Mamamia Out Loud: Are We Allowed To Say We Hate Our Bodies?

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Mamma Mia Out Loud!

Hello and welcome to Mamma Mia Out Loud.

It's what women are talking about on Friday, the 21st of April.

I am Holly Wainwright.

You're so good at saying that so fast.

I'm Mia Friedman.

I'm Jesse Stevens.

And on today's show,

Bluey is the new Taylor Swift Discuss.

We will talk about it in a minute.

The little dog has managed to piss everybody off this week,

and we are going to discuss it.

Plus, two very famous women in Australian headlines this week

are still being defined by something that happened to them or near them

or adjacent to them decades ago.

How do you shift a stubborn celebrity narrative?

And are there some words to the week which range from dogs?

Mia, is that you, the dogs?

Maybe, and it's not Bluey.

To AI, snap bots and smuggling.

But first, Jesse Stevens.

In case you missed it, a 50-year-old Spanish woman,

she won't screw it.

I'm going to spend 500 days in a cave.

And I know what you're thinking,

where is the cave and may I also go and spend 500 days in that cave?

Exactly what I was saying.

Now that it's free.

Now that it's free, is there a vacancy?

Well, it is.

Does cave have Wi-Fi?

Well, the problem is no.

But is that a problem?

No.

No.

I don't think we want Wi-Fi.

No, that's fine.

The cave is in Spain.

Beatrice Flamene is an elite mountaineer who entered in November 2021.

Was it an accident?

So it's a world record for like the longest person who got stuck in a cave

500 days on purpose.

That's the most specific record.

If it's on purpose, you're not stuck, I would suggest.

No, you're just in a cave.

It was for scientific reasons.

So it was about circadian rhythms.

Or did she just have perimenopause and she'd had a gut full?

I think so.

Because from the ages of 48 to 50, she sat in a cave.

She said that when they came to get her, this is a quote,

when they came in to get me, I was asleep.

I thought something had happened.

I said, already?

Surely not.

I hadn't finished my book.

I love her.

So she was monitored by scientists.

It's all about the human mind.

She thought she'd been in there for like 100 days.

She stopped counting at 62.

Was there no light?

Like what were the conditions in the cave?

So because she was reading,

I imagine that she had some sort of torch or book light situation,

but they would bring her kind of food supplies,

pretty basic food supplies.

She exercised, she read, she painted.

So you could stand up in the cave.

Yep, she knitted little hats, that kind of thing.

She loved it.

She doesn't want to come out of the cave.

I see this note that Jesse is about to read.

Every five poos, she would send her body waste

up to one of her support team members to dispose of.

Outside the cave.

Every five.

Every five.

You can live in close proximity to four poos, but not five.

Five is her limit.

And she also had a rule, which was,

okay, what if someone really close to you dies?

Because we can let you know.

And she was like, no.

I don't need to know.

That's why she didn't know about the queen when she came out.

I'm sure they could have got her a dongle or something

to go into the cave with.

And if she wanted to check TikTok and she was like,

absolutely not.

I want to read.

I think she said she read.

60 books.

Yes.

60.

60 books.

Felt really productive.

And yeah, she loves to draw now.

So.

I love that story.

That is the most vibey story I have ever heard.

I just went, yes.

It sounds great.

Imagine being left alone to read 60 books.

In a cave for two years.

I love it.

Jesse's face then.

She felt, ooh.

It was like Timothy's shallower man coming in

and giving her a little pash.

I loved it.

Back to my thesis of why Bluey and Taylor Swift

have a lot in common.

Do you remember when Taylor Swift had to edit

her music video when she stood on the scales

and the scales went to the word fat,

she had to edit it out.

She did that.

She kept the scales in, but they didn't say fat anymore.

Bluey's got to do a little bit of scales editing himself.

For those who don't know, where have you been?

But Bluey is the world's most famous dog.

Australian TV production kids show.

It is so popular.

Did you see that when Lin-Manuel Miranda came,

the only thing he wanted to do was guest spot on Bluey.

His kids love it.

Oh, Americans are mad for Bluey.

Anyway, I just learned when I was reading up for this segment

that Bluey's a girl.

I thought Bluey was a boy.

I'd never thought about it.

I'd never really thought about it.

But Bluey's a kid dog, right?

Like a love puppy.

Bluey's the kid and the dad's called Bandit.

And everybody likes Bandit because, allegedly,

it's a very good role model.

That's a great name for a dog.

