WEBVTT - Episode 9 A Sensational 2nd Act 0:00:02.640 --> 0:00:06.040 I'm Betrina Jones and this is my podcast, Rage Against 0:00:06.120 --> 0:00:10.119 the Menopause. Ossie author Kathy Lett has penned a remarkable 0:00:10.200 --> 0:00:14.560 twenty books, including best sellers Puberty Blues and most recently, 0:00:14.720 --> 0:00:18.200 Husband Replacement Therapy, which she has just sold. 0:00:17.920 --> 0:00:19.080 The movie rights too. 0:00:19.680 --> 0:00:22.279 But it's women like Kathy who've helped pave the way 0:00:22.320 --> 0:00:27.280 for podcasts like mine, her musings wonderbras for future generations, 0:00:27.560 --> 0:00:31.400 and helping to budge the stigma around metopause. Right from 0:00:31.400 --> 0:00:34.880 the get go, Kathy was very accessible, not going through 0:00:34.960 --> 0:00:38.440 pr gurus to secure our chat. An Ossie girl at 0:00:38.479 --> 0:00:44.800 heart despite her enormous success, enjoy episode nine, a sensational 0:00:45.000 --> 0:00:45.720 second act. 0:00:47.360 --> 0:00:47.720 Kathy. 0:00:47.760 --> 0:00:51.839 I have read Husband Replacement Therapy. I just finished it 0:00:51.960 --> 0:00:56.120 last night. I absolutely loved it. It's another masterpiece. I 0:00:56.280 --> 0:00:57.560 just don't know how you do it. 0:00:57.920 --> 0:01:01.640 No, it is seriously, Dan, You're so lovely to say that. 0:01:01.720 --> 0:01:03.240 It's what I love about Australian women. 0:01:03.880 --> 0:01:07.320 We stick together, you know where the Ossie's sisterhood is 0:01:07.360 --> 0:01:10.040 so strong. I always say that women are each other's 0:01:10.120 --> 0:01:13.560 human wonderbras, uplooking and supportive and making each other look 0:01:13.600 --> 0:01:14.320 bigger and better. 0:01:14.680 --> 0:01:17.280 And you have just been my wonder bra. I think, thank. 0:01:17.120 --> 0:01:19.560 You, no, you, I've looked up to you for so 0:01:20.240 --> 0:01:24.440 many years. My god, you wrote Puberty Blues at seventeen. 0:01:24.640 --> 0:01:29.039 You are one gifted bach. Can I say, aha, just 0:01:29.080 --> 0:01:29.800 a loud mouth? 0:01:29.880 --> 0:01:33.000 I think no, No. I think it's because my mom's. 0:01:32.760 --> 0:01:35.640 A teacher, and I was supposed to be a teacher too. 0:01:36.120 --> 0:01:38.400 My grandma was a teacher, but I left school at sixteen. 0:01:38.440 --> 0:01:41.280 I always joked that the only examination I've ever passed 0:01:41.360 --> 0:01:43.319 is my cervical smear test, the one you do want 0:01:43.360 --> 0:01:47.080 to pass. But I think I've got that teaching gene 0:01:47.080 --> 0:01:51.160 where some part of me always wants to educate. So 0:01:51.200 --> 0:01:52.960 I always write the book I wish i'd had when 0:01:52.960 --> 0:01:54.160 I was going through something. 0:01:54.280 --> 0:01:57.000 So yes, Bebi Blues was just written for my. 0:01:56.960 --> 0:02:00.000 Other surphi girlfriends to say to them, you are more 0:02:00.080 --> 0:02:02.160 more than just a live support system to a pair 0:02:02.200 --> 0:02:05.440 of breasts, you know. And then then when I worked out, 0:02:05.480 --> 0:02:08.400 it was so great to be a writer. You know, 0:02:08.440 --> 0:02:12.320 you get to work in jarmis all day, you can 0:02:12.400 --> 0:02:14.400 drink heavily on the job and have affairs and call 0:02:14.440 --> 0:02:18.160 it research. I just kept writing, and everything that happened 0:02:18.200 --> 0:02:21.760 to me being a single girl around Sydney and you know, 0:02:22.000 --> 0:02:24.760 being then being in love and moving to England and 0:02:24.800 --> 0:02:28.680 having children and and then you know, going through the 0:02:28.760 --> 0:02:31.200 menopause and going through divorce or whatever. 