Life Uncut - The best of THE PICKUP -18th June

Episode Date: June 17, 2023

It's our weekly round up! The best of the week from our National radio show THE PICKUP.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Life Uncut podcast acknowledges the traditional custodians of country throughout Australia and their connections to land, sea and community. We pay our respect to their elders, past and present and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples today. This episode is recorded on Gadigal land of the Aurora Nation. Hello, welcome to Life Uncut the podcast. This is our radio show. I'm Mitch. I'm Laura I'm Britt and Laura

I forgot her name where we were for a second no I'm not on the eve everything is awesome on the eve of Dancing with the Stars

yes Dancing with the Stars is on tonight everybody if you haven't yet seen or heard I'm sure you have because you've been listening to me

rave on about it I cannot wait until it's over to watch it no I watched no I cannot wait for it to be finished I went there

and watched it in real time I watched you work your magic I watched you do your moves but I can't wait to watch the glitz

and the glam come together in a production. I'm nervous. It's on at 7 o'clock, Channel 7, 7.30. The promo they've been running, have you seen it? My little arms and legs running around. I look like it.

There's like 0.1 of a second of Laura just like staring into the camera like dancing. It was really aggressive. It's only one sec, but you're like down the barrel. Oh, I haven't seen it. That's really full on. Damn it. That's what I imagine Marley and Lola see when you're mad at them.

Do I look mad? Yeah, you look really mad. I was doing the happiest of jobs, so that's really problematic. You're like, that's concerning. I wasn't mad. I was just concentrating so hard. I was trying to remember the steps, man. And so trying to remember the steps and also control your face

at the same time, really hard. Well, I can confirm you look good in sequence. It is your vibe, brings out your eyes. I'm excited to watch. I'm going to get some popcorn. I'm going to watch. I'm going to post it on Instagram. Guys, stop.

Okay, do you know what? We're not talking about the show. I'm also not even dancing on this episode, just so you know. What are you doing? What do you mean? I just remembered. This episode I'm in the skybox. This is group A.

So, like, I'm not in group A. I don't dance on this Sunday episode. But I am in it. So, like, watch because, you know, you can all be like, ooh, there's Laura in the background. So it might pan to you just to get your facials or something. But actually the people who are in this Sunday night's episode are like Pauline and, like, some of the other really amazing.

Were you offended to not be in group A, the fact that you were group B? I was like, this feels personal. No, because the way it works is that group A and group B end up competing in the final. So, like, you want to have good and bad people in group A and good and bad people in group B. and it will be up to your own subjective opinions as to whether I am good or bad.

I will not tell you just yet. Anyway, guys, so on this week's show, it was a really great show. There was many things we talked about. This is just the highlight reel. One of the things that I was sharing is that recently Matt took up a new hobby. He is running away from his problems and his responsibilities, like literally running, doing like half marathons on the weekend. And, look, he spent the entire weekend in bed

to try and avoid some responsibilities he has. and you guys think it was on purpose. I think anyone running half marathons as a hobby has other problems to deal with. Like that's not a hobby. It's not fun. That's not true. There's many people who do it.

Mitch, no. No, no, can I just say. No, no. Don't pretend like you run half marathons. Shut up. I was going to say and make a nice connection to the segue because ever since I've been through my horrific breakup. Oh, don't.

Don't try and make me feel bad. Listen, walking and exercising actually gets the endorphins going and it makes you feel good. It's true. You are on your health kick. You're in this new Mitch is putting Mitch first era, and I love it. I've had so much protein today. I just watched you eating a carrot stick.

I haven't done a solid shit since 2006. It's all liquid. Mitch is eating tuna out of a can. That's it. It's so bad, but we love Matt. We talk about that. We also do talk about my breakup, which can I just say, I don't want to make this the Mitch show,

but the messages I got from your Life Uncut community warmed my little heart. They were so sweet, so thank you. Also, some of the pics that I got from some of the boys, We warmed other parts of my body We actually, I mean you guys know this Because we tell you all the time But we have, the lifers are the best We have the most incredible community around us

And Mitch, you spoke about it on last week's radio show How you are going through a really shitty breakup And it's so I'm so proud of the lifers When they get around someone And I'm so glad that you got to experience that Because you guys are just an incredible community And yeah, I know Mitch came into work on the Monday

And he was like, guys Your lifers are the best. I got all the messages I needed. You guys are like a family. The lifers are one big family. And if you can actually officially come into the family, if you can hook up with a lifer and be brought in officially, I'd be so down for that.

I think I need to marry a lifer. And then they have access to you two. It'd be great. Okay, to all of our gay lifers, Mitch is now single. Keep on sliding into his DMs with solicited dick pics, please. At Mitch Turi on Instagram. I take all pics. But, yeah, I talk about the breakup.

He gives consent for solicited pictures. Front pics, front pics, dog pics, I'll take it all. Yeah. No, I do talk about the most horrific thing that happened when I sat down with my partner, my ex-partner, and we actually had the breakup decision. You guys know what went down. The spreadsheet?

Oh, it was a comedy of errors after the spreadsheet. Like so many things went wrong and it was actually hilarious. It's only you could find the comedy in such a dark moment. But it just, it was the gift that kept on giving. But you know what, Mitch? There's something to take into account and think about is that you are going through this breakup and it's amicable. You've got spreadsheets.

