“We might have a baby next year!” - A big step forward in our fertility story

0:00Hello guys, welcome back to He Said, She Said. I'm Ryan and you are?

0:04Louise: Louise, the Lou Dog. Oh, you actually got me a Keering for Files there that says the Rye Dog on there. I did, and it's got a little balloon dog on it. Yeah, it's quite iconic actually, I like it. A little doggy. There was a famous artist actually who used to do these balloon dog sculptures I saw at the Pompadou Centre in Paris once. I know exactly the ones you're talking about. Yeah. Smart. Well. How are you this week, Ryan? I'm actually very good, thanks. I feel very good. How are you handling the heatwave? I generally handle heat quite well, but it does affect how productive I want to be. Oh, no.

0:37Louise: Here we go. Any excuse? Oh, no. I've done a Stephen Bartlett. Oh, no. Oh, no. You're not optimising yourself. No, you're way off Stephen Bartlett. You've got a lot of room to grow into the full optimisation. It's only really during the night time where I start to get a bit cranky. but thankfully Brian's decided to sleep with all the windows open all the shutters open so that we can get a big through flow which means that everyone in the morning on the bus can see him naked and all of our neighbours at the back of the house it's just like schnitzel on show it's true I also hairy bum did not predict the like colossal storm last night so I opened the Velux windows at the top of the house and we got so wet in the staircase I told you not to do that yesterday yeah I thought I was being smart You slept through it.

1:25Louise: I woke up at 4am and was running around the house in a frenzy, literally shutting all of the windows. I came and spied on you. Fine. Leo, fine. Me, panic. Dogs, really scared. Did they move upstairs with you? Yeah. No, they follow me around the house. Wherever I go, the dogs go. It's really cute. And so I slept in Leo's little single bed with his new beautiful 13.5 tog duvet and the two dogs. So I was actually pretty toasty. You must have been. And he's got a little pink fan. It never goes that way either, does it? Me and Leah in that bedroom. Yeah. But so you're not super productive. In the heat, no.

2:01But I don't know. What are you like in the heat? Do you like the heat?

2:07Louise: I used to always run quite hot. So when I was at school, even in the winter, I'd only ever wear a shirt with the uniform. That was a little odd. Like everyone would be in jumpers. And I, because I'm such a fast mover, I just remember like running between lessons and always being really hot. and i think now my hormones are so scrambled still that i'm essentially sort of hormonally menopausal so i get hot flushes anyway throughout the month where my body is sort of trying to regulate and that's the worst feeling yeah that must be horrible it's really rank i actually had it when i was on the way to the airport to go to this wedding i was um i feel like you had a few wobbles on that i actually did have quite a lot of wobbles yeah it's not like crap but we'll move on to that let's talk about your your big event okay let's talk about my big event i i'm interested to hear your perspective because that was i i very rarely host events by myself we've done events previously when we did the fitness stuff and we had the whole community and we did retreats which was epic but i was like blending in with the organization of that between you and scott and everyone else but this time it was just me i did the whole thing that's so impressive you hosted your first solo event last Thursday.

3:17Louise: It was the Alliance Stadium. Is that how you say it? Alliance. I've always just known it as Twickenham. You can quote it. It's kind of the home of English rugby. It is the home of English rugby. And you brought together a group of guys who all mean something to you, including some real wild cards like our local vicar. Yeah. And some fellow podcasters, broadcasters, major sportsmen. Yeah. Rugby players, cricket players, and did something really vulnerable and stood up and gave two speeches, not just one speech, but two speeches, speaking about what it means to you to be a father, to be the son of a father, and also, regardless of whether you're a father or not, to have kind of tricky conversations.

4:05Louise: I didn't realise how difficult it is for men to talk. That's interesting. I really didn't get the gravitas of that until being at this event. Like, honestly, I mean it. I was speaking to Jake Humphries and also who's, who's the guy who plays for England cricket? Sam Billings. Sam Billings. Yeah. And they were talking really candidly about how much they struggled to speak to the men in their family about anything. Well, they, they openly told you that in conversation. Oh, that's great. Yeah. um they said and we're all kind of like giggling about it yeah because they're sort of feeling a bit giddy about admitting it in that space but they're like oh that actually felt quite liberating yeah i wasn't judged by louise god i i mean i'm the least judgmental person ever i found it so cool i was so i found it really endearing like i actually found it quite attractive but i suppose that's the well that's really lovely to hear but i suppose that's the hesitation for a lot of men it's like how is this going to be received when i drop this admission or confession i saw you having little conversations little pockets of of the area that would set up it was nice i'm glad you got that experience because it's very it's going to be hard for me to articulate how special and memorable memorable that event was because unless you were there to feel it because it was very much a feeling behind it all it's hard i liked that it was really intimate as well i think i hate throwing events because i feel as though there's so much pressure to perform and for every individual person to have an amazing time which I've explained to you before which is probably one of the reasons why I feel like a wedding is such a high pressure environment yeah but I really respect the fact that it wasn't an issue for you you had like 35 people there could have had 50 could have had 100 so you really focused on quality over quantity And I also think what was really beautiful was to see the slow man win.

6:03Oh, nice. Right. Doesn't happen often. Yeah, I think that you've put in a lot of work over the years

6:13Louise: and it amounted to this amazing opportunity. And it kind of proved to me actually that good things take time because I sometimes panic that I'm not where I need to be in life yeah I wrote about this to to my letter this morning actually in your letters to Leo yeah because I think we live in a world where we kind of we've we've we almost have become accustomed or we have this this huge appetite for instant reward and instant results and like it's really for me it's nice for you to describe it as you know the slow man has got a bit of a win from this because that event is easy to look in on and maybe overlooked that it is that is the coming together that's the culmination of years of working on myself as an individual like I've I've been mood boarding for years do you manifested it I think oh well actually yeah this is probably my first ever manifestation experience yeah I reckon it is which is epic and also you I know that you've struggled with the fact that you've not played professional sport as part of your career and that like you slightly resented your parents for not pushing you harder to be a professional rugby player and you kind of got that moment i did yeah you got to walk out the changing rooms and walk out onto the pitch and host something which is arguably an even bigger privilege yes one one of my closest friends who you know really well jack he's just had a baby he sent me a message and he was like dude I know that because we went to school when we were from age 12 all the way through to finish 17 18 and he knows that the childhood Ryan would have had dreams of being in that stadium walking out the tunnel being on the pitch and he's like dude even though you're not a player to see you get that moment in your own way I know how amazing that would have been for you and I yeah like does it get any better than that no it doesn't no it doesn't no it doesn't although actually that you've been talking about potentially hosting your next one at Chelsea FC yeah well yeah gosh I've got so much to say on this but I realized that not many not many or if any are going to be as interested as me and you but I will say this like it there was a real like irony the juxtaposition between being in what is essentially a coliseum where men and women they go to battle they go out there and they display a different form of strength which is you know tenacity and combativeness and like leadership and teamwork and all that great stuff which I love I love sports as you know but it was incredible to to be we started the evening in the changing room where I gave my version of like a team talk but it was really like my opportunity to kind of set the tone and and give that first chink of vulnerability and I can remember being very emotional during this team talk conversation I've watched the video back and I think I did a better job than I gave myself credit for I think I I didn't I thought like I was tripping up over my words a lot but to have that moment in the changing room people kind of stood around and there's all the like all the finer detail around like how I've organized the changing room and the shirts and the all that good stuff to have that which was then blessed by James who's the vicar or the priest or the pastor in Fulham.

