☎️ Bestie Hotline: I'm Not Ready To Let Go

0:00This episode is brought to you by Madam Tiger. DLs get ready to upgrade your coffee tea smoothie or match up with Madam Tiger's Tiger Nut Milk. This episode was brought to you by AirBnB. Your home might be worth more than you think, find out how much at airbnb.com.au slash host. We would like to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land that this podcast is recorded on. Hi Besties, you know what I do this time, so oh my god, I love this podcast that you guys have. Hello, welcome to Bestie Hotline, bring, bring, I'm Kate Reeves, and I'm Gemma Peanut. And you're the DLs. And it's Friday. It's Friday, which means the dilemma entry is throbbing because it's end of the week and we haven't harvested. Yeah, that's all it means, it doesn't mean, oh we can because where parents, in fact, things

1:01are about to kick off. We're leaving the break that is our full-time job, and this is when we clock on, to clock on, to the other full-time job. For our parenting. How many sport matches are you attending this week, DLs? I am attending five, five! Yeah. Wow. Here's my season. You are a full-blown sportsman. And by my season, I mean my kids. Mm-hmm. Moobah. That's me. Moobah. My moobah. My moobah. I'm just ferrying my kids from game to game, where they can tell me they played terribly. And I can be like, look, good to me. How are your kids at winning and losing these days? Is that by the ages that they are now, are they better at that? They're pretty good. Like, it's good, it's good. It's fine. He's just happy to be there and muck in, you know what I mean? That's T-B-H. Eila, she's disappointed and she likes to go over and where they could have done better and, oh, if we just got this, then that would have affected that. And then, you know, we would have won. And I'm like, well, but that's how games work. You didn't. Yeah. And so you didn't.

2:02I don't know. I just try and do like, well, do we think the best team won? Because you saw it always. Sometimes the team will win and they didn't play the best game, you know? Things happen own goals, you know, silly mistakes, but that's sport, folks. Well, soccer season has just started for Raff. And she went to some, like, a fundraising day to kick off the season. And she played in three games. And I had to leave to take you to a birthday party because that is the juggle. And when I picked her up, I said, how'd she go? And she goes, oh, my God, we got owned. And I was like, what do you mean? And she's like, by all the teams, we didn't score a single goal. Oh. And I was like, oh, okay. And she was weirdly fine with it, fine with it, which is growth and maturity. Yeah. And I was like, how good. And I said, but did you have fun? That was great. I was like, good. This is how it should be. Do you think she would respond the same if her dance crew didn't win their crew comp? Uh, TBC. I don't know yet, because we have an entered dance comp. I think Raff's still, like, sport for fun, right?

3:03Like, you know, I thought there's a line that gets crossed with all these things where they go from fun to, like, really serious about something and then their attitude can change. Yeah. Because Eila does it very seriously, or because she's talented and that's where she's being streamed. Apparently. As in, I'm sure she is. I just, I don't know what I'm looking at. Yeah. Well, you know, but industry tells you, I will say it's the games are getting a lot better for a spectator because they're fast and they're good and you can. And they're strategy. And they're strategy and you, like, they make these cool choices and then cool things happen. And it's like lots of goals get scored. And, you know, it's not just like a absolute knot of children tripping over each other in some kind of direction towards a goal. Oh, that's what it's like for my kids who are six, seven at the moment. It is all, like, cats chasing a ball of yarn totally and they all just, just migrate, just chase it. There's no strategy. They don't understand passing. They all want to score. Or they're just interested doing cartwheels. This is the difference between the boys and the girls. The boys want the glory.

4:04They want to score. They don't pass. They get the ball. They're going to try and score until they're knocked over or pushed out or the ball gets tossed over. Tackled. Tackled. The girls pass, pass, pass. Like, where's the killer? Go. Go for the shot. You don't have to, like, share it around. Let's not pass the pass. We'll put it in the goal. Bend it like Beckham. That's it. That's my only reference point to the sport. It's curinitely. That's my inn. That's my inn. It's a discard sport. But you know what I have to focus on is the goalies. The psychology. It's so much pressure and then the devastation you feel I feel for them. If they let one in, especially, you know, we were at a final a few weeks ago and it was a golden goal. Do you know what that is? No. So basically, at full time, it was a draw and different leagues do different things. It can be a penalty shootout, which is so scary, but it can also be a golden goal, which basically means next goal. Keep playing. Keep playing until someone scores and then the game's over and they kept playing for 14 minutes. Oh.

