The Weekly Planet - TWP Presents - Human Ordinary

Episode Date: June 7, 2018

Hello, here we are again spruiking another great Planet Broadcasting podcast. This week, Sam Loy's Human Ordinary .  Sometimes quirky, sometimes heartbreaking, always well researched and entertaining. Find Human Ordinary here:https://www.planetbroadcasting.com/https://itunes.apple.com/au/podcast/human-ordinary/id1121669942?mt=2https://omny.fm/shows/human-ordinary/playlists/podcast Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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Register today at sunrisechallenge.ca. That's sunrisechallenge.ca. Hello, everybody. It's Thursday, but don't worry. It's nearly Friday. Bloody overhunted, aren't we? T-G-I-T-N-F. Am I right?

Thank God it's Thursday, nearly Friday. That's it. We're just here to tell you about a great podcast from the Planet Broadcasting Network that you might want to listen to. It goes by the name of Human Ordinary, hosted by the wonderful Sam Loy. They're human interest stories. Some are funny, some are sad,

some are a little bit bloody quirky, mate. I'll tell you that much. Just like life. Just like life. But it's a really good and in-depth, but also concise and to-the-point exploration of a particular topic. How's he bloody do it?

How does he do it? His new series is kicking off at the moment and it's absolutely fantastic. His last series, Headstone, was also an absolute bloody delight and also quite grim at times. It was a banger though. Yeah, it was absolutely a banger. There's one in particular where he's talking about Alzheimer's and the effect that his grandpa had and the effect that it has on his family and his grandma.

It's really quite heartbreaking, but he's a wonderful person and it's a wonderful podcast and it's definitely worth checking out, which is why we're about to play an episode right about now. This podcast is part of the Planet Broadcasting Network. Visit planetbroadcasting.com for more podcasts from our great mates. It seems a little foolish for an inexperienced podcaster such as myself to commit to doing a series on headstones and then start the second episode without one.

But such is this story. There is no headstone for Brian Hill, at least not yet. But if there was, it would probably say that he was a loving father, grandfather and great-grandfather. It might say that he loved his family, golf and the Collingwood Football Club. And it would definitely say that he was the beloved husband of Mary. We used to go to the church dances together on a Sunday night at the Sacred Heart School. Anyhow, but we also used to do naughty things sometimes. We'd throw stones on people's roofs as they were walking home. And there was a milk bar up in Plenty Road just around the corner.

And this night we threw stones on the roof of this fella's house and he chased us. So we ran round into the milk bar and the milk bar fella said, oh no, he said, these kids have been here all night. No, it's not them. He stuck up for us because we all used to go in there and have a drink after the dance or an ice cream or something on the way home. And I know one night we were going home and Brian picked me up and threw me on the top of somebody's hedge, which I nearly fell through, but I didn't. I managed not to. Anyhow, that's how it was.

We were just friends walking home from the church together. On the Human Ordinary podcast, this is the Headstone series. Stories about how we live and how we die. Now, full disclosure time. Mary is my nan and Brian was my pop. So this story is rather a little personal. So when Nan was a teenager, her youngest sister Eleanor contracted a kidney disease called nephritis. If a child got it today, it wouldn't be much of an issue.

But it was an issue back then and Eleanor died. She was only six. My Nan and Pop lived across the road from each other and not long after Eleanor's death, they met and started to become friends. And this continued for a little while, until Pop parted my nan to a debutante ball. I felt for Pop, but I didn't know he felt for me. But he did. He told me he did then. But no, we realised then, we said,

well, OK, they know we're a pair now, after the debutante ball. Apparently, courtship was much the same back then as it is today. Only you don't sleep together, that's about the difference. You don't do that, it's just a kiss goodnight and on your way, chum. I had plenty of those, Pop was a great kisserer. But dancing, plenty of dancing. We used to go to the Ivanhoe Town Hall, Moonee Ponds, St Kilda. And the best whole dance hall in Melbourne

