Episode 65 - GenX Speaks Series: Aileen Harvey - You Keep Me Sane Podcast

In this episode, we welcome Aileen Harvey, co‑host of the "You Keep Me Sane" podcast.  Aileen opens up about her upbringing in Glasgow, Scotland, including her experience as a latchkey kid—something many GenX listeners will instantly recognize.  She reflects on her early love of singing, music, dancing, and athletics, and how anxiety shaped her relationship with performing.

Aileen also shares memories from her university years, including the months she spent living in America.  Our conversation explores how many GenX parents have worked to break cycles of generational trauma, and Aileen offers thoughtful insight into becoming a mother later in life.

She speaks candidly about the profound impact of losing her father—an event that shifted the entire trajectory of her life.  Aileen also recounts the many adventures she’s taken with her daughter and the joy of fulfilling her lifelong dream of living in Spain.

We dive into the realities of perimenopause and menopause, as well as what dating looks like in midlife.  We also discuss the "You Keep Me Sane" podcast, which she co‑hosts with previous guest Julie Fahy.  Together, they explore topics that deeply resonate with women navigating midlife, especially around self‑worth.

Our time with Aileen was an absolute delight.  Her adventurous spirit and courageous approach to self‑discovery are sure to inspire listeners.  We especially loved learning so much about Scotland!

Check Aileen Out Here:
Website: https://www.youkeepmesane.com 
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@ykms03
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/youkeepmesane.pod
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@YKMS-01
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/YouKeepMeSanePod  

Check Us Out Here:
https://genxadultingpodcast.com/

#scotland #glasgow #midlife #marriage #divorce #parenting #parent #latchkeykids #menopause #perimenopause #dating #trauma #selfworth #aging #genx #genxtalks #over40 #over50 #dodgeball #puberty #London #england #spain #bali #travel #inspire #healingjourney #adventure 

Check us out at genxadulting.com

#generationx #genx #podcast #marriage #relationship #interview #mom #family

Transcript

GenX Adulting Podcast (00:16)
Welcome to GenX Adulting and today we have Aileen Harvey from the You Keep Me Sane podcast with us. Welcome Aileen.

Aileen (00:24)
Hi guys, it's so nice to be here with you today. Thanks for having me on.

GenX Adulting Podcast (00:28)
We're so excited

to have you here. We had your co-host, Julie, on with us a few weeks ago.

Aileen (00:33)
It's so nice to see her on here as well. She's one of my besties.

GenX Adulting Podcast (00:36)
Yeah, she's

great. She's great. And we're so we've been so excited to have this conversation with you. And our first question is always what year were you born?

Aileen (00:42)
You too.

giving away my secrets. 1971. really? When are your birthdays? Are you Okay. And I'm April. April 13. Thank you.

GenX Adulting Podcast (00:47)
you ⁓

same as us. as us, Yes. ⁓ March, March And mine's August. Yeah. What about you?

Oh, happy birthday. Yeah. Oh, yeah. You

just had a birthday. So wait, you're not I'm a Pisces. You're not a Pisces. Are you an Aries? You're an Aries. Okay. Yeah. So you're you're just like us right in the middle, like right hardcore Gen X. You're not near the Jen Jones like the earlier and you're not near the Zenials later in the Gen X generation. We're in the heart of it where we truly I think I think the 71727374 babies really experience like

Aileen (01:07)
Amenities!

yes. Nope.

Dope.

Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (01:31)
all the stuff that they talk about, like we were really in the heart of all that.

Aileen (01:35)
gosh, definitely. I can remember it as well. I can remember running around the streets like yesterday at like seven years old. And here we are in our fifties. How did that happen?

GenX Adulting Podcast (01:41)
Yes. yeah. yeah.

I know, I know, and I always say like, no matter how old Gen X gets, I think we're perpetually 30. Yeah, I don't feel old at all.

Aileen (01:54)
I don't know, some

days I think definitely don't feel like that. My bones hurt. I'm in perimenopause at this age and I can't believe it. How can it be this late?

GenX Adulting Podcast (02:02)
⁓ yeah.

I know, I

know, I know, no, and I definitely, I'm really looking forward to talking about that with you because I think anytime we have a GenX woman on, I do a whole thing about, let's talk about the perimenopause and menopause. So for our listeners, we are going to cover that. But our next question is always, where were you born?

Aileen (02:25)
I was born in Glasgow, Scotland.

GenX Adulting Podcast (02:28)
Okay, so ⁓ for someone like me who's fairly ignorant to Scotland, anything about Scotland, and for our listeners who may not know anything about Scotland, how big is Glasgow? How would you compare it to other cities?

Aileen (02:32)
Yeah.

So the capital of Scotland is Edinburgh and there's probably about 500 to 700,000 people and Glasgow has, last time I checked, probably about a million people.

GenX Adulting Podcast (02:47)
Okay.

Wow. So Glasgow's a, is it, is it fairly urban?

Aileen (02:58)
It's bigger. It was. ⁓

So you've got the city centre and I mean it used to be big ship building back in the 70s and but now it's much more ⁓ cool and trendy than it used to be when I was young or when were young. ⁓ But I've not been for a while but there is a really cool city centre.

And then there are lots, I lived in a suburb which was about four miles outside of Glasgow. In fact, I used to walk, my uni was in the centre and I used to walk to uni.

GenX Adulting Podcast (03:21)
Okay.

Okay, so that's

so interesting you call the suburb. It's a suburb, but it's only four miles away. Because like in America, a suburb would be like 40.

Aileen (03:36)
Yep.

Yeah I know but look you gotta look at the

size of Scotland. We should get our maps out.

GenX Adulting Podcast (03:46)
Yes. Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. So

was there a big difference between in four miles between the city center and the suburb vibe? Was there that much of a difference? Wow.

Aileen (03:56)
Yeah. yeah. completely different. was

because it's all tenement buildings in the centre, you know, flats. And but we lived in a nice part of Glasgow, the south side where they had houses, red sandstone houses, really nice. And then if you went another couple of miles out, was even bigger houses, detached houses. So it's a real mix Glasgow, but people just always remember Glasgow as this kind of

GenX Adulting Podcast (04:04)
Thank

Yeah.

Okay.

Aileen (04:25)
It's a bit rough I think but it's beautiful around the surrounding area and some of the centre now as well.

GenX Adulting Podcast (04:30)
And now,

now is the city center, ⁓ like you're saying, is it kind of yuppie-fied, like very trendy young people living there? Is that kind of what's happened?

Aileen (04:41)
Some of it is, yeah, there's, definitely changed from when I was young. was, yeah, it wasn't the prettiest, but if you go in, is a beautiful park called Princess Square it had all these beautiful shops. There's some really cool shops, expensive shops, but then you still have the down to earth.

GenX Adulting Podcast (04:50)
can take that out. Okay.

Aileen (05:01)
shops that you would get in Oxford Street in London, don't know if you know London, it's comparable with that.

GenX Adulting Podcast (05:07)
Okay, okay. So in Scotland, because it so how long would it take you to get let's say from Glasgow to Edinburgh?

Aileen (05:16)
So to drive would be about an hour. So not far. I mean, it's not like the States. I spent four months in the States and I remember you had to travel.

GenX Adulting Podcast (05:20)
Okay, wow.

Yeah.

yeah. So where have you gone here in the States?

Aileen (05:30)
Hello.

So when I was 21, I worked in Virginia Beach and I had two jobs and I was working so that I could make money to travel and then I've been to San Francisco, New Orleans, Texas, ⁓ Florida, Miami, New Jersey, New York. I've done quite a lot of the States. I love it.

GenX Adulting Podcast (05:36)
Okay.

Okay. You have,

you have, you have. Okay, so as far as Glasgow, ⁓ how did your family, how many generations back does your family go there? Like how did your family end up there?

Aileen (06:05)
wow.

Right, so my dad was Scottish, but my mum was Irish. And my mum moved to Scotland when she was 19. And she had actually grown up with nuns and they had shipped her to Scotland at that age and she met my dad. And so we're not a big family. My dad had a sister who died when she was nine and he was 11. And his dad died as an alcoholic and he was left with his mum.

GenX Adulting Podcast (06:09)
Okay.

Okay.

Aileen (06:34)
⁓ and we never knew our grandparents and so it hasn't been, it's not a lot of generations behind us.

GenX Adulting Podcast (06:38)
Okay, so.

Okay, so your mom

grew up with nuns and she's from ⁓ Ireland. What's the story there with your mom?

Aileen (06:52)
So my mum was born in Dublin and she was born, her mum, we call it, she was born out with wedlock, so her mum wasn't married as an Irish Catholic. That's a no-no. So she was kicked out, not okay. And she, her dad was from Lithuania. And yeah, so she then got, she was told, she went to foster care.

GenX Adulting Podcast (06:55)
Mm-hmm.

Yep. That's not okay.

Aileen (07:21)
in out of foster care but her mum, there were other siblings so she was allowed to spend time with her mum but not call her mum and she grew up like this.

GenX Adulting Podcast (07:32)
Okay, so let's dissect this. Okay, so how old was your mom when she got pregnant?

Aileen (07:33)
Okay.

Not my mum, her mum. So my mum's Grandmother. Yeah. Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (07:39)
no. ⁓ wait. Okay, so your grandmother had your mom out of wedlock before

she got married and had other children?

Aileen (07:51)
Yeah, but she married a different man.

GenX Adulting Podcast (07:53)
Did you say

a Slovenian? No, Lithuanian.

Aileen (07:56)
⁓

Lithuanian, well remembered, Lithuanian, yeah, yeah and he wasn't Catholic.

GenX Adulting Podcast (07:59)
Lithuanian, okay. So your grandma...

Okay, so your grandmother had your mom out of wedlock with a man who was a Lithuanian. Let's pause there for a second. Yeah. In Ireland, do they discriminate against Lithuanians? Is that a problem or is it okay?

Aileen (08:10)
Yes, and soosh.

No, was just,

it's more about the Catholic thing. And he was actually a Jewish man from Lithuania. And so it's the Catholic thing more than anything.

GenX Adulting Podcast (08:21)
Okay, so the religion.

Okay. Okay.

So how old was your grandmother when she got pregnant with your mom?

Aileen (08:33)
Well, so it was said that she was 18 but we did all the research and it turned out I think she was about 26 so it was quite late.

GenX Adulting Podcast (08:43)
So your grandmother was 26, hadn't been married yet or had any other kids.

Aileen (08:46)
Yeah.

No, well, that's another story.

GenX Adulting Podcast (08:51)
Okay, wait. So,

so had your grandmother been married before or had other children before your mom?

Aileen (08:57)
Well, we didn't know about this but at my mum's funeral about nine years ago we discovered she had another brother who was older so I think there were seven or eight siblings in total.

GenX Adulting Podcast (09:10)
So your grandmother had a son before.

Aileen (09:13)
She had met a few

sons, there was an old, someone who was older than my mum, who we didn't know about. She was meant, we thought she was the oldest, yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (09:19)
before your mom. you thought your mom was the oldest. Right. Okay. So yeah.

So before she had your mom, she had a son, but you don't know who that father was. And you don't know how old she was when she had him. Do you know that?

Aileen (09:28)
She did.

We don't know anything about him, we only heard.

I don't know because it's a lot of history, I don't know how much you want me to go into. So my mum then had a brother who was also part of the Lithuania man. So there was two years between them, but they were separated.

GenX Adulting Podcast (09:57)
OK, wait, repeat that again. Say that again. OK.

Aileen (09:59)
So I know,

the petty manifold for me is terrible. Anyway, right, it's a big story.

GenX Adulting Podcast (10:03)
No, no, no, no. Listen, if you ask me about... Listen,

I can tell you my dad, I have siblings from all over and one of them I didn't find out about until I was 23. So there's nothing you can say. Yeah, I'll share that. But okay, I just want to make sure I'm connecting the dots. Okay, so say that part again.

Aileen (10:11)
I do you.

I want to hear or is it another time? Okay.

Thanks for asking this. Is it to ask these things? So she, my mum was born and then there was a brother two years after her, but they were separated. And then my grandmother then married a man who I'm guessing he's Catholic. I don't know, but he was Irish and then went on to have four children with him.

GenX Adulting Podcast (10:31)
Okay.

Aileen (10:45)
Although they're not sure whether it was with him or still the Lithuanian man because when you look at some of them it's not clear.

GenX Adulting Podcast (10:54)
Okay. That's awesome. I love it. That's amazing. So the

first, the oldest brother, the oldest brother before your mom, we don't know anything about him like his dad or even the, or even the year.

Aileen (11:03)
Mm-hmm. No, we don't know. I think it must

be, I think it's a Lithuanian man. I think it must be. Mam's funeral. Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (11:11)
and they only found out about him at her mother's funeral nine years ago. right. OK, so maybe

with the Lithuanian. Now, do you know, but you don't know the older brother and your mom, how many years between them, how much older he is?

Aileen (11:22)
No,

I think at the funeral, so the four siblings with the husband, they only found out near the funeral time that they were real half siblings of my mum, or maybe full siblings. So they were devastated, but they knew about this other brother somehow, somewhere. They found out.

GenX Adulting Podcast (11:28)
Yes.

Okay,

so just so I'm right, there's the older brother and then your mom, maybe both from the Lithuanian guy, then another brother that was probably Lithuanian guy but separated, right? You said that one was separated, that next brother?

Aileen (11:48)
and then another brother, let's see you in the okay.

Well, they got

separated when my grandmother gave them up, both of them, but they were together at the time, then separated. Then she went on to marry and had four children.

GenX Adulting Podcast (12:07)
So the older brother and your mom were together for a little while but got never together

Aileen (12:11)
No, not the

not the oldest oldest one. There was an oldest one, don't know where he is, then my mum and then another one. They were together and then four and then I don't know if there's any more that we know about.

GenX Adulting Podcast (12:17)
Yes.

And then four more. Yeah. seven total. you think,

yeah, so you think your mom and then her first youngest brother were probably also the Lithuanian guy? But they were separated. The mom and your, do you know where he went?

Aileen (12:35)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Well then my brother, one of my siblings, he found him and got in touch with him and he actually ended up going to Australia and cycling because he got put with priests at some point and then my mum was put with nuns after they had been in and out of foster care. I don't know how they ended up from foster care with in the convent and in the priesthood but I think it was quite damaging for him.

GenX Adulting Podcast (12:46)
Okay.

So we're.

I'm sure were they given up as babies, your mom and her younger brother?

Aileen (13:09)
I

don't think they were given up as babies. Not that I know of, but they could have been. But I don't know at which point. I don't know if my mum knows that, but I just know she was allowed to see her mum from a very young age with the other siblings, but not call her mum.

GenX Adulting Podcast (13:30)
So what a trip so so your mom and her younger brother might have actually been brought home with your mom when they were babies and She maybe raised them a little bit, but then they were put into foster care, but not together to separated and then your mom remarries has more kids and I mean your grandmother and then your mom has memories of going to her mom's place and being around these other siblings

Aileen (13:37)
Maybe. Maybe.

not together, separated, yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (13:59)
but not being able to call her mom, mom. So I wonder how she was explained to them.

Aileen (13:59)
Yeah. No.

I don't

know because we, my oldest sibling and his wife were going to Ireland regularly over the last 20 years and they kept saying, what is the relationship with your mum and us? And then they kept giving them drink alcohol so that they, and eventually they talked, but it took a long time. just, they felt it, but they, it was never said.

GenX Adulting Podcast (14:30)
So they know those four siblings from the quote unquote, they know that there are three other, there were three other siblings that could be their half siblings. Your mom, her younger brother, and that very oldest first son could possibly, but you don't know when they found out about your mom and her.

Aileen (14:32)
They know no.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Or maybe... ⁓

yeah, well, they found out not long before my mum's funeral because my brother had gone over. They had plied them with alcohol, said, who's your mum? And so they were devastated because they had spent time with my mum.

and my brother and everything so they were really, the youngest took it the worst and he was a male and it pushed them away but they wanted to know but they couldn't, it was a lot.

GenX Adulting Podcast (15:17)
Did they so they remembered your mom?

Aileen (15:20)
They did. Yeah, they did.

GenX Adulting Podcast (15:21)
And

that is crazy. mean, it's just like, there's so much trauma on every end, right? Like, especially your mom, hello, and then the two brothers. But then these four siblings who are being raised in this quote unquote conventional family lifestyle, and maybe these other kids are coming over and being told they're cousins or something, like they're not being acknowledged. And they're finding out those were my siblings. Wow.

Aileen (15:28)
my gosh. Yeah. my gosh.

yet, cousins.

terrible but I think it was

common back in these days in in Ireland it was a very common thing but awful

GenX Adulting Podcast (15:51)
Yeah.

And you,

yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely. And then you don't know what made them send her to live in a convent. Was it maybe just she had an age? You just don't, you don't know.

Aileen (16:07)
don't know,

I don't know. She didn't explain that but I know it affected her obviously. ⁓

GenX Adulting Podcast (16:14)
I think the church

stepped in often, right? If it got, I don't know what the threshold was, but somehow the church would get involved and raise kids or care for people. It's very common, think, in Ireland. Yeah. Yeah. And back then with the Catholic Church, that's when everything was very strict, like nuns could hit and, you know, it was like all the old fashioned. Just very powerful. Very powerful, abusive.

Aileen (16:23)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, it was, it was back in the day for sure.

Yeah, yeah they were.

GenX Adulting Podcast (16:44)
You know, and I'm saying this, I'm Catholic. So I'm saying this as a Catholic. There's there's a lot of bad history there of the way

Aileen (16:44)
Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (16:50)
children were treated and all that. mean, even you when you would go to CCD as a kid, think the nun was probably four foot nine, but we were all scared. You know, scared. She could still. Yeah. Yeah, I don't think they by then she wasn't allowed to hit us, but there was rumors, you know, and she carried like a little.

Aileen (17:01)
Yeah, they were skating. We had them at my school as well.

Bye.

Yeah,

GenX Adulting Podcast (17:14)
She carried like a little

Aileen (17:14)
I really-

GenX Adulting Podcast (17:14)
stick, like a little prodding, like a school pointer. And, you know, our kids, yeah, our kids went to Catholic school and there was none. The Catholic Church has gone through a whole change because they were losing people. And so they have had to grow with the times. And obviously, the all the ⁓ pedophilia crap that came out from priests and stuff. So they've had to adjust. But back then, when your mom and her brother

Aileen (17:17)
Yeah, terrifying.

Yeah. No.

picture. Yeah.

yeah.

Okay.

GenX Adulting Podcast (17:43)
were sent away to priests and nuns. That was in the nightmare time. I can't even imagine. How long? Yeah, how long was she with nuns? Do know how long she lived there?

Aileen (17:45)
Hmm. It was all, I couldn't imagine it. just, I don't even want to imagine.

I don't know. I just know things like she didn't have her period till she was 16. And I think she was made to feel guilty when she had hers. And so there was a lot of guilt from anything. And so there was no self-worth. And they were abandoned. But I don't know the age of everything, but I just know the period was there and then she got shipped to Scotland at 19.

GenX Adulting Podcast (18:01)
Mm-hmm.

Yes.

Was she made to feel guilty because she got it so late or because she got it?

Aileen (18:27)
I getting it but she never told me everything. It would have been the control. I mean we all got it, all women get it. But I don't know because the way she was with me when I got mine and I was very early, it was awful. know, she made me think, I thought I was done. Yeah, control. It was, it was. Yep, they did.

GenX Adulting Podcast (18:29)
No, it's the control.

Yeah. Yeah.

Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. The Catholic Church, then, it was all about control. It was an authoritarian regime that was all about control. They scared the shit out of you. They put fear and uncertainty and doubt,

and that's their way of... And shame. Yeah, shame. That's how you keep the people around Shaming women especially, I think, was up there for sure. You know, for... No, mean, for sure.

Aileen (18:57)
They did shame the guilt.

Yeah.

Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (19:08)
Okay,

so do you know why she was sent to Scotland? Like what triggered that?

Aileen (19:12)
I

think maybe for work, I think it was just to come and get her job, her life here. And so she came over and she started as a secretary. She was actually quite bright, my mum. She was funny, cheeky. And I think just back in those days, you didn't get much of a choice if you didn't have the education. And she was stifled, you know. And then you meet your partner young and they meet at a dance. Like you guys were young when you...

GenX Adulting Podcast (19:32)
No.

Aileen (19:40)
obviously I think when you got together.

GenX Adulting Podcast (19:41)
Yes, yes. ⁓ Yeah,

yeah. we met at college. We were friends for like three years. it wasn't out of desperate... Like for your mom, it's like desperation, right? It's a desperate... Or liberation, you know. Depending. I mean, so when she met your father, how did they meet?

Aileen (19:48)
That's nice. Yes. Yes.

Yep.

at a dance hall and he had actually been engaged before, my dad, but he'd been away at the Merchant Navy from the age of 19. I don't know, he must have been engaged really young. He always said I was like this woman. But she ditched him. She wrote him a letter when he was at sea saying, this is off. And then I think he liked my mum because she was so sweet and innocent and all of those things.

GenX Adulting Podcast (20:06)
Okay.

⁓

Aileen (20:29)
She was probably 21 and he would have been about 24, 25 and they got married probably 22 and then had a child. Around 22, 23, then had my oldest when she was 24. My oldest sibling, Oldest brother.

GenX Adulting Podcast (20:34)
Okay.

Okay, so.

your older sister.

So how many are there? How many siblings?

Aileen (20:52)
Three of us,

two brothers and then me. I'm the youngest. It's so funny, you're the youngest at 15.

GenX Adulting Podcast (20:56)
You're the baby.

