Life Uncut - Take care of Maya - When Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy is Misdiagnosed

Episode Date: November 20, 2023

Hey Lifers,Britt had a big surprise this week and Laura had a wonderful family holiday; except for one part where she said something to a stranger that has made us want the ground to swallow us up!We unpack the redemption story that the Kardashians are trying to pull off with one of the world's most notorious cheaters Tristan Thompson.It raised the questions if your sister's or friend's partner cheated on them, and they forgave them, do you have to as well? Do you have to be okay with whatever they decide? Does it depend on the specific situation and what happened with the cheating? We also discuss the documentary on Netflix "Take Care of Maya" and the court case that resulted in a $211 million payout last week. We speak about Maya's mother being mislabelled as having Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy and the tragic outcome for their family that resulted.  If you have a question please send it on it to life uncut podcast on Instagram hereJoin us on tiktok Or join the facebook group here Tell your mum, tell your dad, tell your dog, tell your friend and share the love because WE LOVE LOVE! xx      See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Life Uncut acknowledges the traditional custodians of country. We pay our respects to their elders past and present. Always was, always will be Aboriginal land. This episode was recorded on Darug Wollamutta land. Hi guys and welcome back to another episode of Life Uncut. I'm Laura. And I'm a very happy Brittany. Why are you so happy?

Actually, I know why you're happy. Okay, I feel like a piece of shit right now, so I finished my egg freezing. You're a good-looking piece of shit, though. If I undid, there's a reason I wore baggy pants today. If I undid my pants, you would see a little pot belly. The bloat. The bloat. So I finished the egg freezing finally.

Well, it's not bloat. It's genuinely the two weeks of double-dose hormones that I've had, and I had the extraction on Saturday. This is now Monday that we're recording, and for the last two days, I cannot exaggerate, this is the third time I've done this, but I could not move it was actually so painful and it hasn't been before and I think it's because of the double dose of the hormones I was like sprawled out on my back on the lounge I couldn't get up because the belly is so painful it's not that it's so big it's so painful that you can't

bend so you know how pregnant people can't bend so they have to keep really straight and like hustle up and hold their back and roll to the side and that's what I was doing to get around the house I couldn't sit on the toilet properly it was a rough couple of days which I haven't experience before. But luckily you had a big strong man there to carry you to the toilet and to the bed and to the appointments because guess who's in town baby well not anymore but guess who was in town baby. Ben bless his soul and I was so happy Ben flew in to surprise me I mean he told me two days before he was coming like it wasn't he didn't turn up at my door but he decided really last minute to attempt to get two days off so he could come here he flew across

the world for two and a half days he was here with me for the operation for the procedure he looked after me and he just left late last night and I it was just made my year I was so happy it was really happy yeah and it was we were actually really in a point of really struggling if I'm being honest because it's the longest we've spent apart it'll be about three-ish months and that's a really long time especially when you've got hormones like a body raging of hormones we were really struggling do you feel like a couple of days was enough to overcome the feelings of you know when you get to that point in long distance where you've not seen each other enough so like you're picking fights obviously your situation was it was double fold with all the

hormones but do you think that that was enough of like a little top up of the cup that you're all back to good yeah it was definitely the top up we both needed it was really hard to say goodbye we hate it we hate saying goodbye but I guess it's always harder when you're the person leaving like when you're the one that has to get back on the flight and go back but my life just is normal it's always harder being that person but we did I say we I did get eight eggs this time first time I got 15 second time I got none and this time I got eight two a little a bit dodgy so probably going to be like six quality but two are a bit dodged it's like they're okay and you'd you'd freeze them in case I'll use the other ones first like when you're open 12 yeah a dozen eggs and

one's got a little crack in it or one's got got all the spots on it you're like I won't use that one or I'll use that last that's what two of my eggs were like but this is so much better than the last time so if all of those eight or six or however many are like juicy ripe great we're good we're not doing it again yeah yeah I want to say never again that's what I want to say the only time I'll do it again is IVF obviously it's like the making of the embryos and planning embryos if I have to go down that track but I don't want to think about that yet well while you were in Sydney and not having a copious amount of sexy times, which is very rare for you guys.

Usually when you're in the same room together, it's wham, bam, thank you, ma'am. Yeah, we couldn't have sex. It was a disaster. At all? Honestly, we did once or twice, but I can't explain. And everyone that's listening that has done this process, you'll know it's just so painful.

Everything inside you is swollen to the 10th degree. That's the whole point, right? It's to swell your ovaries and your follicles. You're like, can you put anything else in there? It was so sore. Keep it out. That's when you go for the back and knee, Britt. That's when you can bring it on in.