was the Freemasons in Collins Street. They had the most beautiful floor. And of course no drink, but there was a thing underneath the stage where you could get a drink of cordial. I was cold cordial, which was good. Of course there was a limit of what time I had to be home and sometimes we were a little bit later than the others, but Mum and Dad didn't worry very much

because they knew I was with a good fella. Nan says Pop could really carve it up on the dance floor. All the other girls wanted to be with him. I'd look if they were enjoying dancing with him, smiling and laughing, I'd get real jealous. I couldn't help myself. He was gorgeous. He was so handsome.

I didn't like him even smiling at the girls. My nan admits that Pop was a shocking flirt, but his heart always remained hers. And so, three years later, they got married in the church down the road. We had a beautiful wedding at 9 Darling Street, which was the place in those days. And then we went, a taxi took us into town

to the hotel where we stayed for the night. That hotel was called the Alexandra. I sat up half the night watching the trains come in and out of the station because I'd never slept with a fella before. And I didn't know whether I was going to move in the bed or not. There was movement at the station, I must admit. Yes, my nan did just make a sex reference. Next morning, up for breakfast,

I had to bring my mother to let her know I was all right. He hadn't killed me. They jumped on a bus to take them up to Marysville for their honeymoon. And, of course, I'm still dressed up like a fourpenny ham. Anyhow, we got there and we had some fun. We met with some nice people. And they one night said, oh, they were going to choir practice. Would we like to join them?

And I didn't know what choir practice was all about. I thought it was going to be choir practice. But it wasn't. It was the pub. And we went over to the pub and Brian got that drunk. I had to half carry him home back to the hotel and I had to undress him to put him into bed. But I'll tell you what, I never took his underpants off him.

I left them on him. I wasn't going that far. The newlyweds lived with my nan's parents in a house next door to a small private hospital that they ran. Pop started working for a company called the British Shoe Machinery Factory. But my nan... I was never a scholar at school, and I realise now today that I had dyslexia. I know for sure I did, because I was always backward with the other kids. I was kept down at class at school, which is terribly wrong to do to a child, is keep them down.

It's better to put them up and have somebody help them, because it's very demoralising. All your friends have gone into another class and you're still behind with the little ones as you felt like. And I pleaded with my parents to let me leave school. Dad didn't want me to, but Mum let me. I was only, I don't know, 14 or 15 or something, I'm not sure now. And then mum wanted me to stay home and work with her, but dad said I had to have a trade.

So I had to do something. So I was given the choice of two things, dressmaking or hairdressing. Foolish like, I chose hairdressing. I should have done dressmaking because I'd learnt to sew later in life and I was quite a good sewer. So I really should have did the dressmaking but I didn't. Then I got a job in East Preston on the tram line in Plenty Road, Preston. And Pop's father in those days was a tram driver and every time he'd go past the shop

he'd always honk the horn to me so I'd wave to him. Then of course I got married so I didn't have to give up hairdressing but it wasn't a done thing. Brian didn't want me to work again the old fashioned way. I should have I probably but never mind I didn't. She also worked as a nurse's aide in the private hospital for her parents. They were tough on her but she didn't even get paid. One time, they made her work instead of going to her niece's christening, and Pop had to go alone. She didn't think it fair, but that's what was expected of her. And Pop also wasn't enjoying

his job. He was unhappy there. He didn't like it. I think it was mainly the people. He wasn't happy there at all. He wouldn't tell them I was pregnant because they'd make filth of it. That pregnancy resulted in the birth of a girl who would one day shoulder the burden of being my mum. They named her Eleanor after Nan's sister. I asked my mother and father's permission if they would mind and mum was delighted. Mum used to say to go to the back door and call out

Eleanor again, it'd be lovely. Not long after mum was born, Pop left his job suddenly. I always remember that and he'd come home and he said, well, I've given it away, I'm not working there anymore and I thought, oh my God, what are we going to do? And the next morning he got dressed up and he said, I won't come home until I've got a job. And that was Pop. He brought the paper and he came home late that evening and he had another job and that was at Moldex. Moldex was a plastics manufacturer, making a whole bunch of different stuff but mostly toys.