Yeah, I know right? You're the baby. Yeah, yeah, yeah, no, that's so funny. Okay, so then how far apart are you and your brothers?

Aileen (21:01)
Are you the same? That's so funny.

The one in Asia, he is four and a half years older than me and then between those two there's another three and a half so there's eight between me and the oldest. Same for you.

GenX Adulting Podcast (21:20)
Okay. And what,

your mom, stay at home mom?

Aileen (21:25)
She was, but then she went back to work. So then I became a latchkey kid. My

GenX Adulting Podcast (21:29)
Alaska cake. how old, well what did your dad do?

Aileen (21:35)
So my dad worked in an engineering company. There was about 20 minute walk from where we lived and he put out tenders for desalination products in the Middle East.

GenX Adulting Podcast (21:45)
What is that? De-salination. Yeah. Converts salt to fresh water so they can drink and farm with it. ⁓ that's so cool. Yeah, no, that's so interesting. OK, so how old were you when your mom went back to work?

Aileen (21:47)
So, yeah, it's taking the salt. Yeah, Which I know it sounds cool.

So, I've been thinking about this a lot. It's so hard to remember ages, but probably I would have been maybe eight, seven, eight, I think. I think.

GenX Adulting Podcast (22:10)
Okay,

so that's like what third grade something like second third grade. So is that when you

Aileen (22:15)
So what, prim...

Yeah, I don't know. can't... Primary seven... No, primary four. Yeah. A latchkey kid? I think so. Could have been ten. It's so hard to remember.

GenX Adulting Podcast (22:19)
Yeah, I know, know. It's hard to think back. So around seven, eight is when you became a latchkey kid. So in,

okay, so between the ages of like seven to ten. grade. I became more a latchkey kid in seventh grade. So I don't know how old I was. Yeah. But seventh grade. But for you in elementary school.

Aileen (22:34)
Yeah, but I...

7th grade. Right, where's I go by age? I was definitely

in primary school, week one, primary, so I wasn't at secondary for sure.

GenX Adulting Podcast (22:46)
Okay. Yeah.

Okay, so

being a latchkey kid in Scotland, I'm wondering, it around the same as how it was for American latchkey kids? Like, did you guys, were you feral on the streets? Were you just gone and no one knew where you were? And after school, you just let yourself in and took care of everything? Like, how was that experience in Scotland?

Aileen (22:58)
What's up?

you're okay?

yeah, mean, well you had your key, if you remembered it. But we were just sent out until the streetlights came on in Scotland and no one knew we were. And we were the last generation of this. And so because I could look quite innocent, I would say, I'm just going to here. But I would be walking over the railway tracks and also, mean, I think if our children did what we did.

GenX Adulting Podcast (23:13)
Yes.

Okay.

Yes.

no, no, no. Yeah. never. And then when

you would come home from school, would you let yourself in and have to did you have to do chores or ⁓ anything around the house?

Aileen (23:40)
Yeah, yeah, I let myself in and just...

Not much, not at that age actually. didn't get pushed and I look back and I think that's a shame and I'm probably not very good at giving chores either.

GenX Adulting Podcast (23:55)
yeah.

Yeah. I don't think we are either.

Aileen (23:58)
know, it's really bad

but I certainly don't want to pay for it. I see people paying their children too short. I'm like, no, I'm not doing that. But I don't know why we weren't pushed to do more. It was only later my mum got fed up. But I can remember her ironing 20 shirts on a Friday or a Sunday while we all just watched TV. And you thought that was the norm but I don't even iron.

GenX Adulting Podcast (24:04)
Right, right.

Yeah.

no, I don't think any of us really iron. mean, speaking of my mom irons everything, I never have an ironing board out. Like, I think as a generation, maybe in general, we were like, no, we're not ironing. It's like that's what the dryer is for. My mom told me that my grandmother would iron my grandfather's underwear. Seriously, she would iron his underwear like.

Aileen (24:30)
Funny, I hate it.

Yeah, yep. I know they

did.

GenX Adulting Podcast (24:49)
I don't think, I mean, I know there's people that probably still aren't, I'm not saying everyone, but in general, I don't think we're ironing as a generation. Do you know anyone that irons?

Aileen (24:53)
Yeah.

were no, I can't stand it. I

know. I remember when I got married and I tried to iron a shirt and his mom was like, ⁓ why don't I just take over? I was like, thank you.

GenX Adulting Podcast (25:10)
Yes! Yeah. I just,

I don't think it's a thing. we're have something ironed here, it gets dry cleaned. And then it shows up on a hanger and... It's true. It's true. Although my mom lives with us, so sometimes I'm like, have Grammy de-iron it, because she does. She owns an ironing board, I She has an ironing board. Yeah, no, it's so funny, but I don't think we're the ironers. Okay, but you guys, you guys were still in Scotland. You were doing the same thing.

Aileen (25:19)
⁓ yeah. Yeah, that's great. I know.

It's so funny. I'm glad to hear that.

GenX Adulting Podcast (25:40)
We were all doing.

Aileen (25:40)
same thing. Just, you know, going in, eating. I mean, we didn't have a lot of cakes and sweets in the house or anything. We didn't have a lot of fruit and veg either because it was really expensive. But you didn't eat very well either. It was like white bread and...

GenX Adulting Podcast (25:50)
Mm-hmm.

Aileen (25:54)
spreading cheese or craft that craft cheese that you know you open it's cellophane put it in a sandwich I mean it was disgusting

GenX Adulting Podcast (25:55)
Yeah.

Yes.

So we call that American cheese. Yes. the slices you mean? Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Yes. Yeah. yeah. Yeah. We call that American. Like it's, and it's processed. We know that. Yeah. Yeah. That's over here. That's called the Kraft slice. They come in individual. Yeah. We call that American cheese. Yeah. Isn't that funny? And over here, you can get an orange or white. So it's fancy. It tastes good. It's not real.

Aileen (26:07)
American cheese probably. The wee sliceage, you still like them? We grew up with all that.

I was probably saying, yeah.

The craft, yeah, American cheese.

would for which one's healthier?

GenX Adulting Podcast (26:33)
Neither one. Neither one. Okay, so when you were in elementary school,

like did you do any clubs or sports or what were you into?

Aileen (26:42)
Oh yeah, I was... Yeah.

I was like, captain of the badminton team. I was really good at all the running. What else do we do? Oh, in primary school. I'm trying to think, primary. Lots of PE. Rubbish at the high jump. Good at the long jump. Because you know what? That bar for me, the high jump, I had this thing... Did you do that? Where you just put your legs over and scissors...

GenX Adulting Podcast (27:01)
Okay.

Yeah? Yeah.

Aileen (27:08)
I just couldn't get my head around that and I was scared of that bar. I was so bad.

GenX Adulting Podcast (27:12)
You

guys had, because we call that track and field. You guys had track and field in, you call primary school. We have it, we called elementary. You had it at that young of an age. We really didn't have it. Like it wasn't a thing. You had to sign up for it over here. Yeah, it wasn't like we had like recess and PE where we played dodgeball or things like that, but there was no high jump.

Aileen (27:22)
where we had the bar, we had the high jump. Yeah, but not the high jump you see.

did you? Did you?

Not yet.

GenX Adulting Podcast (27:40)
There was like in junior high and in high school. But it was an elective activity. was a sport you did. It sounds like you're saying it was of it.

Aileen (27:43)
Yeah. we were fours. No, we were...

Well, that was part of it. But it wasn't the high jump you see in the Olympics and you get your body over it. It was just your legs, scissor. Scissor legs. It was horrible. I hated it.

GenX Adulting Podcast (27:53)
Yeah, yeah.

I have

to pick I can't even picture that. Did you guys have a rope you climbed? Did you climb like there's a rope hanging from the ceiling that you climb up? Did you guys have to do that?

Aileen (28:01)
I'll need to look it up. What? A pool? No!

No,

no we didn't have to do that. We did netball.

GenX Adulting Podcast (28:11)
Okay, we

had to do that and the mat was like what half an inch thick? liability. And you had to get all the way to the ceiling and if you fell you landed on a mat that was like... Yeah, it dangerous. couldn't fall. Elementary school, primary, like young. No junior high for us. We had that in elementary. Did you guys have dodgeball?

Aileen (28:16)
⁓ no! Did you?

What? What each were you?

wow! That... Didn't

have dodge ball. Is it like netball? Or basketball? No?

GenX Adulting Podcast (28:37)
No, but we learned

about netball from Julie. We never heard of netball. Yeah, she described that to

Aileen (28:40)
didn't you? That's so funny! I've heard of

dodgeball but I don't know how you play it.

GenX Adulting Podcast (28:47)
Okay, so dodgeball. Okay, so maybe it's totally American, but you have teams and you have a ball and you try to hit the kids on the other team as hard as possible to knock and once they get hit, they're out and you can and with us kind of a last man standing with us. Here's the thing with Gen X. We had a red rubber plastic ball. So when that thing hit you like in the face or anything it hurt now kids have a nerf.

Aileen (28:52)
Yeah.

so...

That sounds painful.

Ow.

GenX Adulting Podcast (29:15)
ball so it's different it doesn't hurt like it did for Gen X but we would get smacked like right in the face with a red rubber ball and it would hurt so bad and it was brutal and so it was just like like king of the hill stuff like you just every man for himself until there's two people standing and then whoever got the other out that's how you won you guys didn't know that now i was horrible that was pretty good i never got it ⁓

Aileen (29:17)
So... Oui!

That sounds awful.

Were you guys good at that?

That sounds painful. I mean it sounds a bit like

paintballing but not. But it sounds painful, wouldn't like that.

GenX Adulting Podcast (29:45)
Like if someone

threw it at you and you caught it, they would have to go out. Yeah. So you try to catch it. You do things like you throw a ball up and when someone's trying to catch it, someone else will smack him in the face. there's more than one ball. But you guys, you had nothing like that.

Aileen (29:49)
right, okay. So you just have to get hit.

⁓ right, okay. Now! Didn't

have that, Majorettes, majorettes and... ⁓ ...terrace and that kind of thing. Loads of sports. Loads. You know with the baton. Do, do, do!

GenX Adulting Podcast (30:10)
What's major at?

okay, yeah, yeah, Baton, Baton, yeah, okay, we have Baton.

But that one again was a, that was like an optional thing. That wasn't something that you just did. And I can, and you said Badminton, right? Is that, now when I picture Badminton, it's the little thing and you hit it, what's it called?

Aileen (30:25)
badminton.

shuttlecock, little shuttlecock they call

it? They call it a shuttlecock.

GenX Adulting Podcast (30:35)
a shuttlecock. I think we call it a birdie here. We called a birdie. Yes, we got like a little rubber nose and a plastic net. Yeah. Yeah. The thing about badminton here is that's just something you do like at a picnic or a barbecue. It was never in school. It was just like, so you guys had teams.

Aileen (30:38)
I love that! The things... Yes! That's so funny! I love all the different names!

we did it in school. Yeah.

We played against different schools. We definitely, yeah. Sometimes two, yeah, sometimes two, two, then sometimes what? Yeah. My school was really sporting. Tennis. Yeah, but so I did, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. A young, yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (31:02)
Yeah, you want to write one on one or two. Yeah. It's similar to like tennis. OK, so but you would have badminton like an actual you'd represent your school. What a trip.

Did you guys have baseball?

Aileen (31:23)
No, we didn't have baseball. You guys have... No. Soccer for the boys, not for the girls. But now they have soccer for the girls. It's massive now, soccer here. It's huge. For the girls. Yeah, the girls are really going for it now. It's changed.

GenX Adulting Podcast (31:24)
No, it's soccer, football. Did you have soccer?

That's awesome. Do you guys call it soccer or football? Okay, and then you don't have football like we have football, right? Like our football. Do you have rugby? Okay. Hockey. Cricket. Did you have cricket in Scotland? Okay.

Aileen (31:43)
football.

No, we don't have that. No. Rugby. Yeah. Hockey. Yeah, I didn't play hockey. Cricket, they play in some schools. Yeah,

cricket they would play, but some... We did more rounders, they called it, where you hit a ball and then you had to run to each pitch point and try and outsmart the... The pit they get. A bit like that. It was a bit like that.

GenX Adulting Podcast (32:13)
like baseball kind of.

Aileen (32:16)
We did rounders, but I know a lot of people that do cricket as well. Depends on the school.

GenX Adulting Podcast (32:20)
Okay,

so you did, so you were, it sounds like you were athletic.

Aileen (32:25)
I was. I loved my sport. I was, yeah, I loved singing, dancing, everything.

GenX Adulting Podcast (32:27)
Okay.

Okay, so that's also artistic. So you kind of did athletics and did you participate like in school theater?

Aileen (32:32)
Yes.

Yeah.

So, I mean, I used to sing for school in secondary school. I... High school, yeah. High school. But I had so much fear and I never thought I was good enough. Because my voice was very straight, whereas this other girl could sing with this warble. And for me, like Mariah Carey. And I was just like, I want to be like that. And my singing teacher would be, Aileen, your voice is great.

GenX Adulting Podcast (32:43)
Would that be like high school for us? Okay, okay.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Aileen (33:03)
But one day I just couldn't take it. couldn't, I just collapsed with fear and I had to duck. I ducked.

GenX Adulting Podcast (33:09)
So when did you discover you could sing?

Aileen (33:11)
It is a lot of pressure, I know, but I loved it.

I loved singing from a young age, singing, dancing. I was such a wee show-off from a very young age. I did. But then it kind of gets kicked out of you a wee bit and you're sent down the academic route more.

GenX Adulting Podcast (33:22)
So you love to perform.

So when would you say, do you guys have middle school or junior high or do you go right from primary to secondary? Or do you have a middle?

Aileen (33:38)
Primary to secondary. So from age

12 you move to secondary, 12, 13, up until...

GenX Adulting Podcast (33:46)
Okay, okay. Okay, so you guys kind

of do like eighth grade to 12th grade, like we have a middle school that's like six to eight. So like 11 to 13, we have a break there of a separate school. And then we go into high school 14. And that starts like our ninth grade. So you guys went primary up to like seventh grade age and then went into secondary.

Aileen (33:56)
So weird.

That's so interesting.

So what?

Bye.

Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (34:15)
So

during your primary, was that when you were singing and dancing and you were kind of uninhibited about it, not so self-conscious? And then was it when you secondary school? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Is it the pressure from the older kids, part of it?

Aileen (34:20)
Yeah.

Yeah, 13 is when you hit 13. I've seen it with my daughter as well. We do, we all become more conscious and...

I know it wasn't

actually. think, to be honest, my mum and dad, my mum would have encouraged actually, but my dad, I found out when he died that he had been offered to be an opera singer at the age of 19. He was an amazing singer, but he was very shy. But after a few whiskies, he got into his opera. And he actually, I mean, it was unbelievable. He got me into opera, which is really unusual for a man of this era.

GenX Adulting Podcast (34:51)
Wow.

Yeah.

Aileen (35:05)
But

he always said it never happens for people like us, Aileen. He wasn't being nasty, he didn't believe that that could happen. So he never wanted to push me or I played the piano. He would sing with me. All of these things. But it just...

GenX Adulting Podcast (35:11)
Yeah.

So you

had this beautiful relationship, this bond with your dad of music, where were guys were bonded with your musical interests and your shared talent, it sounds like. But it sounds like he was probably scared of you going for this and being crushed. So he just stopped it before you even started. Is that accurate?

Aileen (35:27)
Yeah.

That's a really good way to put it actually. Yeah, he did. He did.

GenX Adulting Podcast (35:48)
And I think that's normal for that generation, right? Like our generation would be like, go for it. You can do it. Who cares? You know, who cares what anyone says? But their generation would be like, no, no, no. I need to give you as much reality as possible, as young as possible. You know? Yeah, but not meaning to crush your dreams. Almost trying to protect you. Almost trying to protect you. So, so would you say the influence once you hit that age was more your dad kind of being like, okay.

Aileen (35:50)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, I know, so kicks out your confidence. No, not nasty, nothing like that. Yeah, yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (36:17)
Let's bring some reality into the situation and kind of change how you approach singing after that.

Aileen (36:25)
That would be part of it and also just my lack of self-worth as well. You know, I really didn't think I was good enough and that's been the theme throughout. I just didn't think I had it. But I don't know if that's come from him, but also you've got siblings saying, why are you singing with an American accent? Why are you doing like, you're rubbish. You know, you just had, you just were, there was nothing to encourage. Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (36:46)
Well, you're the youngest. Brothers. Yeah,

⁓ when do you remember your earliest memory of not feeling good enough for your that your self worth wasn't ⁓ wasn't where it should be?

Aileen (37:03)
think probably that time when I ducked when I had to sing that solo on the balcony about to try and sing it. I just knew I wasn't going to get the note and yeah, that was one of them. And then when I was elected as head girl at 16, I went to the headmaster's office and said, I don't deserve this. And he went, shut up, Aileen. Off you go.

GenX Adulting Podcast (37:29)
So, okay, what is that? What is head girl?

Aileen (37:32)
So you represent the school, you're seen as good at everything, you were good all rounder, good at, I mean, was top at school, then all the dancing, all the things that I did, the sports, the dance, I was a goody two shoes really.

GenX Adulting Podcast (37:36)
like president.

Okay, so to me that

sounds like we have a thing at where it's like Miss, it's the high school like ⁓ Miss, you know, Boca or Miss like it like where you you're just good at like you're saying kind of everything and you were elected were you elected by your peers or by teachers?

Aileen (38:01)
Yeah.

Yeah.

was

a girl that elected me and I was like, wow, I didn't even know she noticed me. She said Aileen should be the, I remember. And then they had to all elect and then the teachers had to save.

GenX Adulting Podcast (38:19)
Okay, so you

you had, so you, you excelled at academics, you excelled at singing, you excelled at athletics, I'm assuming, you excelled at dancing. I know dancing is athletics, but I still separate them because I feel like ones are more artistic, but, and then your peers obviously supported you because they elected you. So you have all the reasons, and I think this is so, such a great example. I think this happens to kids that are overachievers, is from the outside looking in.

Aileen (38:24)
it.

Yeah.

I know.

GenX Adulting Podcast (38:48)
It looks like you have every reason to have you have everything to the outsider, right? You're good at everything and you your peers support you and the teachers support you, the adults around you support you. But inside you're crumbling. You don't you have imposter syndrome, probably, I assume, and feel like you don't have a strong foundation or that you deserve it.

Aileen (38:54)
Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah, you just felt like that. And also, I think the relationship with my mum, was really difficult because of what happened to her life and her abandonment issues. And she was so harsh with us. And I ended up being the mediator at times from the age of seven, actually. I just didn't agree with what she was saying. And I would find myself sticking up for my dad and my siblings, talking up to her, telling her no, no, no.

GenX Adulting Podcast (39:27)
Okay.

Aileen (39:42)
⁓ And we had a very tumultuous relationship which was very detrimental to me because she wouldn't listen to me, I couldn't be heard so I was frustrated.

GenX Adulting Podcast (39:53)
So would you say that feeling of ⁓ a lack of self-worth might be rooted in not being accepted and enveloped with that love from your mother?

Aileen (40:05)
Yeah, there was, I didn't feel love. I'm sure she loved me. She did everything that mums do. They do all the practical things, but probably you guys might be the same where you, there wasn't, we didn't get cuddles. You didn't get told you were loved. You just, you were seen and not heard. You didn't have a voice. And so I was very emotional. At age 12, we were going through so much, you know, and actually my mum at age 10 telling me that I couldn't be having my period and then me saying,

GenX Adulting Podcast (40:23)
Yeah.

Yes.

Aileen (40:34)
Well, I must be dying because it must be coming from my bottom and going through that actually wasn't the best.

GenX Adulting Podcast (40:43)
So you got your period early, I did too. So you got your period early and she literally told you that's not what it is?

Aileen (40:50)
She just said it can't be and I said well I must be dying because there's blood and maybe it's from my bottom. That's what I just I thought. So she said let me see. I showed her and she said I think it is your period and then she then tried to teach me how to put a tampon in. Sorry this is so much detail.

GenX Adulting Podcast (40:58)
Yes.

No, no, no, no. This is what, well, and what's interesting is that ⁓ for so many of us, first of all, no one showed us how to put a tampon. I don't know anyone. So the fact that she even tried to show, like, did she try to...

Aileen (41:23)
She didn't show,

she did it from outside the bathroom door and explained what to do. And I'm like, which part am I putting this in? And it ended up in my bottom.

GenX Adulting Podcast (41:26)
Okay. Yeah.

Yeah. See? Yeah.

No, but I'm telling you, OK, so I'm going to share this. So when I I got my period and the first time I used a tampon, my parents were divorced and I grew up in Oregon. My dad lived in Michigan and I was with him for like six weeks in the summer and I needed he lived on a lake. So I was like, I have to use a tampon. I can't keep using pads. So I got a tampon and I remember when I used it, I threw up afterwards.

because it was so traumatic. was shaking. I was in a cold sweat and it's painful. It's a painful experience. I know that like men think it's like you're having sex for the first time. It's not like that. But it's still very painful. I'm blown away. Yeah, it's still very painful. And ⁓ afterwards I literally turned around and puked because it's the first time you've ever put something inside of your body, which is traumatic. It's traumatic.

Aileen (42:03)
Gosh!

gosh.

Yes it is. It is.

No.

Oh, it's, oh my gosh. I'm sorry you went through

that as well. Were you 10 as well? So young, isn't it?

GenX Adulting Podcast (42:35)
I think I was 11. I was 11.