I didn't even think of that or the neck or the underarm. Anyway, if you guys didn't come to the live show or you haven't listened to Early Doors, Life Uncut, you might not remember that and we don't need to go into it. It's okay. Use your imagination. Yeah. Anyways, moving along. If you listen to the episode that Keisha and I did last Tuesday, I was talking about how Matt and I, we had our one year wedding anniversary and how long-term relationships go through ebbs and flows of like the intensity of being in love and then the lack of intensity of the long-termness of your relationship and your two children but no going

away for us for three nights it was exactly what we needed to have those moments of like oh my god we love each other like do you feel like you can and I ask this because I'm not in the position and I also watch your Instagram stories and it looks like a crazy crazy nightmare like I saw Matt putting a video up of like just the alarm you want or the best alarm and it was like Lola banging on the table and like making all this noise at 6am do you feel like you really can romantically and I guess emotionally reconnect when you still do have like two kids there that are depending on you for life? No, do you know what? It's funny for us. Cause I think a lot of times, I think that there are definitely times where you want to carve out time just with your

partner and just have one-on-one. But I also think for us and especially for Matt, because like Matt's number one is he fucking loves being a dad and he loves feeling like he's doing a good job of the whole dadding thing. So like his perfect holiday is going somewhere that has a big pool and being in the pool with the kids all day. Like that really fills his cup. He loves it. And yours is being by the pool with a margarita. And mine was spending half an hour at the adult's pool, having a frozen coconut margarita, which was truly a really exceptional part of my weekend. Did you actually? Yeah. I mean, Matt was doing work and the kids were asleep and I was like, how do you feel if I just pop across the way for a moment? No, I mean, I think it's fine to have time.

Yeah, I love it. You have to, you have to have time that's independent of, but like for Matt, he absolutely loves it. And I think it's his enthusiasm for being a dad that makes it so joyful. When you have someone who actually really loves playing with them, really loves the whole, look at me, look at me. It changes the whole vibe of the holiday. So like we had a fucking amazing time. So no divorce. No divorces. I did have something that happened to me, which every time I think about it, I feel a little bit sick. And I want to tell you, so we're at a restaurant, took the kids out for

dinner at an Italian restaurant. It was great. They were in great spirits. And by great spirits, I mean, they were highly energetic and running around the restaurant like absolute fucking animals. Now there was this big table that was sitting next to us and they had a little kid as well. And the kids were all playing together out in the grass. When your kids are like this and you're in a restaurant, you're not really in a conversation, right? Because you're spending all your time trying to just manage your children and stop them and stop them from like annoying other people, stop them from hurting themselves, stop them from ruining everybody else's night. So I was at the front and the kids were like running around like crazy at the front and

they'd found this little boy that they were playing with and the little boy's parents were out the front too and then some of their friends. Anyway, we were kind of having a bit of a half conversation, but the conversation wasn't really because we were spending so much time with the kids, like the concentration was on the kids, but it was like half conversation. You're not really paying attention to what each other's is saying properly because you're like on the kids yeah got it so there they are running around and this woman has been there with this big table of people and look that they're having a really nice time it was like 15 of them

and I was like oh how you going yeah nice to meet you oh like oh you're here with such a big group and she was like yeah I'm here with my family and my friends I was like oh my god that's so nice so it must be so nice to catch up together and then she said something and I was like it's so hard as adults to like make time to hang out together and you know like be friends and she kept looking at me a bit confused. And so I was trying to explain how, you know, when you're a parent, it can be really hard to carve out time with your friends, but it's so amazing to come away and have a big group of friends together. And she goes, yeah, I mean, I guess it is nice to have so many people here to scatter my dad's ashes. I'm sorry. I wanted to fucking die. I wanted to die. I was

like I am so sorry I missed that part of the conversation I just didn't hear her say that because I was you're like on the kids concentrating on the kids oh my god I'm so mortified I'm actually mortified for you I I want to die Keisha has tears in her eyes Keisha why are you crying that's an extreme reaction I'm on the hormones oh she's embarrassed guys I was humiliated and i am not laughing at the situation it's fucking horrific i am laughing at me because how does this happen to someone i literally as she said it and she looked so confused and i must have looked so confused why are you so jolly about my father i was like god i wish my girlfriends would come away on a trip with me i'm gonna tell you a story that might make you feel better no no this

is gonna make you feel better my mom's gonna kill me for telling this story so my mom works in a store like a bed bath and table betting that's a better yeah you made it sound like your mom works in gambling my mom's a gambler a professional no my mom works in bedding no she doesn't work in betting no laura she's don't go to her for a tip she's never watched a game of sport in her life my mom is really good on the horse racing no my mom is not that person my mom works in a bedding like a bed bath table kind of a store right she just works casually she works in Manchester she just works in like a bed bath and table-ish kind of store where you know they do all the linen and bedding and mattresses and beautiful stuff anyway she loves

it she loves it she gets to go in she chats to people she has a great time not that long ago and I don't remember if I told this on the podcast but not that long ago she did something similar she was talking to a customer the customer was an older lady and she had a bunch of towels in her hand she wanted to buy some new towels and they were going between conversations this is where my mom this is what happened to me it was like multiple things were happening children were running around i was like oh you're from blah blah blah like we're just it would but i think sometimes my mom must just tune out i know sometimes my mom chews out so she's talking to the lady and they're talking about towels blah blah blah and then the conversation takes a turn

and then my mom says oh well yes you know they don't last forever do they the towels the town Mum's talking about the towels. The towels don't last forever. And she's like, oh, I guess not. And Mum's like, you know, I'm sure they had a good innings because they last a long time but it's not going to be forever. So sometimes it's just time to get a new one. They're going to replace them.

And the lady was gobsmacked. Like you couldn't write this. And my mum was like, something doesn't feel right with this conversation. And the lady's like, I guess. I mean, he did make it to 83. She had talked about how her husband had just died and she was getting new stuff. She's like, I need new stuff because my husband died.

