Life Uncut - We're going the distance. Talking long distance relationships with Erin Holland

Episode Date: August 7, 2023

Hey Lifers, First up today, do you think you can fully 'regret' a previous relationship?What if that relationship ended because the person passed away? Does that change things?We unpack the last episode of "And Just Like That' where Carrie asks the question "what if Big was a big mistake?" Joining the podcast today is TV host, sports presenter, model, dancer, and 2013 Miss World Australia, Erin Holland. Erin has been with her husband, Australian cricketer Ben Cutting for 8 years now. They still live in different states. In our chat we speak about: How to survive long distance relationships The types of relationships that can do distance v those that can't Prioritising your career over other aspects of your life Navigating the journey to parenthood when you live separately  Erin also spoke openly about her challenging fertility journey, and PCO. You can follow Erin and her journey here! If you have an accidentally unfiltered, your most embarrassing story, 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 whose lands were never ceded. We pay our respects to their elders past and present. Always was, always will be Aboriginal land. This episode was recorded on Darug Wollongong land. Hey guys and welcome back to another episode of Life Uncut. I'm Brittany. And I am Laura. We have been doing our vocal warm-ups today, that's for sure, haven't we? We've just been singing a little bit of Alanis Morissette in the studio.

Isn't it ironic? And I feel any time I sing that song and any time that anyone talks about it, the first thing that everyone wants to say is that nothing in that song is actually ironic. Is it not? Not really. It's like rain on your wedding day. Not ironic. Nothing ironic about it raining.

It's a free ride, is. A free ride when you've already paid. Do you know I always 10,000 spoons when all you need is a knife Oh the irony Do you know one thing that I'm really bad at And it's bad for a radio host I can never get any lyrics of any song right

And I genuinely go about my life Singing something so confidently Do you know what it is in that song I've always said? What? I've always sung It's a free ride When you're already there And I was like that is ironic

Why are you writing when you're already there? But it's when you've already paid It's when you've already paid I always thought it was when you're already there This just reminds me, do you remember, I may have shared this before, and if I have, I'm so sorry. You know, I'm forgetful. We've established that in the last few episodes,

and also we've recorded 400 episodes, so I don't know the stories I've told you anymore. I think it's nearly 500, but keep going. Do you remember when Sanity used to exist, like the Sanity CD stores? Yeah, you'd go and buy it for $7.90, one single. Yeah, and you would. There are so many young people that are not going to know what we're talking about.

Okay, so Sanity, back in the day, it's a CD store, and you could go in, and if you wanted to listen to an album or listen to something before you bought it. Not like now. You can't just listen to it on Spotify. You had to go into Sanity, you put your headphones on. You have a taste test. And you would listen.

And I remember I was listening to like Greatest Hits thing and like I must have been 12 years old, thought I was a really good singer. Like I was doing singing lessons. It was back when I used to do a steadfast. You're not a bad singer in comparison to me. The bar is low. The bar is low.

What? Because I'm low. No, because you can't sing. Okay. You know the song, I got my first real sex dreams, let it on. Here, drive way home, whatever the words are. Love it, but don't know the words.

Sang out loud in a store. I had my first real sex dream. And I had my first real sex dream. And I'll never forget the very attractive, like, 16-year-old boy who worked at Sanity came up to me. I'm picturing pimples, skinny, gangly. It wouldn't have been attractive at all, but I was 12, so, like, would have taken anything.

He was like, you took nothing at 12. But you know when you have like big crushes. I was 12 with a big crush. I just remember him laughing and walking towards me laughing and I was like, that wasn't the desired effect and said, you know, I think you might need to check the lyrics on that song. I had my first real sex dream. Certainly didn't at 12.

Also, it hits different singing out loud with headphones because no one can hear the music. Why was I doing this? Why were you singing about sex? Like, is that what you thought was going to make him think you were cool? Like singing, I can see you like making eyes at him over the CD counter. There's nothing less attractive than a 12 year old trying to sing sexy songs. That's for sure.

Yeah, no, it's not my thing. Anyhow, we're vocally warmed up. We're here. How was your week? My weekend was so fun. Matt was away. I thought you were going to go fucked. No.

Which it sort of was too. Well, it kind of was. Matt was away. He was at snow. I was supposed to go to the snow with him, but we couldn't find a babysitter. Thursday, Friday night. He went for four days. We had a babysitter for the second half of the weekend, but our babysitter for the first half of the weekend canceled. So one of us had to parent the children. Well, ain't no one coming to babysit for four days. No. Yeah. You go split

that shit up. Right. Right down the middle. Nana could have, however, unfortunately my sister had already bags Nana that weekend. So she already had two kids. So I had to stay home and we're in the midst of packing up a house at the moment. So it is, I was surrounded by boxes and trying to like sort through all of the just the junk of our life whilst Matt was out there on the slopes. Having the time of his life. I was on a Zoom call with Laura. FaceTime. I don't know why I say Zoom. I'm so old. Everything's Zoom. I had my first real sex dream and I was already there. No, I was on FaceTime to Laura and she's like, I have to put the phone down. The phone was in the cupboard. So I was looking through the clothes at her. She was looking through a tulle tutu, which was definitely

lolas it did add some depth to the zoom but anyway you were folding the clothes and putting them in the box because you were packing and then in the background the kids are just like screaming dancing and then behind you so you couldn't see it but i could see it because they were all behind you you would put the clothes in the box and turn around and then they would take them out and then you would put them in yeah they would take them out and you couldn't see you know i was like i don't know if i should tell her what she's what's happening behind her but i was like i'll just let go. She can deal with it later. Yeah. It was big. It was a big weekend, but you know what? We got through it and now we're here. Tell us what today's episode's about because I have something

I need to unpack with you before we get into the interview. Today's episode is amazing. I loved it. We're speaking to Erin Holland. Now she is a TV host. She's a sports presenter. She's so heavily into sport. And when you look at her, because she's this beautiful tall statuesque model, she's ex Miss World Australia. You're like, surely you're not that much of a tomboy into sport but she is and I think that these two come together really well. She's married to a cricketer Ben Cutting. She got married must be two years ago now and she's going to speak to us today about a bunch of stuff particularly long distance because she's been with her partner Ben for about eight to ten years and it's been long distance the entire time. Well this is an episode we've been

speaking about doing pretty much ever since Britt was in a relationship with Jordan. That's how long the long distance conversation has been on the cards for and I think it was one thing for us to talk about it from like the perspective of just you Britt but also the fact that Erin has been in a long-distance relationship for her entire relationship and that she's married and she's still doing a long-distance relationship because I think usually the way we view these things is that there has to be an end goal and that by the time you settle down you'll be living in the same place as each other and I guess the thing I found so interesting about Erin and Ben's situation is that Ben he is a professional sports person as you said he plays cricket and Erin's so focused

on her career as well and her career is very much based in Sydney and so they have to do long distance between Brisbane and Sydney. Ben spends many months overseas playing in India and playing in many different countries and I guess I loved speaking to someone who's doing long distance but doesn't have a clear understanding about what the end goal is and is still managing to navigate that successfully, very successfully. But we also speak a lot about fertility because Erin does have some fertility problems and they are together going down the fertility journey and it's not going to be easy for her. She is going to have to do IVF. And I guess on top of Erin's openness about fertility and how it's a struggle for her, she also has the added stress of the fact that

her partner doesn't live here. They're not together all the time. So it's one thing to try and go down the parenthood journey when you live together. We know it's not straightforward for anyone, but there's another layer of stress when you know you're going to have issues anyway, and then your partner's not there. It adds another layer of stress. so before we get into talking to erin there is something that i wanted to speak to you about brit and now i know that you do not care about sex in the city i know that you do not care about the reboot of it either i'm sure there's other people listening to this who maybe have never seen sex in the city but i would say for the vast majority of us uh i'm the one percent we're in

there oh no i realize that but to be clear it's not that i don't care i guess i don't care by default i've never understood it and i know i'm in the one percent i never understood the hype sort of like I don't want I don't know if I want to admit this but Game of Thrones Lord of the Rings I mean they're very different no but they're not fantasy sci-fi no but what they have in common is these are series that stopped the world and 99% of the world was obsessed with but I just couldn't get into it Sex and the City I have sporadically watched episodes over the years and I watched the film where she got married I don't even know the name of it okay so and just like that is the series the reboot series which I

know most of you're familiar with but something happened recently on and just like that and it got me thinking a bit more about relationships and how we view them especially ones that could be seen as toxic how we view them once we're no longer in the relationship so just to set this up the main storyline from sex in the city the ongoing storyline obviously carrie mr big mr big kind of toxic comes in and out of carrie's life multiple times i mean one time he even came back into her life and he was married and had a model wife and she didn't know about it and on the side to that though Carrie is in and out of relationships with Aiden so Aiden is the very stable man who she probably should have chosen but she chased the chemistry she chased the drama she chased

everything that I would have chased in my 20s also not that you care but I was definitely more attracted to Aiden and I would have gone Aiden yeah I think I would have too but also I mean Aiden proposed to Carrie and she wore his engagement ring around her neck, right? Like on a necklace. And she said it was because she didn't ever feel like she would wear an engagement ring, but really it was because she was still in love with Big. Like the undercurrent was there throughout the whole of Sex and the City. Like what a fuck you if someone proposes to you and you're like, oh my God, I love it. I love this big fat diamond, but I couldn't possibly wear it on my engagement ring. So now Big is dead. That's not a spoiler. Happened in like the first episode.

R.I.P. B.I.G. Yeah. And Big left Carrie at the altar. They eventually got married. She eventually got her happy ending. He died on a Peloton. It was the big scandal. Which is so funny.

Not that it's funny. But imagine being the writer and be like, how are we going to kill him off? Let's put him on an exercise bike. Terrible for Peloton. Terrible. Apparently. Terrible branding. No, Peloton shares went down after that.

Not surprised. Because people are like, I'm not getting on one of those bad boys. I'm not going to have a heart attack like Mr. Big. I'll have one if they're listening. A Peloton or a heart attack? I felt on. Okay, so this is all pretty old news. The thing I wanted to talk to you about is so Carrie got married.

