Books, Bans and the Therapy Debate
Welcome back to Sweet Blondes – Julie is cheeky, Esther is proper, Penny is disobedient… guess what happens next.
This week we ask the big questions. Are you a night owl or an early bird. What would make your personal banned list. Would you ever go to therapy. And is there still magic in holding a book or have you gone all-in on audio.
It is playful, honest and just the right amount of mischievous. The sort of conversation you would have with your best friends over coffee when you are meant to be doing something else.
If life is feeling heavy let us lighten the load. You will laugh, you will nod along and by the end you will feel like you have pulled up a chair at our table.
So grab a brew, press play and join in – we want to know what you would ban first.
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Mentioned in this episode:
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Transcript
Okay, so, Esther, night owl or early bird?
Speaker B:Early bird.
Speaker B:Early bird.
Speaker A:Definite there.
Speaker C:Well, used to be night owl, now early bird.
Speaker B:He said that there was some disappointment.
Speaker C:Yeah, I know.
Speaker C:I can't do staying up late anymore.
Speaker C:Fall asleep on the sofa.
Speaker C:Yeah, it's early bird.
Speaker A:And with you on that, Jimmy, I used to be at my peak on a night and I loved it.
Speaker A:Now I'm all about getting up at 6 o'.
Speaker A:Clock.
Speaker A:So I go to bed at night.
Speaker C:It's all about the sleep.
Speaker A:It's all about.
Speaker B:And it is the sleep when you go to bed early now, isn't it?
Speaker C:It is.
Speaker C:Absolutely it is.
Speaker A:Sadly, it is.
Speaker C:Sleep or cuddling the dog.
Speaker A:Yes, absolutely.
Speaker A:Okay, so what would we ban?
Speaker A:I'll go first.
Speaker A:I would ban and blow it out of existence.
Speaker A:Wood chip wallpaper.
Speaker A:Oh, my goodness.
Speaker A:It was the bane of my life.
Speaker A:I've had two houses and they all had wood chip.
Speaker A:I was picking out my hair and nails for like weeks.
Speaker A:And then when we got our clinic, it was wall to wall wood chip.
Speaker A:And I just.
Speaker A:I used to get incensed and tracked out.
Speaker A:I wanted to track down who'd invented it.
Speaker A:And my dad would like go, well, it's hard wearing.
Speaker A:I'm like, yeah.
Speaker C:And you could paint over it 4,000 times.
Speaker A:Couldn.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:So mine.
Speaker A:Easy, easy one for me.
Speaker A:That wood chip is it.
Speaker C:Can you still buy it?
Speaker A:I think so.
Speaker C:Can you really?
Speaker A:I think you can.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:I'm pretty convinced you can.
Speaker C:It's terrible stuff.
Speaker A:Horrific stuff.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:I mean, you just got that and Artex.
Speaker A:Oh, thank God.
Speaker A:Oh, God.
Speaker C:It was an in thing at one time, wasn't it?
Speaker A:Anybody's ceilings had the artist stickled effect.
Speaker C:Oh, yeah.
Speaker C:Do you remember getting rid of that nightmare?
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:You just had to go over it and you had to get somebody cancelled.
Speaker A:Anyway, so that's mine, that's the Daisy.
Speaker B:Let's go to Esther banning me from the show from now on.
Speaker B:Now I'm not actually a natural banner.
Speaker B:I wouldn't.
Speaker B:Not normally ban.
Speaker B:I don't, you know, live and let live.
Speaker B:I wouldn't.
Speaker B:But then when you put me under pressure, you put me under pressure.
Speaker B:Skin on rice pudding.
Speaker B:Let's ban it.
Speaker B:I cannot bear skin on rice pudding.
Speaker A:Yes.
Speaker B:So that's a simple banana.
Speaker B:But I think the pudding is a lot better without the skin, though.
Speaker B:My dad loves it with a bit of cinnamon or whatever it is, or nutmeg and the skin.
Speaker C:No, I'm going back to school.
Speaker C:Dinner times.
Speaker C:The skin, do you remember it?
Speaker A:Oh, awful, terrible.
Speaker B:But I think there's also a male, female thing on this because lots of men seem to like the skin and women don't like that.
