The Day Anne Freeman Began Life Support

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:01

Life can change in a day. A betrayal, a diagnosis, a devastation, a breakdown.

SPEAKER_02 0:09

This is That Day, the podcast where women tell real stories of the moment life changed, the chaos that followed, and the strength they found along the way. No subject is off limits.

SPEAKER_01 0:20

I'm Jack, a former coronator and empowerment coach.

SPEAKER_02 0:22

And I'm Kylie, once an HR manager, now a published author. Together, we help women tell the stories that matter. By the end of each episode, you'll feel it, you'll learn from it, and carry it with you. Welcome to that day. This podcast contains conversations about difficult life experiences. Some episodes may include coarse language and themes such as illness, suicide, infertility, or childhood trauma. Please take care while listening and prioritize your well-being. Help lines are listed in the show notes.

SPEAKER_01 0:57

Today's guest is Anne Freeman, a contemporary fiction author who writes about women stuck in life and the extraordinary ways they shake themselves loose. It's no surprise that some of these stories are inspired by her very own experiences. At 22, Anne felt invincible. She'd moved out of home, left a controlling relationship, fallen in love again, and was stepping into adulthood with complete certainty that her life would be charmed. Even as she lost weight, developed an unquenchable thirst, and could barely stay awake, she ignored the signs. When colleagues teased her about her frequent toilet trips, she went to the doctor to shut them up. She walked out with a shock diagnosis that would change her life forever. Welcome, Anne. Thanks. It's wonderful to be here. Hi, Anne.

SPEAKER_00 1:45

Hello, Kylie Orl.

SPEAKER_01 1:46

And we're so glad you joined us.

SPEAKER_00 1:48

I'm so happy to be here. I think that what you're doing is fabulous and I think it's going to be really well received by women.

SPEAKER_01 1:55

Wonderful. Thank you. Could you tell us what your life was like as a 22-year-old? What was happening before that day?

SPEAKER_00 2:02

I really had a sense that I was on the precipice of everything. It was really when I was 21 because I had undiagnosed symptoms for a year. And prior to that, everything was just rose-colored, honestly. I was working as a milliner and I loved that job. I was learning so much. It was a family business. One day the owners came to us and said that the business was going to be sold. And I really envisaged myself working there until retirement. And so that was the first tectonic shift, I think, that my life as I had planned it may not work out exactly as I thought. The owners have signed on to sell their business to a couple. And at the last minute, they had a change of heart. And they actually came to me, and I think I was probably 20 or 21 at the time. And they said, We want you to buy our business. Oh, cool. And I had at 19, I had bought my first house. So I bought well, I'm half Greek, so I've been saving since I was 14. Wow. That's impressive. And I bought a house at 19. So all of my savings had gone to that. And my father actually was willing to redraw on the mortgage to fund buying their multi-million dollar millinery business. It was a commercial operation. Oh gosh. And the milliners, they couldn't get out of the contract. So it didn't happen. And I found myself with new bosses. It was a business acquisition to them, and rightfully so. But it had been something else before. It had been sort of heart-led and creative. And I was the head designer at the time. So young to have this incredible role. Yes. Well, I started off as a like an intern. And the head designer, maybe six months after I had started working there, she announced that she was pregnant and she would be leaving. And at the age of 18, I called a meeting with the owners. So this is the attitude I had, honestly. I think it demonstrates where I was at and the surety. Confidence. Confident. I called a meeting with the owners and I said to them, I know that I don't know everything, but I want that job. Please teach me for six months until the designer leaves. And if you feel that I'm ready at that point, I'd like that role.

SPEAKER_02 4:36

Wow, good on you. And I got it. Yeah. I love that. Of course. Because people want employees with initiative, right? And passion and drive. Yeah, the creative juices too.

SPEAKER_00 4:47

So juicy, Jack, honestly. So the business was sold overnight. I had gone from learning so much from these people who had been in business for decades to a role where I was teaching and still getting paid nothing, like really, really badly. I think it was like $550 a fortnight in 1998.

SPEAKER_01 5:10

Yeah. So I had a similar wage for doing articles in life. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 5:15

Barely meeting needs. Exactly right. It was sort of a choice between groceries and vogue. I felt that I was being siphoned for my knowledge. And so I left that role, but I had no tertiary education. I had gone straight from high school into this millinery role. My intention had been to study fashion design, but when I found this job, it was sort of like, well, I'm here. Why spend three years at RMIT?

SPEAKER_01 5:43

When you're getting the practical and business experience every day. Exactly right. And we have Melbourne Cup here, right?

SPEAKER_02 5:50

Well, we do. Is that was that their major major event?

SPEAKER_00 5:53

Huge. The the Milliners, just incidentally, they were very commercial. So you might remember a wonderful accessories chain from the 80s and 90s called Ulala.

SPEAKER_02 6:03

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 6:04

So we supplied Oulala.

SPEAKER_02 6:06

Oh wow.

SPEAKER_00 6:06

And I also hated the mother of the bride, all of it. Veils. Um but I also got them into David Jones and Maya. I was just a go-getter. Yep. Had no experience with anything, but I just had this belief in myself and in the world. And so I realized that I had to leave that job because I didn't love it anymore. And I ended up working for Clink at a pharmacy. And around that time I broke up with a boyfriend who definitely could go. And I hooked up with my crush, who was just like a babe, just an obsession. And I'm married to him now. Oh, that's gorgeous. But at the time, too. Yeah, shout out to Paul. At the time, it w that wasn't meant to be serious. He was just an infatuation, like an itch I had to scratch. I'm glad he obliged. Oh, he did. I don't he honestly, Kyla, he didn't have a choice.

SPEAKER_02 7:11

I mean, you you were driven for whatever goal you were after, you were achieving that business. Men. It was like this is happening.

