Love Lives - Sacrifice in relationships

Episode Date: November 29, 2019

This week Olivia is joined by TV presenter Grace Woodward and poet Charly Cox to discuss sacrifice in relationships.What lengths do we go to for love? How much of ourselves should we compromise for another person? And what happens when we start changing core parts of our personalities and our appearances to suit their desires?How marriage and childbirth are two of the biggest sacrifices women can make and how having an absent father can hugely impact the way we behave in relationships are also up for discussion.You can follow Grace on Instagram herehttps://www.instagram.com/gracewoodward/You can follow Charly on Instagram here and her new poetry anthology, Validate Me, is available now.https://www.instagram.com/charlycox1/Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/millenniallove. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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Visit Peloton at onepeloton.ca. Hello and welcome to Millennial Love, a podcast from The Independent focusing on everything to do with sexuality, relationships, identity, and more. We touch on a wide variety of topics, ranging from how to have feminist sex to how dating has changed in the post-MeToo era. I'm your host Olivia Petter and today on the program I'm joined by poet Charlie Cox and former stylist turned body positivity activist Grace Woodward to discuss sacrifice in relationships. Enjoy the show. Hello. Hello. We should say that more sexily. Hello. Hello. We should say that more sexily. Hello. Hi.

So today's discussion centres around sacrifice in relationships. So Charlie, I'm going to start by asking you about this because I read your poetry collection last night and the lead poem seems to be particularly about this topic but not in the conventional sense. Do you mind if I quote a few lines from your poem okay so uh one of the a few of the lines read like this fascinate me as i fabricate me salivate as i let you navigate me masturbate at how inadequate i find me no idea of what i want

or who i am sans vanity so i wondered in reference that, which parts of ourselves do you think we often sacrifice in relationships to kind of create this like optimised self for another person? I think more so recently, I've come to realise that for so long, I sacrificed the truth of who I was as someone with a mental illness illness because I was so frightened of that not being sexy or attractive which is kind of hilarious because obviously that is not sexy or attractive nor should it be um because that's ridiculous but I spent so much time trying to keep that away because I was so terrified that somebody would find that disgusting or a bit weird or inconvenient or like oh god do I have to deal with that it sort of sounds a bit more like

I'm looking for a carer not a boyfriend which isn't true um and within all of those insecurities I think for a really long time I have pushed myself down into this completely different version of me that ironically actually isn't more put together or more sane or more happy in the relationship. I'm actually probably doing things that are more conventionally mad or a bit stupid or insane and on the whole feel a lot more miserable. bit stupid or insane and on the whole feel a lot more miserable so yeah I think I I used to I'm making a really big deal of it at the moment to not have that as a sacrifice anymore so how do you are you very honest with the people that you date at the beginning you quite up front about it and you say look these are the things that I struggle with on a daily basis? Well, the curse and the great thing, I suppose, of being online and being so painfully honest and having a book that talks about so many really dark, depressing things

is most boys now already know before they've met me that I struggle with lots of different things. So it now is a case of first dates and I sort of have to sit and assume that they've already read something about me or if they're that bothered by it they have the means to to learn and explore what's wrong with my brain um for those who aren't familiar with your work, would you mind briefly explaining, to use your quote, what's wrong with your brain? My name is Charlie Cox and I have bipolar 2 disorder, PTSD, anxiety and depression. I'm a barrel of laughs. Anyone fancy me yet? So do you really get, you go on dates with people and they know the stuff about you already?

So do you really get, you go on dates with people and they know the stuff about you already? Yeah, and it's, it becomes, or now it's definitely become a thing of, a safe feeling of, well, I'm going to assume you might already know this. And if you're still here, it means that you're probably not a wanker because you haven't sought issue in it or you haven't thought, oh God, what does that mean for me? But she's a bit broken. Yeah, or she's got baggage. Oh oh god i've heard that one many times baggage is such a horrible word especially when it's not especially when it's something about your personality like and something about like a mental health condition like how is that how can that be described as baggage yeah it's absolutely not baggage the stupid things and the regrettable things that I've done off the back of my mental illness,

probably baggage, but the thing itself, no, it's just a quirk in the chemistry of me. And why do you think you have sort of, I mean, for obvious reasons, but why do you think you have squashed certain parts of your real personality? Why have you felt pressured, do you think, to do that when you have squashed certain parts of your real personality? Why have you felt pressured, do you think, to do that when you date people? Is it in the first stages, specifically? Yeah, I am a massive romantic. And, I mean, I'm a poet, so I feel like that goes without saying. But I love the idea of love.