0:02:31.320 --> 0:02:34.120 I just then write it up for my other for 0:02:34.200 --> 0:02:36.680 other women, saying this is what happened to me, this 0:02:36.800 --> 0:02:38.080 is how I found the funny. 0:02:38.800 --> 0:02:41.080 I hope this helps you get through it. So that's 0:02:41.120 --> 0:02:45.480 really my entire Raison detra literally raison detra. 0:02:45.720 --> 0:02:47.639 But it's a beautiful legacy, Kathy. 0:02:47.720 --> 0:02:51.680 And that's exactly why I'm doing this podcast is because 0:02:51.720 --> 0:02:55.400 I hit perimenopause probably a couple of years ago, and you. 0:02:55.320 --> 0:02:57.280 Know, I had a lifetime of crap. 0:02:57.320 --> 0:03:00.640 Really, I've had endometriosis and polycystic go there long syndrome. 0:03:01.320 --> 0:03:03.000 Oh well, you know a lot of women have it, 0:03:03.080 --> 0:03:05.200 and you know, a terrible proba. 0:03:05.400 --> 0:03:08.520 It took five years to get our now thirteen year 0:03:08.520 --> 0:03:11.520 old daughter in multiple miscarriages. It was a long road, 0:03:11.560 --> 0:03:14.359 and then I got kidney cancer when she was three. 0:03:14.560 --> 0:03:17.880 But I'm great, No no, no, don't feel sorry for me. 0:03:17.960 --> 0:03:22.200 But what I'm saying is I think it is great 0:03:22.240 --> 0:03:24.840 to lean into all the wobbly bits because and that's 0:03:24.840 --> 0:03:27.639 why I'm doing the podcast because I came up against 0:03:27.639 --> 0:03:30.040 perimenopause and I thought, are you serious? 0:03:30.080 --> 0:03:30.360 Now? 0:03:30.680 --> 0:03:33.680 After all that behind me, I've got to do this, 0:03:33.840 --> 0:03:35.200 like are you fucking serious? 0:03:35.440 --> 0:03:37.640 And there was just no information. 0:03:37.920 --> 0:03:41.440 I felt like I was not armed and totally unprepared. 0:03:42.000 --> 0:03:44.800 And I think this largely is a legacy for Audrey, 0:03:44.880 --> 0:03:47.080 my daughter, because I think we need to have this 0:03:47.120 --> 0:03:50.600 conversation and normalize it, remove the stigma, because that would 0:03:50.600 --> 0:03:53.400 be my worst fear is when she eventually gets to 0:03:53.440 --> 0:03:56.040 that period of her life that she's facing the same 0:03:56.080 --> 0:03:57.000 wall of silence. 0:03:58.680 --> 0:04:02.200 Well, I think my generation have tried very hard to 0:04:02.240 --> 0:04:04.640 take the sticking round of menopause. I mean, people wouldn't 0:04:04.640 --> 0:04:05.360 even talk. 0:04:05.160 --> 0:04:07.440 About it when I first mentioned writing about it, the 0:04:07.480 --> 0:04:11.360 newspapers and stuff. And I remember my mother's generation, they 0:04:11.400 --> 0:04:14.320 would kind of gather in a cardigan to coven in 0:04:14.360 --> 0:04:18.520 the kitchen, whispering nervously about the. 0:04:18.520 --> 0:04:21.719 Change, the change that was coming. And I thought that 0:04:21.800 --> 0:04:26.200 I thought Voldemort was on his way, preacher. 0:04:27.080 --> 0:04:30.479 But at least my generation, we have, we have made 0:04:30.520 --> 0:04:33.000 it more normal to talk about the menopause. And I 0:04:33.040 --> 0:04:36.599 think for women, your life is into acts. I think 0:04:36.680 --> 0:04:40.599 the secret is surviving the interval, which is the menopause, 0:04:41.040 --> 0:04:43.599 where it is awful. I mean it is awful. You 0:04:43.760 --> 0:04:47.080 sweat more than Donald Trump doing a sadoco. You get 0:04:47.080 --> 0:04:50.279 the brain flog, I mean, Patsy. I was on the 0:04:50.320 --> 0:04:52.920 phone one day to my sister. I was on my phone, 0:04:52.960 --> 0:04:55.120 who were going, I've lost my phone. I've lost my phone. 