Mamamia Out Loud: If You Light A Candle Before Sex, I'll Scream

Hi Mamma Mia listeners, Beck Melrose here, dropping into your feed to talk about our

new Mamma Mia podcast, Things You Didn't Learn in School.

Things You Didn't Learn in School is the show that helps you realise that we weirdly

all graduate without the basic life skills we actually need.

Should I buy or rent?

How does voting work?

Should I be investing my money?

How do I even talk to my mechanic?

And most importantly, where the hell do I park my car?

I'm Ann Burnham and I'll be the first to admit we obviously still have some things

to learn.

But that is where our show comes in.

And we know what you're thinking, Beck and Ann, why are you even making a podcast when

we can just Google all of this?

Because you haven't Googled it, have you?

No.

So we rounded up experts on everything from finance to fallopian tubes in a cute little

curriculum just for you.

Things You Didn't Learn in School is a new podcast by Mamma Mia.

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Hey everyone, before we start the show today, I want to let you know that we won't be talking

about what is happening since the terrorist attack on Israel a few days ago.

The horror of it as details are starting to emerge of what Hamas did to 1000 Israeli

children and babies and women and the elderly.

And the ongoing situation with 150 hostages is just too distressing.

It's too traumatic.

But that's not to say you shouldn't be aware of it.

For Jewish people all over the world, this feels like 9-11 to us.

And you certainly didn't need to be American to be gutted by the images that you saw and

the stories that you heard around 9-11.

But we can't possibly do justice to this topic or our feelings about it on this show in this

way at this time.

If you're keen to know more though, we will put some links in the show notes.

But please take care and if you have kids in your life, keep them away from social media

as much as you can over the next few days because some things cannot be unseen or unknown.

Now, after some very deep breaths and a very big ear shift, on with the show.

Mamma Mia Out Loud!

Hello and welcome to Mamma Mia Out Loud, what women are actually talking about on Wednesday

the 11th of October.

I'm Mia Friedman and I am driving the school bus while Holly's away.

And we're all terrified in the back.

I'm Claire Stevens and I'm Elthys Scott.

And on the show today, some people have found a surprising way to deal with loneliness.

But the irony is it's very anti-social, plus how the bristle effect has been identified

as a major killer of intimacy in romantic relationships.

So why is it a sex issue for so many women?

And have you ever felt sad during life moments that should be joyful?

We unpack perfect moments syndrome and why so many of us create weddings.

But first.

In case you missed it, and to be honest you probably did because you're probably reading

more important things at the moment.

But Princess Kate got curtain bangs.

Catherine or Kate, the Princess of Wales has finally given in two to three years after

this trend actually emerged and gotten beautiful curtain bangs.

She's leaning into her far-forset, she's blow-drying them out into 70s waves, she's probably

seen Harry Styles on tour, they're looking good.

Mia, as a fellow bangs woman, how are you feeling about the new look and are you confident

that Kate has copied your style?

It's been rumoured.

We should probably explain what curtain bangs are for out louders who might not know.

Elphi, can you describe a curtain bang?

It's a long fringe that sort of goes to the sides of your face, much like a curtain.

Beautiful.

For those out louders who are very keen on a fringe update, I'm growing my fringe out.

Yeah, you have very little patience for a fringe.

Someone said that it's like getting a pet, having a fringe, particularly as we head

into the summer months.

So I'm trying to grow it out, but it's hard.

So I'm in the curtain bang phase.

I'm growing towards a curtain bang, but my fringe is still straight across, but cowlicks

and fringes don't mix, who knew?

I feel like you can only have curtain bangs if you have your hair professionally blow-dried

every day.

No, all you need is a straightener.

It's actually really easy.

I did this this morning, it's not that bad.

See, I think maybe just the nature of my hairs, it doesn't fall like that.

All I want is to be Sienna Miller.

You know how she has those amazing, she has this hair that just falls and she's like,

and it's like mine always looks awful.

Something to put on your to-do list for your maternity leave.

Exactly.

I'll make curtain bangs work.

Are you OK, Emily?

What did you do to your hair?

They're just bangs.

