Laurie Podcast

Two women in their 50s discuss their earliest memories of their bodies and how they were influenced by outside opinions. They talk about the pressure to be slim and how their family and Catholic upbringing played a role in their body image. They also discuss their experiences with puberty, periods, and developing breasts, and how they felt self-conscious and tried to cover up their bodies. I think we should just get into it. Let's do it. We're women in our 50s, that's how we do things, right? Exactly. We don't hide anymore, we're just out there now. Yep, for sure. Let it all hang out. Okay, let's go back. If you think back, what's your earliest memory of your body? Because I had older siblings, like significantly older than me, teenagers, I'm talking 7, 11 years older, and they were talking a lot about their bodies. I was perhaps influenced by them and what they were saying, because I'd spent a lot of time with them. My parents weren't together, so I was with them a lot. So probably from a young age, I already had this idea that my body wasn't perfect, and that I was a little bit chubby. So I'm talking about- What age are we? I reckon probably five or six. Yeah, I have a memory of around that time being in some shorts and looking at my legs and thinking that they were too chubby. Do you remember anyone talking about your body? You said a bit about your siblings, like anybody else? I remember because of that time and my family being quite involved in the Catholic religion, it was about being ladylike and covering up my body and how you dressed, you know, accordingly. From parents or teachers? From my mum also, and I went to a Catholic school with nuns, so they're, you know, the full uniform from head to toe, covered up, yeah. But no one ever really discussing my body with me personally, but certainly a lot of outside influences of what I was picking up as a young child from what everyone else was saying. Particularly in your family, you're saying? Particularly in my family. There seemed to be, from a very young age, this huge thing around being fat. Right. Do you remember your mum talking about her body? Yeah, so my mum perhaps was, she was carrying some excess weight. I was looking at a photo with my daughter yesterday, and my daughter said, well, I wouldn't say that she was overweight by looking at that, but that memory of that time I had that she was considered large. And so it was, you know, we didn't eat well. We ate a lot of rubbish, like a lot of sweet stuff and sugar, and there wasn't a lot of thought around. I don't think in the 70s there was so much, but, you know, there was a lot of sugary stuff. And my mum, it was considered that, yeah, she was a bit overweight at the time, and my sister as well. And would she talk about that? Yeah. Do you remember her talking about her body at all or not? We're getting really deep really quickly. I don't remember so much about my mum. I remember more my dad saying things that she was fat, you know, and because her marriage ended at that time, and it was sort of being that she'd let herself go, you know, she didn't look after herself, so the man would still love her. Yeah. Yeah. So that's what I remember. And it sort of picked up on if you want to be loved and you want your man to hang around, you have to be slim. Yeah. That's what I was hearing. Okay. And just going back to you as a young child again, do you remember doing anything with your body that you really loved as a child? Like, when I grew up, I really loved riding my bike. I felt like I was flying. Yeah. I loved swimming. If there was a pool, I wanted to be in that pool. And I would be in there for hours and hours and hours, doing somersaults, doing backflips. I wasn't the strongest swimmer as such, but I just loved being in the water a lot. Was that the ocean too, or was it just the pool? We were living in country Yeddin, so it was more the local pool that we'd go down. We were in Victoria, and we would go out in the summer and get absolutely sunburnt, and then go home, put some vinegar on it, and then go back out the next day. And remember when you used to wear your same bathers for about four days in a row, they had that nice kind of musky coat? I remember that. I remember that. No, you didn't wash them out or anything like that. No, you put them straight back on. Pretty much. I think from morning, I would get up, put them on, and they would be on me. I don't know if I... I may have slept in them. I remember sleeping in my bathers, for sure. I love that, and I love that about swimming. Okay, so coming up and getting a little bit older, did your mum or your older sisters, for that matter, ever talk to you about the up-and-coming getting your menstrual cycle or sex or anything like that? Or was it just a little lorry overhearing stuff? Certainly a little lorry overhearing stuff with the teenagers. Overhearing a lot of things, probably too much. Can I share a funny story? Yes. There used to be a show called The Box. Do you remember that show? I was probably living in the country, so I was on commercial, not... Yeah, so it was a long time ago, and it sort of went down in history in Australia, because it was the first