Yeah, of dogdom, of daddom, actually,

because Bandit's a very involved dad.

Now, my kids are too old.

I've missed Bluey a bit, but everybody is obsessed.

So whatever happens on Bluey is seen

as like an important cultural commentary.

And the bad thing that happened this week, apparently,

is Bluey, the puppy, was hiding in the bathroom

on a new episode and Daddy Bandit walks in

and this is what happens.

Oh, man.

What?

Bluey!

Why did you say, oh, man?

Oh, I just need to do some exercise.

Tell me about it.

Oh, he found you.

Why don't you just do some exercise?

Same old reason, Bluey. You kids and work.

Us? Why don't you do it now?

Because I'd be late for work.

So?

Well, that wouldn't make my boss very happy.

So what you couldn't see is that Bandit, the dad dog,

was standing on the scales when he went,

ugh, man.

And the rest of the episode, apparently,

ends up with Bandit learning how to do exercise with his kids.

And they talk...

It's about play.

It's about play.

It's great fun, good for mental health, everybody's happy.

But that first bit has pissed off a lot of people

because of the depiction of scales

and the ugh at the scales.

Now, a group of people are very upset

because they're saying,

I work really hard to instill positive body image in my children.

We talk about weight not being an emotional thing

or a numbers thing.

And then you bloody brought scales into my kids' conversation

and thrown them on the floor

and everybody's talking about it,

how responsible of you, Bluey.

There's another group of people who are very upset

at the first group of people who are very upset.

And their generic comment is,

ugh, you can't say anything anymore.

Ugh, like that.

And it's been talked about all week,

including on Mamma Mia where Claire Murphy,

excellent host of The Quickie,

and sometimes host of this show,

wrote a very thoughtful piece about how she could see

why everybody had a problem,

because she too,

and she's spoken about this on Mamma Mia,

has had a lot of issues with her weight

and with it being tied to exercise and health

by health professionals

who never gave her then the support to follow up.

But that she also could recognize

that what Bluey was really doing in that bit

is reflecting reality

because that is how a lot of conversations about weight

go at real Australian homes.

Jesse Stevens,

should we cancel that bloody dog?

We shouldn't cancel it,

but I'm finding the ensuing conversation productive

and helpful in some ways,

and it wasn't the scales that I thought was a problem.

It wasn't even the conversation I thought was a problem.

It was this one shot where Bandit is looking

in the mirror at himself

and sort of going,

I need to do more exercise,

and grabs his stomach,

and there's some fat.

As much of a cartoon dog can have fat.

I can have,

and I sort of went,

ah, I wish we didn't do that,

because I do think there's something to be said

about how much parents,

especially of little kids at the moment,

are so aware of this

and are being really careful

to not speak negatively,

especially mothers in front of their daughters,

speak negatively about their bodies.

And then when you've got Bluey,

this isn't like a scene on euphoria or succession.

Bluey is educational, right?

That's its purpose as a show.

It's for kids,

and it's meant to be instructive

and help them through the world.

Like Sesame Street.

Like Sesame Street.

And so when I saw that,

I thought we're trying really hard

not to model negative self-talk

and relate a role of stomach fat with

I desperately need to go out and do more exercise.

That isn't a great message in and of itself.

It redeemed itself by the end,

but I just wish it hadn't had that visual

or even the scale.

It could have been Bandit just going,

I'm feeling a bit blur.

Bandit's body hadn't necessarily changed.

And I do agree that parents all over the country

are having that conversation because they're busy

and they don't have time to cook the food they want to cook.

Totally get it.

I didn't like that actual image of the fat roll

because if you have a fat roll

and the amount of times in my life

I have grabbed my stomach,

that doesn't mean you need to do more exercise.

Most of us have fat rolls on our body

and it's not indexed to your health.

What do you reckon, Mia?

Look, I reckon my actual dog really does need to lose weight.

So there's that.

But I have flipped on this

because I first reacted by going,

you know, that's the reality

and sometimes people do need to lose weight

for health benefits,

but also you can't tell

by looking at someone or grabbing a roll

whether they're healthy or not.

So, you know, the complexity of that.

But then I thought, well,

because of course we had back in the 70s and 80s,

we had the cartoon character of Norm in Australia

and he was like a couch potato

and he had like a beer belly

and he was his animating character.

The campaign was called Life Being It,

which is grammatically incorrect.

But it was all about how Norm was on the couch

and Norm was too fat

and Norm needed to do more exercise

and everyone needed to do more exercise, right?