And ever since I was a little girl I couldn't wait to have a boyfriend and I wanted to be fancied and you know all these things definitely have problematic roots and probably some some daddy issues and and just you know being a girl in a very confusing world um and then because of that feeling, I think I've just been so willing to do anything that makes me seem appealing. You know, I'm so desperate to be accepted and loved by men. I'm really not doing myself any favours.

I think it really, no, this is why I wanted to talk about this because I think when you're dating someone or even when you're in a long-term relationship, it really brings any anxieties you have about the person you are whether it's a mental illness or whether it's a flaw you have you perceive that you have about the way that you look all of that really comes up when you start dating someone because you feel pressured to be this perfect version of yourself I wanted to ask you about dating someone because you feel pressured to be this perfect version of yourself. I wanted to ask you about this grace because you obviously speak a lot about

how when you worked in fashion, it changed your relationship with your body and gave you toxic body image and made you more conscious of the way you looked, as I'm sure anyone who works in fashion would you know experience so I wondered if you know if you think when we meet someone we can feel inclined to change the way we look as well in order to suit another person's tastes and how much of that do you think is a normal part of meeting someone and getting to know someone you, like wanting to dress up for a date and wanting to look a certain way. And then how much of that is actually, again, sacrificing who we really are and putting on a front. I mean, I think there's a difference between putting on a front and women being empaths. And we all do that thing about, well, I want them to like me, so I'm going to do things

that they like. It's like a visual version of gifting. You know, it's like, you know, oh, yes, I'm going to please you. But guys do it too. This isn't just something that women do. Guys often think, oh, well, she was she like that or, you know, and I think that I think for the bad experiences a lot of us have had with men is we tar men with the same brush that they're all just like bullish unthinking uncaring yeah uh sort of animals and it's like well actually guys toxic masculinity doesn't help men at all um and I think that guys also want to we all want to please each other that's a part of attraction so i don't think that's a bad thing i think it depends on how far your facade goes

in terms of if something's not going right doing that kind of you know the relationship is a seesaw it's trying to keep the balance always and if your seesaw is out of balance then you know it's not going right um but i think men do have um an ability to not see what's going on and women have this empath thing where they just keep giving and giving giving because that is in our nature that we just can't help that um it was another point i was going to make there but i can't remember what it is do you think the idea of because obviously the idea of wanting to always be giving and wanting to always be empathetic feeds into this idea of then changing ourselves you think because of that then women probably do make more sacrifices in relationships than men do I don't think so I thought I think it goes back to

the Cecil thing that I just said I think that when you find a balance you know when it's out of balance and you know when actually you're like that's that's a relationship that won't work when you find that kind of um sweet spot I think that's when you're kind of both relaxed enough to let the shutters down and not put up I think that having gone to sort of you know it's sort of some major emotional swings in my life through trauma and stuff um when my mum died um I immediately put all of my emotional shutters up and once you put one up they all go up you you know if you're trying not to feel pain you won't feel happiness either and I think that when if you're if you're facadeing so much if you're putting so much of a mask on the wheels will come off anyway you know for a long time in

my life actually I feel like I was trying to be like that best version of myself anyway regardless of if it was for a guy a relationship it was for actually just a coping mechanism to get through life and the wheels fall off at some point because you cannot keep up that facade for long enough so I think that you know these days I think it's much harder because you've got your insta life you know you've got your social media life and I think that unless you can let that down quite quickly with somebody it does keep it's like a hell of a lot of work to keep that up. And eventually, and when I, I guess an example of this would be, I married my husband when I was doing a lot of TV. And so it was like a sort of TV personality, sort of, I would never have called myself a celebrity.

But you know, people, if you're on TV, think you're a celebrity. And there's a whole kind of lifestyle that goes that way that you have to pedal to keep up, keep a profile up, keep seen. So it's always like what you're wearing, being photographed and all of this, and you have to live your life like that. And so my husband married that woman, whether he saw beneath that to the person I was, and now I'm not that person. I'm like, well, and we've done couples counseling recently.

And I was a bit like, well, and we've done couples counselling recently and I was a bit like, well, so what were you attracted in when we met? He was like, well, you know, you're fun and exciting. We're living this standard life. And I'm like, okay, now we live in, you know, the countryside and we have a six-year-old. You know, how does that relate?

