Life Uncut - Ask Uncut - Long Lost Biological Relatives

Episode Date: December 7, 2025

Welcome back to ask uncut where we answer your deep and burning questions. There are two types of people in the world - the ones who shut down their laptop and the ones who never, ever, ever do unless it runs out of battery. Further on this path, are you the type of person who has an ‘order’ that you like your tabs to be in? Vibes and unsubscribes for the week: Laura - Christmas trivia Keeshia - @scotteeisfat Britt - Allison after NXIVM from Uncover Podcast  Then we jump into your questions! IS TAKING FOOD HOME FROM A DINNER PARTY RUDE?I’d love your thoughts on something that happened at my annual Potluck-Style Movie Night and Dinner Party. I host this every year for 6–8 friends, and I usually provide homemade pizzas, drinks, and an appetiser. Everyone else brings a small dish or extra snacks for the movie. This year, one friend brought cheeses and crackers and told us to keep the leftovers—great! But at the end of the night, another couple (two of my closest friends) went into the fridge, took back the drinks they brought, and packed up the dessert they had made. Here’s the question: What’s the etiquette for a potluck-style dinner party? Is it rude to take home what you brought, or is that perfectly okay? For context, this couple is extremely wealthy—but maybe that doesn’t matter? I’d love to hear your take on this. Am I overthinking it, or is this a social faux pas. I WANT SOMETHING BACK FROM MY EXLadies, I am in a little pickle-dickle and would love your thoughts on the route forward. Now, for context, I am a solo Mama that has recently ended a 3 year relationship with a solo Dad. We both have children of ages sentient enough to feel a loss here, so this was a well-thought through decision on my part, based on repeated avoidant patterns and lack of communication. He did not take it well and proceeded to block all communication herein. No worries, his prerogative. My conundrum is that he has a few things of mine I would like back, including a brand new motorcycle helmet I know he was envious of and is likely now using for himself and my 8 y/o’s scooter. I cannot contact him at all as far as I understand. My daughter’s father, with whom I have an excellent relationship with, has offered to message him to collect it... However I feel that looks really petty and like I am pitting two burly dudes against each other so I politely declined. His wife also offered to reach out....again, I don’t feel great about asking someone else to do my dirty-work. What would you do? Snail mail? Show up unannounced (which I do not feel particularly safe about doing…so that is all but off the table), message one of his family members? Or cut my losses…even though I hate the fact he is very likely wearing my shiny-new helmet and giving his kids my daughter’s electric scooter. GAY MAN - WHO SHOULD I GO FOR? I’m a 26 y/o gay male who’s been going on lots of dates after a bit of a romance slump, and now I’m seeing two guys and getting to the point where I need to choose who to keep pursuing. Guy 1: 26, lives super close (very convenient), but doesn’t have stable work, only gets a few event shifts, and isn’t really working toward any study or long-term career goals. Guy 2: 28, lives much further away, works as a podiatrist and is also doing his PhD. Me: I’m 26, a speech pathologist, and hoping to move into more acute hospital/rehab work in the next year. I’m attracted to both, and the chemistry is pretty equal, maybe slightly stronger with Guy 1, but I’m stuck on who fits better long-term. They are both great and although chemistry is stronger with Guy 1 the lack of career drive makes me nervous, Guy 2 seems like a safer option but travel considerations and the chemistry is just a bit lower. You can watch us on Youtube Find us on Instagram Join us on tiktok Or join the Facebook Discussion Group Hosted by Britt Hockley & Laura Byrne Produced by Keeshia Pettit Video Produced by Vanessa Beckford Recorded on Cammeraygal Land Tell your mum, tell your dad, tell your dog, tell your friend and share the love because WE LOVE LOVE! XxSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This episode was recorded on Camaragal land. Hi guys, and welcome back to another episode of Life Uncut. I'm Laura. I'm Brittany. And this is Ask Uncut, where we answer your deep, your dark, and your burning questions. Now you were just saying, Laura. Okay, we've discovered that there's two types of people in the world, and there's only two types of people. there are people who turn their laptop off at the end of the day they shut down one might say

and then there's people who have never shut their laptop down ever unless it's run out of battery and i am have a guess have a guess which one i think we yeah we know i haven't shut my laptop down since since i gave birth to poppy actually that's a lie i didn't shut it down then it turned off because i had no battery i have never once shut my laptop down unless the error comes up where it's like you need to restart this because I'm having an aneurysm. That's the only time. I've never. Do you know what I do sometimes as well?

This is what I do. I shut it down. It's shut. I don't restart it. I don't put it to sleep. I do nothing. I just close the lid. No, sometimes if things are taking too long to shut, like close,

like apps are taking too long to close on my computer or I have too many of them open at one time and the process of closing them all would take more than 30 seconds, I just force quit everything. But that's also fine too. No, it's so bad. No, you fucking don't. If I have to get the tabs back in the order that I like them,

that's a genuinely emotionally draining thing for me to do. Like that actually upsets me if I lose the order that the tabs are in because I know where they are. Gmail is at the start. But you can restore. You restore. I did learn that from you because I got upset one day. But sometimes you can't.