OK, sometimes people cut bangs when everything's fine.

It has been two decades since the first podcast was released.

Obviously, the medium has upended pop culture and media as we know it.

And for heavy users, people who listen

while we clean and cork and eat and commute, podcasting has transformed

the flavour of our everyday lives.

Don't we know it?

I know.

You're welcome.

We're part of the problem.

No, we are part of the solution to media.

A recent article in The Washington Post called The Non-Stop Podcast Listeners

Are On to Something described the life of a 29-year-old woman named Kyra,

who has banished silence from her life.

Here's a bit of a recap of Kyra's day.

The 29-year-old lives in LA and she wakes up at 6am.

She pops in her AirPods and she starts listening to podcasts.

She listens to shows about wellness or true crime while she commutes

and works her day job as a marketer.

Then she heads to her second gig as a workout instructor, podcast playing all the while.

She listens while she cooks and winds down for the night

and finally she falls asleep with a podcast playing.

Pellant says the voices help her focus.

She says they also feel a social need and that ever since the pandemic,

she spent less time with people and working multiple jobs leaves little time

for hanging out with friends.

So she says the podcast she listens to,

and this is what we often say about out loud, it's the friends in your ears.

In recent years, we've also seen the boom of noise cancelling headphones,

which generated $13.1 billion in 2021.

And that's expected to triple over the next 10 years.

And they're essentially accessories to turn down the volume of real life.

And in most cases, fill out ears with our own private alternative realities all day.

So what do we think are the consequences of lacking a shared reality?

If we're walking around with our own dialogue plugged into our brains

and not listening to the world around us, do we think there's a cost?

Look, I think that there is a cost to not living in some semblance of silence.

I think that constantly being stimulated is dangerous for a brain.

I have become more and more aware of this, particularly with my phone news,

but it also extends to podcast listening, where I feel like I can't exist

with baseline discomfort.

And I think that that is a problem.

I've been trying to get over that and just sit in the discomfort of boredom

and silence. And I think that that has actually helped me come up with,

I was about to say, original ideas, but that's probably stretching it,

ideas sometimes and thoughts, which I didn't have for many, many months.

So that has felt really good.

But I also think that there's a social cost to this

because I also see people in like supermarkets listening on their noise

cancelling headphones and interacting with people.

And I think that you often miss out if you're not conscious of it

with those kind of incidental interactions with people that can actually

make your life feel really full and satisfying in a way.

Like speaking to the person at Woolies is doing the checkout.

And when I see those people who keep the noise cancelling headphones on,

it makes me want to drag them into the street. Yes.

Yeah, it's interesting because I have a very complex relationship

with silence and boredom, which I've since learned is a lot to do with my ADHD.

So boredom for the ADHD brain can feel not just uncomfortable,

but like painful is the wrong word.

But you know that feeling of like if you're sitting on a remote control

and it's just going around or like when white noise is just not white noise,

it's just static and it's it can feel like really uncomfortable.

And so I use podcasts very effectively.

And I think probably it's why I got on to podcasts quite early

from a media point of view with Mamma Mia, because like I've always liked

to have lots and lots of stimulation.

So before even the internet was invented, my favourite thing to do

when I came home from work in my magazine days would be to have the television

on a pile of magazines on my lap while I ate dinner.

So it would just be like sensory.

And that is relaxing to me to have my senses very, very stimulated.

What the experts in this article showed is that everybody needs to be

in a certain state of arousal to be able to focus and concentrate.

Now, if you've got ADHD, that level is much, much higher.

But I've also noticed that the way, you know, the internet has allowed us to

because, you know, you're talking about podcasts or looking at screens as well,

has allowed us to fill every gap in our lives.

So the part where you walk to the bus stop, the part where you are waiting in a queue,

the part where you're walking around the grocery aisle or driving in your car.

For a long time, we've had music available to us during those times.

But now podcasts are a different kind of stimulation because it's talking.

When you're listening to music, your mind can wander.

But when you're listening to a podcast, your mind can't wander.

And if it does, you have to like skip it back.

Exactly.

I think that lack of boredom can be really detrimental to creativity.