And it was that exercise was good

and being healthy and exactly the same,

essentially, messages as bandit.

And I would suggest that probably the writers of Bluey

recall Norm

and he might have been the inspiration

for this particular storyline.

So my first instinct was, oh, this is silly.

And then I went, well, actually,

the audience for the Life Being It campaign

were adults

and the audience for Bluey are children,

unless it's also the parents

who have to watch it with the children,

but I would suggest they're probably just scrolling

and I think that having that message

for children for the reasons that you say, Jesse,

which is the grabbing their stomach,

I think most parents have been filled with horror

at their small child,

grabbing a small part of their leg

or their bottom or their stomach,

particularly the girls, but also boys,

and going, I'm so fat, I'm so fat.

And what I've found in my experience of parenting

is that often they'll do that

because they know it'll get a reaction from you

if you're a certain type of parent,

which is, I was that type and I would be like,

darling, what do you mean?

You're lovely and they'd blur and this and we don't...

Don't use that F word in this house.

Yeah, exactly.

And all the things that you try to say,

but it's very challenging for parents

because on the one hand we're told

childhood obesity, obesity, obesity.

On the other hand, we're told body-imaging disorders.

So it is really, really hard.

And it's hard when you've got kids going into,

these are little kids who over the next 15 years,

their bodies are going to stretch and grow

and they're going to have a bunch of different body types

and growth spurts.

Most of the things that are happening developmentally

to their body doesn't mean that they need to do more exercise.

That feels like a disparate issue.

Doing exercise and play is a great message

for all sorts of reasons.

But if you find yourself as a 15-year-old girl

being able to grab parts of yourself

that weren't there five years ago,

that doesn't mean you're unhealthy.

Hold on though, right?

Because really the message here, it's not bluey

who was grabbing their tummy.

So when they're talking to the children, because you're right.

Yeah, but monkey's pee.

No, no, but the point is the message

that this show is trying to give to the children

is let your fucking parents do some exercise.

That was the message, right?

Oh, I didn't think of that.

Because the whole point is that by the end of the episode

they found a way to do it, right?

So the message to the children is

it's important for grown-ups and children

to do exercise because it's good for you, right?

I agree with you, Jessie, that I can do without the scales

because...

They're grabbing at the body.

That's such a very...

You know, you try and keep those out of your kids' lives

as much as they can, except obviously at the doctors

that happens and then, you know,

then they enter their lives in various ways.

You can do without the scales.

But I think that making every frame of a story

be morally perfect.

If the overarching message of the show is good,

which it seems to be,

which is, you know, Bandit found a way to exercise

and to get the kids involved in it,

and it was good for him,

and we all know that exercise is good for our mental health

and all of the different things.

It's possibly the best thing you can do for yourself

to move your body sometimes.

Then, like, get Bandit a break.

Of note is that...

And I watched the scene a few times.

They're arguing about a dog.

The fact that...

I'm defending a dog.

The fact that Bluey was hiding in the bath

was actually a really important plot point

because Bandit would never have spoken about Bandit's body

if they'd known.

That is 100% true

because I became hyper-aware of my negative self-talk

out loud when once I was in a changing room

with my daughter when she was little

and she had to come with you everywhere.

And nowhere do I talk to myself

in a more disgusting manner

than in the mirror of a changing room.

Do you talk out loud?

Yeah.

This is Holly.

You should always talk out loud.

Like, you pull the jeans on and you're like,

oh!

Oh, you're such an idiot!

Oh!

Oh, my God.

You look awful.

Take those off.

Anyway, I couldn't do that anymore.

Looked at my little daughter, her little face.

He's like, oh!

And I was like, oh, what do we call that?

It's a learning moment.

Yeah.

Teachable moment.

For me.

Just shut the fuck up.

Yeah.

There are two in back in the news this week

and as has been the case for 20 years

they are being defined by things

that happened to them decades ago.

Katie Holmes is the cover star

in the latest issue of Glamour magazine.

You might remember Katie Holmes,

she was married to Tom Cruise.

Oh no!

She was in Dorset's Creek.

Proved the whole point of the whole thing.

I know, but like, and she's the mother of Suri.

Oh dear.

Who is the child that Tom Cruise never sees.

And the other woman is someone

that I've interviewed on No Filter before,

and that is Candice Warner, who is an Iron Woman.

She's been on reality TV shows.

She's a mother of two.

She's married to an Australian cricketer,

and she's written a memoir that has been covered widely.