She also once big died because he was extremely wealthy, got a whole lot of money out of the divorce. Not a divorce. The death. He's dead. He's not divorced. Now Aidan has come back into the picture, right? This is the fourth time in the many, many years that they have known each other

that he has somehow been resurrected within the series. Aidan has come back and he has three children of his own from a previous relationship, one that's happened whilst, you know, Carrie's been married to Mr Big. And Carrie poses the question, now that she has the beauty of hindsight, now that her husband has passed away, and she probably can see some of the toxicity that existed in that relationship and how hard she had to work for him

to love her, like for him to choose her. For him to do the bare minimum, she had to go above and beyond. Yeah, she was always the one making herself available. She was always the one ruining her own relationships, also ruining some of his relationships in order to be chosen by him, right? Yeah, just to get him to turn up and like literally just to turn up to the wedding. No, to turn up. Like you fucking asked me and you didn't even come.

Metaphorically, spiritually, literally just turn up. And then Mr. Big gaslit her as well about the whole fact that he didn't show up at the wedding. His response was, well, you got so over the top about the wedding that I wasn't able to communicate with you and so therefore I just didn't show up. I hate the series. Wow. Okay, so now she's with Aiden and she's asked the big question, of maybe Mr. Big was just a big mistake. There has been so much conversation, backlash. Other

people feel emotionally manipulated by Carrie now because we've invested the better half of 15 years into this series, into seeing the happy ending between Carrie and Big. And now all of a sudden she's decided that it was a mistake and maybe she should have chosen Aiden all along, right? She should have chosen the nice guy. Now I think that we can unpack it. I mean, we can obviously unpack it from a sex and city perspective but I think the bigger question I was asking after this played out I was like should we ever regret a relationship that we've chosen to be in that's run its course maybe there was toxicity whatever the outcome was but it wasn't a great relationship or should we view it as a lesson or as a stepping stone to the next place that we are in life

I think this is a really great question and I have definitely changed my opinion on it over the years but it's also like how long is a piece of string because all relationships and situations are so different now old Brittany that was live laugh love that would have been my hashtag live laugh love Brittany would have been like hashtag no regrets hashtag live your life hashtag everything happens for a reason yeah a lot of hashtags floating around I genuinely used to the younger me the more ignorant me that hadn't had enough life experience made me thought you know what this was supposed to happen like that everything happens for a reason I cannot tell you how many times I would have said that. And maybe part of that was a coping mechanism of going through

traumatic situations where you're like, do you know what? Everything happens for a reason. I'm going to be fine. A big part of me would have been like, you cannot regret things that you've done because everything has brought you to where you're going to be. And I still believe that everything that we go through takes us to this point. I mean, like, I feel like that's obvious. We're only here because of everything we've gone through in life. But I do believe now, of course, you can regret situations but these are more serious situations and I'm going to take a serious turn for a second but obviously there are very abusive toxic relationships that have been horrific for people and of course you're going to regret that and say I wish I never went through that

but then of course there's a little piece that you can grasp from that that might help you move forward that's like but I wouldn't be here if I didn't but I do think you can have regrets should you regret your husband dying taking all his money then falling in love with the person that you were in love with for 20 years probably not yeah I think that the overarching thing was very trivialized, but I agree with you. I think that sometimes the hurt doesn't amount to the lesson. And also it's also assuming that people have gotten to a place of resolution. Like a lot of times you go through bad relationships and you don't actually learn the lesson. Sometimes those relationships, and we know this from the many conversations we've had, a lot of people have

cyclical relationships where they just end up being with the same type of person, having the same type of relationship because they haven't been able to grow from it or learn the lessons or whatever it is. And I guess like maybe it's a coping mechanism. The fact that we kind of sometimes convince ourselves that like, oh, I'm not going to regret my past relationships. I'm not going to regret the decisions that I made because, you know, I'm in the place that I'm in now because of the things that I've been through. So maybe it's a way of rationalizing the bad decisions that maybe we've made in relationships. But I definitely think that if you are somebody who has regretted a relationship or has turned around and thought, I wish I had chosen differently.

if I had all the information that I do now in hindsight, I would have chosen differently for myself. Like that that's an okay option as well. I think there is something very healthy though, in looking at relationships with the perspective of majority of them, you can learn something from majority of them. The biggest area of growth is when you go through that breakup and you actually start to take some ownership back of the things that you want, putting boundaries in place, learning who you are as a person. And I say this also taking a bit of a serious turn. so if you've read the book our book we love love if you've listened to the podcast for quite a while you would know that my so my stepdad was super abusive my mom was married to a heroin

addict for the better half of eight years and it was a truly horrific time in life for everyone involved especially my mom but i remember when i was in my early teens and i asked my mom if she regretted her choice to get married to him and she regretted the relationship which to me seemed like a bit of a no fucking brainer yeah you're like obviously the answer is gonna be yes but I have a little brother his name's Matthias and he is a lot younger than me and he is I mean I would never call him my half-brother but he is my half-brother we have different dads and I guess my mum's response to that was I don't regret anything about the decision to marry your stepdad or to have a relationship with your stepdad because I got your brother out of it and so as

much as there was so much hurt like something incredible came out of that relationship as well and I do think that for a lot of people and for a lot of relationships there are good things that come from them but there are absolutely going to be some relationships where the hurt is not worth the lesson as I said earlier. Of course and I wonder and I'm sure and I'm never going to speak for your mum but I'm sure there are parts that she does regret of course because by default other people do get hurt in that situation and in this case it was you and your sister it was a troublesome some time for you guys and obviously you went through a lot but I imagine for your mom she recognizes that she knows that but she has to grasp onto something good that came from that

situation otherwise that's on her and she put you guys through it for nothing so I feel like for her I imagine it's like well look what we all got you got an amazing brother I have an amazing son so I can't ever regret it completely but I have no doubt there are aspects of that that she's aware that she would regret going back to this situation between Carrie Bigg and Aiden I have a lot of like conflicting feelings about this. Firstly, I think how on earth is Aiden giving this situation? I know it's hype. I know it's not real. I know it's fancy. I get that guys, but I'm really invested. No, I think we talk about it because it's like real life. The writers have written this series as in people really go through this. So I think we can talk about them like they're

real. I know they're not, but. Okay. Well, I firstly think like how on earth is somebody giving a fourth chance? Like how is it after four times of rejection, after being someone's complete second choice in life at every single turn how he could have such little boundaries in himself and such a little self-respect that he gives carrie another opportunity to let him down which let's be real it's probably going to happen but i feel that the same about carrie she did the same with big he treated her like shit for like 20 years the entire time she knew him toxic gas lighting he was a dick married other people she wasn't enough constantly and she did the same thing it was like a domino effect of of pain of pain for all of them it was actually it's actually

horrible okay well second to that I and maybe this is a controversial opinion but I kind of think that Carrie is the problem and the reason for that is I think the girl needs some therapy I think she needs to do some self-work she's the perfect example of how we glorify chemistry how we glorify attraction over everything else over you know we romanticize chemistry over stability we romanticize attraction over reliability over love over people who show up consistently in our lives I did find it interesting when I did my little deep dive I know I haven't seen the whole season but I'm really interested in this point of like can you regret can you do this anyway the internet was divided it wasn't actually everyone hating on Carrie which I thought there were some people

that were really for it too being like fuck yes it was never big how did it take you so long I'm team Aiden like it was definitely a team Aiden team big thing and I feel like she's getting just as much support for this thought that she's had of maybe she made a mistake as as much hate she's getting for it some of the comments across twitter were absolutely fucking amazing why did this not work out the first time because i made a mistake says carrie carrie i've been saying this for 20 years big was toxic but you loved the drama don't we all in our 20s uh so aiden got the shaft loving their chemistry and their happiness while knowing that it probably won't last however many people are like carrie bradshaw is living lavish of that dead man's money spent decades destroying

relationships to prioritize him and now she's not sure if he was worth it i know i did not just sit through six seasons followed by two movies and then 1.5 seasons of a sequel series to hear carrie bradshaw say that big was a mistake like girl aiden won't even enter your apartment your life is a fucking fantasy and also married big but now he was a mistake oh okay carrie but i bet you won't say that the money you inherited was a mistake too well that's that it's a big question but it's also a really prime example of this romanticism that we have when we're in a relationship and there's always that one that got away there's that one that we always fantasize on I feel like she's done this constantly over her life with Aiden which is with Aiden it's big got away when she's

with big it's Aiden got away and now she's done it both she got married for however long after ruining relationships she got a big sum of money she's taking the money she's got the life she wants then she's like oh I'll go back to the grass is always greener safe option now now that I'm older and i should prioritize safety and comfort or maybe there's options are slim now maybe she's like got my money i'll just go back to the the og options are slim because your husband is dead yeah it's fucked i've never been on board with carrie and i think that's why i never got in because i tried to get into sex she's like i mean she's the fucking icon of our time yeah but it got to the point where it's it was frustrating for me i think they drove home how ridiculous she was

too much i think at this she would have been great she had some development but she didn't She was just a toxic twat for like, and heaps of people are going to hate me for that. It was the frustration of how are you doing this again? Like, how are you letting him treat you like that and going back? And I think that's where I started to get a bit frustrated. I think because for me, the series and the storyline between Big and Aiden was my life. Yeah, but no, but let me say what I'm going to say. For anybody who's been in a situation where they feel like they're attracted to two people

at the same time one of them is a safe option and one of them is a bit dangerous but that's where the bigger feelings are it almost embodied every that person like if you've experienced that where you've had like this pull between two people it is the outcome that everyone wishes for the outcome being that the toxic slightly more problematic guy turns into no turns into the marriage and gives you all the things that you've been hoping will actually happen in your life it's like it's the romanticized version of a toxic relationship that I think a lot of people hope for and wish for, you know, instead of choosing the safe option, instead of choosing the stability, it's kind of like the notebook when you watch that and you actually unpack it

for what it is. Like she chose the fucking guy who was not a stable option when she had this amazing man who wanted to be with her, who was everything and committed and there. But it's the way that Hollywood romanticizes drama, toxicity and chemistry. And then we bring that into our own lives well it also drives home the the idea of the nice guy finishes last like in this case it was 20 years and a death it took for her to pick the nice guy like for the nice guy to win and come out on top i think we need to start putting the nice guy first we can learn anything from sex in the city over the last two decades is that the nice guy should win but earlier well it is time now for accidentally unfiltered i have a sexy banger