Because you change. And I was like, I can't keep up with that because I'm not that person anymore. But that's the person he married. I was listening to someone talking about it the other day on a podcast about how within a relationship, you have sorts of lots of mini relationships. Because especially in something long term,

how long have you been married for? Seven years. And we've been dating on and off for like 12, 13 years. So within that, I'm sure there are many different stages yeah we split up for a year and a half you know and then you know for various reasons we got back together and you do and we've got to a stage now we're like seven year itch definitely and you get to that point where you're like oh wow that's just not a cliche that actually happens that you're like you know you sort of he's working super hard I'm working super hard

but I'm also bringing up a six-year-old and then you're like well you what you don't do is the relationship you do everything else and then you're suddenly like oh wow we haven't given each other much you know a relationship is a constant changing thing it really is how much do you think Charlie when you talk about owning your own map in your poem Overseas I thought to me that feels like you're talking about just like what Grace was saying shedding that facade and just owning who you are and you know making compromises but also at the same time just being you know autonomous in your relationship and feeling the confidence to do that, having the confidence to do that. Is that kind of what you meant by that phrase?

Yeah, that poem was written in LA and that sounds so bougie and so wanky. I was in LA writing poetry. You can stay home with my six-year-old if you want. Please. His name's Larkin. Of course I want to hang out with him. Yeah, I was away and I had gone for a man. I had gone for love. And that very quickly broke down. And ordinarily, you know, I was on my own. I was 5,000 miles away from the people that would ordinarily support me and look after me through a heartbreak. And something within me, instead of

feeling so downtrodden and upset and as though the universe was punishing me and that I was unlovable and here it was happening again. I was just this ugly fat troll in America, finally being uncloaked for who she really was. And do you know what? I cannot think of anything worse than getting on a flight home heartbroken. So why didn't I cancel my flight and stay for an extra four weeks and redo the trip? And there must be a reason why I've been brought here and that is something within me whether that was a learning or a teaching that had come in disguise as love or in disguise as a relationship or in disguise as a man there was something much bigger and more exciting there if I didn't wallow in the idea of loss that's really interesting

because it sounds like initially you went there obviously for this guy so that's sort of disguised as a sacrifice you're making you know you're changing up your whole life to move across the world for this person yeah how long had you known him for at the time? Nine months. But the last time we spoke, I had just met him. How funny. Wow, that's come full circle. I remember that. So for people who listened to Millennial Love last year, we had Charlie on as a guest to talk about her first collection,

She Must Be Mad. And I remember you telling me about this guy. That's so bizarre. So I'm really interested about how you decided to then sort of reclaim the point and I have I'm learning to be a lot softer on myself and that I am still quite young and I don't have all the answers and all of these are still relatively fresh and new experiences for me so I can't always pretend to myself that I've got wisdom to get me through it I don't sometimes it is just shit we've got to learn real quick here and I took myself out for dinner every night and I would sit

in bars on my own and I booked I mean it was it was very very very very expensive and I came home like god I'm gonna have to work really hard now. But I just did all these things that in my head, I thought I was going to do with him and went and did them on my own and met the most amazing people and really just found a version of me that unbeknownst to me during that relationship, I hadn't seen. unbeknownst to me during that relationship I hadn't seen and because I had sacrificed so much within that to the point of finding myself in America it then it was almost like a mass exodus of my body just suddenly going well you're now free of having to try like be this person that you have been trying to be for nine months and you're in a place where nobody knows what that is let alone you so why don't we just try it out like who are

you now who who is this person without having to to fake or lie and it was amazing it was yeah the best breakup I've ever gone through have you ever moved moved across the world, Grace, for a man? No. I feel like that's the most, when you think of sacrificing something, that's probably the biggest example. Somebody did, I used to work for the Erotic Review and when they came back out recently, they said, you know, what's the craziest thing you'd ever done for love? I think what they wanted it to be like is like,

oh, you know, we fucked in a JCB or something like that, you know. I was like, I got married you know it's like that is the insanest thing that you would do for love it's bonkers you sort of think that you are going to promise to be with this person for the rest of your life that's almost impossible these days anyway and actually I've been looking at when wedding vows that whole thing you know the whole thing till death do us part was written in the 14th century when people died at 30. So it's like, what happens when you're like, you know, you get past 30 and you're like,

oh shit, well, we didn't think about this, did we? You know, yeah, they're really, really ancient vows. And so we're not equipped with, you know, what we're signing up to because the wedding industry is a machine. It's, you know, the minute you want to, you know, you want to jug of orange juice at your wedding, that's £27, please. And you're like, I mean, I know how much orange juice costs, by the way.