And every single magazine article

that has been written this week

has mentioned a much reported incident

that happened in a toilet cubicle when she was single

back in 2007 with a football player

where a grotty paparazzi put a camera

under the cubicle door, took photos,

and basically she was slut-shamed.

Well, it has been slut-shamed on going

for the past 15 plus years.

For Sunny, I'm assuming just by reading his book,

it didn't follow him quite as much as it followed me.

I think in his book, he might have covered it

in one paragraph.

For me, it has followed me around.

It has followed my husband around.

It has followed my kids, my family.

It hasn't gone away.

It's amazing how one mistake as a young woman

can have huge implications on your life.

So how come some women are not able

to escape a single incident

or a single relationship from their past

while others such as Nicole Kidman can?

I think there's two things at play.

The first is a bit of an unpopular opinion

and it's not that it's not sexist,

but I think that there's something true to it,

which is what is the moment or the index

by which we truly know who you are?

That doesn't mean it's good or fair

or the best, most important thing you ever did,

but when did you go viral?

And for Candice Warner,

the time that we were introduced to her

was through this horrific experience.

So if you were speaking to a friend

and you were trying to place her,

you might throw that piece of information in.

The origin of that was incredibly sexist and wrong

and it shouldn't have been the story that it was,

but it was.

That's so true, Jesse,

because if I was explaining to someone

who Candice Warner was

and I was trying to be respectful

and not mention that incident,

I bet you any money that when they got,

they'd go, oh, you mean the one in the toilet with her?

Like 100%.

Because of the fact it made the front page.

So Candice Warner,

knowing that that is part of her narrative

and then going, I'm gonna own it is clever

because she's aware of that.

And then Katie Holmes,

there's a lot of reasons why people love Katie Holmes.

And I think it's because she is a single mother

and there's a lot of women who really relate to that.

You don't see a heap of that in celebrity culture

where single to the point where she's so custody,

like Suri is her daughter

and we're obsessed with those pap pics

of them together and their relationship.

She's really dedicated her life to motherhood

and to indie projects.

And therefore, what's the thing

that made her the most famous?

It was probably her relationship to Tom Cruise.

So I think that that's the first thing.

So you mean if you don't do anything

that sticks out in the public consciousness more

than that thing, it will always re-index to that thing.

Because if you think about it that way,

the way to shift a stubborn narrative about yourself

is to write a new one, right?

And Kidman, immediately after she divorced Tom Cruise,

won an Oscar, dated a lot of famous dudes

and then married Keith Urban

and then had a couple of children.

And all the way through that,

she made bigger, better, more interesting movies

like her career kept moving, kept building, kept growing.

And that narrative has now outweighed

the Tom Cruise narrative.

There would be people around our office,

I'm sure, who probably don't even know

she was married to Tom Cruise.

Because she also doesn't ever speak about it.

Yeah, her new narrative is probably more powerful

than the Tom Cruise one.

Well, there've been more stop points, right?

Whereas Katie Holmes,

and there could be a million reasons for this,

has chosen, I think, not that I know,

but the Tom Cruise experience made her intensely private.

And so remember she was dating Jamie Foxx

for like years and years and years,

but never mentioned it.

There were hardly any photos of them together.

She is intensely private.

And the downside of that

is that the narrative remains the one that everybody heard.

You're basically creating a void

that people then project into.

But if you were Katie Holmes,

you'd be looking at it and going,

your story's fine.

Like, this story is that I married an idiot,

which she did, who wasn't kind or good.

She has never had to say a word

and yet all the words are said for her.

But I reckon the other way is exactly as Holly said,

you never comment on that narrative

and you build something entirely new,

which we have seen with someone like Lara Worthington,

who I think is the complete opposite.

I mean, she was shamed and she existed

in that same moment that Candace Warner did.

And it was awful.

And she has completely rebranded.

It's true. She has a new name.

We did a lowbrow episode about Lara Bingle,

which is a show I do with Shannon Finlay.

And I told the story of her being massively slut-shamed

after that relationship with Brendan Favola

and the photograph that he leaked of her.

And Shannon didn't know that story.

So that was not...

You just know her as this like...

I've forgotten about that story.

That was not her narrative about Lara Bingle.

She knows her as like a very stylish, you know,

skincare, beauty, famous person's wife.

Like that's the narrative that she knows about Lara Bingle.

What do we think about Candace Warner then?

Because I saw that project interview

and saw all of this come out.

And is there a point where you've got to stop talking about it?

