April 28, 2025 • 50 mins
Welcome to MID Season Five...We have a very special guest.
Mia Freedman has been in countless conversations with Holly Wainwright—on mics, off mics, in meetings, in texts. But she’s never been on MID. Until now.
In this episode, Holly kicks off Season Five with someone who knows her well, and who’s read something very personal—her brand new book, He Would Never.
It’s a story about the limits and power of female friendships, narcissistic love, and the tricky transitions from girlhood to teenagehood. And Mia had thoughts. Lots of them. For one - the teenage girls we were in the 90s are very different than the teenage girls of today.
This episode is about writing and ambition. Confidence and self-doubt. Teenage daughters and their teenage selves. It’s a conversation between two women the same age, but at different parenting stages.
At the end of this episode, Holly has a very special gift for you - so stick around, you don't want to miss it.
You can pre order Holly's book He Would Never here. And it's available in all good book stores from April 29th
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Share your feedback! Send us a voice message or email us at podcast@mamamia.com.au
Follow us on Instagram @MidbyMamamia or sign up to the MID newsletter, dropping weekly here.
Mamamia's new podcast BIZ is rewriting the rules of work with no generic advice - just real strategies from women who've actually been there. Listen here.
CREDITS:
Host: Holly Wainwright
Guest: Mia Freedman
Executive Producer: Naima Brown
Senior Producer: Grace Rouvray
Producer: Tahli Blackman
Audio Producer: Jacob Round
Mamamia acknowledges the Traditional Owners of the Land we have recorded this podcast on, the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation. We pay our respects to their Elders past and present, and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:10):
You're listening to a MoMA Mia podcast.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
Mama Mia acknowledges the traditional owners of land and waters
that this podcast is recorded on. It's Annals dropping into
your feed here with a very special episode of MIT
Mama Mer's podcast for Women who Are Anything But. Season
five kicks off with a very special guest. Holly Wainwright
is talking to Miya Friedman.
Speaker 3 (00:34):
Now.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
They've had a million conversations in their lives, but she's
never been on mid until now, and Holly kicks it
off because Mia has read her brand new book, He
Would Never It's a beautiful story about the limits and
power of female friendships, and also it really shines a
light on teenage girls and the teenage girls we were
(00:57):
in the nineties are very different than the teenage girls
of today. It's a conversation between two women the same age,
but at different parenting stages.
Speaker 1 (01:06):
So enjoy.
Speaker 4 (01:08):
It's that disconnect period in your daughter's life or your
own life. I'm sure we can all probably remember it
where you cross this rubicon from being a child in
the eyes of others to being you know, sexually available
(01:28):
or a source of sexual gratification for men. There's always
a disconnect because it always happens.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
Earlier than you can see. You can see it.
Speaker 5 (01:38):
Hello, I'm Holly Wainwright and I am Mid, Midlife, Mid Family,
Mid Mayhem. Welcome back to our show Mid Conversations for
gen X women who are anything. But this is our
first episode of a news season, and as you'll know
if you're a regular listener, it's starting a little differently
(01:58):
and that's because I've got something special for you later
at the end this season on Mid, we have got
gurus and health experts. I have nineties icons and household names.
I have Melinda French Gates. Yes, we have carefully planned
every episode to bring you something that makes life a
little bit better, a great story, a very useful idea,
(02:20):
something to try, someone who reminds you of you. And today,
for the first episode of this new season of MID,
I have a friend. I think you know her. It's
Mia Friedman. If you listen to Mamma Mia out loud,
you know that I spend a lot of time talking
to Mia, along with our beloved co host Jesse Stevens,
(02:41):
disagreeing with Mia quite a lot, laughing till I snort
with her, gossiping with her, setting the world to rights,
with her, but I'd never asked her to be on
MID before. And the reason that I wanted to for
the first ep of season five was twofold. I wanted
to talk to her about my new book. It's called
He Would Never, and it's out in a hot minute.
(03:03):
I nervously slipped Mia an early copy of it over
the summer holidays, and she immediately messaged me this say
she wanted to talk to me about it on MID
and not before, so I have been waiting nervously to
hear what she wants to tell.
Speaker 2 (03:16):
Me about it.
Speaker 5 (03:17):
But also it's because of the themes of the book
I think they're going to resonate with you as listeners
to MID.
Speaker 1 (03:23):
It's about the power.