You're talking it out. Think about the woman we're going to tell you about today that was the ultimate ghosting by her, none other than her husband. Like she got ghosted. If there was a ghosting award, he would have won. He'd be president of the company. He wouldn't have won gold. He'd be president.

He'd be Casper. It's truly horrific. We still don't know where he is to this day. Still looking for him. Anyway, there's so much more in this show. Let's get into it. I announced it on the show last week. If you missed it, I'm going through a pretty horrendous breakup,

A big breakup of five years with my partner, Hayden. And, you know, I'm not one to make things dramatic. I don't want to go on and on about it. But I will say, yeah, there's a live orchestra in the studio at the moment. No, I'm okay. I'm feeling good. And I'm at the point in the breakup where I can look back and laugh because so many moments in this breakup that you two,

I haven't told you about because I've been a very sad boy. But these moments that have happened truly could only happen to a person like me. Mid-breakup, Hayden and I are sitting down at our dining room table. We have the house together. We've lived together for years, and we're sitting there. And it's a sad moment. Oh, my God.

A treacherous moment. We're sitting there, and I go, you know, you've really hurt me. And we're done. And we cannot. I just can't. After what you've done to me, there is no way. my neighbor is learning the simpsons tune on the clarinet and she goes a great time to rehearse three o'clock on a saturday afternoon wait how old is your neighbor she's 45 she's too old to

be learning the clarinet i get you going through a middle-life crisis janine if you're listening and you have a lovely terrace home but stop you're not good at it you're not getting any better because i hear every iteration doesn't know you're breaking up at 3 p.m on a saturday i'm pro janine we're all pro hobbies janine's going through a hard time and so are you and we all need to respect how we deal with trauma you're so dramatic because you just kept going so what do you do like shut up you mid-fight you mid-crying there's tears the simpsons are playing do you do you stop and and really sit in the fact that there's a funny moment or do you ignore the simpsons and keep breaking up because my line of work is this i write it down in my notes

section of my phone. So he's going, he must be texting his friends about how sad he is. And I'm going Simpsons tune on phone. Yeah, clarinet, Jeanette. Did you just proceed with the breakup? So the clarinet's playing, you've gotten through the Simpsons anthem and then you just continued with like, you know, I'm sorry.

We push through. It's not me, it's you. Simpsons aside, it's still over. We push through and we break up and I, you know, I'm living in the house alone because I kicked him out and I put a load of washing on. I got to clean some clothes. So we're sitting there, the washing machine is going, we're in the middle of the living room and I've got a Samsung washing machine

and those who have a Samsung washing machine will relate and I'm going, you know, I just feel that there's no coming back from this because the main thing that you did to me, really. You really have... Hold on. Just, hold on. And because when you went...

Oh. And you think it's meant... Oh, it's still going. Yeah. Oh, it's still going. Can I get a tissue? Oh, here we go. And I just, oh.

You're a bust. That is the actual, I recorded it for you. Who has a 22-minute timer alarm on the washing machine? That's everyone with a Samsung can relate. Who puts the washing on when you're breaking up? It's my first breakup. I don't know what to do. Maybe you needed a little distraction.

It's always good when you're like, you're getting too in the moment, things are a bit too emotional, like, sorry, I need to like, we need to break. Go and put the washing on. Well, we did. We hung the washing out and we went, okay, a little break. We sit back down, back to crying, back to depression. And we're sitting there and this is the magnum opus.

This is the big moment of the breakup of you're getting out of here. I'm staying here. Pack up your things and you get out of this. Hello, boys. Jake and Sam here from the Red Cross. How are you today? Stop it. At our screen door.

Stop it. I swear to God. I swear on my life. Oh, sorry, boys. Just now is not a really good time. Well, I will challenge you to say when is a good time to talk about child sex trafficking? I'm not joking no but he has

a really good point he actually has a wonderful point there is no good time to talk about it so we might as well be now I said to Hayden

I go babe we should probably put this on the back burner he's got a really good point he got me so what did you do did you let him in and then you sat down

and had a chat with the nice people from the Red Cross no he said could you come back in a bit he goes give me give us five

we'll come back bro I'm like no we need longer than five minutes to get through this conversation you're like we're still putting the washing out

yeah definitely oh Mitch I know I know but Wait, did you actually get through the breakup or are you guys still in the middle of it? No, we're back together now.

We're in full circle. No, they've got to do the whites now. The first one was just colours. No, we definitely did break up. But it's those actual moments that keep you going. They're the best moments in a little breakup. That's what you live for, isn't it, Rich? Yeah.

Well, we're glad you came out on the outside. I'm deeply sad. And we're glad to see you laughing and happy. We're glad to see you happy. I'll pull through. Thank you, guys. You will. Mitch, you can't end it and then say,

I'm deeply, deeply depressed. Oh, well, there's light and shade. No, we've got to let him sit in the emotions. He's happy one minute and he's sad the next. Real interesting show back on Channel 9 at the moment, guys. Parental Guidance, hosted by Ali Langdon. It was on last night. It's back on tonight.

Everyone's loving it. But the parental guidance expert, Dr. Justin Coulson, is joining us now. You guys know this guy. He's a superstar. He's a legend. Yeah, he's a legend in the parenting world. And I also think that because I'm the one here that has kids, like this is my wheelhouse.

This is my show. I mean, Justin's there, but you're a big fan. You're wearing a Justin Coulson shirt. Yeah, you got the cap. Hi, Dr. Justin. How are you going? It's so nice to be with you guys. I didn't know the shirt was available already.