show on commercial television where they spoke about homosexuality. Wow. And a female came out and said that she was a lesbian. And here I am, about five or six, watching this show and thought, oh, yeah, she's a lesbian. Oh, yeah, okay. Oh, she's got blonde hair. I see people with blonde hair. And then a few days later, I was down at my godmother's house playing with... They had a couple of kids over, and they were picking on me, and they wouldn't include me. They were leaving me out. And we were about to go inside the house, and they were saying things to me that I obviously didn't like, and they all had blonde hair. And so I said, a year later, just a pack of lesbians. And with that, my godmother opened the door and heard me and sent me home. Wow. I was in trouble. So the reason I share that is because that's how I learnt a lot of stuff. Yes. Did a trial and error and make it up as you go along. Pretty much. Fish and pieces. So I don't remember anyone... So mum never came and said... No. I don't remember anyone telling me about how babies were made as such. I do have a memory of... Do you remember that book that came out? Where Do I Come From? Yes. I remember us all sitting around with my siblings, my daughter's boyfriend at the time, our partner, and them all talking to me about that. But I don't remember anyone ever saying how the baby got there. I don't remember that as such. And then as far as periods, I don't remember vividly my mum having a chat with me. What I do remember though is school talking about it. And school talking about... I think I was in year six. Yep, year six. And we had a very progressive female vice principal, I remember. And they put in the sanitary boxes in the toilets and took all the girls in and had a chat to us about that. I think that's... And then I went home and talked to mum about what was... And was she open about talking about it with you when you went home and told her about that? Yeah, she was okay. Not in like, oh, yes, dear, yes, that's happening. She didn't shrug it off, but we didn't go into lots of detail. I remember wanting to use tampons and wanting someone to show me because it's quite a difficult thing to know how to insert a tampon. And sort of kept approaching mum of like, well, how do I do this? What do I do? And, oh, you work it out. That's all I was told. Yeah. And then, so when you did get your period, was it a thing like you went to your mum and told her? And was she quite pragmatic or...? Yeah, they were pretty good. I remember, so at that time we were living over here. I think I was about 12 and we were living over here, but we'd gone back to New South Wales to visit family. So it was summer holidays and I got my period then and the family were all very, you know, huge stomach cramps that I had. They were very caring and supportive, but it was like, no one sort of talked about it. Yeah. I remember myself feeling quite weird thinking, well, what does this mean now? What am I or who am I? And I do have that memory. I can even remember the street I was walking out when I was thinking. Isn't that interesting? Yeah. Those details, like I kept this diary between year 8 and 12 and I've got the little cotex. I cut out the packet and it's still got the price on it, which is fascinating, and the little corner of the packet of the first pad packet that I used. And there's a story of the day as well, which I must find and reread. So with that, so you said you did start to feel a little bit different. Do you remember your body changing at this time at all during adolescence? And like, can you remember, was there anything happening like that? I hated my breasts growing. Oh, did you? Yeah. Why, Laurie? Because everyone noticed them. You know, that was something for everyone to see now. It was something that, just going back when you said before about talking about bodies, you know, when we were younger, I remember about being about five. And do you remember in the newspapers, I don't know over here if they did, but in New South Wales, they would have the page three girls. And I remember saying to my dad, like, why is that lady there with no top on? You know, isn't that rude? That's wrong. And my dad was saying, he said, well, it's quite natural. It's a woman's body. I mean, why is she in the newspaper? Right. I mean, he's right on one hand and then on the other hand, you're like, what? I know. Why is she in the newspaper? But yes, it was very natural. But I think that that going forward now to my adolescence and my breast developing, that, well, you know, that that was something that people would ogle over, you know, it wasn't thought about the breast with the breastfeeding or for anything else. It was more about that sexual objective, you know, that people would be looking at me that way. And I did and how do you deal with that as a young person? How did you deal with it as a young person? Because I know what I did. I started wearing a T-shirt over my bathers. Yeah, me too. Yeah, all the time. T-shirt over my bathers or anything that would cover up that you couldn't see anything, no cleavage or anything like that. I remember being at school with boys and they would say things and I would be trying