During his time there, Pop tried his hand in the design department and drew a sauce bottle in the shape of a tomato. Well, they produced this thing and it sold like hotcakes. If you live in Australia or New Zealand, there's a good chance that you've used this sauce bottle that my pop designed. It used to be around the house when I was a kid, but I had no idea where it had come from. Which is no surprise, really,

because pop sought no accolades or extra pats on the back for his design. He just saw it all as part of his job. Nan says Pop had always been smart. He could fix anything, she says, but as a kid his parents couldn't afford to give him the education that he deserved. But then around the time that he designed the sauce bottle, he took himself back to night school and studied to become a methods engineer. These are the people who work out the quickest and easiest way to do a repetitive task in a factory. He was real good at it. Then, a few years after that, they had another daughter, Suzanne, my Aunty Sue. I was a good mum. I was a loving mum. I was a bit not real strict. I had my rules and they didn't like it. well, they were in trouble.

We had a house where the lounge and the dining room and kitchen all sort of went round in a circle and I would chase them with my shoe off my foot round there to give them a slap with my shoe. But half the time we'd all fall over on the floor and end up laughing so they never got hit. Pop was out working during the day, but when he got home, he was playful

and made the most of the time he had with his girls. Now this night, Brian had said his goodnight, as I thought, and gone out in the kitchen. And with that, Eleanor was jumping up and down in her bed. And I said, Eleanor, stop that jumping. She said, but Mummy, I can't stop. And I said, why? She said, because something's there. And I said, why? She said, because something's there.

And I said, what? And we looked under the bed and it was Brian. And he was up there pushing it up and down. The poor kid, no wonder she couldn't lie still. He was pushing her up and down in bed. Yeah, I think she remembers that to this day. And that's how it was. A nice, happy, normal family living in the suburbs of Melbourne.

Over the years, Nan continued to help out at her parents' hospital, even managing the whole place when they went overseas one time, also for no money, and helped out at a mental health institution in a kind of big sister program. Pop continued to work as a methods engineer, but left Moldex for a better post at a place called Sidchrome. He worked there until his retirement. At his retirement party,

his boss announced that Pop had saved the company millions over the years. But for all that, his bonus was comparatively paltry. Pop didn't complain though. Along the way, they became grandparents four times over, to three boys and a girl. Yeah, my poor mum was so excited. But unfortunately, she died just before you were born. But in January, and you were born in the May. Nan says the best thing about being a grandparent is getting to spoil the kids, and then somebody else takes them home.

When we used to visit, she would often leave a present for me on my bed. I remember the time you went and ran down to the back room and had a look on your bed and there wasn't a matchbox car or anything like that for you. It was a lovely jumper I did as you. You weren't very impressed with that jumper. This one Christmas, when all the family got together down at a holiday house on the beach,

I had just been given a tent. Of course, it had to be pitched up straight away. As soon as we arrived, before we did anything, the tent had to go up in the backyard. And then who was going to sleep in it with you at night? Both your fathers completely refused to get out there. And anyhow, poor old Poppy decided he'd get out there with you and sleep with just his pillow and on the hard ground with his bad back. It was only a kid's tent but you all lasted the night. Pop come in like a cripple when he got up. He was still a kid at heart on things like that. He loved you all. He'd do anything for you. Nan and Pop loved that spot so much

that after Pop retired, they built a house not far from it. Their dream home, way up on a hill overlooking Dramana with views right across the bay to the city. And their plans for retirement were pretty simple. Play golf, go fishing and travel. Lots of travel. I mean, we drove from Dramana right up to Cape Tribulation and we drove over to Western Australia

and we'd go up to Yarrawonga to play golf and do the wineries and we had a good life like that. Matter of fact, the boys used to say, Nana and Papa never home. Brian would get the urge and he'd say, Come on, let's go. And we'd plan something and sometimes we hardly even planned it. We'd just get in the car and go wherever the car took us.