5:04The stakes. And then, yeah, a very talented player. The other team got the goal in. Was it closer? You know how sometimes it was an amazing game. It was in that final golden goal, you know, you touched it. Oh, so it was a great, oh, that's so tough. But the player who scored plays for Australia. Oh, oh. So I came. You know, I was like, come on. That was my reframe. How cool we got to see her in action doing what she does best, you know, and did your kid feel that way? Yeah, I think everyone was quite star-struck. Oh, it was a national player. Wow. And we're in that. We're playing at that level, you know? That's so cool. Not at that level, but with people of that level. It only improves your game. That's why I always say to my kids, you always want everyone around you to be better than you. So you lift. Otherwise, you have to take your foot off the break to play down. Yeah. To be dragged down. Yeah. You want everyone, no matter what you're doing. To medical life. Yeah. I agree. People in the room to be better than you. You want to be the dumbest person at the table. 100%. Here we go. Sport. I'm like, oh, we're treating this bestie hotline like a main app.

6:06We hijacked it. Yeah. Who are we helping today? Help besties. Here's my dilemma. We have one frozen embryo left and we're paying $600 plus a year for storage. My husband feels our family is complete after our second child and wants to donate the embryo due to finances and practicality. However, I am not ready to transfer it now, but I've always hoped to give it a chance in the future. I'm very grateful for the two children we have, yet I'm struggling to let go of what this last embryo represents. I feel so stuck and unsure how to move forward as we're not on the same page. Oh. Oh. Oh. Same dilemma and slightly different flavor, right? And we've been here before with people who are like, I want another kid. My husband doesn't. My husband wants another kid. I don't. You know, one of you thinks the shape of your family is done. The other one wants a different, oh, this is so tricky and I don't know if we ever get to the right answer. Yeah.

7:06Because when you're misaligned on this, both people's opinion are right in this instance. Do you think there is a difference with embryo chat, though, because I find this particularly fascinating because an embryo isn't a lone sperm or an egg, it is a fertilized egg. It's a sibling. It is. Your current children. Yeah. Which I find really fascinating. It's actually a twin, isn't it? Not always. Not always. Not always. Yeah. But potentially it's a twin. Yeah. Or like, you know, a fraternal twin. Sure. Yeah, it could be. But the idea of a sibling being in an ice box somewhere just waiting to be born or to take up residence in a womb and, you know, to donate is a tough one. I've tried to put myself in this position, you know, like you have Ila and Teddy and imagine if you had a fertilized embryo, like a sibling with the exact same DNA as your kids and donating that so that someone else can have a family knowing that that is your chart.

8:07How different is that from carrying a baby to full term and then giving it out for adoption versus handing over an embryo for someone else to house and grow? I think all of these things are incredibly selfless, generous, giving. I guess the only thing to consider is, yeah, for your kids, I guess they could find out one day that they have a sibling out there they didn't know about unless you want to be completely transparent with them from now, which is another option as well. If it were me and we weren't going to put that embryo in and we weren't going to go for it, I would probably donate to science, rather than donate to another couple. Yeah, to another couple, although I would like to think I could be the person who would donate for another couple. I know, and I feel the same as you, as you mentioned before perfectly, it is the most selfless act, because we need people in the world who are willing to give such a gift of life for people who are struggling with infertility, not to make this about me, but something I genuinely would have loved to do, and I don't think I could do it anymore, but I would genuinely have loved to be a surrogate for someone, because I feel rocked

9:09pregnancy. I like, I enjoy pregnancy, I have really good pregnancies. I think because of my thyroid condition, it's not something I actually could do. I think I looked into it when I was younger before I'd had kids, because actually I would love to donate my body for nine months to grow someone else's baby, and I understand there would be complicated feelings that might come with that, but I think I could handle that. So there was a moment we talked about this Rebsy with your sister's diagnosis of MS, and there was a bit of a touch-and-go period with her having kids, and that she should go now, rather than later, and so there was a whole chat around it, and you said in the office, you were like, I would have a baby for my sister in a heartbeat, but I would do it for a stranger as well. I would feel just as meaningful, yeah, it would be something I would have loved to have done, but that's because I enjoy pregnancy. Yeah, I guess when you've got other people involved, I would love to actually, this would be a great back-of-the-car chat to have with your kids like, how would you feel, you know, and their children. They can't really make decisions or anything, but it'd be just interesting to, I don't