So young and no one talked to us about even... Why though? That's what I'm blown away with. Like why would your mom maybe... Didn't you have an older sister? No, brothers. Just three older brother, okay. Two brothers, two older brothers. I don't understand why moms back then wouldn't help That's wild I don't know. No, because my mom wasn't Catholic and it wasn't that my mom didn't...

Aileen (42:41)
No.

No, no sisters.

No.

They didn't... I think it's the Catholic thing, isn't it? Part of... No?

GenX Adulting Podcast (43:04)
You just weren't with your mom, but would she have helped you? I don't know. I don't know if would have asked. Like it wasn't open like that. Like when I had my daughter, as soon as she was old enough, there was like an American Girl book. I don't know if you guys have it over there. You know, American Girl Dolls. You guys have ever heard of that? There's a book that that company wrote about it's called The Caring Keeping of You. I highly recommend any moms of preteens get it.

Aileen (43:11)
Gosh.

Yeah, no.

The end.

GenX Adulting Podcast (43:31)
But they have a whole chapter about getting your period. And I remember I got that book when she was like eight and around nine, I read it to her. And then we talked about it because I was like, I'm not having her go through going into this blindly because it's traumatic. I can't believe that. And like for you, you thought your mom actually denied at first what was happening to you. You went through that fear of I'm I'm hemorrhaging.

Aileen (43:36)
Mm-hmm.

No.

It's just so mad. Wow.

⁓

thinking you're dying. I mean, how do you think? I don't know.

GenX Adulting Podcast (43:57)
That's what I

Aileen (43:57)
I know.

GenX Adulting Podcast (43:58)
was curious about. At first I thought you had an older sister. So was like, why would your mom... She almost couldn't handle it, it sounds like. When you said I have my period, she's like, I can't handle this. Well, you know what? She was made to shame, right? She was made to feel shame. So... No, but it just wasn't part of the generation to like go into the gate field.

Aileen (44:02)
No.

Yeah.

No, I guess. She was, no one taught her. Yes, exactly. So your mum didn't have that, but then...

Yes, they didn't

talk to me about... No.

GenX Adulting Podcast (44:25)
not to that degree.

I think I don't think people understand if a young girl doesn't, if no one talks to her about what it's like to put a tampon in for the first time how truly traumatic that can be. It's horrible. And for you, didn't even do pads, you went right for the tampon. my

Aileen (44:37)
Awful. Putting it in my bum, I mean, my bottom. She, well,

I guess because she didn't have pads in the house, it was straight, yeah. I can't, probably, which is the norm. I think the norm is 12, 13. But I'm like you with my daughter from the very young age. She saw me in the toilet and she would ask me and I would just say, this is what this is.

GenX Adulting Podcast (44:47)
And then she thought she had a couple years. Yeah, yeah, maybe. yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Aileen (45:04)
She would just be like, okay, no idea what she's talking about, I didn't, same as you, you don't want to make it taboo.

GenX Adulting Podcast (45:07)
Yeah.

You make it

natural. And even with my sons, especially my younger son, I'm better with this. He's 16. But I'll say if there's a girl that's like she's leaked through her pants or if she needs help, like you help her. You don't make fun of her. You don't laugh. You give her your sweatshirt to cover her pants till she gets to the nurse. The young men need to be educated too. That this is like nothing to me made fun of. And I think that's changing. I think the younger generation, it's changed.

Aileen (45:24)
school.

last night.

That's great.

It's definitely changing. I love that advice.

And I've heard other people talk like that about their sons as well. think that's brilliant. Different generation. It's fantastic. Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (45:43)
It's beautiful. It really is.

And I think the more we all talk about this, the more change, you know, Well, thank God for the internet too, right? For single dads who have to deal with this at least. 100%. I would want to be supportive. You know?

Aileen (45:47)
Abs. Yes. Yeah. For single... Yeah. I can't believe

you didn't know that story. Did you not know that story about... ⁓ wow, I love that this is something new. I love when that happens with it.

GenX Adulting Podcast (46:01)
Mm-mm. Yeah.

Oh, it's great. It's great. We've been together almost 33 years. I'm blown away. I'm just still blown away that your moms were so standoffish. I get it to a point. get it generationally, but it... Very so. Well, I doubt your mom... You just don't talk. Your mom was probably the same with your sister. was probably more just, you don't know. Yeah, no Because your mom didn't talk about periods around you, right? You didn't grow up where people talked about periods, like...

Aileen (46:13)
I know a different Janet, we were just stoic weren't we? They didn't know how, they weren't taught. Don't talk. Yeah. Yeah.

Of course. Probably

not.

GenX Adulting Podcast (46:29)
normal

was probably more secretive or like she has her period but there was no discussion about it or I have no memory of that being the thing I know at some point it became a thing but not a how you do this type of thing I would guess if I were to guess for gen x men I'm just gonna speak gen x men they their first exposure to women's periods was when they got a girlfriend that they were having sex with and the reason I say that is because they would learn

Aileen (46:43)
Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (46:58)
we're not having sex right now because she's on her period. And I would guess that's the most applicable time Gen X boys were exposed to women's periods up in and that's when it affected We were far more sensitive than that. no, no, right. It's it's when, no. I would think it was from some Hollywood movie like something Fast Times at Ridgemont High or something. No.

Aileen (47:01)
yeah.

Hopefully.

Where are you? us. Come on, us. Come on, I want to hear.

I'm trying to think of a Hollywood movie back then

that we'd have.

GenX Adulting Podcast (47:28)
There is no way, no

Hollywood movies, Hollywood movies back in our time were showing women's boobs and nudity for men. Like I'm sorry, Hollywood was catering to men too and they certainly were talking about women's periods. Here in speed, it was the first time that they really thought about it because- sister so there was third birth activities, right? Things, but you're probably not totally wrong if you grew up with two brothers and it, yeah, that's probably-

Aileen (47:35)
Yeah. ⁓ they were, we're not, yeah.

Okay.

Yeah.

Yeah, you were, it wasn't talked. That's true.

GenX Adulting Podcast (47:57)
That was when it

affected them is when they first really thought about it. I know I'm right. Oh, trust me. I'm going to maybe put this clip out and we'll see what we can do. But I think that's just what makes sense because if nobody was talking about it in the home, they would have no reason to really give it much thought. Right. And so it's not even their fault. But you know, it's not a topic.

Aileen (48:03)
We need to do... I think you're right, but we need to do some research on this.

Hahaha

No.

No. No, it's not. But we know better

now.

GenX Adulting Podcast (48:26)
Now

we know better. Okay, so that makes sense though with kind of, I mean, it almost sounds like you kind of have a mother wound a little bit, right? From not having...

Aileen (48:36)
I don't actually

know. I did for a long time but I made peace with her. In fact, when my dad died, she apologised to me for all the behaviours. And she was 63 at that point and I remember people saying to me, oh it's terrible, it took your dad dying for your mum to say sorry and I said...

I think it's utterly amazing that at 63, after everything she's been through, she was able to say I'm sorry and as soon as she said sorry I said that's it. We don't need to talk about this again. And that was it. We had closure.

GenX Adulting Podcast (49:00)
Yes. Yes.

I think that's

absolutely beautiful. You got what so many, I was like Gen X, but so many adult kids have wanted from their parents for so long and never get. The fact that she was able to apologize to you, that's amazing.

Aileen (49:13)
Yeah, it is.

I know. I know.

I know. I know. And then she had

a stroke a couple of years later and was paralysed halfway. You know, almost locked in syndrome for 12 years. So it was a lot. It did. Yeah, it did because, you know, she didn't speak to me on my wedding. She didn't speak to my brother on his wedding. She didn't speak to me for a year, even though I got engaged to the guy that she thought was the best.

GenX Adulting Podcast (49:40)
Wow. Oh my gosh. Did that lift like a veil for you? Like where either clarity or a weight off your...

Aileen (49:59)
There's lots of silent treatment, all quite narcissistic traits. And so I really struggled. But even though I went through all that, in my 20s when I started earning money, I used to love still taking her away to nice hotels, doing these things for her. When my dad died, I took her, got her a car. You know, I did all these, I wanted to do things because I knew how difficult life was. But it lifted that wound of how nasty it had been and how...

awful it had been for all of us and the arguing in the house and yeah it made closure for me.

GenX Adulting Podcast (50:35)
What do you think clicked for her to be able to do that?

Aileen (50:39)
That's a really good

question. I don't know, I just remember we were sitting one day and maybe we had become more open with one another. I guess seeing my dad die, you know, really was a shock to her and that kind of loss where you have someone even though you argue all the time, but to lose them, you then realize actually I had something really good and I didn't cherish that. So maybe.

She softened and realised, she saw, she didn't, she always thought I was really tough, but I was tough with her. And when, my, you know, she said, I don't think Aileen would ever look out for us if anything bad happened. My dad said, that's not, that's not true. Aileen's got a big heart. And I think she started to see that after he died when we spoke. And yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (51:29)
So maybe because growing up, you guys butted heads as you didn't feel connected to her, she didn't feel connected to you. And so she didn't trust that, like you said, if something were to happen that you would step in and help. So it's almost like you guys finally found that bridge of connection a little bit in that moment. I mean, it really and not to negate the pain that you went through and the trauma, but to have that closure.

Aileen (51:33)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

no, it's fine. know it's amazing.

I'm very lucky. I am lucky. I know a lot of my friends. I know. I'm very lucky because I had a lovely dad who I loved. And I'm very lucky that she said sorry.

GenX Adulting Podcast (52:01)
You are. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Well,

it sounds like you and your dad definitely you had a very positive father daughter relationship, right? Now, what about your brothers with your mom? Was it the same?

Aileen (52:14)
Yeah, very lucky, very open.

Same, it was the same, very difficult. Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (52:24)
Okay,

and were they close to your dad?

Aileen (52:27)
⁓ My middle brother, yes. And then he went off to live in Asia because he couldn't find a job in Scotland at that time. And then my mum blamed him for my dad not being well after his retirement. So he retired quite young. Well, not young, but was 63 and he died a couple of years after. So she blamed him, which wasn't true, which was shocking.

GenX Adulting Podcast (52:53)
Of course not. Of course not.

so one thing I did want to ask you, though, and it's on it's not a Gen X ⁓ shared experience thing. In America, we grew up.

where we would see missing kids on milk cartons and we would hear about kids being kidnapped. Did you guys have that in Scotland or was there any type of, were you scared of being kidnapped or was that a thing over there?

Aileen (53:07)
Mm-hmm.

This is so funny that, not funny, but so strange that you say this because we had a big thing in the 70s about stranger danger. Was it called that with you? And we had a cartoon called Charlie Says and it was a boy with his cat and Charlie, there weren't many of these episodes, but Charlie's in the park, this guy, the boy's in the park, Charlie's with him and there's a stranger comes over and says, come and help me find my puppies.

GenX Adulting Podcast (53:27)
Yeah. Yeah.

Aileen (53:47)
And the cat, Charlie, says, do not go with strangers. And really strangely, and I don't know if it's because of that, but at the age of seven, when I was playing outside, about 150 meters from my house, a man pulls up in his car. He opens the passenger door, which is nearest to me, and he says, can you come and help me find my puppy? And I looked at him. I can remember he was quite a handsome guy. He was like probably in his 30s, hair.

GenX Adulting Podcast (53:56)
Mm-hmm.

Aileen (54:17)
I looked to him, I said no, I slammed the door, I ran all the way home. But I don't remember the reaction being big at home and I tried to look back because it was a big thing and actually recently I decided to look this up, just what was it like in the 70s? Were there serial killers of children? And there were two in Glasgow at that time. And I do think I did, but you know, they were dark hair.

GenX Adulting Podcast (54:28)
Yeah.

Did you look at the pictures at all of the?

Aileen (54:47)
But I can't remember exactly the face because it is nearly 50 years ago. it, yeah, I haven't thought about it a lot over the years. But that was, somebody was looking over me, I think that day. Scary.

GenX Adulting Podcast (55:02)
What does your gut

tell you? Does your gut tell you that that could have been one of the serial killers?

Aileen (55:06)
think that might

have been a bad, a really bad situation. could have, yeah, because it was that classic, come and find my puppy in a car. Where were you going to go?

GenX Adulting Podcast (55:11)
That's crazy. Yeah.

Aileen (55:22)
⁓ you see it in London. White van. So what happens? Do they open the back or how does it work there? Just take.

GenX Adulting Podcast (55:31)
or the side. here

the kids, well the kids... could be more folklore than anything because, but it's the white, we call it the white stalker van. It's a stalker van. It's because they're, they're, don't have the windows. You can't really see in. It's perfect to open the back, throw someone in and drive away. Yeah. Now it's happened. Like if you listen to True Crime, there's definitely situations where it was a white stalker van. But what's funny is the Gen Z kids and the alpha kids, I assume.

Aileen (55:46)
Mm-hmm.

terrifying and easily done.

GenX Adulting Podcast (56:01)
are so educated by their parents, by Gen X and millennial parents, since they were little, that they almost just naturally like, there's a soccer van. Like, it's very natural to them. Like, soccer van, and everyone stays away. Or he looks like a pedophile. Like, they'll talk like that. he looks like a pedophile. Stay away. Where we didn't, you the closest we got was like what you're talking about, like an educational ⁓ campaign, like Charlie and his cat, whatever.

Aileen (56:03)
Yes.

Yeah.

kids.

available.

Yeah, you did that, yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (56:29)
For us, it was the melt carton kids. Like they would literally be on our melt cartons as we're eating breakfast. We're looking at a kid who's missing and then we would just go to school like nothing's going on. No one talked to us about it or anything. And I can picture you going home all startled thinking, my God. And then it's just lands like a dud. No one's like, right? Yeah.

Aileen (56:32)
Yep. Let's turn them on.

Yeah, of course.

Yeah. Yeah. I can't remember. But maybe they did, but I don't think so. Because you guys,

we would be like, ⁓ tell me what they looked like. We would be all over that in shock. Yeah, exactly. I couldn't... Yeah. my god. Yep.

GenX Adulting Podcast (56:54)
Yeah.

I'd go drive around the neighborhood. he would, yeah, he'd get his gun. Of course, we're in America. Yeah.

And it's, know, so we're in Florida. So he'd get his gun. He'd put on his sneakers because you to have close-toe shoes if you're going to go like kick someone's ass. There were times like if he couldn't get a hold of our daughter, she was in West Palm, like at a bar or something. And we track our kids. And if she wasn't answering, I remember one time he, it was like two in the morning. He put on his

Aileen (57:08)
Yeah.

You could have your shoes.

Mm-hmm.

GenX Adulting Podcast (57:26)
his sneakers and got his know and he's on his way to the West Palm and she finally she calls she's like dad turn around I'm fine. I don't remember. Almost, almost he got his gun. I don't think so. He's gonna be like cut this part out. I just don't remember it it's not beyond me to do this but I just don't remember getting that far. No no what you did was you were walking out the door and she called. Maybe. didn't get in the car.

Aileen (57:28)
Did you? Did you?

God, what driving did you drive? ⁓ my God. But I understand it. do. I would think... No. But you were obviously just very worried.

GenX Adulting Podcast (57:55)
But the thing that always cracks me up is the shoes. You got to have the shoes right shoes on if you're going to go tennis shoes. Yeah, yeah. We're in South Florida. So flip flops. No, no, you go kick someone's ass and flip flops. That's crazy. That happens to you, though.

Aileen (57:58)
your shoes on well if you're gonna run you need your shoes on yeah flip-flop we don't do flip-flops but yeah

It is

crazy but with my daughter, you know, in Spain, we lived in Spain for a while and it felt quite safe where we were but we moved back to London and she would run off in front of me and eventually I was like, no, Amelia, this is what happened to me and I was really harsh and I remember a couple of people saying you shouldn't be that harsh and I'm like, I should be that harsh because it's either that or someone's going to take her and what's worse? So they need to know. ⁓

GenX Adulting Podcast (58:36)
Yeah,

I would tell my kids, you're priceless. Like would I leave a million dollars there? No, you're more priceless than a million dollars. So that's how I'm treating you. There's just too many crazy, sick people in the world.

Aileen (58:42)
Yeah.

Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. More and more

because of social media and here we are on it but yeah, more and more. They're good.

GenX Adulting Podcast (58:55)
Yeah, yeah, but in a good way. So I

want to come back to this moment ⁓ when you were going to sing and it all hit you. Was that like a play you were performing in in secondary school or what was the scenario there?

Aileen (59:13)
We used to sing classical songs, because we still had high up, pitchy voices and it must have just been some performance to show our voices and instruments. You know, we were always doing shows at our school. And I think it was just a case of, here are the singers to date now. Someone doing the clarinet. I actually sang on TV when I was 10 or 11. And it was the end of, they had a coin called the sixpence.

GenX Adulting Podcast (59:27)
Okay.

Okay.

wow.

Aileen (59:43)
I don't know if you know that, but that was in the UK and they were saying goodbye to the Sixpence and they had a teacher whose son worked at the BBC and they needed singers to come and say goodbye. So they were trying to get hold of our mums, know, can they go? Eventually they got hold and then we had a big close up of me singing a song of Sixpence. It's very sweet. No, we just did it in the BBC in Scotland. We were in the studios. were a few people playing instruments.

GenX Adulting Podcast (59:46)
Okay.

That's cool. did you go to London to do that?

Aileen (1:00:12)
We kept practising, we were rubbish, but in the final moment, we pulled it together and it was shown on national TV. It was our claim to fame. It was cool.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:00:20)
Awesome.

Your dad must have thought that was really cool. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, that's really cool. Okay, so you're in school and it's just like music, whether you're showing the voices or like, is it like after school or was this a class where? Okay. And it was your time to go up and sing? Were you on a stage?

Aileen (1:00:24)
He did think that was cool. Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, it would have been a show after school with all the parents, just to... And I just collapsed.

No, it was, we had this school that had, they called it a forum and they had this balcony. It went round and the parents, we all sat in the middle. It was like an octagon shape. And so the singers were up, spotlight, ready to sing. And I just ducked and...

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:00:57)
Okay.

Aileen (1:01:05)
crawled along the floor and no one said anything.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:01:08)
You

literally collapsed down an army crawl?

Aileen (1:01:10)
and some of the others

looked down and I crawled away and no one said anything no one said alien it was so strange no one gave me a hard time my mum dad all the parents

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:01:19)
Who was in the audience?

So it came to your point, the spotlight goes on you, you collapse, you drop, and army crawl away like a covert operation. my gosh. So it wasn't just, was it just like horrible stage fright, do you think?

Aileen (1:01:25)
you

It's terrible, it's really ridiculous. I know.

It was, I think

it just took over. You know when your heart just, you're beating, it's like I used to get lot of panic attacks when I was really young. I think because my parents were arguing all the time. From the age of seven I was panicked. I think it goes back to, it's just, you know, some people can't perform.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:01:44)
Yeah.

Mmm.

Yeah.

Have you shared this

story with Julie? Because she shared a similar event with us, right? Remember she had to give a speech? The speech. The speech.

Aileen (1:02:03)
Or did she? yeah, I think

we have talked, we would have talked about, yeah, she had one of those. Yes, because she's...

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:02:08)
Yeah, you'll have to see her up. And it was around that, like hers was senior

year, she called it year 12. Yeah. But ⁓ yeah, where the call and you both are high achievers. Yeah. So when did you know you were a high like I know when she could pinpoint the moment she realized she was a high achiever. Can you?

Aileen (1:02:16)
Funny.

I know all that pressure we put on ourselves, it's ridiculous.

I knew at primary school, because I used to win for spelling arithmetic. used to get money, 10p. And yeah, I know it, it must have been worth quite a lot today, I think. So I always liked to be top. And I don't know where it comes from, because I don't remember my parents putting that pressure. But I just being top. There was me and another guy. But my collapse came at age 16 when I had an eating disorder.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:02:34)
Okay, yeah.

Wow.

Cool. Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Okay. So, all right. So in primary school is when you started winning the awards and the accolades and getting recognized. And you liked that, that competitiveness picked in. ⁓ it's that weird contrast of wanting that recognition, competing, wanting to be on top, but inside not feeling that you deserved it. Right? Is that battling? no, no. But you were good until 16.

Aileen (1:03:05)
⁓

Yeah, up till 16.

I did. Yeah.

Yep.

Probably. Yeah, at primary,

yeah, so primary was okay and then secondary was okay, but yeah, it was up to 16, I think it then changed, something changed. At 13.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:03:37)
So when did the eating disorder start?

And do know what triggered that?

Aileen (1:03:43)
I think it was all this stuff with my mum. think, you know, obviously you saw thin people and it was all about thin, but it was more than that. You know, I've done a lot of work on myself. It's about control. I had no control at home, nothing. You guys know, you see it, it's people with self harm, it's a similar. It's just not, one thing you can control. It's all.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:03:52)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

It was the one thing. Yes, yes. Okay. Did

anyone know you were suffering from a needing disorder?

Aileen (1:04:12)
No, but one of my friends at school, she used to try and force me to eat and then one of the teachers said, Aileen, there was a man, but he said in front of the whole class, Aileen, you've lost weight, what's happening? And I remember thinking, this is great that you're noticing, but you're saying in front of everyone, I'm not going to tell you anything. And so no one knew. And then that continued for quite a while.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:04:30)
Yeah.

Right.

Was it ⁓ anorexia, amblymia, or one or the other?

Aileen (1:04:43)
No.

Bulimia. It was just bulimia. ⁓ But obviously it has a detrimental effect on your mind. You're trying to study. You're binge eating, purging. It's awful. I feel sorry for anyone.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:04:47)
Okay.

Absolutely.