That's great. It is. We're selling it as merch after the show as well. For anyone who hasn't seen what parental guidance is, can you give us a little bit of an overview of what the show actually entails? Yeah, sure. We get a whole bunch of parents who have very different parenting styles. They go through a range of different challenges with their kids

and then we watch those challenges back and pretty much say, hey, what did you like and what didn't you like? what can we learn about parenting from your parenting style? When you have these different, very different types of parenting styles, and as someone who is a psychologist, do you look at these and say some of them are vastly better than others? Or is it just a case that they're different? Yeah, so very much the second one. Like, there are definitely things that you can do that will mess up your kids. But we're very, very careful with the parents we bring onto this show. They

go through psychological testing, and we make sure that they're good parents who are raising their kids well but gee they do it differently i mean you got outback parents who are teaching their kids to shoot guns and drive cars from like the age of eight or nine and then you've got gentle parents who don't ever raise their voices to their kids what i loved watching was the the parents that have their children on social media so this was on the show last night if anyone missed it our parenting style is influencer as they explore parenting are you blocking your ears in the digital age our rules around technology are basically non-existent i'm curious what age you gave your kids a account maybe nine she's up to 500 000 followers now what's your stance on this

because laura your kids are on social media and they have been from a young age i mean my kids don't have social media they're two and three that they appear on my social media yes yes yeah where do you stand on that justin like kids on social media then kids having their own social media accounts? Yeah, so Laura is doing what we call share and ping, which is where we're sharing the lives of our children on social media. And this is a pretty provocative and controversial thing in and of itself, because one day the kids might look back and say, hey, I wanted privacy, and now I'm an adult. I don't like the fact that my life is everywhere. Yeah, totally. Then we've got these parents, Jonathan and Kat, who, frankly, I think that they represent

themselves so well. And what they're saying is, whether you like it or not, social media is part of the fabric of the society in which we live and you can try to keep your kids off it all you like but they will be on it so isn't it better to teach them how to use it well and I mean I think that they're doing a fantastic job. Do you think it affects children in terms of how they get validation how's that going to impact kids as they get older? Okay so two things here first of all I want to get technical and legal for a sec that whole 13 years of age that only exists because in America when social media was being developed, the lobbyists and the technology companies had lots of meetings with the politicians in Congress and decided on what we might call the age of internet maturity.

And there were some people who were saying you need to be 18, some people saying 15. In the end, they chose 13. And all it means is American companies are not allowed to collect data on people under the age of 13. That's the only reason that rule of Instagram at 13 is there. It's true that some of them will get caught up in how many likes they're getting, how many shares they're getting and how many followers they've got. What I would say though is there are probably in most kids' lives, many, many more things that matter so much more in terms of their welfare and their wellbeing than how many likes they're getting. Like the quality of the relationship that they have with you as parents or with their friends, the extracurricular activities they're

doing and what they're doing well in life. All that stuff I reckon is going to have a much bigger impact on their self-esteem and their wellbeing than how many followers they've got. My worry is who's watching these? If you go on to some of these kids' Instagrams and you look at the followers and the people that are liking this content, I mean, a lot of them are people that shouldn't be there. It's not kids, is it? A lot of them are men from other countries.

They're adults that you're like, what are you getting from this? And I guess that's where my worry comes in to having a nine-year-old or below on social media. There are a lot of people who should not be in there who are, and they are approaching our kids. Once again, Jonathan Catt, the influencer parents, they're really clear that when they're dealing with their younger child their nine-year-old and her social media accounts they're involved they're monitoring they're having conversations

and they're actively teaching you how to be safe and and frankly we've got to do it whether our kids want to be influencers or youtube stars or professional gamers or whether they're just like the average kid who has an accountant and wants to hang out with their friends we've got to be involved to keep them safe it's it's critically important not in a controlling way, but in a, I'm the wise adult in this relationship and we need to talk about this. Listen, you can get the Happy Families podcast now. It's available on the iHeartRadio app. If you want to have a listen, it's brilliant.

And of course, Parental Guidance with Dr. Justin Coulson tonight, 7.30 on Channel 9. Thank you for coming on The Pickup, Dr. Justin. Appreciate it. Yeah, hey, awesome to be with you. And just on the podcast, we're doing mega recaps of every episode at the moment. So definitely worth checking it out if you get a chance. All right, get it on the iHeart app. Amazing, thank you.

Thanks so much. Now, we were just talking to one of Australia's most trusted parenting experts. His name's Dr. Coulson. He's on Parental Guidance, the new TV show. Your favourite show. Oh, my God. It's very brilliant. And if you're a parent who's just fumbling your way through trying to figure out the right way to parent, as we all are, it is a truly brilliant show.

But we got talking about social media and whether it's okay to have your kids on social media or not. Because there is one family who is on this show at the moment. And they have a nine-year-old who has their own social media account. they have like 500 000 followers and they're also making money as a nine-year-old off the social media account now i have a few feelings about this we wanted to hear do you do your kids have social media how do you feel as a parent about it but i mean my kids they feature on my social media from time to time yeah but i think that there's a really big difference between making money from your children on social media and just sharing kind of like the highlight reel of what's happening in

your life because if you're a mummy blogger and that's your one and only job is to be a mummy blogger and to talk about the experience of parenting and that's how you make all your money I think the big issue with that type of social media is that then it makes it really hard to say no when jobs come in so instead of being able to have a good litmus for the types of things that you share about your kids if all your income is tied up on social media and you don't have any other ways of making an income it makes it really challenging to say I don't want to do that job I I don't want to put my kid in that campaign because ultimately you're saying no to money.