Speaker B:I'm just putting it out.
Speaker B:Phil and my dad love the skin.
Speaker B:Can't bear it.
Speaker B:I don't tell you something else, which is men and women, Right?
Speaker B:Men also.
Speaker B:Phillips.
Speaker B:Oh, I know what Phillips band would be sharing food.
Speaker B:He cannot.
Speaker B:That is such a male.
Speaker C:Yeah, it is.
Speaker C:But I'm sort of with him in a way.
Speaker C:Yeah, I'm sort of with it with him.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker C:I always think if we share something, I'm watching very carefully as whether Dean takes more, more, more than me.
Speaker C:I'm thinking, there's only three pieces chicken left now.
Speaker C:Oh, he's had another one.
Speaker C:And he said he's had.
Speaker C:He's already had two.
Speaker A:He's already.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:So I'm not sure I like sharing food.
Speaker B:Goes, order it yourself if you want it.
Speaker A:That's what my guess is.
Speaker B:Definitely a male.
Speaker B:Usually.
Speaker B:I know you're an exception, but you.
Speaker C:Yeah, I am an exception.
Speaker C:I'm not into sharing food.
Speaker A:Phil will say.
Speaker A:I'll say, I'll have a couple of your chips.
Speaker A:He goes, no, but he'll share everything else.
Speaker A:But not chips.
Speaker B:I've got to say, I knew your own.
Speaker A:I knew I loved Phil when I. I did share food with him.
Speaker B:You mean you knew he loved you when he allowed you to share.
Speaker A:No, no, I would.
Speaker A:I would.
Speaker A:I would let him have food.
Speaker C:Would you?
Speaker C:So you knew you loved him.
Speaker A:Try and be generous about it.
Speaker A:And I thought, almost really love him because I'll share food.
Speaker C:Well, I remember my parents, my mum was constantly on a diet, so she.
Speaker C:If she ate somebody else's food, it didn't count.
Speaker C:She used to steal off my dad's, like, chips and things and he used to go absolutely mad.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker C:Because.
Speaker C:No, don't like it at all.
Speaker B:But equally, there's a hygiene thing there, you see.
Speaker B:There is.
Speaker B:But you can't double dip.
Speaker A:Oh, you can't double dip.
Speaker C:No, no.
Speaker C:Double dipping.
Speaker B:Yeah, so.
Speaker A:So.
Speaker B:So there are reasons I don't want people.
Speaker A:Yes, that's a good point.
Speaker B:So there you go.
Speaker B:So that I've got two bands for you.
Speaker B:Skin on rice pudding and for my husband, banning sharing food.
Speaker A:Yeah, I think we can make those happen.
Speaker A:What's yours, Julie?
Speaker C:Oh, mine's really boring.
Speaker C:Vaping.
Speaker C:Oh, I'm sick of walking around, like, local village town and there's just like a puff of.
Speaker C:It's not smoke, is it?
Speaker C:Yeah, it's not smoke.
Speaker C:What is it?
Speaker C:It's Moisture.
Speaker C:Moisture that smells of mango and such and such a thing.
Speaker A:And it's like somebody's lungs as well.
Speaker C:Yes.
Speaker C:I just think like.
Speaker C:And you drive past people and they're clutching onto these things as though they're a.
Speaker C:A dummy, like a kid's dummy or something.
Speaker C:So I. I know it's better than smoking, allegedly.
Speaker C:However, I feel like people have become so obsessed with clutching onto their vapes.
Speaker C:It's like their cover planted.
Speaker A:Yeah, it is.
Speaker A:They're blankie, isn't it?
Speaker C:They're blankie, yeah.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker C:Little yellow blankie.
Speaker A:So would you ban it outright or just outdoors?
Speaker C:Yeah, I'm probably being harsh, aren't I?
Speaker C:But I saying ban it outright.
Speaker A:Go outright.
Speaker A:Go for it, Julie.
Speaker C:I'm banning it outright.
Speaker C:They're gone.
Speaker C:Just don't do anything.
Speaker C:Don't smoke.
Speaker C:I've never been a smoker.
Speaker C:It's easy for me to say, no smoking, no vaping.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:Job done.
