facing
Speaker 1: these hormonal changes that are going to take it that
Speaker 1: control away from me again and do things to my
Speaker 1: body that I can't control. And he is not going
Speaker 1: to go through that. And Evan always keeps himself in shape,
Speaker 1: and he loves the gym, and he loves going outside
Speaker 1: and being physical. And I also worry about you know,
Speaker 1: you see these I don't worry about him ever leaving me.
Speaker 1: I know he loves me.
Speaker 2: But you see all these older or training in for
Speaker 2: a younger version and a younger thirty version.
Speaker 1: I feel like aging doesn't affect men the way that
Speaker 1: it does women. Yeah, you know, but then again, I'm
Speaker 1: not in a man's body. I don't know.
Speaker 2: I don't know what they think. But here's okay. So
Speaker 2: here's if we spin that a little bit. Here's the thing.
Speaker 2: So I become decrepit, and let's say I stop doing
Speaker 2: all of these things that prop my face up and
Speaker 2: my body up and whatever. Let's say I become decrepit.
Speaker 2: And Jeff Fessler does an age the same way that
Speaker 2: I do, and he for whatever reason, becomes more attractive
Speaker 2: and more But here's the thing that I know now
Speaker 2: that I didn't know. Then, Good luck, dude. Like, I'm
Speaker 2: good honey, you do you? Because I know who I am. Obviously,
Speaker 2: if Jeff Fessler ever left me, it would completely devastate me.
Speaker 2: But I am not that person who is scared. I'm
Speaker 2: not scared, honey, because I know who I am, different
Speaker 2: than when I was, even in my forties, and you're
Speaker 2: forty seven. I don't remember exactly where I was in
Speaker 2: terms of my my you know, my headset. But like
Speaker 2: now I'm okay, Like I don't want you to leave.
Speaker 2: I love you, You're You're my person. But guess what you
Speaker 2: think there is better? Honey? Do you? I'll be back here.
Speaker 2: How would you feel? What? I mean?
Speaker 1: You saw them?
Speaker 2: Really?
Speaker 1: I'm either kind of botox or anything or you don't
Speaker 1: have to say, Jeff Festna, does Jeff Besto get botox?
Speaker 1: Are you?
Speaker 2: He's not warn cologne ever since the day I met him. Botox.
Speaker 2: He shocks her jeans at cold. He just wants me
Speaker 2: to leave him alone. No, there's no botox. The world
Speaker 2: comfortable he is. It's all about it. If I didn't
Speaker 2: do anything. Oh man, Yeah, well guess what. I don't
Speaker 2: give shit either.
Speaker 1: I don't mean it's just that fair, though, And then
Speaker 1: you look at all of these men with these younger women,
Speaker 1: and nobody bats andy like Steven Tyler looking at pictures.
Speaker 1: He was at some kind of Grammy's party. His girlfriend
Speaker 1: is thirty nine, and he's I think.
Speaker 2: I know double he was, Oh, I know. I mean,
Speaker 2: how about this.
Speaker 1: When I was in my twenties, I went on vacation
Speaker 1: with my parents. I was with my dad. We were
Speaker 1: on some kind of like trolley in the Caribbean going
Speaker 1: to play tennis. I was going with my dad and
Speaker 1: we were sitting next to each other and this couple
Speaker 1: asked us if we were on our honeymoon, and my dad.
Speaker 2: Was like, oh, he loved it.
Speaker 1: It was like the greatest moment of his life.
Speaker 2: And I remember thinking, God, that's so unfair.
Speaker 1: I'm like twenty two years old and he's like in
Speaker 1: his fifties. You know, like it's just and nobody would
Speaker 1: think twice. But then you have Luanne was just on
Speaker 1: Watch what Happens Lie like this young guy and he
Speaker 1: was flirting with her, and I saw so many comments
Speaker 1: like why would he be flirting with her, you know,
Speaker 1: like and she just said, I mean, and she's a
Speaker 1: gorgeous woman, you know, like even when you know cher
Speaker 1: or Madonna people. I assume that these younger men want
Speaker 1: their money and their fame, and there couldn't be another reason.
Speaker 1: There couldn't be a reason why a young man, a
Speaker 1: young beautiful man, would fall in love with an older woman,
Speaker 1: like a signify older woman.
Speaker 2: My father married a woman the divorced now, who was
Speaker 2: three years older than me. I actually I have a
Speaker 2: sister who is younger than my daughter. And that's for
Speaker 2: another episode. Why We'll get into family dysfunction another time,
Speaker 2: but anyway, we can have a long one on that. Yeah,
Speaker 2: we could have a long one on that. But anyway,
Speaker 2: but you know, imagine being cool with that, right, Like
Speaker 2: he made a choice and it would have been so
Speaker 2: I can't imagine my mom marrying someone that was three
Speaker 2: years older than me, Like that's just unheard of. That
Speaker 2: would never happen in the world. My father was always
Speaker 2: with younger women. It seemed, it was no big shock
Speaker 2: when it happened, do you know what I mean. My mother,
Speaker 2: on the other hand, like it would have been the
Speaker 2: twilight zone. Never think about it.