If you do like a whole update and like it's shut down for a certain amount of time, it doesn't let you. It forgets. What I'm taking from this conversation is that I actually don't think anyone shuts their laptops down i don't think anyone goes to the little apple symbol and goes shut down laptop i think and then goes on with that i don't i reckon it's only people that work in offices where you have to shut your computer down at the end of the day i don't know anyone else but putting your flap down is like forced sleep i put my flap down all the time it's like

a forcefully my flaps are constantly shut my flaps were down for 10 years okay wait i have to tell you something it is about flaps so apparently and i think i might have mentioned this i was told this on an episode before in which case give me the green dream put me to sleep when you go through menopause you lose your labia yeah it shrinks it shrinks it shrivels so i've been talking about it for forever that i was going to get like a labiaplasty i'm not getting it because when you have less estrogen in your body your labia disappears you don't have a labia where does it go i've seen many many many elderly vaginas so i have known this for a very long time no labias Brittany, stop talking about your weekends where it works.

They're there, but they're just very shriveled and small. But they just suck back in. I can't like that. I'm ready for it. Come on, estrogen. Leave my body. You don't want to bring on menopause just so you get a skinny labia. You've got to take the wins where you find them.

I can't believe that you strategically force quit your laptop. Sorry, yeah, take it back. This really reminds me of the time, Britt, you were away. You were doing, I can't remember which show. one of the shows and I came to Laura and I said this is a laptop activity like it's a task that is so big it has to be on a laptop I think I ended up drawing a line in the sand and saying that anything of a purchase of over $300 for me has to be made from a laptop can't do that from a phone it's too much pressure like you can't see enough and it was really really divided Laura ended up

saying that she would book her own funeral on her phone everything's on my phone yeah everything I will run my entire life off my phone i think that the question now has become it's not about whether you shut your laptop off or not it's whether you are the type of person who needs to have your tabs in the same order or if you're as chaotic as laura and you can just force quit them willy-nilly because there's too many open yeah sometimes i wish i could like extend that to my brain and just be like control alt delete shut down shut down quit open tab shut all right well look it is ask and cut as we said but before we get into your questions we need to do our vibes and unsubscribes for the week I have a very rogue vibe I have a like it's not your typical vibe I'm gonna go last

Brit you're first okay mine mine is a podcast that may or may not be divisive that I'm recommending it but and I don't even know why I'm recommending it other than it's super interesting I don't know how I feel about it yet. So I want to say that many years ago, we did an episode with India Oxenberg. Now India Oxenberg was in the sex cult NXIVM. She was a survivor. Yeah. Keith Ranieri was the head of the sex cult. And she did this in conjunction with Stan to just highlight exactly what went on. It was an incredible docu-series. It's an incredible episode that we did with India Oxenberg, just highlighting what went on in this cult that so many people don't know about. Now this podcast series is called Alison after Nixxiom. Now what this is, is Alison Mack was

the woman that I guess was like a sub leader of this cult. She was underneath Keith Raniere. So she got sucked into this cult, became almost in a partnership with Keith Raniere. And she was one of the people that then brought India in underneath her. So there was like this hierarchy. Yeah. And she was from Smallville, but also the reason why this, the TV show. Yeah. So the reason why next year and became such a like it was such a prolific conversation story around this cold is because it had so many celebrities it started it was like forward-facing almost like a self-help group and like think about going to like a Tony Robbins type concert they had those sorts of things and so on one hand it was like a self-help program and on the other hand once you had like

moved up into the highest divisions of this self-help program you actually were working underneath Keith Raniere and that's when he was becoming like this predator that's that's how he enacted his sexual violence it's a crazy story but interesting because Alison Mack's been in prison for a long time because of it well Alison Mack is out of prison now so this is the first time this is a podcast series that they're interviewing Alison Mack the whole series is interviewing her on her experience in it it's fascinating and when I say I don't know how I feel yet it's because when I started I didn't know the angle they were going to take I didn't know if was going to be a real woe is me a real victim mentality because she she has taken complete

ownership and the podcast is unraveling how she got into it because she's the one that I said sucked so many other people including India Oxenberg but it's how she originally got brought into it how it all worked because I didn't even realize it was funded by two heiresses to this billion dollar fortune so they were putting one heiress put 100 million dollars of her own money to keep Keith Raniere and Nixxiom afloat. So you're, you're finding out a lot of information about it, but she sits down and I was really, I had my guard up to think, how am I going to feel about this? She takes a lot of ownership, Alison, about what she did. And she speaks very openly about what she did and how she did it. She speaks about all of her flaws, about how she was feeling

at the time. And basically that she's like, she's like, I was a narcissist and I was this and I was that. And I, I truly believed what I was doing was right, but she openly will say now she knows it's wrong. She's obviously had the time. I don't think I feel sorry for her. I don't think I'm excusing her, but that's not to say that in some capacity, my takeaway is like, in a way she was a victim too. I think people can be victims and perpetrators. Yeah, but she was, she was both. She was a victim and then a perpetrator. And it's a, maybe I'm so fascinated by the podcast because it's balancing both. I think I would really struggle to listen to that

because we have a relationship with India and I still speak to India and I think having a redemption story to the perpetrator, even if they were a victim at the start, I don't know how I would be able to stomach it, to be honest. That's so true, but it's not a redemption story by any means. It's almost just a bit more of an expose and a lifting of the curtain onto what went on.