My mum missed the husband dying and goes they don't last forever. That was me. Oh, my God. I was like, Mum, I'm so mortified for you. She's like, I nearly died. She's like, I wanted the ground to swallow me up. But she's like, oh, well, put those three 20% off. It's so bad.

That was literally me. I did not hear. She must have said the reason why she was there and I was so fixated on how nice it would be to have a girls' weekend that I just didn't hear what she said. lauren's like it's so nice you brought a vase to dinner oh you're fucked you're fucking cooked if you're listening to this the ladies were so nice if you're listening to this oh fuck i'm so sorry i cannot tell you how uncomfortable i felt when i left because i didn't hear it when you said

it and i genuinely like hope you had i hope you i hope you had a beautiful time with your family fucking horrible okay i just need you to stop talking okay don't let her talk anymore something to make you feel a bit better let's do accidentally unfiltered and favorite part what have you got today no i pulled this one out because i was like at least this makes me feel a little bit less bad about how dumb i am actually this isn't no i take that back because this is a child who did this not a grown adult so i'm still the idiot in this situation okay i took my four-year-old son to dinner and he needed to pee so i took him to the toilet and also i needed to go too i had my period and i was wearing a pad i asked him to turn around so i wouldn't traumatize him he's four and

I didn't really want to have the conversation about periods with him just yet. He couldn't help himself and he had a look and then he screamed at the top of his lungs in a very, very packed public cubicle, you did a poo in your undies. I said, no, I didn't, in a panic. He said, yes, you did and I'm telling dad. He then ran out of the toilet and started screaming in the restaurant

while running back to his dad, mum pooed in her undies. Dad, mum did a big poo in her undies. Fuck me, I wanted to flush myself down the toilet. I probably would have stayed in the cubicle until the restaurant closed. What do you do, hey? The whole restaurant thinks you just shag yourself. You can't go out and explain it being like,

oh, what he meant was it was my period in my undies. It's actually not. Do you know what? You could. You absolutely could. No, you could not. You cannot go out to a restaurant full of patrons and say, I know he said I shit, but it was my period.

I've got my period. I wish we could talk about it so openly. It would make life a bit better. Oh, my God. So she had to walk back to her table. my kids they're inquisitive because like kids always come in so like Lola and Marley will come in and it'll be that time of the month and I'll be like trying to like put a tampon in and do things and Marley's like why are you touching your bum and I'm like oh my god darling I'm not ready

to explain to you what's going on down here I would love to be honest but she knows the tampons kind of go down there but she doesn't know what they're for she sees them go in and not come out she's like where'd that go like a squirrel just what is that mouse tail yeah anyway I think that there comes an age. It's not like you need to keep it from them, but you just, it's too hard to explain. They do not, they do not understand. I want to talk about the family that literally owns the entire world. And that is the Kardashians. Now something is happening in the storyline of the Kardashians. And it's funny that their whole life, I do look at it and I think everyone looks at it like it is a storyline. They're all characters. I know they're real people, but

they play into their storylines. And there's one storyline now developing with one of my faves. it's Chloe and her ex Tristan. Tristan was the basketballer she's got two kids to him he cheated on her multiple times in like truly horrific ways he's had secret kids with other people he truly has humiliated her and done wrong by her every step of the way in their relationship like just when you think he might be a semi-decent guy he does something so fucked like you know have a secret baby with someone else and not tell her about it while simultaneously trying to coax her to having another baby at the same time, this kind of shit. I think these guys are really bad egg.

There's a storyline developing on the show. It's like a redemption arc. The thing is for Chloe, though, is that she received so much backlash for even being in a relationship with him, for like giving him another chance, having another baby with him, but she wasn't aware that he was still doing the things that he was doing at the time. Yeah, totally. Now he's featuring quite heavily in the season again

And everyone seems, and I say everyone, like Christiana, her mom, some of her friends, her sisters are sort of like coaxing her back into maybe giving him a second chance. Like, you know, yeah, the hundredth chance. It's this really weird concept of why everyone in her life is encouraging her to get back with this twat. The only person that's really come out strong is Courtney. The next day after you, like, do the deed, like, do you feel anything?

For me personally, when I cheat, I feel disgusted the next day. But then, so then why do you do it again? I was just literally just cheating just for an action, like, just cheating just for a feeling. But also it really came down to not really knowing how to love because that's the way I grew up. I've never seen a man treat a woman good.

I've never seen a man not cheat on a woman. I've never seen a good husband. I made a mistake. But did I really... Multiple. Multiple times. But did I really ever understand why I'm making a mistake? But what do you think the mistake is?

Like, truly, like what... So the mistake is I cheated him. If I was ahead of it and maybe told Chloe, we might have been able to figure it out together instead of her being blindsided. But I don't think you deserve Chloe. or the way the actions that you've done have been something that she's deserved.