0:04:55.120 --> 0:04:55.680 I can't find it. 0:04:55.720 --> 0:04:57.599 Where is it? Where is it? I've lost without it? 0:04:57.839 --> 0:05:00.920 She said, Kath what are you talking on? And I 0:05:00.960 --> 0:05:02.480 was like, how could I be so stupid? 0:05:02.880 --> 0:05:04.400 You do get the brain fog and all of that, 0:05:04.440 --> 0:05:08.719 But once you get through that, I'm telling you, it's 0:05:08.760 --> 0:05:11.560 the best time of a woman's life. You have a 0:05:11.800 --> 0:05:14.720 lot to look forward to, which we can talk about 0:05:14.760 --> 0:05:17.080 in a minute. But talking about the stigma, I think 0:05:17.080 --> 0:05:18.720 the more we talk about it the better. And I 0:05:18.760 --> 0:05:21.960 suppose women didn't talk about it because nobody wanted to 0:05:21.960 --> 0:05:25.479 see themselves as being no longer second. Because once women 0:05:26.360 --> 0:05:28.400 couldn't have babies, we were deemed to have passed our 0:05:28.600 --> 0:05:31.880 amuse by date and put out to career pasture yep, 0:05:32.360 --> 0:05:36.719 which is outrageous, and that age of sexism still exists, 0:05:36.880 --> 0:05:40.839 which where that's my next big battle is to fight 0:05:41.040 --> 0:05:44.880 that for your generation, because you know, women my age 0:05:44.920 --> 0:05:48.000 are just deemed to have been We're given the kind 0:05:48.040 --> 0:05:51.360 of the cloak of invisibility and just told to disappear. 0:05:51.880 --> 0:05:55.200 Well, you know that's the sexism is innate. It's in 0:05:55.240 --> 0:05:55.880 our language. 0:05:55.920 --> 0:05:58.599 You know, a guy my age is as bigged up 0:05:58.640 --> 0:06:01.320 as a silver fox, whereas I dismissed as an old bag, 0:06:01.360 --> 0:06:02.400 a hag and a groan. 0:06:02.680 --> 0:06:03.040 Correct. 0:06:03.040 --> 0:06:06.000 And I make this joke in my book The Revenge Club, 0:06:06.080 --> 0:06:08.920 but you never hear a man dismissed as much undressed 0:06:09.000 --> 0:06:09.840 as ram. 0:06:10.560 --> 0:06:12.600 Ever, that's so true. 0:06:13.360 --> 0:06:15.479 And yet women are told what we can wear, what 0:06:15.600 --> 0:06:18.159 we can't wear. We can't wear short skirts, we mustn't know, 0:06:18.279 --> 0:06:19.760 we mustn't shure I did collar tabs. 0:06:19.800 --> 0:06:21.239 You mustn't show our upper arms. 0:06:21.560 --> 0:06:24.240 I'm like, who who is this good time gestapo telling 0:06:24.240 --> 0:06:25.520 me what I can and can't wear? 0:06:26.480 --> 0:06:28.839 You're too old to have long hair, time you trimmed it. 0:06:28.880 --> 0:06:31.000 You know you need a bob cup by now you're fifty. 0:06:31.000 --> 0:06:33.920 Come on, old girl, Well that's it exactly. 0:06:34.120 --> 0:06:36.920 And then if you dare to put a picturerop on 0:06:36.960 --> 0:06:40.880 Instagram or Twitter or whatever of yourself without makeup or 0:06:40.920 --> 0:06:42.599 one thread of gray hair. 0:06:42.600 --> 0:06:46.160 They're like, Oh, isn't she brave? She courageous. 0:06:46.200 --> 0:06:48.800 I'm like, no, brave is racing into a burning building 0:06:48.839 --> 0:06:49.840 and saving a child. 0:06:50.000 --> 0:06:54.119 Yeah, and showing you without makeup. So that's that's the 0:06:54.160 --> 0:06:55.120 next big battle. 0:06:55.200 --> 0:06:58.200 But thanks to your podcast, like yours, books like mine, 0:06:58.240 --> 0:07:00.960 we are saying to women, this is what's going to happen. 