It hasn't changed how I feel about her, but I guess in a way I understand more about that cult and what it was like because she's not she's not trying to say everybody forgive me this is what I did it's really not that it's actually really interesting that she's doing it because I thought if you would ever do that that's the angle you would take but that's not it I think it kind of questions how you feel about justice and whether people can change and whether it is all just to show or not this sounds really fascinating and yeah I do think that people can be in situations where they are both and sometimes simultaneously victims and perpetrators and it has a lot to do with manipulation and that's not

about excusing their behavior it's actually about providing reasons that it was able to happen and I think if you can unpack those things then hopefully societally we're able to stop these things in their tracks sooner. Yeah I do think it's important to be able to understand why people are the way they are in any aspect and it doesn't mean you have to change your opinion on them but it's it's open to interpretation and she was there like there is no doubt that she was a victim before she became a perpetrator like she got sucked in the same way she was on a 500 calorie a day diet they were starving themselves she was physically branded as well everything that she ended up doing happened to her and I'm it's not an excuse but it is very interesting but what I

will say in full disclaimer just in case this goes haywire it's eight episodes I've only listened to four because the other four are being released like in the week so I'm four deep and I don't know what's going to happen in the next four but it is just interesting getting a different insight into that cult and I guess along that line India does have a book of her own if you are more interested in hearing her story it is called still learning a memoir my vibe this week is a person who has actually really encouraged me to become a little bit more active and it is not in the way that you would typically think. This is an Instagram account called ScottyIsFat

and he's got 563,000 followers. He's a yoga teacher. He's a podcast host. He is a part-time actor, but he's also a reluctant runner. I just want to give you an example. You've probably seen it. His videos are so, so funny. They make me laugh so much, but they also make me be like,

you know what, maybe I actually can go out and exercise because he's got a good message towards the end. This is what he sounds like. this week i'm in a place which essentially is a series of continents put together i'm somewhere in north wales there are lots of fucking heels if i sit in bed all day i'll just be like oh you should have gone for a run come to one running up a fucking hill with this cold air in my fucking lungs i cannot tell you how little i want to fucking do this another fucking hill no wonder why the welsh are so fucking miserable i'm having a bit of a walk and if you've got a problem with

that go fucking tell your mum because i'm not interested kilometer two i've got my yoga music on i'm facing the sun just said good morning to the fucking hottest farmhouse and of course he's wearing a pair of fucking rugby shorts and not much else i'll take everything back i said about welsh i'm downloading fucking duolingo welsh now diok boroda nosta kilometer floor i just run up a hill without complaining about it i'm fantasizing about coffee but the town i'm running towards has only got a costa and i'm not that fucking desperate if you're a hill runner i genuinely think you need to go for a mental health assessment at the kilometer five number six got an itchy bum number seven number eight and that's where i'll finish nine and a half you might have realized

by now that i don't run for pleasure i run for the feelings that i get afterwards on friday my mental health nurse called me to check my meds and to let me know that two years ago was my last psychotic episode and obviously in the last two years running has been a big part of my life i don't believe that running will cure me but it's one of the many things that gives me nice thoughts and feelings it can demonstrate to me that i can do hard things and pull through the other side he's just fantastic he's so entertaining he's got all of these videos where he's doing yoga and he's i mean his account is called scotty is fat he's in a bigger body and he really shows people that you know the aesthetic of yoga it doesn't have to look a certain way the aesthetic of running

like his videos are just so entertaining and i find them really really motivating like just in the sense that he takes the piss i love it and i think that going into the new year there is about to be a shitload of motivational you know you need a different body content I find him a really good person to follow also I'm yeah I know every year we talk about it we're like how do you feel about new year's resolutions the same I'm not having any can't wait to do our resolution episode we always do it and I always say like you know I think we make it about a month we've never fucking done a resolution in our life not a resolution I'm on mine no we do our resolution episodes but we never do our resolutions oh yeah yeah yeah it's all fake

I'm doing mine. What's yours? Mine was to have a hobby that wasn't about work or self-improvement in terms of like health and fitness and I'm up to like day 350-something of Duolingo French. But can you speak French? Yes, oui. Yeah, but it's more so, look, if I was doing more than three minutes a day,