It's horrible. I also had an eating disorder. had anorexia and bulimia. Yeah, no, it's horrible. I started in seventh grade and I think I battled disordered eating through college. I was still dabble in bulimia in college and Samantha. It really depended on what was going on with me.

Aileen (1:05:03)
Did you, did you, what age were you?

You swell?

Yep.

Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:05:23)
As I got older emotionally, was one of my coping mechanisms. So if life got to be too much, I would just stop eating or I would become bulimic. And then if life got better, I could let it go. That's when I was older. When I was younger, I was like in the throes of it. It didn't matter because so much was going on all the time. But if I would have moments of peace, I could actually let it go. But it became one of my tools of coping. ⁓ And even now, I'm still very weight conscious. You know, I just...

Aileen (1:05:26)
Yeah, cool.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Same. yeah? Same? Same. ⁓

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:05:52)
It's not some and I

am ten pounds heavier than I want to be and I'm very much aware of that But I'm healed in that I eat healthy. I take care of myself. I deal with it through wellness versus Abstaining from food. Does that make sense?

Aileen (1:05:56)
Mm.

Yes.

Yeah, yes. Yeah,

so I'm the same. I mean, it's always there. I think it's an addiction, really. Kind of addiction. And so, yeah, because it's a coping mechanism.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:06:11)
It's always her.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

Aileen (1:06:23)
I don't do it now either but I'm conscious and I see my weight change and I don't do anything about it like I used to.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:06:30)
Right. And I think like you mentioned, it's a double whammy, right? Because in the times we grew up, there was no acceptance of different body types. There was one body type you were supposed to be and it's as thin as possible. There was not acceptance of having a butt. There was not acceptance of having curves. You needed the thigh gap. All those things, ribs, like seeing your ribs was a big deal. Seeing back ribs or your, what's this, the clavicle or whatever, neck, this, that was huge, right? All the little things, your wrists.

Aileen (1:06:43)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Yep. Yep. Yep. All these things.

It's terrible!

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:07:00)
all the eating disorder

things that you look for, that was like winning. it's a weird thing as the pounds dropped, you physically felt ill, but you mentally felt like you were ⁓ accomplishing something huge. Like you were like, yes. It's a weird cycle, you know.

Aileen (1:07:16)
I know. I'm winning. But it's not... it's awful. I'm sorry you

went through that as well, so you really understand.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:07:26)
Yeah, but I think for those of us who had trauma and grew up in that time, it was a double, like I said, a double whammy. You have an eating disorder because it's the only thing you can control. But also you're getting rewarded by getting thin because we grew up in a society where that was how you're supposed to look. So could actually have people telling you, look great.

Aileen (1:07:37)
Yeah.

wasn't accepted.

I know, the thinner you were.

So you're probably saying, because you're your period young, I got curves young. And I remember the boy, and actually when I think about it, the boys would say, my mum wouldn't let me get a bra. So, you know, had boobs when I was 12, 13. And I said, mum, I need to get a bra, because all the boys were then talking about them by then, you know. And it was a fight to get a bra.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:07:55)
Yes.

Yes.

Yes.

That's so interesting because you would think she'd want to cover you. You know what I mean? But it's opposite. Yeah. So then if you had curves, but also trying to be as skinny as possible, it's cut. Were you going to say something? I'm just curious. When did you guys realize it was control? That, right, you're trying to control. You're doing it because it's something you can control. When did you?

Aileen (1:08:17)
No, I know. No, was... yeah. So all those things. Yeah. I know. It's so hard.

Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:08:40)
⁓ When I was older and I was out of it, didn't know. Not in the moment at all though.

Aileen (1:08:42)
That's your older. That's your...

No, not in the moment. The only thing that made me stop was that my teeth started to decay at the front. And as soon as I saw that, said, I'm not doing this anymore. But it's the therapy and... ...aging. ⁓ And then you think... You think it's just because you want to be thin. Yeah. But a lot of men have it.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:08:59)
You don't know why it's just, I don't know. It's an adult revolution. Yeah. And I know,

did you have friends? I had friends. would all kind of like, if we had sleepovers, we'd binge and purge. It would be a thing.

Aileen (1:09:11)
binged again. So I didn't have it

young. I found a girl at university who did it as well and we did that. We had the binged and purged hangout.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:09:23)
I know

or you'd compete about like how many pounds you could lose or all the tricks Like the lemon water with the kind and like all the different things the laxatives. ⁓ Yeah, all the things so how many years? No, I'm blown away because I'm hearing you say it's about being thin but I don't Know if that was the demand that boys were putting on girls at the time or it was you the girls doing it to one another

Aileen (1:09:32)
laxative my gosh did you know i'm guessing you didn't have that

No it's not, it's good.

Mm.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:09:51)
It was society. was the media. It was to a point, but it wasn't 100%. The media, were magazines. So the Cosmopolitan sports. 17 twiggy, But all the supermodel really took a break in the 80s and they were all thin. The 17 magazine. But if you look at the supermodels from back in the 80s, they actually do have bodies. Compared to what I see today, it's very...

Aileen (1:09:52)
Yeah, it's society it was.

gosh, magazines, Twiggy. my God. Supermodels, my gosh.

Yeah.

Today's...

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:10:19)
Right there's there is a healthier body back like a Cindy Crawford or a no they were so thin you don't realize it. But here's the thing there's so much in here today. No it's like no well no okay so then it went through this like the early 2000 then it went through here heroin chic like with the moths. Yeah that's like back in the night that's our time.

Aileen (1:10:25)
They were thin, yeah, they're thinner than you. Yeah, now they're they're better, but keep moss.

Well...

Kate Morse, yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:10:43)
That's the eighties,

Aileen (1:10:43)
Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:10:44)
nineties, and then 2000s was really thin. And then it went through body positivity where it was like accepted. But you know what's happening right now? Thin is coming back. Have you noticed that? Yes.

Aileen (1:10:49)
Yeah.

Is it? I'm not because

I'm watching my daughter and she eats like a horse and I love it and there's no body issue at all. So that's sad.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:10:58)
Yeah, I know, that's great. Yeah, no, it's... keep talking with her

because thin is like the Kardashians have all gotten super thin again. Because you know why? Ozempic. All the celebrities that are already thin are now doing GLP1s and they're becoming like a zero with nothing. the the English, British girl, Osbourne. Kelly. Kelly Osbourne. So it is from the Ozempic and I think...

Aileen (1:11:06)
⁓ Yeah, all these same, yeah.

I'm not keen, I haven't...

Sharon Oz. Kelly Osborne, yes. Terrible. That's true.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:11:28)
alleged. But I mean, in general, I think people are using GLP ones that shouldn't be and they're getting like that. Really, really what it used to be that heroin skinny like so bad. But no, no, it's not healthy.

Aileen (1:11:39)
It's not a good look, is it? And it's just not healthy. Because

I follow a lady who's already aged for fitness and she's beautiful, you know. She's got a real body. And I love that because it's more about weight that I see about the training to keep your body. Yeah, strength training. Our bones. No.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:11:49)
Mm hmm. Yeah.

Strength training. Strength training muscle. Especially as we get older, you don't want to be super thin. It's not healthy. As you go into

aging, you'll be frail. You've got to able to survive some crazy disease. Well, yeah, that too. But you want to be able to have the strength to get up out of a chair, to open a jar. Like these basic things you need strength to do. ⁓

Aileen (1:12:08)
Break your bones!

I know, I know.

Yeah. Yes, all these things that you don't think about when you're a teenager. You're just trying to...

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:12:26)
So how many years did you have your eating disorder?

Aileen (1:12:30)
Mine was about eight years just because of the teeth. about you? How was yours? Yeah, it's long enough.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:12:34)
Okay. Yeah, that sounds about right. So

you had it as you went into ⁓ college or university.

Aileen (1:12:40)
Yeah,

so university starts at 18 and finishes about 22. Yeah, so was probably throughout most of it, yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:12:44)
Yeah, Okay, and you had it there too.

So after the singing incident, did you stop singing in public?

Aileen (1:12:56)
I think I did actually, I haven't thought about that before. But I still danced. I did synchronise swimming at 16. That was cool. I love trying new things, ⁓ I think all the other things I did, but yeah, the singing probably did. Stop. That was it.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:13:00)
Okay. that's cool.

That was it.

So ⁓ everything you tried, you said you like trying new things. Whenever you would try it, was your goal to excel at everything that you tried?

Aileen (1:13:23)
I don't think I thought of it like that, but I did like when I excelled and I got praise. I loved, I did. I needed a lot of validation. I got a lot of validation from peers, but not at home. And I think I looked for the wrong validation because you're not getting it home and you're not seen and you're not heard, so you go looking.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:13:32)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Aileen (1:13:49)
and I was lucky because I got lot of validation but then that's hard. It's like when celebrities get so much praise and validation and then it stops.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:13:55)
Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

Aileen (1:13:59)
a slick rejection,

how do you handle it? But now I don't care, I this has got, I realised this some years ago going, I don't care about that anymore isn't it brilliant?

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:14:01)
Yes.

Yeah.

Yeah, it's liberating. It is. But what's interesting is that as much as you were looking for that outside validation, you still went to your headmaster about when you won the, what was it called? The miss the not miss. Big head girl. You said you didn't deserve it. So you you got the validation. Is that where that imposter syndrome kind of settles in?

Aileen (1:14:11)
Oh, it's so loud.

being head get all head get all of the school. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah, it

was running. was. I don't know why. I think because I realised with the bulimia, my brain wasn't, I wasn't good at studying at that point. And I was expected to be a straight A student because I had been and then my marks dropped and they weren't straight A's and I said, look, you know, and he said no. Yeah, shut up.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:14:41)
Mm.

Yeah.

Did you find

that with all the excelling you did when you weren't getting straight A's, your grades dropped, or if you didn't excel, you didn't know how to handle that adversity at all?

Aileen (1:15:02)
Yeah.

I couldn't handle it at all.

I felt like I was nothing.

and I was lost for many years like that.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:15:18)
So was either all or nothing.

Aileen (1:15:20)
all or nothing. Because I think if you've had nothing and then you grow and then you're up there, it's incredible. When you're up there and then you go down, it's very hard to handle.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:15:30)
Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. I think that happens to a lot of, especially a lot of overachieving adolescents. And then if they get one B, they've gotten all A's, they've gotten all hundreds, they've gotten, they've won all the blue ribbons, whatever, first place, everything. And then you see them get a B and they're destroyed. it, like it cracks something in them. And it's really sad. Does it? It's really sad.

Aileen (1:15:45)
Mm-hmm.

You focus on...

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:15:59)
I wonder for you, did it validate the lack of support you got from your mom? Like almost like I was up here and I was proving her wrong then all of a sudden I got knocked down a notch and maybe she is right. I don't know.

Aileen (1:16:07)
Yeah.

I think it's because

I don't know. It's not that she knocked me down. She didn't like when I got big headed, but then that's a Scottish thing. We were very, we were taught to be self derogatory and humility. mean, I love humility is one of my favourite traits in people, but it was too much. It was like, you couldn't say anything nice about yourself. And so what I remember, used to get a lot of people say I was special and my mum would say, and she wasn't, I don't think she was being nasty either, but you're not special.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:16:30)
Mm-hmm.

Aileen (1:16:44)
And so maybe I, yeah, I felt special because I was at top of everything. And then...

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:16:44)
it's

That's just the

Stratus thing. No, that's our generation. That's our generation. I didn't, but... Yeah, but he was in an unusual situation. he had this great... Like, his parents built him up and, like, he wasn't that typical Gen X, you know? But no, I think in general, though, our generation, it's that whole, get too big for your britches. That's what it was, yeah. Don't, you know...

Aileen (1:16:53)
So you guys have that derogatory... self derogatory...

tonight.

Yeah, too big for your

boots, we say, yeah. Same.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:17:15)
Yeah, exactly.

don't get over your skis. Yeah. But I think their generation came from that place where where we celebrate our children. Right. Like, you're amazing. That's great. did that. my God. Because we were like, no, even you, like, even though you did great, it's still as different than how you you handle our kids when they do an achievement. You know, I think it was just don't they were we weren't built up in the same way.

Aileen (1:17:21)
Yeah.

gosh.

Yeah, you're in front. Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:17:45)
Like we weren't built up, right?

Aileen (1:17:46)
No, because they weren't built

up. wasn't their fault and we know that now, this stage. But it damaged us.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:17:51)
Right. Right. But we

did. And even though they weren't built up and we can say they didn't know different. And that's true. But but we somehow knew different. Right. Because we did. We broke the generational trauma.

Aileen (1:18:05)
I know. I know. So

how did we know? How did...

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:18:10)
I think maybe that's the grit of our generation is we were like, we're not doing this. We're not doing this to our kids. And we've been so self-sufficient and feral and scrappy from the start and exposed to so much. And I guess we just knew we're like, not passing this on. I don't know. I don't know why we're different.

Aileen (1:18:16)
Yeah.

Yeah.

But isn't it interesting?

I know, but I, this is what I find amazing is you're in the States, Julie's in Australia, we're all over the world and as a generation, we all did this. It's not like we got in touch with each other across the world and said, I'm going to do this. How did it? That's what I don't get. That the whole generation did it, you know?

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:18:38)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Right.

It's true. Probably the most remarkable thing about us doing this podcast and talking about this is that it is a global thing. It's a global shared experience. It's wild. It's the most wild thing I think we've discovered in all of this. Yeah, the trip.

Aileen (1:19:01)
Yeah.

Yeah, it's fascinating, isn't it? Yeah, it blows

my mind that we all live so far away and all did the same thing with our children.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:19:13)
and all have the shared experience,

not just as our childhoods, but that as we became parents, we all kind of consciously made this decision not to repeat a lot of the crap we went through and to break those cycles. I think it's just such a... I love our generation and I think it's such a testament to us that even without connecting, we still collectively made that change, you know? And I think it's only now in the last...

Aileen (1:19:18)
Yeah.

I I'm not doing... I know!

Yeah.

Yeah, we did

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:19:43)
few years with social media that we even all realized we had a shared experience at all. We didn't know.

Aileen (1:19:46)
Yeah. yeah, if it wasn't

for, we wouldn't have known this otherwise. And so I love that about the social, no. I know.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:19:51)
Yeah. Could you imagine if we could go back and know,

hey, I'm not the only one. I'm not the only one feeling alone. I'm not the only one coming home to an empty house. I'm not the only one that feels like ⁓ no one cares about me. You all those things like I wish I'm not good enough. Right. The self-worth, you know. So in a way, as we've hit midlife, we all can kind of validate each other now. It is.

Aileen (1:19:57)
I know.

Yep, I'm not good enough and...

No, isn't it lovely? I love that.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:20:19)
No, it's amazing. I do love that for us because I think we deserve it because we survived. Not only did we survive, but we're breaking those generational trauma, the generational cycle, generational curses, whatever you want to call it. So we continue to do good with the next generation. And now we're able to support each other and validate each other midlife. I think it's so cool. I know, I know it is. No, it's amazing.

Aileen (1:20:25)
Yep.

I know, I love it, we should talk more. It's really uplifting. And you know you're

not alone.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:20:49)
Yeah, I do think it's an evolutionary thing and even without social media I think it would happen because we would all say that just wasn't cool. I need to improve this because you going back to the period thing. It's like I don't know As a guy I would want to make sure it's okay for my daughter where 50 years ago, maybe it wasn't it wasn't that way, right? But I think it's an evolutionary thing of you see this. It's not right. That's course, correct and I

Aileen (1:20:57)
Yeah.

Yeah.

No. No.

Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:21:18)
probably going on for thousands of years. don't know. mean, I think you'll look back and I think our generation has made one of the biggest leaps and change. I really do. I really do. really do. And I think when they look back at this time and the things we did, because we're not just changing things as parents with our children, we're changing things midlife. We're talking about things that no one talked to previous generations, never discussed midlife. And I think we'll continue to do that.

Aileen (1:21:20)
Yeah, I thought I know we...

Yeah, I think so as well. I do too. I do.

Yeah. No.

Yeah. We will. I love it.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:21:46)
into our 60s, into our 70s, into our 80s and

change the narrative ⁓ in aging and that aging, we're changing aging. Yeah.

Aileen (1:21:55)
Yeah, absolutely. It's just a number. I know.

I love it when I see these ladies or men in their 90s and they're becoming Olympic champions at swimming and singing, bringing. I saw a lady that brought out her first book at 102, a lady who's made an album, singing album at 99. And I'm thinking, maybe at some point I'll go back to that. Because you just don't know.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:22:17)
Yeah. Yeah.

No, and I think us as a collective are going to continue to do that because they're the ⁓ exceptions of those generations. Right. And I think us as a whole, we're going to be like, we're all going to do it. And I think that's going to then show the younger generations there is you don't hit 40, you don't have 50. And then it's like, it's done. You're actually just getting started. We to think that we did. Right.

Aileen (1:22:23)
Yep.

Yeah, amazing. We go doing it.

No. I know. I know. Sometimes it doesn't... Yeah, we did. Because... ⁓

I don't know about your parents, but mine dressed like they were about 90. Even when they were 40. It was brown. It was dull. They looked old, but we're not like that. Yeah, they were brilliant. I loved the golden girl. Yeah. my God, yeah, they looked really... I know.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:22:51)
Yes.

No, well, look at the Golden Girls. Do you know the show, The Golden Girls? They were young. They were like in their 40s. they were, those actresses were not old, but the

way they look. Now I know for characters, they were, but even as actresses, they still looked older than my 40s and 50s. So, no, I think it's awesome. Yeah. Okay. So ⁓ was college our...

Aileen (1:23:11)
my gosh.

Yeah, yeah, I know. But look at everyone now.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:23:25)
or university, was that disgusting your home? Was it something that you just assumed you would automatically do?

Aileen (1:23:31)
Yeah, it was actually, I think because my parents didn't get the chance to do that, they instilled it into us that we would go. But they didn't have money, so we got grants. So we all went to college or uni near where we lived. And we were actually given government money to help us fund us. And I had a job in a restaurant part time. I was really wealthy as a student. I was drinking in the student union for a pound.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:23:36)
Okay.

Mm.

Aileen (1:23:59)
And then saving all my money, which allowed me to come to the States for my summer. So actually, I think I did the wrong thing. I copied my brother because I didn't know what to do. I just knew I had to go. And I was really good at maths and I loved maths. But because no one knew what you could do with maths, I thought I don't want to be a maths teacher, so I'm not going to study maths. And then I actually thought about TV presenting and I thought, I don't know how to get into that.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:24:00)
Yeah.

So what did you, did you know what you wanted to go to college for?

Yeah.

Aileen (1:24:29)
And then I just went into marketing business, best business school in Europe it was, Spanish I wanted to learn because I wanted to live there and that was the course I did for four years but it didn't. Strathclyde University. Business school in the centre of Glasgow, it was the best one at that time.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:24:40)
So what school did you go to?

and was a business school.

Did you live in dorms?

Aileen (1:24:53)
I lived at my mum's and dad's, so was four miles. It was in the city centre. But obviously I would stay out with friends and stay over with people and they were quite, let me, you know, at that age they let me do that. But, no, no.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:24:57)
Okay. Okay.

Okay, so they didn't try to control you during those years. You were able to still

kind of have that college or university experience even though you were living at home.

Aileen (1:25:12)
still had the experience,

yeah, I just didn't look, yeah, looking forward to do that, but they did their best,

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:25:17)
So ⁓

you said you wanted to learn Spanish because you wanted to live in Spain. When did you decide you wanted to live in Spain? When did that hit you?

Aileen (1:25:22)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

So that was when I was 18 and I was with my first love. So I was the head girl at school, he was head boy, he had the car, all that stuff, romantic stuff. And he had this massive house in Spain and we went for a month and I fell in love with it because of the blue skies, the sunlight and then the food and the white buildings because coming from Glasgow where it was grey where you said you've come from.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:25:38)
Okay.

Aileen (1:25:55)
That was just a dream for me. And I said, 18, I'm going to move to Spain in 22 years. I'm going to save up enough money. I had all these dreams and I ended up working and I remember running a company in Glasgow and I said, this is my dream. By this point, 18 years, I'm going to be living in Spain and I'll have enough money to save to fulfill my dream. And everyone laughed at me. And some of those people I still know, they said, you did it.

you know, and I did do it, but I'm not there anymore. managed, manifested, did it. 22 year dream came true.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:26:24)
you

Now they'd say you manifested it. Yeah. That's amazing. So wait,

was he Scottish or was he Spanish?

Aileen (1:26:39)
He was Scottish, yes, very Scottish. And then he wanted to get married when we were 19. And I said, I want to see the world. And then he married the girl after me. And I think they're still together. Same school. No, he didn't go to uni. He did something else. But his dad was a builder. He built a lot of homes. I think they had a property in the States as well, Florida as well, I think. Yes, which, but we weren't, we were in.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:26:52)
Okay, so did you go to the same university?

Okay.

Aileen (1:27:07)
in the middle so it was like real wealth but very humble and his dad made him work really hard because he was a self-made man so I had my eyes opened.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:27:11)
Yeah.

Okay.

Okay, so you kind of saw it. saw Spain, you manifested your dream, you went to university, but as soon as you graduated, where did you stay in Glasgow or did you head straight to Spain? What did you do? Okay.

Aileen (1:27:32)
I know, Spain was my long dream but

what happened was I went for a job interview in company called IBM and so I went for marketing job down the south of England. got the job but by this time I hadn't had a job so my dad saw an advert in paper and said Aileen you should go for this they want people who are bubbly and... ⁓

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:27:42)
Mm-hmm.