0:07:01.000 --> 0:07:02.440 You will get through it, and I'm. 0:07:02.240 --> 0:07:06.240 Saying you will have a sensational second act, so you 0:07:06.279 --> 0:07:07.919 have a lot lot to look forward to. 0:07:08.160 --> 0:07:11.800 I love that when you're sort of facing it head on, 0:07:11.920 --> 0:07:14.960 you do wonder. You know, there has been times where 0:07:15.280 --> 0:07:16.520 I've thought, is this it? 0:07:17.000 --> 0:07:17.080 Like? 0:07:17.200 --> 0:07:18.880 Is this now as good as it gets? 0:07:18.920 --> 0:07:22.600 And I love in your book Husband Replacement Therapy, And 0:07:22.640 --> 0:07:23.800 I'll read page two. 0:07:23.800 --> 0:07:25.400 Ninety four if you can indulge me. 0:07:25.880 --> 0:07:28.280 You told me that there was so much life to 0:07:28.440 --> 0:07:31.480 enjoy in your second act. He ran a hand through 0:07:31.520 --> 0:07:35.640 his unruly hair. You said it was like adolescence in reverse, 0:07:36.040 --> 0:07:37.680 a lovely rebirth. 0:07:38.600 --> 0:07:39.320 I just love that. 0:07:40.400 --> 0:07:41.120 Well, it is it a way? 0:07:41.200 --> 0:07:44.160 You know, It's like adolescens is set with wrinkles instead 0:07:44.200 --> 0:07:45.960 of pimples. 0:07:46.000 --> 0:07:46.720 So true. 0:07:46.840 --> 0:07:50.240 But you know what, Kathy, it's because of the work 0:07:50.360 --> 0:07:53.320 and the legacy that women in your generation have done, 0:07:53.400 --> 0:07:55.440 that I can do this podcast, that. 0:07:55.400 --> 0:07:56.760 I can lean into it. 0:07:56.960 --> 0:07:59.640 You know, I think we passed the baton on just 0:07:59.680 --> 0:08:03.360 as I will to my daughter. I think that's what 0:08:03.400 --> 0:08:06.760 we do talking about mothers and daughters. The mother in 0:08:06.800 --> 0:08:09.360 this book is horrendous. 0:08:09.880 --> 0:08:11.120 Isn't she a piece of work? 0:08:12.480 --> 0:08:12.720 Yes? 0:08:12.720 --> 0:08:15.840 But see I have a beautiful mother, gorgeous, wonderful mother. 0:08:15.880 --> 0:08:20.720 But a lot of my girlfriends have very fractious and 0:08:20.960 --> 0:08:24.679 difficult relationships with their mothers. And I think these women 0:08:24.680 --> 0:08:28.000 probably should never have had children. But it was expected. 0:08:28.040 --> 0:08:30.400 That's what you did. It was just you know, you 0:08:30.480 --> 0:08:32.640 got married, you had babies. Was Women now can make 0:08:32.720 --> 0:08:35.439 choices about whether or not they think they have got 0:08:35.480 --> 0:08:38.960 the maternal instinct. And a lot of women now, I 0:08:39.000 --> 0:08:42.800 mean the birth rates are really low. And also a 0:08:42.880 --> 0:08:46.760 lot of young women embracing celibacy the whole. 0:08:46.800 --> 0:08:49.959 They call it netflix and chill, you know, rather than 0:08:50.080 --> 0:08:52.920 having said and I think it's a lot. 0:08:53.160 --> 0:08:55.720 I think it's partly because they're looking at their careers, 0:08:55.760 --> 0:08:59.480 which they're loving, and they understand that if they have 0:08:59.559 --> 0:09:02.080 a baby, that career will be derailed. 0:09:02.120 --> 0:09:04.680 I mean, my generation thought we could have it all. 0:09:05.320 --> 0:09:07.960 We just ended up doing it all and it was 0:09:08.080 --> 0:09:12.120 absolutely exhausting. Well now, I think women can have it all, 0:09:12.120 --> 0:09:14.600 but just not all at once unless you've got a 0:09:14.600 --> 0:09:18.840 beat male husband. If you've got a fella who is 0:09:18.920 --> 0:09:21.640 if you're the breadwinner and he's the beta male, you know, 0:09:21.720 --> 0:09:24.880 the earth father, yes that could work, but there's not 0:09:24.960 --> 