9:39I wanted him to have just a couple of minutes to connect everyone in the room because I was mindful that not everyone is a dad, but we all have or have, we all have a dad or we had a dad. There might be a really strong fatherhood figure. Maybe it's a granddad.

9:55Louise: Well, and quite a few people in the room had recently lost their dads. Correct. So I wanted us all to like really feel like we were all meant to be in that room together. And he brought us together in such a beautiful way anyway from that moment leo it's back to your point about me getting my moment i held his hand and he led the whole 35 of us from the change room to the pitch and we walked out and the music was going and the barbecues were like puffing with smoke and i'd kind of i wanted to take this coliseum and turn it into my version of like a camp site or a campfire so i wanted to have all the things that i love in one sort of area of that pitch side and it was just incredible yeah um but sorry i've missed out the point about we were there to show a different version of strength that was the point sorry i was trying to get to we were there to to lean into that backdrop of the of the coliseum arena but to show that actually there is there is an opportunity here to show a different version of strength through through honesty and vulnerability and just be just be really raw and you got to see it from your lens as a woman i got to see it from mine and i got to feel it and i think everyone the messages i've had have they been incredible like absolutely incredible do you know what and i said this to you yesterday what i think was really cool was that i've been to a lot of events yeah a lot of them are incredibly polished a lot of the speeches are very rehearsed they're read from a script that someone's written down on a phone or an iPad or a piece of paper yeah I know that you worked hard to prepare for this and it all came together really quite quickly but the speech and also the panel talk that you did with your dad and your son our son and your friend were actually quite and I don't want you to take this the wrong way imperfect yeah nice and so there were some clunky moments there were some pauses and part of me for a second thought oh gosh you know but afterwards the reception from people that were there was phenomenal and everyone really opened up and they just like took a deep breath and went like oh I can be myself because there's actually something quite irritating and almost patronizing about watching people talk so professionally and so perfectly and it actually leaves you as someone that's listening to it feeling quite inadequate and okay and i think actually people felt like you were one of them and i think you left people feeling quite good about themselves not no i get what you're saying do you get what i'm saying 100 i think people thought like okay good like we're all human and we all yeah we're all just winging it and we're having a nice time and you weren't patronizing which i think is really cool because many men could have taken that moment to be the leader.

12:53No, it wasn't about that. I wanted to use my family between Leo, myself and my dad. I wanted that to be an illustration. It wasn't a self-indulgent piece where I'm going to talk to you about how wonderful things are in my world. It wasn't that. It was essentially like, what has been passed down from my dad to me to him? And how does that connect us? But also, how does it kind of provoke or leave something within you where you think about, oh, if I think about it, my dad or my mum or my grandfather. And it just connects everyone. And like you say, we did it in a very imperfect way. And I think there was a necessary amount of human feeling which connected us.

13:37Louise: Because even your father, who has a military background and also worked for the King's Trust and had a really high sort of leadership role there, he was very informal about the whole thing. Yeah. it was beautiful yeah well done thank you very much of you no thank you that means a lot i then felt like shit the next day when i had to get on a flight yeah after a really late night so i had a wedding i thought you looked great by the way i'll start by saying that well at the wedding yeah in that red dress thank you it's funny because i tried on so many different options and i ordered loads of things and like the girls i work with they ordered me things and i really wanted to go and look chef's kiss like did you smash it out the ballpark colorful a bit daring maybe i mean there are some people there that i haven't seen in a really long time i kind of wanted to get my foot on i just wanted to feel you know seen again fair enough and when i arrived i was so um i'd been so dissociated basically all morning i haven't traveled on my own since we've had our son so almost five years now I haven't traveled without you for a really long time and I kind of hate to admit it but I quite like hand holding it's fine enough yeah throughout that airport navigation and also on the airplane I'm not particularly good flyer and I was so exhausted I felt like I'd been hit by a bus I was I felt like I'd been hung over and obviously I haven't drunk for years but I was really really quite dissociated sort of meandering around this airport i had a horrible experience when i was coming through the security and

15:15Louise: and it was just typical it was it was almost as though you know when you do manifest something with a bad mood bad outcomes happen yeah what's it called a pathetic fallacy when in a story something really horrible is happening and then it pours with rain like the thunder and the storm last night like something really dramatic happens yeah I kind of felt like my mood was then being reflected in my surroundings. And so I sort of shuffled up to the security. I was so scared about having a stoma leap because I wouldn't have had you there to explain it to anyone around me, to help me. Or to give you my jumper or something.

15:48Louise: To give me your big jumper to cover myself up. And I shuffled through the security. And I'd said to a few people, just say, you know, I've got a medical device. Is that what you call it, a medical device? Yeah, I can't be bothered to explain what a stoma bag is. No one's going to know what an ileostomy bag is. Yeah, fair enough. Although I think that there is, I think people are educated more now and that's sort of part of what I'm trying to do. But normally what I will say is that airport staff are very polite and very helpful. But I went through and I was flagged and I had to go and stand in the other queue.

16:22Louise: And then this lady checked me and she, she just showed me no mercy and no empathy. and she basically made me pull down my trousers so that my stoma bag was visible and took a massive swab all around it. And I actually felt really humiliated. Yeah, that's not great. And I actually cried like a little bit, but I was really quick to obviously hide my tears. It wasn't a full-on breakdown. Yeah. But I shuffled over to the conveyor belt and I just, it makes me feel really sorry for myself talking about it now. Because I just felt like a child that was there on my own, you know, in my like small stature, just really early in the morning, no makeup on, vulnerable.

17:07Bless you.