She's definitely not a part of this redemption arc and them getting back together. But I feel like that's the question, right? When is enough? When is enough enough? And why are they putting him back on one of the most publicized shows in the world and their whole family who's supposed to care about Khloe

and want her to be with this amazing man? Why is everyone so on his side? I mean, if you haven't seen it and if you don't follow along with the Kardashians, I dip in and I dip out. But part of it that I think is interesting is that so Tristan's mum passed away. He has now become the sole carer for his brother, who is severely disabled. And I guess like part of that makes you kind of look at him and have some empathy for how

caring he must be. The fact that he has become an additional guardian, I guess. But it's very interesting to me that the people who are the closest to Chloe are the ones who are encouraging her to give the relationship another go. and they're the ones who are like you know you should be trying to save your relationship this sort of language when I think it's very very clear for anyone who's followed along with any sort of consistency that she has done everything she possibly can to save her relationship earlier on I think that this is a setup for the fact that they are getting back together and they're trying

to groom the audience into not vilifying Chloe when that happens now if she is wanting to give this relationship with Tristan another chance they need this redemption arc they need this like almost like changing of the perception around who he is as a person to try and frame him as though he's grown as a person he's like a kind and empathetic man now he's learned from his ways but they also need the contrast of Courtney there to put the hard word on him and I think that this is all a setup and we will probably see in a few months time that they're back in a relationship together it's funny because the the first thing I thought was exactly that I was like there's no other reason than everyone. Even her best friend said to her, like, you know, you should be fighting

for your family. Maybe you should be giving him another go for your family, which I have opinions about that as well. It has to be right. Like everyone in your life that you love and that loves you can't be this pro somebody that just fucked you over so many times. So I think that you're onto something. I think that it is, it is a redemption act for a reason. They are going to bring him back in and they'll probably end up getting back together. But also when it comes to the Kardashians, I think we are all very aware that every single thing that happens in that show, every single storyline has been contrived and created for a purpose. It has been either created to gun a PR, it's been created to push the show further because obviously they still need to

continue to have exciting and relevant things happening in their lives in order to maintain relevancy forever. You can't just live a normal life to have a reality TV show. So I think that this is a setup for the next story arc that's coming. And that's kind of how they roll these things one into the other. But I think the bigger and probably more interesting question to kind of move it away and shift gears away from the Kardashians is, so here is Kourtney and she's putting the hard word on Tristan. She obviously protects her sister. She cares about the fact that her sister has been lied to, that she's been coerced into having a baby who was lying to her and having a baby with someone else, like the absolute magnitude of the lies in which he spread

are unbelievable. And I think if we were ever to do an Ask Uncut for someone who'd sent in a question like that, we'd be like, fucking remove him from your life, co-parent, but just like cut ties. But the way in which like a normal psychologist, therapist, literally your friend, anyone giving advice to this relationship would be to cut this person out of your life. So it's very interesting that in this instance, there's so many people within her life, which is saying like, give him another chance. Now, the big question is, is if this was somebody who was in your life, if this was your friend, if this was your sister, and they were in a relationship with someone who had cheated on them multiple times, and they wanted to go back and

give that person another chance, do you have to forgive and allow that person, the partner back into your life as the supportive friend or the supportive sister, because the person who you love has chosen to pursue a relationship with them a third or fourth time? It's such a hard question. And obviously it depends so much on the situation, what they did, the why, what they've done after it, how they've tried to get you back and make amends. In the Kardashian situation, so in Tristan's situation and Khloe, absolutely not. I would be Courtney, right? In that situation, I would be like, you have had enough chances. And I think I would be pretty obvious in my dislike for that person. If my sister's partner, for example, like had cheated once, accidentally

made amends, was sorry, was doing everything he can to get the family back on track, then I think that's different, right? Because I do believe people do make mistakes. I believe it's very situational and I believe it's what you do after the fact that makes you who you are, right? It's yes, you've done something, but what's your reaction to that? I think it's the same with friends. Like I have some friends whose partners have cheated before and we've ended up all getting like all of our friend groups go on, like nothing happened eventually because they worked through it. They're happy and it's fine. But then I have friends whose partner have cheated, you know, more horrific ways and I can't get on board with that, but I want to support my friends. So it's

a really, you know, if your friend says that they're happy in that situation, it's really difficult. I think that is the hardest part of it, right? Like I do think that this, and I know that this is a relevant question because we have received so many ask uncuts over the years from people who are like, I love my friend. I hate their partner. I hate the way their partner treats them, but they're giving them another chance. Like, how do I navigate this situation? And I do think that it's very corrosive, not just on the relationship between your partner and your friendship group, but it's really corrosive as well on your relationship with your friends. Like it can change in terms of like, as much as you want to support them, it's very hard to be around

someone whose values you despise and who you have grown to resent because of how they treat your friend. And sometimes it's like, you just kind of want to shake someone and be like, how can you not want better for yourself? How can you not think that you're worthy of better than this? And I don't want to be in the same room as this person who treats you so badly and pretend like we accept them again and everything's fine. And we do the small talk and we pretend like, you know, you're not a bad person. And I don't say bad person because obviously like cheating doesn't instantly make you a bad person, but repetitive lying, cheating and treating someone as though they're disposable, but not letting them walk away and wanting to like reinvest in the relationship and

then doing the same behavior does make you a pretty shitty person. The only thing I think about these types of situations and with this guy, Tristan specifically, is that I think the only way that people who are like this do change their behavior is when they hit rock bottom. You have to hit absolute rock bottom. You have to lose everything to be able to get to a point where you change that behavior and you understand the way in which you're treating people is not viable and you can't continue to do that. And I think that that's the case for some people who are terrible cheaters or who are incredibly manipulative. Once they've hit rock bottom and they realize that they've lost everything, they can sometimes go through the process of making