And so it's an amazing consumerist machine of which we're all pushed towards. That's why it's, you know, having any other kind of thought space about getting married is kind of you know it's it's tough it's kind of not taboo but it's just like um if you want to be alternative about it it's kind of like you have to be other rather than just be like because I feel like when we got married I did it as a kind of not a PR stunt that sounds like I'm an absolute arsehole but it was a part of what I was doing the trajectory of what women on TV do they should be living this kind of normative life so the next big PR thing is the marriage the da da da da da da da and I felt real pressured to

do that and actually now looking back on it I never would have spent the money I would have done it in a completely different way and I would have wouldn't have been so pressured by society if I wasn't in the pressure cooker of like kind of being in the public eye and I don't think there's enough kind of space around that either and also like the whole thing about why you get into relationships because it feels like guys will go that women go from you know meeting to fifth date to marriage in like you know in like five seconds and you're like well well no actually not necessarily you know there's that thing that guys like oh she you know she just wants commitment and you're like well do do i do i really is that what i want isn't it like actually what i want to

meet somebody is just like you know we we can hang out and work it out. It doesn't mean we have to hurtle towards sort of normative coupling. Now that you have been married for seven years, did you say, do you think you've got to a place where you can now recognize when you feel compelled to do something that is actually beyond a compromise. And it feels like it's too much. And it feels like if you did this thing for your husband, you would be compromising on something that actually is really going to have a long-term impact on you afterwards. Do you feel like you can recognize when something like that comes up now?

I think having a child is an incredible sacrifice for a woman i don't i still don't think we're supported in the way that it's you know because it's not an internally changing thing for a man it's an external thing and the way that women are supported in the workplace through childbirth, especially being freelance. For me, it was very, very tough. And I had a row with my husband not long ago and he was like, we're going to force you to have a baby. And I was like, oh, wow, okay. Because I don't think it's discussed enough

about the huge changes that women go through, are supposed to go through literally overnight like you give birth you're supposed to change you're supposed to become like a mother right there and then and there's no guidebook for that it doesn't matter you know you can have support from your mother or grandmother you still don't really know how you're meant to do that overnight change and I still think that's a very female sacrifice that you, especially now that we're like, you know, I feel it's like the biggest sort of patriarchal joke that it's like, OK, girls, what you want? You want a career and you want to have kids and you want to do this, you know, you want to have big balls. OK, there it is. You go and deal with it all. And you're like, oh, wow, this is hard.

And so we're now we're all being, you know, absolutely promoted to be like, you know, taxpayers. Like we're all meant to be like career women and because it helps the economy. But nobody sort of helps you through the bit where you're like, oh, so what I've done is I've made my entire identity about my work. And then all of a sudden you have a kid

and you're like, oh, oh wow that doesn't work anymore and that was a huge and I think sacrifice is a strong word because it makes me it makes it sound like you know I wouldn't have a child but there you I've had to sacrifice parts of myself that I would still like to be because I'm now a carer for somebody yeah my um my best friend has a kid and it's really funny because people are always surprised to hear that she still comes out with us on the weekends and she lives in the countryside

and of course she comes out with us and she is normal and she's not talking about nappies and what colour her kid's poo is. Of course she's the same person. It's so strange. There's such a taboo around motherhood still and also what I found is you get retired whether you want to or not the minute

you're not a sexually available woman and and part of my project about body of work the the hardest post that I put on there was a really sexy image and I like, oh, that people are not, I don't call myself like a body positive Instagrammer. I'm just curious about it because my mom had an eating disorder and I've always had real massive issues with my body. And it's actually stopped me from getting jobs because I just have no confidence at all. So I decided to actually grab that and be like I need to do some work around this the hardest one was putting up a sexy image of myself at 43 because the minute you have kids like you don't exist anymore because you're just not in the market it's like you're retired and that kind of goes down the line of women you get to 50 and some of the feedback that I've been getting from Instagram is women say I I heard that you were it became invisible I didn't realize it happened like

it happens to other people that's why it no but it just happens to everybody and that's a kind of weird sacrifice in itself when you sort of pair off to one person you realize you become like invisible to the entire world. ACAST powers the world's best podcasts. Here's a show that we recommend. I'm Jessie Kirkshank, and on my podcast, Phone a Friend, I break down the biggest stories in pop culture. But when I have questions, I get to phone a friend. I phone my old friend, Dan Levy. You will not die hosting the Hills after show.