17:08Louise: Yeah. And it was horrible. But ultimately I tried to kind of justify it in my head by thinking that it would be a pretty good hiding spot for lots of drugs. So maybe she was just doing her due diligence. That is one way of looking at it. if I was a drug dealer I would use me as a drug mule because normally my innocence gets away with a lot and I don't get checked and I avoided a lot of very uncomfortable situations when traveling on my gut I don't think that's that's not a very pleasant experience for you I'm sorry you had to kiss you that but I also would say like I don't know if I before this I don't know if I would know what an ileostomy bag was I haven't said that there is like a there's a there should be almost a code of conduct And there's courtesy, you know, around like, even actually without, even if you didn't, but like if you're going to ask a woman to step to the side to be searched and whatever else, there's a level of bedside manner, if you like, to go about that.

18:09Louise: They should maybe have a separate area or something. Especially for a woman, especially if you've got a medical device. You don't just expose it in front of a line of people. Well, look, if someone has sort of shards of metal in their body from, I don't know, fighting in a war or they've had a knee replacement they're not getting people to pull their trousers down to then swab their knees and it's right by my crotch it's really uncomfortable it's not good do you think do you think that people in those kind of roles should be better informed and educated about things like this you know what i actually do it goes without saying if you work in a hospital environment you're a nurse a doctor yeah that you should but perhaps in the security space because you are encroaching on someone's personal space yeah yeah and i think there is a fine line between being professional and doing your job really well and i agree upsetting somebody and invading their personal space yeah so actually g just flagged that there is actually a lanyard that you can get if you are someone that has an invisible disability that you can wear and it's green with sunflowers on it that is probably quite a good way of visibly telling somebody that you're going through something and that there is that you have a disability um I actually experienced it again later on in the day so I had two hits in one day where I went to a disabled bathroom and I had a lot of people look at me in a very funny way because for the most part I do look incredibly well and quite polished yeah and it's and that's really uncomfortable because I I absolutely require all of the extra space that a disabled bathroom offers.

19:47Louise: I need a ledge. Like if I'm going to change my snowman bag, I need some space. I need extra hygiene around me. Like it's, I've got a, there's a part of my body that sits outside of my body. It's really susceptible to getting, to picking up infections and things. It's a very difficult scenario, isn't it? It's really hard. I don't want to go around and be that girl that's like, I've got a disability. I've got a disability. it's one of the reasons why i do speak about it fairly regularly online without becoming really somber about somber about it i actually do have but i've lost it so i should get a new one a um crohn's and colitis sort of id card that means i can show it to people if i require well that's probably worth having a key to get into a disabled bathroom because actually the disabled bathrooms even here aren't accessible without a key which maybe is a good thing but when you're in kind of an emergency situation and you're say having a leak you really need to get in quite quickly i don't think that's a good thing actually but then in a way it keeps it clean so that you don't get non-disabled people going in there i don't really want to have to go and ask for a key so that's quite embarrassing i think actually you can get a key ring that sits on your on your keys that then you can open a disabled bathroom excuse me i'm it's crazy that i've lived with this for a couple of years now and i'm still quite slow to the uptake with uh some of these things i've been very lucky so it's really interesting though but i was unlucky on a day that i was on my own and i had moments i'll be honest where i was messaging you really panicking and you told me to if the if i needed to to come to turn around and come home which i thought you i thought you were going to do to be fair and i felt quite embarrassed sending those messages because i tend to air towards quite a stoic attitude when it comes to my stoma bag and I knew that you were with my dad sorry you were with your dad following the event the night before and I didn't want him to know that I was being a bit of a baby about feeling anxious in the airport no well luckily for you he was actually long gone by then but usually I mean usually I try to encourage you and people in general to kind of do the things that feel somewhat difficult because I knew that you would end up having a great time with your friends but I don't know something something about that just the whole the sort of health implications surrounding it and i'm now of the mindset where i'm like if you're not feeling great about it just just don't put yourself through the stress i just for me i'm like gosh like nothing's worth that level of stress or upset so in my mind i was like just come home it's tricky because with something like a wedding so much planning goes into it and so much money and it's it's a huge day it's you know people always say it's the biggest day in someone's life.

22:27Louise: And so I really wanted to be there for one of my best friends who I've known since we were 15. You know, I was at her super sweet 16th and 18th and 21st and then her hen and then wanting to be there at her wedding. And lots of my friends were going, but there were people who actually had to, had to stay at home for personal reasons or financial reasons. And I think that we're definitely coming into wedding season now. And it is, it is like a big commitment going to an abroad wedding have you ever been to an abroad wedding um i don't think i have actually no isn't that weird not many of our friends have done abroad i think we should count ourselves quite lucky they're like he probably won't go invited to any of the weddings there's the whole thing if you only get invited to a wedding if you're married anyway so you sort of that's your get out of jail free card well no because i remember one particular year we went to a fuckload of weddings yeah we had a wedding every weekend It's one of the reasons we didn't get married because I didn't want it to pale into insignificance.

23:25Louise: Because from May through to September, no joke, we maybe had two weekends off. Every single weekend was a wedding. And then you're pitching them, pitting them against each other. You're like, that's the fun one. That's the crap one. That's the one I'm going to drink at and have a good time at. Actually, strangely, I ended up having a really great time at every one of those. But the lead up, I was like, please just leave me out of it. Is that how you actually felt? Yeah. Yeah, obviously. Wait, you didn't want to come? No. you're the kind of guy that finds a couple of people that also don't want to be at the wedding there's been a few memorable nights there on those weddings do you think it's it's a lot to expect people to fly abroad i do think it's a lot i mean we're actually doing it next year for my cousin but i feel like because he's family he's getting married in zanzibar yeah to answer your question i do think it's it is a pretty big expectation however that is that is costing a few thousand pounds you do get like a you do get an immediate sort of like trimming of the fat and you're left with your core and i'm like it's kind of smart because it's like in reality speaking from well this is just me you might have a different view but i don't know like a wedding for me is not about big numbers it's about having the right people like the people you really want to be there and i feel like regardless of where it is in the world and the cost they'll find a way to be there.

24:41So yeah, Zanzibar. I mean, my cousin, bless him. I mean.

24:45Louise: It's cool. It's actually really cool because he's not travelled that much. No, he hasn't travelled that much. And it's actually really special. So I'm excited about that. Plus it now falls over Leo's half term. Yeah. Which we'll be continuing with next year. But it's fucking expensive and it is going to be a hassle. Yeah. Dude, I had a friend who's 36 that travelled to this wedding that I was just at on coach, not the entire way. So she flew and then got two hour coach from the airport to the hotel that we were staying at. Oh gosh. I mean, a lot of people have come from New York because my friend lives in New York now.