amends. Is this going to be the case in the Kardashian storyline? No. Who knows? Who knows? But it's a very hard thing to navigate when you love someone and they're your best friend, but then they are choosing to be in a relationship with somebody who devalues them all the time and you're expected to accept that. I wanted to talk about a documentary which Brit, you watched on the weekend, I watched it on the weekend and it has left me absolutely traumatized. I sent Brit a photo last night and I had tears streaming down my face when I was watching this. I did message you and say, be ready because no one can watch this documentary without being

severely affected. And I was like, I actually don't think I'm ever going to be okay again. And Matt was, he was sitting in the kitchen and I was trying to explain to him the storyline of what was happening as it was happening. Now, it's a Netflix docker that came out in June this year called Take Care of Maya. We as parents tried to do the best we can for our children, but there's nothing that could prepare me for what I went through. Nothing.

beata and i had a beautiful family but then maya started to get sick maya had advanced complex regional pain syndrome and we know what the best therapy is for it it's called ketamine we're just blessed that we finally seen something working but maya relapsed Viata's explaining to the emergency room, this is what needs to be done. You don't understand how much medication it takes to control her pain. But they didn't listen. They accused Viata of medical child abuse. And that's when they told me I had to leave.

That my daughter is under state custody. The reason why we are talking about it now is because the case that has been surrounding this documentary has just been finalised recently and there has been an enormous, enormous payout to this little girl, Maya Kowalski, and her family. So just the other week on November 9, there was a settlement, more than $200 million for false imprisonment, medical negligence, battery fraud and intentional infliction of emotional distress. Yeah, they ended up with $261 million combined in damages and punitive damages total. That is one of the biggest payouts has ever happened in a hospital environment. Now, if you haven't seen the

doco, I just want to kind of set up what happened for you so that you know what it is that we're talking about. So Maya, she was a normal little girl, had a beautiful mom and dad and a little brother. And she at the age of seven started having this pain syndrome that's called CRPS and it's complex regional pain syndrome. So Maya was taken to all these different hospitals. She was taken to all these different doctors because what she was experiencing was a super rare condition that not many people knew what it was nor how to treat it and for a long time there they even thought that maybe she was making up the symptoms and it was actually a psychological disorder. Eventually her mother found a doctor who specialized in this type of rare pain condition

and it turns out that the treatment for this rare pain condition is and now it sounds crazy but it's ketamine. They prescribe ketamine in different doses depending on how debilitating the pain is And so at the time she was seven when she was diagnosed and then she went through this crazy like induced ketamine coma, which was experimental treatment that happened in Mexico. Her feet had started to turn in. She had gone from being a fully functioning little girl to being unable to walk, unable to sleep, unable to really lift her arms up or do anything because of the amount and severity of pain that she was in. Her mother was Polish and her name was Beata and she was a nurse herself. So she was the one who was really spearheading the treatment plan for her and like taking

her to these doctors to ensure that her little girl was getting seen too. And so she went and had this induced coma done, this ketamine coma, the symptoms started getting better and better after the coma and it kind of rewires the brain and how the brain received the pain. And so she was actually so much better afterwards and that was maintained for an entire year. and then after a year the treatment kind of just wore off and the pain came back and so Maya was rushed to the local emergency and that's where their lives completely unraveled so when she was rushed to the emergency the ED doctors were questioning why Maya was on such high levels

of ketamine they were questioning why her mother was pushing for different types of prescriptions or doses in terms of managing the pain and that was where they started to think that maybe Biara had Munchausen's by proxy and was actually the one who was making Maya sick. So the hospital that she was taken to, which I think is really important, is John Hopkins Hospital in Florida. And the reason this is really important is because throughout the documentary, we discover that there have been a lot of similar cases at said hospital. It didn't seem to be a one-off.

This misdiagnosis was quite common. Watching the way they treated the mother, which ultimately, and they do show this in the documentary, ultimately led to her suicide. and watching the way they treated Maya was like nothing I have ever seen before. This disease presents as almost an invisible disease. But also the fact that they didn't even look into it. They didn't listen and they didn't hear what the family was saying. They didn't hear what Maya, the patient, was saying.

And there's one scene in it that really shocked me where she's crying. She's grown up. Years have gone past because they're still fighting this court case. And she says, I just want to be heard. No one is listening to me. and it took me back to when she was in the hospital screaming in pain trying to explain what was wrong with her and what she's feeling and being told that she's making it up I cannot imagine what you would be going through in that situation where you're begging for somebody to

help you and not only are they not helping you but they're making the condition worse and they're making your life worse well just to kind of give you a bit of the backstory of them what happens so like Maya's mum because they thought that she was the one who was inflicting this condition on her daughter. Her daughter, Maya, was made basically a ward of the state. So they were taken a custody away from them. They weren't allowed any visitation rights. So imagine you're at this point in time, Maya is only 10 years old. She has been denied any visitation from her parents. She has a chronic pain condition. She's all on her own in a hospital and she's being cared for by a social worker and also by a doctor. Now her name is Sally Smith and she's the one