my boyfriend and i were recently catching up with his best friend and his wife whilst they were in town visiting they have a one-year-old baby boy and were staying at the grandparents house it had been a while since they'd got it on and i guess you know it was the holiday vibe that got them a little bit frisky they started getting freaky in the downstairs guest bedroom Afterwards, the wife went back upstairs and Nana said to her, oh, there were really strange sounds in the kitchen. Is your phone a baby monitor? To her dismay, she realized she had left her phone upstairs

with the baby monitor connected and the grandparents heard everything. RIP. So they were just going for it with the baby monitor right next to them and the whole house could hear it. I think that is so good. Imagine the Nana being like, what sound is your baby making? that's a very advanced baby for a one-year-old like can you imagine what she's thinking like what do you think if you i'm sorry i would think that there was something that was down there

possessing my child i'd have to go down to an exorcism or something no because you're one year old going faster faster faster faster faster quicker more it's so fucking messed up baby monitors i reckon are going to catch a lot of people out yeah i was trying to think if we've ever been in a situation, but we're too lazy to use a baby monitor. So no. Don't you even use a baby monitor? Never use one. Our apartment is so small. We lived in the tiniest apartment. I know, my apartment. Lola lived in a hallway for the first year of her life. Her portacot, Lola. People, I think we all forget this, guys. It's my favorite. I lived in a tiny apartment and Lola lived in a portacot in the hallway outside of our bedroom. So I live in Laura's apartment now, in case you

don't know but most of you do it's two bedroom it's small it's fine it's a great apartment for one to two people no not for four people and a dog I want to move out because I said to Laura I think I need to move out it's too small she's like bitch my whole family lived in that apartment we lived in that apartment during COVID okay so let me just set this up when it was you Matt obviously Buster and you had Marley and Buster is the size of a great day well Marley had a room and then Buster took over the lounge room and you guys had a room but we also used the podcast office in your bedroom god knows how we did that the bedroom is not that big wait when we say office in the bedroom there is no office in the bedroom it was just a desk that i had put next to

the bed and that's what we recorded anyway it's actually when you look back at how we started it's so funny anyway laura's pregnant obviously with lola and i was like oh so you gotta move out because obviously there's no way to put lola and she's like no i don't think so we really like our apartment i was like but but where will the baby go and she's like i think we'll just put it in the hallway and I thought it was a joke and then I came over and Lola lived in the hallway she just they just and the hallway's only about three meters long and very narrow and dark they just put a cot in the hallway and you had to like scurry around it and that's literally where she lived there was like a little alcove area in the hallway so we just tucked the portacot in there

wasn't too much of a trip hazard well no wonder you didn't have it we just couldn't use the front door we had to only come in and out the back door because the baby was asleep it's actually funny because um humble roots guys humble roots i understand now why you didn't need a baby monitor because she was just there like you could see her and hear her at all times when you went to the toilet she was there when you went to the cupboard she was there i actually in packing up this weekend i just found the baby monitor that we were bought and it was in a box and so i just put the whole box straight into the salvos box maybe you can give it to me i'll probably have a baby before you yeah do you guys think it will be weird when i have my second hand portico yeah

I'm also humble beginnings I don't care I'll take anything do you want my second hand baby monitor that never got used but do you think I'm speaking to you guys too the listeners is it going to be weird like if and when I have a kid that's going to be a weird transition for me you need to have the penis in Australia the cock and balls need to be here no it's just not it can happen believe it or not Laura it just takes one sexy time it can happen it's not ideal but I know I just mean more my life in general like you guys have only ever known me to be a crazy single person that didn't know she was ever going to have kids imagine the day that I'm like I'll have a kid I think this is more alarming that you've gone from more because like it's been a very

dramatic shift from I don't know if I want to have kids ever to hey everyone I think that I might yeah oh and by the way I'm definitely not pregnant don't take that from this but no but it's a weird transition in my own brain for for me to think about because I never pictured my life with that and I'm not saying it's going to happen but the thoughts are there now like it's it's definitely transitioning and I think it's a whole nother conversation as to why it's not for the back of accidentally unfiltered bread bread coming you to next week's episode anyway let's get into the chat with Erin I'm so excited to introduce our guests today for a multitude of reasons one I feel like we connect because we're in the same situation two she's been a very long time friend

of mine and three she's just one of those people that you want a hater you know those people that can do everything they're beautiful they're talented they're amazing they're nice you like where's your fault well there's such things as like a triple threat and then there's like a quadruple i don't even know what it is when you get into the six is it she's like she's like the octagon mom of threats erin holland she's a singer television host presenter model dancer she was miss world australia she's beautiful she's lovely and she's here in person and she's also an og fan of life uncut erin welcome to life uncut finally oh thanks guys my gosh i'm a bit nervous i am i'm an og listener like right from the very beginnings of your wherever the heck you were recording that

tinny little basement when we were recording back in like the train tunnel uh in 2020 or whatever it was i had good times do you know i can remember i just hit me now you probably don't remember because it was not a monumental moment for you but i remember the moment that i met you the first night it was at bondi beach in the winter and they had that ice skating rink you know how they put that that long ago they put the ice skating rink up and we had a mutual friend renee iris yeah renee and that was the very first night i met you which must have been 10 years ago it was it was like nine or ten years ago do you remember yeah i do remember that that was it oh my gosh and here we are and you're like like with those little penguins that help you not fall over

because i was a novice because i grew up in cans and we don't have snow in cans my god just fumbling around like Bambi on the ice like legit try not to fall over I don't remember when I first met Erin but I feel like ever since I've worked in this world of media we've known each other where was it I actually think it was All New Monty because Maddie had done he got his dick out not my season but the season before and then you came along to pretend to be one of the people that were maybe going to do it but obviously you knew you weren't going to do it and you were there for the filming so is that how you guys bonded over Maddie's dick to be fair I met 24 women at the same time as when I bonded over Matt and then I just continued to meet women and bond over Matt

but usually not all his body parts. Yeah, it was filming for All New Monty for Channel 7. Well, we are so glad to have you here today. And look, I mean, we can unpack and talk about all your successes, but there's something that you have that we've talked about a lot on the podcast, Brit, long distance. It's something that you're navigating. It's definitely a reoccurring theme and we've spoken

about doing an episode around long distance relationships for a really long time. What I'm hearing is my commitment issues are a reoccurring theme. A reoccurring theme and also your desire to date men who don't live in this country recurring theme but Erin you have successfully navigated a long distance relationship for a very very long time with your husband so we wanted to unpack what that looks like for you and how you managed to make it work but can you tell us we start every episode the same which I know you know what is your accidentally unfiltered obviously I knew

this was coming long time listener I have so many options but I just think this one just takes the cake of just ridiculousness but um talking about an accident I had at 40,000 feet a couple of years back so I was working in Canada at the time I'd been doing 12 hour days for like I think it was two weeks worth and then I had to come back to Australia only to unpack my bag repack my bag within five hours and get another plane to go to Malta to do some work for Qatar Airways and I know that sounds ridiculous but because I was working for the airline we were literally filming from like the second you get on at Sydney airport so I had to come all the way back just to go over to Europe and my lovely manager Morgan was with me and he's a bit of a nervous

flyer so the guy's got some heavy stuff when it comes to coping with long distance flights and he had these like anti-psychotics they were like proper prescribed by Dr. Proper Strong he was like they're going to help him sleep because the second we hit the ground in Malta we were go go go we had to work so I was like okay great I'm a terrible sleeper at the best of times that I was so jet lagged so exhausted knew my brain had to connect to my mouth the second we landed so I was like oh maybe i'll just i'll just have just not even one i had a nibble a nibble of one of these little lick little antipsychotic lick tiny little nibble of one of these pills he had two full ones i had a nibble of one anyway i had the bladder of the size of a small child so at one point maybe three

or four hours into my nice long sleep i was like i really have to pee so i got up and i shuffled my way in my pjs to go to the bathroom and i wake up on the floor something happens and i passed out and I get up and kind of pull my way up and look in the mirror. But in the toilet. In the cubicle of the aeroplane toilet. And we all know they're like a one metre by 50 centimetres. It's very small. And I look in the mirror and there's blood just coming

from my eyebrow dripped all the way down to my mouth. I was like, oh, my God, what have you done? And then all of a sudden I notice that half of my front tooth is missing. I was like, oh, shit. And I was like in my fluster, I'm like, I need help. Oh, my God, I'm missing my tooth. I am filming the second I get to Malta, shit. So I open the door and I trip over my little slipper

and I hit the galley and I pass out again. So I wake up on the floor and all the flight attendants are standing over me going, because they know, oh, she's the ambassador. She's here. We're going to look after her. And she has crumpled on the floor with blood all over her and a missing fucking tooth. And they're like, oh, my God, are you okay?

And I'm like, uh, the, nah, freaking out because I'm still drugged as well. And they're like, well, go wake up your friend and see if it's okay. Don't fucking wake him up. I was like, I don't know if we want to do that. anyway they go and they get him and he trudges over sits down on the floor next to me puts his arm on me and goes you'll be fine babes and then goes back to sleep and I'm there going oh my god like literally we're on our way to Doha we have a five hour stopover and then we're filming the second we get there so I'm there like trying to madly in my stupor find a dentist that is open

at 1am in Doha so I can get my tooth fixed thank god for in-flight wi-fi thank god for in-flight wi-fi i actually know i think the captain had to call ahead and organize it organize a visa literally don't worry about flying the plane i'm like you don't understand this is very important it's like you know for the i need my tooth i can't be going like hey guys welcome to malta like we all have snaggle tooth like what am i gonna do so they get me a visa they pick me up on the tarmac we get a cab to the dentist at like some international dentist at 1am they fix my tooth but i also kind of fractured my my nose in the process and had like a swollen face so I was like this is literally my good

side guys I'm not being a princess we just have to film from this side the only way this could have been better is if when you tumbled out you pissed yourself like that was the only way I was like this maybe it happened maybe it didn't I just it was just it was a comedy of errors and that's how I lost my tooth at 40,000 feet the one lesson I think we can all take from this is just don't take medication that's not prescribed for you don't don't don't do it it's not a good idea to not get a good sleep and cost me 800 dollars maybe your teeth look great thank you yeah you're like they're not real they're not real now i had to get them fixed oh my god that's that's gonna be one of my best my favorite accidentally unfilled tips it just kept getting

worse it did it got worse fucking hell okay trauma but anyway it's fine it's fine it just goes to show that if you put your mind to it you can solve anything you took your manager to fix these problems but you're the one that had to be like the captain getting it done because he's passed out because he's had two antipsychotics and then he lent over at one point he's like babes I had a dream that you knocked out your tooth and I smiled he was like oh shit it wasn't a dream stop he's actually in the room right now and he's sitting in the corner hating his life you did this this will come back to bite you I know well Erin you do a lot of things well but one thing you don't do well is like close proximity relationships you've been in a long

distance relationship for eight and a half years but before we get into that because I think it's important to note what were your relationships like or your relationship style like before you met your now husband Ben? I didn't have a lot of boyfriends I had a lot of situationships I think but I probably had three proper boyfriends in my whole life including Ben my now husband plenty of situationships but the first one was the you know the very first love from 16 years old he was from up my way in far north Queensland as well he came to Sydney for a little bit it didn't work out I think the whole adage of you kind of hold on to a bit of your past when you move to a big city particularly when you're 17 but it just it just wasn't right it wasn't going anywhere and then

