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Speaker 1: Jonesy and Amanda's if.

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Speaker 2: You could tell your mum anything, what would it be?

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Speaker 2: Well that was the challenge that Samuel Johnson gave me,

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Speaker 2: along with a bunch of other Australians for his latest book,

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Speaker 2: Dear Mum, which is in bookstores today. And Samuel Johnson

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Speaker 2: joins us.

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Speaker 1: Now, Hello, hello, Amanda and jo d how are you?

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Speaker 1: We are very well.

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Speaker 2: So I know that you had Dear Santa, Dear Dad,

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Speaker 2: Love your Sister, Dear Mum. Tell us about that.

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Speaker 1: Oh look, this was the ace up the sleeve, I think, Amanda.

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Speaker 1: We've I'm chief custodian at a charity called Love Your Sister,

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Speaker 1: which tries to protect families from cancer, and it all

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Speaker 1: stemmed from my sister's battle with breast cancer about ten

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Speaker 1: years ago when she was diagnosed, Which means that our

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Speaker 1: village is comprised of staggeringly now about eight hundred thousand

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Speaker 1: Australians and we're about eighty five eighty six percent women

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Speaker 1: and mums, so kind of so mums formed the bedrock

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Speaker 1: of our kind of fundraising achievements. We've raised thirteen point

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Speaker 1: four million dollars for cancer research, largely thanks to women

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Speaker 1: and mums. So This was my This was my way

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Speaker 1: of trying to stay thank you, and my way of

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Speaker 1: trying to celebrate mums, because mums are so bloody important

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Speaker 1: and there's nothing more important than mumming. And I wanted

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Speaker 1: to celebrate the mums that we represented. Love Your Sister

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Speaker 1: with a book with a collection of letters to mums

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Speaker 1: from really really interesting Australians. And I managed to get

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Speaker 1: a bunch of Australians of the year and a few

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Speaker 1: show beers people and some sports people and some stand

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Speaker 1: up comics and the like to all write to their mums.

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Speaker 1: And it was a really really cathartic process for all involved.

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Speaker 1: Your time with your mom was cut short. How old

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Speaker 1: were you when your mom passed away? I was. I

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Speaker 1: was three years old when my mumm opted out, and

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Speaker 1: my sister was curtailed by cancer before her kids were ten.

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Speaker 1: So our family has been characterized by an absence of mums,

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Speaker 1: which perhaps only pronounces the importance of them to me,

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Speaker 1: you know, I mean, I didn't realize until until you

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Speaker 1: rerated this book just how just how important mums are.

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Speaker 1: And it's only really I'm forty three years old now,

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Speaker 1: and it's only really now through doing this book that

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Speaker 1: I've realized just how much I've missed out on. And

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Speaker 1: of course, of course I've substituted, you know, with my

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Speaker 1: work in the Lovely Sister community, and I have thousands

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Speaker 1: of mums, kind of storring of mums all around the country,

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Speaker 1: so I'm not sure of mother figures. And I've been

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Speaker 1: looked after by women my whole life. So look, I

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Speaker 1: ultimately I don't feel sure changed at all. But I

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Speaker 1: did get a sense in the in the curation of

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Speaker 1: this book of just how much I might have missed

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Speaker 1: out on.

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Speaker 2: It's you know, I find that and I'll get weepy

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Speaker 2: thinking about it. And I might read my litter after

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Speaker 2: eight o'clock and I know a ball. But I didn't

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Speaker 2: realize how important mum was until I became a mum,

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Speaker 2: I think, and all those all those things that used

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Speaker 2: to irritate me, that you know, too too needy, too

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Speaker 2: too loving, too cloying, too much, I do that with

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Speaker 2: my children, and that they're all acts of love. And

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Speaker 2: I get it now, and I just wish I could

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Speaker 2: tell Mum that I get it.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, And there's so many there looks. There's there's a

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Speaker 1: bunch of people that are in your shoes that that

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Speaker 1: have contributed to this book. There's people that are writing

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Speaker 1: to mums, you know, knowing just what mumming is. As

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Speaker 1: you said, there's people writing to mums that are that

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Speaker 1: are gone, and there's also people like Guy Peers writing

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Speaker 1: to mums that are still alive but are gone mentally,

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Speaker 1: like through dementia and stuff. So I found Guy Pierce's

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Speaker 1: letter to his mum who's been lost to dementia for

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Speaker 1: twenty one years to be quite to be quite heartbreaking.

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Speaker 1: This is a celebration of mums, but I learned through

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Speaker 1: the curation of this book that mumming is an intricate

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Speaker 1: business and it's really complicated, and there's all kinds of

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Speaker 1: mums out there. And the book isn't It isn't as

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Speaker 1: fluffy as I thought it would be when I started.