I'd probably be able to do more. But it's about doing the one thing every day. I've done it every day and I just turn up for a couple of minutes and it's not about health. It's not about what I look like. it's not about a work improvement it's about croissants laws you said that yours was a bit of a rogue one okay mine is very rogue because it is not a product and it is not a book or a podcast it is an a life experience everyone strap on in didn't we do that once we were like hang out with

your friends that was yours i was like what i was like go i think i had a dinner party or something and had a really good time and i was like well that okay that's pretty much the equivalent of this okay mine mine is not hang out with your friends though mine is go and do Christmas trivia with your friends okay so it is the same thing on the weekend so our neighbor is she is like the queen of festivities they're from America they're a couple they've got two little kids and like Halloween they had a Halloween party at Christmas they had Christmas adult trivia and like she is the person who is like the holiday maker and I've always kind of thought this since having kids it's like if you don't make Christmas special like no one's making it special right like if

you're not the one who makes it big and does the decorations and puts up the tree and and has like little family traditions they don't just make themselves like Christmas is only special because the people around you who make it special on the weekend she did Christmas trivia she created this massive board and every little pocket had like a different trivia thing in it and we were put into teams and it was so fun it was such a fun afternoon and i this is my recommendation to you if you over the next couple of weeks get your girlfriends together get a group of people together and go and do christmas trivia with drinks if you enjoy it or if you're the sober kind i'm sure you'll still have a great time but they were like all different categories there was

like the man the myth the legend and it was about santa claus there was like christmas through the ages there was christmas around the world there was movies and music so you could pick your category and you picked which envelope it accounted for. So there was like questions that were 600, questions that were 400. Anyway, it was fucking great. Well, I've just Googled, and for anyone who doesn't have the effort, the capabilities to organize something like that, you can get from Amazon Gift Republic Christmas Trivia for $39.46.

Let's get into your questions. Okay, question number one. Is taking food home from a dinner party rude? Nah. This is funny. This is so relatable. Also great for Christmas time. I'd love your thoughts on something that happened at my annual potluck-style movie night and dinner party.

I host this every year for six to eight friends, and I usually provide homemade pizzas, drinks, and an appetizer. Everyone else will bring a small dish or extra snacks for the movie. This chick is absolutely organizing Christmas trivia. She's the Christmas trivia girl. Everyone needs one of these people in their friendship group. Yeah. Otherwise, nothing gets done. this year one friend brought cheeses and i don't know why i'm laughing sorry this year one it's

just so specific get my shit together this year one friend brought cheese and crackers and she told us to keep the leftovers which is great but at the end of the night another couple who two of my closest friends went into the fridge and took back the drinks that they brought and packed up the dessert that they had made. Here's the question. What is the etiquette for a potluck style dinner party? Is it rude to take home what you've brought or is that just perfectly okay, normal? For context, this couple is extremely wealthy, but maybe that doesn't matter. I'd love to hear your take on it. Am I overthinking it or is this a social faux pas? Depends on what dish the dessert was in. Okay. Hear me out. If it was in a fancy dish or in a Tupperware container

that they wanted back, then it's all fair game. You don't get free Tupperware just because you host a party. Because if we do Christmas lunch, for example, and there's heaps of leftovers, I send people home with doggy bags. They go home with a little sandwich thing that they can have the next day. I don't want it all at our house. It just goes off. You have food for the next five days.

I would never personally go to the fridge and take back stuff. I would die. I would just not do it if I brought it but where I thought this was going while I was laughing when she's like one friend brought cheese I thought to go and to take the cube of cheese but that was just a bit of extra information for us that friend left the cheese how do you feel about the drinks though because like let's say we were having a dinner party and I brought over a six-pack but I only had two no you can't do I go and take my other four back no because the whole thing is right it's like hey i'm gonna provide the bulk of everything like just bring this your little

contribution but that stays with the host you don't take that back like in my eyes i think that there is like levels of etiquette here it depends on whose house it is it depends on how close you are depends on its family if it's your best friend whatever i also think it depends on what the drink is if it's a bottle of wine it's been opened that's staying if it's a bottle of spirits it's been opened, that's staying. If it's a six pack and you've had one beer out of it, I think you can take the individual portions. I think you can take that home. What about if you didn't open the bottle of wine that you brought? If it's a bottle of wine, that's a gift. Like if you're rocking up to someone's house and the contribution that you have brought is a bottle of wine, then you're

leaving it. But for example, if you bring a bottle of wine and a six pack, cause your partner or someone's drinking beers and they're the only one drinking the beers and they have one of them then I'm like take the five beers home I think that there's just an etiquette around whose house it is more so and it's also very specific to what the evening or day like the situation the event is because this is like a potluck style dinner this is literally like I'm going to provide everything everyone just come and contribute something it's a dinner that she's put on if it's a hey everyone come over for a Saturday barbecue bring your own drinks then yeah you pack your drinks up and go like it's that is different the dessert thing i agree on if they've brought a beautiful crystal

platter with a cake on it they're not going to leave that for you but it's also because they're never getting it back that's the problem if you leave a plate or a platter at someone's house only 50 of the times that a boomerang is it coming back to you so we have this is funny when i go up to the gold coast to see my sister we have a group of friends up there there's five of us and every single time i go up we all have dinner usually we go to some sometimes we go out but usually we'll just go to someone's house and we have a it's called the dessert plate and it just goes between people's houses and the next time we go up that's what they bring the dessert plate back on then the plate stays at that so shannon will take it to sherry's house

and then sherry keeps it there we eat it she'll wash it up then the next dinner a couple weeks later the dessert plate sherry makes a dessert and it goes to tani and and it's just that one exact so it's like we do have one really nice dessert plate that just gets around it's like The sisterhood of the traveling dessert place. It is. Of all the questions we get sent, this one made it in the list. Because it's relatable. Yeah.