I had one major boyfriend before my husband but yeah just plenty of situationships and I think I was always guilty of giving too much I'm a perfectionist I'm a bit of a people pleaser like I put up with so much I would literally grind these relationships down into the ground trying to make them work because I would always think it was my fault that I think a lot of women can relate to that when you feel like that you're the problem as to why things aren't working but with Ben I think I realized that you know all of the insecurities and the things that I were feeling was as a result of the relationship and how I was being made to feel because the second I was with the right person quote unquote all of that just went away and you know I don't think

you could have a eight and a half year long distance relationship if you were insecure at all about the relationship I think it's it's 100% that communication is the major thing when it comes to any relationship but particularly long distance totally we say this a lot in terms of you can act crazy in a relationship right like everyone has the capacity to and I know some people like I would never do that but I think you can be matched with people who inflame the insecurities in you and then you can be matched with people who those insecurities that may have been inflamed in previous relationships it's almost like they're the antidote to that like they're really good at kind of soothing the parts of you that maybe are problematic when you're with

somebody else in saying that. Talk us through how you met Ben and how that relationship kind of came to be. Well, there's a lot of similarities between my Ben and your Ben, Brittany, which is just hysterical. I know we connected a lot over that, but Ben I met through Instagram. So this was eight and a half years ago and online dating had only kind of just started. It was like kind of wasn't the done thing back then I think particularly if you had a public profile it wasn't like it is these days you just kind of I don't know you didn't really do it so the slide into the DMs was how that relationship started and technically I liked his photo first but he was the one that slid into my DMs and there's a whole story around that and the photo that I

liked first of Ben's actually it's a bit of a sad story but it was I was a sports tragic from way back I watched a lot of sport growing up I knew who Ben was as a player in the context of being a cricketer. My husband's a professional cricketer. It was a photo of him and a lovely guy called Phil Hughes, who actually passed away at the SCG when he was hit by a cricket ball about nine years ago. Yeah, it was very tragic. It was awful, awful, awful. And he and Ben had played together for Australia for many years before then. And Instagram kind of wasn't as sophisticated as it is now. So the explore page was just stuff that was trending in Australia at the time. It wasn't specific to who you follow and what you like. So there was a social campaign

to put your bat out for Phil between when he got hit and when he died. And Ben had posted a couple of photos having known Phil, loved Phil. I liked those photos amongst many others. I'm a liberal liker. I like everything on Instagram. I probably liked one of your photos, whoever's listening at home. I apologise.

I do like that you're trying to set this up as though you didn't set this up as a like, like, like, wait for the DM slide in. It truly wasn't. And then when he did slide into the DMs, I was like, who's this? Oh, yeah, cool, hi. And I was seeing someone else at the time so there was a bit of friendly banter back and forth but genuinely that was all

it was and I thought it was the whole oh you know well I work in this industry I might bump into him I'll be I'll be pleasant oh you know I'll reply and be nice but that was where it ended and then we kind of just chatted for a few months back and forth until we decided to yeah meet in person like I think four or five months later so there was a weird little parasocial relationship for a little while first before I actually met him in person and at the time when you kind of were doing this dm slide in were you based in Sydney and was he in Queensland like what was the living arrangements I guess at that point in time as they stand today eight and a half years later I live in Sydney Ben lives in Brisbane which is so fun we're gonna get to that okay I just want to I feel like you've

scooted past some stuff so you've met Ben now and was it love at first sight or was it supposed to be a little bit of fun what was the vibe the first time it was supposed to go absolutely nowhere like I was getting over someone else at the time and it was across Christmas time and he was supposed to come down to Sydney and play a game, play a cricket game. He ended up getting injured and not coming. So we were going to meet up then and then that didn't end up happening. I was like, whatever. And then he said, look, I know this is really forward and really weird

but it's big bash season. Like my life is not my own for the next three months. I've had the game in Sydney now. I'm not going to be in Sydney unless we make finals. If you are in Brisbane at all, because my family is from Brisbane originally, so aunts, uncles, grandparents, they're all there, like let me know. I'll take you out to dinner. And I was like, yeah, cool.

It's never going to happen. And I remember being in Cairns with, like, my oldest friend in the entire world and she's like, that guy you're talking to, I'm like, yeah, but he lives in Brisbane. And she's like, like, what's the worst that could happen? Just go. Like, you're going to go and see your aunt and uncle or whatever. Just go to dinner.

Like, who cares? See what happens. So I went on a first date that lasted a weekend. And then I flew back to Sydney for New Year's. I remember clear as day. Kissed someone else on New Year's and instantly felt guilty. and I was like and I don't have no reason to feel guilty but obviously I really like this person because otherwise I wouldn't care well you know what's just happened with this other person and

literally since that day we've yeah been together it was all like love bombing each other after three weeks and here we are eight and a half years later married for two and a half so when you very first got into a relationship and you knew that Ben was in Queensland and you're in New South Wales I mean it's a bit different in terms of when I think about you Bria and you guys doing long distance and someone living on the other side of the world. She took it to the extreme. Yeah. It really doesn't do things by half, but I mean, you say it's been eight and a half years now and you're still in the same long distance relationship. You have your life set up in Sydney and he has his life set up in Brisbane where you own a house. And it seems so unconventional

to someone who kind of lives a very normal coupled relationship here where we all live together in the same household. It kind of feels like there must be an end date to it. Like you must be working towards being in the same place forever at the same time when you started to originally have those conversations about doing long distance what did that look like to you it was kind of just either was that or it wasn't going to happen so we kind of decided early on that it felt like whatever we had was worth the time apart and because very early on eight and a half years ago I didn't have the money to travel up and see him like Sydney's an expensive city I was you know working paycheck to paycheck and he was obviously a professional cricketer and they spent so much

time away it's hard to sort of explain because you might know someone who's a footy player right and they play a national sport and they might go away for a game on a weekend somewhere different but with cricket they're gone for months and months and months on end so it's not even like a normal long distance relationship with with someone in that sort of an industry it is to the extreme this sort of a sport so it really had to be something special to to kind of put yourself through that and to not know what the end date is like you sort of alluded to because at the end of the day, I'd been working away in Sydney and creating a life and, you know, chipping away at a career for myself. The last thing I wanted to do was give that up for anybody, no matter how

amazing they were. But then also on the flip side, why bother giving that up for someone who's not even home 80% of the year? So you're kind of stuck in a rock and a hard place. Well, I think that's an important thing to note is you guys do live separately in separate states in terms of Brisbane and New South Wales, Sydney, but they do spend a lot of time overseas. So both Erin and Ben are constantly traveling around the world for their work because Erin you do a lot of hosting for the cricket but not necessarily where Ben's playing sometimes yes sometimes no and Ben's away for months so it's not just interstate they can't still just jump on a flight for an hour it is a lot of time overseas and I think just last night you said goodbye for a couple of months

again didn't you yeah yeah two and a half months he's gone to Canada and the Caribbean now and unless something changes work-wise I'm not going to be able to get over there and see him and then i go to zimbabwe myself in two days for a couple weeks and then potentially america as well next month so you do feel like passing ships in in the night sometimes but the thing about athletes is the career is not forever so in terms of what the future looks like they will become a point in time in the near future where he won't play anymore and we'll be able to have more of a home base and and as to where that is well again one of the variables that happens in a long distance relationship like this is you can sit and you can try and plan for a future and make all these

really hard decisions where inevitably someone is giving up more than the other but why have all these hard conversations in this particular moment when we don't know so many of those variables you know he could get injured tomorrow and never play again I could get a massive job at a network like I've always wanted to in Sydney and and be locked into a city that you kind of have to decide that you want to be together and then agree to be malleable as to what that looks like in the future because yeah, you can't make any hard or fast, dead fast rules when you just have no idea what the future holds for either of us work-wise. What about your friends and your family? When you very first got into a relationship, I mean, I'm sure they all loved Ben, but were there people

in your life who were concerned about the dynamic and how on earth you're going to make it work with someone who's physically not here? People came to our wedding who'd never met Ben. Wow. Some of my friends had never met Ben. That's how much he is away. So he was just kind of like the joke boyfriend for a while everyone's like oh yeah the figure of your imagination you've just got one of those big doll dolls in your bed you're like i'm with benton it's not because it was a relationship that did genuinely feel so easy in every other aspect like we never thought i was always so happy and excited to see him like he's a very easy person to live with for the most period of time and to be with so because he didn't have any other issues other than this

roadblock of obviously where we live I'd never had anything negative to say about it people like so like how's it going I guess it's still still going well and I think because I was so focused on my career and needing to be selfish in some capacity with that but then also with his career as an athlete it's very interesting how the entertainment industry and sporting industry are so aligned with some similar pressures in many ways so in other relationships where I'd have to drop everything because a job came up and I had to cancel that holiday or I couldn't go to that thing. There was no animosity or anger from Ben because he probably did the same thing to me the week before. And so there was a level of understanding that I hadn't had from a partner

before because there are those, yeah, those similarities between our industries that made it easier. Well, I think one of the things that's so unique potentially about your situation is that usually there is one person who makes more of a sacrifice. Usually there is one partner who puts their career potentially on hold to meet the other person where they are why did you not want to make that decision or why did he so I think obviously when the relationship first started he was the one that was really making the money and had the means to make the relationship work I didn't have the money to fly up and see him so it kind of became equal in that he wasn't able to give me the time that I was able to give him in terms of getting on a plane and going up to see him every week or

every two weeks so it was it was my time versus his money essentially in order to make the relationship work and then that's changed over time as my career has improved and his career has taken the turn that it's taken but it has always been kind of equal in some way which has been great and I think you know for me I've been so career focused my whole life the last thing I ever wanted to do was put myself second because I felt like I'd done that in my previous relationships and they hadn't worked out I'd given too much of myself so I was actually very very standoffish with him for at least the first year I was there going like you know you're saying all of these lovely things like I just I don't know I just don't believe you like well I'm gonna do my thing

and I'm never moving just so you know this is me and this is what I'm doing and if you want to get on board with that that's great but I'm done with making my life about someone else I would like someone to sort of come and meet me halfway so you know I think obviously it would have been much easier had I packed everything up and moved to Brisbane at least being there whenever he was home but do you know what though it's easy to say that but it probably wouldn't work if you did that because you'd harbor some resentment you'd be like I don't actually want to be here and I feel like I've given up something to be here and the relationship probably wouldn't work because you're like fuck that I just worked so hard and now I've given it up and when he does come home you're like