25:13Louise: That's a long journey. Oh, wow. So people have come for just like a nine hour flight. It's a little bit sad in a way because there are, there will be people who really want to be there, but actually just can't physically, financially get there. And that's, that's, that's an unfortunate position to be put in. Like, I don't know, before, like speaking truthfully, before we met and things changed, Like I would have really struggled to get to my cousin's wedding in Zanzibar on the wages of a personal trainer. And there might have been a chance where I couldn't have been there, which is kind of sad.

25:45Louise: Yeah, that is sad. But it's a bit like the whole like going into the disabled loo and judging that situation. It's like, well, we should do better as people to not judge that. Your friend who couldn't go, she might have given you a version. The truth of it might be that she can't actually afford to be there. It's actually quite true. So there's that version to consider as well. Do you think that it's on the bridal party to contribute to the cost? Well, I'm quite traditional in many ways. I quite like the idea of... What, my dad paying for the whole thing? Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry.

26:18What was your question? You said contribute.

26:23Louise: Yeah, no. Do you think that the bride and groom should contribute to the wedding guests stay? If you're in a position to do so, yeah. That would be... If I could do that, that would be awesome. Mate, I often say I'd be a fucking wonderfully epic rich bloke because I'd take care of people in such a great way. Like that, for example. I'd be like, I'm going to get married in Corfu on this date. Here's your tickets and your hotel. Well, we decided we were going to get married at the Allianz Stadium now. Right, well. Because they host weddings there. Well, that's a short Uber ride. I can take care of that.

27:00Louise: I guess the other thing that's quite divisive is whether you're allowed to bring children to weddings. And it's a bit of a roadblock if you're not allowed to, because some people can't find childcare. All childcare is really expensive. It's actually one of the reasons why I think you stayed at home. Is it? It's convenient, but the alternative is then we're flying three of us out there and making a holiday of it interestingly none of my friends really did that they most of my married friends with kids husbands stayed at home but there's like the husband will be thinking we could turn this into a family trip and i could take days from my allocators the holiday days from work and i could pay for another fucking seat for the children everything just goes up and then before you know it you're like gosh this is quite quite an expensive thing so you can go to your friend's wedding the husband's probably thinking i don't even want to go to barcelona i want to go to Fiji.

27:54Yeah, fair enough. Do you know what I mean? So it's like, but back to the kids idea, I've got a, I've got a, I've actually got a mind blowing example for kids being invited to weddings. So my cousin, the brother of the cousin that we're going to his wedding in Zanzibar, his brother got married, let's say 15 years ago. I can't remember the time frame. And I've never seen him since. He's never spoken to any of my family because he said that my eldest brother couldn't bring children and my brother was like um but i don't know what to do with him so it's either like we come as a family and i just look after my one child at the time or we can't come he's like there's no children did were there any other kids

28:37Louise: there no no no like no bridesmaids no little babies they didn't have kids of their own no no how do you feel about that it's it's it's like the biggest faux pas and miscommunication my family's ever seen. Because this cousin... Let me get this straight. But Gareth, your eldest brother, they would have had a really young baby. Yeah. So maybe they just wanted to bring the baby to... Probably to the reception. I don't know if the baby was going to be in the church, but like the reception and the party afterwards. Just sort of like in the corner doing a bit of breastfeeding and that sort of stuff.

29:14Basically that, yeah. Yeah.

29:15Louise: And he said, no, absolutely not. To my knowledge, he said no kids at the wedding. Okay. Full stop. This particular cousin, I won't name names, has never spoken to our side and his side of the family ever again. So he's turned his back on his own mum and dad, his brother. Sorry, yes, he's also never spoken to his parents again. Yeah, he's turned his back on. And by the way, back to the whole like father figures and all that sort of stuff. My dad was his father figure in some respect because of the military career that he took. so like very involved and all of a sudden pivots turns his back on everyone and gone never ever ever again people listening would be like there's gotta be more to the story tell us i know it is i'm so curious there's some really interesting things the truth is i actually don't know what happened my parents have written letters they've tried to orchestrate meetings his own parents have tried to step in his brothers have stepped in gareth has written letters to be like i'm really sorry about the whole like wedding thing is there something more it's wild it's a big deal then would you i have to say i'd say no to the babies i do not want babies stealing the attention when i'm walking down the aisle children are chaotic i i choose quite fun actually to think about the bridesmaids and grooms groomsmen they're adults bridesmaids what about the little ones like Trotting down with the ring bearers and everything.

30:43That's what I mean. The flower girls.

30:45Louise: The flower girls. Listen, the best - Which flower, which little ones would we have? Little people. We've got loads of little people in our family. I'd want like all of our friends. Little people. I actually think, I think kids should be allowed. I think it's a celebration of love and families. And I don't think we should exclude that. Oh, I don't. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Not having children at the party. The best wedding scene I've ever seen on the movie Crazy Rich Asians. Don't think there's any kids on that one. No, there are kids. There's cute kids. There are kids. Yeah, you can have them as the flower girls and little boys.

31:17Oh, you mean just the party bit?

31:18Louise: Yeah. And also we're not having other people's children. We're not throwing a festival. It's not a creche. I think the idea is that you do the wedding bit as everyone's there. And then you go to like a sort of like hotel or where - You dump them. And you have like one massive room and you hire two or three people to just watch and keep a lid on the kids who are just running wild in the hotel room. That's the sweet spot. And that's your mum. No, that's not my mum. That is the role that she always gets. She did that at your brother's wedding. Well, she's not going to do that at ours. No, that's a bit of pants for her.

31:52Louise: Because also if she wants to get drunk, then I don't know how responsible that is. I'm talking like an external, like member of staff from the hotel will take three of your most lovely people. Please watch over the kids. I'll pay you whatever you want. Just give us one night to party. No, I just mean, I actually just don't want any children at the wedding. Fucking hell. So I wasn't actually the only person on the aeroplane this weekend. Well, no, I'm sure there's lots of people from the wedding there as well. No, but also our babies are on a flight. Oh, shit. With a total stranger.