to cover up or having my period and wearing a pad and being super, super paranoid because the boys would grab you on the bum as you walk past. And I was so worried that someone was going to do that and feel my pad and then make fun of me. Yeah, it wasn't comfortable. It wasn't a time to celebrate my body changing or that I was becoming a woman. It was more about not knowing how to navigate it. And no one really talking about that. I remember going to my sister. So I would have been probably 14 and I remember going to her. So she at that time would have been like 20, 22 and she had her children. And I remember going to her and sort of trying to have a conversation about boys and sex and she just, oh, you'll work it out. She didn't want to talk about it. I don't come from a family where we talk about things. And does she come into your... Often. Do you? Yeah. What do you think? Well, to tell her that it's okay, you know, to perhaps want to nurture her a little more, you know, to maybe get out these feelings, like to talk about it, that you're not, not to make her smaller. Yeah. Because I think through that puberty and adolescence and not knowing, when we don't know, we tend to become smaller. You know, we don't know if we don't know the past. We don't know what I tend to make myself smaller. And I don't know. And I think that's what I did in adolescence sort of covered up a little bit more. Yeah. Yeah. And so now I would think I would, you know, I would try and, I don't know, take her to, let's go and try on different clothes or let's go and, you know, experiment a little bit, you know, that there's not a lot of that. Don't you reckon when you saw those, and even now, I mean, you see the teenagers that are just so self-expressed and so, you know, and you just go, I wish I had that. I wish I had that gumption, you know, to just go, this is me and instead of, yeah. But it's, they're tricky waters, you know. You don't have to answer this, but were you thinking about sex at the time? I think I was shit scared of it. Were you? Yeah. Yeah. Totally. I really was. And well, you know, you hear all these things that's going to hurt. So, and also, but the other big thing of feeling that my body's not perfect, feeling not comfortable with my body, not loving my body, not at, I don't know, I think I thought I was just a vehicle for, for sex, not, well, not a vehicle for sex. That's the wrong way of putting it. But I didn't know how I, I wasn't in touch with my, how could I, how could I expect someone else to love my body when I didn't really love it. I was a bit scared of it. Yeah. So the sex then, or I was going to have to be with someone that was, you know, Jesus, how was I going to do that? Yeah. Yeah. Like, I don't know. So yeah, I was really scared of sex. Yeah. Yeah. Do you remember your first kiss then? And what, what it was like? Oh, wow. Can I remember my first kiss? My first kiss I think was when I was like young, like little. Well, not little, but like when I was probably like a peck, if you mean like a little peck. No, proper patch. Proper patch. I'm far out. I don't remember actually. Oh yeah, probably when I was like 14. Yes. I can, I can remember. What did you, what were you thinking? Can you remember? Scared. Scared? Scared, totally. Because I was so scared that that was going to lead to sex. Yeah. And that's, what was I going to do? You know, that, like at 14, that, you know, you know that other people, that we were talking about that more. And also it was talked about, can I be, how explicit? As explicit as you want. But I remember kids saying, oh, you know, little, oh, did you hear about Jane? Jane gave Maria a blowjob down there behind the gym shed. What was a blowjob? I didn't even know what a blowjob was. What was that? Did she do his hair? Like far out. I don't know. And so you just heard all this stuff. So I was just scared. And, you know, didn't talk about any of it. Did you ask anyone? Did you go back to the big sister at this point? Is this when I said, what's her name? You know, Jane, what's a blowjob? No, no, no. I didn't go back and ask her that, what that was. No way. No, didn't go back and say anything. Just working out with your friends. I don't even know when I eventually worked out what it was, to be honest. But I do know that I was just scared. I remember being with some friends once and I think, I don't know, I think they were being more sexually active and I was with this boy and I was just like pretending I was asleep. Yeah. So nothing would happen. Yeah. Yeah. Wow. So much to navigate. What messages do you think in the 1980s and 90s, let's say, particularly the 1980s and you're like a later teenager into your 20s. That's right, isn't it? 90s and 90s. What messages were you receiving about your body from society? Do you think there's any really come to mind? Yeah, being skinny, just being skinny. That's all I really remember is that to be deemed beautiful or attractive meant being slim. How were you getting these messages? Oh, from everything, from commercials, through things that you watch, whether movies or television, and more importantly, my family. I was told a lot as a teenager that you'll get, you