I've just missed all my own opportunities you've been doing your opportunities I think a big key to success in long distance relationship is making sure you are still living the life you want to live and chasing your dreams and not making too many sacrifices. I do think another key to the success is keeping busy and having your own interests. And I think that that's probably why it's been so easy for you guys for eight years is because you're so career focused and he's so career focused. I think it'd be different if you were sitting at home, not doing anything. And no one is getting left behind in this situation. I think that's a big part too, is it's not one person that's always flying off around the world and doing whatever they're doing.

It's we're both kind of doing the same thing. And I think one of the other important things is because we don't have children yet there isn't a need to have that 100% full-time home base as there would be if obviously there was little tiny humans that we were looking after as well because we're both away and we're both doing what we're doing no one's getting left behind there isn't that resentment and at the end of the day I know myself well enough to know what I can cope with and I've always said there's kind of three pillars in life there's your love there's your work and your passion and unfortunately for Ben my work and my passion have become one and the same and two has always outweighed one with that so my work and my passion gives me so much

and you know fuels my soul was my priority and then I found you know the love of my life as well but I was like you know what I actually need you to come to the party and help fit in around me rather than me always giving myself to the other person because it never worked out well for me well I think one of the biggest things I mean the foundation to build a relationship in long distance is trust obviously because on the other side of the world and in today's day and age with online dating and Instagram and obviously he's a professional athlete and you're a very beautiful public figure there must be a level at some stage of are they going to do the wrong thing you know do I trust them to do that have you guys ever experienced that obviously not now that you're

married but in the earlier days do you know what never and that shocks me so much we were saying before Laura like the crazy insecure version of me has just never reared its head in this relationship and sometimes I let other people's thoughts and feelings and projections get in my head and I think I could literally count one or two times in the entire relationship have I ever gone through his phone and checked and that was only because people had gone but you don't know what he's doing like surely like aren't you worried like and obviously that's because they've experienced what they've experienced and maybe they've been worried but never in my relationship have I ever felt that insecure and that that was a real sort of light bulb moment to me that maybe

this was the right relationship to me because I don't think you could have a long distance relationship obviously if there was terrible trust and terrible communication they're obviously the most important things with any relationship but everything's exacerbated I think when it's long distance and we are so open with each other like obviously when we're on tour overseas and there's nights out and whatever it is I'll be messaging from the night up and hey the boys say hi he's like yes I hired everyone for me and I'm like go out do something he's like oh no I should like I'm trying to encourage him to get out and live his life more but yeah we've always had that sort of innate sense of trust which is not something that I have ever experienced before I think it's

so important that you mentioned that often it can be influenced by other people's opinions because there will be people who are listening to this and I would say me when I was in my early 20s I would have thought everyone cheats you just don't know about it that's what I used to think and I believed it so fundamentally. And that was because every relationship I'd ever been in, I'd been cheated on or someone had done the wrong thing. And so there are people who believe it is just a normal thing and not an acceptable thing, not a thing that they want in their life, but just it happens. And if you don't think it happens, you're living in denial. And then it was only when I got into the relationship with Matt, who I guess from the outset, he had probably has more options

than anyone, you know, he's a super handsome man. He's away all the time doing different work things. I have the least sort of oversight over his life, but he's the person I have the most trust with, you know, and I'm not to say that people don't and can't do the wrong thing, but I would truly be fucking shocked if I found out that he ever did. Whereas in my past relationships, shocked wouldn't be the right word, disappointed maybe. And I think it's when you get into a relationship where you realize that sometimes trust is just innately a part of how you communicate and it doesn't matter whether someone's literally living in the same house as you and sleeping in the same bed as you every night if they want to do you wrong they will

and they could be in the same fucking postcode and intuition is everything I think every time I think back to feeling uncomfortable in a relationship and unsure it's because they were cheating on me or there was something going on and that's like I have been cheated on by of all the three boyfriends two did so I have been hurt before in the past I did have that scar and that baggage with me coming into this but there's something about the way that our relationship is the way the communication is that that I genuinely same as you if he ever did I would be so shocked he's the sort of person that one day I think and you know you never know what the future can hold in this moment we choose to be together we believe each other our future

and you know for the foreseeable future and if he were to decide that I wasn't that one day I have no qualms in thinking he'd just be like hey this is I just don't think this is for me anymore rather than cheat on me that's just the sort of person that he is and I believe that wholeheartedly and he's never shown me in eight and a half years nor have I heard any whisperings from anybody else about him either to make me believe otherwise and I think that intuition that women have particularly is really important and I also think like I mean if you are somebody who's listening to this and you do have that thought like you just think well everyone cheats that is such like I cannot tell you how important it is for you to assess the relationships that you're choosing in your life

if you think it is normal because it's not fucking normal. It's just not and sometimes we accept it. How nice of a feeling it is to get to a point in a relationship where they can walk out of the room or go down to the shops and leave their phone on the table and you don't even want to – you're not even tempted to go through it. It doesn't even cross you – like Ben could go out for the entire day and leave his phone there and I wouldn't even have an inkling

of wanting to go through it because there's – and I can't tell you how safe you feel. You're like, wow, this is how it was always supposed to be. And it was strange because it was easy and right from the word go if and so many of my friends who are now in long-term relationships that they're really happy and comfortable in and feel very loved they kind of all say the same thing like it just feels easy I don't feel anxious or worried or upset or well I think going back to this thing that you said about intuition and how important it is to pay attention to your

intuition when we feel crazy or we feel unstable in a relationship it's usually when we are denying our intuition, when we are trying to ignore all the warning signs that your body's telling you that something is there and you're trying to suppress that. And that's when you feel like you don't have control. And it's because you don't have control or you're suspicious or all those feelings. And I think it's a very different feeling when you're in a relationship that just feels safe and communication is so freely shared. What would you say is for you and for Ben, the secret sauce, like how is it that you've managed to make eight and a half years of long distance relationships actually work? I mean, it sounds so basic bitch to say,

but it's communication. You know, every morning I would wake up to a morning babe or every night, like if he didn't message me good night, I'd be like, send out the fucking search party. Like something's wrong. But you know what you say communication, but I think it's not just that it's consistency because people have patterned behavior in relationships and it's when people are inconsistent and they become unreliable that that's when you feel like you don't know where you stand so communication is important but just as much as communication is important it is the consistency of communication it's not all hot or cold you're on then you're off that is such an important part of it and when you're looking for a long-term relationship and a life partner you

want someone who's reliable that's why the older you get you go wow actually the guy is like dependable and actually shows up when he says he's going to show up and does the things that he says he's going to do that is more attractive to me than like the guy in the leather jacket that's kind of you know like the excitement it's like no that wears away and dependability and compatibility and someone who is reliable and shows up when they say they're going to show up what I love about Ben one of the things I love most about Ben is that I have to adult for so much of my life living as an independent woman in Sydney when I go to Brisbane or and I spend time around him he adults he takes the load he just makes me feel really safe and I know that's

I've said the same thing on the podcast about Ben I was like the relief when you go because being on your own for so long it's like you don't realize it's a decision fatigue I like to call it adult fatigue like adulting is really hard and when I've had enough can come and be an adult to your adult I'll take it and you know if you live in the same house that looks very you know it's a similar idea but in different ways like yeah I'll do this tonight I'll do this I'll take that load off you whatever it is but when you don't live in the same house you don't feel that on a day-to-day basis sometimes but you know when I go up and when I see him and I spend time around him like I just feel like I can actually just relax and let all my walls down

and I think working in this industry sometimes you present such a it's a version of yourself in some aspect I can just literally just be myself and he genuinely says like no you don't need makeup you don't need this like just what are you doing that for like I don't care just relax be yourself and it's really nice to feel like you can be so vulnerable with someone and a place of acceptance. For people in a long distance relationship, what are some things that have helped you or some tips? I'm talking like, do you guys do your date nights? What are some things that have helped you over the years? It's quality time. And I think for us where we are so often on the road, we really just value spending time together whether it's on the couch or watching

something on Netflix or just quality time in whatever that looks like. It doesn't matter what it is. It definitely doesn't have to be getting dressed up and going on a nice day out. It is just literally spending that one-on-one time together and I think you know that consistent communication like we were saying before is very important like what are your bare minimums like I really want you to check in with me in the morning and in the night so like I kind of know that you're okay and I think without ever asking each other to do so we just kind of always update each other on our day all day every day we use Facebook Messenger which is so random so I use Facebook for nothing else that's cute and because he's one of those idiots that doesn't have an iphone so the

green message of death like google pixel oh it's the best camera in the world oh whatever every single person who has a google pixel that's what they say it's got a great you're not a fucking photographer pal i know to my stepdad who's like it's so good i'm like no one cares ben is a boomer as well he's a closet boomer like everything seriously everything about him is he's just like 300 emojis oh my god but we so we communicate all day every day and without ever being like I want to know what you're doing at all times we just go how's your day going yep done this done this going to this next so if you don't hear from each other for four five hours I know he's training or I know he's driving or I kind of roughly know where he is so there's never that