32:32Oh, man. Which is absolutely bizarre. Was that that whole, like, R2-D2 tank that you sent? Yes. Was that you Was that you Describing that As an R2-D2 as well Quite clever Yeah I loved that I was like The hell

32:45Louise: Yeah our babies Were literally Travelling across the ocean In R2-D2 When you sent me that text I was like I'm kind of impressed By the analogy here I'm not even in Star Wars You know Sam's got Two Star Wars tattoos No I didn't know that actually Yeah it's just funny That like R2-D2 with our babies in Is sat next to Some random bloke's Orange suitcase In his cabin bag And I'm like That's our children In in that machine at like minus 170 degrees probably got that wrong next to a random bloke's luggage. Next to his cheese sandwich. Like imagine sitting I've never seen one on an aeroplane before. Yeah it's cheese sandwich.

33:22Louise: I'd quite like to know what he was up to in the aeroplane. Why have we never seen a little cooler a little like cryo chamber before on the flight? And I hope he got to skip the queue and go into some special lane with a different kind of medical device. So are you telling me that we had nine children flying? No four. Sorry, four. Yeah, the first four. I don't want to send nine to Georgia in case something crazy happens. That is such a bizarre concept to think about. Do you put it in the hold? Or does it have a seat? I don't know, G. Maybe he had to pay for two seats. I think he has a seat for it, yeah.

33:55Louise: I'd quite like to see the picture of the machine on the seat. It's not going in the hold. No. With like, I find it extraordinary that pets sometimes go in the hold. That makes me feel really scared. Oh, God. It's actually mad. The responsibility of that job, that is living human DNA. So they've landed in Georgia. Yeah, they're now in a clinic. And this week we meet a potential... Surrogate. I know you said mother then, but... We were supposed to do it on Friday, but I had the flight. That's in two days. Any tips for me to prepare for this meeting? I think nice to have maybe some questions about her experience she's done it five times you said oh no sorry four which actually is quite a lot but that that to me is like okay great you've proven not we've been quite honest here yeah but that goes to show that she's had success in this space yeah so this is we've basically been presented with a profile of a um of a woman who's had already carried a number of children and when I first saw the profile oh my god that's quite a lot because I obviously know firsthand how messy birth can be and how how it can affect your organs and you know the the pressure it puts on your uterus every time you carry a child for it to then sort of it's quite elastic actually sort of spring back into shape especially if you've had any any surgery the scar tissue is there for life um you're actually recommended not to carry more than three children if you've had c-sections so when i saw that she'd already been a surrogate four times i was quite shocked but i did a bit more research and actually she's had natural vaginal deliveries really healthy deliveries for all of them and so I kind of went from feeling quite worried about this about you know the health and the safety of the surrogate and whether you know she was doing it for the right reasons to then flipping it after a conversation I actually had with your mother

36:13Louise: um to a yeah to flipping it to a sort of more positive thing because there are people whose bodies are just designed to have children and who are really really good at it yeah you know and back in the olden days some people were having like six or seven kids yeah and so if it's something that this lady loves doing which we'll find out on yeah and and she's really really good at doing and she obviously really enjoys helping people then i actually think that it's a really really special thing and so i'd really love to ask her a bit about the other experiences and whether she like really feels like she wants to do this again yeah yeah i thought that's a very important question to ask it's hugely personal because i probably will ask her about her previous birth experiences if she's willing to talk about it actually that that for me would be like the pivotal part of that conversation finding out why she wants to do it and sorry why she has done it four times and why she wants to do it again And also how involved we'll be.

37:15I don't necessarily need to.

37:16Louise: You know, at the actual delivery. Oh. Let's just meet her first. Baby steps, Firon. Baby steps. I feel really excited about it now. Quite nervous. But also there have been so many hurdles to jump over to get to this place. And now in a funny kind of way, I feel as though the gates are open. So our embryos are in Georgia. They're already at a fertility clinic. If we have a great rapport with this lovely lady who's offering to do this for us, we can essentially move quite quickly. Well, that would be the most perfect version of it, yeah. Yeah, and I think we should really, you know, keep all of our fingers and toes crossed that it goes really smoothly.

38:05Louise: And there's no reason why it wouldn't at this point. And actually the statistics - You know, the statistics of success for first time implantations into surrogates are actually really quite high because of all of the steps that you need to do to get there, to get the euploid embryos and to have them all tested and to do the numerous rounds of IVF. You know, that's quite a lot of the hard work is in that process. And then if somebody's already experienced, you know, four really healthy pregnancies without having any miscarriages, their uterus and their lining is really healthy. Most of the barriers are now removed.