know, don't eat that, you'll get fat, you'll be fat. And mostly from one of my siblings. But I was told that quite a lot that, you know, I was going to be fat, I was going to be fat. And we weren't, our family weren't really, well, as kids, we weren't educated about what we were putting into our bodies. You know, there's a lot of Coke and meat pies and pizza subs. Do you remember pizza subs you used to buy? We were a family of six kids. It was all home cooked food. I mean, I think I probably dreamt of a pizza sub. Probably a really long one. I'm going to make you one. Okay, because it's just that if you make, we made them at cooking in Home Ec, I remember, and you just got tomato paste and a bit of cheese and a bit of ham on a hot dog for other half a hot dog. I'm making you one. I'm dropping it around. I'm dropping it around. I'll go down. I'll go down to a nice bakery and get you a nice roll. Yeah. Oh, I love it. Okay. So and what, what did you do about those messages, Laurie? They were coming through and you were getting older. What, what did you... I took it on board. In what way? Well, I didn't starve myself because I like food too much. I like eating, but I did bigger exercise was always something that I did a lot of. Um, and so in those younger years, I played a lot of netball as a kid and tennis, and then netball was sort of my go to on and off for a long time. I had a girlfriend too, that was just so slim and she would eat and eat and eat. And I don't know where it went. I still don't know. I see now. In fact, I go to school reunions. There was a school reunion that we had some years ago now, but I wanted to go to it because she was pregnant. And it was the only time that I would be slimmer than her. But she, and she didn't seem to exercise. So it was just this for me to be attractive. And then that was the thing too. It was more about, it was, there was too much influence on the body, too much influence on outward opinion, outward on external, how I looked and not enough of, um, being beautiful from the inside. Yeah. So if we go back to that time and you're getting all these messages and perhaps you're, and you're, you're exercising because, and you've got these ideas of I'm valuable if I'm thin. Do you, through this time, can you remember times when you were using your body, be it exercise or playing netball or swimming, going back to that thing that you love so much, where you felt so happy and in your body? Can you remember any times? I loved aerobics because of the dancing with it. I really, I love it so much. Like if you were to do aerobics classes out, I'd be there. I'd be there with my little leotard. I'm looking like Olivia Newton-John out of physical, you know, with my leg warmers, my headband, um, that part, anything to do with dancing. I really love being in my body and, and that, and not really caring. Once I got there, I went, it didn't, I never felt like I could only be skinny to be there because it was a real enjoyment of it. Aerobics, you're talking about. And anything, netball or anything. So really being in my body with that. So that's awesome. So that's almost like, even though there's this outside messaging, when you came to it, you could be quite present and in your body and let go. For sure. And that, that message that I was receiving, perhaps that I was a little bit chubbier, which I wasn't, but I was a little bit chubbier, didn't stop me from going and doing those things. Yeah. I still wanted to do them because I'm, whilst I've probably only thought about it in later years, the feeling I got from it, it made me feel good. Yeah. You know, I don't, I don't think I gave it a lot of thought at the time. It's something that's more present to me, probably in my forties now, but, um, how it made me feel, it did make me feel good once I was there. Yeah. Mm. Okay. So let's move on to, when you were growing up, um, did you think about having babies? So is it something that you yearn, you know, were you one of those girls who was like, I can't wait to have a baby or it's a fait accompli or? No, I wasn't one of those at all. Yeah. I love kids. I didn't have a lot of good examples around of happy, of it being a happy time for people, you know. Being pregnant. Being pregnant and being a mum and it seemed harder. So it's something I scared away from and something that I thought that I perhaps, um, wasn't, wasn't good enough to do or couldn't do. So it wasn't, having babies wasn't something for me, wasn't something I necessarily ruled out, but it wasn't something that I yearned for or that I thought was there that I was going to do. So when you got pregnant with your, um, first child, did you plan that? Um, it wasn't planned. I didn't want to be on contraception anymore. So we, we went on the Billings method. Why didn't you want to be on contraception anymore? So I didn't want to be on, um, uh, on the pill any longer because I felt that I'd been on it for a long time over the years. I had gone off it a little bit for short periods. But, so we went on the Billings method, but of course, once again, takes two people to follow the Billings method and only one of us was following it. So it was a bit of a shock when I, I mean, on