And that's what we like to do. Yeah. Yeah. And I wish that their story continued like this far into their old age. But sometime around the late 90s, Pop's memory started to go. I think Pop was more aware of it than I was, mainly on people's names.

That was the first thing that went. You know, he'd say, oh, my bloody memory's going, you know. This frustrated him, but he dismissed it. When others would bring it up and worry that it indicated a bigger problem, he would just shake them off. He would say that his only problem was that he had a shithouse memory. One time, a friend of Pop's spoke to Nan and told her that Pop was cheating at golf.

I said, what do you mean he's cheating? He said, well, he puts down the wrong, how many shots he'd have. But it wasn't because he was trying to get a leg up on his course partners. He just couldn't remember. And he was too proud to say anything. Then driving became a problem. We heard from a friend of my cousin's that he saw Pop drive into a roundabout and then just go round and around and around. We'd get in the car to go shopping and Brian would say,

where are we going? I'd say, we're going to Jetty Road Safeway. We'd only be a couple of minutes up the road. He said, now where are we going? Anyhow, this day we went and we were crossing the Pan Highway. He watched the cars coming down on his right, but he forgot about the cars coming down on the left and he took off. I don't know how we missed it ever because the car coming down on the left nearly collected us. And I hadn't been happy with Pops driving for a while. Anyhow, I burst into tears and I said, when we get to Seffway, you'll give me the keys of the car and I'm never driving with you again he never drove again never even asked to drive again I think he was happy not to drive the car but he wouldn't admit

it men are pig-headed they wouldn't admit they can't do something his memory was getting more and more shithouse every day but he refused to admit that anything was wrong. My only Sue had worked for years in a nursing home and knew a thing or two about dementia and Alzheimer's disease. She especially knew that it could be hereditary, and so she begged Pop to consider his family. Even if he wanted to ignore what was happening, we had a right to know.

This got Pop in his soft spot, his family. I knew, I felt I knew what the answer was going to be, but it was a shock, a shock. My Pop had Alzheimer's disease. Now, I don't know how much you know about what Alzheimer's actually is, but if you're like me before all this went down, then it's probably not very much. is. But if you're like me before all this went down, then it's probably not very much. All right, a brain that is affected by Alzheimer's disease produces too much protein. This protein then forms into a plaque which attaches to neurons.

Will you rise with the sun to help change mental health care forever? Join the Sunrise Challenge to raise funds for CAMH, the Center for Addiction and Mental Health, to support life-saving progress in mental health care. From May 27th to 31st, people across Canada will rise together and show those living with mental illness and addiction that they're not alone. Help CAMH build a future where no one is left behind. So, who will you rise for? Register today at sunrisechallenge.ca. That's sunrisechallenge.ca. That's sunrisechallenge.ca.

The neurons then shut down and lose their connection to other neurons, and everything starts to die. The Alzheimer's brain begins to atrophy and degenerate. You know all those lines in a brain that make it look like it's just one big sausage all folded up? Well, an Alzheimer's brain doesn't look like that by the end. It's got no definition. It's just this big, flat lump of stuff that doesn't work like it should anymore. And my pop wouldn't accept the diagnosis.