SPEAKER_00 7:18

Yeah, love it. In all areas of life.

unknown 7:21

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 7:23

And so at around this time, I felt an upheaval. So I moved into the home that I purchased, and I was working full-time in retail and going out a lot. I mean, not an excessive amount, but appropriate for a 21-year-old. Raves. Raves. All night raves. But you know, kept myself nice. It wasn't like m multiple all-nighters in a row. But it was tidy. It was a heady time. It was peak rave scene. It was like the end of the glory days. And I started to really gradually notice a decline in health, but I didn't put it all together. So initially I lost weight, but I didn't lose a huge amount. It was maybe five kilos. Probably five kilos I didn't have to lose. But I was like, this is the best. You know. Kate Moss, you're right. Kate Mossy. Yeah, that's me. Like we have grown up in that time, right? Where we prize the jutting hip bones. And so I had that. And I was like, well, this is the best. Yep. And it happened almost overnight. And then it was the unquenchable thirst and just exhaustion. But I was working full-time in retail. I had moved out of home. So for the first time in my life, I was doing everything. And I remember at the time not telling my mother about my exhaustion because I figured she was twice my age. I assumed she felt twice as bad as I did. Yep. I didn't attribute it to anything other than adulting. And adulting is exhausting. It is. I mean, I think we can all attest to that now. Yes. But this was an exhaustion that could not be remedied by rest. And towards the end of that, because I had symptoms for a year, and that's quite unusual. Normally people will develop symptoms of type 1 diabetes and they will collapse within three or four months. And I was dangerous. Wow. And I took myself to the GP.

SPEAKER_02 9:31

So what were your symptoms? Exhaustion, unquenchable thirst, regular toilet.

SPEAKER_00 9:36

Yes. So the unquenchable thirst thing is really interesting. So what's happening is that your blood glucose is so high that your body tries to purge it because it's toxic. And that makes you go to the toilet a lot. And going to the toilet so frequently dehydrates you. So the thirst is replenishing what is lost and it's just on a loop. Your body also with a lack of accessible energy starts to eat itself. So it starts eating into your muscle. So that's why you lose weight is because your body is accessing the fat stores first and then it goes into muscle. And obviously, you know, there's a weakening and all of those things. But I remember having like the most unspeakable leg cramp of my life one night. It woke me up. And the only way I could get myself out of it was to stab a dressmaker's pin into my calf to release it. Oh Jesus. It was that drastic. And so I deteriorated over the 12 months, but I really just kept going and I didn't talk about it. I just got through it. And were you still partying as well? Yes. Wow. But I remember getting home one day from from work, from being on my feet all day, and I walked in and I got two steps into the the hallway and I just went down onto my knees and laid on my side for maybe ten minutes because I couldn't make it to the next room without doing that. And I think that was probably where you you start to wonder something like this is this really just is this normal?

SPEAKER_02 11:16

I mean that must have been very scary. Were you not or were you in denial or were you scared by that by then?

SPEAKER_00 11:22

No, I I was never scared. I never really thought that anything was truly wrong. And as I said, I was working at a pharmacy and I had the pharmacists constantly teasing me about my trips to the toilet and saying, You've got diabetes. It was a taunt though. It wasn't a gentle taking aside. There was no advice. There was no warmth in it. It was a taunt. It was teasing. And I got really sick of it. And so I made an appointment with the GP because I wanted to I wanted that I wanted to be able to rebuff them. And that plan didn't work out.

SPEAKER_01 12:02

Wow. Yes. Wow. I can't believe they they were doing it as a taunt rather than, hey, this is um something unusual. I guess it was because of your age, but they had the opportunity with education and their um scientific knowledge to suggest perhaps maybe it might be worth getting tested. Absolutely. Rather than teasing you.

SPEAKER_00 12:22

You know, you think that there might be some care giving in the health space, but there really wasn't. There was arrogance and dismissiveness. But off I went to the GP and you might recall that type 1 diabetes was known as juvenile diabetes when we were growing up. And that's because most diagnoses happen in childhood. But more and more adults are being diagnosed with type 1. So they've had a rebrand. It's no longer juvenile diabetes, it's now type 1 diabetes. But in 2002, when I sought my diagnosis, the GP didn't know what to do with me. So she saw that my blood glucose levels were extremely high. For context, normal blood glucose levels are around sort of between four and six, would be bang on. And I was over 30.

SPEAKER_02 13:14

Oh.

SPEAKER_00 13:15

Jesus.

SPEAKER_02 13:16

So did you you just went in with your symptoms. Were you thinking type 1 diabetes because that's what the pharmacist had said? Or you just thought I'm gonna shut these guys up?

SPEAKER_00 13:24

Yeah, this was an act of defiance. And we couldn't Google in those days. Well, this was me being stubborn and I was going to throw it back in their dirty faces. Yeah. This was not really seeking a diagnosis. This was seeking a retort.

SPEAKER_01 13:41

But it's the first thing the doctor thought as a diagnosis with your symptoms.

SPEAKER_00 13:45

Well, it's very simple to just do a fingerprint blood test and see that it's astronomical. But the interesting thing was she didn't know what to do with me, so she put me on the medication for type 2 diabetes, which is a tablet, and she sent me off with a glucometer, which is a manual mobile testing device, and she told me to record my readings for the week and to phone in at the end of the week. Yikes. She told me a little bit of, you know, you won't be able to eat sugar and all those things. And I felt completely overwhelmed in that moment. But I told myself that as long as it wasn't the one with the needles, that I could do it. And at the end of that week, I tested my blood sugar for the last time on that Friday. I was working the late Friday shift. Had you told them you'd been to the doctor or not yet? Yes, I think I had, because I was testing and I had to call the GP before the end of the day. I called because the glucometer it returned an error and it said hi, like H I. And I went, hi. Yeah, get A. What does that mean? And I called the GP and she told me that if your blood sugar is over 33, the machine won't register it. Holy Jesus. And I told the pharmacists this. She told me you need to get to the hospital. Were you not feeling woozy? No, I really wasn't. I mean, I was generally feeling unwell, like a heaviness, but no. You know, most people in that situation would go into heavy ketoacidosis, they would faint, they would vomit. I finished my shift. Whoa, extraordinary. And I drove myself to the GP and she said, There's an ambulance here, you need to get in it.

SPEAKER_03 15:32

Oh God.

SPEAKER_00 15:33

And I said, No, no, no, I'm fine. So I drove myself next door to the hospital and parked my car and walked into the ED. And I saw I went, Hi, I've been told that I have type 1 diabetes and I need treatment. Wow. And I vaguely thought I should text someone. So I texted Paul and I texted my mother. And I was it's going to sound strange, but surprised they turned up. I just felt that I was handling it. Because you always had. I guess so. I I I've always been quite an independent person, you know, competent. You just get it done. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 16:17

But when someone calls and they're at the hospital, you're like, okay, as a parent or a partner, you drop everything. And you would do that now. Oh, absolutely. I would do that then. But you didn't realise that.