fear or that worry of kind of you know where the other person is and just falling naturally into those good habits I suppose that do help make you feel comfortable well you've made it sound impeccably easy and flawless, but I'd love to know the hard times. And I'm going to say this because this is something that I do, but I find myself every couple of weeks starting an argument that's probably not there or being a bit emotional or I'm picking at things, right? And I know I'm being unreasonable and deep down, I know I'm being unreasonable, but then I have to really think to myself, why am I doing this? Am I feeling like I need more attention? Am I just getting antsy because we're not together. And then we'll have a little argument. And then he'll point out the

fact he's like, I don't know, he's so good. He's like, I don't understand why you're doing this. And I'm like, me either. I was like, I don't know why I'm doing this. Every three or four weeks, like clockwork. Do you find that? Or are you guys literally just perfect? No, no, no. I mean, for the longest time, we didn't fight at all. And as the relationship progressed, and obviously it did become apparent that this was going to be the forever, the big conversations come out every now and again. And it would be things that are probably festering under the skin for you long term like the worry of but when are we actually going to be together and for me before we got engaged is this actually forever because I don't have a ring on my finger

and I don't care about a lot of these sort of you know staples of a normal relationship inverted commas but I think this is something that would make me feel secure that I am investing all of my time and energy into something that's going somewhere so and it's like with everything I think you know we as women we take on a lot and then the tiniest little thing that tips you over the edge and it would be something ridiculous like I don't know you didn't say hello at this exact time I wanted you to or you didn't do this and and it tips everything over the edge and for a pragmatic male like our Ben's by the sound of it they just look at the exact moment that you got mad and discover why you're mad I don't understand and you're like it's not about the dishwasher it's

about this this this and this yeah and it's you know inevitably things bubble up and if you know I try to let a lot of things slide because it's very hard to argue when you're not in the same the same city as well it can be not a proactive way to actually hash out big issues but no I just think accepting that you know every couple fights every couple has you know arguments and it's how you work through them that's important and when you're in a long distance relationship I feel like you shelve a lot of that shit sometimes because it doesn't feel worth having the argument or easy to have the argument which you would be able to flesh out very easily in person so I think just you just got to kind of accept that there will be days that you know you are really missing

them. And for me, it was around that three week itch is when I would get really, it would set in that, oh no, I'm in this for a long period now without you. And that's upsetting. But at the end of the day, you are worth the distance and the missing you. And I've made that decision. Did you think at any point, well, when we get married, then we'll be together? Or were you very much entering into that part of like the next phase of your relationship? And you're like, no, I know that it's going to stay the same. I know we're going to do long distance and we're going to be a married couple during long distance. Yeah, that was kind of where my head was at, just knowing how long he had left of his career and what I wanted to do. But for us, it's more

the kids. The kids is the thing that will mean that we both have to sort of reside in the same place for a while. And during COVID, actually, quite luckily, in the end, our wedding got pushed back three times within, I think, the same year. So instead of getting married in June 2020, we got married in February 21. But it meant in that first lockdown, that was the first time that we'd ever spent like four months together in the same house but it was actually a really nice little reminder and I suppose proven time of like we can actually live under the same roof together and thank god imagine if you did eight and a half years then you're finally living together and you're like a fucking hell he doesn't put the lid on the meal yeah that's me he's the honeymoon

boyfriend who was so good when he was overseas well I actually think I'm that person though because Ben is like a domestic goddess so I think I'm the one that probably was like I always say it was like staying at a hotel when I go stay at Ben's place because everything's done and I leave it like a bomb and then I come back the next week and everything's clean and washed and done and I'm the useless one so I think yeah it was actually nice to have that time together albeit super stressed about the wedding and you know work and when was that coming back but actually knowing that we could live under the same roof together not that I ever had any reservations about getting married but I think just having that time together was actually great

And I think if you can get through that period of time together, you can probably get through most things because that was a lot. Well, speaking about kids, we saw each other quite a few years ago. It was just after I had had Marley and we were at a Fitbit event thing. Yes, you guys were working on that together. I remember that. Ben and I were both working on it. That was the only time that I had met Ben.

You and most people. I've met him more than some of your friends. I haven't met him. There you go. So I had just had Marley. I think Marley was like six weeks old at the time. And I think when you're a first time mom, we're so quick to talk about all the bad bits of being a parent, like the fact that you haven't slept or, you know, the sore nipples,

all the things we all know what the bad bits are. But I was very conscious at the time that they were the only things that I had been told. And at the six week mark, despite the sleep debt and everything else, I was truly loving it. And I think I was genuinely surprised by how much I loved being a mom versus what I thought the experience was going to be from what people had told me. And I remember saying that to Ben.

And Ben was like, you need to go and speak to Aaron. You need to go and say all this to Aaron because at the time you weren't really sure whether kids were part of what you wanted in your future and he seemed like he was the one that was really pushing that idea. Boy has babies on the brain, let me tell you. He is like if he could grow a womb and have a child, we would have three already.

Okay, he's like he's Matt. He's Matt. He's Matt Persona 5. And I think had we been, I don't know, maybe if he'd been retired or if he'd been in the same place or maybe he could be living in Sydney with me it is something that maybe I would have ventured down earlier than what I have but yeah I think kids wasn't something that was ever forefront of my mind like as you said I wasn't even really sure if it was something that I wanted to do but then having met Ben and Ben

being very upfront with I absolutely want to be a dad and me sort of seeing in him you know all of his beautiful qualities and I do you know you would be an amazing dad and I want that for you and I think I want to have children with you I don't want to have children with just anybody but the relationship I have with you I said yeah I think this is something that I want for us in our future and I would never have married him if I didn't want to go at least try to go down that path with him as well knowing how important it was to him and they're big conversations to have up front obviously when you're in a long-distance relationship too. So what does that look like then for you guys in terms of being in a long-distance relationship I know you said

earlier that you didn't want to make that decision because the full brunt of it would have fallen on you, you lived in Sydney, you're still trying to manage a career and managing a very full-time career, but then also the full brunt of parenting would fall on you. It's not like it's an even split. What were those conversations like for the two of you? I think that's why it kind of never really progressed beyond those conversations for so many years, like eight and a half years we've been together because he could see and could realise, particularly coming from the background of being an athlete, there are a lot of athletes who have full-time partners who are carers of the children and that's also of a necessity of if they want to see dad they have

to be able to travel around with them wherever they are in the world otherwise you go for six months on it like the guys who are overplaying the ashes right now they're away for four months imagine if you didn't see your young children for four months you know those women are traveling with them living out of it's not a glamorous life at all and I know that there's a misconception that oh you know wag life and whatnot obviously it's a privilege to not have to work to be able to pay the mortgage but it is a very lonely life to pick up your stuff and travel around after a person and live in hotel rooms and and be that support not only for the children who are out of their comfort zone and moving around cities every couple of days but it's not easy and it wasn't a

sacrifice that I was comfortable enough to make well you end up having to be the second most important one in your relationship because your relationship or your purpose becomes around supporting your partner's passion and that is a huge sacrifice for someone to make especially if they're career driven. I'm a pretty indecisive person with lots of my life like I always second guess a lot of the decisions that I make but one thing I've always been sure about is what I want to do with my career and where I want to go and that's the thing when I'm really hyper focused on something like it doesn't matter when anyone says that's going to be what my priority is and I've always like pushed and pushed and pushed and and put all of my focus into that so I think

knowing where I'm at I would never have wanted to have brought a child into the world with my focus being where it was because I don't think that's you know I think that's fair if you can't you know open your life and try and sort of I suppose welcome that that sharing of the load in it's not a path that I wanted to go down. I think it's a controversial opinion probably for a lot of people but I think it's something you and I have probably bonded over a few times and that's this idea of what if I have a child and then everything I've worked so hard for my career stops what if that's taken away from me what if the opportunities stop coming because I'm not as available I'm not as accessible I have to go overseas and be my partner and I haven't been in a relationship for eight

years it's still something I think about because I mean people's priorities in life are different right I do prioritize my career a lot not necessarily over my relationship but it's a very important part of my life because it's what fills my cup and it's where I get my satisfaction from is working hard and achieving my goals and things like that is it something that you are still battling with now as the relationship progresses and the years go on and we all know that as women we have biological clocks and I know you're taking those steps and we'll speak about that but is it something you still battle with daily every day and the problem is is like biology our biology as women hasn't caught up with our evolution in society so for so many women this is

just on a different a different version of whatever you do for your career like we all kind of feel this I think at some point is you feel like in your 30s everything that you've worked for is finally starting to come to fruition and you're you're working your way through whatever career path you've taken then all of a sudden this is the time that you know your body's knocking on the door going yeah but if you want to have kids it's now or never and you're going this is just feels like the worst time to take a step back but inevitably if I don't do it I may miss the window completely and and it is so hard and it keeps me up at night like constantly I'm so worried about missing the boat but then I'm so worried about letting go of everything that I've worked

for like I you know this is all I've ever wanted to do with my life and you know coming from Cairns a small town up in North Queensland and living in Sydney and grinding and and making it work like that's I'm so proud of that and it makes me it makes me cry because it's it's um because yeah you don't want to miss out on this huge part of of your life which is obviously you know and um as we'll get into it's not going to be easy for us to have a child um yeah it's a really hard balance and you just I don't know like I struggle with this every day and I feel so guilty as well for holding back my partner from a life that he so you know very much wants but then also knowing within myself like if I do it before I'm ready I won't forgive myself either and just like I see

you completely because these girls know too i'm gonna cry now too but it's like it is already there it is all i think about as well like i'm 36 um i'm going through fertility treatment again at the moment but um every it keeps me up at night when you say that i'm like fucking i hear you because i every single night i'm like if i don't do this i might never ever have it and it consumes every part of your brain and it's hard to explain that to people sometimes but I know for you it's not going to be easy like you just said talk us through through that and I only say talk us through that because I know you have spoken about it before yeah so it's really funny isn't it I think we talk about women's intuition I think I kind of always knew it wasn't going to be easy and maybe

that's been a big roadblock for me when it comes to getting my head around having children I feel like oh shit did I always know that there was something wrong and maybe it wasn't going to be I've heard a lot of women say this before I have a girlfriend who had a really really hard time she now has a baby and she said so much of her saying I don't think I want to have kids actually came from this innate feeling of like I don't think I can and it was almost a protection mechanism more so than what it was how she truly felt yeah I guess 100% I think we convince ourselves all the time of things that I know I don't really want that anyway but it's you just protecting yourself from hurt yeah from hurt and from a future that you kind of maybe deep down believe