10:11know how my kids as adults would feel. If I had done that, I'm sure it would be very common, and again, maybe it's not about them, maybe it's about a larger community thing, I don't know. I just think it's an interesting area to tease out how everybody involved would feel. I always come back with the husband wants this wife wants this, I guess because it's the same thing. In a different iteration. The only real delineation between the male and the female want here is its her body, but that sort of only works when he wants a kid and she doesn't. I think she always has the right to say, no, I'm not incubating any more children. Totally. However, we're talking about an embryo, and it's in reverse, she might want to do it later. I guess, yeah, financially, oh, it's so hard when things become financial because then you're supposed to take the emotion out of it, but it's inherently emotional decision to make. I don't know. I'm really stumped on this one. Interestingly, France now have just changed their laws, where now at the age of 29, you will get a letter in the mail being invited to have your eggs frozen, and they will pay

11:17for the storage to encourage people, I guess there must be a decline in population issue, but also to encourage people to donate to science as well, because they need more eggs in embryos in the name of science, and so they say, well, pay for the storage, and they'll even pay for the procedure. It's all heavily subsidized. I know it might be a little small cost. This is us when the government gets involved at this level, because I'm like, this is not about doing it for women. This is about productivity, keeping people in the work, declining birth rate, which means our economy is going to take you down the line, you know what I mean, it's very- Well, it's double-edged because when you kind of zoom out on one hand, yes, it's that, but then on the other hand, when you think about the age in which women are now having children, it is beneficial for them to use. But imagine they put these resources instead of fixing the symptom downstream. What if it was more affordable to have children and still be in the workforce? What if there was pay parity? So women could stay working and have children. What if men had more paternity leave?

12:18No, it would work more for, instead of going, freeze them, freeze them, deal with it later, or instead of going, why are we having a declining birth rate? Is it because it's really expensive and hard for women to have all these children and still have their own lives and contribute to the economy and their families and work and have a sense of personhood? Gem, I have the most exciting hack. I cannot believe I haven't told you sooner. My coffee has had a full glow up. It actually tastes so much better. Sorry. How is this even possible? Tiger's tiger nut milk, well that sounds made up. Tiger nuts, they're root veggies, not nuts, but the milk creamy, slightly nutty, elite. So it's just another alternative milk? No, no, no, this is the thing. It doesn't split, it froths perfectly, it actually lets the coffee shine. It's so good in March or two. I literally took a photo of my coffee this morning. Okay, that foam is ridiculous. So tiger nut milk, you say? And it's super clean, no seed oils, just Australian olive oil, dairy-free, nut-free,

13:19soy-free, gluten-free, and low-fod-map. Wow, that sounds too good to be true. They also ethically source the tiger nuts from a female farming collective in Burkina Faso West Africa. Oh, so it's ethical and delicious? Well, that's a full upgrade. I'm in. Where do I get it? MadamTiger.com. You'll be obsessed. Add break. Gotta keep the lights on. It's time for a deal intervention. Huh? This is about people leaving their homes empty while they're away on work trips and holidays. How could they? Like, Jim, why do our houses and apartments get peace and quiet? Well, our bank accounts are fighting for their lives. Nope, this cannot continue. Your home should be contributing to your household. Exactly. So DLs, if you're going away, you could host your place on Airbnb and let it earn some extra cash while you're gone. And DLs, before you start sweating, you don't even have to do the work. That's right. Airbnb has a co-host network. So you can get an experience local co-host who handles all of the listings, the bookings, guest messages, check-ins, literally the whole situation.

14:20So while you're away having some well-deserved R&R, someone else is running my place? Yes. Your home becomes a functional adult, even if you're not. Finally. DLs, your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at Airbnb.com.au. Slash host. The cost of living is the key driving factor. Of course. We data, especially in Japan. They have a huge population decline problem and they have the biggest aging population in the world. And it's going to take care of those people. Exactly. And the younger generation have been very outspoken in Japan, obviously not all, but a large percentage saying, we don't want kids because life is expensive because don't make it lower. Right. Sell it to us. So yeah. How about sell the dream government? Fix the systemic problems that make it impossible to have kids these days or more than one or more than two. We've got a declining birth rate here in Australia as well. It's global problem. Totally. It's these quick fixes are hilarious. I know.