SPEAKER_00 16:28

I didn't need it, you know. I offer it readily.

SPEAKER_03 16:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:31

And seeing their faces was a real moment, I think, of understanding. We we went in to see a doctor. I was told that I would need insulin and a nurse gave me an injection. But prior to that I had I needed a drip put in because I was severely dehydrated despite the litres and litres of water that I would drink every day. I could hear my stomach sloshing. You could you could hear it as I moved. And, you know, prior to that, I couldn't go for like an hour supermarket shopping trip without feeling incredibly stressed because I would need the toilet in that time. You know, at work I remember the the bathrooms were upstairs and I remember being so exhausted and so needing the toilet desperately that I would go up on all fours on my hands and knees climbing to the top of the stairs. The stairs were insurmountable. Yeah. And I would be scaling them at least every hour, if not more frequently. This is prior to your formal diagnosis. Yes. So this is this is the lead up to that. And so in the hospital, a nurse came and she said, We've got to give you a drip. Then the doctor came in and explained that I had type 1 diabetes.

SPEAKER_02 17:48

Hang on, when they say you have type 1 diabetes, this is the diabetes you don't want. I were okay with the type 2. You didn't want the one where you had to self-inject. So when those words hit, did it actually the reality hit you in that moment or did it come later?

SPEAKER_00 18:03

I'm not sure about that exact moment. The thing that I remember most was they told me I couldn't go home because I lived alone and I had to go home with my mother. It was very up in the air as to whether I would be permitted to live alone generally because if you have a hypo, which is low blood glucose levels, um, if you have a hypo overnight and you're asymptomatic, you go straight into a coma. So that was like suffocating, the knowledge that my independence might be taken and having to leave with my mother and sleep in my childhood bed with my feet hanging over the edge. For those of you who don't know me, I'm 178 centimetres tall. That was incredibly sorrowful.

SPEAKER_03 18:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:57

So in in 2002, there was no program, no formal program for diagnosing adults with what was juvenile diabetes. Incredible. Yeah, that's so a child would spend a week at the Royal Children's Hospital. Getting educated about how to manage, yep.

SPEAKER_01 19:15

Correct. But they didn't have that programme for adults.

SPEAKER_00 19:17

They did not have that, and there was nowhere for me to go, so I went home. There were no information other than you need to inject yourself. So I had an appointment the next day back at the hospital with a diabetes educator, and that was when I received my crash course. But I remember going home with my mother that night and holding it together as best I could. Going to s to bed in my childhood bed and just feeling utter despair and allowing that despair to overcome me. I didn't really know what it would mean, but I knew it wasn't good.

SPEAKER_01 19:58

Which is reasonable that you could feel like that. Like it's entirely normal that you would feel lost in despair.

SPEAKER_00 20:07

Yes. And also my independence was very precious to me.

SPEAKER_02 20:11

Well you'd bought a house at nineteen. I bought a house at nineteen.

SPEAKER_00 20:15

You were gonna buy a multimillion dollar millinery company. Indeed, I was. And I I think in that moment I've I was cut off at the knees.

SPEAKER_03 20:26

For sure.

SPEAKER_00 20:26

I never got that back.

SPEAKER_01 20:28

Did you get any assurance or reassurance from the doctors that this is manageable, we can help you, it's fine, you're gonna be okay? Or was it, no, this is um a life-threatening illness, you're gonna have to have the support or whatever of people for you know, your future ongoing?

SPEAKER_00 20:45

I think in that moment at night in the ED, I didn't get a lot. I mean, they're time poor, they're pressed, they're stressed, all of those things. So what I got was an appointment for the next day. My mother drove me to the appointment and I met with a diabetes educator and I received the world's shittest show bag that came with a su a stuffed bear, which she had the good graces to remove before handing it to me. But all of the information, you know, the glucometer, which is the blood testing unit, and all of the paraphernalia had these pictures of smiling elderly people and children on the front. And I cannot tell you how much I despised those people. I was nothing like them. And I was appalled and outraged that I wanted to distance myself from them. And the diabetes educator said to me, Okay, so we'll test your blood sugar and then you can give yourself an injection. And I had this screaming in my ears at at the notion that she was about to hand me a needle and and ask me to inject myself. And I've had countless people over the years say to me, I could never do what you do. I hate needles. What choice do you have? Yeah. This is to keep you alive. You have to. It's like and I did not like needles. Who likes needles? I'm sure there's pockets of the internet where there there is that kink, but in mainstream society, nobody likes needles. No. And you have to make a choice whether to live or die. And I'm really glad that those people don't have to make that choice. Yeah. But she handed me the needle and she said, okay, now you just have to squeeze a a little bit of your flesh. You know, I had no flesh. Squeeze your flesh and just insert the needle and then press down on the end and hold it in place for a few seconds and then remove it. And it's probably one of the scariest things I've ever had to do. You know, five millimeter needle. It ain't no thing. But at the time it was horrific to me that she just handed it over and I had to do that myself. And then she proceeded to explain the world's most indecipherable disease to me that is, you know, incurable and requires constant monitoring and attention. And I was required to test my blood glucose throughout the day, to inject through the day. And my question was: okay, so you just tell me how much to inject, and I go from there. And the pitying look on her face I understand now with hindsight, because it's not like taking a pill where you have to, you know, you have this dosage, this many milligrams at this time and repeat until forever. It's not like that. It is ever-changing. They cannot tell you how much to have. It's trial and error, and it's your trial and error largely. Blood glucose levels are affected by the food you eat, the exercise you do, by the weather, literally the weather, by hormones. The weather. Yeah. Too hot, too cold. Um, hormones, stress levels.

SPEAKER_01 24:23

So so many variable conditions determine the level of insulin you need.