Aileen (1:27:58)
I okay, so I ended up working in door-to-door sales again, which I did at 13. And I was selling restaurant cards, promoting restaurants. I absolutely loved this job. And I turned down the job that was the marketing job and my parent, my mum, she didn't speak to me. You can imagine after getting a degree, getting this amazing job offer.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:28:15)
Yeah.

From IBM. From IBM. So what did you do in 2013 where you were doing door-to-door sales? At 13?

Aileen (1:28:20)
from IBM.

I was selling bacon

round the doors in the houses. Did you guys work at 13 as well or is that just...

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:28:32)
Babysitting not a job job and you work for your cousins. yeah. Yeah. Yeah, we We worked. Yeah

Aileen (1:28:34)
Yeah, so you did, we did jobs that were you.

Well, it's

funny. I mean, I can't imagine now, but.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:28:45)
Not door-to-door

selling bacon though, that's something.

Aileen (1:28:48)
I know, and going into people's houses, when you think

of it, no. I thinking of my daughter, your children.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:28:54)
I used to deliver

papers back then and collect money. Yeah, you deliver. go inside people's homes. But you're in a city. Like I was in a suburb. Well, she was in a suburb of her city. Yeah. But still, you were closer to a major city than I was. Yeah. But that division was probably still there because this was on a smaller scale. OK, so then your dad had randomly told you about this door door sales.

Aileen (1:28:57)
Paper. Yes, yes, yeah, we did it!

I was in the supper. I was in the supper.

Yeah, but it's not a huge... Yeah, it's probably so... Yeah.

Yeah, just so we

could work.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:29:22)
you did it and then you decided to stay in Glasgow and do that and not go to England for IBM.

Aileen (1:29:25)
do that job. Yeah.

And then I ended up owning the company, I ran the company. It was like a multi-level marketing thing. Everyone kept saying it was the pyramid scheme, but it wasn't. It actually was multi-level marketing. It's just that people didn't know what this was. And I was really, actually I was good at it. was good at it. And people trusted me.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:29:34)
Yep.

Okay. Right, right.

Aileen (1:29:47)
But eventually when I was running that company at 23, I got held up at Knifepoint by two guys came into the office with and they put balaclavas and I thought it was a joke. So I laughed and this guy has a blade like this of my throat and saying, give me the money. There's money here. We know there's a safe, blah, blah, blah. This went on for a couple of minutes. I didn't know where the key was. And the guy at the front desk was holding the key and I didn't realize, but eventually the key was given.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:30:07)
All right.

Aileen (1:30:15)
I was put in a room with another person. They pulled the phone cable but they didn't pull it out properly. They left and then we were able to call outside. There was a helicopter. I had to go to an ID parade at the police station. They found one of them and I could identify him by his black teeth. But it was quite a shock at the time. I remember my mum just ailing if you've got your face.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:30:33)
my gosh.

Aileen (1:30:41)
And people said, why did you not just hit him? I have no self-defence glasses, no training. I'm not going to hit the guy. I don't even know if he's high on drugs or whatever. Money. Give him the money. Yeah, so that was...

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:30:47)
No, no, no, Just money. Yeah, no, it's not worth you risking yourself. Yeah, here's the money. Did

they ⁓ like hold the knife to you physically? Did the knife touch you?

Aileen (1:31:03)
can't remember it touching me but I can remember it being right there. Close enough?

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:31:07)
Like on your neck, near your neck. So

he was close enough to you where he could put a knife. Knife point, right? My God, that is so traumatic. my gosh.

Aileen (1:31:12)
He was holding it, yeah. Yeah, right up, right up at next year.

But then again,

but then you forgot about it quickly again, you know, it's just sometimes it comes back to you and you go, ⁓ I remember when we got on with it. You just got on with it.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:31:24)
yeah.

Well, you're Gen X, you just grind through it,

I love that concept, because you're so spot on. We deal with crazy shit in our lives. You forget about it move on, but then you're, you know, it hits you one day and you're like, man, that really was crazy. I survived that. Or it's when you have kids and you think like, my god, if that happened to them, I'd be losing my mind. Destroyed, you know.

Aileen (1:31:33)
I don't go.

I nearly got killed.

I know.

Distraught, I know. And our

kids' to things are, you know, completely different from ours. It's not a get, let's get on with it. It's, let's, we're traumatized for, yeah. Yes, we have.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:32:00)
No, no, it's trauma because we've created. Yeah, we've created the space for them, right? Like to talk about,

you know, it's a beautiful thing. But if that happened to one of our kids, they'd be off work for like two weeks. They'd be meeting with a therapist. Like our lives would stop, you know, it would be a whole thing. But I'm sure for you was like, people are like, why didn't you fight back? We would never.

Aileen (1:32:12)
Same. I know it's so...

I know, why didn't you? Love that, only in Glasgow!

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:32:28)
Oh my, so did we keep working there after that?

Aileen (1:32:30)
not for long and then I went back to IVM. That job obviously had gone. I got another job that was less than and I went down south and I needed that break and then I got engaged to someone back in Glasgow. I did for nine months.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:32:38)
Okay.

Okay, wait, did you move to England?

Okay, and did you live on your own?

Aileen (1:32:52)
I shared a house with a guy actually from IBM as well and that was nice, it was fun. But we got burgled. We got burgled as well. Burgled. Burgled, you know, someone comes into your house and steals things. We call it burgled. It's my accent.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:32:56)
Okay. So is that your first time? You got what?

What's?

⁓ burglar. Yeah,

I was like, was this a new word? Burglar? Wait, okay, so you're in London, your first time living outside of Scotland, right?

Aileen (1:33:18)
It was in actually a place called Portsmouth so was down near the sea. was lovely, really nice place. Yeah, and then...

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:33:24)
Okay. And was that your

first time living outside of Scotland for any length of time?

Aileen (1:33:29)
I

was actually, oh no, well I had four months in the States when I was 21 and I had four months in Spain when I was 20.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:33:36)
Okay, and then nine months in Portsmouth and you're living with a co-worker or a colleague, whatever you guys call it, ⁓ and you're saying that somebody broke in.

Aileen (1:33:38)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

They broke in but we weren't in the house. But then when I moved back to Glasgow, someone broke in when we were in the house. And took in Glasgow, yeah, when I got engaged. So a year later, I was burgled again, but in the house.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:33:54)
in Glasgow.

Okay, wait, so it's all in like a year's time. No, a year.

Aileen (1:34:03)
Hehehehe

It all took

quite short time. So 23 was the knife point. 24 I must have gone down south. And 25 I got engaged and came back to Glasgow.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:34:19)
Okay, so. We can't hang out with you.

So wait, just to go to when someone broke in in Glasgow, you were home. Was that Night Point as well?

Aileen (1:34:28)
You

No, my husband, well he was my fiance, he woke up at the time but no, they just came in the patio door and they grabbed the keys to the car. We got the car and then took the car. Yeah, so they didn't come into the bedroom thankfully.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:34:43)
I took the car.

Thank God. Thank God. OK, so ⁓ how did you meet the guy that you got engaged to?

Aileen (1:34:54)
He was a friend of mine in our teens and he had been living in, he was Scottish but lived in Africa and he came back to go to uni and I was in my last year at school, he was in his first year at uni and he saw me in the library and then we got talking and then we started friendship at uni, bit like you guys and we were best of friends, we hung out all the time and...

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:35:03)
Mm.

Aileen (1:35:22)
He said, he got offered a job in the States and he said, and they were 21, 22 at this point, said, I won't go if you'll marry me. I said, I'm not gonna marry you, so you go. And I went to the airport to say goodbye to him with his mum and dad. And then he came back. His dad died actually of cancer. He was such a nice man, but he was about 24, 25 that time. He came back, we met up for a coffee and then something happened and...

He looked at me and said, something's changed. And I said, yeah. And then 10 weeks later, we got engaged. Yes, my dad.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:35:58)
Wow. So were you in England when you got engaged? you still, I mean, not England. Yeah, in England, Portsmouth. So you guys were doing long distance?

Aileen (1:35:59)
like that.

Yeah, yeah I was. I was in England, yeah. Yeah, he came down.

Yes, we were. He used to come down.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:36:11)
And then did you move back for him? You left the job at IBM and moved back to Glasgow?

Aileen (1:36:13)
I did. Yeah,

I did actually. I moved in with my mum and dad at first and then moved in with him.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:36:22)
with him. And then did you get a job there again in Glasgow? What did you do?

Aileen (1:36:24)
I did, yeah, I got job.

I was a rep for some publishing company. So they wanted a, I was advertising. I thought I'd be really good, cause of the door to door sales. So I was traveling around Scotland and had a nice company car, going to the north of Scotland, speak to people at, know, Loch Ness. I had to go and do this thing at Loch Ness, but I just liked people and talked to them and I wasn't bringing in the revenue.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:36:31)
Okay.

Yeah, yeah.

Aileen (1:36:53)
So that didn't last very long. And then I went into a company who were really new in the world of the internet world. And it was publishing cars on the internet basically. So I went around the dealerships, the car dealerships, did presentations, got them all signed up onto the internet, show your cars. And actually I loved it. I was good at it. And then the guy that owned that company asked me to come work with him.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:36:56)
So what did you do after that?

Aileen (1:37:22)
in London, because he couldn't get the funding for that company, but he was doing something else. So by this time, that would have been about when I was 27 when I got married, so it was just after that, and my husband got offered a job at the same time in London, and we moved to London when I was 28.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:37:25)
Okay. Yeah, because how, what year was that again?

Okay, so you guys are in Glasgow, you're working those couple jobs. How long between the time you got engaged and got married? How many years between?

Aileen (1:37:48)
to

think, so it was two years.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:37:56)
Okay, and then you both got offered jobs that took you to London. so you pack up, move to London, you're newlyweds, living in London, and you're working, I mean, the internet, was it pretty new at that time what you were doing?

Aileen (1:37:59)
to London, yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah, it was new when

I was 25, yes. But it was obviously, so by this time we'd grown quite a lot. And then I went to work in cable and wireless. There was a division of cable and wireless. And they had all these data servers for the Financial Times newspaper and big companies like that. And so I became a, I don't know, a project manager there. And then...

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:38:23)
Okay.

Yeah, yeah, And

what did he do?

Aileen (1:38:38)
He was a fund manager. So, you know, money.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:38:41)
Okay.

And then how long, yeah,

yeah. How long were you guys in London?

Aileen (1:38:51)
So then I went into another, then I went into broken. Gosh. My dad died when I was 31. And so we were still together. And then the year after I left the marriage, because I couldn't cope with the death of my dad. And I just saw life very differently.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:39:10)
So before that, were you kind of grinding and making money and was that kind of your focus? Was your career?

Aileen (1:39:17)
making

money to go to Spain and he wanted to move to Spain or France. So we made this plan that we were going to go and live overseas together and build something together overseas. So he now lives in France. Yes, it was always, yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:39:27)
Okay. So that was still on your your in your sights. Spain

was still so you're just working to make the money to live in Spain. And so when your dad passed away, had you gone to Spain yet? Or were you still in London grinding on the career path?

Aileen (1:39:36)
to make as much money. Yeah.

Yeah.

just grinding on the career path. And it was a shock for me because none of us had been ill. was just, yeah, I got the phone call. I had just been promoted at work. My mum said, oh, your dad came down the stairs and he couldn't feel his right hand side. He's going to hospital. Don't worry. And I said, it doesn't sound right. I'm coming back. And so within six days he died. then...

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:40:08)
Mm-hmm.

Aileen (1:40:15)
I stayed about another six days, came back, because work was then saying, where are you? You've got this new job. You should be here. Of course, I was just an absolute shock. Yeah, but it was that world of finance. I was a money broker at this point. It was quite brutal. And then a year later, I left my marriage. My immediate boss was my ex-husband's best friend. So there was a lot of stuff.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:40:22)
Right.

You just saw Shana. Yeah.

Aileen (1:40:44)
But we were very amicable when we broke up. wasn't a bad breakup. We've been friends. We still speak. You I love him. I love him like my brother. I will always love him. He was one of the best guys I've ever met in my life. But then the year after that, my mum had her stroke and she was paralysed. So it was quite a lot in a few years.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:40:49)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

What did your did

your father pass away from a stroke?

Aileen (1:41:06)
Yeah, stroke. Stroke or aneurysm? Well, actually, my brother said that I didn't allow the autopsy because I just couldn't cope. And I'm so sorry, but my grandmother had one as well. So I think it was an aneurysm or the stroke. Yeah. Do you guys still have both parents? Do you both?

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:41:09)
Okay.

Something in the, it sounds genetic, like maybe or okay. So you lose your, no,

I actually lost my dad at 31. But in a car accident. Yeah. And then Brian lost his dad in 2007. How old would we have been? 30? I can relate to what you're saying because I had just accepted a new role down here in Florida and

Aileen (1:41:30)
as well. We've got so much time and I'm so sorry.

Mm-hmm.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:41:49)
My dad had recently retired and then he passed away while I was in the process of... I was living here flying back to New Jersey. We were living in Jersey, but he had gotten transferred down here. Yeah, so I was flying back and forth on the weekends and then he passed away pretty quickly. And we went, we moved, we had to keep going forward down here because that was around when the recession was happening or started.

Aileen (1:41:55)
Same.

Mm-hmm. Right.

Yep.

I'm sorry.

Yeah.

Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:42:19)
I can relate to what you're saying in terms of that shock, I guess, and especially for you. And I was close with my dad, but you were probably closer with your dad for sure than your mom, right? Your dad was your champion. So I'm sure that was a big blow.

Aileen (1:42:21)
I'm sorry.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah, but you guys, it's so weird that we've all lost in our thirties, because I've got friends in their fifties, I've still got both parents. And there's all the grandparents.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:42:39)
No, it's the shark.

Yeah. Yeah, no, it's like our kids have never really had a Like grown up with one, like they remember it from when they were really young. But two of our three. Yeah. Well, even our older two, it's like a faded memory with his dad, whereas they have friends whose grandparents are even their cousin. We just went to a wedding in Washington, D.C. in September, and there was like three or four sets of grandparents at this wedding. And these there and.

Aileen (1:42:48)
No? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, is it she? It's a me.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:43:11)
our niece and nephew that got married, they're in their 20s and they still have all these grand... So yeah, I always tell people it was like a new normal. Like everything changed and my life was one way and then the next day it was different. I'm sure that's how it is for most people that lose a parent or anyone close. But you don't expect it at 31 or 35, however old, because your dad died only like... My dad died 2003, I don't think we're equipped to deal with it.

Aileen (1:43:16)
to me.

Yeah.

Yep. Yep. Yep.

You don't.

No, I don't know. Yeah. Yeah. It's traumatic.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:43:40)
at that young of an age and it's shocking and you kind of just bury it. Well, yeah, I mean, it's, know, it's in

your 30s, you still think you're gonna have your parents. Yeah.

Aileen (1:43:49)
Of course. Yeah. So it is a

major shock. It's a trauma. Really. I mean... Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:43:54)
It's a trauma. And depending on how you deal with it,

I struggled for a long time, but I went through those emotions. And not to put Brian down in any way, shape, form, but his way of dealing with it was compartmentalizing it, putting it somewhere, maybe a little bit of denial, like not emotionally dealing with it. And that could be the man-woman, the Gen X man, Gen X woman. How did you process it?

Aileen (1:44:01)
Yeah. Right.

Right.

Right.

I dealt with

it. think because I don't know about both of you but I physically felt it like you know when you see the cartoon did you have that where your heart physically breaks and so I definitely processed it and did you guys see any signs? Like I had signs after.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:44:36)
⁓ Like

after I did like I would have things happen like ⁓ my dad loved Bob Seeger and I in every grocery store any any store I was in Bob Seeger would start playing I could smell my dad smoked cigars and I would randomly smell cigar smoke or his cologne So for me, that's what it was. I don't did you I don't think he wasn't he allowed any of it You have to be no he's still

Aileen (1:44:40)
Yeah. Yeah.

That's great. Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, if you do it, you have to be open to it.

Yeah,

and that's fine. It's not for everyone, I get that. I did see signs, white feathers and actually my dad whistled and I had a whistling kettle that was electric and it used to randomly start whistling and it just reminded me of him. It was wild and he came to me in a dream because I was mad at him for not saying I love you and he came to me in the dream and said I didn't need to tell you. Everyone knew.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:45:06)
It's not now, but did you see signs?

That's wild. Yeah.

Aileen (1:45:34)
I just remember it just felt real, I woke up and who knows? A few things like that. Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:45:38)
Beautiful. No, that's

really beautiful. Did you struggle on the year anniversary for quite a while every year? Yeah. Do you notice ⁓ like the week before, even if you consciously don't know the year is coming up, like you know, but you haven't really thought about it, but then the week before you're off, like something's off, your emotions are off. And then all of sudden you're like, ⁓ it's next week.

Aileen (1:45:46)
Even now, even now I struggle. It's...

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:46:07)
like you know, but then you're like, that's why I'm off. Yeah.

Aileen (1:46:07)
Yeah. Then you... That's... Yeah. That's where I'm off. Or then I'm in a card shop and I see a Father's Day card or something that just goes... It's not like the pain we had when it started at the start, but it's still there. You never... You can't.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:46:20)
Yes, it's still there. never.

Yeah, it just it changes and it's fluid, right? It just it flows. So how how did it affect your marriage, though? You said because you couldn't cope, you your marriage ended.

Aileen (1:46:26)
Yeah, of course.

I

think I just saw life differently and I guess I think because of my upbringing and not seeing happiness with my parents I think I just didn't really believe in marriage I think and I it wasn't nothing to do with him it was all me I was very immature and I just thought this isn't giving fulfilling for me even though he was doing everything

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:46:59)
Mm-hmm.

Aileen (1:47:03)
couldn't do enough, but it was something in me and I needed to do a lot of work in myself, which I then did when I got to 40 and I went to Bali. It was very cliched, know, the Eat Love Pray, the book, the film, and I said, I'm going to go and meet the guy from the film who actually was a real guy, Katoot. I went to meet him and I lived 50 metres from him.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:47:21)
Wow.

Wow.

Aileen (1:47:26)
Yeah, which

was this... have you seen this film Eat Love Pray? ⁓ no, it's such a girly one. And this woman tries to... ⁓ years ago!

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:47:29)
He hasn't seen it.

Yeah, yeah, and I haven't seen it since it came out, which was like,

like 15, 20 years, like a long time, right? Years ago. Yeah. Well, OK, so but it's like, how would you describe it to Brian, like to sum up the whole concept?

Aileen (1:47:43)
Yeah, we'd probably be about 20. ⁓

So this

woman has the dream of getting married, having children, all of those things, the nice house, and she marries, and she has the nice house. I mean, it's beautiful house. But the marriage, she just feels a bit bored. And so she says to him one night, I don't want to do this anymore. I want to find myself. And she goes off to live in Italy, Bali. And I've forgotten the other one now.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:48:16)
I don't remember.

Aileen (1:48:16)
and she

goes on this journey of life, of learning who she is and it was a bit like that for me, I think. Forty. Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:48:24)
And so you did that at 40, literally.

It makes sense if you feel like your life has been just a progression of going through the motions to get hit with something and say, I don't understand the meaning of all this. I'm to go find it. It's kind of what you're describing in some ways, right? Yeah. Yeah.

Aileen (1:48:40)
Yeah.

Yeah, I don't know.

Yeah, I just wasn't, I was never a conformist. And then I remember my dad saying, you know, you might be left on a shelf. And I looked for security and all of the things that I didn't feel I had growing up, because it was always so argumentative. And I got it. But I think from the work that I've done, my safety was chaos, not calm. And that's, it's crazy.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:49:07)
Yes.

No, but that's really common when you grow up in trauma is if you all you know is chaos. Calm is scary. Calm is an unknown and you have to adjust to calmness and peace and the adjustment, the transition. That's a whole process. And if you're not capable yet or ready to go through that journey and accept it as a reality and that you deserve it.

Aileen (1:49:19)
It's Weird.

No, yes.

Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:49:41)
and let

the cortisol come down in your system to not be addicted to that high cortisol that trauma causes. That's a whole thing.

Aileen (1:49:46)
Yeah.

Yes, so many, I'm hearing more and more people talk about it, same kind of... ⁓ really?

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:49:55)
Yeah, we have a guest who wrote a book about it. Yeah. Yeah, we had someone

on top. I couldn't believe when she described it. It was very eye opening for me because I'm I like calmness. Yeah, I grew up in a fairly calm. Right. It's stability. But yeah, she described it as that quietness is even more chaos. And you're just not programmed to deal with it. And you need to go seek out some chaos to get your cortisol levels back up to

Aileen (1:50:06)
Wait, I do know. did you? Yeah.

Yep.

Yep. It's terrible.

Yeah it is. And the dopamine and all of those hits. So getting into a relationship you get that dopamine high and then that fizzles out quickly. The honeymoon period's over. It's like, this is it. This is calm. Now I would be calm but...

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:50:42)
Yeah. So,

right. So before your dad passed away, were you already feeling unsettled in the marriage? Was that already creeping in?

Aileen (1:50:53)
It was actually, yeah, it was. Even though it was quite fresh, the marriage, it was just, yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:50:55)
And then.

it was starting and

then when your dad passed away, what did that kind of yeah and then you.

Aileen (1:51:02)
It highlighted it. Well, it's

that finality, isn't it? This is it. We get one life that we know of. And so that's done. And I'm not happy and I'm not going to make him happy. I need to let him go and find happiness and I need to go and work out what's going on with me. And it was the right thing because he, we didn't want children together. It was really me.