He didn't know I was wrong. He didn't believe it at all. He said, I'm just getting forgetful. Anything popped in my eye, he would poo-poo anyhow. Anything at all. But Alzheimer's disease doesn't give a damn about whether you believe it's happening to you or not. It doesn't need your permission or your acknowledgement. It just needs your brain, which is going to destroy. It's like King Midas in reverse, turning everything it touches to shit. And that would be bad enough in itself, but the really awful thing about the disease

is it then starts to pick apart other aspects of your life too. It wasn't long until Nan and Pop realised they had to leave their dream home, way up in a hill overlooking Dramana, with views right across the bay to the city. They sold the house and bought a unit in a retirement community a couple of suburbs over. At least they were closer to my Aunty Sue and her family. Soon, it wasn't just Pop's memory.

He started to behave more and more like a child. Nan would put his clothes out for him and she would return to find him with his underpants on over his trousers. Then their friends started deserting them. Well, a lot of people didn't know how to handle it and you wouldn't get the invitations to go to dinner or anything like that. Like this friend I was telling you about, I think he came and saw Brian once. He was Brian's mate at golf. There were four of them that played golf together and Phil was the only one that called in about one,

twice at the most, to see Pop, which it hurt me. Pop didn't notice, but it hurt me. Another time, they went to Bali with some of the other couples from their retirement community. The women were OK, but I thought the men were horrible. They'd get in a little corner, like Aussie blokes in that little group, you know, and the women in this little group, and I'd push myself and pop over into the men group.

It never happened. They weren't really friendly people, which I thought they would be. I thought they would be good company. That's why we went there. That's why we went there. I can't ignore the fact that I was like these people too. I know I didn't include him at family functions, leaving him out of chats about the footy or whatever else was going on.

I just didn't know how to relate to him then. I didn't think he would know what we were talking about. So I didn't try. I remember at his 80th birthday party, we were out at his favorite restaurant recalling stories about him, like how he used to dress up as Santa Claus at Christmas, or that time he built us boys a billy cart that then got smashed by my cousin on its first use, and how he was always a happy, joyful man. He sat there listening, and I could see on his face that he couldn't remember the stories. I don't think he even knew that it was him that we were talking about.

Later on that night I was a little drunk and I called my partner crying down the phone. My pop didn't even have the comfort of remembering his life. It seemed a cruel trick that old age was playing and it left me angry and upset. I think after that I chose to avoid these emotions, as if getting too close to Pop would expose me to the illogical chaos of life, non sequitur after non sequitur, all leading to a final unpredictable conclusion that was neither just nor deserving. What was happening to Pop wasn't fair, and that laid bare a truth about life I wasn't ready to confront. But you see, therein lies my selfishness,

because all through this I favoured my own feelings over my Nan's, my Nan who just wanted to see Pop being included, not shunned by others, especially by those that loved him. Because while I was absorbed with my own minor feelings, Nan was Pop's primary carer for more than 10 years. And it wasn't easy. I'd get cross with him sometimes and then I had the guilt, you know. And I'd cry at the girls and they'd say, oh Mum, you're not Mother Teresa.

And Sue would say to me, Mum, get a pad and write down what you do and you'll realise it, you know. After a while, though, it got too much and Nan realised that she had to put Pop into care. But rather than go straight for a full-time arrangement, she opted for short-term stays. And I booked him in for a week. I left him there three days because I couldn't be without him.

I had to get him home. I put him in again and I went to see him and he begged me to take him home and I said no, I couldn't take him home. And he said, well, I'll commit suicide. I said, no, you won't commit suicide suicide so while he wasn't thinking I slipped out and didn't let him know I was leaving but he settled down he was all right that time I did leave him for the week. And despite the love and devotion despite the 60 plus years of marriage and the in sickness and in health vows, it all got too much for Nan. The emotional and physical burden was taking its toll.

I was having a little bit more heart problems because I had to go and have stents put in and just run down in particular, I suppose, and the anxiety of it all put me on antidepressants for the emotional side of things. She called up the manager of the retirement community, who then helped find Pop a permanent placement at a different care facility. Nan experienced enormous guilt. She says the day Pop was moved into

full-time care was probably the worst of her life. Yeah, very heavy-hearted. But it was very hard on me, very hard indeed. Heavy in the chest I was, you know, in the heart, yeah. The place Pop was moved to wasn't ideal. To me it seemed part mental institution, part end of the line hospice, but it was only for a short time while a different facility was being finished. Still, Pop wasn't doing that well. He wouldn't leave his room.