It's social etiquette. And because there isn't a clear line in the sand, there's so many factors that no one knows what's right and what's wrong. But I think what we've established is that there's still no clear line in the sand. The question is also around like who needs it more? And I don't say need it more, but where's the best place for the leftovers? Because if it's my house, I'm making people take it. I live alone.

I'm not going to use it but if it's a found if like you're the single person if I've come to your house Laura and you've got three kids you've got Ellie you've got Matt your house is full if I'm going to take all the leftovers back to my house on my own then that's so rude because I bet they're going to be eaten at your house like I think it's very situational there's no black and white yes you do leave something no you don't there's just not it's too dependent on stuff but personally I'd rather die than go back to the fridge and take my cubes of cheese and my dessert and my drinks and leave. I would like to answer the last part of this question though. It says, am I overthinking it? The question, the answer is yes. No, I also think that this was

very pointed because she's like my wealthy friend is the one who took home the leftovers. This is a pointed. Yeah. If either of you come to my house, you better fucking leave everything, including the nice tableware. All right. Next question. Ladies, I'm in a little pickle dickle. I love that you use that. And I would love your thoughts on the route forward. Now for context, I am a solo mum that has recently ended a three-year relationship with a solo dad. We both have children that are old enough to understand and feel the loss here. So this was a well thought through decision on my part based on repeated avoidant patterns and lack of communication.

Now he didn't take it well and he proceeded to block all communication with me. No worries, that was his prerogative to do so. However, the issue is that he still has a few things of mine that I would like back, including a brand new motorcycle helmet that I know he was envious of and he's probably likely using it for himself now. He also has my eight-year-old scooter. I cannot contact him as far as I am aware. Now, my daughter's husband, sorry, my daughter's father, with whom I have an excellent relationship with, has offered to message to collect it. However, I feel that that looks really petty and like I'm pitting two burly dudes against each other, so I politely

declined. His wife also offered to reach out. Again, I don't feel great about asking someone else to do my dirty work. What would you do? Show up unannounced, which I don't feel particularly safe about doing so. Message one of his family members or cut my losses. Even though I hate the fact that he is very likely wearing my shiny new helmet and giving his kids my daughter's electric scooter. What would you do? I wouldn't snail mail. I wouldn't turn up for sure, especially when you that I don't feel safe and I wouldn't contact his family. What I probably would do is take your ex husband up on his offer to say, Hey, I can reach out if you want me to try and get it. It sounds like you guys were together for a while. What? Three years? Yeah. You were together for a long

time. So I have no doubt that your recent ex has some kind of a relationship with your ex husband. Like three years with kids, they're going to know who each other are. So I think it's okay for him. it doesn't have to be aggressive your ex knows that he's blocked you that you can't contact him I think it's okay for him to say hey Sarah hasn't been able to get a hold of you like you know read between the lines if it's cool and you're around on Saturday I'm going to come and pick up a few of her things don't ask I'm going to go and grab the helmet and the scooter and let me know what time that works I just put it to him he's not going to ignore it coming from the guy he knows he's got your stuff and it's not little stuff like an electric scooter is a big thing and it's

your daughters and new bike helmet they're not cheap either don't you think though that if he organizes a time he will ignore it like he just won't be home like if he wants to be that petty like he's already blocked out yeah she can't get in contact if the ex-husband's now calling and being like i'm coming around on saturday at 10 a.m to pick up the bike well it's easier to be petty with a woman that he feels like he can control than it is to be petty with another big burly man that also has an interest in it like it just gets he's gonna give you the shit back for sure. I think it's easier because there's the kid's scooter as well. Exactly. So like the dad is trying to get the scooter for his own daughter too. Yeah. Helmet can just get thrown in. I mean,

it's a whole nother issue if he doesn't want to comply with your ex's request to pick it up. It could be a pretty murky path. And maybe if they start having issues, I'd probably just call it a day and be like, you know what? It's not worth it. Keep the scooter. But I would be shocked if he had an issue with your husband saying, Hey, I'm going to come and pick up Sally's scooter. Yeah. And I also wouldn't just cut my losses like in this instance like just because you go through a separation doesn't mean that someone's entitled to keep the things that you left at their house that's not an altruistic gift you're not giving him your helmet there's definitely a time where you let dead dogs lie like not every relationship when it ends if you've left something there is it

worth going back and getting like I know it's like easy to say you shouldn't have to leave it they shouldn't have to take it sometimes it is definitely easier but that's dependent on how that relationship ended what is going on and what the item was like if it was the most toxic relationship and you left your jumper there I'd probably let the jumper go well I actually think it's probably more so around the having a third party going and doing it for you right like in the instance that you are going through a separation and there are things that need to be done like what is and isn't okay I mean having your ex rock up to pick up things the only reason why it's okay in this instance is because there's a kid involved and no doubt you've had relationships

with you know each other but I would say normally it is not a normal thing to have your ex rock up at their house to pick up things that you own I would say that that could create more tension but I don't think that it's clear-cut and I think it depends on how much is something worth what's the sentimental value what drama is it going to cause and also often people use leaving something at their house as an excuse to try and see them again do you know I mean like you have that fucking ten dollar cup I bought from Kmart that's my favorite mug I'm coming to get it sometimes it's actually not about the item it's about the excuse to have contact which doesn't seem like it's the case in this instance so I think you know knowing what is the reasoning

behind wanting something makes a big difference to it too it's also because you know you secretly wanted your helmet so it's like also you want to be like fuck I'm getting that back because I know you're using it are people normally envious of people's helmets like is that a normal thing a Helmet's really expensive. Ness, you ride a motorbike. Is a helmet thing like? They can be. I like the ones that have the magpie things coming out the top.