15:20This is a random detailed fact, but hubs is grand parents. They had 10 children, so his mum is one of 10. And his grandfather was a ferry driver. They could raise 10 kids on one ferry driver's salary. And the unpaid labour of the stay-at-home mum, I assume, 100%. But then there's interesting complications there, having 10 kids and all the siblings raising the younger siblings, while mum is perpetually pregnant and breastfeeding, you know, for many, many, many years and having sex somewhere in there as well, apparently. Yeah. When he's back from his ferry shift. Yes. We pop another kid in you. Yeah. It's so interesting. Like, it would be unheard of now, obviously it's not unheard of, but if I were to meet someone who's like, yeah, I got 10 kids. If I meet someone now who has four, I'm impressed. So my daughter has made a friend this year who is one of eight. Wow. So she says, if it was Teddy, I'd be like, sure, I think I believe her. But I'm like, what do you mean? And I need all the other details. This is what she can't believe. Mum, she's never had a birthday party because they can't, because if everyone has a

16:22birthday party, there's just so many birthday parties and I was like, is it you and your girlfriend should throw her a birthday party this year in the playground, because she has one. Is it a blended family? Is it step family? Like I'm always intrigued. I know. I asked all these questions. No, but it sounds like there are eight siblings. Two of them have left home. That's the most I've got. So two don't live there anymore. Six, two. Yeah. Crazy. I'm like, where do they live? In what kind of house? Seriously. In a bus. Okay. This is the biggest tangent of all tangents and we are really getting off track here from our deals. That's because we can't solve the cylinder, which is so unhelpful of us. However, I am watching Gordon Ramsay's docuseries on Netflix. Have you seen that drop? I think it's seen the ads. You've seen the ads. So it's called being Gordon Ramsay. Anyway, I am halfway through the season. I've surprised myself. I really enjoy it. I thought, oh, here's another. Here's another Simon Cowell story with a young wife. Yeah. Totally. However, Gordon Ramsay has six children with his partner who he met at 18. And he's 56 or 57 now, but the age gap fascinates me.

17:24So he has a 26 year old, 24 year old twins, and then at 22 year old, then a six year old and an 18 month old. Same mum? Same mum? Same family? Absolutely a choice. She's been having kids for 26 years? But with a massive gap. Basically, they separate them as the four and the two. Did I get that maths right? She's been having kids over 26 years. Yeah. I know. Or 24 years. Still. I know. I find it intriguing. And then she's been having kids for as long as we've been friends. That's wild. That's wild. But imagine having a 26 year old, and in the series, his oldest daughter, she's getting married. And then her 18 month old little brother is at her engagement party in one of the episodes. And I'm like, this is so unique. It sure is. Fascinating. Anyway, that's when you're rich. You can make these decisions, can't you? Because you're like, ah, let's do it again. Well, they share a story in the episode because they talk about it. Like, when did you decide to have the other two? And so when the youngest of the first four finished school, Gordon said, oh, the house

18:29is going to feel really quiet. And she was paying school fees. And she was like, yeah, I know. I know. Oh, we're going to get our life back. We should fuck it off again. They're again rich. Actively chose. Yeah. Great. So they must have started very young. Yes. Because they've been together since they were 18. I know, but still some people wait 10 years, but they've been together a long time because she shares, and it comes from such a deep place where she's like, we had four kids under six. And you weren't around. Yeah. You know, there's a lot of that. And a lot of chat about how he's a different dad for the youngest two because he's able to be more present and, you know, and I was like, you hear this a lot with step, you know, parenting. Hungry P that they have like a second go at it. Totally. Oh, not even step just like half, you know, grandparents, you know, hubs is dad, my father and law. He is the most engaged and involved grandfather. And hubs is like, yeah, dad was in his hustle years.

19:30And it's so lovely to see him so engaged with our kids to see this version of him because I don't know this version. Yeah. But with no resentment, which is really cool, just to understand this, you were working your ass off to send us to school, made enormous sacrifices. And thank you. Thank you again for being such a legend to our children. That's great. Yeah. It's really cool. Anyway, how do we get here? We don't know what to do. And everyone should do what they need to do. Would money affect your decision if you had embryos like if it was financial with that? It sort of forces your hand. I think it does. I mean, I think because you get billed annually with frozen embryos. And I think it brings up the conversation every year. At least this is what a friend of mine has told me. She's like, every year it comes up and every year we have the conversation and every year we make a choice to pay it for another year because they're not ready to let go. And she's got three frozen embryos and she's just like, it just feels weird and she has three kids herself.