Or is this going to sell a book

that's going to also include a new narrative?

Yeah, that's what I'd love to hear you on, Mia, right?

Because when I saw it at the weekend,

I think it was like the cover of The Sunday Telly or whatever.

And there was another one too that was like Candace Warner

on Sunny Bill Williams and Sandpaper Gate.

Now, those...

Sandpaper Gate is the famous cricketing scandal

where her husband was among the cricketers

who were caught cheating in a massive international test match.

Now, that has literally nothing to do with her,

except that she's married to that guy and she was there.

And the other incident is something that happened almost 20 years ago

that she has spoken about, including to you on No Filter,

at length and kind of explained, I guess,

as much as she should have to explain anything.

Yet they were the headlines every time.

And I wanted to ask you, would she be okay with that

because she's selling a book?

Or would she be every time she sees herself described that way,

like Jesse was saying, oh, she's the one in the toilet with her?

Does she just...

What do you think?

I don't know, but I know that this is the price

of putting your story out there

that you can't choose what part of it people take hold of.

Lisa Wilkinson's memoir, for example.

All anyone wanted to talk to her about was the Carl thing

and the Today show and leaving the Today show.

Which is one page, you know.

Yeah, which was a small part of her book.

But we're in a click economy and an attention economy.

And it's a little bit like Katie Himes' life.

The stuff about her being a single mother

and living off the radar, that's not interesting.

The Tom Cruise is the interesting bit of heat.

You've got someone like Nicole Kidman

who leans into celebrity and continues with her narrative.

Or you've got the Lara Worthington model

where she just completely withdraws but for years.

And it's interesting.

I was thinking also about James Parker, billionaire Australian,

who at one point got into a physical fight

with his best friend in the street outside his house in Bondi

when there were paparazzi around.

And the photos of that that went everywhere.

The only way that that could be eclipsed

was when he started dating Mariah Carey and they got engaged.

New narratives.

New narratives.

So suddenly that was way down the Google search.

Like, you know, I think also those photos

have been taken off the market.

But at the time, at the time you think,

how could anything ever eclipse this?

But it did because he got engaged to Mariah Carey.

And same with Nicole Kidman.

Like I never thought there would be a time

when she would not be asked about Tom Cruise.

But I also think that when you don't talk about it,

you don't talk about it, you don't talk about it.

And for years and you stay disciplined, it does stop.

And also you get more power as you get older.

So not everyone gets more power.

And I would argue that Candice doesn't necessarily

have that power yet.

Lara Worthington does though,

because she married an international movie star.

And she is glamorous and people want her on the cover

of their magazine or they want her to attend their event.

So she can control the parameters of an interview.

And she can say, I won't talk about this

and I won't talk about that.

Candice Warner doesn't have that power,

particularly when you're selling a memoir.

It wouldn't furiate me so much.

When I see those headlines, I'm furious for her.

But as Jennifer Aniston is the same,

she's still defined by the love triangle

of her and Brad and Angelina,

which is something that happened to her two marriages ago.

No one asks her about Justin Thoreau and that divorce.

Yeah, her narrative is also stuck 20 years ago.

If you want to make out loud part of your routine

five days a week, we release segments

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To get full access, follow the link in the show notes

and a big thank you to all our current subscribers.

Okay, best and worst of the week.

My worst of the week occurred in a nail salon,

a local nail salon.

I was there with my daughter who's 13

and her best mate who's visiting from Sydney

and it was her best mate's birthday.

So I, because I'm mother of the year, Mia, I said,

it's what children like to do.

You can't get their nails done.

Actually, they bloody do.

I know.

They both wanted acrylics.

And look.

Acrylic?

I've never got acrylics.

Oh, Matilda.

I don't get acrylics either, but it's school holidays.

They beg me long enough.

Whatever.

Can you be on a phone while getting acrylics?

Well, here was like, this is where the worst comes in.

So I know you're all already judging me

for getting my daughter acrylics.

That was my worst.

But it gets worse.

I've only got her daughter acrylics.

It's my worst of the week.

I was like, well, at least they won't be on their phones

for a while.

How wrong I was.

I sat in the nail salon with them.

You know, sometimes you go to the nails and take ages

because, you know, they always,

because they're very busy and they always over-subscribe

and they go, sure, we can do 14 of you at once.

And they can.

Listen to a podcast.

Yeah.

But anyway, we were there for a very long time.

And I sat next to them, two smart, engaged, 13-year-old girls,

as they got to know the new AI bot on Snapchat.