one hand it was like, well, we're just throwing it to the universe and see what would happen. But then when it finally did happen, um, I think I, I think I just started postnatal depression from the minute I felt pregnant really. Um, because I don't think I'd put enough thought into if I really wanted, wanted to do it and what it meant and, um, how I would navigate that or the emotions around that. Yeah. Just didn't think about it. And then too, the other thing is that because I was like 32, everyone would say, when are you having babies, when are you having babies? But then the minute I felt pregnant, all I heard was negativity or enjoy that meal because it's the last one you're going to get to sit down and eat fully, you know, or it was never what are the joys or the, what you would learn from it. Like what I have learned from it, I would not change having children for the world. There's nothing else that could have, um, I could have had those experiences with or had or learned what I've learned from being a mother. Um, so that, you know, I'm glad that it happened, but nothing prepared me for it. I, so going back to, and I'm, yeah. And thank you for sharing about the, about those feelings around when you did become pregnant. Um, did you, um, do you remember how you were feeling in your body as you became more and more pregnant? Did you? Yeah. I didn't enjoy being pregnant. I didn't, I don't, I'm probably, I liked it when I could feel my baby moving inside that part I did love, but the overall, I was uncomfortable. Um, I didn't like seeing how it changed. I don't think I've verbalized that to anyone. I've just got on with it as I do, but, um, yeah, I didn't enjoy it at all. And then, um, were you shocked by birth and what happened? So that, um, we didn't really talk about, no, no one really talked. You just, I don't know if it was just, if it's only me or if everyone goes through this, but did anyone talk to you about childbirth? All I, all you, you know, all I knew is that it's going to hurt, you know, anything else. My mum said it didn't hurt that much, but she, yeah, that's what she told me. But I asked my sister and my sister's friends, I should say, grilled a few people about it. I was a bit scared, but, um, yeah. So, so do you remember how you felt about your body after you gave birth or, or like the act of birth? Like do you, within that big emotional time for you, do you, do you feel like there was any big feelings about your body, about carrying a child and birthing this child? Um, I, I once again felt that, um, pressure that, you know, you need, your body had to bounce back, that I had to, I know that you had to be slim again pretty much straight away. I, I, I didn't, I love breastfeeding. I probably, the hardest thing for me, um, with my kids was their sleep deprivation. I just didn't cope with that. But I didn't mind breastfeeding. I didn't mind, I didn't have a problem with breastfeeding in public. In fact, you know, it's more interesting other people's responses to that, that I shouldn't be getting my breasts out, which I still just find amazing in the year 2000 that people were responding that way. Um, but I didn't have a problem. It's 2023, by the way. My baby was 2000. Well, 2023, they still do. I see what you're saying. Yeah, back in the year 2000. Oh, crikey. Yeah, that's when my first baby was born and people, I remember being, um, out with, um, my, um, ex-husband's relatives and one of them coming up and grabbing one of the baby blankets and putting it over the baby's head and my breasts so no one could see, you know, while they were feeding. Wow. I just couldn't, yeah, like that's pretty amazing. So I didn't have a problem with that. It was more the pressure around what I, that I should be the super mom. Yeah. That I should be looking good straight after, that I should bounce back. Do you feel like the first experience informed the second experience around your, around your body? I mean, I just feel like for me that I, I went in with a bit of a confidence, which was I'd done it before. With the second one? Yeah. Oh, shit, yeah. Different? Yeah, totally different. Everything was different, you know, and hence to the, um, he was different, I think, as well. Like, uh, that, um, I was more confident, relaxed, relaxed with my body, relaxed with, uh, with him, not so worried about people's opinions on breastfeeding or what I should be doing with him. Yeah, certainly far more confident the second time around. Gosh, it's amazing, isn't it? What, what can you think of, of that time, of coming into your 40s and becoming a middle-aged woman and your body? So, well, that for me, coupled with my marriage ending, um, and being single again and not wanting to, I didn't want to go out looking as mutton done up as lamb, like they used to say, you know, that feeling like I'm middle-aged now, I'm older, so I need to be careful of this, what I'm portraying. So I got a bit caught up in that, that old idea. Yeah, so, and then noticing, I became, I'm probably jumping ahead on one of these questions, but, um, my mother only told me about our family going through menopause early when I had my first child at 32. Right. That it was, um, most of the women in our family experienced early menopause. So I was lucky, she said, lucky I've had a baby now because we go through menopause early and hence. What's early? Uh, 39. So, well, I was 39. So I had my first child at 32, my second at 34, I think. And does that work? Yeah, I think it does. And, um, 39, literally it was like someone turned the tap off. I've always been pretty regular with my periods and someone turned, just came and turned the tap off. Do you mean at 39, your period stopped? Yeah, since I was 39, which is now 16 years ago, probably had four periods or five. So basically when you were having your children, you were, you were having children, but you're also perimenopausal. Likely. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And a lot of the, you know, I mean, like you're talking about even some of the anxiety and things around having children is probably the feelings of perimenopause too, potentially. Potentially. So even at that time, cause our marriage ended. So when we talk about menopause and those anxieties we have and our mental health during that time, it's hard for me to differentiate what was menopause and what was, um, just the struggles of a relationship ending or ending a relationship. It's difficult to know what, what that was or what were my feelings exacerbated by the fact that it relates, uh, that I was going through when my feelings around my relationship ending exacerbated because I was menopausal. I think it's chicken and egg kind of which one first, you know, like that. Yeah. Yeah. It's a question. It's a question. Um, so you're 39, you've just had a couple of kids, essentially you're 39 and your period's starting to stop and what's, what's happening in your body? Um, what are you feeling and are you feeling like you're changing again? So you've just gone through being pregnant, birthing, and then five years later you. So it didn't, other than the sleep, uh, the sleep deprivation or waking up at night with really hot sweats, my overall body, I, I don't, I didn't feel anything physical. It was more mental and just getting really hot in the evening. Um, and not being like wake up in the middle of the night, not sleeping that I remember. But at that time too, because I was having my children, I didn't really have, uh, um, an exercise routine at that time. And I was getting some really bad headaches and a chap I was working with at the time who's pretty healthy encouraged me. I was living down on, um, near South Beach and he said, you know, you need to go for a swim, that'll help your headaches. And you need to, you know, he was, uh, he wasn't jogging by then, he was a bit older, but he was always at the gym and stuff. So he just said, you know, you need to do something. And so all these feelings I was having, whether it was my, um, of the emotional breakup of my marriage and then menopause, seemed for me to coincide with me finding exercise again. Oh, that's great, isn't it? Yeah, but what a great, great, what a great friend too. For sure, like those headaches seemed to go. Like I did that. Yeah. Yeah. I did go for a swim. So I was living on the Hulbert street in South Free at the time and I'm trying, yeah, here I am, a single mum working two kids and trying to find time to exercise. And, um, if there's anyone from, um, Department of Children's Services, they're not allowed to ring me after this, but I used to, yeah, I'd say to my kids, if you wake up in the morning, mummy's not here, sit at the lounge room window and you'll see me come past. So I would jog around the block and I hadn't done any exercise for years. And, but I would say, say to myself, if I can make it to the corner, Oh, I'm getting feeling. If I can get, make it to the corner, I can get through this next week with the kids or, you know, working or if I can make it. And then if I can make it to the next corner, I can get through this mediation with my ex-husband. If I can make it to this corner, we'll, I'll find the money for the groceries this week, if I can make it. And that really got me through. And I would just keep extending that and then, and look up and see my kids at lounge room window cheering me on when I was running past. That is, thank you for sharing that. It's incredible. And what a, what a desperate, but clever and, and amazing strategy that you, you know, as a person who is probably very tired too, but you know, and it worked. Yeah, it did. And from that learnt the power, a bit of exercise and how that would make me feel better from doing that. Like, and if I didn't do that, the rest of the day seemed harder. So what, what that was giving me overall was better than anything else at that time, you know, better than more sleep or just seemed to get the dopamine levels and adrenaline and everything going to the endorphins going through the day. And it was hugely important. So from that was, you know, born a whole lot of others. Amazing. Do you, and then, so as we're getting towards, you know, like towards the end of your forties, let's say mid to end of forties heading towards 50. What, what are you thinking about your body? Well, in my forties, I think I finally came into my body. Amazing. What does that