who's doing the investigation into what is essentially deemed child abuse. And now what Britt referred to is that this hospital itself has double the rate of incidences of children being taken away from parents for suspected child abuse, double the average. I can't even imagine what it would be to have a child and have them be in so much pain and then be blamed for that pain when all you're trying to do is make them better. The thing that was in this instance that was so harrowing is that the condition she has, so the thing that she was being denied and said that it wasn't, that she didn't have that. It was all make-believe. The hospital had said that it wasn't this illness. It wasn't CRPS, this thing that they had denied this whole time. They were still

billing and they had billed over $650,000 to the insurance company because you've got to remember in this state, all of the hospitals are privatized. And so medical and medical healthcare is privatized there. So they were billing the insurance company over $650,000 in billings for the treatment of the exact thing that they said that she didn't have in the first place. Yeah. And the way Maya describes it is quote unquote medical abduction. They inflicted these rules that the family could not visit her. They could have no contact because they thought that this was the reason she was sick. So now you've got a 10 year old girl that is in so much pain that no one's believing that is having her parents taken away from her. She was forced to do things

she didn't want to do. There's one part where she was forced to take her clothes off, just keep her bra and undies on and they held her down to take photos she was screaming no and the only reason that they're able to make this documentary the only reason that they're able to go to court is because of how amazing her mother was at documenting every single thing so every single phone call she ever made every single treatment every single request every visit everything that that daughter any interaction that she had was noted down and I guess that comes from a I mean of course she was being a protective mother but b it comes from being a nurse where you have to write down everything you have and the reason that this hasn't gone to court before with any

other families is because no one's ever had the evidence to provide for it because no one ever fight them because no one ever thinks that you have to document every single thing like every how many times do you call a doctor about the girls law and you don't write it down and you don't write down who you spoke to and when you did and what they said and what the outcome was yeah but if you were being criminally investigated for child abuse that you hadn't done and you knew that your child was in pain and they were not being treated. She did that even before she was being accused of anything. Like she's just a really thorough mother that had her whole life been taught in nursing to write everything down. So from the second her daughter got sick, she had

everything written. Well, I think the other part of this as well is, so Beata was Polish and it's established early on in the documentary that she could be quite abrupt in the way that she communicated. But I also think that that comes as part and parcel of English being a second language. and I think that there is definitely some racism that is imbued in this the fact that they thought that Beata was too pushy that she was too aggressive in the way that she spoke the way in which she handled herself got the hospital offside which meant that they fought her harder they fought her as though she was the problem I don't even know how to describe it but it is just like tapped so deeply into a mother's love for her daughter and she truly would have done anything

for Maya but basically what happened is that Beata was being investigated so she had criminal charges against her for child abuse even though she had in no way inflicted any abuse onto Maya and so it had been made very very clear to her through so many court proceedings and failed court proceedings at this point in time Maya had been imprisoned in the hospital for three months without having any access to her mother apart from a phone call which was regulated by the hospital and the hospital had taken even more liberties in sanctioning the type of contact that Maya was able to have with her mother and so she had gone to another court proceeding it was a failed court proceeding she was not allowed to see Maya she was not allowed to hug Maya and it was made very

clear that for as long as Beata was in the picture and for as long as Beata was in the family home that Maya would not be coming home but the issue with the condition that Maya had is that if it had continued to go untreated, if it continued to not be taken care of, that she would have deteriorated. And the professional and medical advice from her main doctor who had been caring for her up until this point was that if she doesn't get the treatment and get it soon, she will end up dying and it will be a very slow and suffering death. I can only imagine being in that situation as a mother when you have zero options. You have been deemed the problem. You have been deemed the only reason why your child is not allowed to leave hospital and to be able

to get the treatment in which she so desperately needs what are your options and I think sometimes we I mean trigger warning we are going to speak about suicide I know you mentioned it already Brit but like we often talk about suicide as though it's a selfish thing and when Matt so Matt was sitting in the background he could see this play out on the tv and he's like he didn't get the whole of the story he was only dipping in and dipping out and he's like I feel so angry at her mom for taking her life. I feel so angry at her mom for feeling so as though the situation was so helpless that she wasn't able to continue to quote unquote fight. But what actually happened in this situation is yes, I'm sure that played a part of it. I'm sure there was a part where

she felt completely defeated by the system, but by Beata suiciding, she actually then enabled Maya to be able to be let out of hospital. So it was like the most unbelievable, like it makes me want cry thinking about it it was the most unbelievable sacrifice that a mother could make to try and save her child yeah I definitely look at this different and I hate that that was how they made her feel like a hospital is supposed to be a safe place and help people and the hospital is the genuinely the reason she ended her life yes she had another child as well and she had a husband but I couldn't imagine that decision knowing that the only way to stop the pain and slow death of one child is to end your life, which in turn is going to inflict a lot of pain in the rest of your family

and that daughter. But I understand almost why she did it when you watch the documentary. There's this one doctor, her name's Dr. Sally Smith. She's the one who originated the inquiry and the investigation into these child abuse claims. She's the one who put together the case for it. And it did make me ask some questions, I guess, because she's a person who has genuinely been exposed to so much trauma in her life. She has been exposed to so much child abuse and she is the reason why this hospital itself has a two times higher rate of separating parents from their children. But it also makes you think like if you've been surrounded by true trauma for so long, if you have seen the most horrific things, would you not then have that sort of mentality

of like, I would rather be over-cautious than under-cautious. I would rather do what I can to protect children if she genuinely believed that she was protecting children rather than reuniting children with their family. Because I think she would carry this weight and this burden of like, well, what if I reunite a child with a parent who is actually an abuser and then something happens? I mean, my heart goes out to anyone who works in child protection and has to actually make these decisions and has to try and figure out, well, what is the best thing for that child? I agree with you in terms of what Dr. Sally Smith, you know, I can't imagine how hard that job is to be the person that decides if a child goes home to a family that could be abusive or not.