SPEAKER_00 24:29

It's basically everything. So it's the food you eat, the exercise that you've done or are likely to do, hormone levels, whether you're on your period, stress levels. Constantly changing every single hour of the day. Every single hour of the day. And I have done this for a long time now. It's been 24 years, and I am still surprised and gobsmacked often because there will be inexplicable changes, things that I just cannot point to as a reason for a high or a low. There's a fact circulating amongst the diabetes community that people with type 1 diabetes make an extra 180 decisions per day than their non-diabetic counterparts. Yeah. And it's it's 24 hours a day as well. It doesn't keep business hours, let's just say. Yeah. So I was given all of this information and told to go and good luck.

unknown 25:30

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 25:31

I think there was a a handbook of how many carbohydrates in different types of food.

SPEAKER_02 25:37

Were you really that unusual for there to be a young adult diagnosed with diabetes? So every adult with type 1 diabetes walking around the world had been diagnosed as a juvenile?

SPEAKER_00 25:48

Pretty much. You know, generally speaking, yes. In in 2002, it was highly unusual for an adult to be diagnosed. It's becoming more and more prevalent, which is really interesting, and I can't really speak to that, but something's going on.

SPEAKER_02 26:03

Are you born with it then? And it just didn't kind of show up for you till you were older, or was it just masked through your childhood?

SPEAKER_00 26:11

From what I know, and I am not a scientist or a medical professional, but there is a gene and it switches on or it doesn't. Okay. And most people's switches on during childhood, and mine happened to be at the age of twenty one. Is it a genetic um disorder, or it's just it's so random? They don't really know.

SPEAKER_02 26:31

Autoimmune?

SPEAKER_00 26:32

It is an autoimmune disease in terms of being hereditary. I know that it can be in families, but there was nothing in my family.

SPEAKER_02 26:42

Well came out of nowhere. Came out of nowhere. That's right. So how long did you stay at your mum's house before you were able to embrace your independence again?

SPEAKER_00 26:53

I only remember staying one night. Wow. Okay. I just refused to give up my life in that way. And so off I went. I remember cleaning out the cupboards immediately. I remember just being like, okay, this is what I have to do, let's do it. And I got a box and I put everything that had sugar into that box and put it in the bin on day one. And I think that was just, you know, I'm I'm taking control of this. But I very quickly realized that even if you follow the advice, you're you're not necessarily going to yield the outcome you want. And I think, Kylie, you know, we've spoken about motherhood in a similar way. You feel that if you work hard and you're diligent and you do everything you're supposed to do, then it will yield a certain outcome. And motherhood isn't like that, and diabetes isn't either. And in fact, life isn't like that. No. I mean, some of life is though, right? Some of it is. Yeah. The the part of life that taught us that it can be is. Yeah. But I remember having my first hypo, and I was told by the educator that hypoglycemia, which is low blood sugar, you might experience a number of different symptoms. There's lightheadedness, you might feel shaky, an inability to string a sentence together. One of my most interesting symptoms is that my tongue sometimes goes numb. Oh. And my first really bad hypo, so I remember it was 1.4, which is quite low. And I couldn't chew the jelly beans because I didn't have the strength. And I remember being slumped on the kitchen floor with my hot boyfriend, right? My new rebound crush spooning sugar into my mouth from the the canister. And I was staring out at him from this corpse of a body as he's spooning sugar into my mouth. And I just thought my life is over. Whatever this is, I don't I don't want. And, you know, in the days that followed, I it's a bit of a haze, but I I put on weight really quickly. And they told me that that would happen because insulin loves fat. So if you have the more insulin you have, the more weight you put on. And so I went from the Kate Moss jutting hips of my dreams to putting on weight. And a lot of my hair fell out, my eyebrows fell out, my body was so depleted that I broke out in cold sores. I remember I had a cold sore on my cheekbone or my eye, and I had run out of sick leave from the pharmacy, so I had to go back. And an elderly customer took me aside and he said, Tell me who did this to you. Because he thought that I was a victim of domestic violence. And I was horrified, and I couldn't tell him actually, you know, I've got herpes of the eye because my body is dying. And I remember thinking, I wish I was dead. I just wished I was dead. And the interesting thing about diabetes is that they hand you the means with which to take your life. They just hand it to you, and it's gosh, it would be so easy, right? You just inject all your insulin and that's it, that's game over. I couldn't do it though, because I knew that if I did that I would be transferring my pain to my loved ones. And I was unwilling to do that. But I felt like I was in a purgatory. Because I wasn't alive. And endless purgatory too.

SPEAKER_01 30:48

Endless.

SPEAKER_00 30:49

Do this forever. And I didn't feel alive, but I didn't have the courage to be dead. And I have this very clear thought. And it's bizarre to me now, and it's it will reflect as very superficial, but here we go. This is the podcast of truth. I was so ugly. I had put on all this weight, my hair had fallen out, my eyebrows had fallen out for God's sake. I had herpes of the face. I was a swamp monster, and I remember thinking that I didn't want such an ugly corpse. I remembered thinking that I didn't want to leave this world as this. And I had to find a way through it.

SPEAKER_02 31:36

Can I just say that those that don't know Anne, she is she looks like a Greek goddess. So she's tall and gorgeous and has worked in jobs that you haven't mentioned yet, which were actual models. So it it does sound superficial, but it's not, because it was part of your identity and that had been taken away with your independence and your health. So I think it's a really important thing to say.

SPEAKER_00 32:05

Whatever anyone thinks of me, there it is. I I was very hung up on my appearance. But you're also 22.

SPEAKER_01 32:13

Exactly. I don't know many people that don't care about what they look like.

SPEAKER_02 32:16

So remember they weighed Victoria Beckham after she had her baby on national TV? I mean, that's the world we were living in. And what they did to Kate Winslet. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 32:25

So we we were surrounded by this as that is your value as a woman. That's right. And that's certainly the messaging that I received from everywhere.

unknown 32:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 32:34

You know, I had men follow me down the street. I had I had a man get on a train once. Yeah, until until I gave him my phone number. And I in the end I agreed to take his so that he would get off the train. This would happen weekly. People would run down the street asking for my number. Not that I enjoyed that, mind you, but certainly a lot of my worth I attributed to the physical. And this was gone. It was gone. And along with it, I felt that my personality was gone as well. Because I thought that my exuberance, my confidence, my zest for life, I attributed it to high blood sugar. I thought that my whole personality was a fabrication. And that when I started insulin, along with the feelings of depression and depletion, there was also a physical component because as my blood sugar came down, even a normal or above-normal reading felt like hypoglycemia. I felt deadened.

unknown 33:41

Right.