And then he said, I don't want children. But then he didn't marry, but he's got two children and he's really happy. And I've spoken to his mum, you know, it was a heartbreak with her. She became like a mum to me. And that was really that was the hardest thing was saying, leaving her. saw her a couple of years ago and she said, I'm so glad you left because I got grandchildren, but you're still our family. it's just so nice. Beautiful woman. Beautiful.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:51:40)
Yeah.

⁓ that's beautiful. Well, she probably

filled that void a little for you, right of that nurturing, loving, warm mother figure that you didn't have growing up. Right. So it's a when

Aileen (1:51:56)
Mmm.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But was it not the same

for you? you, I'm sorry, you had Cam and you do have more chaos.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:52:10)
Yeah. Yeah. So after you ended the marriage, what was the first was that like around thirty one thirty two for you?

Aileen (1:52:19)
32,

32, 32, 33. Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:52:23)
So did you

leave London?

Aileen (1:52:26)
No, I just left the house and moved not far, yeah, and I stayed in the job and kept working that job and it was hard, yeah, really hard.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:52:28)
Okay, so you say. And you keep working that job and grinding.

for

how long, ⁓ go ahead. I'm just curious, is that a thing for you growing up in Glasgow to leave? Everyone's like, you gotta get out. And is the destination London or is it to stay? Okay.

Aileen (1:52:44)
No,

no, most, a lot of people that we know stayed. I think I knew a couple of people who were like me. I mean, I'm quite a free spirit anyway. I just want to, you know, not now, I'm exhausted, but I was so cute. I love people. love going to airports, talking to people, hearing about their lives. And I wish now I'd recorded all these things over the years because it's been fascinating people we've met. I'm sure you guys.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:53:00)
You

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Aileen (1:53:13)
feel it when you travel. You

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:53:13)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Aileen (1:53:15)
do the poker. So no, I think I'm quite the exception of leaving. It just felt too small for me. And there was a big world to see.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:53:26)
How long did you stay in that job in London? Like you left your marriage, the marriage ended. So you did make a shift in your life. ⁓ You knew that wasn't settled for you, but you continued on that corporate path. Was there a shift professionally ever for you?

Aileen (1:53:31)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

No, because I knew when I went into that job that it was a burnout job. It was work hard, play hard. And I started at 30 and I said I could do this for 10 years and I'm out. And everyone said there's no way you'll do that. I did stick to that.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:53:55)
Okay.

So did you live just like in your own place for your 30s?

Aileen (1:54:04)
So

yeah, I moved to a rental then I bought where I am now and I moved in here at 35 on my own, yeah. And then at 40 I left. I had a couple of boyfriends after and then at 37, 38 I was thinking I should really have a child because I think I'll regret it because I was ticking off all the boxes, all the dreams.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:54:09)
Okay.

Were you single then through your 30s?

Aileen (1:54:31)
And then it was a guy that I was friends with. We're not together now, but we had a child. went off to Thailand to live for a while. And Bali came back and then it didn't work out with him, but obviously I have my daughter and she sees him. 41. Late mum. Thailand and Bali.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:54:47)
So how old were you when you had her?

Okay, so you work the job, you go to Bali with the guy, her father, and

you had her over there.

Aileen (1:55:01)
No, just got pregnant there. was there for about six months. And then came back to Haber here in London. 41. Pregnant at 40.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:55:08)
and you were 41.

41.

So you have a ⁓ well yeah. We have 16. she's your daughter's 13. Okay. I got the math wrong. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. She's an alpha. You I think she's when was she born 20?

Aileen (1:55:15)
13. Yeah, she's 13. So you've got 16. She's 13. She's coming up for 14. Yeah. Young. She's young.

2012.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:55:35)
She might be the last Gen Z or she's the first Alpha. She's somewhere in there. She's either the last Gen Z, because I don't, I have to look that up. ⁓ So how did it change your life becoming a mother?

Aileen (1:55:37)
I don't know, I did look before but I can't remember. Need to check.

Oh, well, I felt, you know, this one of my favorite quotes by Carl Jung, you the unlived, the unlived life of a child, no, the unlived life of a parent is a burden on a child. And that was one of my things. I love Carl Jung. And life of a child, yes. I love that quote.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:55:57)
We love Carl Jung.

What was that? The unlived life of a parent is a burden on the child. I love that. I love that saying.

I've written that quote down so many times. Yes. It's a great one.

Aileen (1:56:18)
It's a good one, isn't it? I love that. And it reminded me

of my mum and dad because my dad was so worldly and my mum wasn't and I didn't ever want to have a child and not be wiser. And some people can be worldly through travel, some people can be worldly through books. And so I felt I have a wisdom and I'm just so happy and I just, my God, I loved when they were so young, taken to all the classes.

just loved being a mum. I was at my happiest probably just felt free and love and joy and no purpose. was a lot of purpose.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:56:53)
purpose, all of it.

But I love that quote. ⁓ And I think it's a wonderful way to parent because you don't vicariously live through them and you don't put your unfulfilled, the pressure of your unfulfilled dreams on them. And you also don't look to them for emotional needs or validation. And so many parents that we had did that to us.

Aileen (1:57:07)
Yes. Absolutely.

They did.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:57:20)
And so you, I think when you look at parenting like that, that your life, our lives are our responsibility and our happiness is our responsibility, not theirs. It allows them to have their own life without the pressure of worrying about us. It's not their job. It's not their job.

Aileen (1:57:27)
Exactly.

Exactly. No, it's not. And

they're not extensions of us. They're on loan to us. And it's amazing. You've got three children. You watch them go through all the phases. And it's lovely. It's hard to see them. It's exciting for them to see them grow like that, but to actually understand the growth phases, which we weren't understood for when we were at the age, you know, like, why are you awful at age 13?

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:57:45)
Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

Aileen (1:58:05)
But we know.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:58:06)
Yeah, it has nothing to do with us. Like if you're 13 year old, like snaps at you, it's not personal about us. This is the phase they're in. It's their job right now to be doing this. It really has nothing. And as soon as you understand that you can actually communicate better with them and help them and know when to step in, but when to take a step back and let them come to you. Because a lot of times if you go with them too much, you just shut them down. You know, but it's all that.

Aileen (1:58:08)
No, it's just them.

Exactly.

Yeah. Yeah, help me.

Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:58:37)
It's nuanced and it's a dance and it's four steps forward, five steps back. It's a waltz, right, of parenting. ⁓ But understanding that it has nothing to do with you most of the time and you have to just be there to support them, guide them, let them land, have a safe place to land. But it's not personal about you. It's so important. But especially if there's a lot of narcissistic parents out there that will never get past themselves in order to give them their children that space.

Aileen (1:58:39)
Yeah.

Absolutely.

Yeah. Yes.

Yes, I won't say too much about that but yes there is a lot.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:59:08)
You know, yeah, it's true.

Okay, so ⁓ what pros would you say are to having children later in life?

Aileen (1:59:20)
For me personally, it was that I had ticked off everything I wanted to do. So I didn't feel any, I've seen friends of mine younger say, I didn't get to do my career. I didn't do this. And they have unfulfilled dreams and they're not happy. Whereas for me, okay, I'm tired because I'm 55. At about 25, I wouldn't have been tired, but I would have been going out partying all the time. So I feel like it's become...

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:59:45)
Right.

Aileen (1:59:48)
It's almost selfless, but not only because I've done so much. And so I genuinely just want to see her have fun and create that for her where I can, even when I'm tired, but have her friends over all the time and see them all giggling. All those things I wouldn't have done in my... I would have been a rubbish mum earlier. Too selfish.

GenX Adulting Podcast (1:59:53)
Right.

Right.

Right. And you're settled so that you can just 100 % give to her and not feel like you're missing out on anything because you did. You did the things. Yeah.

Aileen (2:00:14)
It's a boha.

Absolutely nothing like you were saying earlier. I don't want to go out at

eight o'clock and have dinner. I don't want to. We've done it all.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:00:24)
Yeah.

Yeah. So did the whole eat, pray, love thing that part of your life when you went to Thailand and Bali, you got pregnant during that time?

Aileen (2:00:34)
It was the plan, yeah, we planned to. We said, let's get away from the London scene, because we were partying. Let's go over, do a bit more of chill and try and get pregnant. And it's the first time I've ever tried to get pregnant and it worked.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:00:39)
Okay, yeah.

And that's wonderful

considering you were 41, right?

Aileen (2:00:52)
So 40 pregnant, 41 had her. Yeah, it was.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:00:53)
40. But still, yeah.

Yeah. Did you ever end up with the span in Spain?

Aileen (2:01:01)
with the Spanish man or...

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:01:03)
Did

you end up where you that was your goal was to end up in Spain? Just in general with your life, did you end up there in Spain living?

Aileen (2:01:06)
Yeah, with her. She came with... ⁓ Yeah, in Spain, in

Bali. She came with me to Bali. We lived for a while, the two of us. We lived in Scotland. We lived in another part of England. We lived in Spain for five years and she was speaking Spanish like a Spanish girl. It was a gift for her. She was speaking Balinese when we lived in Bali. It was incredible.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:01:17)
Okay.

that's amazing. ⁓ Absolutely. ⁓ wow. Okay.

So how did you do that? So you came back to London, you had her. You obviously were not doing this corporate job if you're traveling all over. How did you pull that off?

Aileen (2:01:45)
I had saved money and I was doing a bit this and that and able to travel with her and I thought, well, she's this age. I want to show her a bit of the world because, you know, was a different upbringing from what I had and there's other reasons, I did, yeah, I needed to get away,

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:01:47)
Okay.

Yeah.

Aileen (2:02:08)
⁓

But I did what I had to do and I took her to Bali because I felt so safe there when I was pregnant. They prayed to me in the waters in Bali and I felt like a goddess. So I thought, we'll go back there. And my brother had a friend who he went to school with and she went to Bali, immersed herself with local people, didn't speak English so that she could speak Balinese and she spoke it fluently. She started a school to teach English. So we got connected.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:02:35)
Wow.

Aileen (2:02:37)
We became best of friends. Amelia had a stint at her school. I did a bit of work that funded her school because she was about to lose it. And we just had this amazing experience. And Amelia was speaking of Alanis. And then about six months and then we had to come back. And then we moved up to Scotland for just over a year because my mum was still in a nursing home there. And I wanted Amelia to at least experience.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:02:50)
That's how long were you in Bali?

Okay.

Aileen (2:03:06)
something with a grandma because she was able to smile and couldn't speak, you know, but she, you know, I wanted it for my mum and I wanted it for her. ⁓ And then I said to my mum, look, you knew my life dream was to live in Spain. We're going to go there now and head off. And we did, two of us. But one of my best friends, I met in London, is Spanish. She was moving back and she said, why don't you come here? So we went beside her. But

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:03:08)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Just the two of you.

Aileen (2:03:36)
It was just a bit judgmental because I was a single mum in a small community, in a very Spanish community.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:03:45)
So in the community itself, you felt some judgment.

Aileen (2:03:47)
Yeah.

⁓ in Murcia, which is about an hour from Alicante.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:03:55)
What's the next biggest city? know Barcelona, Valencia. Okay. Okay. So, so you live there. I know. We're American. We do, it's America. Remember, you're talking to Americans. I'll get on my phone and look stuff up. So, but you stayed there for five years in that same community?

Aileen (2:03:56)
Next biggest city, Valencia. Valencia.

We need to get maps out, don't we? you've got one behind you. What's this do? America.

We did, yeah, and we traveled a bit as well, yeah. But we stayed because of COVID as well. I knew after a couple of years, just wasn't quite right. And also it was very isolating because my Spanish at the time wasn't great. And I didn't have many, my friend from here, there weren't many people to communicate with, just at the shops, voila.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:04:19)
Thank you at the school.

⁓ okay. Okay, okay.

Okay.

Thank

Aileen (2:04:43)
But within those five years, I did speak Spanish really well because people were just like at the end, wow, you started like this and now it's like that. And then Amelia, she was just speaking like as if she was Spanish. And it was, I loved it.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:04:49)
Yeah.

That's amazing. That's so cool.

Does she still know those languages?

Aileen (2:05:00)
She knows, she doesn't remember Balinese, but she knows Spanish, but she doesn't know how to speak it properly anymore because she's not practicing it. She's doing it at school. Why I've wanted her to... She will, she was. Actually, she got 99 out of 100 and the teacher said, that's not good enough. Like for goodness sake, I wouldn't even get 99 out of 100 in English. Oh my God.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:05:12)
She's probably getting A's in that class. Yeah.

In what world does that look good enough?

That's crazy. my gosh. That's crazy. Yeah, yeah. So it sounds like from the time she was born, for at least up until recently, you got you were pretty much traveling with her, right? Like those years.

Aileen (2:05:28)
I'm just like, no, that's crazy. So this is a gift for her. Yeah.

wasn't until

we came back and she was about nearly nine. But she was in school in Spain, International school. It was cool. That was the thing about being an older parent and having the freedom.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:05:48)
Okay, yeah, that's really cool. That's really cool that you get

You could do that.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:05:59)
I was gonna ask you, okay, so it sounds like now, you know, you and your daughter did your you did traveling with her and now you're back in London and kind of settled doing ⁓ doing the single mom life. How is that because you said in Spain?

Aileen (2:06:07)
Hmm. Yeah.

Yep.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:06:16)
It was a little awkward being a single mom, but I'm assuming where you are now, it's totally fine.

Aileen (2:06:21)
It's everyone.

Where we live, everybody is the norm. It doesn't matter. So she doesn't stick out. It was changing in Spain, but it was just we were, I don't know how many years ago was that we knew? ⁓ about 10. So it was still quite new. And I was a foreigner.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:06:26)
Yeah. Yeah.

Aileen (2:06:43)
There was a lot of questions being asked and then I would go into a bar in Spain and people would say, are you the Scottish woman? So I felt like I was in a goldfish bowl. In London, no one cares. You're just, you do what you do.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:06:52)
Right. Right.

So for the last, you've been in London for the last 10 years.

Aileen (2:06:59)
No, the last four years. Four years, so ten years ago I started my journey in Spain and then, yeah. I didn't get there at 40 but I got there. Got there. Did it. Yeah. Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:07:03)
Okay.

Okay, okay.

You got there. That's awesome. Like you did it. know, however, however way it went, you did it. ⁓

Which is really cool. So for the last four years, since you've gotten back, did you go back to the corporate grind or did you choose a different career path?

Aileen (2:07:26)
No, I didn't go back to the corporate grind. I I couldn't go back to that world of being in an office every day. I mean, I was getting up at half past six to walk to work, you know, and then coming back and then staying out. No, I couldn't do that. So I have my friendship with Julie in Australia, who you've spoken to, and we met in London 15 years ago and we just became best friends and we became better friends the more, the further we moved apart from each other.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:07:36)
Yeah.

Yes.

Mm-hmm.

Aileen (2:07:56)
We supported each other every day through WhatsApp for about 10 years. And then it was, it has been unbelievable, the best lifeline, best therapy. And we started a podcast about, do you keep me sane podcast, which is all about self-worth, really our generation and self-worth, lack of self-worth.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:08:01)
amazing.

So it's the You Keep Me Saying podcast, right?

Okay.

So that's,

is it mainly about women and self-worth, would you say?

Aileen (2:08:26)
Mainly, yes, but some men have tapped in because of the single parent thing with me. There's some single dads who find it hard to speak, you know, because sometimes they go into a group of women and then the women are sceptical and think the man's looking for something. So they're even more isolated than a single mum. So there's a bit of that, but yet more women that we're targeting because we're the ones that have usually more self-worth issues.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:08:35)
Mm-hmm.

Right, right.

Yeah.

Are you finding that a lot of women, at least in our generation, that are hitting midlife, it's the first time that they've ever taken the time to consider what they want, their needs, or to even figure out what they want or like, or their purpose in midlife?

Aileen (2:09:17)
Definitely,

they were never taught to think about themselves. They just followed the path of get married, have children, serve, be there for everyone, be the emotional caretaker, have all the mental load, the physical load, everything, every load. And then they hit the estrogen drop, the perimenopause, which started for me a few years ago, and everything starts to land differently.

And then you're faced with a kind of criticism of you're selfish for thinking of yourself. When actually, if you're the woman isn't together, then the whole place will fall apart, usually, because women are doing running the households, usually not in every household. And there are a lot of exceptions. But from women that we speak to, they've been doing everything and they're exhausted.

and they don't want to do it anymore and no wonder! Because it's work!

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:10:17)
Yeah.

And would you say that for most of those women, they are in perimenopause or menopause, right? So that's...

Aileen (2:10:24)
a lot, yeah, yeah,

it's the estrogen. Because, you know, even I've watched Julie and she was completely different a couple of years ago and she's now post-menopause and she's clicked into this gear that's just so strong and so powerful and I'm so happy to see her in this mode. It's so nice to see someone you know go through that transition. Whereas I'm still in the journey.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:10:49)
Yeah.

Aileen (2:10:52)
because I've got the brain fog and I'm still having, you know, a different side of it at the moment. But she relates to it, so we work together so well as a team. I can't imagine being in finance and saying, I've got pyrimidipoism and brain fog, it just would never work.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:10:55)
Right.

Yeah.

It's an interesting thing to think about. Women who are in corporate life going through perimenopause and menopause and experiencing the side effects that can be very severe from that and not having it weaponized, like not being able to talk about it in the fear that it could be weaponized against them and used against them professionally, but having to figure out

Aileen (2:11:29)
You

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:11:36)
how to maintain that level of production they've been producing, I guess, that's redundant, but under these side effects, like there's got to be a group of professional women that are just in this struggle, I would assume, but can't really talk about it because they're afraid it's going to be used against them.

Aileen (2:11:56)
Well, from what I'm saying and from lot of friends and people that we speak to, there's a lot of women losing their jobs at this time.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:12:05)
interesting.

Aileen (2:12:05)
Yeah, and they're struggling because they're just, this was their career and now at 50, 52 they're just being pushed aside and told it's not right for them anymore and they've got to stop jobs and they're having to manage it. I'm seeing it a lot here in London and it's off.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:12:25)
So it's,

they're losing their jobs for performance reasons as opposed to layoffs and you know, in the UK the term is redundant. Your position is now redundant. Is it for performance? You're seeing?

Aileen (2:12:32)
you.

Yeah. It seems

to be, I think that's being hidden. They know that they have got brain fog and they know that they're struggling. And I think it must be witnessed. And that is now they're not going to say to you, we know that you're going through this transition.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:12:45)
Yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

Aileen (2:12:53)
but that seems to be going on a lot at the moment. But there's some places are starting to embrace it and will bring it into the culture that this is an issue for women and we shouldn't be penalized like this. But it's a harsh, it's a harsh, yeah, there is, there are some places in London and probably around the world. I don't know, I can't speak for around the world, but.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:13:06)
Really? Really?

Aileen (2:13:17)
Yeah, it's been really strange because I didn't know anything about menopause or perimenopause until Julie and then another friend of mine and then moving back to London and speaking to a lot of people in senior roles and they're just devastated because what do you do next?

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:13:33)
But you are seeing, you have seen or heard about businesses in London that are taking it into account.

Aileen (2:13:42)
Yeah, they are. There's menopause specialists going in to speak and talk about it. Probably not in the world that I worked in, in that finance world, but in certain worlds where it's a bit softer. There's a transition happening. I don't know how big it's going to become, but it's encouraging because it was never taught. Obviously, our parents never had anything like this.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:13:55)
Right.

Yes.

Aileen (2:14:07)
but it's becoming a thing and because it's being talked about around the world, it's been talked about so much. There's something coming, it's coming. It's getting better, yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:14:16)
I hope so.

It would be really an amazing thing if not only would perimenopause and menopause be discussed openly like anything else, anything else, but that if it could be discussed, if women didn't have to be afraid to even mention it in the workplace in fear of losing their job. I wonder if we will evolve. I hope we will evolve to that because there's so much

Aileen (2:14:27)
Mm.

I hope so.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:14:44)
such a vast experience these women have. mean, they're at the top of their game. And if they could be supported through this transition, they're probably going to be even better when they get on the other side of it. But you just got to... long is the transition, roughly? It depends.

Aileen (2:14:48)
Yeah.

Yeah.

tropical.

It

depends. Julie was 10 years. I know other people. Some people are 3 years, 4 years. How about you?

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:15:02)
Yeah.

It just depends. That's a lifetime in the corporate world.

Aileen (2:15:09)
It's a lot, I know. I did my 10 years stint

in that world. If it had been at that stage, I wouldn't have been able to perform the way I did. No way. Not with a brain full.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:15:15)
Yeah.

Yeah. No, but then

also, mean, I think HRT is just now being accepted again because, you know, for so many years, women were told, don't do it, it's dangerous now that that's been debunked. That is such a tool to help women with these side effects. So I think what's happening is those 20 years where women were told, don't do it because it could cause breast cancer. And now that one study has been debunked. So now they're saying, do it. It'll help you. You know, with the support of

Aileen (2:15:24)
Mm.

Yeah, absolutely.

Yeah. Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:15:47)
not just HRT, diet, exercise, supplements, everything, all the things, right? ⁓ Women could still be at their game, but there has to be support, education. There's so many women that don't even know about just can't be a secret. Once it's no longer a secret, now everybody can deal with it. And you can even deal with it with humor. Like, hold on, I'm having a hot flash or whatever. I'll be right back. Yes.

Aileen (2:15:48)
Yep. Yep.

Yeah.

Yeah.

No. Yeah.

Yeah, exactly. Well, that's what we do now. Exactly.

yeah, yeah. Absolutely. There was a newsreader who did it recently. She got up and she had everything written and she said, I'm in perimenopause. I won't remember any of this. So she read it and she it was accepted. She was praised for it. And so it's.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:16:13)
But like you could be in a board meeting and being like, on guys.