is true or maybe my body understands to be true but basically you know i can't have kids naturally it's going to have to be ivf so last year after finding out that i had the conditions that i have which for me is um a severe version of pco which is not to be confused with pcos it's basically i have too many eggs but who knew that was a problem i'm bloody eastern bunny i i never have i am i'm you're like i can't win i've got too many too many still not enough but like crap quality which is a whole other thing so yeah so i you know basically i'm not able to have kids naturally i don't have a cycle there's all these things going on with my body so tell us just sorry a bit more about what that actually means because i there'll be probably a lot of people at home right now that

are like what's the problem you got too many yeah so if you have too many eggs and you have an overload of hormone every month your pituitary gland never gets the cue to ovulate and if you don't get the cue to ovulate obviously you can't get pregnant because there's never an egg but you also don't get a period so basically once I came off the pill after 16 years of being on it I never got a period and I went to see a fertility doctor and I got all the tests and everything done under the sun and I fully expected them to come back and say don't train so much like you know pull back on this do this and that you know let's bring no no I actually had a condition which meant that I was probably always like this but the pill masked it through a constant dosage of

hormones i think a lot of people have this thought that like the pill creates issues there's a fear that if you're in the pill for a really long time that it's gonna you're gonna have these side effects of it and it's not so much that it creates issues in you it's that it masks those issues and then you're left dealing with the things that maybe you could have dealt with when you were in your early 20s but you're dealing with them at a time when you've just started thinking about well now i want to get pregnant so i've come off the pill 100 and the reason why i went to get all these tests done in the first place it was actually from bloody tv show so i just done was just signing up to do SAS Australia and getting all of my psychological tests and my

medical tests done. And I thought at the time, oh, fang that AMH test in while you're at it, just because it'd be like, well, I was 32. And I thought, you know, I don't want kids anytime soon. But then Ben was so, you know, avidly wanting to sort of go down that path. He's like, but let's just like see where you're at just in case. And I was like, yeah, okay, fine. Like I'll do the test. And because I was on birth control at the time, I actually got a really wrong reading from my AMH. It came back as the very low end of normal or the high end of poor, as Ben liked to put it. So I should go and do something about that ASAP. Yeah. So based on that low level, which ended up being incorrect, I booked, well, no, I didn't. Ben did all of this.

He found the doctor, he booked the appointment, he did everything for me. He's like, just, just go, just go to this appointment. You just got to turn up. You just got to show up, babes. All right. All right. So I went to see a fertility doctor and when he went in with the ultrasound, the internal ultrasound to look at my ovaries and my uterus and just check that you know everything was there and looking good he's like ah i'm like that's not good what he goes oh what did you say your amh was i said oh it was like a 6.2 and he goes i'd like to redo that test because what i'm seeing here doesn't marry up and my ovaries are basically full of eggs like honeycomb and that is indicative of a high amh not a low amh and so as all things transpired along with a couple of

other nice little genetic situations I've got going on it turned out that I had a severe case of PCO and this constant Easter bunny hoarding of eggs all year round meant that I never ever got a cycle so so yeah he goes like you know have you had a period in the last year I said not not one he's like okay I can see no sign that you've ovulated as well every time but he's checked me we can try and put you on ovulation drugs when you are ready to have a child but I worry that you will ovulate like eight eggs at once and you will become optimum oh my god and i'm like that ain't happening you're like that's not the desired outcome he's like triplets or worse i'm like worse than triplets he's like well oh my god it looks like you're about to ovulate eight eggs at the

moment i was like but also so dangerous like no one consciously is going into that as an option for parenthood that's except the optimum except the optimum i mean that didn't work out great for her no I didn't and you know I'm a tiny person and Ben's six foot four I don't know what eight of those oh my god imagine you wouldn't make it imagine uh but yeah so we had to go down the path of freezing embryos so last year I went through four rounds of YBF egg freezing again I'm not mentally at a point where I feel like I can deal with a transfer at the moment we're sort of trying to sort through when that will be but as I now know with fertility the younger you are to do anything about it, the better. So it took four rounds to get six healthy embryos, which are on

ice now. But even at my age of 33, when I did it, I actually had 11. So five were genetically no good. Five were tested and five were no good. So how many embryos do you have now? I've got six. It took four rounds to get there. So it was a lot. And then that whole process for anyone who's going through it my heart reaches out to you because it is such a mind fuck such a body stress it was just a whole new world open to me and and an understanding of my gosh like I always thought it was going to be hard mentally for me to get my head around but now I know physically it's going to be so difficult there's a lot and I'm still sorting through it what do you see for yourself now that now that you have a bit of a plan in place and you understand where your fertility

is at I guess like having the knowledge is power and being able to make decisions for your life what's next for the two of you fertility's so hard because you're managing expectations as well of your partner who perhaps doesn't really understand the gravity of of what it means so you know ben thinks like great we've got our embryos we're good to go and that's not necessarily the case like ivf is not a guarantee that this will work there's still a very high chance that this won't amount to a live pregnancy and a live birth like there's so many different things that that go into it and and for me because none of this will ever be quote unquote normal I actually think for someone like me it would have been so much better if we just actively decided to give

it a go and see what happens and the decision of when to try was taken out of my hands also when to have a baby was taken out of my hands now everything is so planned I'm going to need a six week lead up before I do a transfer because they're going to put me on drugs to bring on a period put me on drugs to bring on ovulation and then do a transfer and then hope it works like it's such a long a long process so I'm now looking at when does that fit in with my schedule and work and and the cost of it the cost is insane it's so funny just listening to you say this and I know like my relationship's new but I'm 36 so it's sped up but literally yesterday to Keisha and Laura I said it'd almost be easier if I just fell pregnant like I I almost want to accidentally not

accidentally just fall pregnant so that I don't have to go through the this process and also for you to say you're an indecisive person so many decisions have to be made for you to go down this process then it loops back to being in a long-distance relationship if ben's never here do you go through this alone you know what's that whole it's a whole nother support network that you're going to need so last year i i fly a lot for work anyway let alone making sure that my relationship continues and i work overseas a lot but last year i did 136 flights and a lot of those had to do with fertility treatment as well because I chose to do my treatment in Brisbane where there were friends and family that could pick me up from the hospital because down in

Sydney I've got some you know beautiful friends as well but no one that I felt like I could you know demand come and pick me up or drop me off or whatever it was so when you go through a fertility cycle to to harvest eggs or whatever it may be you're looking at sort of around five or six appointments across a two-week period so if you're living in another city as well you're constantly having to fly up for those appointments and adding that in on top of everything else has been really difficult in terms of Ben being around for it he could be anywhere now because he's done a he's done a sample he's got that frozen away he doesn't actually have to be there for any of it of course I want him to be there for it and he wants to be there for it too but the reality is

is whenever we try to do this there'll be a lot of time that I'll be spending on my own and having to lean on other people around me because my partner will be away and he has to be away because it's his job and it's really expensive and you know we need him to work we need you know so it's yeah it's it is it does make it really difficult and it just adds another layer of complexity upon what's already a really complex situation it also makes me think of like women who live in rural australia who like it's not feasible for them to just go and be able to get the treatment they need to travel you know it's not just people who are doing long distance who are so isolated by this it's happens to so many women across the country does ben like is there a plan now for

him in terms of his career in terms of like aging out of being able to play or where he's at i guess and you say you know he could get injured things could happen outside of the plan but does that exist for you guys a bit of a structure around well what's his timelines oh absolutely i mean biology for him is also a factor as an athlete there will be a time his age their shoulders yeah yeah oh boy his back is no good after 18 years of professional cricket but obviously he does have a an end point in his career like there will be a time that he can't play anymore I think knowing how passionate I am about my career and not wanting to ever have resentment I want him to play for as long as he can because unlike for him we do know that there is a definite end date and

there's no coming back and playing beyond that point and I think that's one part of doing what you know we all do in the entertainment industry that actually serves our relationship well is like I afford him the same grace as what he affords me is that, you know, I want you to live your dream for as long as you can, because hopefully I can fight my way back from whatever sabbatical I take if I, you know, hope to God I ever do have a child one day. But for him, there is a definite end and that's it. So there is a timeline for him. I think given the age that we're both at, it's going to be a sooner rather than later on my part to at least begin to try. This could be a very, very long journey, even from this moment that we start to try. But yeah, it's a matter of

whatever the information is available when we're sort of, you know, forced to make the decision as to what that home base looks like. But obviously, yeah, when you've got kids, you want that stability. Something that I guess it's something I learned myself because I had so much fear going into being a mum. And the thing that was my biggest fear was that my career would end and it makes me upset thinking about it because I remember just after I'd had Marley and she was maybe three weeks old and I had a really big fight with Matt and I was like you don't get it your life goes on as normal and everything for me has changed now and I was like it doesn't exist in the same capacity and I think was a big factor for me for not wanting to have

kids because I was like well all the stuff that I want is going to stop and I guess what I've realized since having children is that some of the things I wanted have changed and I want different things, but it hasn't stopped my career. And I think it's part of that is because I have an incredibly supportive partner who also parents alongside. And when you have a partner who shows up to parenting 50, 50, it's fucking incredible the amount of stuff you can get done as a mom, because you've got someone who's actually doing the load. If you're in a relationship where the full brunt of the parenting falls on you, it's almost impossible to continue to forge a career. but it also for me was a bit of a rebirth in my career as well in terms of the type of things I

wanted to be doing the type of conversations it opened me up to a new audience and I mean this in terms of entertainment and media because I now see so many mums who go on to do really incredible things after they would have thought that their career would end because they became mums and I don't think it has the same impact for a lot of women as what it used to I think the world has changed so much and you know I think this this fear of having to take a sabbatical and then fight your way back to the top I'm sure it affects some people but I do think there are so many women who actually it transforms their careers equally as so you've been a prime example for me having that fear of everything will stop me taken away from me you've been a prime example that it's like the

opposite like you've managed to flourish and do tenfold to what you were doing so it is something that I think a lot of women are scared about but it's not necessarily something we should be scared but it does come back to and I can't say it enough because I don't want anyone listening to this who feels because I you know sometimes I think about what I do in terms of my career and having kids and I know that it's a bit of an unrealistic standard that for some people they're like how the fuck do you manage to do all that I can barely get out of bed in the day you know and take care of my kids and still find time to have a shower and wipe my ass because I've got to wipe two other kids asses but that is and I always stink why is my mom but honestly it comes