And even things like critical thinking, like we should be conscious that the

podcast that we're listening to, we're arbitrarily choosing them.

So it's another echo chamber.

It's putting into our ears what we want to hear.

And as a result, you're not necessarily being challenged by little interactions

around you or noticing the complexity of the world around you.

I think it also feels like a bit of a band aid solution for loneliness.

I talked about this recently when we were talking about group chats and the fact

that I haven't been socializing as much and group chats.

I think I'm using as a bit of a very artificial way to mask that loneliness.

And I think podcasts do the same thing.

You can feel like you've had a million conversations in a week and you haven't

had a million conversations.

You've listened to other people have conversations.

And I don't think the value of that is nearly as important or rewarding as

actually being around other humans.

But on the upside, doesn't it enable you to have that kind of mental

stimulation and that feeling of friendship without having to expend any energy?

Like if you are not well or if you are, you know, you can't afford to go out

or if you don't have friends, I know it's a facsimile of that social experience,

but it also doesn't cost you anything financially or in energy.

Listening to podcasts has been something I've realized that that is a way I learn

and I absorb information.

So I think overwhelmingly it has added so much to my life.

But I think it's the plugging of every moment.

It's being in the shower and listening to a podcast.

I did that until about a year ago when I moved house and it wasn't feasible.

There wasn't anywhere for me to put my phone where it wouldn't get wet.

Whereas where I lived before, I could put my phone sort of on the edge of the

bath and I could listen to it.

And so I literally listened to podcasts all day, every day.

And I think that AirPods have enabled people to do that as well more because

you can like move around while you're in a family situation.

I listened to you guys while I'm in the shower while she says dirtily.

I know, I do it as well.

And I also think what you said, Elfie, about having ideas, it's almost like

being plugged with ideas constantly.

You can't differentiate.

Like, I feel like I'm constantly stimulated by information and thoughts.

And then when I'm asked to have a thought, I have no idea what that thought is.

But Elfie, you saw a TikTok trend recently about silent walking.

Yes.

So it's a concept called silent walking, which to the layperson would otherwise

just be dubbed walking.

Do you ever put your AirPods in to go for a walk with all the

intentions of listening to a podcast or music or something?

But then you just end up listening to the sounds of nature or the cars going by

or the water or whatever it is.

I literally do this every single day.

You know that feeling where sometimes you get the bus or you have to make some

kind of journey to work and you forget your headphones and then you have to do

the 15 minute walk without headphones and you're like, oh, fuck.

Yeah.

God, how am I going to sit on that?

What do people do?

Yeah, what did people do?

Yeah.

But I've been doing that recently and I'm really enjoying it.

Sometimes your brain will come up with ideas that you find genuinely

interesting, maybe once a week.

Yeah.

It's amazing what your brain can do when you sort of give it that opportunity.

But that's why I'm scared of my brain because I don't want to think.

And in this article, it explained how this particular person, she has

intrusive thoughts.

She uses podcasts to keep those intrusive thoughts at bay.

And for example, this week, when the news has just been so horrifying

and my brain is just going, going, or if I've got anxiety, which I also do.

But anxiety, you can't be anxious while you are thinking about something else

as long as it's not the thing that makes you anxious.

The brain can't do two things at once.

So if you are distracted with a podcast, it can keep those thoughts out.

Yes, but we know that that's not necessarily good in the long term.

My question about that is always when you then do have to switch off

because you feasibly cannot be plugged in constantly.

So for example, when I go to bed, I have to not be listening to a podcast

because I'm sharing a bed with somebody who wants to sleep.

When I am laying in bed, that's when all the thoughts that probably

should have come in, plug them with.

I feel like it's the wave of thoughts that I should have had naturally

throughout the day are all descending on me.

And then it's four a.m.

And I'm like, goodness, I really had to work through a lot that I could have.

I could have done while I was going through a silent walk.

When we were kids and teenagers, silent walking was all you had.

So for all the kids out there, make sure you enjoy a silent walk,

clear your head out in the trees, in the sunlight with your mother out loud.

One of the biggest intimacy killers in a relationship has been identified

in an article in The New York Times this week, and it's called The Bristle Reaction.