0:09:26.920 many of those guys around. Whenever I give talks, some 0:09:27.000 --> 0:09:30.640 schools now always said women, young girls, be very careful 0:09:30.720 --> 0:09:33.120 choosing your partner. If you choose an now for male, 0:09:33.920 --> 0:09:35.840 you know, when your child is sick. I mean, you'll 0:09:35.840 --> 0:09:37.720 be the one expected to step back. But if you 0:09:37.800 --> 0:09:40.800 choose a beta male beat to male's adore you don't 0:09:40.840 --> 0:09:43.080 bore you and do all your chowls for you. So, 0:09:43.360 --> 0:09:46.920 you know, maybe like a wife in other words, So 0:09:47.080 --> 0:09:48.880 maybe that's the kind of guy you got to look 0:09:48.920 --> 0:09:50.960 for if you want a big, big, beautiful career. 0:09:51.000 --> 0:09:52.360 How does it work in your life? 0:09:52.480 --> 0:09:53.520 I'm very very lucky. 0:09:53.600 --> 0:09:53.760 You know. 0:09:53.800 --> 0:09:55.800 It's like a tag team. It has to be to 0:09:55.920 --> 0:10:01.079 enable me to do breakfast radio. Oh mate, I leave 0:10:01.120 --> 0:10:03.360 the house at three so and at the moment he 0:10:03.520 --> 0:10:05.960 just had his knee. Dumb god, you don't think I'm 0:10:05.960 --> 0:10:08.360 feeling it. I didn't realize just how much he did. 0:10:10.720 --> 0:10:14.199 That's what men normally say when a woman gets filled. 0:10:14.600 --> 0:10:16.679 I happ he heard his knee because he was kneeling 0:10:16.720 --> 0:10:19.000 before you. 0:10:19.000 --> 0:10:20.720 You're going to laugh, do you know how it happened. 0:10:22.440 --> 0:10:25.240 So we've never been to Luna Park. So we're Victorian 0:10:25.280 --> 0:10:27.840 born and bred, but regional Victoria. We're from a place 0:10:27.880 --> 0:10:35.040 called Wangaratta. I'm near Aubrey. There is a song about Wangaratta, 0:10:37.360 --> 0:10:40.400 that's right. But we've been in Melbourne since I think 0:10:40.480 --> 0:10:43.319 ninety five. But we've never been to Luna Park. And 0:10:43.360 --> 0:10:45.240 so our daughter one weekend, what are we going to 0:10:45.320 --> 0:10:45.960 do this weekend? 0:10:46.000 --> 0:10:46.160 Oh? 0:10:46.240 --> 0:10:48.439 Mom and dad, we've never never been to Luna Park. 0:10:48.480 --> 0:10:50.400 All right, we'll go to Luna Park. And he was 0:10:50.440 --> 0:10:54.160 getting on the ghost train and so his knee kind 0:10:54.160 --> 0:10:56.680 of went one way and his foot went the other way, 0:10:56.920 --> 0:11:02.239 and I heard the snap, and he and his girlish 0:11:02.280 --> 0:11:07.199 scream and he downplays, downplayed it. He goes, oh, look 0:11:07.240 --> 0:11:08.520 on all right, and I said, no, I don't think 0:11:08.520 --> 0:11:10.880 you are. You starting like you're breaking out in a sweat, 0:11:11.720 --> 0:11:14.520 and every because it was the end carriage, so everyone's 0:11:14.520 --> 0:11:15.640 looking behind thinking. 0:11:15.480 --> 0:11:17.360 What is this wanka doing. We just want to go 0:11:17.440 --> 0:11:19.480 on the ride, and he said, you know what, I'm 0:11:19.520 --> 0:11:20.240 just going to sit out. 0:11:20.280 --> 0:11:23.040 You and Audrey go. So we went on the ghost train. 0:11:23.240 --> 0:11:25.160 Does that make me a bad wife? We went on 0:11:25.200 --> 0:11:27.959 the ride and got back and it was pretty obvious 0:11:28.000 --> 0:11:31.640 that he needed to go to first daid so and 0:11:31.679 --> 0:11:33.160 then it's just sort of that was a few months 0:11:33.200 --> 0:11:36.000 ago and it's just progressively got worse. So what he'd done, 0:11:36.040 --> 0:11:38.080 he torn the moniscus right at the back of the 0:11:38.120 --> 0:11:38.800 now've done that? 0:11:39.080 --> 0:11:41.640 Oh have you? What was your recovery like. 0:11:42.760 --> 0:11:45.480 It's pretty damn slow. Yes, it's got to do all 0:11:45.600 --> 0:11:48.440 the exercises. Just make sure he does all the exercise. 