Speaker C:Harsh.
Speaker A:So recently we saw that the Obamas were back in the news.
Speaker A:There was rumors that they were being going through difficulties and they were going to get divorced.
Speaker A:But it turns out Michelle is having therapy and that's what was going on.
Speaker A:So the questions are, would you both have therapy?
Speaker A:I'll go to Esther first.
Speaker B:It's probably difficult to answer that if you're not in a place where you actually need it.
Speaker B:So as it stands now, no, I wouldn't.
Speaker B:But I'm also blessed that I've got lots of good friends, so I might be having therapy all the time with my friends and with my dad and my husband so I can talk things through, but maybe I haven't come to some of those big life issues.
Speaker B:And in a way, Michelle, you know, if you look at her life as a roller coaster, has had massive highs there.
Speaker B:She was married to the president and then you're not.
Speaker B:So there's a bereavement there.
Speaker B:You're no longer with all of that, you know, just that lifestyle.
Speaker B:And there's an adulation.
Speaker B:But there's also hatred as well, isn't.
Speaker B:There's a whole package that comes with that.
Speaker B:But you are the number one in the work couple.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:And then her children had got of a certain age and like the, you know, the home and so they call it an empty nest.
Speaker B:So there was a lot going on there.
Speaker B:And she's a woman very, very clever, very, very able and she's probably thought, where has my life gone?
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:So if you had all of those things to a multiple of most of the people on the Planet.
Speaker B:Then you might say, what about me?
Speaker B:Is what you're saying?
Speaker B:What will happen?
Speaker A:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker A:And she's 61, so I think 61's like the new 51, isn't it?
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:There's another chapter left, a massive chapter.
Speaker C:Left that and the whole.
Speaker C:All that's left their life changing so much.
Speaker C:She's probably now sat there going, where's my life gone?
Speaker C:What have I done for me?
Speaker A:Absolutely.
Speaker C:You know, and is it now not time to focus on me?
Speaker A:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker C:And dealing with all those things, because it must have been incredibly difficult to be the wife of a president.
Speaker C:Like you said, there's lots of, lots of great things to celebrate, but they got a lot of hatred as well.
Speaker B:And your every day would be diarized.
Speaker C:Absolutely driven here under the spotlight.
Speaker B:You'd be, you know, on the best tables, you'd be chauffeured in.
Speaker B:So there was a lot.
Speaker B:And, you know, how does she feel a day now?
Speaker B:She might have been up at five o' clock every morning, every moment accounted for right the way down to, say, midnight.
Speaker B:And then you say, but what do I do?
Speaker A:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker A:And she was really in demand as a speaker as well.
Speaker C:She was.
Speaker A:You know, she still is.
Speaker A:I was gonna say.
Speaker A:I'm sure she's still doing that, but, you know, it's.
Speaker A:I sometimes feel sorry for people who've been on X Factor and I've had a moment of fame and then all of a sudden the next year has rolled over the new contestants.
Speaker C:Who are they?
Speaker C:Who are they?
Speaker A:And again, if you look at that and you compare it to someone like Michelle Obama, where her whole life has changed, hasn't it?
Speaker B:And I wonder if when you're on the speaking circuit, you are speaking about what you've done in the past, what it was like being married to Barack Obama.
Speaker B:So there could be something in that.
Speaker B:Oh, is my life over?
Speaker B:Because I'm talking about everything in the past.
Speaker B:Where is my future?
Speaker C:You also said about her husband, it's like her life was her husband's career.
Speaker A:Yes.
Speaker C:So would she have been the same person if she wasn't married to him?
Speaker C:No, she wouldn't.
Speaker C:It had gone in a different way.
Speaker C:So she'd have been doing different things.
Speaker C:A lot of the things that she did do were because of her husband and because of who he was and he was the president.
Speaker C:And it put her on a pedestal too, didn't it?
Speaker B:And if you remember at the very beginning, she was the high flyer.
Speaker B:She was the person who was, you know, bringing the bucks into the house household.
Speaker B:And then he went off on this political journey.
Speaker B:And if you ever remember the sort of early conversation, there were like weird things that I thought, gosh, that was weird.