Sex therapist Vanessa Marin explains in the article that the bristle reaction

is what happens when your partner's touch makes your entire body tense or bristle.

Because as she writes, you know, it can mean just one thing.

She says that she's noticed it as a trend among her clients

who are in long term relationships that complain to her

that their partners would only touch them when initiating sex.

So as anyone who's been in a long term relationship or even a short term,

one knows at the start, you want to touch each other, lots of physical touching,

lots of affection.

But then as time goes on, it becomes apparent usually that you and your partner

may not want sex or physical affection as often or at the same time as each other.

Maybe he likes having sex in the morning, but you want to get up early

and go for a run or get to work.

Maybe you want to have it at night, but he's too full from dinner.

Maybe you just want to cuddle in bed.

Marin says this is all normal.

But when a pattern sets in and the bristle reaction starts to occur,

usually the woman it is who feels that the only time their partner

wants to touch them is when they want sex.

That's when it can set up this really, really bad dynamic.

Alfie, have you been the bristle lure and or the bristley?

Like, can you relate?

I've probably been the person who makes my partner bristle,

but it's not like he's nasty enough to say that out loud.

But I love this term.

I'm so glad that there is a term for this

because I've spoken about this with my girlfriends before

and everybody knows when their partner is trying to initiate sex.

And it's not even the fact that you don't want sex.

Like, sometimes you do want sex, but it's just the fact that it's so

transparent that makes it embarrassing.

Can you give some examples of what kinds of things

and not talking necessarily about your current partner

at all and a probe into your sex life, even though we've just talked about it.

Even though you absolutely do.

Even though, you know, if you really want to share.

And Kathy let used to call it the hand, the hand that would come across the bed.

What are some of the ways that it can make you bristle?

Like, some of the things that might make one bristle.

Touch is definitely a big part of it.

Everybody knows when their partner is touching them in a way

where they're trying to incite some kind of sexual acts.

But then I also think, babe, do you want a massage?

Yes. Oh, my God.

You don't care about the tension in my shoulder.

What person ever wanted to just give their partner a massage?

But I also think that there are other things that come into this, right?

Like, some people I've spoken to, like their partners will like

light a candle or like close the curtains.

And you're like, and then you're like, yeah, it's nice and so irritating

because men are dirty dogs.

But like, I would almost prefer someone to just go,

I really want to have sex with you right now because it's like,

let's just be grownups about this.

Yes. Yeah, I think as a busy person, I'm not really that busy,

but as a person who likes efficiency, sometimes it's like

when there's like a hand movement or a fucking candle, it's like,

I know this is going to be an hour long expedition.

It is a fucking candle, isn't it?

That's what Gwyneth Paltrow should sell, a fucking candle.

A fucking candle.

So when someone wants to have sex, you light the fucking candle.

And it's like, I don't need a freaking candle.

Like it's like, let's just be efficient and direct about this.

I don't need all the bullshit.

But I do think there's some really good advice in this about the bristle

reaction and what you're meant to do to kind of combat it.

And one was practicing nonsexual touching, which I reckon

this is something I have noticed my whole life about older couples

who seem really happy.

I've always looked at older couples like my parents' generation

who hold hands, who just interact quite physically with each other,

obviously not in a sexual way because it's in public.

And I reckon there's a direct correlation there

between nonsexual touching and happiness.

But you don't know that they're not Roger and like rabbits as well.

No, I'm sure they are.

I'm sure they are.

They're doing the touching outside of that

because Claire isn't watching them have sex, I see.

I don't think I am.

And I think the problem becomes when you only touch as a precursor for sex.

And it's interesting that there are moments, phases in a relationship

where you probably struggle with that and don't struggle with that.

So at the moment, like I'm quite a big handholder.

I quite like holding hands if I'm out and about when you're pregnant,

like you are constantly getting your partner to feel your belly,

to feel kicks and that sort of thing.

And it's like, that's not a sexual, believe me, that is not sexual.

Or I'm like, rub my back, I'm sore, rub my feet, I'm sore.

And I think that that's good, that it's like there's not a sexual element to it.