Like, I can't imagine what that is like. For me, that wasn't the problem. The problem was how they went about it. They didn't do the tests. They weren't having the right communication, the way they spoke to them and treated them like they were criminals from the day that they walked in that door. She was this very unique type of person who never thought she could be wrong. And I think that that's when it is so dangerous. If you are in a caring position as in like a position of authority, if you're in a position of care, but you have the demeanor that you do not make mistakes and you can't make mistakes. What it means is then once you've made up your decision about someone, whether that be from a feeling, whether that be from a hunch, whether that be because of some of

the facts might indicate X rather than Y, it means that you become so monofocus that you actually can't acknowledge or consider the alternate option. And I think there's people that do this in many, many walks of life, whereas obviously when it's a situation like this, it can be so incredibly damning. But if you're someone who like, you know, I feel like this is the way it is. So therefore I'm going to ignore other facts in order to believe what I feel is true. And that's what dr sally smith did yeah she was not right there was something off about her i don't think she's the right person to be in that position she's definitely not the right person now we're lacking of empathy right well yeah and the other thing is that really made me wonder is this the

whole hospital environment is this the judiciary system is this sally smith i mean they say the problem was the mother right like we can't let you go home because it's not safe etc etc when her mother took her life they allowed maya to see the family and maya took to the stands throughout this trial and she she spoke a lot and she read a lot of statements and she had said she was only given one hour one hour with her father after learning of her mother's suicide and she said if I'm being completely honest it was actually so unbelievably cruel the amount of time they allocated for me to spend with my family after hearing such awful news so how does that work if you've said a like what normal person or institution would allow that the girl is 10

years old? How do you take her from a family when her mother has just ended her life and put her back in a hospital alone? But if you said the problem was the mother anyway, which we know it's not, but if you have said that, why are you still keeping her from being with her father in this time? This is the stuff that I don't get. There are so, so much wrong with this case. Like there are so many avenues and so many people that are at fault completely and utterly let this girl and let this family down. The reason why I think it can happen so prolifically within the States is because of the fact that hospitals are privatized and they make a lot of money. So the fact that they are businesses, they make money by what they prescribe, by how they have patients, the more

operations, the more procedures, the more things that they can do within the hospital unit, the more money that the hospital actually makes. I understand the difficulty. I mean, 13 years, I worked in specialist kids' hospitals and normal hospitals that kids come into, and I have reported suspected child abuse before even the reporting from our end I mean there are very specific pathways that you have to take you know you're ticking off checklists it's a real order like a real process but that decision to even report that because at the end of the day you are usually in a room with a child and its parent on your own as a medical professional sometimes there'll be someone else but making that decision to report someone because you're not reporting

that they are you're just saying something's not right and I'm not sure about it and the reason you do that is there are very specific injuries and breaks and things like that that you know can only present from things that would be linked to abuse twisting injuries falling from a height different things like that but kids also fall from a height so it is really difficult to make I've reported people before from the way they've interacted with their child and linked that to an injury but the push and pull that you feel internally to even make that report because you think what if this is nothing and it's so normal and i put this family through even just an investigation right even being accused or saying hey we need to talk to you about suspected child that is horrific if

it's not but then if you don't do that and it is well then you're sending a child home like you won't sleep at night you're sending a child home knowing that something could be wrong so i understand from that point of view why she did what she did dr sally smith but there is not one part of the way that she went about it that was correct that was right and that's what I'm that's I think that's the difference with Australia like we have so many checklists to follow and we follow it too like immaculately but that's also because you can't profitize off it like there's no profiting off that situation and I think when money is the end goal of any business there will always be people who abuse the system the thing that I think about this documentary which does

relate to what happens here in Australia especially if you are the victim of something and you're up against a big corporation or a big business or a big company that has so much money to throw at these sorts of legal proceedings. What we see happen in this documentary is that the hospital keeps the Kowalski family in the court battle for like five years. And the reason why they do that is because it was said halfway through that they knew that if they got on the stand, if it went to trial, that they had enough evidence to bury the hospital for what they had done. So the hospital's only tactic was to try and keep the legal proceedings bleed them out as much as they possibly could in terms of their finances in terms of their ability to keep the court battle going

five years on they finally were able to stand trial and to take their case to court but the thing is is when big companies do this they do this in the hope that people will take a settlement or they'll bow out early because they can't possibly keep it going for so long yeah and 90% of I mean most people probably 99% of people do not have the finances to fight a big conglomerate like an enormous hospital in a court system for five years and the father makes that comment all the way through and he says to his kids you know his kids want to give up at some point and he says you know that's what they want they are pushing this court battle back because they know we're going to win if we can get on the stand so they're doing everything they can to stop it hoping that