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Speaker 1: I thought I thought it might be that I might

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Speaker 1: have to be careful to make sure it's not too hallmarky.

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Speaker 1: But everybody really respected my wishes when it came to

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Speaker 1: writing honest letters, and so that's what letters should be.

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Speaker 1: They should be honest. And I'm surprised by just how

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Speaker 1: full on this book is to be honest. It's got

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Speaker 1: everything in it as it all it has because I'm

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Speaker 1: trying to represent mums and you've done well and you've

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Speaker 1: given us the term mummy. I didn't think mumming was

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Speaker 1: a thing, but it's a thing now thanks to you. Yeah. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: why shouldn't it be a yeah, I've got kind of

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Speaker 1: I made that up and I can't stop saying it now.

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Speaker 2: Mummy.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, Well, Mummy's really important, isn't it. It's important

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Speaker 1: to do mumming.

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Speaker 2: Just well, Samuel, there's there's things in that book, you know,

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Speaker 2: there's there's laughter as well as the tears. And yeah,

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Speaker 2: and thank you for the opportunity to press the bruise

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Speaker 2: that I've had since my mum went.

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Speaker 1: Thank you, thank you for opening up. And I can't

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Speaker 1: wait to hear you read your letter. And you should

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Speaker 1: read that letter. Maybe you do that letter.

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Speaker 2: After writing, I grab the clinics because you know, I

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Speaker 2: won't make it through without it.

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Speaker 1: I've been making it now and I realized so I

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Speaker 1: rely so heavily on people like you to help me

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Speaker 1: and my fundraising duties, and and and and it's also

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Speaker 1: that I can protect that mum's you know, it's from cancer.

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Speaker 1: In this particular case, but I can't. I just as

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Speaker 1: Molly would say, I thank you from the heart of

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Speaker 1: my bottom. You know, I just wanted to say thank

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Speaker 1: you because I mean, I can't. I can't do my

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Speaker 1: job without people like you, you know, providing the necessary

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Speaker 1: generosity of spirit. Because of course, all of these letters

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Speaker 1: were written so free so that we can raise money

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Speaker 1: for cancer research. So thank you, so thank you for

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Speaker 1: taking the time. How did you How did you find

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Speaker 1: the process of writing the letter and did it did

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Speaker 1: you find it challenging? And did it take long?

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Speaker 2: You know, it was interesting. I thought it would and

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Speaker 2: I put it off for a little while because it

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Speaker 2: is a bit like, as I said, pressing the bruise,

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Speaker 2: but the stuff I feel every day. And yet I

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Speaker 2: wrote it in about five minutes because it just poured out.

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Speaker 1: Oh wow. Well, so you know we need to do this.

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Speaker 1: If anyone does buy the book, A lot of people

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Speaker 1: are cheating to write their own letter to their moment

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Speaker 1: to include it in the in the cover. And I'd

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Speaker 1: just like to take this opportunity to to to suggest

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Speaker 1: that we consider writing to our loved ones before it's

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Speaker 1: too late. We need to know how we feel about

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Speaker 1: them and writing a letter helps us do that, and

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Speaker 1: we need our loved ones to know just why and

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Speaker 1: how we love them. And I asked several of our

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Speaker 1: contributors if I could be there when they gifted this

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Speaker 1: book to their mum, and every time there was tears

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Speaker 1: of joy. You know, we send lots of messages, and

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Speaker 1: letter writing is alive and well. But to take the

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Speaker 1: time to put pen to paper or to write a

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Speaker 1: proper letter on a computer, you know, even if you

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Speaker 1: just email it over, it's a really valuable thing to do.

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Speaker 1: I didn't realize how just how many I didn't realize

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Speaker 1: just how I felt until I wrote my letter. And

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Speaker 1: I didn't realize that I had so much bottled up

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Speaker 1: until I wrote my letter. And and you think you

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Speaker 1: know how you feel, and then you sit down and

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Speaker 1: write a letter and you realize, hey, there's way more

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Speaker 1: feelings here. And I realized you so so, you know,

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Speaker 1: you know, this book is a nod to the to

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Speaker 1: the benefit. It's a letter writing as well as the celebration.

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Speaker 2: Of mums book stores tonight, Thank you so much, dear

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Speaker 2: Mamma is in all good bookstores today.

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Speaker 1: Sammuel Johnson, thank you for joining us. Thank you thank you,

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Speaker 1: I Love you. Amanda Jonesy and Amanda's gamation