But like, I'm joking. It's that one. Wait, Ben, bless him. Last time he was here, he's like, what the fuck is that helmet? And I'm like, that's because we also have magpie sweeping season. He was shocked. He was like, Australia has everything. That actually would be really funny to a foreigner.

Whereas to us, it's just so assumed that you know what it is. But you've got to be a specific type of person to wear a magpie helmet. Or you've been attacked enough. You've been attacked enough. Question three. Gay man, who should I go for? I'm a 26-year-old gay man who has been going on lots of dates after a bit of a romantic slump, and now I'm seeing two guys

and getting to the point where I need to choose who I'm going to keep pursuing. Now, this is a conundrum we have all faced in our past. Have we? Not as a gay man, but yes, I have faced it in my heterosexual relationships. No, then when you've got two going and you're like, I'm going to have to make the choice, which one am I going to pursue?

Because it gets to the point where like you can date multiple people until you can't, you know, that was deep. So guy one, 26, lives super close, which is very convenient, but doesn't have stable work, only gets a few event shifts and isn't really working towards any study or long-term career goals. Guy number two, 28, lives much further away, but works as a podiatrist and is also doing his phd me i'm 26 a speech pathologist and hoping to move into more acute hospital rehab work in the next year now the problem is i am attracted to both the chemistry is pretty equal maybe slightly

stronger with guy one now to remind you guy one is the person they have chemistry he doesn't have a job he lives close which is inconvenient but he doesn't have a lot of work ethic or drive okay They are both really great, and although chemistry is stronger with guy one, it's not bad with guy two, and the lack of the career drive makes me nervous. Guy two seems like a safer option, but the travel considerations and the chemistry is a bit lower. I love it.

I love this question so much. I feel like I'm sitting across from like at the cafe and my friend is showing me the profiles of the two and I get to pick and have an input. I already know who I want. Are you guys guy one or guy two? I feel like that this is one of those instances where doing the pros and cons list has backfired.

You know how everyone always says, like, if you don't know what you want, sit down, write down what it is that's a benefit about one and what is the benefit about the other and then sit there with your list. You've done this and then you've come up with the list and been like, I still can't choose. And I objectively don't think that anyone can tell you which of these two choices is going to be the right choice for you. I can too.

I don't think so. I want input. Who would you choose? I'm going guy two. Me too. I'm going stable job. good work ethic the chemistry is still there the only thing that you're saying is really negative is that he doesn't live as close and it's not as convenient as we know that's not an issue for me

and maybe a little bit less chemistry yes tiny little bit less chemistry but no chemistry is created equal we know that it's like but a little bit less chemistry doesn't mean it's the wrong chemistry because chemistry is not always clear-cut and chemistry doesn't always equate to healthy beautiful loving relationships I think doing the pros list has been beneficial I think if you actually write them down and look at them the only thing is you want the quick easy sex with the convenient guy which is great but you've got to look if you're wanting long term you need to look into your future and see what you want and I can guarantee it it's not the person who doesn't have the work drive because that's going to get old very quickly yeah I think it's it's a tricky

one for me because it only is important if it's important to you which evidently he said like you know if that's the one thing that makes him nervous I don't want to rule out someone because they don't have at 26 they don't have their ideal career already set in stone I don't know I think there's lots of people who are who are 26 who aren't like 100% of what they want to be doing career-wise I think it's more about attitude like are you the type of person who is a driven person which we actually don't know we don't know whether this person's driven to travel or to you know what mean you can be driven in other ways yeah I don't know I think we could come across as way too judgmental by making that decision based off purely the fact that one has a job one doesn't

you're more dateable because you have a job feels pretty like black and white to me if I met somebody and he was like hey I don't really work much and I was like what are you aiming for like because it's okay if right now you're between jobs and and you're struggling to find the work and you and you're trying but it's very different if you don't have the drive and you're like I'm happy to cruise with three shifts a week yeah and I think that that's the difference it's a drive match right like it's meeting someone who has similar goals ambitions yes or has similar values more so around the things that you want in life that I think is a way more important way of looking at it than just being like well one of them has a job and one doesn't guy number two is committing

to a PhD so you know that he can commit to you for anywhere between three and five years but he'll have no time for you for the next three depending on what type of PhD which is the only problem about the PhD like there's no there's no black and white we don't know how this is going to pen out for you you could pick number two and it might not work out and then you could spend the next couple of months being like damn it I should have picked number one fuck life uncut or vice versa like I also think like is it actually at a point now where you have to choose like do they not know that you're dating multiple people do they both want to settle down like what does it look like in your life that you're at this sort of crossroad where you have to choose one or the