mean? Describe that to me. I liked it. I enjoyed what it could do for me. I enjoyed the strength of it. I enjoyed the way it looked. I didn't care about what anyone had been dictating to me, like the social construct or whatever, what a woman's body should be or should look like. And, and I didn't care so much. I used to say to people that the fact that I was a certain size was more of by-product of everything else. And that because for me at that time, my mental health was managed through exercise and that had was really driving me. So I felt really strong. I felt strong. I felt pretty much I could do anything, you know, that um, yeah, my body was, um, I was probably more in, in touch with the different feelings in my body as well, or how things made me feel in my body. I was just comfortable in what I wore or I didn't spend so much time worried about that. How you expressed yourself, would you say, and isn't that just, it's just such an incredible part of the story of your story because all these years and then you're hitting middle age and this is, this is when you're feeling the most embodied, embodied. Would that have reflected in your kind of freedom as in like, perhaps your ability to express sexually or, or to be in the world? Do you think you're more free with your body with that idea in you? Yeah, definitely. Yeah. I think if we define the freedom as well of what that means, does that mean that sexually I felt free to have a number of partners or sexually just, or free in? No, free in the sense, or either, whatever you want to do, but free in the sense of more present, I would say, because I think sometimes when you, you're not in your body and you're in, in, and sexually you can be much more in your head, can't you? Do you know what I mean? And not be like, I need to just let go. I can let go because I, because I accept me. Yeah. I agree. I was less in my head and more in my body in that time for sure. I found how things overall were making me, making me feel inside. That's, it was an intuition thing to being comfortable to trust myself and those feelings in my body as well, but not processing it of shoulds or how things should be inside my mind in that dialogue. Tell me, so then, then your daughter becomes pregnant and you're going to have a grandchild and you, and you have this beautiful grandchild come along. What, what does that mean as a woman in, in, in your, how old were you when she, when grandchild? What are we? Uh, he's, uh, so 52. 52. Yeah. What does that mean? Like how does, well, it's a bit of a shock. Uh, what does it mean? What does it mean? Because in society, when you're a grandmother, you're older and I, there's been jokes with people where they'd call me granny and I'm like, Oh no, I'm not a granny. And they think that I say that because the granny sounds old and it does, but I just, I don't, I don't want to be, I don't like granny. I think granny sounds awful. Um, but it was this thing of, Oh my God, I'm, I'm a certain age and I'm not socially like I'm not, I don't feel that social definition of a grandmother, but on the other side, Oh my God, it is so great to be physically fit to be able to run around with this youngster who I think he thinks I'm his age and wants me to get up on his monkey bars with him. Like I have been up there with him recently. My knees not great. So I can't. And he's like, come on. Yeah. Yeah. Get up here. And he just wants me to run around with him. Like him. I mean that, you know, so I guess there's two things. Initially you think I'm becoming a grandmother. That means I'm old now. And then the other side of, hang on a minute. I, I love the fact that physically, regardless of my age, physically, I'm healthy enough to run around with this youngster. And just rewinding back for a sec. When your daughter was pregnant with your grandson, did, was there, was that, was that wild? Is that while your child being really pregnant? For sure. I think, you know, it all came as a surprise. So, um, and that took us some time to get, um, did I get my head around, but that probably because mentally I wasn't ready for it. It was hard to remember, uh, not hard to read, hard to process and, um, and being, you know, what she was going through. I don't know, perhaps in like sitting here now thinking about it, um, because it was all came about prematurely for me that I probably didn't talk to her around the things that I would have. Like, it was a huge thing for my daughter and I in that time of, um, like mother and daughter relationships, they're complicated. And this came about prematurely and it meant that we had to deal with a lot of stuff and we're better for it now. We can talk about things now. We're quite close now. Um, not quite close. We're super close now. And I feel now actually this is an important thing. I feel now that we are two women walking side by side. Amazing. Yeah. And that she has, um, I'm super proud of her, but she has, um, taken on some of my, uh, um, my sharings and she is walking further and stronger and forging a path that I, um, that I just am so proud to see her do that, you know, to, for, um, not just being her mother, but a woman. What would you like the story to be of Laurie