Yeah, definitely. Well, I guess it's also like a whole other question is, do the kids get the money? Are you putting it in an account for the kids? Like where is it going? Yeah, savings account. Are the kids earning the money for the parents? The parents are just using it themselves.

I think there's a whole other layer to it. Well, it also means, right, that you need to share. The more and more personal, the more vulnerable, the more challenging parts of parenting that you share, the bigger your community gets online because the more mums relate to it, the more they want to talk about it and that that's how you kind of grow your following but the thing i think is really worrying about that is that if you're sharing the really vulnerable bits about your parenting experience you're also sharing the really vulnerable bits about your kids

as well and your kids can't opt into that and that's where i think it's a bit of a gray area where this sharing thing can go too far well that's we also spoke to dr justin about this it's the safety concerns around it as well i mean it's all well and good to say kids are on social media and then assume that kids are the only people engaging with that content but it's not true there is he said it himself there's creeps on the internet that look at this content so what about their privacy exactly totally and we open the lines we've got katrin what's your thoughts on this kids on social media i think there's a few different aspects that we can look with kids on social media um i think the most important thing especially me as a parent of very young

children i know i have this to come in uh quite a few years ahead of me but for me the importance is teaching our children the safety within social media. Totally. So I think this is even as them using social media and viewers of social media, I think that is the most important thing for us all to be discussing as a family with our youngsters. But you say you've got really little kids.

At what age do you think it's appropriate to start to teach kids about social media? Do you think that there's kind of, you know, an age until which you should shield them from it, I guess? Yeah, for sure. And I think this is very dependent on each child as they grow and as they mature. For me, my kids are currently, I have a little girl,

she is two, and my little boy has only just turned one. So I am, you know, looking in the future with this. But for me, for sure, it depends on how my children mature and their relevance within social media in the time that it would become part of their life. So for me, ideally, I would love to see my children maybe using social media when they're 12 or 13. Yeah.

But, I mean, it's so hard, right? I think 13, everyone says, oh, yeah, 13, I'll start talking about it. But what if you've got your 11-year-old and every day they're yelling at you that they want an Instagram account or they want YouTube and then you've got to deal with two years of them being like, I want an Instagram or I want a YouTube. It's so hard. There was this trend not that long ago and I can't remember,

I know Pink did it and I know a few other like big superstars did it. They came out talking about how their kids are begging them to let them on social media. They're the only kids at the school that don't have it And they've said to them, when you can find me an article, this is what they say to their kids, when you find me an article that shows that social media has a positive impact on children's lives,

I will let you on there. And they can't find one article. Oh, God, yeah. I agree with that completely. I think social media overall for children would have an overridingly negative effect. It has to. Oh, it does.

It's proven to. And it's so addictive. That's the big thing. More so than just having a negative impact. It's so addictive. We've got Emma. Do you have kids? What is your stance on this?

Hi, I have an 11-year-old daughter and I just feel like she doesn't need social media right now. She has the rest of her life to be on Instagram and TikTok and Facebook. So why does she need to spend the years that I would probably say some of the most important years about finding out who she is as a person and developing her own identity? why should she be spending those years comparing herself to others is she wanting it has she been trying to ask for it or pressure you for it so far um look probably 12 months ago she did because

she's one of the only ones in her friendship group without it so we let her have um kids messenger because that's something we can monitor and she's not being exposed to um you know the highlight reels on Instagram and TikTok. But after we had that conversation with her and said, we don't think that she's emotionally mature enough to be exposed to some of the content, she understands and she knows that her time will come and we will let her have it one day, but it's just not right now. I'll tell you what, it scares the bejeebers out of me. I don't have kids and it's a big part of me wondering if I want to bring kids into the world. Sometimes I look online and I'm like, I don't think I have the emotional capacity to deal with it,

let alone bringing a kid in and then having it. I actually genuinely, it plays on my mind whether I would want to bring a kid into the world now because there's some scary stuff out there. Oh, God, I'd get jealous as well. Jealous? Yeah, imagine if your kid got a blue tick before you did. Oh, no. I'm serious.

Imagine. They're earning more money than you, Mitch. I know. That would send me on a spiral. I think you need to have very good boundaries as a parent with this. You have to be okay with saying no to your children, and that's something that a lot of parents struggle with, especially when you want to be friends with your kids.

Having those boundaries and saying no can be really, really hard. And also, as an adult, as a parent, you have to be social media literate. You've got to understand what's happening on social media to be able to help educate your kids and protect them. Yeah, well said. Go live in the real world. Get outside, kids. Now, you guys know that Matt is my husband, Matt.

He is a very good dad. He's very, I hate the word, but he's very hands-on, hangs out with kids a lot, does a lot of work around the house. He is. We love Matt. And he's not sort of the guy that would normally go to the pub on a weekend or, like, make excuses to get away from his family. No, he loves his family.

He loves his family. Oh, the fact that she's having to do this groundwork and set it up. Okay. He's set him up for a fail. No, no, no. He's recently taken up a new hobby, and I'm behind it. Like, he's really gotten into running. Well, he's dropped his beatboxing.