SPEAKER_00 33:42

Your energy levels? Energy levels. It was as though I I didn't have my wit, my spark. You know, I've always been very quick in the moment. You were a ghost of yourself. I was a ghost, I was a shell, and I thought it was permanent. I thought that the girl I was was gone, that maybe even she was a lie, and that this was real, and this was me, and it was me forever. And I thought that the best thing to do, the right thing to do, was to break up with Paul because the girlfriend he knew was gone. She didn't exist anymore, and I didn't want him to feel a sense of obligation to stay with whatever was left. And I couldn't do it because I loved him so much. And at the time, you know, we had been together for only a year. It was meant to be a fling. And I had no idea at that age that our relationship had the energy and the capacity to sustain an entire life, a family, children, a community. I was so sure that the right thing to do, a selfless person would break up with him and set him free.

SPEAKER_02 34:57

Had he given you any indication that he he wanted out?

SPEAKER_00 35:00

Nope.

unknown 35:00

No.

SPEAKER_02 35:01

It was all in your head.

SPEAKER_01 35:02

It was all in my head. And had you talked to him about how you were feeling before thinking I need to break up with him? Were you discussing what was going on? No, I don't think so.

SPEAKER_00 35:14

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 35:14

You're just like disintegrating in front of him.

SPEAKER_00 35:17

Yes. Yes. Wow. That. And I couldn't break up with him and I thought I was selfish because of it. But I loved him too much and I just couldn't do it. And I had to get myself up out of it. I knew that because I didn't have the courage to die. So I had to find a way through. And I was still working at the pharmacy and I started waking up earlier and I would go for a walk every morning for 45 minutes, just a gentle walk. And I would repeat to myself over and over for 45 minutes, Paul loves you because you're a good person. Paul loves you because you're a good person. And in that way, I was able to separate the physical and all of those things and to find a way through to reassure myself that I was more than just my physical self. I was more than just my exuberance. And I pulled myself up out of it and I got it done.

SPEAKER_01 36:25

That's remarkable. The day that you got up to go for a walk, what happened in your head that just went, something has to change here. I have to take control of this.

SPEAKER_00 36:36

It was just a way forward. It was the path of least least resistance, I suppose. Because I wanted to cease being, but I was not willing to take the action towards that.

SPEAKER_03 36:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 36:49

And so I've always been a very motivated and proactive person. And I guess even in the the darkest times, I reverted to that in a small way. And gosh, it was a small way. Like let me tell you. You know, from the 18-year-old who called a meeting about taking over the head designer's job. This was putting on shoes and putting one foot in front of the other and saying very simple words over and over to myself.

SPEAKER_01 37:18

But that 18-year-old girl was still inside you and just sort of getting bulshy and going, we're not gonna like having a chat with your 22-year-old self saying, This is not who we are.

SPEAKER_03 37:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 37:29

Like something.

SPEAKER_00 37:31

It wasn't it wasn't as dramatic as that. It was the smallest ember and I had to shield it from a hurricane. It was just to get through it.

SPEAKER_02 37:44

Yeah, and the problem is there's no finish line here. No. This is a lifelong thing, so it's so hard to break it down into okay, we can just get through today.

SPEAKER_00 37:56

That's right. And I think that's the that's the thing that gets you is how ceaseless it is. And did you have support from Paul and your family? I did, but I I suppose it's one of those things where I really felt, you know those thriller novels and the killer is in the house? Yeah. That's what I felt like. Right. I felt an internal job. It was. It was an internal terror as well. I felt that my body had betrayed me and I was walking around like a ticking time bomb, and I was fearful in my own body.

SPEAKER_03 38:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 38:36

And I remember the first time I went out for dinner and having the waiter stand there waiting to hear what I would order, and the menu just coming at me like this sinister thing, doing endless calculations in my mind, how much bread crumb is on a schnitzel.

SPEAKER_03 38:56

Yeah, God.

SPEAKER_00 38:57

And how does that relate to slices of bread? And is it better to get that or the calamari and the terror and the heat rising up my neck? Probably sounds comical, but the murderer was within me.

SPEAKER_02 39:09

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 39:10

And I felt vulnerable and unpredictable at all times. Yeah. And the notion of being expected to go about regular life while all of this is happening under the surface and will never end. And I am in such a good place now. I have a very good handle on my blood glucose levels. It's still unpredictable. Even with all my knowledge and all of the measures that I take to control my environment, it's still wildly unpredictable. Yep.

SPEAKER_01 39:47

It's the nature of the I can't call it a disease. I don't know if it's a disease. Like, what is it?

SPEAKER_00 39:53

No, and people don't know what to call it. It's a disease, it's a chronic illness, it's a disability. And the the the term disability has resonated with me. And I only just learned two years ago when I was writing a book, which is an own voices story, during my research for that book. I happened upon the fact that if you have at least one insulin injection per day, it counts as a disability. And I have five injections a day. Wow. And I remember thinking I feel validated that yes, this is a a disability. So that language resonates with me, but maybe not with others. Okay. Yeah. I think it's, you know, people use the term chronic illness. Disease never felt right to me, certainly. And, you know, illness, it's I'm not ill. I'm just on self-managed life support. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 40:48

Forever. Forever.

SPEAKER_03 40:50

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 40:51

And that's remarkable. I don't think people ever stop to appreciate the chronic it's a d it's an everyday thing that you live with. Yes. A fear at the back of I'm sure it doesn't, hopefully, um, it's not at the forefront of your mind anymore because you've learned how to manage it. But this constant I could die.

SPEAKER_03 41:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 41:12

If I don't have my insulin, if I don't eat the right things, if something happens. I mean, that is frightening. So how do you manage that?