Yeah.

Yes.

That's what needs

to happen. Those will be the pioneers, the professional women that are like, and it may be ones that are in ⁓ a celebrity roles or on TV or more in a more prominent space where they can't just be fired, you know, where it's more public, where they're like, I have perimenopause. And so I'm going to I'm going to hold this and read it. That's how it is. Or I'm wearing a tank top today because I'm having hot flashes.

Aileen (2:16:36)
That's what, yeah.

Yeah.

Thank you.

Yep.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:17:05)
And you're scared to deal with it. that's your generation. That's the both of you. And others like you that talk about it and normalize it.

Aileen (2:17:09)
Yeah, there lot, yeah, well there is.

Everyone's talking, actually, you know, I was on, I saw a post and it was Halle Berry talking and she was showing how to put the patch on. I made a comment because I said, you know, my patch is so much bigger than that. And she, we ended up having a chat. And I was just like, this is so nice because it doesn't matter who we are. We're all going through the same thing. We're all around the world supporting each other.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:17:19)
Yes. Yes.

⁓ wow.

No. Yes.

Aileen (2:17:37)
And that was just a really nice moment.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:17:37)
Yes.

I think Drew Barrymore has talked about it too. I think if more more women our age that have large platforms will talk about perimenopause and menopause, that will help all women, not just in our Gen X generation, but the younger women. Because we went into all this so blind, no one told us anything, and it really is our job to not only change the culture on the professional front, but personally for these young women coming behind us.

Aileen (2:17:42)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, they are.

No, but there's ones to come. Absolutely.

Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:18:08)
This is our moment. If we're going to do it, this is it. So we have the platforms, but even women who have much larger platforms, they really have to take the lead on this. I think Hallie Berry has been very outspoken. Yeah.

Aileen (2:18:09)
Yeah, we have the platforms.

Yeah, gosh.

She has, yep. A lot of the big celebrities

are doing it, being honest about it. It's great.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:18:27)
making a

change. was watching the news yesterday, it's funny you guys are bringing this up, but what might have been, I don't know what it was, CNN or something like that. That one guy Sanjay Gupta, think it is. somebody asked the question, was like, does cannabis help with perimenopause? And he started talking about kind of the science behind it. was like, yeah, there are benefits. Yeah.

Aileen (2:18:51)
Yeah, yeah and I've heard

mushrooms as well, mushroom dozing.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:18:54)
Yeah, psilocybin,

yeah, the whole, yeah. Like microdosing mushrooms, right? Yeah. Yeah, no, I think that... ⁓ But the fact that it's mainstream on, you know, it's getting mainstreamed and there's alternative approaches to your point, HRT, it's not like just go sit down with a towel on your head and you'll be fine in a half an hour or whatever it is, Listen, we're...

Aileen (2:18:58)
Microdosing, microdosing, yeah, let's try microdosing. If it works. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, being, yeah.

Yep. Yep.

No, no, it's not always like that. No.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:19:21)
We're half the population, know, give or take, and we're probably the most powerful. Like, we're the sources of life. We run the household. We're the rock of the home. You know, we need it. true. I didn't roll my eyes. He knows it's true. Where's my sunglasses? So it's like, but you can't just celebrate us. You can't just celebrate us in our youth. You have to celebrate us through all of our life and all of our changes. You can't just celebrate the young.

Aileen (2:19:28)
Yeah.

You're laughing, you're smiling.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:19:50)
women we were and then discard us as we hit midlife because we're still thriving, we're still vibrant, and we may be going through these changes, but we're going to be even stronger and better from it and still have even more to offer society. So I think as a generation that's kind of what we're trying to show is you have to listen to us when it comes to this and watch us as we tackle this next phase of our life.

Aileen (2:19:52)
No.

next step

Exactly. Yep.

gosh, yeah.

Yeah, because it's so interesting

when you speak, because I have a 13 year old and I can say, look, you're going through this hormone change and it's horrific, but I'm also going through a hormone change and you're going to have to put up with some of that. We're just going to have to work through this. And it's so healthy that we can talk like that, which we've never had. Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:20:32)
Yes.

Yes, you're doing it. Oh my gosh, I

just correlated that. Your daughter and you are both going through hormonal changes at the same time. Wow. Now, but in a way, you have each other through it. So there's pros and cons for sure. Yes? Yes.

Aileen (2:20:44)
That's not pretty. There's a lot. Yes, you're crazy, I'm crazy. But I can remember thinking

my mum was crazy and people calling her crazy, my family saying she was crazy and we need to be, we were so much better than this.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:21:03)
think about the women that were put in like institutions, probably for perimenopause and menopause symptoms, or given lobotomies or electric shock treatments. Like that went on. So it breaks my heart. think of the women. That's one of the reasons also, it's like we got to change this because we got to stop that stigma. It stops here with our generation. We are changing this narrative. I don't care if we're screaming it, but if we all scream it together, they can't keep calling us crazy.

Aileen (2:21:06)
yes, I know absolutely.

It's shocking. At least we're not doing that.

It does.

Yeah. No, well they

can, but we can fight it.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:21:33)
That's beautiful

thing about being Gen X and also the estrogen topping. We don't care what you think. That's the other thing. You you hit a point where, I don't care. I don't care at all. you know.

Aileen (2:21:40)
Yeah, we don't care. I don't care. No, I don't care. When it is such a transition,

isn't it, from our youth, when you think, you know, I remember being told that if what our neighbours thought, what our friends thought, what God thought was much more important than what we thought. But now we're just like, actually, I don't care. It's turnaround.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:21:58)
Yes. Yes.

It's so liberating.

It's so liberating to not care. And I think what's so interesting is I don't think men understand. We really don't care. think that that hold that, you know, searching for that male partner that we were fed when we were young, that had a hold on us, right? But I think most of us have hit that point, married, not in a relationship or not. But once you go through perimenopause and menopause,

Aileen (2:22:14)
No. No.

Mm-hmm.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:22:33)
I don't care what you either accept me as I am or I don't care. And I don't I think that is where men sometimes get confused because they think it's still the same game. It's totally different game now. Totally.

Aileen (2:22:35)
Yeah. Yeah.

It's hard, yeah. It's actually

an interesting point then, is that a hard transition for you, Brian, to watch this change?

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:22:56)
⁓ man, that's a loaded question. ⁓ I love it. No, I think, you know what I think is interesting is doing this podcast, I'm definitely outnumbered at times. ⁓ It's been very enlightening to be in these conversations and it's just fascinating. ⁓ It all makes sense scientifically, you know, I'm a data guy so it kind of all makes sense.

Aileen (2:22:58)
Ooh! Happy Nounsening!

Yep.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:23:26)
⁓

Aileen (2:23:28)
I'll put you on this spot.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:23:29)
It's just

an interesting thing. I think we all evolve. I've got this theory of the evolution of we're all evolving. So you guys are, we've got this medium where you guys can talk about different things. You can share the stories. You can share the collective experiences. And it all just kind of makes sense. ⁓

Aileen (2:23:36)
yet.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:23:55)
I forget your original question, but... How have you handled the transition, like of me going through perimenopause and menopause? It's, you know... It's, What's the right word? I have a daughter, so I powerful women, or I love the empowerment of women. So to see her shift through this and become powerful and say outspoken as a mom, I love it, because it's a...

Aileen (2:23:57)
If you got pedicure you could forget it.

Interesting? Yeah.

Right. Mm-hmm.

That's great. Yeah, that's great.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:24:23)
It's a role model for my daughter. And I'm

a huge fan of women. think I love women, but I love powerful. I like women not being dependent on men or being say subservient. And maybe that's because I have a daughter. ⁓ So I think it's cool, but it's definitely a transition because I'm a Gen X guy and I grew up with those role models and you know, and I've worked.

Aileen (2:24:35)
Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah.

Of course. Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:24:49)
while she's maintained the house. So we've fallen into our own roles around maybe who's cooking dinner versus getting the kids ready while I'm at work, that kind of thing. So we've had these traditional roles, but as we've grown and our kids have grown and gotten older, the roles have changed. And so I love it. I think it's great. Cause I've said this before, I think women are their own worst enemies in how they treat each other. So I think it's great that

Aileen (2:24:52)
Mm-hmm. Yep.

Yep

Yeah.

Yep.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:25:19)
there's support for women and I'm a huge fan of that if that all makes sense. Yeah. It is a good answer and he's been super supportive as far as my HRT, as far as all the different things I need to do by, you know, research in order to, I always say it's like putting Humpty Dumpty back together. If I don't do one of my things, a piece is falling off and if too many pieces fall off, I'm down. And if you all want me up.

Aileen (2:25:21)
Yeah.

Yeah, no, that's good. Good answer. Very good.

Yeah.

yeah.

yet.

Yeah.

Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:25:49)
all my pieces

have to be in their place. And so that takes research. takes, need to be able to buy whatever I need, the supplements or whatever I need to do without anyone saying, why are you buying that? Or that's ridiculous. Or where's the proof of that? So he's super supportive of anything I'm saying I'm going to do or need in order to thrive as I've gone through this or going through this. And that's huge. That's like, if you have a man in your life,

Aileen (2:25:52)
a good way.

Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

which is

Yeah, that's it. Yep.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:26:18)
during this time, that really is his main job is supporting whatever steps you need to take so you can thrive and feel sane and not give any pushback. But there's not, I'm not a saint in that. I'm not giving a BS answer, but I'm also, we've gone through periods like you're crazy. You are crazy. Where is the lobotomy? Let's get the.

Aileen (2:26:20)
Yeah, huge.

I love that. None of us are.

Yeah, yep, that's alright. But that's honest!

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:26:44)
We've been married forever. Forever. But no, no. And I will tell you this, and I think I've talked about this. When I went into perimenopause, I didn't know I was in perimenopause because I had just had our youngest, that was a bonus baby. I got pregnant at 39 unexpectedly. And so I had him and then I got thyroid disease, Hashimoto's right after that. Okay.

Aileen (2:26:46)
I know, I'm...

Yeah.

Me too.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:27:10)
And so then I went into perimenopause unknowingly in my early 40s. So I suffered for most of my 40s with perimenopause not knowing. And so if I would have known, I would have been better. I know that there were, and I, I coped with it with alcohol. So I would have a drink at night because I couldn't sleep or I was stressed out. So I'd have a martini or I'd have wine. So I, and I, I

Aileen (2:27:20)
Yeah.

Yep, of course.

Yep.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:27:33)
be the first I've talked about this. was a functioning alcoholic in a lot of ways because I was having a drink almost every day at the end of the day to deal. And so I know there are arguments we had through our 40s that I'm sure part of it was that I was I was going through this hormonal change and was feeling nuts and didn't understand. You know, so that's part of it. You know, and I look back now and I'm like, that's what it was. But

Aileen (2:27:38)
Yep.

Yeah.

course.

Yeah, it's awful. Yeah. That's what that was. Of course.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:28:03)
No one talked about it.

Aileen (2:28:04)
No. But at least you know now. But yeah, imagine that would have been very difficult because I'm not in a partnership. ⁓ it must be very hard to go through that. But you've come through it and look at you both.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:28:11)
Yeah. Yeah, especially

we came through and I tell people that is that especially we've talked about this too on the podcast for the men and women's lives that are going through this. If you can ride this ride with her and be supportive, your relationship after is going to be a million times stronger and more fulfilling. You'll be closer and you'll be able to take on anything.

And we have gotten through it and we grew as a couple, you know, so there is that reward, but you have as the husband, you have to be supportive. That's like a big part of it. You just really do.

Aileen (2:28:40)
That's lovely.

Yeah, but I think that

needs to be talked about more. I'm seeing more and more men going online and seeing the supportive things about their wives and there's a lot of it coming and I think if there was more of that because it must be really confusing because it's confusing for us. So of course it's going to be confusing for you guys. How can it not be? It's hard.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:28:53)
Yeah. Yes.

Yes.

Yes, I think there's

a lot of things though that get you through it. One would be kids, then your shared goals that you want to have in life, right? And your friendship and your partnership. So there's got to be something, there's got to be some Northern light you're chasing together. If you don't have that, I don't know how you would survive because it is crazy. And we go through our own stuff. I don't even, you know, I'll get the...

Aileen (2:29:17)
Yeah.

Yep.

course.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:29:30)
blown up for saying this but I don't know what the male equivalent is we've talked about I do know I just can't remember.

Aileen (2:29:36)
There is some... yeah, there's a guy I know

was talking... yeah, you should do. I know a guy that was talking about it as well. Yeah, it's a big thing. Yeah. No.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:29:42)
Yeah, they do go through their own thing. Yeah. And I don't think that's talked enough about

at all. No, I have no clue. But I'm just going forward. Yeah. Just keep moving. Well, I always say, I mean, at least for us, the foundation of our marriage, there's no question is our friendship. We were friends for three years beforehand. And through the ups and downs, that has been the steady. Like, there's just that's what's gone. That's been the anchor. Because I'll be the first to tell people marriage is...

Aileen (2:29:51)
Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

That's great. Got you through.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:30:10)
There's bad days, bad weeks, bad months. There's bad years. There's an up and down. But if you have that friendship and that truly, truly that deep love and romantic love, it can't just be friend. Like we're platonic friends. You romantically love each other. You can pretty much, if you hold on to that, that's what got us through because it's not easy. And the times have changed, right? So it used to be OK for you to

Aileen (2:30:13)
Yeah, of course.

Yeah.

Yeah, I know.

Yeah, no, it's not easy.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:30:38)
the guys go do their thing, wife does her thing and everyone's silent. You just keep doing what you're doing, but you can't do that anymore. doesn't seem like, you know, everybody's held accountable to different levels now and you kind of got to, you can't go hard. The Gen X women are holding their medics out. I want the good old days. We're not silent. Yeah. No. I'll be outside.

Aileen (2:30:40)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah. Step up. We are not taking it. Were you sick? You go in the kitchen, the women go over there.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:31:06)
Let me know when dinner's ready. Silence is a killer, I think, in a relationship. You gotta keep talking. Anya? No, no, go ahead.

Aileen (2:31:06)
Yeah.

But do you guys always, sorry, do you have

every day together or do you sometimes go away apart?

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:31:18)
So before COVID, it was very traditional. He went to work Monday through Friday and I was home still raising, because our youngest is 16, still raising kids and all that. COVID, home, like everyone else, he was home. And then he had the option to keep working from home and he likes that. So he chose that. So ever since then, we're pretty much together every day, which that was an adjustment for me.

Aileen (2:31:45)
Of course.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:31:45)
because

I had had the home to myself running a home, our whole marriage. So now he's here. So that was a huge change for me is to not have time to myself ⁓ and to have him there, just kind of that other person of there were times where I'm busy, like, you know, you're on your feet and you don't sit down until the end of the day and you're going and doing and doing.

But there might be a time where I might want to sit down for 10 minutes, you know, but then at first when he was home, I felt I can't sit down because he's going to think I just sit all day. So it's like I can't even take any breaks because I was like, I don't want him to think I'm just but then like now I don't give a shit. But this is like now I know she just chilled all day. years ago or whatever. So now I don't care. But so first there was that pressure of, OK, I need to make sure I'm not stopping. So I don't want him to think when he's at work, I'm not doing anything at the time I cared.

Aileen (2:32:19)
Well that's tricky.

Yeah, yeah, at the beginning. So interesting.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:32:39)
But then once I adjusted to him being home, then everything just kind of worked out. And now it's he does go back into the office sometimes. And now that's weird. And that's fine. I'm totally fine with it. But it's like it's the opposite. So, yeah, we're together a lot. probably a lot. We yeah, we we couldn't. Now we're 50s. We could handle it. But I don't think we could have been together all the time younger. Now. We needed. Yeah, you have to have space. You have to have space. So.

Aileen (2:32:47)
Right.

So interesting. That's cute. That's lovely. It's nice.

younger, yeah, different fees. ⁓

Yeah,

cool.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:33:10)
But I was going

to ask you on your podcast, do you guys ever cover how someone was raised, their upbringing and how it affects the directions they go in their life, the choices they like, the root of their upbringing, how that can affect the partners they choose, the directions they go in. Have you guys tackled that yet?

Aileen (2:33:32)
I mean, I've touched on it. I've definitely touched on some of my own story and my own, because it's affected my relationships for sure, my upbringing. ⁓ Julie's is different. We talk about it, but it's not been one episode just on that. But we talk about relationship breakups. But yeah, we probably need to do that topic as a whole.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:33:57)
How much do you think how someone was raised affects the partners they choose?

Aileen (2:34:06)
I'm going to speak for myself because it's so interesting because I look at my siblings and we've done it all so differently. I've been trying to work this all out because my mum had narcissistic traits. My dad was the camis guy on the planet, but I didn't choose the camis guys. I went for the ones with the narcissistic traits. And I always was trying to fix something and I don't know if that comes from being seven and trying to fix hip.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:34:08)
Mm-hmm.

Mmm.

Aileen (2:34:35)
my mum's unjustness, because I hate unjust. I hate any injustice. I'll stick up for anyone and I should have probably done something in law, because it's a big thing for me. But when you look at the partners, think, why did I not stay with that guy? And then I went with the narcissist, so I do think it has an effect. But then I know other people who come from terrible backgrounds and they've ended up with amazing partners. So it's...

It's a difficult one to pinpoint.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:35:06)
I wonder for you if it was what we talked about earlier is the chaos is more calming than the calm. It's safe.

Aileen (2:35:12)
Yeah, thank you. Yeah. It's safe. Isn't

it? I'm not in that stage at all. I've done enough work, finally. But when you look back, but I just think we're here all on our journeys, soul journeys. We've got a lot to learn. And we'll go into all the past lives, if there are with them, future lives, who knows? But we get this life done. Am I?

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:35:19)
Yes, yes, yes.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Are you, can I ask,

because we've had people write in, talk about dating in your 50s. Talk about dating in your 50s. Are you dating? And if so, is there anything you can share on what it's like out there?

Aileen (2:35:50)
I'm not dating. When did I last date? I did date actually. I won't go into detail. It's tricky actually because we've all got so much baggage. And so there's all that to deal with. There's trauma responses and things that you would think expect from a 13 year old. You're seeing it people in their 50s.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:35:57)
No, no, you don't have to go into detail.

Yeah.

Mmm.

Aileen (2:36:16)
And obviously I'm finding some people who have been in very long relationships, so say they got together at 22, like you guys, and then they come out, they haven't changed as much as someone who had five ladies or, know, so they have an expectation of you to be a bit like that marriage, but actually you've evolved in a whole different way. managing that has been quite tricky. There's one in...

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:36:32)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Aileen (2:36:46)
Yeah, I've not been actively looking, have to admit, I've kind of given up.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:36:51)
That makes

sense though, is if you have, if you're talking about men, if you have a man who's been in a marriage and gotten out of one, he really has no clue about women in their 50s at all.

Aileen (2:36:59)
No, in their 50s. And so

that's really tricky. So you meet the guys at 30 who can really get you. They want something because they quite like older women, but everyone always thinks it's the older man that likes the younger woman because that was the tradition. It was always, you know, but these guys are, I'm finding are so wise at 30.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:37:09)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Aileen (2:37:25)
But you're like, but no, you're 30, you're young enough to be my son and I don't. You know what, it's been interesting.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:37:30)
Yes,

that's because we've raised them to be different and more enlightened. Now they're out there and they're relating with older women that are older than them because they're more evolved.

Aileen (2:37:35)
Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah, so they don't want to be

with the younger girls because they're like, they don't know anything. You women, it's really, it's not what you expect because in our parents' day it wouldn't have happened like that. There's no way. So this... Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:37:55)
That's so interesting.

Fascinating dynamic. Yeah. Right. If if if I were to be single and I've been in this marriage for so long, being with someone who's not been married for I could only probably like be with someone who's been married forever. And you just almost both like you settle into it like, all right, this is comfortable. But anything outside of that would be very interesting. You would have to evolve. Yeah, because a lot of like women are

Aileen (2:38:05)
Mm.

Yep.

Yeah. Exactly.

Yeah. Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:38:24)
divorcing men at our age more so than men divorcing women, right? And those women are like, I'm not putting up with this shit anymore. So that makes sense to 30 year old maybe. Yeah, that makes sense. It's interesting. No, I think I think that it's a whole thing and the gray divorce and all that. But I think you're right. Women are like, I'm done. I'm not. And they're and they certainly are not going to put up with it when they return to dating.

Aileen (2:38:25)
Yes, yes, stand up. Yeah.

Yep.

I know, they want a woman who's confident and just appreciates. It's such an interesting thing.

Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:38:53)
I'm sure as soon as they see signs like red flags.

Aileen (2:38:55)
No, no they don't. They're saying

no and so these guys, if it's someone who's been in that traditional marriage, who's been looked after, they're displaced. They don't know what can I offer here and we're saying no.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:39:07)
100 % Yeah. No, they didn't have no idea.

This is where especially GenX men that are out there dating really need to start evolving and need their emotional development to get active here because the women aren't going to go back out there and get a guy just like the guy they just left. They're like, absolutely not.

Aileen (2:39:17)
Yeah.

no. Whereas

the man would be happy to fall into that because statistics show that for a man, it benefits way more in a marriage, usually traditional marriage, than a woman does. I there's a lot of stats about death and the man lives longer and the woman tends to not. You know, I'm sure it's going to be different for you guys.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:39:30)
yeah.

Yes, yes. I've just laughed because that's

come up before. I think Nicola said that that women men benefit far more from marriage than women. It's true because they've had free labor their whole marriage. We've taken care of everything.