No, he still does beatboxing. He runs while he beatboxes. No, he's gotten into running, and I mean, like, really into running. He's got the running, the Strava app. he's got a run coach like he goes running all the time and often i'll come home from work and he's sweaty because he's been for this big long run and he's all about he splits and trying to get his splits down anyway saturday just passed he uh he was like hey babe you don't mind it was eight in the morning we've just gotten the kids all up and ready and organized you don't mind

if i go for a run do you and i was like no fine that's fine in my head i was like you'll be home in an hour that's it what would you think is a suitable run time if someone says they've got 45 minutes an hour. 5K max. Yeah, which is how much time? Well, for Matt, probably about two minutes. Yeah, for me, about a month. But for Matt, an hour.

So one hour. One hour. I was like, yeah, he'll be home by 9. 9.30 if he goes for a big one. Okay. So he comes home at quarter to one. Quarter to one. From what?

Nine o'clock? He'd been out since, yeah, pretty much 9am. 9 to 10, 10 to 11. Four and a half hours. Yeah, four hours. I would have called Polar and the Missing People's Unit and gone, where's my Matt? Do you like that I had to count that on my fingers?

I'm so bad at maths that I had to literally go 9 to 10, 10 to, anyway. What did he do? Did he run to Newcastle? By then I'd even put Lola down for her lunch nap. I was so confused. I was like, when do we send out the search party? Anyway, he walks in the door. He's dying, like absolutely dying.

I was like, dear God, this boy's been running for his life. He ran 21 kilometres. So he pretty much ran to the northern beaches and back. And I was a bit confused as to why. And now later on in the day we had a family, like my family were coming out. We had this, like, nice dinner planned. We were all going to spend the evening together with my side of the family.

Matt comes home and he has lunch and then he sits down and he goes, oh, babe, not feeling very well. Then he went to bed for the rest of the day, for the entire day, because he ran so far that he made himself sick. Was he, like, tired? No, he, like, almost vomited. Like heat stroke? He, like, well, I don't even know if it was heat stroke.

Just tuck it out. I think he just ran at his maximum heart rate for so long that he was so exhausted he had to go back to bed. but part of me was like this is very convenient that this happened on a day where we had my family coming up and we had a family event planned he's done this on purpose i don't know if he's done it on purpose laura this is so transparent he's done it to get i love matt and we love we love matt but he didn't want to go to the dinner but he knew that he had a dinner that night of course he knew okay he promised that that's not the case but i also asked the question

like what are you running from why are you running for so long what demon are you running your mom why is my why also maybe he didn't want to parent for the rest of the day i'm joking he was just like wanted to clock out of life for a second so he's like i'm just gonna say i i've got heat stroke i don't know but i think it's pretty bad if you've got a partner that like runs away to the pub all weekend but it's also equally as bad if you've got a partner who leaves the house goes for a four-hour run and then has to spend the entire day this is such a good excuse what was your terrible excuse to get out of a family event because i feel like people do this all the time And this is so clearly what Maddie's done.

At what point do I say to him, I know that this is a good hobby. Like I know I should be supportive of you getting into exercise. I know that this is like a good thing that you have undertaken. But it's now impacting our ability to parent on the weekends because you spend the whole day in bed afterwards. You've got to draw a line. That's the line. I reckon you've got to cap him at 10 kilometres.

We got back. How did you lie? What happened? Well, it was my mother-in-law's birthday and I was very heavily pregnant. And I was due to be induced that week, later that week. And I just lied and said that I went into labor early. I didn't want to go. You said you had a week-long labor.

How long after you lied did you have the baby? Yeah. Well, it was only a few days later that I was actually meant to be induced. But nobody knew the date because originally we didn't want to tell anyone the date that we were being induced. Because, you know, when people know you're having a baby, they're all messaging. and, you know, we just wanted to do that quietly anyway. So I sort of just like, my partner was in on it. He obviously knew I wasn't going to get the baby.

Did people ask for photos? No. Did she just Google stock images? She turns up to the hospital. No, we just said it was a false alarm after that. Totally. You can have phantom labour where you think you're in labour. I'm all for this one.

Next week, Matt will be in labour. Surprise me. Oh, hi, Adam. Tell us, mate. Did you do this? Are you in the same boat as Maddie? Are you lying to get out of family events? Oh, mate, I had a beauty.

knocking off October the 3rd, 2010. Wow, you remember it greatly. Yeah, and I'll tell you why I remember it, because I was invited to a cousin's wedding, and I put an RSVP, yeah, I'm going to go. And October the 3rd is the NRL grand final. And I'm obviously a huge Dragons fan, I still am, and I didn't know whether they were going to make it,

but they made the grand final. Couldn't go to that wedding. No, I said, look, I'm going to be out of town. I'm going to be in Cairns, so I won't be able to do it for work. Oh, no, that's all right. That's all right. But little behold, I didn't know that they were watching the game before the wedding.

The Dragons won, so the camera pans around, and here I am jumping up and down. Go, the Dragons! Go, the Dragons! It's like you're on the kiss cam. Yep, they spotted me, and you know what? He hasn't spoken to me to this date. Oh, no.

That's dreadful. That's terrible. But you won the grand final. Yeah, did you win? Yes. The Dragons won the last grand final and they haven't been in the grand final since. I was happy I missed the wedding and I got to the grand final. So what we're getting out of this is that it was worth it.

Yeah. It was. It was. Sorry, cuz. Oh, that's so good. Was your parents offended in the end, Laura, with Matty? Were they upset? No, they think he was actually genuinely dying.