SPEAKER_00 41:19

That's right. And being reliant on on the technology as well. You know, years after my diagnosis when I was snowboarding, my glucometer stopped working because it was too cold. Oh. You know, I've had that happen in a tropical climate as well. It's too hot. And and you feel vulnerable because you need that information. I cannot make decisions without that data. Even though your body might give you things you just don't know without the data. It doesn't number it gives something at the at each end of the scale at extremes. We can't see that you're going. But in the middle, you feel nothing. And you know, the the unrelenting chronic nature of it is the thing that wears you down over time because you know what it's like to have a job you hate. Yep. And you turn up and you trudge through, but it finishes at six and you don't have to go back until eight. And you have the weekend or a couple of weeks of annual leave. And this is that, but without a break ever, not even overnight. No leave. No leave. Every now and then, not often, because I'm very diligent and I have to be, but every now and then I might forget my test strips that go into my glucometer, rendering it useless. And I might be out for dinner and everyone's having a great time and I'm panicking because I have to decide whether to drive 45 minutes home to get it or to wing it and deal with the consequences. And highs and lows, you want to avoid them for a lot of reasons. I mean, long-term health is one of them. If a lot of people will run high because it's safer in the moment than going low, yeah. Than going low. But then you pay the toll for that at the end of your life with the plethora of complications that can befall you. Kidney disease, heart failure, diabetic retinopathy, nerve damage that ends in amputation. The laundry list of very real complications are there in the back of your mind. And I spent many, many years failing at getting my blood glucose right because it was impossible. You turn up to your appointment with an endocrinologist and they give you this laundry list. You know, you are at risk. You are putting yourself at risk. And the amount of times that I cried in my car after these appointments, because even when I followed those instructions, I could not get it right. And it would be years until I would find. Find the one thing that helped unlock the mystery of how to keep myself healthy. And it was an accident. Totally serendipitous. So let's spill the tea.

SPEAKER_01 44:15

Let's share this groundbreaking information that the medical community doesn't promote.

SPEAKER_00 44:22

No, I think it's changing now. I hope it's changing now. And it it certainly isn't something that works for everyone. But one night I had a terrible day at work. I was sitting on the couch in a huff, and my husband put on a program called Catalyst for ABC. Yep. And it was about low carb, high-fat eating, but for athletes. So completely nothing to do with me. And it was about a marathon runner who was a doctor, and he literally wrote the book on carb loading. And then he was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes because his body could not cope with the demand for insulin. So your body needs to excrete insulin to turn carbohydrates into usable energy. And he was the poster boy for carb loading. And then he got type 2 diabetes. And the typical person that you might think of who gets type 2 diabetes, the the the cliche, would be someone who is older and overweight and unfit. Yep. And he was not that. He was this sinewy, live athlete. Yep. And it made him re-look at everything he thought was true. And he he had to sort of denounce his book. He distanced himself from it. He said everything in this book is a lie. Oh, how good is that? I know what a moment. I know. What a moment. And also a man who can admit his wrong, right, ladies? Very right. And so he looked at it again and he discovered that actually high performance can be achieved by eating a low carbohydrate, high fat diet. Because essentially the human body is a hybrid engine, right? We're a Prius. We can function on both. We've got two fuel tanks. One of them is carbs and one of them is fat. Yeah. So this became interesting to me. I sat up straight on the couch. And then they started talking about type 1 diabetes as well. And there was someone quite high up in the diabetes world, like Diabetes Australia, former director or something like that. And he said, in Australia, we the advice we give is to eat a lot of carbs and inject a lot of insulin. And it's like trying to put out a fire using a combination of water and petrol. And I burst into tears. It wrecked me because that's how it felt. And my husband, Paul, you might remember him from earlier comments about being a stone-cold fox. He did some extra research. He was sending me links all the the next day about this movement of low-carb, high-fat eating. And in terms of what the body does with those things, so carbohydrates need a lot of insulin to be processed. Protein needs a moderate amount, and fat needs a negligible amount. And so by switching the way you eat, your insulin requirements are reduced. And I switched to that way of eating within 24 hours. It made sense to me. I mean, trying to put out a fire with water and petrol. Bang. Which is the medical advice to this day. That's right. And it's count your carbs, it's know how many you eat and inject insulin accordingly. And I'm sure there's people out there for whom that works. I wasn't one of them, and I'm certainly not here to preach or to encourage people to do what I do. I'm not Jesus. But it's a good one. I mean, I do look good in a sandal. Thanks for noticing. I'm not trying to start a movement. No, this is your story. This is my story, and it was a light bulb moment. Now, honest, honestly, I didn't know what to eat. I spent that first week. I basically ate cheese and salami. Not gonna lie. Also not great. I mean, look, it was delicious. So, you know. But my blood glucose levels, every time I tested, it was in the sixes. And I was gobsmacked. It was an immediate result. Your body responded. It responded immediately. Yeah, well, it didn't even take time. And so then I was very committed. And, you know, during that time we sought additional resources. At the time, I had to make everything because nothing was commercially available. It is now. There's a lot available now. But that was in November, and then Paul and I went away for New Year's. And we were at the Hepburn spa floating around having a lovely time. And for the first time ever, I said to him, Do you want to have children? Because I thought that that was not available to me. I could not control my blood sugars for a week, let alone nine months. And controlled blood sugars are essential for a healthy baby. And I I had no doubt that I would be unable to achieve this and that it would end in unfathomable disaster. So I accepted that we would not have children. And and so did Paul. And for the first time I said, But do you want children? And he said, I don't know. Do you? And I said, I don't know. And I was 34 at the time, and he said, Okay, when's your next appointment with the endocrinologist? And it was in March. And he said, Okay, so let's just not use contraception and then we will talk about it with her in March. And I was pregnant six days later. Wow. That was meant to happen. It really was, and and here's the reason why. Uh all right. It's not that kind of podcast, mate. I I called the endocrinologist and I said, uh, I just want to let you know that I'm pregnant. And she said, You need to come in tomorrow. And when a specialist says you need to come in tomorrow, you know it's serious. Was that just your way of getting an earlier appointment? No, that would not have been worth it. It worked though. It worked. So I went in and she proceeded to tell me just how difficult pregnancy would be. And dangerous. And dangerous, hi. For you and the baby? Yes. And Jack can attest to this having experienced gestational diabetes, which I insulin dependent. I take my hat off to you because you went into that with no prior experience at a time where the stakes are the highest they will ever be. So I have immense respect for women who have to navigate that. Thanks.

SPEAKER_01 51:22

It's not easy, but it's nothing compared to you.