Speaker B:When everybody was adulating him, oh, well, he's just the guy who wakes up next to me with the bad breath.
Speaker B:Or have you.
Speaker A:And I thought, well, yeah.
Speaker B:Or was the resentment there already?
Speaker B:In a way, and she didn't want the spotlight, but my goodness, she couldn't get more spotlight than being.
Speaker C:No, you could not.
Speaker C:So there is that to consider as well.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Maybe years of resentment.
Speaker A:So I think with her being American in Britain, we are a little bit more buttoned up, aren't we, about therapy?
Speaker B:But.
Speaker B:But, you know, and this is why I say, would I do therapy?
Speaker B:And then you think sometimes people who have done therapy and then the therapist might have sold the story, what went on.
Speaker B:Do you remember, like the Princess Diana and she had the crystals or whatever.
Speaker B:And so it's quite a brave thing for Michelle Obama to do therapy.
Speaker B:I mean, could you trust.
Speaker B:I mean, that's a very close relationship to be able to trust somebody, to reveal with all your deepest, darkest thoughts.
Speaker B:I don't know if I could do that.
Speaker B:I don't think I could share that intimacy with somebody who wasn't close to me.
Speaker B:I don't know.
Speaker B:Could you?
Speaker C:I'm doing it.
Speaker C:So last year, first time ever, I decided to.
Speaker C:That it was time and it was because certain big things had happened in my life.
Speaker C:Had breast cancer the year before.
Speaker C:Then my daughter was in a terrible accident and it was like one thing after another.
Speaker C:And then all of a sudden it's like, do you know what?
Speaker C:Yes, I've got brilliant friends.
Speaker C:And you talk to your friends, don't you?
Speaker C:They're your best therapist ever.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker C:But there's also.
Speaker C:They're never going to tell you when you're in the wrong, really, aren't they?
Speaker C:They're never.
Speaker C:Sometimes there is.
Speaker B:Got to be cruel to be kind.
Speaker C:You do.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:And going to see somebody else who isn't emotionally attached to you, you can be really open.
Speaker C:They're not going to judge you.
Speaker C:They're not going to tell you what to do either.
Speaker C:But they can help you or guide you on a new journey of focusing on yourself.
Speaker C:I've had six kids.
Speaker C:When did I focus on myself last?
Speaker C:Probably when I was at college, you know, so it's a journey and it's really alien.
Speaker C:And the same with her.
Speaker C:It's like she's focused on her husband and her children and his career for all those years, is it not time to look at herself?
Speaker C:But it doesn't come natural.
Speaker B:So did you think, oh, that was what I expected to get out of it.
Speaker B:Did you know what was going to happen?
Speaker B:Did you think at the end.
Speaker B:I'm pleased I did it.
Speaker B:That's all you need to know at the end, isn't it?
Speaker B:It solved my problems.
Speaker C:I'm still doing it.
Speaker C:And I think it's one of those things that in America in particular, everybody has a therapist.
Speaker C:It's sort of a known fact and I understand why people do it.
Speaker A:Absolutely.
Speaker C:And, you know, for me, it's going to talk to somebody and you can just blurb it out and then she'll say, oh, I've noticed a difference in you.
Speaker C:You're talking so differently.
Speaker C:Your body language.
Speaker C:Well, nobody at home will notice your body language unless you've not put some sausages in the fridge or something like, mum, there's no sausages.
Speaker C:You know, you're talking to somebody about you for it for a change.
Speaker A:Yes.
Speaker C:Just you.
Speaker B:So what.
Speaker B:I guess I've always thought, right, things go wrong and it's a bit like if you cut yourself, you get a scar.
Speaker C:Yes.
Speaker B:And it heals and, you know, it's been there and you move on.
Speaker B:And I wondered whether therapy was like picking at the scab completely.
Speaker B:So instead of it letting it heal, it's happened, move on.
Speaker B:Is there an element, actually, you're not letting it heal?
Speaker B:Scratching at the scab there and reliving.
Speaker B:Reliving it.
Speaker C:Well, you've got to deal with whatever the issue is, haven't you?
Speaker C:Because if you don't, it starts to affect you physically.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker C:So with stress, things like that, you're not sleeping, you're probably not eating.