in her sixties and beyond? And the rest of your fifties, obviously, but, and beyond 16. Yeah. I think the, the, we talked about being younger and having a concentration on doing exercise to be slim, but now, uh, what I want in my older years is that now I pay more attention. I'm grateful for my body and the movement and what it can do. And it's not so much anymore. I don't care about the size or anything. It's more now about wanting to keep, um, uh, physically able and moving around. And that now, um, it's more about looking, preserving myself into my health and those healthy years into those older years and, and being able to age in a healthy way that I'm still mobile and doing things this week. I've gone to two houses where, um, people have vintage cars and I've thought of myself, I'm not, I don't think I'm at the vintage stage, maybe classic stage. I'm going into, but I was looking at those cars and thinking about like, we are like, you know, we are, yeah, what we put into like these, what we put into our bodies and as we're aging now, you know, that those cars can't do the miles that used to do. I can't do the miles. I used to, I've really noticed in the last, certainly two years that I get more tired now that rest is super important to me that I can say no to things that, um, that things don't repair as quick as what they used to when they were younger. You know, if I, if I hurt myself when I was younger and it was day later, week later, I'd be back into it. Now it takes me a lot longer to rest and recuperate. And just like those old cars, you know, they need a lot of, um, fine tuning and care and attention and can't go out in the sun as much as they used to, you know, those sorts of things. What great wisdom. Yeah. Amazing. Yeah. I love that. I love that analogy too. Let's talk about just before a couple more questions left. Um, what, when now do you just feel zingy and completely in your body and like really amazing in your body? What things are you doing or what are you, what's Laurie doing when you feel like that? Wow. Well, lately, lately I've been, um, doing something for me that's quite indulgent and that is, uh, on a Sunday staying in bed and reading a book. Is that, is that zingy enough in my body? I mean, that is something that when you've raised children or like when you were any busy person, I don't think we give ourselves enough time just to relax and be, and it's so super important, especially in this world we live in now that's so fast paced and with technology, we're constantly got that, um, urgent sort of mentality that we've got to keep answering things and doing things and moving all the time. So to give myself permission to do that and snuggling up and feeling my body and feeling all comfortable that that's a great feeling. I love that. Likewise, you know, going to choir and singing, that is such an amazing feeling. And more recently, cause I've been, um, nursing a knee injury. I have, um, really enjoyed going to spin classes and they turn the lights down and they have all the colored lights going with the funky music. I mean, people must look at me and think that girl needs to get out more really. Cause I just love that. And, but my body can do that. And that rhythm in that time, that's like going back to aerobics again. Well, that's, I see a common theme there, Laurie. They're things that have music with them generally. Do you know what I mean? Like you, that common combination of music and movement you is, um, something that brings you joy. It sounds like I can't sing at choir without moving my body. I cannot. Yeah. Great. Isn't it? I love it. All right. Last question. Is there anything that surprised you about our conversation and these topics that we've talked about today? Well, you've made it very comfortable. Thank you. When I read the questions, I thought that I was just going to probably, um, well, I'm a bit of an open book, so I don't have a problem answering them, but, um, thought it was going to be more confronting in a way. Yeah. It's been very easy to talk about. So thank you for that. Thank you for sharing. I guess too, just that, you know, to the youngsters, like we said before, I love seeing youngsters that are comfortable in their bodies and what they do, what they wear. Um, it's beautiful. You know, the female form is beautiful, physical body, regardless of gender is beautiful. And we need to celebrate that, you know, we all look different. And, and I think just remembering the benefits of, um, being physical of what that can do, not just for your, not just for your fitness and health, but your mind like you're waiting. That's something lately to my mind that, um, in my older years is remembering for, um, uh, brain health, brain health, super important. I probably, even though over the years and having my own sort of mental health struggles, I didn't put in enough concentration on my inner dialogue and controlling my, um, brain health and thoughts and how that affects my overall body and physicality. And I give that a lot more attention these days than I used to. Amazing. Thank you so much. You're welcome, Sarah. Thank you so much for having me totally celebrate what you're doing. Thank you.