SPEAKER_00 51:24

I think the day they were born. I think you know that those nine months, terrifying. And, you know, don't get stressed though, because it'll affect your blood sugar levels. Good luck with that. Don't eat hot chips because you know you're craving it because you're pregnant. I craved ham and cheese toasties. Do you think I had one? No. Never. Both pregnancies. Uh-uh. So I went to the endocrinologist and she was very smarmy and said, I thought you said you weren't going to have children. And I wanted to say if I had followed your advice, I wouldn't be. But instead, I was very nice. Um, she told me that my blood glucose levels would go wild during pregnancy, that I would experience insulin resistance, which is what causes gestational diabetes, and that my insulin requirements would skyrocket, and not in an incremental way either. So you can't graph it. It's not like scaling a mountain. And honest to God, if I had have had that knowledge prior, I would not have had children. Oh, really?

SPEAKER_01 52:32

Absolutely. Had you had an appointment with the endocrinologist before that? Or was this the first time you were educating her about what you had been doing about your blood sugars?

SPEAKER_00 52:43

So this was the first time. So I told her, and she said, Well, you can't have a pregnancy without carbs. You're going to have to introduce them back into your diet. It was a statement. You will have to do this. And I said to her, if I had followed your advice, I wouldn't be here. And I am changing nothing. So you can either support me or I will go elsewhere. Yep. And so she happened to be on staff at the Royal Women's Hospital, and they have the best diabetes care in the state. I, as a high-risk pregnancy, also geriatric, shout out to the geriatrics out there. Such a good term. That's also why we get gestational diabetes, anyone over 34. Old Broads Unite. Geriatrics. So I had to go to the Royal Women's Hospital every two weeks for my entire pregnancy. And I had an ultrasound, I saw the endocrinologist, the obstetrician, and a nutritionist. And I went into that first appointment with the nutritionist, ready for a fight, honestly. Because advocating for yourself in that situation is intimidating. Yeah. We have been conditioned to respect doctors and people in positions of power and to defer to them and say yes and thank you and leave swiftly. And as fortune would have it, the nutritionist said to me, I think what you're doing is fascinating. There is a lot of talk about this in the Australian medical community. There's been a lot of success overseas. And if you are willing to attend these appointments, I would like to learn from you.

SPEAKER_02 54:23

What an amazing person.

SPEAKER_00 54:26

Fortune favors the brave. In this instance, yes. So she was wonderful. And really, she asked me questions for half an hour every two weeks. And she asked me to keep food diaries to share with her. And she was part of a cohort of nutritionists who were advocating to change the guidelines. So that was really interesting. And I was so relieved. You know, what an anticlimax. I went in with my knuckles white and then I'm gonna teach you.

SPEAKER_02 54:55

Yeah. But also you instigated change in the medical industry because you were brave enough. And also, let's be honest, no mother is putting her unborn baby at risk. Surely everyone's motivation here is to have a healthy baby and a healthy mother.

SPEAKER_00 55:10

And everyone's motivation was that, but everybody's means of getting there was different. And I had to fight for mine. But it became very clear very quickly that what I was doing was working. And my endocrinologist, the same one who told me that I would have to eat carbs, she would take my blood glucose book around and brag to the other endocrinologists and say, look at my patient. And she told me that I was the best controlled type one diabetic that the Royal Women's Hospital had ever seen.

SPEAKER_03 55:46

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 55:46

It's incredible. Did you get a trophy? I got a trophy, but it is not a physical one. It resides in my mind. They should name the room at the Royal Women's After You.

SPEAKER_01 55:56

I mean, I want to win. I want to wing. How amazing is that? Like, so your determination to fight for yourself and advocate had a huge impact on hopefully other women coming after you.

SPEAKER_00 56:09

I mean, I don't know about that for sure, but let's let's say yes and hopefully. But n understanding how things would change, I sort of doubled my efforts. So I set my alarm and I woke up at 2:30 a.m. to test my blood glucose levels every night of my pregnancies, both pregnancies. And 80% of the time I required intervention so that when I wake up at 7 a.m., my blood glucose is between four and five.

SPEAKER_02 56:41

Wow, that's incredible. Your mental load, my God, you were prepped for motherhood already. I was. As night wake ups. I was. So did the pregnancy impact your levels as much as you thought it would? Yes.

SPEAKER_00 56:55

Yes. And so to have your blood glucose levels constantly changing due to increased insulin resistance and having to ride the wave of that and stay ahead of that. So the general wisdom is that you don't adjust your insulin by more than two units at a time. You don't do that because that's being a cowboy. But at the brink of this change, you have to make incredible decisions, in decisions that feel wrong. Your whole body is screaming that this is going to end in disaster. If you inject this much insulin, there will be trouble. And you have to do this sort of override and do it anyway, and increase your insulin by four units or six units, unfathomable amounts. So there's that element as well. You have to be bold. Otherwise, you'll have high blood glucose levels, and that leads to neonatal morbidity or increased birth weights that then are complicated for childbirth.

SPEAKER_01 57:54

So you had to trust yourself like you've never trusted yourself before. You had to have that certainty that you had back when you were 18 to actually know what was going to keep you and your baby safe. And you you followed that to a T, even if it seemed contrary to what you needed to do.

SPEAKER_00 58:13

It did. And I wasn't sure of anything, but I had to turn the volume down on the fear and do it anyway. I love that.

SPEAKER_02 58:23

And so this ended in a healthy baby.

SPEAKER_00 58:28

It did. Two healthy babies. The policy was you give birth at 38 weeks. And I wasn't a cowboy. I wanted a healthy baby out of this. But my goal in both pregnancies was I want to control my blood glucose levels so well that my baby doesn't know that I have diabetes. I want to create an environment that is so close to normal that they don't even have an inkling. And I was able to do that. And my babies were both born bang on average.

SPEAKER_02 59:02

What an amazing achievement, honestly. The management of that nine months is like nothing else. It was intense for sure. So you've had two healthy children. Obviously, you ended up staying with Paul, marrying Paul. I know, who knew? Yes, we are. The hot crush. I have actually seen you post on Instagram that Paul makes you these special crackers, doesn't he? I mean, this is this is a romance. Yeah. A man who makes you special diabetes-friendly crackers. I know.

SPEAKER_00 59:33

I think his love language is acts of service. Where he's So is so is yours, and so is my husband. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 59:40

Totally.

SPEAKER_00 59:40

Yes. Just quietly. He just quietly innovating. Always. Beautiful. He's always looking for opportunities for advancement and improvement.