But now they're going to listen to this and be not so sure. He's done. He's not coming to the next family Christmas. Britt's got a ghost story. Okay, it's not a real-life ghost story, although I do see ghosts. What? You can't just drop that in. That's another story in itself. Did you know that, Laura, that she saw ghosts?

Britt's nuts. Britt is not nuts. Britt is connected to the other worlds. I have a story for you about the ultimate ghosting story in a relationship. Now, it's an Aussie woman who goes by the name Isabel. She doesn't go by the name. Her name is Isabel Glastonbury, And she's 31 years old now.

Her ghosting story is one for the ages. I feel very sorry for her. She met her husband, who was a Texan. She met him back in 2015, and they moved down under in 2018. Now, if you do the maths, that's eight years they've been together, right? This is a long game. Good maths. It's a long game.

She got married. Her family paid for this amazing wedding, $50,000 in Sydney. Her parents also helped pay for his visa, which was $10,000. because, you know, that's what you do when you're in love and that's what you do for your family to help them have the ultimate beautiful family life. You know, they've been together like six to eight years. You want them to have the happy life.

She went out to celebrate him getting his visa, his Australian visa. Did she not go out with him? Well, they obviously celebrated separately, Laura Byrne. She went out celebrating and she came home from the dinner to a house that 90% of the furniture and his stuff was gone. One day after the visa. Anyway, she tried logging into the immigration accounts, but she'd been locked out of everything, all accounts.

Her credit card was maxed. She was blocked on his phone. By the cowboy. By the Texan cowboy, the Texan ghost. And none of her calls or messages were going through. It was actually really, really sad. It's really hard to go someone these days because everyone has social media. Did he just delete all of his social media accounts?

He deleted his entire life. It's the ultimate ghosting. Eight years. He put in the long game for that visa and then he left. Wouldn't the red flag be that he wasn't at his own visa celebration at dinner and she went home and the stuff was gone? I don't know. Look, it just says she was out celebrating his visa acquirement,

but I think she was celebrating with her own parents maybe because they were the ones that paid for it. So maybe, look, bitch, you're asking technical questions. Okay, I don't think that this guy met her back in 2015 and thought, you know what, in eight years' time, I'm in it. This is the girl who's going to get me into Australia. I reckon they were in a relationship. He loved her.

He was happy. And then eventually the wheels started falling off the wagon and they were already married and he was like, well, look, I'm just going to wait for my visa to come through. But he is such a chicken, I won't say the word. He's a piece of shit. Okay, well, you said it. He's so chicken that he couldn't deal with the confrontation

and just walk away from the relationship. I have another theory. He was abducted by aliens. He was abducted and then the house was broken into that same night and all their stuff was taken. Guys, this is horrific. Heaps of people reported him to immigration and no one did anything about it.

And you know what the icing on the cake is? Yeah. You know what the icing on the immigration celebration cake was? What? One year later to the day he got married again. Oh, he was having an affair. Oh, he's a scam artist. So he's a scam artist or he is having an affair or he's just a dick.

I feel like people have ghosting stories out there. You catch up with a friend after a couple of years of not seeing him and I feel like everyone's friend has a ghosting story. I've ghosted a couple of people in my time. I'm very conflict avoidant so I would just not reply to them after bad dates and just never ever text them again. There's a difference with not replying to a bumble and ghosting them and marrying them for eight years and then being like,

bye. Yeah, and getting a Hertz truck filled with all your furniture and speeding off into the Texan sunset. So our next guest, so excited, guys. You'll know one of them, Shana Burgess, of course, from being a beautiful Aussie. She's on Dancing With The Stars. Yes, yep.

She's a very good judge on Dancing With The Stars. The nicest of the judges. Yeah, with you, Loz. And then also Brian Austin Green, her beautiful partner. I mean, international. Oh, 90210, who could forget? I was obsessed. Oh, my God.

I was absolutely obsessed with that show when I was young. Crush on everyone. Well, crush now because he's here. Shana, Brian, welcome to The Pickup. Hey, welcome, guys. Hi. Hello. I feel like we should play the music.

And there I am. Laura, you're on Dancing With The Stars. That music needs a trigger. Like, I need a trigger warning for that. Well, Shana, you're here obviously hosting Dancing With The Stars, which is very exciting. And our very beloved Laura Byrne is a contestant on Dancing With The Stars. She is.

I was judging, by the way. Sorry, that's what I should have said. Yes, you were judging. How has Laura gone? on this is it's been a question we have watched her train and sweat we've watched her put her spirit fingers all over the studio shana it's shocking no she looks like an inflatable used car dealership shana it's fine you can lie and tell them that i did great it's fine how was she actually so in my honest and professional opinion i thought she was amazing and i think that

she has so much potential and she thinks she's goofy and she thinks she isn't sexy but she hits that dance floor and she really was super coordinated very sexy who says i'm not sexy everyone i can name a few people right now no we so we i mean we've we watched laura practice and rehearse she rehearsed in my house a few days and it was it was questionable i'm gonna say that but i came out to the first night we came out to support and you were a little firecracker and And you are so hot. You look like a supermodel shimmying across the floor. You look so good.

And you've got that stank face. I saw a promo and you had that stank face on the dance floor. I don't know if a stank face is a good thing, but I am enjoying this interview, guys. This is great for my self-esteem. Shana, in all honesty, I couldn't look away from your legs that night. I was right behind you. You looked so smoking hot as well.