other well he does say he's there so whatever's happened has happened because he's like I'm at the point where i need to make a choice so yeah we don't know what it is it sounds like you're at the point where you're looking more long term for me i know where i would be going and of course we don't know if it's going to work out nobody has a glass future ball but i would be going for guy number two the speech path you're attracted to him he's got the chemistry whilst a little bit less he's a little bit further away but that is irrelevant you can travel and as we know distance doesn't mean everything you know he's got drive you know he's got ambition for me number two so I just thought of, you know, in Shrek when he's like, pick number two, my lord.

Yes, yes. That's what it is. Pick number three, my lord. Okay, okay. Number three. I do want to say, though, if you are the type of person who is writing this list, if you are that specific about this and you've really weighed up the pros and cons, you're a catch because two people want you.

You are a catch, but you also are the number two person because the number one person is way too carefree for you. That ain't your person. I'd just bang number one first for one last time, get that chemistry out. Don't use number one. It's not using him, but if you're making the decision, goodbye bang. You've got to have a goodbye bang and then you can go and lock it down. He might not have a job, but he's got feelings, Brick.

God damn it. He's not about to have a boyfriend either. He's not going to have anything. He's worth love as well. He is, just not with speech path. All right, do I blow up my life? Let's get into it. If you had a family that you didn't know existed,

would you want them to contact you? genuinely would you want your life as you know it to change forever or would you want it to remain as is i'm grappling with this and want to hear as many perspectives as possible now just for quick context that was the entire question which made no sense we needed more but i loved the question i loved the idea of even just that sit here right now if there is a family if you have family out there right now laura keish would you want them no background no context you know that you've got siblings or maybe your biological mum, would you want them to contact you?

It depends on who they are, doesn't it? But you don't know. That's the point. Are they rich? Well, I wrote back to her and I said, give me more. So here's the more. Okay. It's the 1960s.

My mum was conceived by two teens, then forcibly given up for adoption after her birth. She found her biological mum later in life, but the secret of her biological father remained until 2023. Mum did a MyHeritage DNA test. from there we worked out who her biological father was we managed to track him down we spoke with him on the phone and he was the most kind and lovely man everything you could hope for he never knew about mum he didn't know how to tell his family about us except for his older sister and then he

died a couple of months later we watched his funeral online his sister hasn't wanted the secret to come out at all she is of the view that mum knows where she comes from now and that should be enough we've respected her wishes for two years but every so often I wonder if walking away is the right thing to do the sister who I call from time to time is dying now also I'd love to reach out to the rest of the family but is my great aunt right is it best to let sleeping dogs lie this is really tricky and I really feel for everyone involved because I don't want to say it goes back to like who owns the story right but in a way it does affect everybody it affects the aunt that doesn't want you to contact the family as much as it affects you wanting to contact the family

like everyone's entitled to have their feelings and opinions but I think at the end of the day and it's so hard because I've never been in this situation I don't think I will ever be in this situation having said that I sent off my DNA test last week so unless that comes back there could be some spoilers Tony Hockley which you've been up to but um I'm not expecting anything like that I just want to know my heritage but something that you have been thinking about for a long time it is also your family and you are also entitled to I would probably be inclined to reach out and if the rest of the family's feedback is we don't really want to go there and we don't want to know about it then you do have to respect it it comes to the point but if it was just one auntie saying

don't do it move on it's time that wouldn't be enough for me that wouldn't be enough to lull my feelings that are probably going to be overpowering for a long time to want to know more about your heritage and your family tree and things like that so I would probably continue to try and contact the family but if then it comes to some pushback then you've got no choice but to be like cool I reached out I put it there no one wants a bar of it but that's just me personally I think with this very specific story you've said that the sister is now on her deathbed also I would say for the time being if that's her wishes like if if she's the only one who knows and he only told her there's probably a reason why he only told her at this point I would respect

that she and he didn't want anyone else to know and I wouldn't necessarily make the last couple of months of her life hell emotionally dramatic and stressful if she felt as though this is something that she had to keep and that was expected to be kept a secret if once she passes away you want to reach out and have that conversation with you know the children of him and let them know that they have another sibling like I think that that's a different conversation but I wouldn't be doing it while she's alive especially if she's expressed this I just think that it feels deeply disrespectful and I would ask the question in the opposite way because you asked if you had a family would you want to know I don't think it matters what necessarily they

specifically want to know do you feel as though you need to find out more because if you're doing it for them then I would say there's not really a need are you doing it for yourself yeah because then I think like if there's this unmet need to kind of find out more about your story and to find out more about where you came from and all of that then I understand it but if you're just doing it for the benefit of the people who don't know then I would say why take that burden on board like why make that decision for them yeah I'm pretty in the if it were me personally and I don't want to project this onto you, I wouldn't be telling anyone because I have a really strong opinion on nature versus nurture when it comes to what makes a person who they are. And that is backed