SPEAKER_02 59:50

Was he frightened through this time of the pregnancies, or he he he knew you had a great hold on it?

SPEAKER_00 59:57

He has an immense amount of faith in me. And the only time I've ever seen a a mild inkling of his worry was recently I took our son Davy camping, mother son camping. Oh yeah. And Paul just gently asked, Do you think you might just maybe run your blood sugars a bit high for the camping trip? And his question was, so you can make it through the night. And I I basically told him that I had it, that I would take measures to ensure my survival as the sole carer of our son in the wilderness. Yeah. And that was really the only time ever in our whole relationship where he has just had a gentle inquiry about that.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:48

Do you use an app that shows the levels? Because I have friends whose son they all are on the app, so they can all see his levels in case he falls asleep or whatever.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:58

Yeah, and that's a fantastic tool for for exactly that situation and for many others. I trialed continuous glucose monitoring for two weeks and I concurrently did manual testing and I found that the manual testing is the gold standard. It's the most accurate reading. So I stick with manual testing. Continuous glucose monitoring is really good for people who forget to test or are a bit maybe ambivalent about it or they're rebelling against it. It's good to have that. Hugely valuable for children.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:36

Because the parents can have it on their phone, the teacher as well. The alarm goes off. It's incredibly valuable for people who have asymptomatic hypoglycemia hypose. I feel my hypose, which is lucky, so lucky, even overnight. So a hypo will wake me up overnight. I will wake up shaking and sweating and confused, and all I want to do is go back to sleep. And I have to have this sort of override that says, get the fuck out of bed, you're gonna die.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:08

Wow, that's a little voice to have any title on. I've got to say, this is a shitload of maths for a words woman.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:15

It is. I never liked maths, and it turned out my life like I'm a mathematician. Yeah, every day. It's constant. You know, they talk about girl maths and mom maths. I hate that. Yeah, there's there is diabetes math, and it's constant. And I have a book tour coming up, and there will be public speaking engagements everywhere over a three-week period. We're dri driving from Melbourne to the Sunshine Coast and back again. And I'm doing author talks and workshops all along the road. And the knowledge that that will mess with my blood glucose levels is incredibly stressful.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:51

Can you please check your level right now? Duty of care. I'd like to make sure we're looking after, although you're very good at looking after yourself.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:59

No, totally fine.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:00

It's amazing how much can influence it.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:02

Yes. And and even here, speaking to you two, there is probably adrenaline at play, and my blood glucose level is likely elevated. It's constant.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:13

Uh it's it's incredible that that's how you live your life. This is every day now. So how do you have such a positive outlook and a I call an effervescent? It's the perfect description. Um you are authentically bubbly and full of life. How do you do that when you're carrying this psychological weight every single day?

SPEAKER_00 1:03:33

I'm not sure what the alternative is. I mean, I know that people struggle under the burden of this. I I have a friend who's a psychologist and he works primarily with people with chronic conditions. He supports their mental health. I am fortunate to be able to feel that I'm in control of this most of the time. But the fact that I can control it so well, and I feel quite proud of it as well, because it wasn't always the case, and it's hard won, and I feel very proud. But I always say about diabetes, it it is uh the dark cloud shadowing you on your best day, uh, and it is the boot kicking you in the ribs on your worst day. But for the most part, I I am able to be really positive about it. I feel like I do everything I possibly can. You know, there's resilience that has come from this. There is an ability for me to understand people's invisible struggles. And I think most of us have them. You know, whether it's anxiety or depression or a chronic illness or a disability. I have an enormous amount of empathy for the unseen struggle. It helps me to understand people better. And I think that's a gift. Especially for a writer. Yes, that's right.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:56

It's all just research, Kylie. So just give us a little blurb of your next book, the title and what it's about, because this leans very heavily into um this topic, right?

SPEAKER_00 1:05:08

It does very heavily. This is an own voices story. So it's called The Time After Now. And we first meet our protagonist, Liv, when she is in her early twenties, standing on the precipice of an extraordinary life. Sounds familiar. Yep. It's the um fiction, they call it kind of I write fiction. So she's standing at the precipice of an extraordinary life, and she's really cut down by her diabetes diagnosis. And she chooses the path I didn't choose, which is she breaks up with her soulmate. And we meet her again 20 years later, and she's a wife and mother. She's in a loveless marriage with someone else. And when her first love dies, she starts receiving intimate photos with an anonymous threat of exposure. But we have to figure out who's behind it. And it's due out when? It's due on the 26th of August.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:09

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:10

Fantastic.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:11

So we we like to wrap up just by having you give a woman or somebody listening who's in a really dark time of their life some pearl of wisdom that has helped get you through these dark times. Is there something you could say to someone? It's not necessarily someone who's just got a diabetes diagnosis, but something that is really altering the course of their life like yours did. What what would you say to that listener?

SPEAKER_00 1:06:39

I think it's what we touched on earlier, which is one foot in front of the other. It really is. There's no silver bullet, there's no magic remedy to anything. I think the act of refusing to stay down is one of defiance, of finding a new normal, of not giving up on yourself. And it can be as simple as put your shoes on and go outside. And what starts as very small today will only grow. And you will learn things about yourself that you never thought possible. We don't always want to find our inner strength. Like I would love to be blissfully ignorant, but I'm a better person for it, which isn't to say I would choose it, but I think hardship and challenges uh certainly make us more interesting people, more empathetic people, more compassionate people. And we all can dig deep and find the strength to get through.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:40

Thank you so much for telling us your very vulnerable story and all those feelings that came with that diagnosis. We think that you all have been a gift to anyone listening.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:50

Thank you for sharing. Thank you so much. And again, as I said, what you are doing here is so important. Women's stories are so powerful, and I think we unite through them, whether we've experienced something the same or not. So thank you. Amen.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:08

Yay. That's a wrap. Thanks for listening to That Day with Kylie and Jack. If this story stirred something in you, if you've had that day, we'd love to hear from you. Find us on Instagram at That Day Podcast or get in touch via email. Hosts at thatdaypodcast.com. Your story matters. We're listening.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:30

We record that day in Nam on the lands of the Warrangeri Boyurong people, the cooler nation. We pay our respects to elders, past, present, and honour the