I get thirsty for the hot wiggle. I didn't even know what thirsty meant until there was all these headlines. And I get schooled by a tween. Facebook is like a node. That's what my grandma's on. Thank God Phone a Friend with Jesse Cruokshank is not available on Facebook. It's out now wherever you get your podcasts. Acast helps creators launch, grow, and monetize their podcasts everywhere. Acast.com Now it's time for our lessons in love segment where i ask each guest to describe one lesson

they've learned through their experiences grace your lesson feels pretty appropriate to start with given what we've been discussing uh particularly with charlie's poetry the idea of morphing yourself into another to suit someone else's desires i feel like if that is something that you find yourself doing in relationships time and time again, probably means that you're choosing the wrong people. I think so. Is that sort of what your lesson is about?

Do you want to explain your lesson? Okay, so I started with a, it's a quote from the Bible, I think it's from Jeremiah, which, and it says, the heart is deceitful above all else. I might have misquoted that. So my my thinking behind that is that I Charlie and I both, you know, we we sort of meet on a mental health level.

But also we are we had fathers that left and that I. All right. This is why we're sitting here deeply talking about relationships because I really think it puts you on the back foot if you don't have a great relationship with your father you're always like this it's such a complex need that you have for men uh the validation um the love the sort of the the daddy levels but also the lover levels the carer levels. And that was a, it was a really complicated thing for me. I didn't get married till I was 37. And I spent a long time being single as well, because I was just a bit like,

what I'm doing is damaging to myself. And I'm just going to have some time out and maybe just grow a bit myself and try and just heal myself so that then i can be on a parallel with with if i want to have a partner um so i don't trust my mind or my heart in relationships because i get massive um rushes of um hormones that which completely like mess with your head um and charlie's written about this and um it's just so you can't trust yourself you get these you know massive rushes of feelings that aren't necessarily true they want they aren't they wouldn't be how you would act in a normal rational circumstance and how do you keep it how do you keep that under check and I said to Charlie we were we were talking about coming on here and I was like you know I literally by the time my knickers have hit the floor I'm in love with them this is not rational behavior how do you overcome that

how do you know when you actually have met someone and your feelings are genuine so I have the dichotomy with my husband I never got the big like oxytocin rush I never got the big kind of like tummy flip that kind of crazy let you know that sort of what people call the honeymoon period but what I did get with my husband is possibly what I need not what I wanted because I possibly had my list upside down because Because, you know, at the top it's like, you know, he's like, you know, handsome, successful, la, la, la, la. And what I got was not the opposite, but what somebody who was just, it was like, oh, well, I really got, you know, kind of sidelined by that.

And I was like, okay, he's completely the opposite of what I thought I wanted. However, we can go to the supermarket together and not row. And, you know, we can just do just general shit and just rub along together quite well. And actually, funny enough, my sister, who's 29, just got married this weekend. And one of the readings was Captain Corelli's Mandolin,

from Captain Corelli's Mandolin. And it's a bit hardcore in a church. We're going, love is not all you think it is. And you're like, okay, wow. My brother was reading it and was like, oh my God, did you make this up? But basically it says like, when all of the pretty flowers have fallen away,

when you've got the intertwined roots and you realize you're not two trees but one, that's kind of it. When all the like the fancy stuff or the jazzy like dinners and stuff like that when you can be really high you can be like oh my god this is amazing because that because because that can keep you on a super high for an an amount of time but actually it's the it's the mundane stuff that actually where love deep love is it's oh, well, let's go and drink champagne

and cruise around and have fancy dinners. The long-term love is just people you can basically put up with. Charlie, would you like to share your lesson? I could have listened to that for a lot longer. It's a very good point. Well, I feel I would be wrong to suggest that I really knew what love was or is I definitely know what my idea of it is and I have my projected um sort of hope for what it will be and what it will look like in the future and within that my greatest lesson so far is forgiveness on both sides so