38:37Louise: so if we go ahead I actually just got shivers and maybe can move forward with an embryo transfer in the next month or two we might have a baby next spring sweet heavens no I will I will tell you this though it's important for me to tell you this because I think for probably up until only the last few days realistically and I think it's I think it's probably as a result of being around people like my mum and dad and uh something has happened in my own mind and my own house as well around the barriers are kind of coming down a little bit i can see the excitement from my parents i can i can see their willingness to be there in georgia for a month or more if it takes that to support in any which way i can see the goosebumps coming up on your arms and your back of your neck it's i feel like and also shout out to you like you've done all of the admin and all the hard stuff and you've you've got us to this position i guess what i'm trying to say is like i'm now i'm feeling more at peace with with everything in some uh in some well it's a it's a really good thing what i'm trying to tell you that i'm this is a really good this is a good feeling for ryan because before it was like very uncertain and unsettled by the whole thing and i wasn't deliberately trying to present any friction or barrier to it but in my in my head i had barriers up because i couldn't fathom and process this this next chapter but now you know there's there's a big part of me that's thinking oh my gosh if we if we meet this lovely person on thursday and i genuinely feel that she's wonderful mate i'll be like rock on dude like this yeah let's have a baby next spring like wow that's like that that would be wonderful but it's taken me until now to say that i'm so happy i hope i think what do you think the barriers were do you think there was any part of you that felt it's just it's a push back to the version of events it's my it's my heart not accepting the reality of it okay it's a bit like when you mirror something right so that's something in front of me i didn't feel great about the energy the the turn of events the the outcome the result so my eye was giving the same like i don't i i'm not feeling this now it's starting that picture in front of me starting to look very different I'm now starting to visualize the sweetest little Georgian woman who's been like don't worry I've done this four times and then in the back of that picture there's a little mini Ryan again and I'm like okay and and it's like I'm turning into the mirror in a positive way we've in recent weeks come together a lot nicer and a lot tighter and I think that's probably been a massive thing for for me I feel like it was all a little bit like a bit like a stress bucket just spilling over the edges there's so many things happening in our world and I feel like we've we've done some really necessary hard conversations and like come together feel much more aligned and part of it and I just feel excited for for that next piece to be plugged in yeah did you ever feel and I know that sort of men really get to talk about their side of fertility or infertility I wondered whether you were worried and resistant to the IVF process knowing that sperm is 50 % of the of the puzzle do you feel a bit of relief knowing that we've now got quite a few embryos yeah I suppose yeah yeah I suppose I do I never that whole um back to that time when I was told that you know I wasn't particularly uh giving the most like healthy fertile sperm like that that for me was like a really unexpected and kind of deeply shocking bit of news so I suppose there's been a rebound from that which has taken some time we all know that I don't rebound quick so I sit in things for a while but now I'm like lifting out of all of it lifting out of all of it and it is reassuring to know that like i've been in that freaking production room many times and like it's good to know that there's like still lead in the old pencil so yeah and i guess one of the hard things and we can talk about this more sort of as we progress on the journey but is is actually gearing up for having a new baby I've already caught myself thinking of names obviously not going to share because even like a couple of weeks ago a couple of months ago you were quite like resistant to even talking about it most of what I'm telling you yeah it's a major major shift in me for me to admit that to you but also to also say that I've been thinking about names is pretty symbolic fuck I feel so relieved to be honest because I have probably been leading the charge with this one and there have been moments where it hasn't felt right that I'm going so full steam ahead with it and you're almost on a train that's going in the other direction you're not even on my train you're not moving slowly on the train you're actually driving back home and I feel like it's it's so important that we are aligned on this journey together like i i would hate for you to feel any resentment towards it because that wouldn't mean that we're bringing a child into like a really loving healthy happy home and i think that from you know here moving forward we've got you know at least sort of nine ten however many months to really process well well i guess maybe not maybe not we might have a spring baby right it's going to come around so quickly we've got so much big stuff happening in the next year Leo will have started school we're going to have to write that awkward letter to the teachers saying please can we pull him out of school for a month while we go and live in Georgia to do this really weird unconventional thing I can't I've never even looked at Georgia on the map or let alone google image I think it's I think you'll love it because it's really stripped back and like beautiful and I think it's like mountainous and lakey I need to have a look right now I think it's giving Ryan guys Georgia is giving Ryan and it's going to be the best thing good let's keep up this really posse vibes narrative new place new little like yeah it looks like a fairy tale yeah it looks quite um oh Bavarian almost well I've genuinely never looked at an image of Georgia yeah stunning it's got your name written all over it I also think that spring is going to be quite nice who knew not me all right let me tell you let me give you some some hot news there's a footballer called jeremy docker who plays for belgium represents his country plays for man city at club level he has um decided which i i'll give you my opinion on it in a second actually he he left the fifa world cup to be present for the birth of his first baby and he well first of all what do you think about that as a standalone thing i think it's really important Well, I do as well.

46:15I think it's a demonstration that his priorities and his values are really in the right order.

46:21Louise: It must have been a really hard decision because you've obviously been picked as part of a small lineup. And it's a huge honor to play for your country and the World Cup only comes around every four years. So it's like more than bucket list stuff. And he'll have said yes to that, knowing that his wife is expecting a baby at the same time. So tricky, but I think it's the most vulnerable time in a woman's life and it's a huge part of i mean you're growing a family like it's the biggest thing that can happen to you i can i can only imagine that that is the sort of thing that would come to haunt haunt you later in life because like football or whatever a sport it is it's just a game you know i mean well some people do not see it as just a game uh maybe yeah but the birth of your child is is where is where it all begins and i don't know there's i think there's some people who well well again maybe from your perspective i think it's pretty pretty crucial for the for the father to be there and to be supportive in any which way i mean i would be fuming if my partner was choosing to prioritize sport or whatever his career is over the birth of my child i actually know somebody who's partnered actually this is awful oh god can i even say this i know there's somebody who gave hospital was giving birth in in the hospital that we gave birth in and their partner left throughout the night to go to the nightclub this is totally different that was very close to the hospital and then came back in the morning far-fetched that happened unsurprisingly that couple is not together anymore um you go to a nightclub i know isn't that just horrendous but some of the things that people do are are awful and i think that that's actually represented in this interview that jeremy docu had with a was she french yeah um it was a l 'equipe channel presenter i think her name was france pierron and she criticized him saying that a father is completely useless at that time of their child's birth um which is apparently a disgusting moment and she also then kind of joked saying that he just you know a partner just holds your hand and takes a photo which I think is such an ignorant thing to say I haven't delved deeper to find out whether this lady has had children herself but I can't fathom how anybody that has been through the childbirth experience could undermine it like that and undermine the input of their of their partner because you know even people that are um having a child on their own maybe through a sperm donor so women that have chosen to go down that path still would bring in a birthing partner and that could be a friend it could be someone that they know it could be a medical professional a doula or a parent i think comments like that are really damaging and it's i think it's part of a wider conversation around um why some men really struggle being fathers especially in that first year or first half a year there's there's there's almost two camps in society we want fathers to be more present and hands-on and we want them to be around a lot more but then you've got women like that you're saying you're actually quite useless mate just just go back to work and just protect and provide and it's like well this is bloody confusing and then you've got the whole like you've got the whole the conversation around paternity and the whole two weeks and is it long enough my personal view is that it's not long enough how can we expect a father to adjust to his new role to the new normal to be supportive to mum to establish a bond with baby all that in two weeks and then to switch again to get back into i've got to get back to work and crunch through all that paperwork or whatever it is they do yeah it's such a it's such a it's a really hard position to be and i know that people watching this there's gonna be people who be like shut up mate but that is that is the reality of it there are two camps and i think it's causing confusion for men being a man is difficult being a woman is difficult going through birth is very difficult for a woman for obvious reasons but for a man to adjust and keep up with it and be helpful in the best possible way i'd take my hat off to him i i would i'd hug him i'd kiss him if i could see this jeremy docker and i'd be like mate you as on the on the biggest stage of sport in the biggest tournament you have have stepped out of that because you're protecting what you think is more important.

50:51Not many people do that. Yeah.

50:53Louise: He's setting a pretty big example there. There might be more to the story. Many women will be thanking him actually. I think many men will as well. I'm fucking thanking him. Yeah. I think that's incredible. Like I, I don't know. I don't really know. I'm not really a football sort of, I'm not three and three footballers, you know, but it makes me want to look into Jeremy Doku and almost like support him. I'm going to fucking GF Belgium next time they play. I love that. I'm going to buy a Doku shirt. Literally. Also, I think, look, I mean, he's played in a few games, am I right? And he then can pass the baton on to someone else.