Speaker 1: Think about it for a second, though, if something happened
Speaker 1: with your marriage.
Speaker 2: Would you I don't think I would ever.
Speaker 1: Feel comfortable, as great as it might seem to date
Speaker 1: a real young man. I think I'd always wonder if
Speaker 1: he saw me as old, and if he was looking
Speaker 1: at younger women. You know, I don't think i'd ever
Speaker 1: feel secure.
Speaker 2: I don't know, I don't know. I always wanted older anyway.
Speaker 2: I mean, Jeff is not Jeff sixty one and fifty five.
Speaker 2: But like I always wanted when I was dating, to
Speaker 2: be with an older man, and I just never had
Speaker 2: the patience for anybody that was certainly younger than me
Speaker 2: or I don't see myself ever really wanting that, who
Speaker 2: knows why, But like I would go up. So if
Speaker 2: I was single right now and I had to put
Speaker 2: in the age range on the dating app that I
Speaker 2: would date up to, I would probably date to seventy.
Speaker 1: Really, yeah, I could never be with a seventy year
Speaker 1: old man. Yeah, just you're younger than I am just
Speaker 1: a few years. I don't know, Yeah, but yeah, I
Speaker 1: do think that men have a different sense of midlife.
Speaker 1: They don't feel you know, the looks pressure. They don't
Speaker 1: feel you know, they don't. They don't feel empty, nesting
Speaker 1: loss as much as I'm sure some men do. But
Speaker 1: you know, I think they look forward to the freedom
Speaker 1: and to the selfishness again, you know, yeah, but you
Speaker 1: know there are there are good things about midlife.
Speaker 2: Like you said, I don't even know my midlife. Maybe
Speaker 2: I'm not. Maybe I'm old life. I don't even know.
Speaker 2: You're not. What is mid life even considered anymore? What
Speaker 2: is midlife considered? I mean, if we're going to break
Speaker 2: it up into three different segments, I'm way past I'm
Speaker 2: in the third quarter, baby, No, I don't think so.
Speaker 2: I'm in the third card, and you're a map with right,
Speaker 2: I think. No, I don't think you're there yet. I
Speaker 2: think forty of sixty is midlife. I don't know now.
Speaker 1: I refuse to be in the last quarter. No way,
Speaker 1: let's see here. So you know, what's also difficult about
Speaker 1: these years is that a lot of women are in
Speaker 1: crossover roles. So we're still taking care of our kids,
Speaker 1: but we're also taking care of aging parents, and all
Speaker 1: of those pressures leave very little time for our own
Speaker 1: self care.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that part is definitely hard. The aging parents piece
Speaker 2: is definitely hard. And I both my parents are alive
Speaker 2: and healthy, but we lost my mother in law and
Speaker 2: my father in law years back, and it was just
Speaker 2: a bitch. It was horrible, and they were the most
Speaker 2: amazing people, and Jeff was so close to them both.
Speaker 2: And my father in law died of Alzheimer's. My mother
Speaker 2: in law died shortly after her heart gave way. But
Speaker 2: they weren't old. I mean, eighty hold was backs eighty
Speaker 2: two whatever. Anyway, that is a very difficult and heartbreaking scenario.
Speaker 2: And also I think, you know, it means that we're next, right,
Speaker 2: Like it used to be death so far away, right,
Speaker 2: My grandparents were alive and maybe my great grandparents, and
Speaker 2: now it's like once your parents go, you're next in line.
Speaker 2: It is scary.
Speaker 1: It is scary, and I think that's why you stop
Speaker 1: being such a people pleaser, you know.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well yeah, And.
Speaker 1: I think about my mother when I was younger, and
Speaker 1: I never realized, never appreciated this then, but my mother,
Speaker 1: when she was in her forties, my grandparents lived with us.
Speaker 1: They were Holocaust survivors. My grandfather, my mother's father. I
Speaker 1: only knew him when his dementia really started in so
Speaker 1: I just remember him as a frail old man counting.
Speaker 1: He used to count pennies all day on the couch,
Speaker 1: and he thought we lived in Denmark. He didn't really
Speaker 1: know what was going on. He knew who his grandchildren were.
Speaker 1: But my mother was taking care of her parents, taking
Speaker 1: care of her children, and working full time. And I
Speaker 1: have a handcap brother. I mean, she was just doing
Speaker 1: everything for everyone, and I didn't appreciate it them. But
Speaker 1: I look back now and I'm like, oh.
Speaker 2: Did you do all of that right? Right? You know?
Speaker 1: But my mother also never gave a shit about her looks.
Speaker 1: I mean, past a certain age, she started looking old.
Speaker 1: I used to have vicious fights with her about coloring
Speaker 1: her hair. The last time I think she colored her
Speaker 1: hair was for my wedding. I begged her to color
Speaker 1: her hair.
Speaker 2: Yeah, she's been graceful. My mother is so I mean,
Speaker 2: to this day, she's running five miles, she's every she
Speaker 2: is so put together. It's a you know, I think
Speaker 2: that I like that part of being a woman. I
Speaker 2: think my mother does too. So it's not even like
Speaker 2: I'm still trying to hold onto my youth. Maybe as
Speaker 2: much as like I enjoy makeup. I love the feeling
Speaker 2: of like a new haircut, getting my hair colored. I
Speaker 2: like when my nails look pretty. I don't know if
Speaker 2: that's about even youth. So much is just for me,
Speaker 2: just part of what I love about being a woman.