Whereas I know that a lot of people, once they've had babies

and they are touched out because you're always with the baby

and you always feel like you're being touched.

As soon as your partner puts a hand on you, it's like, I'll get the fuck away.

Like, I know what this is leading to.

Alfie, in this article, the sex therapist also suggested establishing erotic time zones.

I think that means scheduling when you're going to have sex

so that if there's touching outside that time,

you can relax into it because you both know that this is not a sex time.

And she suggests having a conversation about your preferred initiation style

and asking each other questions such as, when do you feel most sexual?

How can I initiate sex better?

And when do you prefer having sex?

Well, it's all about communication.

I think those are great ideas.

But erotic time zones, would you want it scheduled in?

Because that would make me ick even more.

I know.

It's like, fuck a clock, it's five o'clock on Friday.

We're going. Come on now. Come on now.

And it's like, well, maybe I don't feel like that at that time.

Maybe that changes.

My favorite is apparently you're meant to say to your partner when you bristle.

So, you know, your partner's touched you, you've just bristled.

You're meant to say, oh, sorry, honey, you startled me.

Let's circle back to this tonight.

The idea of me saying to my partner, sorry, honey,

you startled me with your touch.

You have startled me.

I also like, let's circle back to this corporate speak.

It's fantastic.

In a relationship, it's the weirdest thing.

This is a very unpopular opinion and probably scientifically wrong.

But I feel like some of that overcommunication around like,

when do you feel most sexual and how can I initiate?

I'm like, are we just vibe?

Do you know what I mean?

Yeah. Let's just vibe.

I get that.

But I also think that that comes from a place of deep repression.

Yeah.

But you don't want to talk about it.

I don't want to talk about it at all.

You just want to listen to a podcast.

Yeah.

So what do you think?

Should we have sex tonight?

Sounds awful.

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and a big thank you to all our current subscribers.

Happy birthday to me.

Happy birthday to me.

Have you ever experienced something that should have been one of your happiest

moments? A birthday party?

Your wedding, a holiday and found that the reality is just not working out

like you expected. It's being called Perfect Moments Syndrome.

And basically it refers to the gap between expectation and reality

in some of your happiest moments.

It afflicts those of us who think life should operate in a certain way

and to certain ratios that birthdays are always happy, that a week in Thailand

is meant to be relaxing, that a long awaited date with your partner at a

special restaurant will bring you closer together.

So the term was coined by author Sarah Wilson and it's hit a chord with a lot

of people on TikTok this week who are talking about how it affects their

relationships, holidays, formals, basically anything in their lives that should

feel good, but just does not.

Experts are weighing in on Perfect Moments Syndrome with some pointing out

that people can be scarred by traumatic histories where bad things were shown

to naturally follow good things.

So anxiety or distress is a natural reaction to things going well.

But it can also come down to black and white thinking, disproportionate

expectations and a lack of understanding of what will truly make you happy in any

given situation. Claire, as somebody who has never deeply examined the concept

of happiness or moments of disappointment and also never launched a chart

topping podcast about this literal exact topic, what are your thoughts on Perfect

Moments Syndrome and have you ever had it?

I love this concept because it's essentially what my podcast, Very Happy,

is about and we ask and we ask guests for a time the world told them they'd be

happy and they weren't and the answers are always fascinating.

I think Instagram slash social media has a huge part to play in this because the

idea of flattening life experiences to an image is something I don't think we've

explored enough, the impact that that has on our expectations and on how we

expect things to be emotionally.

Like we were talking a few weeks ago about the influencer who was in Europe.

This occurred to me immediately as well.

I was like, guys, there's like cues and there's rubbish on the street.

And it's like, yeah, because the beautiful image that you've seen,

that's a 360 actual living, breathing moment.

That's not just a flat image.

So I've had lots of these moments, which is what

inspired the podcast and why I was interested in this topic.

At the moment, for example, I have always looked forward to pregnancy.

I looked at people like Megan Markle holding her bump at those awards.

Remember, like everyone made fun of her.

But I was like, I don't know, I'd love to hold my bump.

I hate pregnancy.