0:11:48.600 --> 0:11:51.280 Yeah, gosh, how did you do it? Catherine? 0:11:52.720 --> 0:11:55.920 Well, all my injuries from being healthy. So that was 0:11:55.960 --> 0:11:56.920 a jogging injury. 0:11:57.240 --> 0:11:59.840 Oh no, And I've been knocked off my push bike twice, 0:12:00.080 --> 0:12:01.920 had three show surgeries. 0:12:02.320 --> 0:12:04.200 Being nothing is very very bad. 0:12:05.080 --> 0:12:10.880 My new exercise regime is just the disco diet. After 0:12:10.960 --> 0:12:13.199 we drink and eat as much as we want, then 0:12:13.240 --> 0:12:14.960 I put the music on and we dance and dance 0:12:15.000 --> 0:12:15.400 and dance. 0:12:15.440 --> 0:12:16.720 One morning we got running. 0:12:16.760 --> 0:12:18.480 I woke up and I looked at my phone, I'd 0:12:18.520 --> 0:12:20.040 done twenty two thousand steps. 0:12:20.400 --> 0:12:22.920 Wait a minute, oh my god. 0:12:23.040 --> 0:12:27.200 By shagging the bartender up down, And then I thought, no, 0:12:27.240 --> 0:12:27.760 we were. 0:12:27.600 --> 0:12:31.800 Just busting out some postmenopausal abba dance moves. 0:12:31.840 --> 0:12:35.920 Oh my god. Yes, that's the best exercise regime is 0:12:36.000 --> 0:12:38.520 just keep dancing. You know. That's a very important a 0:12:38.840 --> 0:12:40.199 part of your second act. 0:12:40.360 --> 0:12:42.000 What music do you like to Bookie too? 0:12:42.240 --> 0:12:43.960 Oh, I like the I like R and B. 0:12:44.280 --> 0:12:47.640 I like all the all the feminist Torch songs. You know, 0:12:49.000 --> 0:12:51.960 I like love all that so that you can't my generation. 0:12:51.640 --> 0:12:53.120 Cannot dance to those songs. 0:12:53.240 --> 0:12:57.760 Sister Sledge, We're up and at it of course. 0:12:57.840 --> 0:12:59.199 Yeah, I know Freedom from Appa. 0:12:59.240 --> 0:13:01.479 Actually, are you serious? 0:13:02.000 --> 0:13:05.720 Yeah, she's having an amazing second that And when I 0:13:05.760 --> 0:13:09.720 asked her about the AI show, you know, yeah, which 0:13:09.760 --> 0:13:12.320 is extraordinary. Way you see it, you feel like you're 0:13:12.320 --> 0:13:16.400 out the concert, she said, Darling. Even Viking goddesses get old, 0:13:16.600 --> 0:13:17.120 she said. 0:13:16.960 --> 0:13:18.760 About a two of the world. While I'm lying on 0:13:18.800 --> 0:13:19.320 my couch. 0:13:21.520 --> 0:13:23.360 She's beautiful, is it? She got? 0:13:23.440 --> 0:13:26.480 I love those that band. As I can remember as 0:13:26.480 --> 0:13:28.720 a three year old, I used to have Dad's mini 0:13:28.800 --> 0:13:32.280 extension called and Mum wrapped foil around it. So it 0:13:32.360 --> 0:13:35.280 looked like a microphone and I would stand on the 0:13:35.320 --> 0:13:37.199 hearth in front of the fire and I'd sing a 0:13:37.520 --> 0:13:39.559 songs and I thought God. 0:13:40.720 --> 0:13:43.120 And also the great thing about those songs they were 0:13:43.120 --> 0:13:46.800 the at the time, the rock industry was very male dominated, 0:13:47.400 --> 0:13:51.839 and then here these two women singing about heartbreak and 0:13:52.440 --> 0:13:55.480 lusting after men, Give me a man after midnight, And 0:13:55.600 --> 0:13:59.320 they're actually quite radical feminist songs. 