Aileen (2:39:55)
They do. Well they do. Exactly. I know. So that allows you to have the career

but then there's men who will say but the woman just did the home stuff. So when they divorce they say I don't need to pay for things and like what I gave up my life to. I've worked for you. Yeah. No exactly and that's the difference.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:40:07)
Just, just.

Yes. And if you would have had to hire that out, you couldn't have afforded it. It's crazy.

saw a creator on social media recently. was a guy saying, he's like, men will say, well, I worked. And she was just home. But he's like, but dude, you would have worked anyways. You would have had a job anyways. So it's not like you're doing something spectacular. She's a mother. She's having to take care of a home. She's having to take care of family. She wouldn't have done that anyways.

Aileen (2:40:27)
Yep. yeah.

Yes. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:40:42)
Like

she could have gone and worked and had a career. No matter what, you're working. What do you think the solution is there though? Because those are roles. Those are traditional societal male, female, mom, dad roles. Yeah, it's changing, right? Are we just in that?

Aileen (2:40:46)
Exactly.

But that's changing and the marriage is

dissolving. People are not getting married as much.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:41:00)
I think

that they both need to carry the domestic load. But you think they both carry the domestic load but also the professional career? That's between them. if one of them is the breadwinner, the breadwinner still has to carry some of the domestic load. Because whoever's home is also doing a job during the day. So it's more in the evening you're talking about. Let's say one's home and one's at work, but in the evening they're together.

Aileen (2:41:04)
Yeah, they do.

⁓ Controversial.

Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:41:30)
The one that was at work can't just come home, sit down in front of the TV and just put their feet up because I was at work. The one at home was working too. So at the evening time, that has to be equal. I think that's where most of the stress happens is that one comes home and this one still has to do baths, do dinner, clean up, do laundry, do bedtime, do homework, know, all that shit. And so I think that it's the evening time when whoever was home needs to also still

Aileen (2:41:33)
I know that...

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah?

Yeah.

Yeah. It is changing. it is. They're not putting up with it. Like, well, I wouldn't be good. When I was married, he did everything at home. was, he did. I don't want to cause a fight, but he was amazing. He loved cooking. He did all the sh... It was very, he's been the only one, but yeah, I couldn't have been.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:41:58)
participate. I do think it's changing though in the younger generations. Yeah. Now, it's great.

Did he really?

No, he was a unicorn. Sounds like me.

Aileen (2:42:23)
I always say this, I just couldn't have been that person at home who did all the stuff and have someone come home and sit.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:42:29)
All the stuff. It's a tough one.

Yeah. I think that's a tough one because if you're it's almost what I heard maybe isn't what you were saying, but there's a whole shift to all it all going on to the guy. You could take that from what you said. I know that's not what you're saying, but it's a tough one because if the guy has to handle the professional side of it, the career, the financial side and the mom is home raising the kids.

Aileen (2:42:54)
Mm.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:42:58)
When dad comes home tired and just wants to chill, you're saying, nope, you can't. You got to do the bath and dinner. ⁓ Help. Help. at the same time, you don't want to bring, and it's happened already. It is what it is. But taking women into the, so now you've got dual careers and no one's home. That's a challenge too, because that's breaking the mold in some ways. I think you can totally have dual careers and still have

Aileen (2:43:05)
Help. Yeah, help.

Mmm, definitely.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:43:27)
100 % connection with your children. Yeah, you know, I because especially when that time comes when everyone's together at night, if you're all working together, that's where so much of that happens. Yeah, then when the kids are sick and they can't either go to a lot of people has to stay home. yeah.

Aileen (2:43:30)
Mm-hmm. I know people.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, no there

is that but I do know a lot of people that make it work like that with the two careers and the children are great, yeah. If you have them, yeah you need a village that's what I've learned, you really do.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:43:51)
They're fine. And that's where grandparents come in if you can, if you're able to have that. Yeah. But if not, especially with

phones now, think that is a positive of phones is we have a family chat. Like you can keep in touch with your kids all day. You know, I think it's actually more now than ever you can be connected to your kids with both parents working and all that. So. All right. But listen, before I ask my last question, do you have any questions? I do music. So.

Aileen (2:44:03)
Mm. Yeah.

dip.

Yeah. Yeah.

yes.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:44:21)
Right? we know the UK's been tremendous in music. What about in Scotland? I'm trying to think. I was looking it up. What hit the major scene?

Aileen (2:44:24)
Yeah.

gosh. wow.

Yeah. Deacon blue, simple minds, prefab sprout, Texas, you're in the mix. ⁓ Gosh, I need to think of names. Spice Girls, but that's not Scotland.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:44:37)
Mmm.

So you're you

lit up a little bit. you're you're okay with the music scene that's come out of Scotland. Yeah, okay.

Aileen (2:44:51)
Oh yeah, Scotland was

a great music scene. Actually, when I was at school, do you remember Band Aid? Midyar? So in my school, was 13, so I can't do the grade thing. Midyar and Bob Yelgold came to our school. And that was just an amazing moment. And then Simple Minds, you know Simple Minds? They came to our school. I went to see U2 in Scotland.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:44:58)
Yes. Yes.

No way. Okay, cool.

Yes, of course. course.

Aileen (2:45:19)
Phil Collins came to school. The music scene is massive in Scotland. It was massive in the 80s, 90s. Glasgow was the place to be. You should look up.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:45:26)
Yeah.

Wow.

It might still be, right? I feel like there's probably some big festivals that come through there.

Aileen (2:45:34)
Yeah there are

festivals there and have you heard of Wet Wet Wet? It was an old band. You know Texas? Charlene's the Scottish, you know. But you must know your Rhythmics. Annie Lennox. So yeah, I can't think of all the names now myself but there's a lot of bands, great bands from Scotland.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:45:38)
Mm-mm.

No. Yes, Yes, of course. OK.

Yeah, that's what I thought.

What was Bob Geldof like? I loved him. I loved him.

Aileen (2:45:57)
It was so nice, well you know, there's all that controversy over... with Midgur about the band-aid thing because it was actually Midgur's idea and Midgur from Ultravox, a Scottish one, and he approached Bob Geldof and there was a book about it all, how it was really Midgur's idea but Bob Geldof got all the credit.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:46:02)
like with Michael Hudgens and stuff, that.

Whose idea?

⁓ it was. did he still?

Aileen (2:46:24)
So that was interesting, but we just got to say hi. I mean, it was a big thing to have them come to our school.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:46:28)
Yeah, I'm sure.

Yeah, yeah. Like he was like, that was hot. Like we all, that was the whole thing. There's also that controversy with Michael Hutchins, right? Yeah, and like he ended up, like they were dating the same woman or something. And yes. And then the daughter. Yeah, there was all that going on too. Yeah, yeah.

Aileen (2:46:33)
Yeah.

Yeah. yeah, yeah, yeah, Yeah.

Yeah, Paula Yates and yeah, that's right. I forgot about that. Yeah, yeah, there was a lot of stuff that went on. Yeah. So I didn't get

to have a full blown conversation. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Ethiopia, yeah. Yeah, it was amazing.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:46:57)
What was Band-Aid about again? It was about raising money for ⁓ Was it for AIDS awareness? was Ethiopia, right? Ethiopia, that's right. it started

⁓ It was... It led to Live Aid. The ⁓ Remember Live Aid? Yeah, they raised a ton of money. They're like, let's do this again. Feed the world? Yeah. No. Yes. Yeah, yeah. Okay, okay.

Aileen (2:47:09)
Yeah, Band-Aid Live Aid was huge. Feed the the World was the song. yeah, do know the Proclaimers? I would walk 500 miles. That's another Scottish one.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:47:26)
And you know, We Are the World, that song came from that time.

Aileen (2:47:27)
Yeah. Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:47:30)
And then when Band-Aid did the Christmas one. The Christmas... Yeah, that one. Yeah, that was a time. That's such a Gen X memory. All of that. yeah. Were you guys into American music when you were younger?

Aileen (2:47:34)
It's Christmas time. Yep. Yeah, it's not... The music back then was great.

I'm trying to

think, give me your bands, give me...

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:47:47)
I mean, would have been like, gosh, there's so many, what like... Well, a lot of our music growing up would have been rock and roll. would have been like maybe ACDC or Rolling Stones, Oliver, Black Step, Omegle. Yeah, but the ones you just said are from... Well, ACDC is not from England. They're Australian. They're Australian. From America. Elvis, we can claim Elvis.

Aileen (2:47:54)
I like chopping them. Yeah, ACDC. I loved meatloaf.

Australian here for all those rock ballads. I loved all that.

Elvis sang a Scottish song

called Donald's Where's Your Troosers. You gotta look at Donald Where's Your Troosers. I know the name but I can't think of any... Yes, you need to sing something. Yeah, I do.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:48:17)
wow, I have to look that up. You know who the Grateful Dead is?

It's like a jam band. So that's like big over here. They've never gone to Scotland.

They've gone to across Europe, but never to Scotland.

Aileen (2:48:32)
I definitely know the name, it's just songs, I can't... Yeah, I can't think. Blu Dress, I don't know.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:48:36)
You like bluegrass at all?

OK, you've got to check out right this time. You got to check out Billy Strings. Billy Strings, you have a pen or it'll it'll be in your episode. Billy Strings. There's a sticker. Yeah, he's like bluegrass jam band, but that's an American. He's young. He's like in his early 30s, but he's really big over here and he's.

Aileen (2:48:45)
Billy Strings, I don't have a pen actually. You need to message me. Billy Strings.

I need to leave them.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:49:03)
Probably nothing you've ever heard. Just played the Royal Albert Hall back in the fall. Yeah. Yeah. Really strange. Yeah.

Aileen (2:49:06)
⁓ in England? Really? ⁓ you've to go to Royal Albert Hall.

it's amazing. Yeah, I have. I've been in, because I'm into opera as well, I've seen the opera singers. I've been to Vienna and I saw my favourite opera singer by accident singing out in the open, which was amazing. Jose Carreras. That was cool.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:49:13)
Have you been? ⁓

Yeah. Right.

Wow. is

so cool. Wait, you said you came to the States when you were 21 for four months. Why did you come over here?

Aileen (2:49:32)
Yeah,

because I was at uni, we had four months off summer and we got offered this Work America or Camp America work to just kind of exchange things with students. So I thought, why not? I just wanted to explore and was just the best time. were 17 of us shared a house. was nuts. That was when I went to Virginia Beach and worked for two jobs and then traveled all over to New Orleans and...

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:49:40)
Mm-hmm.

Okay.

Where'd you go?

Okay. Okay.

Aileen (2:50:02)
San Francisco. San Francisco I love. Travel, yeah I saved money there and travel was very cool. I loved it, it was my favorite place at that time. Elves.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:50:03)
so you were in Virginia Beach, but through that you traveled like through that job you're like, that's cool. How'd you like San Francisco?

Yeah, even

more so than New York.

Aileen (2:50:18)
Yeah, I did, I preferred it. just, I dunno, everybody was so friendly. That's what I remember. But everyone says it's not like that now and I did actually work there for a while as well. Not like that is sad, isn't it? What changed?

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:50:24)
Yeah. No.

It is.

I think it is coming back around. But yeah, it hasn't been. It was one of our favorite places in college. But then we haven't been able to go back because it's just but I think it is changing. ⁓ do you know? ⁓ well, yeah, it's beautiful. Did you ever go to the Redwoods in Northern California? See the big trees?

Aileen (2:50:42)
and love going to Napa Valley as well.

No. I've read with no... I've

been to Santa Monica and... ⁓ What else? I stayed at the Mondrian in LA.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:50:53)
Yep. Yeah.

California is beautiful.

Where did you go in Florida?

Aileen (2:51:03)
can't remember names. So bad. I mean, I've been obviously done Disney. I've been to Miami and then Fort Lauderdale and then I can't remember.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:51:05)
Miami. Miami.

Okay. Now in Scotland, do Scottish people feel about Americans?

You can be honest.

Aileen (2:51:23)
I think they

think Americans are brash, that they are very full of themselves is the general thing because we're so, oh you know, we just put ourselves down so much. So when you said earlier that that your generation did that, I didn't know that because that wasn't our experience of America.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:51:30)
Mm-hmm.

Right. Right.

Aileen (2:51:46)
So that was very interesting for me. But that would just be a general thing that people would see.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:51:50)
Probably

us being raised to not be full of ourselves is still not as extreme as it would have been over in Scotland. We would still seem full of ourselves to Scottish people, even though in general, yeah, because we still would feel full of

Aileen (2:51:59)
Right. Yes.

Well actually, I did meet an American

man not so long ago and he thought he was very humble and then he met me and said, I'm not humble at all.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:52:16)
That's funny.

is so funny. My last question. ⁓ Scotch. Scotch whiskey. Do you call it just whiskey? Because we call it Scotch over here. Okay.

Aileen (2:52:24)
Which whiskey? Which... We say whiskey and

you get it in Ireland as well. I'm not a drinker of it myself but my mum and dad loved it and one of my friends is really into it. But you obviously you can have single malts or you can have... What do you like?

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:52:42)
yeah.

I actually stopped drinking, but I love good scotch. To go buy a semi-expensive bottle would be a thing and share it with friends, truthfully. I'm trying to What's that one? That one is Balame? Balame. I'm saying it wrong. It's such a good one, too. Val... Larame? Something.

Aileen (2:52:47)
What did you do?

You want to... I can... Well, if you've still... I've got a name but... Go on.

gosh, my name.

You're as bad as me now my brain's A friend of mine drinks Highland Park. She says it's fun. do you like it?

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:53:12)
Yeah, now we're in it's getting later. It's getting later

I've had that.

Yeah, it's good. I've not ever had a bad scotch, to be honest with you.

Aileen (2:53:23)
I just,

it burns my throat. I'm a gin, I'm no gin, I was vodka, now I'm a gin.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:53:27)
Yeah, yeah.

Well, gin can burn your throat a little bit too, you know, but not like whiskey, not like whiskey. All right. Do you have any other questions? No, I'm good. Okay. my last question, I told you to block off for hours. My last question, I think we've gone over that. My last question is always, where do you see yourself in five years? Five years.

Aileen (2:53:34)
wee bit. Not like whiskey though. Right, gosh we've talked. Thank you. Yes.

Five years. Okay, so

when you wrote that to me, I thought, oh no, I can't think five years ahead because I've always planned, you know, 22 years, all these, but actually I think five years, I will be sharing time between here and Spain and I'll be doing my podcast there with Julie in Spain.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:54:02)
Yeah.

I love

that.

Aileen (2:54:14)
as well as whatever other projects come my way. I'm still a numbers girl, because I quite like bit of trading and things like that. So there'll be a mix of things. A little bit of everything.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:54:23)
there you go. A little bit of everything. And I love that Spain,

you're still manifesting Spain. I love that.

Aileen (2:54:29)
You

guys need to come. What about you? What are you going to do in five years?

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:54:33)
I don't know. Let's see. We will finally be have no kids in the house. Well, maybe. You think? Yeah, I would think so. Maybe or no, he'll still be in college. So we won't be totally. But hopefully this podcast still because I love this podcast. I love meeting people. I love hearing their stories and hopefully doing some more traveling because we haven't done a lot of traveling for a while just because.

Aileen (2:54:37)
Yep.

Yeah, maybe not.

It's been amazing.

Yeah.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:55:00)
of everything with the kids, but our youngest played travel across for a while. And so we were always traveling for lacrosse. So it'll be nice to just travel for leisure. So that and I don't know, and the podcast and maybe a little more freedom selling here and moving a little further north. He wants to see what. Actually, so we just spent the weekend in Savannah, Georgia, and I noticed when.

Aileen (2:55:02)
Yep.

Okay.

Yeah.

see and

Okay, why? What's north?

Mmm.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:55:30)
when we first hopped on, could see out your window and it was still light out and you have buildings out there, right? We don't really have that here in South Florida. Everything's new and it's beautiful, right? It is beautiful. It's wonderful here, but I miss that walking around Savannah. It's all old buildings, old for us, old for the US. From the early 1700s, early 1800s. Everything in Florida is from like, you know, two years ago. I'm exaggerating, but it's...

Aileen (2:55:34)
Mm-hmm. Yep.

I, ⁓ Yep.

Right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, You

won't.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:55:59)
It's

all new. I've missed that being able to walk around a city, old city, and brick buildings and monuments and history. That's primarily why.

Aileen (2:56:03)
yet.

Yeah.

Oh, that's a good... Yeah. Well, you've got to get to Scotland, really, as well, don't you? Go and see Edinburgh and... It's beautiful.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:56:15)
I do want to go to Scotland. We would love to. We would love to

go over there. He traveled for work back in the late 2000s. I've been to London several times, been driven up from London to Leicester, Birmingham, ⁓ in France, over in Paris and in various cities, the Netherlands. I do love London. It's a great city. Yeah.

Aileen (2:56:29)
Mm-hmm.

lovely. It is a great city but it's nice to get out of it as well when you're in it. It's like

everywhere you need to get out.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:56:45)
If we plan that trip, I'm going to be contacting you. You tell me where to go. What to do. I want to know where to go as a local, not the tourists. It's such a great city to around. there's places you would recommend for sure. Yeah. You know, that only locals do or go to. That's what I want to know.

Aileen (2:56:49)
I I'd love... absolutely! yeah, no I've... Yeah, no it is, you can walk away. Definitely. ⁓ Yeah, no absolutely! Definitely get in touch

and come to Spain if I'm in Spain.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:57:07)
Oh, absolutely.

Absolutely. Well, Aileen, can't thank you. Wait, did I? I said it correct, right, Aileen? Now I'm having I said it perfect. OK, I don't know. You know why I have that song in my that menopausal stuff. I know. Yes, we were just talking about music and I just had that song in my head and I was trying to remember who's saying that because that was. And where are they from? You're good. OK, yeah, so while you guys were talking music that came my head and then I just got confused like.

Aileen (2:57:10)
Thank you.

You said it perfectly.

Or you've got Eileen. Come on, Eileen.

Dexie's Midnight Runner.

Are they not Irish? Maybe. I might,

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:57:36)
Okay, wait, did I hear a name wrong? They're

Aileen (2:57:36)
but maybe I'm not, maybe they're English. I need to look that up.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:57:39)
not American, I know that. I love that song. I used to watch that video on MTV over and over over again. Did you have MTV? Did you have MTV growing up? MTV. Music television is what it was called.

Aileen (2:57:43)
Come on Eileen, dee dee dee dee dee. I'm warm. Did I have what? Have what? MTV.

No, we... Do you know what? We started with three channels then had four then five and I don't know what age it changed but MTV now obviously but definitely not. We're top of the pops. Yeah, you're weird.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:58:04)
Yeah, I think we've had 500 channels forever. but not, but growing up

you guys didn't have MTV in Scotland?

Aileen (2:58:11)
I don't know what

year it came from, no made top of the pops on a Saturday. We've got Dukes of Hazzard, Starsky and Hutch. Loved it. my god.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:58:18)
Yeah? Yes. Did

you have chips and love boat? Chips like, chips like where the happy days. ⁓ Sure. The island. Okay. Wait, you have Amazon prime over there, right? You have all those shows right now on there. free. We have to check. There might be some international.

Aileen (2:58:23)
Chips? Did you say chips? Yeah, happy days? Yeah, love boat, I remember the name, gosh. Fantasy Island, ⁓ my god, that was...

Yeah, So I've got Prame, so I need to go back.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:58:44)
Nonsense. Well over here in America you can watch- remember Bionic Woman? That's on MSN Prime now. Like all of

Aileen (2:58:47)
Okay. ⁓ god, love the biome. Women, And ssss ⁓

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:58:55)
Wonder Woman. I loved her. I loved her. love it. could sit and talk about this stuff. Aileen, thank you. Thank you for your story.

We loved it. We loved your story. And I know there's going to be a lot of listeners that it resonates with and we'll enjoy it as well. And your podcast with Julie, You Keep Me Saying podcast, where people can go and hear more of this and more relatable stories, especially midlife.

what a lot of Gen Xers are going through and especially women, but not just women, but they can go find you guys and you talk about all these important topics and keep using your voices, keep getting the messages out there, especially for the younger generation, but for ours. But we can't thank you enough for being so candid and vulnerable and sharing your story.

Aileen (2:59:45)
Thank you so much for having me on. I've had the best time. Thanks for getting me to talk. It's been a pleasure. You guys are amazing.

GenX Adulting Podcast (2:59:51)
It was wonderful. It was lovely. And

thank you. Thank you. And for our listeners, I can listen just so you know, I can listen to you talk about anything because of your accent. Totally. I love it. I love it. Do ever get Americans asking you just to say words?

Aileen (3:00:01)
Thank you. ⁓ I hate it but I do get it quite nice. Thank you.

yeah, people used to pay me in the States when I was a waitress and they used to say just say xyz and give me big tips.

GenX Adulting Podcast (3:00:17)
I love

it. I love it. That's amazing. You can put it on your GPS. ⁓ yeah. ⁓ you should. Yeah. Take a right here. Turn left. ⁓ know no one wants to hear the American accent.

Aileen (3:00:19)
Okay.

Yeah, yeah, I should sell my voice on that!

Thanks.

not over here

yet. They do.

GenX Adulting Podcast (3:00:37)
I don't know. But anyways, thank you again. And for our listeners, everywhere you can find Aileen will be in the show notes. And again, it's the You Keep Me Sane podcast. And her co-host Julie just did an episode with us. And by the time Aileen's episode airs, Julie's will be up for sure. So check them both out. And if you have any questions or comments for us, we always love to hear it. And again, thank you, Aileen. And we will see you next time. Bye.

Aileen (3:00:40)
Thanks again.

Thank you.

Bye!