they bleed us dry we run out of money or we emotionally don't have it is anymore and we give up and I love the fact that he said the only way to make a difference is to not give up and to be loud like we need to keep making noise and keep making sure our voices are heard and I can't imagine how defeating it would be every time you get so close to so close to a trial and then the hospital comes in and the judge says now we're gonna wait we're gonna wait we're gonna push it back oh I just cannot imagine especially because the father like I really felt for him he's trying to fight for his daughter but he's fighting for his late wife as well who took her own life because of this same system that he's trying to squish him like like a little bug on the road but this

stuff also happens i mean it happens with insurance companies like there are so many people who have been through something traumatic something horrific where it should seem like it is a clear cut case but it is a tactic that wears people down within the legal system in order for the person who is at fault to pay the least amount of money and to be able to settle outside of court but it does make you think you know it's 260 million dollars it sounds like it's an incomprehensible amount of money but there is no amount of money that could put a value on the fact of what this family went through and the fact that the only way of getting their daughter out of hospital was for the mother to take her own life no and i have no doubt they'd give it all up in a heartbeat

to have changed their story and to change the outcome it's honestly i know we've spoken about it for a while but i wish i could say like i do not have words for how much it affected me watching that and i think as a mom it makes you question like what would the lengths be that you would go to to protect your child if your child was somebody who was suffering from chronic illness what lengths would you go to to try and make that pain stop it absolutely floored me yeah we can't recommend the documentary enough and even though we've spoken about it you will still take so much away from it I had heard this story so many times which is why like I'd read about it on the news which is why I didn't jump to the doco straight away I always saw it advertised and I thought

not for me I know the story and I'm so glad I watched it finally because there is so much to this story that I didn't know and also information hits different when it's coming straight from the source and their personal experience so I genuinely cannot recommend this enough you know we never finish an episode without our suck and our sweet our highlight and our low light mine I feel is really easy this week my suck is probably just how bad I still feel post my egg freezing procedure it's really hung around I'm very very uncomfortable feel like if you put a pin in me I'd pop that's how I feel I feel like I need to do the biggest fart you've ever heard but I can't like so nice It feels like it's full of gas, but it's not.

It's because all my insides are literally on steroids. They're swollen. So that's my suck. Would Ben going home not be your suck? Would him leaving you again not be like the suckiest part of your week? Yeah, but I was trying to make it not all about Ben. But my other suck is that last night I ordered my favourite Italian. Ben and I, for his last meal, his last meal,

we ordered my favourite Italian from this restaurant down the road. It's fettuccine carbonara with chicken. I love it. Anyway, we were shoveling that in and I hadn't finished mine yet when it was time for Ben to go. So I sort of left it up on the ledge of my couch, went out the front with Ben, came back in, and Delilah had eaten the whole fettuccine carbonara.

That is so bad for you and for her. She's such a little bitch. My sweet is, you know, two things. Ben came to visit and we had a really nice couple of days and on top of that I actually got some eggs from this procedure. So I feel like it's Ben coming and getting some eggs. They're my sweets. okay my suck for the week is that yesterday on the plane on the flight home you know with the

air pressure and we have a drink bottle and then you take the lid off and the air pressure makes the water just spray out everywhere so lola maybe too but she still has a baby bottle that she uses to get to sleep she has a baby bottle she likes warm water in it don't ask me i can't be bothered to die on that hill she can have it until she's over it 100 so we're on the plane and i packed the baby bottle i put a lid in it because i was like you know what she might want to sleep on the plane i'll take it just in case have all my creature comforts the full bottle was in my bag and it turns out that the air pressure had popped the lid off the baby bottle entirely the entire thing had tipped out into my handbag and my laptop had been swimming in 800 mils of water for the

entire flight and the whole trip home so now my laptop is fucked i have no laptop at the moment i'm leaving this to go straight to the apple store to buy myself a new one that's why you're using my ipad right now i'm using brit's ipad matt has been he matt's an angel sent from the heavens he's trying so hard to resurrect it he's currently he's currently got my laptop at home in a box full of rice but it's just one of those things where we came home from the most beautiful holiday the beautiful three days away and i was like oh i'm so happy and then i was like i'm fucking miserable like i hate my life only because i'm starting to realize all the shit that's on that laptop that i've now lost like all the files all the working files all the things that i need to

get stuff done that i'm like oh it's gone it really sets you back in life doesn't it really does it's like doing a uni in year 12 and getting almost finished and then it crashing and losing the whole thing like that's what that reminds me of that yeah anyway and then my sweet for the week is that we had three nights we went to elements I know I've spoken about elements in Byron Bay before but honestly it is my dream place like and this is not sponsored we pay full price for the place I just it's the only place that I've been to with kids where I genuinely walk away and I feel like I've had a relaxing holiday like I've had three days to completely switch off and it's because it's the kind of place that has everything that kids need

for them to have a good time, but also everything that an adult needs for them to have a good time. So everyone's having a fucking good time. And it's a great location. Yeah, and it was just beautiful. Cute. Three nights, great weather. Like my cup is very full and overflowing into my laptop.

Into the laptop, yeah. Well, that is it from us, guys. Please, if you have any questions for Ask Uncut or you have embarrassing moments, please write them into our Instagram, Life Uncut Podcast. And you know the drill. Tell your mum, tell your dad, tell your dog, tell your friends. to channel love

because we love love