back to this like having someone who shows up in the relationship and parents alongside you because so many people talk about wanting to have kids but they don't talk about how are we going to parent what does that split look like what do our lives look like when we actually have the kids in the world and that's I think a massive conversation that misses from a lot of relationships it's always about wanting to have children but what does life look like when they're here and I think being a little bit older as well and women having the sorts of conversations the real in-depth raw versions of motherhood that I am privy to versus the conversations that men have with each other sometimes totally that also sets you back because I have a much more realistic idea

of what it will look like and what it will entail whereas you know the boys hey mate how's little one yes I got best thing ever yeah cool and that's kind of where it ends whereas if you know for me I think because we do have these beautifully raw you know conversations about the reality of being a mother particularly early on it makes me go oh god how am i going to fit that in with everything else and then you know brit and i dealing with the prospect of but where do you have it as well oh totally the actual where is the home base and where both of us are going to parent from it just yeah there's a lot of variables in there to sort of sort through and at the end of the day you know i feel very blessed at least i know that ben is going to be that sort of a parent like he's he's

incredibly doting and all he wants he says is to have a coffee in one hand a husky in the other hand and the baby on the front pack and walking down the street i'm like that's great babe but like when are you gonna retire on a serious note if you because i really felt what you said before if you need to have these things in sydney and you need someone to pick you up please let me know because and vice versa i ubered myself to i'll never forget i ubered myself to my egg freezing and i couldn't believe how much pain i was in i couldn't even take a step because i had hypovarian syndrome i sat in the back of the uber and every bump he went over was like agony and i remember just being like i wish i was with someone right now that i could just be like

can you just chill i need to plank in the back it was so horrible i'm gonna be a support person while i bend her away you were like it's the things you have to think about right like who's gonna help me at that time so absolutely you can call me but also i feel like i think you didn't think it was going to be anywhere near as bad like like we're here keisha could help you i could have helped you like i don't want people listening to this thinking you don't have people in your life who love you who would have been there i think you were very much like it's not going to be that bad and then you were surprised by how much it affected you it's not that it's not going to be that bad I just am a super bad person for asking for help I never want to ask anyone yeah

I completely relate to that like I never want to be in a position on anyone else or encroach on people's lives you know best friends have children and partners and jobs and I think when you're an empathetic person as well which I know that you are you just you're always worried about what everyone else is doing and impacting their lives rather than but actually that impacts you more because listening to this and knowing that my friends need help and they can't ask for it or even when it's offered it's not taken makes you feel shitty it makes you feel like you weren't there and hearing you say that that like that and not to make it about me but it makes me go I want to be there like that's not fair yeah a hundred percent but it's exactly what you said

it's like you know people have jobs and kids and it's like for something that can be done on your own like of course I can get in a car an uber to there of course you can so it's it's always that reason of like it's not the end of the world but it comes down to this independence it comes down to when you are someone who's been on your own and you've been doing it for yourself for so long i think so many women especially live with this i'm fine totally i'm fine mentality everything's fine and things could be on fire and things could be fucking not fine and we're so conditioned to say it's fine everything's fine that's the one reason why i did choose to share this part of my fertility story is because you know i was sick of pretending that i was fine when i was at work

and I'm a pretty open book and you know the more that we feel comfortably sharing this with the people closest around us because so many people do go through this alone because they feel like they don't want to be in a position or they feel embarrassed or you know whatever it is like the number of people who obviously have opened up since as well that I've shared this and sort of come and said to me oh you know I'm going through it as well and don't know who I can talk to or whatever it may be like you know we can be those people for anyone who's listening right now i see you and hear you and and i know the inner turmoil that you're going through on an hourly basis sometimes well a big just before we wrap up i think it's really important to say that you

advocating for this and uh you know being so vulnerable and open and talking about it it also helps other women realize that they're not a failure and i think a big part of when women go through ibf and can't carry a baby we spoke to chloe fisher recently and a big part of that is women feel like a failure when their body doesn't do what they want to do they feel like they're letting their partner down they feel like they're letting themselves down but the more people talk about it it's more apparent that it's not that you're failing but everyone's journey is a little bit different and you realize that it's you're not alone and you're not the only one whose body isn't working quote unquote really admirable and great that you're talking about and you're helping

a lot of people and I imagine you're going to continue to share that journey as it unfolds and people can go and find you at Erin V. Holland. Erin, thank you so much for coming and being a part of the pod and, like, I mean, for sharing how to navigate long distance but also just for your vulnerability around your own journey towards motherhood, whatever that looks like. We've loved having you. No, thank you so much.

It's a true honour as an OG lifer. Yeah, so happy to chat to you guys and, yeah, keep doing what you're doing. I love it. Twice a week. I think we should have three times a week, four times. Let's go. All right, it is time for our suck in our suite,

our highlight and our lowlight of each and every week. My – okay, I'm going to go first. Well, I gathered that, yes. My suck for the week is this was my suite. I went down and I saw my mum and my stepdad. We went and stayed down in Wollongong with my nephew and my niece as well, so my sister. Family weekend.

Yeah, my sister had left her kids with Nana and Papa and because I was parenting alone, I was like, do you know where I'm going to go? I'm going to go down and see Nana and Far. So we went down to Wollongong. Yeah, we call him Far, Nana and Far. so we went down to Wollongong and spent a night with Nana and Faha but somehow my laptop got left in Wollongong somehow Nana thought my laptop was her laptop and it ended up in the kitchen

not in my handbag and I got three quarters of the way back to Sydney which if I mean if you don't know where Wollongong is from Sydney it's almost a two-hour drive so I was about an hour and a half back and I got a call from mum and she was like I think your laptop is here well I think the best part of this story is what you haven't mentioned yet is that you didn't leave it but your mum took it out of your bag because she thought it was hers. Not knowing that all Apple laptops look the same. Mom was like, oh, why is my laptop in Laura's bag? And so there it was. Not in my bag anymore. It's made me realize how anxiously attached I am to my laptop. It's kind of like being anxiously attached to your phone. Going without it for one day, like all the time,

I was like, oh my God, where's my laptop? I need to do this work. I even messaged Britt and I was like, can I borrow your laptop for the morning on Saturday? Because I have work that I need to do. Britt was like, no, because I'm also anxiously attached to my laptop. no that was actually it was the worst timing normally it wouldn't matter this one weekend I had all I've got this big pitch that I'm doing this week and I actually had to work on my laptop the whole weekend which never happens I normally would have been like you could take it for the weekend but it was the one weekend I was like I actually I was like you've got a one hour limit but I was like too hard I'll just wait for my laptop to come back but anyway my suite for the

week I feel like I've already rattled off some of my suites obviously going and seeing my my mom and my stepdad. I also spent a gorgeous weekend with the girls and we got to like do really cute mummy. We have girls day is what we call it. And it was adorable, but I never get to just watch TV for the last two weeks. Last week, I recommended watching The Deepest Breath. This week, I don't know what happened. It was like Sunday night or Saturday night. And I was like, you know what? I've got a little hour to watch some TV. And I put on Alone, the new season, series five. And I reckon I watched almost the whole thing. I think I have an episode to go. It's so fucking good and then it got me thinking i was like oh could i go and live in the wilderness and

do alone and you absolutely could not you just panicked over an hour without your laptop five hundred thousand dollars i was like yeah could i could i win like i don't know could i go and hunt build myself a cave laura you would not in mongolia a day i reckon i would last a night i'd get so scared i can't even be alone by myself in the house with the kids exactly i go and check the doors and get a knife and sleep with it under my pillow as if you're going into the wilderness for a month no you're not there's not gonna be any murderers out there just bears oh which is the murderer of the bush alone is very good if you want to watch it's on netflix i loved it okay well my suck is actually something i watched as well my suck i recommended hijack last week a

week before with idris elba hijack i got so many people messaged me about that i recommend hijack i know all of you are watching it but now i'm on the idris elba train because he's so hot and he's so beautiful and I also spoke about this other show that he's in called Luther that I started like a couple of years ago it's a detective show right and there's a lot of crime that goes on I started re-watching it again because once Hijack finished I realized I really missed Idris Elba and I felt like we had a connection so I wanted to go back and watch something else that he's in so I started watching Luther it has got to be the scariest show I've probably ever seen I would not recommend it unless you are obsessed with crime and you're okay with watching some stuff because

it pushes the boundaries of horrific crime and he has to try and solve these murders and it's really really confronting but I can't stop watching it and now I've started having nightmares so I've been trying to put Delilah on my bed to sleep with which it's for two years she's had a no sleeping on my bed rule except when she's at Keisha's and Keisha lets her do whatever she wants I've been putting it in my room because I'm like I'm actually scared so I bring her in and she just fucks off she doesn't want to know me she just goes back out and sleeps on her own she's like don't use me for your protection i know what's going on here so my suck this week is like the nightmares that i have induced on myself by watching this show but i can't stop watching

it i'm three seasons in and i'm like why am i doing this i have nightmares every night this is why you have terrible because like you say that you love listening to true crime you say that you love watching shit like who was the guy with the glasses dharma jeffrey dharma like love this shit and then you can't sleep you actually can't sleep you need to stop it's not good for you start watching the care bears or something yeah a little bit cocoa melon my sweet is I got a postcard it was from my niece she sent it from Queensland from Seaweld and it was to Aunty Brittany and Uncle Ben and the address was Scotland I said Aunty Brittany and Uncle Ben in Scotland how did it make it all the way to Bondi they rerouted it uh no there was obviously

that's what she'd written and then obviously my brother had written over the top the actual address but it was really cute I got a real life postcard and when I spoke to her about it it was talking about all the stuff she did in SeaWorld and all the rides she went on and stuff. And I called her to say thank you. And I asked her about it and she goes, oh, I wasn't really there. She just made it up. But I was like, what do you mean? She just pretended that she was there and was having heaps of fun and then sent it to me. That's weird. I think it was a thing they had to do at school, which is like pretend, where would you want to be that's somewhere fun and tell someone in your life that you love where you are? It was like an imagination thing. So that's my

postcard. And that's my sweet this week is, and this is how I realized I think I might want kids because I'm actually starting to get that maternal pull when I look at cute things that kids do. I'm like, oh, kids can be cute. That's my story. That is it from us. If you loved the episode and got anything out of speaking about long distances and Erin, go on, leave us a review.

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