This just launched.

What are you?

What?

So this is what they do.

You can design it for how you want it to look.

So Matilda looks like a robot.

Margot looks like something else.

And they said, can you write my essay for me about Albert

Einstein?

Click 30 seconds later.

Essay about Albert Einstein.

Do you know where I live?

Yes.

You live here and here.

Should I get this nail color, snap, or this nail color, snap?

Gosh, they both look great.

I've heard that green's more in the seat.

Like, no.

Oh, wow.

Shit.

And I wanted to throw myself on the fumes of the acrylics.

A deep breath because modern life is rubbish.

It really, really is.

Yeah, I'm not enjoying all this AI style.

And I was sitting there, and Matilda goes,

I think they've made this for people with no friends

because basically you don't need people anymore.

Like, it doesn't matter if my friends aren't replying to my messages.

I can just sit there and talk to the bot.

And then the thing is, is we're so unprepared.

And I'm sure that I'm more prepared than some

because, you know, of the world I work and live in.

But like, they can't think of one good reason

why it isn't an excellent idea for the AI bot

to write their school essay.

I keep waiting for my kids' schools to reach out and go,

hey, this is our plan.

We're on it.

We're a cross this.

I know.

And then I was like, it's really dangerous

that the bot knows where you live.

And then I was like, why is it though?

The bot's not coming for them.

Maybe it is.

I don't know.

And the phone knows where they live.

Not yet.

Right?

The AI says it's not dangerous, actually.

It's very confusing and very upsetting.

And I don't know.

And I was just questioning all of my life choices

and nails a lot on a Saturday afternoon.

My best and the antidote to that is a wholesome moment.

I had the corrective experience.

I had the next day with my son.

Let's just call him the favorite child this week, shall we?

I'm joking.

Everybody don't at me.

I posted about the trials of school holidays and phones

this week and every parent I know is like, I know it's awful.

But a corrective experience is I made my child

by bribing him with his with a phone.

He doesn't have a phone.

But I was like, you can play on your Nintendo thing

if you come out and garden with mom for 10 minutes.

And he's like, anyone would think I'd ask Tim.

Yeah.

Pull his own teeth out with pliers.

But he came.

10 minutes isn't very long.

I know.

Well, that was my trick or opening offer.

We pulled out all the tomato plants.

He actually loved it.

Pulled out lots of the good plants at the same time,

which was kind of annoying.

But I tried not to lose my shit

because we're rewarding good behavior.

Yes.

Positive outside, healthy.

With screen time.

Exactly, with Nintendo.

Pulled out all the tomato plants.

He loved it.

Washing up all the soil, doing all that.

Planted more plants.

I thought, there you go.

Nailed school holidays.

Then he went back inside and played on his Nintendo.

That was the pretty much the best they go.

You had 10 good minutes.

I did.

What about you, Mia Friedman?

Well, I know everyone's been missing

instalments of my worst of the week being about my dogs.

So I'm back to tell you

that they are making another appearance

in my worst of the week.

And I wasn't even in the country at the time.

So I was away in Fiji on Jesse's honeymoon.

And my phone rings.

And it's not a number that I recognise.

So I answer.

And if you've got kids,

when the school rings or the daycare rings,

they'll always say, well, you hope they'll say.

Now, everything's fine.

But.

But.

The person at the other room went,

Hi, Mia.

It's Annie from Dogue.

Everything's fine.

She's fine.

But I'm just at the vet with Bella.

And I'm like, oh, Annie, what's happened?

Bonnie attacked her.

Oh, no.

She was attacked by a dog on retreat

that happened to be Mia's other dog.

Yes.

There are many, many dogs on this retreat,

including Jesse's dog.

And she was attacked one dog.

And in the fracar, she's lost a tooth

and there's blood everywhere.

So we've had to take her to the vet.

And I just want you to know.

When Mia got off the phone,

she goes, Bella's in the hospital.

She kept saying Bella's in the hospital.

Bonnie's attacked her.

I think Bella's in the vet.

Bella's been rushed to hospital.

She's in the AR.

Anyway, so I'm like, Annie, talk me through it.

And she said, well, Bella was eating her dinner

and Bonnie walked past and smelt the food

and they got into a fight.

Two of us had to pull them apart.

But in the whole thing, we think Bella bumped her head

on a wall and smashed her tooth out.

So anyway, I'm like, OK, that's bad.

She's got painkillers and she took a photo of her

on the way back to the retreat, looking very high, I must say.