It just definitely made me want to become a dancer. I wasn't there. That was the takeaway. And I said, how was Laura? And Britt was like, I don't know. I was looking at Shana's legs. seriously well i am also enjoying this interview let's keep it going so who's the who can you tell us shana who is the standout on the show i know you can't give us too much but just a little

something something you know i think there were so many standouts for many reasons i think laura was phenomenal i loved watching her your packages laura and getting to know you and then watching you get out there and dance and um again what you you see you in this package and you're so uh organic and down to earth and you you see yourself as not sexy and then you come out there and you bust this move and i'm like holy shit that's a whole woman right there in her own power and it was so beautiful to watch and they're the things that i love i love moments like that uh and i think you'll see when you tune into the season you'll see a lot of shocking moments that i didn't expect coming um some eliminations that i didn't expect coming and some great personalities that

are really gonna lay it all bare on the dance floor i honestly reckon the cast of this season I mean, I put myself aside, but there were some phenomenal dancers in this season and people who I think you would think shouldn't have dance skills, like there's some people in there that you'd be like, no, they're not going to be very good. Everyone was amazing and I was so incredibly surprised by the calibre across the board of the dancers. Yeah, absolutely.

It was really impressive, especially because you guys came into it with zero dance experience under really high pressure circumstances and you know very minimal i would say rehearsal time for you guys to truly get it together um and put a performance out there and yet you did it every episode you would come out there and nail it and give something that was just so impressive and it was it was really cool to watch especially having been a dancer on the show for such a long time to sit there and get to just enjoy the hard work that these guys put in was just really beautiful this is all very sweet but laura what was the light to be judged by shana was it was was she mean was she nice like is she the

mean judge like i want some gossip no shana it was like a breath of fresh air it was so nice that she was there because she was the cushion she was the rose between the thorns oh the nice oh yes who are the other judges so it was craig and then i've just had a mental black so craig so todd was normally um and mark as well so todd is normally the one who kind of goes in a little bit hard but craig went in so hard on people i found like he you could tell it was like nails in his mouth trying to find a nice thing to say about anyone but everybody else kind of gave really even and like warm responses but like it was good because you start off on the on the first week and you would get constructive feedback on things that you needed to change and

then you kind of had a few days to really implement that and see if you could actually get better between the next competition dance yeah and you're doing so many different dances you know one week you might be doing the jive then the next week you're doing ballroom it's not like you have time to get good at just one dance, you're kind of doing everything in a real sort of pressure cooker kind of way. But, Brian, moving on to you, welcome to Australia. It's your first time in Australia. Yay, welcome!

It is, yeah. My partner is here for pretty much the first time from Switzerland and he has been petrified of the animals here. He thinks everything's going to eat him. What's your vibe? Has that been a thing for you? Like he thinks he's going to walk down the street and like a huntsman's going to drop onto his head

and a snake's going to wrap around his leg. No, because it's winter. Sure, so most things that are poisonous are sort of away at this point. If not, that's what I'm saying to myself. Common misconception. That helps me to get through the day. But I definitely look around and I go, so if it was hot out and I was a snake, I would be right there.

So I'm constantly looking around for those things. Brian, I have a confession to make. You used to be on my lunchbox when I was in primary school. What? Oh, I love that. You don't tell a man in front of Sharno. What's crazy about you saying that is that I used to be on my lunchbox as well. So we have something in common.

90210, some people will remember them. And, yeah, very big show at the time. I had the whole cast, the whole gang on my lunchbox. And I remember Jasmine stood on it and she broke it and it still really affected me. I think I was in kindergarten. Oh, she broke your lunchbox? How dare she?

How dare she? How dare she? How dare she? But it was a moment. I saw you at the back. I mean we were backstage dancing with the stars and I was like hold on that's the guy from 90210 who was on my lunchbox and then I saw the guy whose lunchbox yeah and I face here in real that's his for life and then I saw your beautiful family you were there with all of your kids

how many kids do you have between the two of you so five five kids between the two I had uh four kids before I came from along um they're my bonus babies I love them 21 10 9 and six and now he shares old this month not to be one year you guys are like the beautiful of what co-parenting looks like how do you guys manage uh such a blended family how do you manage that it was well we took it slow to start and i think in the beginning bride did such an amazing job at allowing the kids to feel uh included in decisions of me coming over that you know first we introduced it with my dogs and then if duke and daisy want to come play shana's got to come play and so there was this way of allowing them to have a choice in the matter of how often I was

around and eventually you know and for me from my approach kids will call bullshit on you so quick you can't be someone you're not with them so it was just about me showing them who I am and letting them take their time in coming to me for you know attention affection and all those sorts of things I think if you try too hard with them you're then setting yourself up fairly because you're putting is something forward that isn't going to be sustainable, right? I'm not going to overplay or overdo it or overact with them. I just wanted to be myself. And I think that was really helpful. Sharna was amazingly patient with this situation. She understood that I'd just come out of a divorce, that my kids are very connected to their mother also. So she had a real good understanding

of trying to be friends with them and be exactly who she was she wasn't trying to parent in any way she was really just trying to connect with them in a loving way she does with everyone that i've that i've ever seen her interact with and i'm a nurturer by nature and the kids just naturally um we were we were super lucky i mean it for a situation that could have gone wrong in so many which has been hard from the very beginning uh just in in media in life in friends in the kids in family and everyone we we met we were met with no friction at all from anyone which was it was really quite shocking um because we we'd sort of prepared for anything to go sideways and and when it didn't it was such a relief beautiful it just continues to go that way yeah and so