Speaker C:So if you tackle the issue finally.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker C:All those things then start to.
Speaker C:Should go into should.
Speaker A:And I guess for women, and probably Michelle and Julie, particularly with families, you just get on with it.
Speaker A:There is no time to reflect on yourself because you've just got, you know, six kids.
Speaker C:You just keep going, don't you?
Speaker A:Yeah, there's a lot.
Speaker A:Now, I found myself in therapy inadvertently.
Speaker B:So how do you do that?
Speaker B:How do you get into it?
Speaker B:I was walking down the street, I was just about to go, whatever, and I fell into it.
Speaker B:Bit like falling pregnant.
Speaker B:No, you didn't fall pregnant.
Speaker B:We all know what you did.
Speaker C:We know what you did to get there.
Speaker A:It didn't just happen.
Speaker A:Well, one of my clients was a therapist.
Speaker A:She was called Penny, actually.
Speaker A:Hi, Pen, if you're listening, and I Was at the time doing business coaching with groups of people.
Speaker A:And I was trying to understand group dynamics because I noticed patterns in groups that I was coaching and she said, analyzing us.
Speaker C:No, I'm probably.
Speaker A:There's always a trouble.
Speaker A:Cause.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:And it was actually, it was that there's always a group dynamic.
Speaker A:So I said, I'll have a bit of coaching on this because I was having trouble controlling them all.
Speaker A:And it fell into myself.
Speaker A:And then I thought, this is nice, isn't it?
Speaker A:An hour of just me, I can just talk about myself.
Speaker A:And then we all started getting into stuff and family relationships.
Speaker A:And then I found myself starting all my conversations with.
Speaker A:Well, my therapist said.
Speaker B:It was like Woody Allen film.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:I could start any conversation because I could just say, well, my therapist said I should do that and I really enjoyed it.
Speaker A:And I only stopped because we went into lockdown then and, and you know, I couldn't see you and blah blah, blah.
Speaker A:And I didn't want to do it online.
Speaker A:But I've got to say I enjoyed it.
Speaker A:It was good and I felt like it was worth the money.
Speaker A:Now there's the argument.
Speaker A:Do, do you just go and see your friends and have a glass of wine and get it off your chest?
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker A:But then I always think of if you used to watch Sex and the City.
Speaker C:Yes.
Speaker A:I don't know if you did, Esther.
Speaker B:Yes, I did.
Speaker A:Where Carrie cannot get over big, you know, again.
Speaker A:And in the end her friends are that sick of her, they're just like, we can't help you anymore, you've got to come get therapy.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:And I think then she met someone and he was addicted to therapy anyway, so.
Speaker A:So there's that.
Speaker A:I enjoyed it and I've never felt I needed to go back to it.
Speaker A:But I did go and do a group session with an amazing woman called Joanna Groves and that was about grief and gratitude for different phase of your life.
Speaker A:So again, when you think of Michelle, maybe menopause, a job is finished, or.
Speaker C:You children have left home or gone to college or.
Speaker B:And I think that isn't it.
Speaker B:It's those major life changing moments where you feel you've, you know, fallen off your track, you know, somebody dying, something.
Speaker B:So.
Speaker B:So whilst I can't see it at the moment, there will be something.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:For anybody.
Speaker B:Everybody's got an Achilles and you might be lucky in your life that you never actually go close to that.
Speaker B:You don't get burnt, as it were, or you know, open minded.
Speaker B:So yes, I am open minded.
Speaker B:But I think the privacy issue for Me is something I'd have to get over.
Speaker B:I'd sooner not, because of the privacy issue, or try and, you know, talk it through, you know.
Speaker B:My dad, interestingly, is very philosophical.
Speaker B:You kind of think, oh, you know, he's, you know, a lad from Liverpool, you know, one of the lads or what have you set up his own business.
Speaker B:Rough and ready is an old expression.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker B:But my goodness, he is so philosophical.
Speaker A:Wow.
Speaker B:And much more gentle, caring.
Speaker B:It's interesting, isn't it?
Speaker B:As you grow up in, like, you find these different parts of people you never thought they had.