So high.

So sorry for herself.

And then she texted me and she said,

I've got bad news to report.

When we got back, Bonnie bailed her up into a corner

and started growling at her.

Oh, no.

Double down on the aggression.

Bonnie's not an aggressive,

well, sometimes she's an aggressive dog,

but not towards Belle.

We haven't had this before.

Anyway, so I've been talking to this dog psychologist about it.

Oh, my God.

I'm shipping.

I love that you get reports while the dogs are on holiday.

Oh, guys.

We think that what's happening is that Bonnie,

who is like one and a half, almost two,

and Bella, who is nine,

that it is time for the alpha top dog status to change.

Oh.

Changing up the guide.

And that Bonnie's like, no, move over, bitch.

There's a new top dog.

And that now, because what you have to do if you've got two dogs,

you've got to put down the bowl and feed the one first,

who's the top dog, to maintain the order.

And they've said, reverse it now.

So Bella has always been top dog because she's older and came first.

And Bonnie has always been bottom dog.

And now you're flipping it.

That's rough on Bella.

That wasn't my idea.

It's so sad.

Yeah.

It's so sad.

How's Bella going to feel about losing her top dog?

I watch Survivor.

I know losing your top dog position is very painful.

Well, in good news, Bella keeps humping me or an I.

So she still knows that she's above some, just not a bottom.

Which is a power thing.

So Bella humps Jesse and I.

I haven't done it for a really long time,

but is doing it again and it's about asserting dominance.

So I get it.

She...

So what that also tells us is that Jesse and I are at the bottom,

like even under Bella.

So that's my worst.

My best was going on Jesse's honeymoon.

I honestly had such a great time.

People keep being like, how's the honeymoon?

And I said, I hadn't.

Guy, it was great.

It would never not be funny to me.

Did you enjoy it more than yours?

So much more.

I hated my honeymoon.

I got food poisoning because I had like undiagnosed anxiety.

So I think I had a lot of anxiety and I just thought that I was miserable.

Yeah.

I got sick and I just had a terrible honeymoon.

Really bad honeymoon.

Bad wedding, bad honeymoon.

They've just been good.

And then you've redone it.

My corrective experience was Luca and Jesse's honeymoon.

Oh my God, there's nothing unhealthy about that.

No.

What about you, Jesse Stevens?

Look, my worst.

I've been married for two weeks-ish, as I mentioned.

And no, three weeks, three weeks.

Hey, oh my God, it's going so fast.

Anyway, two things have happened.

Firstly, Luca thinks he can get any haircut he wants.

He went and got a haircut.

He looks revolting.

Hate it.

Oh, I quite like it.

Hate it, hate it, hate it.

Don't.

It's not nice.

I didn't want it.

He looks awful.

Did you tell him?

It's very short.

It's, yeah, I told him, I hated it.

But I think it was retaliation for an incident

that happened this week,

which is that I was walking in the door.

We've talked a lot about me and my new bladder issues, right?

I have a baby that sits on my bladder.

It is in a particular weird position, sits on the bladder.

Your bladder or the baby?

The baby.

The baby is very bladder focused.

Right.

Comfy pillow, bladder.

Yes.

Yeah.

And I walked in the door and I just shrieked.

It's coming, it's coming,

as in I'm currently wetting my pants.

And Luca's face dropped.

And then he followed me to my bathroom,

where I ran, holding my, like, between my legs.

I had a dress on and it was coming down.

And you know the shame of a child who's wet themselves?

And I was going, it's coming, it's coming,

I don't know what to do.

And Luca stood at the doorway, just like,

what have I just witnessed?

But I thought, I would have thought,

oh my God, the baby's coming.

No, no, no, he knew that it was a weep.

He was a shameful experience and he refused to look away.

And he just stared at me and then really slowly

just closed the door.

Like, can we please have this separate?

And then about an hour later,

he was like, should we talk about that?

Because never.

He kept saying the standard you walk past

is a standard you accept.

And I don't accept that this happens in our home now.

We don't just wet ourselves in front of each other.

Oh my God, just wait till you know the flavour.

And I was like, I'm sorry, I don't know.

What happened?

I'm doing everything that I can.

It was so embarrassing.

Honey, why don't you go to passive aggressive haircut?

Yes, just to be like,

if you bring up the haircut,

I'll bring up what happened the other night.

So marriage is going really well between us.

My best, I've got to say Honeymoon as well.