0:13:58.960 --> 0:14:01.280 Some of them very agressive for the time. 0:14:01.720 --> 0:14:04.520 What I love about Australia is that where we don't 0:14:04.520 --> 0:14:10.199 think optimisms an eye disease, but we're quite skeptical, always 0:14:10.200 --> 0:14:12.480 say we have chronic skepticemia. 0:14:12.760 --> 0:14:15.360 Yes, and we've got a good sense of irony. 0:14:15.800 --> 0:14:21.720 So that that mix of irony, skepticism and optimism is 0:14:22.320 --> 0:14:25.480 delicious and I think it boosts our immune system and 0:14:25.560 --> 0:14:26.760 lowers our blood pressure. 0:14:27.480 --> 0:14:29.520 Yeah, we don't take ourselves too seriously. 0:14:29.960 --> 0:14:33.080 Yeah, but I get thinking about humor for a minute too. 0:14:33.720 --> 0:14:36.880 I think that's also what makes Australian women so fabulous 0:14:37.000 --> 0:14:38.960 is the way when we get together we cackle like 0:14:39.040 --> 0:14:43.120 Cooko Boroughs and it's very therapeutic and very cathartic. And 0:14:43.160 --> 0:14:45.360 if you are going through a bad menopause, I would 0:14:45.400 --> 0:14:49.800 say it's vitally important that you go on girls' nights out. 0:14:50.400 --> 0:14:53.240 You know, yes, you have to be hospitalized from hilarity, 0:14:53.320 --> 0:14:57.400 but you're also we have a strip op your emotional undies, 0:14:57.400 --> 0:15:01.160 which is a psychological strip tease that reveals all and talk. 0:15:01.080 --> 0:15:04.080 About how you really are feeling and find out, just 0:15:04.080 --> 0:15:05.280 find me out. You're not alone. 0:15:05.320 --> 0:15:09.280 It's so it's so helpful, and it's not just me 0:15:09.360 --> 0:15:15.000 imagining women are funny. Anthropologists say that women laugh more 0:15:15.040 --> 0:15:19.000 often than men, especially in all female groups, in every 0:15:19.080 --> 0:15:20.480 society on the planet. 0:15:21.280 --> 0:15:23.080 So and I know what we're laughing at. We're laughing 0:15:23.120 --> 0:15:25.960 at the same thing. We're laughing about male idiosyncrasies. 0:15:26.920 --> 0:15:29.920 And also the fact that whether butt of God's biological 0:15:30.000 --> 0:15:31.920 jokes when you were telling me all the things you've 0:15:31.920 --> 0:15:33.320 been through, I mean, endo. 0:15:33.280 --> 0:15:34.080 Is the worst. 0:15:34.160 --> 0:15:38.800 It's ain of that and being misdiagnosed constantly by a 0:15:38.840 --> 0:15:40.440 male dominated medical profession. 0:15:40.560 --> 0:15:42.400 Yes, but you know, and I thought one day, even 0:15:42.480 --> 0:15:45.200 God is a fellah because you think of all the things. 0:15:45.000 --> 0:15:47.120 Women go through, from when you first get taken hostage 0:15:47.160 --> 0:15:50.160 by your hormones once a month is a teenager. Then 0:15:50.200 --> 0:15:54.760 there's pregnancy where everything swells to sumer wrestler proportions and 0:15:54.840 --> 0:15:57.000 the childbirth where you stretch your birth can. 0:15:57.000 --> 0:16:02.880 Now the customer, what five six kilometers? And there's masts. 0:16:03.120 --> 0:16:06.120 Then there's the metopause, and it's just when everything goes quiet, 0:16:06.320 --> 0:16:07.680 you grow a beard. 0:16:08.000 --> 0:16:09.800 Yes, and how could that be fair? 0:16:10.080 --> 0:16:10.280 Yeah? 0:16:10.400 --> 0:16:11.040 Get hair. 0:16:12.800 --> 0:16:16.160 Mccrama, hanging basket arrangement going on in my can area? 0:16:16.200 --> 0:16:20.040 What about you? How's your how's your chin sprown? 0:16:20.200 --> 0:16:22.840 Well, I've always had chin sprouting because of the polycystic 0:16:22.880 --> 0:16:23.960 Overian syndrome. 0:16:24.040 --> 0:16:25.800 But I you know what. 0:16:25.840 --> 0:16:28.520 The best thing I've ever done in life. Kathy is 0:16:28.600 --> 0:16:31.200 gone and got laser. 