20:31So she's like, I just find it really hard to separate the idea that that embryo is one of my kids. I don't want to be insensitive in any way, but is there an option that they just defrost and then that's medical waste? Of course. Yeah. That feels funny too. It's not just donate or donate or keep paying, like donate to science is almost like being an organ donor. Yeah. Right. I mean, I think it's also a generous act in choice that baby's not a sentient person yet. No. They're not even a baby technically. No. They're a zygote. Well, not even. No. They're an embryo. Yeah. But I think everyone gets there in their own time because like, for example, this friend, she's like, I'm not going to lie, like paying $600 every year hurts in this economy and with the mortgages, no one needs another $600 or anything debited from their account for this theoretical idea of future children that they don't even want. Yeah. I guess if, you know, this is always my argument with vasectomies. If you know you don't want more children, I don't understand the decision, do you know

21:34what I mean? I can understand with an embryo deciding where it's going to go and what goes next, but the actual decision itself, if someone is done, I think you are dealing with dicey territory to make anyone have another baby. Whatever gender you are, whatever your, whatever your couple to me is, if someone doesn't want that baby, I don't know how you deal with resentment later on when it's, and the financial commitment of another baby is obviously much bigger than the financial commitment of storing an embryo. Huge. Yeah. That's such a good point. Can you let go of not fully fulfilling a part of your soul in order to honour the fact that someone else, because this is the problem, right? Like if you have a partner who's vehemently done, who's like, I do not want any more children, please don't make me, because I've seen dynamics. I know someone from my past who isn't in my life anymore, but she basically wanted a baby so badly, and at that time her husband wasn't ready, which I thought was unfair as well, like they felt like there was no compromise.

22:34And so her strategy was to say, I'll handle the baby, and I remember thinking, oh, that feels naive and really short-sighted, like this is a long con commitment, you know, like in your saying, I'll be in charge of this. Well, it's a big commitment. Yeah. Because what, 4am when you're sick and the baby's crying, are you going, no, no, I said, I'd do it off I go. Yeah. But then if you put the show on the other foot, like if I was someone who was like, no, I don't want that. I'm sorry that you do, but if I don't, then I sort of wash my hands of the full responsibilities of it. So I couldn't. That's the thing you couldn't. It wouldn't stack that way. Even if you made that deal with a man, it would not fall that way. You're the mother. I know, but we know how disproportionately being the parent lands on us. It just does. It just does, and you could make any deal in the world. No, that's not my lane note. We made a deal. It doesn't matter. And that kid is a person who's going to have opinions on who they want. That's certain, you know, this is hilarious to think you can decide these things ahead

23:36of time. That's different from when one person in a relationship wants a dog. And I've seen this before where they're like, I will do everything to do with the dog. And then next minute, that person has a job and then they're working somewhere abroad. And then it's like, well, my partner's got to look after the dog. Yes, you've got to pick up the shit. Yes, it's different shots, whatever it may be. You've got to walk it to, otherwise it goes loopy. And then it does become your responsibility. Yeah, it's not getting an artwork that you're not into. It just sits on a wall, you know, like these things are living breathing. They have opinions and they are erratic and they don't make sense. Sometimes. Yeah, I don't know. I don't know. Sorry, dear. Sorry, dear. We've really let you down here. Yeah. But I'm sure the Facebook group will do better than us. Yeah. Maybe we put it in there. You okay, Katie? Yeah, I'm just thinking I feel like nobody should ever be born to a world where they're not wanted. Yeah. Very true. Whether it's the mother or the father. Totally. I don't die now a lot on that like, but once they're here, he'll love them or she'll

24:38love you. You know, you never regret a swim or a baby, whatever we say, but it's like, yeah, I don't know. Yeah. You can still have resentment. You can still love a person. Of course. Two things can do. And resent, you know, the surrounding environment. You can't. Anyway. Facebook group. Do your thing. Yeah. Assemble. We have a DL who needs help and we have let her down. DLs, we hope you have a wonderful, less complicated weekend ahead. Not having to make big life decisions in case you missed it. We had a OT DL on the DL on the download episode that dropped yesterday and wow, the response. Yeah. A real, understandably. Double life situation. Imagine finding out in the worst possible way that your husband has been doing the dirty on you. That is what happened to this very generous DL who was sharing her story with us. You can dine out on that episode while you hopefully dine on some yummy things this weekend. I'm always interested. But what's your mung-in? It's going to say that's not what dine out means, but I really like it.

25:39Keep it in. What are you mung-in? Gem wants to know. Always. Send her pics. Fill her dams with food pics. I reckon she'd love it. Do you know what? I took a photo of my lunch when I was getting the bov and then, you know, when you're like editing content and I'm like, yeah, no, take, keep it out, Gem. It's got nothing to do with the bov. No one needs a segway to your fur, but you ate. Now I want fur. I'm going to order a fur. Yeah, I'm going to do that too. Yeah. Nice way to end the week. Bye. Hey, Reps. What was the name of the episode sponsor? The creamy, slightly nutty, elate milk that makes your coffee taste amazing. Madam Tiger's Tiger Night Milk. Find your new favourite alternative milk at MadamTiger.com. This episode was brought to you by Airbnb. Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at Airbnb.com.au slash host.