I hate it. I absolutely hate it.

Probably the biggest example was Jesse's wedding day.

So it was something I'd looked forward to my entire life and then I was sick,

which is something that happens in life is that sometimes those moments,

they just don't happen or they just don't work out the way that you feel.

Perfect moments in drone.

Maybe I've misunderstood what it is.

I thought it was about not because you cry because you're disappointed,

that it's not what you'd hoped that it would be,

but more that feeling of I'll often cry in happy moments and it's always connected

to a loss because with a lot of milestone happy moments like your child's wedding,

for example, I cried with happiness, but also because I was crossing a threshold

into him, you know, that next phase of life into letting go and stepping back.

And on my daughter's last day of school, I was so happy.

But I was also very emotional because there was also a letting go and a sort

of a looking back to me.

It's the nostalgia of tearfulness, not of mismatched expectations.

Is that different to perfect moment syndrome?

I think it might be because I think that what you're describing is where you're

living in a moment and you're able to like reflect seriously on the implications

of that moment, whereas I think that perfect moment syndrome more reflects a kind

of delusion, the mismatch between reality and what your expectations are.

Or our lack of understanding that like the way life works is that even the most

perfect day of your life is going to have disappointments and even the

crappiest day of your life is going to have silver linings.

Like it's sort of that really black and white, all or nothing thinking that means

that when we get to these moments and I think it's just especially true of young

people that, you know, you get to your wedding day or you get to your year 12

formal and you think that it's going to be this absolutely perfect thing.

And it's absolutely not because nothing is.

Do you think that's why a lot of people feel very sad on Christmas day?

You can never recapture if you had a good Christmas when you're a kid.

You can never recapture the joy of that.

It's always a disappointment, particularly when you have to sort of do all the work.

I don't think that Christmas day is like the pinnacle of Christmas time.

So it's like you've got this whole season that's building up to a day and then you

get you wake up on the day and you're like, I'm tired and cranky.

Do you know what I mean?

Like like you kind of face with the reality that like this is not magic.

This is just life.

I think the other part of this and and I spoke to Hugh Van Kylenberg about this

in an episode of But Are You Happy That Drops Tomorrow is this idea of life

seasoned, which you guys have spoken about on this podcast.

And we sort of expect life seasons to be either completely happy or completely not.

And there are people who look at a particular life season and anticipate,

for example, it's a big reason for postnatal depression that people look at,

you know, I'm going to have a baby and I'm going to be the happiest ever been.

And that's a huge thing that then plays into the mental health issues that can arise.

I was talking to Hugh Van Kylenberg about this and the fact that, you know,

I was like, but what about when you just absolutely hate it?

And I'm only pregnant because I want a baby and I actually hate this phase.

He had some beautiful lines about in your favourite book, there will be chapters

you don't like and in your favourite chapter, there will be sentences you don't like.

And also in the Crappist chapter of a book, there will be great sentences like you've

really got to kind of play with that nuance of like having gratitude for

goodness in bad times and appreciating that in the best times,

the most magical times, there are going to be imperfections.

Elphi, can you think of times that you've had perfect moments in Joe?

I don't think that this is something that troubles me because I have very low

expectations of a lot of things.

Cynicism is great.

But I have to say that my partner has been very good at getting me to voice

when I am feeling discomfort, that is putting me in a grump.

And I think being able to pinpoint that and laugh at it, because ultimately,

it's always going to be like, it was a good day, but it was very windy.

Yes.

It's like, it really makes you laugh at yourself and how unbelievably fickle

you can be when you are just in a cranky mood.

And I think that that can really interrupt a good day.

But I really love that idea, Claire, because I think that a lot of this is also

just about relinquishing control and not being perfectionist and having a very

realistic idea of what the world and life is like.

Birthdays have felt like that to me.

I've now managed to remove all my expectations for birthdays after having

so many terrible, terrible birthdays.

Happy birthday, like, and it's like you're meant to feel.

I don't know what.

I always feel like I'm getting my feelings wrong on my birthday.

Yeah, yeah.

Like, I think it's that you feel like your own emotions can never live up to what

they're meant to. Yeah.