and then uh zane coming into the world the kids are just absolutely obsessed with him and they every morning um they're just constantly hugging him and kissing on him and wanting to hold him and carry him around and and be that and he became this amazing glue with all of us that that permanently connected things for the kids and that's what the kids wanted to like yeah they're constantly talking to me about you know okay so sharon is just going to be in our life for forever now our 10 year old um is always asking like when are you going to propose when are you going to propose oh my god so it's like oh no now we we have a sibling we have a brother so she can't go yeah yeah about like locking me down and make sure i wasn't going anywhere which

is just the cutest thing um and yeah so i we've been very very lucky yeah and it is so hard for kids when they already have seen change they already have felt that change themselves shana i mean you guys have baby zane he's only seven months now is that right seven months 11 11 months he's gonna he's gonna be one on the 28th how did you manage to juggle the intensive filming schedule for dancing with the stars alongside um you know the the weight of parenting it's so hard so dancing with the stars in australia or america both it's well when we were both competing on the show and managing having kids at home again we put family in our relationship first so it that made a huge difference for us when rehearsal time was done we went home and we made a choice to

leave work at work and come home and just be with the kids we're really good at balancing you know i feel like we're very lucky in that sense um but once zane came along it obviously is more intense with an infant you have way more demands on you uh but again the kids have been so in love with having zane that they just want to help out and be around so we didn't even we didn't even know that charna was pregnant at the point when we first had started doing dancer with the stars okay it wasn't until really the end of that it was like the the second to last episode that we had done found out wow that's wild yeah crazy um but yeah so i think i think it was our uh our rumba i mean i just gotta i gotta commend you guys i mean i don't have kids i see laura do it

with maddie but like the fact that you guys are such a blended family and you do it so seamlessly um and with so much love yeah it's so nice for me to see and so much support for each other totally 100 and brian i loved i mean you coming out in defense of your ex-wife megan fox this week obviously your kids are embroiled in that ridiculous debate i think it's disgusting if you don't know your children have been brought into a political fight um in the u.s over megan dressing them in clothes that they want to be dressed in the boys are in girls clothes we don't need to get into that side of it but the fact that you came out brian in defense i mean what a brilliant dad a you are and a brilliant partner to come out i mean where did

that come from where did where do we stand on that what's going on there because i think it is disgusting yeah um so first of all megan and i megan is an amazing mother we co-parent so well together um i think people make the mistake when they separate and they have kids in feel putting this ridiculous uh pressure on themselves of like oh we don't want this to affect our kids because i think that's an impossible thing to ask for it to not affect your kids. I think the only thing you really have control over is how it affects your kids. So, um, we've tried so incredibly hard to make it as painless a situation as we possibly can for them in, in including them in everything. Like I really made a point when Sharon and I first

started dating of including them in absolutely everything in, in letting them know and making them feel like uh the house that we shared together is their house also so it's like listen i love spending time with this person so if you want her around she'll absolutely come around and if you don't then we'll talk about that we'll figure it out and the reality is as much as i love sharna and we connected the way we did um if that was something that came up and was an issue it would be an issue yeah i was if we didn't blend then it would absolutely be an issue yeah yeah megan and brian do an amazing job at co-parenting and i am so grateful that like i can come in and be a part of that amazing team and i will say that in watching them it's always

kids first that's that's the intention it doesn't matter what they have going on uh it's always kids first and that i think is really what makes it the best that's always good it'll be the priority and people forget and they make it about their own battles or beef or whatever's going on wants needs whatever they don't have any of that it's kids first and as far as our kids dressing they dress themselves absolutely and just because 100 percent boys have long hair it does not make their gorgeous kids whether i cut their hair off or it grows long they're still going to be beautiful so it's there there's no way of changing that with a shirt or pants they won the genetic lottery oh my god on that it's the it's the only problem people have

is that gender is involved laura's daughter wears undies on her head and no one has a problem but then when gender and gendered clothes becomes a thing it blows up you pick your battles with your children and if that's if that's the thing that makes them feel like they have choice and agency like who is going to fight a kid on what they want to wear it's a it's not anyone wants to have this is the point where they are supposed to be wearing and doing exactly what they want to do what you give them control to do because later in life when you're working in offices and you're working in certain situations you have to dress appropriately and dress a certain way and carry yourself a certain way now is not the time yeah they're they're they're the ages that they are

so it's to make their own choices find their own style Jesus wear whatever you want to wear absolutely yeah yeah that's a takeaway literally every single day to school and at one point the school was like you know he wears the same jersey every day and his dad was like well you know we wash it every day so it's clean but that's what he wants to wear so that's what it is yeah oh my god i want all you guys to be my parents i always want to like have kids and then break up and then get with someone else so i can have your family because you've just sold it you've just made a You really are. You're the beautiful, perfect example of what a blended family should be

and putting kids first. It truly is awesome to see. And look, I'm so excited for Friday night to be able to watch everyone compete. I am not in Sunday night's competition, but Shana, it was awesome meeting you and having you there for a sounding board and you were honestly the caring judge of the show and I think everyone walked away from every competition feeling like,

oh, well, at least Shana was nice to me. Shana looked at me tonight. Sean, it was so nice.