by science. But I just don't think that, I don't think that many of us know much more about our biological heritage further than our grandparents. Some of us might be lucky enough to know great grandparents, but I just don't think it's actually going to give you much information that's going to change anything for you because you were brought up in different environments this family you know you do share some genetic material but other than like health conditions like what are you really gonna know about that you don't already maybe have access to or that you don't have information from I still understand I mean think about it if you if you found out that your mom was she does already have that info she's already got the dad no I know I know but like you didn't know anything

about your granddad or like you know it's a very close the link is not so tenuous it's not so far in history it's your grandfather and it's like your cousins and it's there is a really close link to this I think it's your aunties it's your uncles it's your cousins it's I think that that's where I have the difference though and I'm sorry if this sounds really harsh you share genetic material but they're not your grandfather they're not your cousins because you weren't raised around them you had a grandfather hopefully you know like you had these relationships and I don't think that biological material changes that. I understand. Do you know what I mean? Like, and that's why for me, I know I am kind of in the further category of this. I don't think it will give

you much more information about your own life because you weren't raised around them. Like their personalities didn't actually impact your life. It's really cool to find out stories about our grandparents and about what they did and different things like that. But if you already have those people and you already have the memories of those people in your life and they had an influence on you I don't think finding out about these you know genetic contributors is going to change much this also occurs for donor children like did the donor children want to know a huge amount about the history of I think that they would want to know their donor but maybe not any further than that put it this way though if my dad had had a kid when he was in his teens and he had

no idea about it like there is you know half brothers and sisters walking around and I found out in no way would that make me feel differently about my dad you know in no way would that make me be like oh my god I you know how did you keep this from me I would like to know I think that that would be cool information and if we had a relationship or we had a friendship great if that friendship or relationship doesn't evolve into anything fine I think it's different if there's been a lie like he didn't know he had no clue that this happened but he did ask he only told his own one child he didn't tell the others yeah but he only knew for a couple of months and then passed away. I don't think you really had the opportunity to, which is what it sounds like as

well. I think whatever decision you make in this instance, I would be doing it after your auntie passes away because that was clearly her wishes. But at the end of the day, I don't think that any remaining siblings, children, cousins, whatever that, you know, relationship link is, I don't think it's going to be received badly because it wasn't information that they could have possibly known. I think it's very different when there is deceit around it. And I think that that information hits a lot differently i think go for it i think in these instances do what you need to do for your own closure but don't be doing it for other people because it's probably not worth blowing up someone else's life unless you're actually going to get something out of this it's too much i just also

think that like all i can think of is personally if i had family members out there that i discovered from my dad or my grandpa having a family before we existed i would want to know who they are i'd want to know what they're like i'd want to know what you do with that information afterwards or what they do is different like once you've got information information is power then you can decide what you do with it but i would rather have the information and be able to decide what to do with it than not have the information but you know what like it's not that uncommon like our grandparents lived of a time when they spread their seat well no they lived at a time whereas like if you had a child young you were expected to adopt it out like there was such pressure around

it or if you had a child out of wedlock like there was so many lies that was said within families in order to keep family respect and to keep up appearances in community my stepmom growing up so my dad remarried after my mom and she found out when she was 19 that her sister was actually her mom and her mom was actually her grandmother and she was 19 years old she just always thought that there was a really big age gap between her and her sister that it turns out her sister was her mom wow yeah imagine how much that fucks you up when you're 19 finding out that your sister who's 15 years older. But then also for the mum who was expected to keep that a secret

from her own mum. But then you want to know that stuff, right? Well, no, it ruined their relationships. Like it ruined – Well, yeah, that's very different. I don't think that those sort of situations you just kind of be like, oh, my God, you're not my sister, you're my mum? No, you're like, what the fuck, mum?

That ruins you, you know, and it ruins your sense of identity, it ruins your relationships. Like I think that that was traumatic. There were so many lies in that and like there's a lot of – So much trauma. But we spoke with Rhyan John on an episode quite recently and actually you should go back and listen to that because he had kind of the best case scenario of finding out about his he was adopted he always knew he was adopted and he did an ancestry test

same thing his biological father didn't know that he existed but his biological mother had passed away and so they now have a really beautiful relationship that is best case scenario of what could happen but yeah I think the one determining factor that will kind of walk the line for every person here is how much emphasis you put on a genetic contribution to determine what makes up family. If you think that it's a large part of what makes up family, you're probably going to want to find out more information. If you're like me and you don't think it has much relevance at all, you probably won't find it necessary to go and find out that information and it would be more peaceful for you to just let it go. Yeah. And look, I mean, if you have more skin in the game

with this, like please slide into the DMs because this I think is such a subjective and interesting conversation. And as the person wrote in, the more perspectives that you can get on this to kind of make a decision, I think is better. Well, that is it from us, guys. If you have a question for Ask Uncut, slide on into the DMs and we will do our best to answer it for you. Or you can join the discussion group at Life Uncut Discussion Group. And there's also a lot of anonymous questions that go down in there as well. And you know the drill. Tell your mum, tell your dad, tell your friends and share the love because we love love. We'll be right back.