He'd had a mirror in his room. Pop didn't realise that the fella he saw in the mirror was himself. And he wouldn't leave the room because that fella would be on his own. So they put paper all over the mirror so he couldn't see that person. Well, then he would leave his room to go to the dining room. Sad, isn't it? And also, the shower business was absolutely terrible to get him under the shower. I was there one day while they were trying to shower him and he even bit one of the nurses, which wasn't proper to do that sort of thing. He'd even lash out at them. And of course he wasn't

aggressive at all, but there's something about the water. I don't know what it is, but apparently it happens a lot, not to all of them, but majority of them, Alzheimer's people. They don't like that water. Although it took longer than first planned, the new facility was completed and Pop was moved. He was so happy there. He was never in his room. I bought him this expensive chair. He was never in the room to sit in it. And he walked and walked and walked and walked. He walked up and down, up and down, up and down, you know.

And also, I took him beer and red wine. So he was supposed to have a beer a day and a glass of red wine with his meals. And he liked that. I remember going to see him one day and taking with me a copy of the 2010 grand final. Pop had always been a mad Collingwood supporter, and they had won that day. As we were watching it, I realised he didn't understand what the game was, or that it was his team that was playing. He didn't even know who I was.

or that it was his team that was playing. He didn't even know who I was. I was talking to him about how me and my cousins, his other grandsons, would go to the footy. I pointed up to a photo board of his family my mum had made to try to remind him of who I was talking about. He asked me if all those people were my mates. He'd forgotten all of them too. I guess that's inevitable.

When he didn't know who I was that day, oh, that was hard. He didn't know who the girls were quite a while before he lost me. And then this day I went to see him and he just smiled at me and I said, who am I? He said, oh, I don't know. And I said oh I don't know and I said you don't know who I am I'm your wife he said are you really and I said yeah I'm your wife Mary you know that really killed me that day I didn't think he'd ever forget me but there we are that insidious thing took it off him you know it's one thing for me to experience my pop forgetting who i am but i can't imagine if that was my partner but you see that's the thing because alzheimer's doesn't give a shit whether it's the memory of what you had for dinner last week or it's the memory of your wife of 60 years,

the disease is going to come in and eat that memory away and never give it back. It took longer for him to forget Nan simply because spending your life with someone means that you're everywhere in their mind. But it ate away every memory of her eventually, just as it did to everything. Nan calls it did to everything.

Nan calls it a living death. So their brain is dying and it's just, it's a horrible thing, really. Because they get that vacant look in their face. Nothing is in joyous, you know. is in joyous, you know. One day, Nan noticed that Pop's ankle was really badly swollen. I said, I want the doctor to have a look at that. Anyhow, the doctor had a look at it and he rang me up. He said, I think he's only just pulled a muscle or something.

He said, I took his shoe off and sock off and had a really good look at his foot and there was no nothing wrong there. But anyhow, then it must have been this cellulitis. Cellulitis is where an open sore gets infected with bacteria. And it developed, and of course the germ went through his body. I believe it's a very painful thing too. I mean, he shouldn't have died of it, but he did. Pop died on April 11, 2014.

He was 85 years old. The last time I saw him was a few days before he died. The cellulitis had put him into a kind of coma where the fever was so great that he was in and out of consciousness. We all knew he was going to die soon. I felt awkward standing in his room with everyone else around. I think I was afraid of the vulnerability that would come if I showed my emotions. But I also had this strange sense that it wasn't my pop. There's a cruelty in death that those around you will see you at the end when illness or old age have left you a whisper of the person you were.