0:16:30.960 --> 0:16:32.240 Hair removal right. 0:16:32.560 --> 0:16:34.600 Oh my god, it doesn't work on the white hairs. 0:16:34.600 --> 0:16:36.800 I've got like one white hair on the right. 0:16:36.640 --> 0:16:37.920 Of my chin that I have to pluck. 0:16:39.040 --> 0:16:41.760 But oh, I don't think I've done my legs since 0:16:41.960 --> 0:16:44.200 maybe last October, like nearly a year. 0:16:44.760 --> 0:16:47.000 It's tremendous. It's tremendous. 0:16:47.080 --> 0:16:50.040 Wow is it painful? Though? 0:16:50.320 --> 0:16:50.920 No? 0:16:50.920 --> 0:16:51.120 No? 0:16:51.400 --> 0:16:51.600 You know. 0:16:51.680 --> 0:16:53.360 The only thing I got like a little bit of 0:16:53.360 --> 0:16:53.840 a reaction. 0:16:53.960 --> 0:16:57.800 The first few I had like a I got hives, 0:16:57.840 --> 0:17:00.720 like itchy, So I had like the spaghetti four itching my. 0:17:00.720 --> 0:17:04.200 Legs oh no, gosh, and. 0:17:04.200 --> 0:17:06.800 My husband said, we're never eating it, never ever eating 0:17:06.840 --> 0:17:07.639 spaghetti again. 0:17:08.040 --> 0:17:11.240 You've got to throw that fork out. But no, no, 0:17:11.320 --> 0:17:14.520 it's brilliant. I do want to draw. There's something else. 0:17:14.320 --> 0:17:18.160 In the book that really really touched my heart as well, 0:17:18.320 --> 0:17:20.560 and I did feel it once I turned fifty. I 0:17:20.600 --> 0:17:22.840 did you know, Being in the media, I have had 0:17:22.840 --> 0:17:26.200 a strong sense over a few years about imposter syndrome, 0:17:26.280 --> 0:17:28.400 especially as you're getting older and. 0:17:28.320 --> 0:17:29.159 You think, oh. 0:17:29.160 --> 0:17:31.879 But then when I turned fifty, I felt like I didn't. 0:17:32.000 --> 0:17:34.960 I did care, but I had that sort of not 0:17:35.000 --> 0:17:37.080 everyone's going to like me, and you know what, I'm 0:17:37.119 --> 0:17:40.600 okay with that. And I've been through too much shit 0:17:40.680 --> 0:17:43.320 and you've you've written I'm drawing up my bucket list, 0:17:43.400 --> 0:17:46.199 or my fucket list, as I prefer to call it. 0:17:46.240 --> 0:17:48.280 I don't want to keep putting things off until I 0:17:48.320 --> 0:17:53.160 have time, because that time never comes, does it. Somewhere 0:17:53.200 --> 0:17:56.280 along the way, I feel as though I lost my identity. 0:17:56.680 --> 0:17:59.600 I think a lot of women going through menopause can 0:18:00.240 --> 0:18:00.639 night with that. 0:18:02.040 --> 0:18:06.000 Well, it's the menopause is really tricky. You lose your confidence, 0:18:06.480 --> 0:18:11.879 your testosterone. But what will happen that's good is you. 0:18:11.960 --> 0:18:13.879 First of all, Okay, women have brought up to be 0:18:13.920 --> 0:18:14.920 decorative and demure. 0:18:15.800 --> 0:18:18.840 We're too nice. So all the research shows where a 0:18:18.880 --> 0:18:19.080 man and. 0:18:19.080 --> 0:18:21.240 Woman start talking at the same time, the woman always 0:18:21.320 --> 0:18:24.639 pulls back. But the nice thing about going through the menopause, 0:18:24.680 --> 0:18:28.119 once you get over the brain fog and the feeling 0:18:28.119 --> 0:18:31.520 and secure and that whole transitional period, is that you 0:18:31.600 --> 0:18:34.200 get a kind of of fuck it, I'm fifty gene 0:18:34.320 --> 0:18:37.800 kicks it when you no longer care what people think 0:18:37.840 --> 0:18:41.760 about you. This is so liberating for women. And it's 0:18:41.800 --> 0:18:45.280 partly hormonal because your estrogen drops, which is your caring 0:18:45.320 --> 0:18:48.680