my best teachers were disguised as lovers some of the best things I've ever learned have been from people I really thought were supposed to be in love with me and they just weren't and at the time I was so angry about that and so cross and so heartbroken and furious with the world and over time learning to forgive those people in that situation and perhaps maybe they were just supposed to be there in that moment to show me what I didn't need or what I shouldn't have or where I shouldn't be. And having done that, A, it frees up a huge amount of emotional space within you because you're not resenting someone anymore, which is so incredibly toxic and exhausting and all-consuming. But it also means now I've got these amazing male friends

that I do still really need and I do still really value. They just weren't supposed to be my boyfriend. So you're friends with quite a lot of your exes. Yeah. That's so mature. That's very impressive. There's certainly some that I'm not and have absolutely no intention of ever being friends with. But I have, you know, a good handful of some of my best mates now are people that at one time I probably called my mum snotty nose sobbing down the phone.

And that feels like a really powerful, lovely, good thing. These aren't the ones... Do you remember, you told me about the guy recently that you spent a lot of time not having sex with. And he's like, oh, yeah, Charlie, we did a lot of kissing. Great! OK, so... Please tell that story.

He might actually work in this building, you know. So I... This is a slight tangent, but I can bring it back full circle. So I, about four years ago... So embarrassing, I hate you so much. About four years ago, I tried out an experiment where I thought, to see if someone really does love me and if they are really interested in me as a person and not my sausage roll fuelled body,

maybe I should just try not to have sex with them for as long as possible, which is a really miserable idea and I cannot tell you how dumb and ill-advised that was. Nobody gets anything from it. I think many people have tried that before. It's just, again, the naivety of youth. It's fine, I'll never do it again. But it's also just the whole idea of, like, oh, yeah, don't give up your treasure yet.

Yeah, exactly, like, yeah. Keep thinking. Yeah, where's my treasure? Yeah, exactly. And so then eventually it just you know it uh it didn't work out because i didn't sleep with him um or he didn't sleep with me rather or that situation never arised anyway i bumped into him at a festival last year and uh i was like wow who is that beautiful man walking towards me and then realised it was him.

And as my friend asked, I heard you guys know each other. He very sweetly bent and I went, Charlie and I used to do a lot of kissing. I said that. I said Charlie and I used to do a lot of kissing. And I felt mortified. I was like, oh God, that's how you remember me. But within the line of forgiveness, forgiving, you know, guys that weren't in love with me or had made mistakes. I know that there are things like that. You know, that was a mistake. That was that was not something that worked out. And,

you know, perhaps had I not have taken this vow of celibacy for literally no reason. But I think there is a reason behind it. You you know I think there is still this taboo of do you put out you know do you have sex on first dates you know does it you know and it's like oh there is still this kind of terrible patriarchal hangover that it's like there's a whole judgy stuff going on there and it's quite hard to navigate especially you were really young there you know I I still feel like now but you know I'm 43 I'm like I'm gonna do what I want to do regardless of whatever whether they speak to me again or whatever I you know I've just got to that stage where it's like actually I don't care anymore because not what somebody else thinks of me is not going to affect what, of course, it does. I'm like, oh, my God, what do they think of me?

But, you know, I have got to that point where I decide, actually, life is too short. Yeah, and also there's just this toxic myth that, you know, if you do sleep with someone on the first date, it then sets a precedent for how the rest of your relationship will unfold. It's like, well, this clearly isn't something, isn't going to be anything serious. And it's like absolute rubbish. Like there are, I know so many people who have had long-term relationships and yeah, they happen to have slept with the person on the first date. It makes no impact.

If you feel comfortable, you do what makes you feel comfortable. And if you don't, you don't. And I just feel like we shouldn't hold each other to these bizarre, like you said, patriarchal standards. How long did you make him wait can I ask before you ended the relationship before he ended the relationship and that tells you everything you have am I right ladies um two and a half months right okay really like decent amount of time when he ended it did he say this is why no but we both knew and I yeah I didn't I didn't hate him for it I thought yeah I kind of

feel like I've left it a bit late now and but also interesting it's like well maybe I just didn't actually fancy that much yeah exactly I think it's an interesting social experiment actually and henceforth I've not hated myself for doing that that's all we have time for this week on Millennial Love follow Independent Lifestyle on social media to keep up to date with what's coming up on the show. And if you're a new listener, remember to subscribe to this series on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Acast, or wherever you listen.

Also, leave us a rating and comment with your thoughts on our conversation today. Until next time, thanks a lot for listening. Goodbye.