51:28Louise: It means someone else gets a go. Imagine what she'll be feeling. The mum seeing her husband come back from America, arriving at the hospital. Let's say he's in his kit. Let's make it like, let's make it visually romantic. He's in his boots. And he's like, don't worry, I'm here. and she's like she's so in love with him she's so in love with him she's literally like I love you so much right now you are my world you have literally sacrificed the world cup for me and then that baby will have the same story and he'll be like my dad did that for me that's so cool icons fuck in uh in other news Keir Starman's resigned how's that gonna affect your maternity commission petition thank you for getting that right it's a bit of a tongue teaser, isn't it?

52:16Louise: How is it going to affect everything? I think politics is just so complicated at the moment. So how's it going to affect the country? I've gone straight to your petition. I've been sending emails saying, how is it going to affect our petition? But then also caveating that with brackets being like, and also all the other really important things that are going on in the world right now. Not that this is the be all and end all. It is to those affected, but, oh, it feels really, actually it was quite expected. So a lot of people that I work with were, they kind of had the heads up that this was going to happen a month ago.

52:47Louise: So from our campaign's perspective, it's been really complicated because we feel like we can't really move forward and have the right conversations. We were bedded into his leadership team. And now he, as of sort of July, depending on how long it takes for him to be replaced, it could take up until September. this is a really pivotal time for us with our campaign and these reviews that are coming out at the end of this month you know our campaign comes to an end or this current petition comes to an end i think on the 6th of july which is in a matter of 7th of july thanks ryan um he's involved he's supportive and there won't be anyone for us to go and hand in the petition to potentially.

53:31Louise: I've sent an email to our new Secretary of Health and Social Care, James Murray, so waiting to hear a response. But with all of this political instability and the reshuffling, it's not going to be a priority because everybody is just going to be fighting for positions right now. So that will be the priority potentially for the next three months, which means that any policies that were going to be enacted over that period will probably just be scrapped. and we start again which just proves the need for the commissioner because they would sit outside of this so if anything it's actually kind of making my job easier because i now have lots to speak about why it's so important for a role like this to sit outside of the this specific like party politics as it's a cross-party issue so yeah we'll crack on and i have got meetings set up with with certain mps you know michelle walsh who's our new maternity advisor who actually is in support of the maternity commissioner which is really brilliant because i was worried that when she took on this new role that that was basically the government's excuse for filling the maternity commissioner role and so theo and i felt quite disheartened that obviously wes had left that you know everyone was moving around and they just sort of i actually think almost that care or whoever made the decision to make michelle the maternity advisor was a bit of a last ditch attempt to go we're meeting the needs of the public yes see look we're we're filling that role in a similar way that he's also done with this under 16 social media ban it's like let's just try and keep the public happy by giving them what they want giving these noisy people online who are frustrated concerned parents that are of sort of peak voting age like keeping them quiet and but but ultimately it's the people that sit inside the Labour Party that had lost confidence in him so whatever we all thought on the outside obviously there was the local election and he started losing seats to reform and Nigel Farage is suddenly climbing out of nowhere um I think he like panicked and started making these these sort of like quick policy recommendations and implementations and and now it would be interesting to see what does happen with this under 16 social media ban because it wasn't going to be rolled out until the beginning of next year anyway it starts to make you slightly lose faith in the system he's only been in less than two years in power for less than two years and we're seeing a much quicker shift in leadership at the moment yeah how can anyone possibly get anything done in such a short space of time when we know even to use this under 16 social media ban as an example that they say they're going to do it now was they sort of agree it they green light it in the summer of 26 and they're not rolling out until the following year and by then none of us have any idea who's going to be looking after the country without sounding too too without sounding too doom and gloom about it and i don't know i don't know nearly enough about politics to make this cool but i just i feel like i feel like the country is so broken in many ways how can anyone fill that seat and get it right so on the assumption that the under 16 social media band does come into play next year do you think it's a good or a bad thing i think it's a good thing i don't think it's one of those things that is necessary for any child under the age of 16 i think that the i think there's a there's a there's a danger of of us robbing their childhood and their innocence and i think that devices and social media and all of these things that pummel messages which in large are really unhelpful for anyone but especially for someone who's in that crucial stage of development they plague the brain don't they the narrative that's totally out of parents and teachers control and your brain actually doesn't fully develop i think it's like the prefrontal cortex or something i read in the anxious generation.

57:25Louise: Is it until, until 27? So yeah, 25 for girls and 27 for, for boys. 16, very malleable. I think it's, I think the idea is great. I think it's going to be very hard to roll out, especially when you just start it one day. Lots of people from 12 upwards will have already been playing around on social media for many years um how do you suddenly say stop because they're smart they're smarter than we are like people will continue to outsmart us as every new baby is born they will be smarter than the generation that exists before them and so they will find things like vpns they'll find workarounds to access the system and it might make it more dangerous because as parents they might feel safe and secure that their children aren't using it because it's been banned, they then are less likely to have the conversations that they need to have.

58:20I think social media has become so dangerous and I think when it came out originally, I think it was designed for one purpose and it's fucking spiralled into something they cannot control. So they have only one option to turn it off.

58:31Louise: Facebook, when it first came out, was literally just to connect people that went from one university to the next. But do we think that then it's Meta's responsibility to make the content more PG? 13. I think it's a reaction to how bad it is. Yeah, that's that's my it's definitely a reaction, but it's also a deflection So it sort of feels like the easy option, doesn't it just to say no Well, what I'm thinking about spending monies on youth clubs and getting children outside We were talking about how sport is basically going to be the savior for children like getting children outside to get the same form of connection, but in team sport, especially and apparently schools are getting rid of compulsory PE lessons they're like dropping yeah i can't remember the exact stats but he was saying that in that there are like some pretty shocking statistics around PE lessons becoming less important which makes you think that there is some huge agenda behind this they're doomed that people are doomed so children are going to spend less time outdoors doing swimming and pee and going to their nice little local park and instead they're going to be probably doing more it lessons learning how to code no no in a stuffy room somewhere blowing up their brain stop this it is it is really interesting that they're not stopping the tech people or holding them responsible i guess they're literally just funding whole economies at this point so that's where the money is um I think as parents ourself the approach I don't know what your approach would be I'd probably allow Leo to have it explain that we use it for our jobs and hope that his algorithm is tailored towards people that have cool hobbies and passions and people that do play sport or play the violin or are cool creative artists or people that really are doing good things and having good conversations but equally i wouldn't even want him to sit in on like really deep conversations about the crises that are taking place in the world right now because i think that's scary and we need to maintain the youth and innocence of our children for as long as possible i mean surely the tech companies should be filtering anything that talks about like death you know any heavy topics and yeah and not allowing yeah people have to see them they must i'm sorry technology is very clever and very powerful these days there will be ways to be able to do that money will push all of this and power yeah so that there is a sector of our population around the world where they're like we can fucking manipulate the hell out of these people and we're going to we're going to squeeze it i think it's a pushback to say lots of people now having an influence online because any ultimately anyone can have a voice now and they can be really noisy I think it's actually all to do with them with with media the like massive companies gaining back control by making the whole space quite scary I had that thought the other day about like the press trying to claw back some control because you know people are more interested in learning about people directly through them and through the horse's mouth versus various powerful previously powerful media outlets and there must there is definitely there'll be ways around it these kids will find a way around it look at andrew tate he's been banned from social media yeah he's still pumping messages worldwide but also people are saying how youtube shouldn't be banned because it's a helpful resource for young people some clever bastard will develop a new app that will get around all this and kids will be like cheers yeah you're probably right the version of what comes next might be what it was meant to be it It might be like, this is a clean platform.