I worked out that it was the first holiday I'd been on

in years and years where I didn't have a book to write.

So usually when I go on holidays,

it's like I do have a project.

I'm, even if I'm not doing it every second,

it's in my head.

You can't fully relax.

I could, I put in these structural edits

and then I went, oh my God.

And I felt my brain go, you could do this,

you could do that, you could.

And I went, no, that's not the point.

And so I actually felt like I could rest,

snorkeling, floating, hanging out with reef sharks.

Just loved it, loved it, loved it.

And your 14 year old brother-in-law.

Yeah, exactly right.

Romantic breakfast for three.

I have got a recommendation for you for a new show.

Now, I don't know about you,

but I love and have missed Natasha Leon.

Oh, from Orange as a New Black?

Yes.

I love her.

I listened to a podcast interview with her recently

and she's just badass.

She's really interesting.

So interesting.

Anyway, she has made a new TV show called Poker Face.

What's it like?

I always know the truth.

There's nothing mystical about it.

I could just tell.

And anyone is lying.

You're going to find Charlie Kier

and you're going to bring it to me.

I can tell she was lying.

What if it's a woman's intuition?

Oh, it's not like a tampon commercial, okay?

It's a real thing.

I guess I'm not over the pot

where you're a human lie detector.

Yeah, I know.

It's crazy.

Oh, everyone's talking about this.

Yeah, and it's on stand.

And it's created by the guys called Ryan Johnson.

Now, he's really hot these days

because he makes the Knives Out series.

So, you know, the Knives Out murder mystery.

Yes.

And Glass Onion, which everybody loves.

And I'm sure we've recommended that.

That is good.

It's amazing.

Anyway, Natasha Leon stars in this that he has created

and she plays this woman called Charlie

who has this uncanny ability to tell if people are lying.

So, I'm not going to give you spoilers,

but a lot happens in the first episode.

And it ends up with her basically going

on a road trip across America.

And basically every episode is about

her kind of solving different deaths.

Oh, I'm so glad.

Because a lot of people have recommended this to me,

including my friend who I had dinner with last night.

And I've always got like that rule of three.

So, three people I love recommended

something to me.

It's got to be good.

But I thought it was about poker.

No, it's not about poker.

I'm so relieved.

It's about lying and all of those things.

And she is amazing in it, but also the cast is amazing.

It's got Adrienne Brody.

It's got Joseph Gordon.

Levitt.

It's got Hong Chao.

It's got Chloe Swingney.

I was saying her name wrong.

Swingney.

Oh, that's a high quality cast.

Very cool cast.

And almost every episode I end up going,

oh, it's that guy from that thing.

And I've been watching it with Brent.

It's a good show to watch with someone else.

So, I fully recommend.

What's it on?

Poker face on stand.

Get into it.

That is all we've got time for today.

If you're looking for something else to listen to,

while these two are away on honeymoon,

we recorded a bonus episode with me and Claire Stevens,

host of But Are You Happy?

And related to one, Jesse Stevens over here

and Elfie Scott, editor of Mom and Me, about jealousy.

One of the things that came up when we were listening

to the first episode of But Are You Happy?

When Claire was talking about you, Jesse,

and about how she loves you more than anyone in the world,

but also feeling jealous of you and whether that's a motivator.

And it got me, I'm always really interested

in whether people's relationship with envy,

if it's useful or not.

Like I said, if competition is your fuel and drives you,

or if it kind of paralyzes you and makes you feel insecure.

So, we all talk about our different things

that make us jealous and how.

So, not just like romantic jealousy.

No, in fact, not romantic jealousy.

Professional jealousy.

Or friendship and what it might tell you,

because Claire has said she uses it as a bit of a guide sometimes

for where she wants to be.

Yes, that's interesting.

Whereas for other people, it can be really paralyzing.

Like, well, there's no point in me trying to do anything

because it can never be as good as that, you know, that kind of thing.

So, we talk about our relationship with that.

It's really interesting if I say so myself.

And... No, that's so good.

I miss you, but you know, we may do.

Thank you for listening.

Luckily, I'm a Mamma Mia subscriber.

But if you're not, click the link in your show notes

and then you can become one.

Yes, thank you for listening to Mom and Me right loud this week.

This episode is produced by Emma Gillespie with audio production

by Leah Porges and assistant production from Susanna Makin.

And we'll see you next week.

Bye. Bye.

Shout out to any Mamma Mia subscribers listening.

If you love the show and you want to support us,

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There's a link in the episode description.

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