This image is the last they will have of you. I didn't want to remember Pop as a frail old man, feverishly dying with no memories to comfort him. I wanted to remember the Pop I knew when I was young, the happy gentleman who didn't like swearing and who would always keep the lolly jar stocked for when his grandkids stopped by. But this image I had of him hadn't been around for years. In a way, Popper died the moment he began to lose sense of who he was.

Nan says he was just a shell of the man we all knew, that everything else had been taken away. Even before he died, Nan had lost her best friend, her husband and her lover. And when he did die, Nan felt a strange sense of relief. Oh yeah, I looked at his face and I thought, darling, you're not all muddled anymore now. You can think straight now, you're not all muddled. I sort of felt you could notice it in his face. He was free. I read somewhere that people with Alzheimer's aren't expected to live more than 10 years past diagnosis.

It's even less if you're elderly. Well, my pop lived with that insidious thing for 15 years. Like a champ. Nan's alone now, except for Toby, her new pet cat, but she still struggles to get used to Pop not being around. I don't think you ever do, Dale. I mean, I can be sitting down there in a chair and something will happen on television and I'll go to turn to say to Pop and I'm talking to myself. I still think he's there. No, I don't think you ever get over that. I know I'm on my own here, but I can feel him around me at times, very much so.

I can feel him here with me. Yeah. We had a certain way how we'd sleep in bed of a night time. He'd always cuddle into the back of me and shouldn't be telling you this, I suppose, and he'd put one hand on my breast and that's how we'd go to sleep. Well, in the finish, I had to tell him to do that because he'd forgotten. I'd say, come on, cuddle in. That's one of the most things I miss is me cuddled. Been in the bed on your own too is not fun.

Now I've got the cat. There's no headstone to remember, Pop. Nan says she never wants to be apart from him, so she keeps his ashes in a safe place until she dies. And then we'll give them both headstones, side by side. Because while headstones are remembrance markers for a life, as long as my nan is still around, we don't need one for my pop. We just need her and her memory of the life they shared.

I hope that before my life ends, I will be able to reminisce over it with the people who filled it. But I can't be sure that that will be the case. You see, Alzheimer's disease is hereditary, and it wasn't just my pop who had it. His mother and also his sisters had it too. So there's maybe a chance that one day I will forget my friends and my children and my partner and all the things we did together. I feel like having memories and being able to reflect on them is such a human quality. I worry what I'll be if all that is taken

away. People often say that they want to be remembered once they're gone. Well I think it's even more important to remember while we're still here. You think you go back over your life the whole time. Every day I'm going back over things that I did in my life, even when I was a tiny little girl. You remember, everything comes back to you. You think about all your loved ones. I felt I was put here to love people

and look after people and I think I've done a job of that with my parents. My mother was naughty but I looked after her. My father, I gave him a good five years after mum died but now I feel I've fulfilled my job. Yeah, I have. I've fulfilled my job, I'm sure. When they say you've got to double yourself, well, I've got... How many of us are there? Something like 14 of us or something now, isn't there? So I think we've done OK there. There's every little soul's born. They're beautiful. They're all part of me.

I feel they're mine. But they're only to mine to lend I'm only having a lend of them My thanks and love to my nan Mary Hill for sharing this story with me and with you My thanks and love to my Nan, Mary Hill, for sharing this story with me and with you. My appreciation also for her patience. We recorded this over a year ago,

but I didn't feel I was ready to make it into a story I thought worthy of release. I hope you like it, Nan. Hello, it's us at the end of the podcast again. What did you think about that? I had a great time. Absolute banger. Wouldn't you agree I 100% agree

yep but you can find all his podcasts wherever you find any podcast Spotify iTunes planetbroadcasting.com Sam Lowe's work

is human ordinary it's definitely worth checking out also you can probably go back and listen to that episode of our podcast that he was on

oh yeah talking about the alien franchise that's correct he's a delightful guest alright thank you for listening and we'll see you guys...

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