On a certain. Where does the meant to come from?

Is it what we digest in movies or social media?

I think everyone's performing.

Is everyone performing birthdays?

I think they are.

Yeah, it's a weird thing.

I don't think anyone.

I don't know what you meant to feel on your birthday.

I've never felt it.

I also, on those big moments where you're meant to feel a lot,

I'm always paralyzed with nothing, with just numbness.

Like the day I got engaged, each of the days I had my babies.

I never felt that I was feeling what I was meant to feel.

And I don't know what I was meant to feel, but that wasn't it.

And to me, my happiest times, like on Friday night, that was not any special

occasion, but I had all my family over.

You know, someone was holding lunar and the kids were teasing each other and

laughing and someone was in the kitchen.

And it was like my heart was so full in that moment.

But it was like, I had no expectations for that night.

Exactly. But I think that you're also

tapping into this idea that we are so built to believe that our moments of happiness

should be moments of ecstatic joy.

And I think actually what happiness boils down to is contentment, right?

And that heartful feeling.

And it's not like it's going to feel like fireworks.

A lot of the time it will just feel like fulfillment.

Out louders, come into the Facebook group and let us know when you've had perfect

moment syndrome, we want to know the moment, why it didn't live up to expectations

and how you've sort of processed it afterwards.

Before we go, I have a recommendation and it is for a bedtime story.

It's been a long time since I've read or listened to a bedtime story.

Thank God, Jesse and Claire Stevens have done a very special bedtime story for Luna.

Here is a little bit of it.

Your mummy and your auntie are going to read you a book called The Voice Referendum.

We're voting on whether Indigenous and Torres Strait Islander people should get

a say in the policies and laws that affect them.

Very good question, Luna.

Well, the no-sides say that not every single Indigenous person in Australia was

consulted about The Voice.

Yes, that would be literally impossible.

And also it overlooks that this cat, this was an idea that came from Indigenous

people that convened and they came up with this idea.

It's so good, you'll get to see Luna being so cute.

You guys are so funny.

How did you come up with this idea?

It's a reel that you've done.

It's on TikTok, it's on Instagram.

How did you come up with the idea?

We had this idea weeks and weeks ago to do this.

And then we tossed up whether to say anything, do anything.

Are you entitled to have an opinion on this?

And then we sort of landed on the fact that both of us would feel really weird

the day after the referendum if it got to that and we hadn't said anything.

If we hadn't even attempted to change minds or show a perspective.

And so we kind of thought like, what's a way to do it that has a very low level

emotional entry point, which is Little Bay Luna and that hopefully uses humour

rather than yelling at people.

Like, I also didn't want to, you know,

write something that was angry or could get misconstrued or exactly, exactly.

So we thought we'd just do this and there's been some interesting

conversations in the comments and overwhelmingly, the response has been lovely.

Yeah, I loved it.

It's so funny out loud as we'll put a link in the show notes.

Check it out. So good.

If you're looking for something else to listen to on yesterday's subscriber

episode, Holly, Mia and I had a fight about money.

We discussed if there is a point people reach where they're making too much

money, because on a subscriber episode last week, we sort of got to this point

in a conversation about Taylor Swift and Mia called Holly and I out for thinking

that women are greedy for making too much money.

And so we decided to just unpack that entire fight and it's very personal.

It's interesting. Yeah, it got really hated.

It was revealing.

I learned things about you both that I didn't know, and maybe you would say the same.

You know, money is such a contentious topic.

I'm really glad we did it.

Yeah, we've had some great feedback.

So a link to that episode will be in the show notes.

Thank you for listening to Australia's number one news and pop culture podcast.

You might be in the shower.

Hello, you look lovely.

Or going to the toilet.

This episode was produced by Emeline Gazillas, the assistant producer is

Tali Blackman with audio production by Lea Porges.

We'll be in your ears tomorrow. Bye. Bye.

Shout out to any mum Mia subscribers listening.

If you love the show and want to support us,

subscribing to mum Mia is the best way to do so.

There's a link in the episode description.

Machine-generated transcript that may contain inaccuracies.