Speaker B:So if there was anybody I turned to, interestingly, it's my dad.
Speaker B:But you wouldn't think that on first impressions.
Speaker A:What I would say, Esther, you're quite a philosophical person.
Speaker B:Obviously, it's in the genes, it's from my dad.
Speaker B:But you're still going then.
Speaker B:And did you feel it's done what you wanted?
Speaker C:Totally.
Speaker C:Because I feel she's taught me things that I didn't probably understand, you know, because.
Speaker B:Is it self worth, self value?
Speaker C:Yes, it is.
Speaker C:Putting yourself first.
Speaker C:What do you need?
Speaker C:Don't expect that you can just say something to somebody and like, oh, you know, your husband, for instance, like, oh, you know, you're expecting him to give you a hug because you're feeling a bit down.
Speaker C:You need to sort of spell it out, because if you don't, you're gonna sit there thinking, could have given me a hug.
Speaker C:I mean, he obviously knew I was upset.
Speaker B:So that's commun.
Speaker C:It is, it is, but it's just understanding.
Speaker C:What do you need?
Speaker C:Well, you do need a hug, and you're so used to just getting on with it that you probably put up an exterior of like, oh, she's just getting on with it.
Speaker C:She doesn't need a hug.
Speaker C:What does she need a hug for?
Speaker C:She's just cracking on.
Speaker A:And I will say here, Esther and I don't have children and not put everybody ahead of us, maybe our whole lives.
Speaker B:You've got dogs, though, which are like children.
Speaker B:I've got stepchildren, which is a totally.
Speaker B:Again, another time, for another.
Speaker B:But that's a different dynamic as well.
Speaker B:And I've always thought the mum is their mum.
Speaker B:I am not.
Speaker B:I am Philip's partner, Philip's wife now.
Speaker B:And I think understanding and supporting the mum, because that is that relationship.
Speaker B:And I'm slightly sort of different to that, but that's a different sort of dynamic.
Speaker A:It's a different role.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:I have a stepmom as well, but they don't live with us.
Speaker A:And, you know, I can't imagine.
Speaker A:The reason I didn't have children really, was I just couldn't imagine giving my life over.
Speaker B:We're gonna have to talk about this.
Speaker B:White people never had children.
Speaker B:That's another topic.
Speaker C:Six.
Speaker C:You.
Speaker B:You were a dog.
Speaker B:You've had two.
Speaker B:Two and two.
Speaker B:Yeah, exactly.
Speaker B:Done us.
Speaker C:Yeah, sorted.
Speaker B:But I definitely think that's another, you know, why didn't.
Speaker A:Oh, how.
Speaker C:Why do you.
Speaker C:Why?
Speaker C:Yeah, why?
Speaker C:And what's wrong with that?
Speaker C:Nothing.
Speaker C:So.
Speaker C:Yeah, but it's.
Speaker A:I touched on that in my book as well.
Speaker A:Like, why.
Speaker A:You know, why don't people want kids?
Speaker A:Why do they want kids?
Speaker A:Yeah, it's fucking.
Speaker C:There's a pressure to have kids and.
Speaker B:Then sometimes I know I don't, you know, oh, I thought I might have.
Speaker B:And then I didn't just.
Speaker B:And it wasn't a brownie, so there's.
Speaker B:I'm not saying I missed the boat with children.
Speaker B:I.
Speaker B:Obviously, it wasn't that important to me.
Speaker B:But you've got to think about that as well.
Speaker B:It can creep up and.
Speaker A:Yeah, I think it does.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker A:A lot of women, it does.
Speaker A:To think, oh, I didn't.
Speaker A:I know someone who was like, I don't want kids.
Speaker A:Got to 40.
Speaker A:Womb, started screaming at her IVF, you know, 40 grand later.
Speaker A:And she did have a child eventually, at 42.
Speaker A:And then I thought, oh, you're gonna be headlonging into your menopause soon.
Speaker A:I don't think I'll mention it.
Speaker A:But there's.
Speaker A:There's all of those, of course.
Speaker A:Whilst I, you know, I think women, if you want a child, have a child.
Speaker A:And whenever.
Speaker B:That's gonna perform with bereavement, isn't it?