Speaker 2: And my mother has more maintenance, has more maintenance I
Speaker 2: think than I do. I mean, she is on her
Speaker 2: maintenance game.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I like feeling put together. I don't know if
Speaker 1: it's a woman thing. I just I like having all
Speaker 1: that done. But I do think I sometimes chasing youth
Speaker 1: is all the tattoos that I get. I love getting tattoos,
Speaker 1: and I think it's honest keeps me a little bit young.
Speaker 2: But this was I got nothing.
Speaker 1: Let's send us off with what kind of things can
Speaker 1: a woman do for herself in middle age to make
Speaker 1: herself feel good?
Speaker 2: You can join on the Housewives of New Jersey. Yes,
Speaker 2: join the house. I don't know if that'll make you
Speaker 2: feel internally, but all of a sudden, you'll glow your
Speaker 2: ass right up.
Speaker 1: No oh yeah, Jed's glow up was well, your grow
Speaker 1: up was like nobody else's. I didn't have that kind
Speaker 1: of glow up. I just learned to contour better. Actually,
Speaker 1: people accuse me all the time of changing my face.
Speaker 1: Like whenever I do a picture, like take a picture
Speaker 1: or post a picture of people were like, what did
Speaker 1: you do it to your face?
Speaker 2: You destroyed your face.
Speaker 1: Honestly, I did nothing to my face. I start, I
Speaker 1: didn't destroy your beautify face. So no, but like this
Speaker 1: is my nose and these are my eyebrows, Like I
Speaker 1: didn't get No, I'm just saying like I did get
Speaker 1: filler in my lips, but I like, I didn't change
Speaker 1: my face. So I didn't really have the blow up
Speaker 1: that you had.
Speaker 2: I mean it was I was a separate it was
Speaker 2: a different face. I have a cult completely different face
Speaker 2: and I lost all this we face, different body, just
Speaker 2: so super glam. Like I was looking at a picture
Speaker 2: of you. I actually somebody asked me what plastic surgeon
Speaker 2: you went to, and I said, look at her before
Speaker 2: and after. So I went to your Instagram page.
Speaker 1: And I scrolled down to the bottom and I took
Speaker 1: a picture from like, oh I didn't deleave these years ago,
Speaker 1: thanks for reminding me of Sorry, I'm a little bit
Speaker 1: of a dogger. And then I went back up to
Speaker 1: the top and I was like, that's the same person.
Speaker 1: They were like, yeah, it's not because, yeah, the same
Speaker 1: person and they took your doctor's number.
Speaker 2: Yeah it was. So that's my advice, So get yourself
Speaker 2: on reality TV. Yeah no, I don't mean it, but really,
Speaker 2: like take the time.
Speaker 1: And I have to remind myself of this sometimes, Like
Speaker 1: right now, I have a son who's knee who he
Speaker 1: broke his tibia and he has he's a non non
Speaker 1: weight bearing so he can't walk by himself. So I've
Speaker 1: been doing just absolutely every single thing for him, and
Speaker 1: so I haven't breathed because I still have the other
Speaker 1: three kids and like four different like gig jobs, and
Speaker 1: I haven't stopped. And I thought to myself, what if
Speaker 1: this was my life forever, how would I ever take
Speaker 1: time for myself because I had to, you know, everything
Speaker 1: I've wanted to do for myself for the past few
Speaker 1: weeks I've put aside or if canceled. And I think,
Speaker 1: you really, really it's important to carve out that time
Speaker 1: for yourself, even if it's just a little bit. Go
Speaker 1: for a drive by yourself, go for a walk by yourself,
Speaker 1: see your friends, you know.
Speaker 2: Investing me with friends right now, That's what I'm saying
Speaker 2: that's why I love maybe the whole empty nesting like
Speaker 2: lots and lots of time for me. Yeah, lots of
Speaker 2: gend time.
Speaker 1: True. I guess that's the good part about it.
Speaker 2: I like it too much, properly.
Speaker 1: Well, I think that you are aging perfectly right.
Speaker 2: Back at you, my sister.
Speaker 1: But I only met you a few years ago, so
Speaker 1: we but but no, you are not in your fourth quarter.
Speaker 1: You are supple and beautiful, healthfully in your in your
Speaker 1: second third.
Speaker 2: Yes, all right, my friend, my young friend, this was fun.
Speaker 2: I wish you could get I want feedback, like I
Speaker 2: don't know you, guys, if anyone's listening and wants to
Speaker 2: what does the young person's expression slide into the DMS
Speaker 2: or whatever the hell it is? Like, I want to know.
Speaker 2: I wish we maybe when we'll have eventually like a
Speaker 2: question and answer like I don't know how.
Speaker 1: Yeah, let's do a live let's do a live one.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we'd love that. All right, guys, thank you for listening.
Speaker 2: We love you. Thank you so much.
Speaker 1: Bye,