1:02:27It's going to connect and you can share content that is monitored to keep it all safe and helpful.

1:02:33Louise: There's always a tipping point though where everything boils down to money. They've learned a very harsh lesson. There's been suicides, deaths, whatever else. Who's learned a lesson? Nobody. Whoever's behind this mega machine, whoever's behind this mega machine, they're like this, they're being tied up like this and they'll be like, you better stop this fucking thing now otherwise we're going to do something very bad to you. None of these tech bros that live in Silicon Valley let their children go on social media. All of their kids are banned from social media. Facts. Well, I feel like we could talk for quite a long time on this stuff.

1:03:07Louise: Yeah, I guess we'll watch the space and see what happens next. Should I give you something to finish on in terms of my recommendation for the week? Yes, please. All right, without sounding too geeky, I've stolen something from you. This is a gift that was yours. The Ray-Ban Meta glasses have transformed how I feel about riding my bike. And that can be motorbike or bicycle. Let me tell you for why. Put these glasses on, beautiful, comfortable lenses, which change in the light. I'm like, this is great. Yeah, they've got like the Perv lens on. Okay. But dude, I can be riding my bike and I can be, I can just say Meta.

1:03:41Play Spotify. Plays beautiful music in my ears. Don't have to touch anything. Then I can be like, what a lovely view. Take a photo. Takes the photo for me. then I can be like actually dude Meta can you call Louise calls Louise and I can speak to you

1:03:55Louise: I'm just wearing normal sunglasses I'm just wearing normal sunglasses that is quite mental I didn't realise that it was capable of all of those things and now I'd quite like them back dude I've got motorbike helmets which have got like comms inbuilt and wires and all this stuff and like sometimes I've put headphones underneath the helmet it all spills out this time lenses pop on the face it does everything from video to record to music to calls stunning I actually noted someone was wearing a pair at the event and I thought quite sly dog you're trying to take secret photos without having to get your phone out yes how about you tell me your recommendation mine's really short it's another tv show the Dallas Texas cowboy cheerleaders I don't even know if I've said that all in the right order because it's quite the onomatopoeia it's not even that but it is so good and the one thing that I loved about being in that grotty little hotel room in Barcelona was that I managed to watch like three or four episodes in a row it is i've heard from guy friends this is a good show they're all really hot so i'm not surprised and it's quite inspirational big ups although slightly

1:05:01Louise: slightly inappropriate at times it's kind of giving it's not fully giving america's next top model but like moments which are a bit reminiscent of it when they are giving people glam makeovers forcing them to die their hair shrub around and like there's a little bit of looks maxing going on and that i think is a bit inappropriate and also they're really biased against short people like if you're not five foot four plus you're not going to make it onto the team and that is fucking savage so anyway let's still watch it okay so we've also taken some advice from anna williamson who was our delightful guest last week and she mentioned a little bit of a technique and some tips around how to keep the relationship on track which we listen to very carefully embarrassingly we've literally sat down and done exactly that yep the 777 technique we've applied so we've got a something in seven weeks no sorry seven in seven days yeah seven weeks in seven months so you can tell them what we've got seven days which is actually now sooner thanks i'm really excited ryan has booked for us to go to peter's gym nurseries for a nice little dinner a date nice seven weeks we've got a holiday we're gonna go on a family holiday which is so important because have we not sat down and booked this in genuinely i think we would have breezed through the whole summer not planned a trip and just focused on work and then leo would have started school and that would have been really mean because he wouldn't have even got to learn how to swim in a pool and gone on holiday yeah and seven or maybe not mean but just a bit selfish from us And then in seven months, we are, we're hoping to go out to Georgia, maybe around January time to meet with our surrogate and hang out and, and kind of get, do a bit of recce on the place before the baby is maybe born in spring.

1:06:44I reckon that people listening to this show should give that a go. Have a little think about the 777, I was going to say rule, but it's not, it's a technique.

1:06:52Louise: Yeah. Seven days, seven weeks, seven months. On that note, that was a lovely conversation. That was actually. thanks for thanks for being here Louise maybe you could come back thank you boss and if you guys enjoyed this episode please do share it to anyone else that you think might love it it helps us out hugely we like to spread the message far and wide if you think there's anything relevant to anybody any of your friends family members if they're going through something or they just want to have a bit of a giggle then send it to them based purely on our recommendations because they're good and you can also write in and ask us questions which we tried to get around to when we're not babbling on too much and our email address is h triple s at srproductions.co.uk you can also get all links to everything in the show notes including we'll pop some of our recommendations in there like the shows that you guys can watch but yeah do stay in touch follow us on instagram we still really want to hit the 100 000 follower mark yeah we do um and we'll share some other bits and bobs like some cute little little bits over there too also just wanted to say before we go um i had a really wonderful opportunity to invite some of my subscribers from letters to leo so the point is to your to the rugby event yeah so anyone listening to this who i mean i've mentioned letters to leo a few times and this is not me plugging it so much but it's just that platform that i've got with beehive which is my letters to leo which is a weekly thing i do it's given me the opportunity to bring those people and that community to some of the events that i've done i did one last week that we've spoken about more coming.

1:08:22We should also invite some of our

1:08:23Louise: who said she said this? Yeah. If there's any guys in particular who are listening to these episodes and saying, oh, he's dropped the letters to the other thing a few times. Please subscribe because on the next event, which will be coming up in the summer, we could connect in person. And that's epic. Gorge. Love that, Rye. Yeah. Alright. Adios. See you next week. Yeah. See you next week. Bye. Stance.

1:08:53Thank you.