Speaker B:Because I know somebody who wished they'd had a child.
Speaker C:Yes.
Speaker B:Who didn't then have a child.
Speaker B:And she did go to therapy.
Speaker B:And really important that she did, because actually, you don't know you can't until you can't.
Speaker C:No.
Speaker B:And so that.
Speaker B:So like I say, you know, we can't foresee that big issue in your life when it's going to.
Speaker C:When it's going to actually arrive.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Well, I think it's Baz Luhrmann, isn't it?
Speaker A:The sunscreen song.
Speaker A:Yes.
Speaker A:There's a line in that that sticks with me all the time.
Speaker A:And it's like the things that do knock us, you know, this is not verbatim that we get blindsided by.
Speaker A:We never see the big stuff come in.
Speaker C:No, we don't.
Speaker A:And that's why sweat any of It.
Speaker A:Because the stuff that can derail you.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker A:Even momentarily, you never ever see that coming.
Speaker A:Very philosophical still.
Speaker B:Like the book, or do you read it on a Kindle?
Speaker C:Another gadget?
Speaker C:Kindle.
Speaker C:Kindle for me.
Speaker B:Are you a Kindle?
Speaker B:I'll read on my iPad.
Speaker B:But I think it'd probably be better for your eyes, isn't it?
Speaker B:It's better for your eyes if you.
Speaker B:If you're reading a book.
Speaker A:I would think so.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:But, you know, it's less.
Speaker A:I don't know much about.
Speaker A:Well, I listen to books now because.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:I'll consume them like that because I've got time.
Speaker A:It makes me sleepy.
Speaker C:It makes me sleepy.
Speaker C:I've done that.
Speaker B:And I guess this is how we all sort of learn differently, isn't it?
Speaker B:If I read it, I remember.
Speaker B:If I listen to it, it sort of just passes through as.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:You can be sort of somewhere else while that's going on in the background.
Speaker A:If I've enjoyed a book I've listened to, I buy it.
Speaker A:Do you really buy it in paperback and keep it?
Speaker C:I did like going.
Speaker C:Buying books.
Speaker B:I did a trophy book.
Speaker B:I've listened to it.
Speaker B:I will now put it on my shelf.
Speaker A:I have read a book.
Speaker C:I used to like buying books.
Speaker C:Did you like buying books?
Speaker C:I used to go, and you'd, like, look at the COVID and think, oh, that's an attractive cover.
Speaker B:Or that.
Speaker C:I miss that.
Speaker B:My other half loves books.
Speaker B:He will not chuck a book away.
Speaker B:We every year have to have.
Speaker B:Have more space, dedicated books.
Speaker B:I said, phil, I am now moving out the house.
Speaker B:We've got just your books everywhere.
Speaker B:Oh, my.
Speaker B:These are like little living, breathing entities.
Speaker B:He loves his books.
Speaker B:And one of that.
Speaker B:You don't turn down a page.
Speaker B:You don't write across the page.
Speaker B:Oh, that is.
Speaker B:That's just abuse of a book.
Speaker B:That's.
Speaker B:I can't.
Speaker C:Book abuse.
Speaker A:People do that to my book.
Speaker A:Now, I think with a book, if you write on it, if you turn a page over, I think it shows you.
Speaker B:You've read a pa. You've read a page.
Speaker A:I've definitely read this one.
Speaker A:But it shows that you've connected with it and I underline things.
Speaker A:Do you really?
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Think, oh, I'm gonna come back to that.
Speaker A:I never do, but it's there.
Speaker C:I might have done that in the 50 Shades range.
Speaker A:Oh, yeah.
Speaker C:If you remember those books.
Speaker C:Did you read those?
Speaker B:Yeah, I didn't.
Speaker C:Did you not.
Speaker C:Did you see the film?
Speaker C:I did see the film.
Speaker C:The book was more explicit, so I might have done a lot of page turning and underlining and remembering.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker C:Isn't those books?
Speaker B:Must.
Speaker B:Must come back.
Speaker B:Must come back to this or husband must try harder.
Speaker C:Yes.
Speaker C:Oh, gosh, yes.
Speaker C:Must decorate spare room in red paint.