Speaker 5 (03:24):
And limitations of female friendships. It's about narcissistic relationships. It's
centered around a knoddy little mystery, and it's about the
sometimes confusing shift of little girls into teenage ones. This
is something that Mia and I talk about off Mike
a lot. She's the first person I ask for parenting
advice about teenagers because although she and I are exactly
(03:47):
the same age, she had her kids a lot younger
than I did. She's a grandmother now for God's sake,
so she's always a few big paces ahead in lots
of ways, of course, So we talk about guiding teenage daughters,
and we also reflect on our teenage selves, who appear
to have existed in an entirely different universe. What we
got right, what we got wrong. We talk about all
(04:08):
of that, and we talk about writing and ambition and
confidence and friendship. But we start, of course with me
asking Mia a very bald question about he would never
and getting the kind of honest answer I would only
expect from the extraordinarily honest, funny, brilliant, generous MEA Friedman.
And don't forget to stay listening at the end of
(04:30):
this conversation for your surprise, me A Friedman, Holly Wayne, Right,
there's nothing like getting you in a studio and putting
in front of a mic and asking you did you
like my book? Not really, I've read better.
Speaker 1 (04:45):
No, she's just fucking loved it.
Speaker 4 (04:47):
So what happened was you gave it to me, and
then I was away with Jesse, our third co host,
and kind of like our little sister and friend on
out loud, and she read it first.
Speaker 1 (05:01):
And you and.
Speaker 4 (05:02):
I often get given books by friends and in some
ways they land, and you just go, this is a
job because you know that your friend will be very
anxious and that you've got to read it, and then
you've got to obviously say nice things about it, even
if you don't really like it. And so then Jesse
(05:24):
started reading it first, and she was just like she
spent the whole weekend just like I just want to
I just want to go and finish holly book. I
just all, it's all I want to read. It's all
I want to think about. So I was like, okay,
this is a good sign. So when she was finished,
I started reading. And as soon as I started, I
(05:45):
realized why you had been such a nutcase for before,
because I said to Jesse, what's so good about it?
Because She's like, I'm just desperate to read it. I
just want to get back to it. I just want
to get back to it. Can you hold the baby?
I just want to get back to Holly's book. And
I'm like, what's so good about it? And she said
she's gone to like she's gone up three levels. What's
(06:07):
she said? I understand why she's so stressed. What she's
tried to do is extraordinary. She's thrown a lot of
balls in the air, and she's bitten off a lot
and she's pulling it off.
Speaker 5 (06:20):
It must be tiresome for you to have to watch
me having a breakdown every time I write a book.
Speaker 1 (06:24):
That was a long answer to your off shot question.
Speaker 5 (06:26):
And thank you for all those lovely things say, because
Mia does have to watch listen watch me have a
breakdown every time write.
Speaker 1 (06:33):
Yeah, I have.
Speaker 4 (06:33):
It's just so funny because I don't write books anymore,
but all my friends do, including you and Jesse, who
took my closest friends, and also Jesse's sister Claire recently
wrote her first book. And you will have breakdowns in
very different ways. You will have complete breakdowns, but differently,
and you have different breakdowns from book to book. This one,
(06:57):
i've never seen you go so sort of the one
that you did before, which is a Couple Upstairs that
was quite dark, and when I read that, you went
quite dark, and I understood You're like you were really
insecure when you were writing that, which is interesting because
it was like going back to a time about an
emotionally abusive relationship and there were some dark themes in it.
(07:20):
With this one, it felt different. I felt like you
were like wrestling an alligator. Yeah, for a really long
period of time. And I've never been one of your readers.
You've never given it to me early, which I appreciate,
thank you, but.
Speaker 5 (07:35):
It really would be a job.
Speaker 1 (07:36):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (07:36):
I know you have other readers, and I also know
that you didn't give it to them this time either,
and I yeah, it was just once I read the book,
I understood everything.
Speaker 5 (07:47):
It's funny because I told you this at the time
because obviously we record together, you know, three five times
a week, so we see each other all the time.
And for years, I when I haven't only spoken about this,
but when I handed the first draft of this book in,
it got handed back to me like they were like,
you need it needs some more work. And you didn't
tell me that at the time, because I was really devastated.
(08:10):
And tell me why, Like is that because every author,
I mean, I know what it's like to hand in
a book and all you want is no notes. It
isn't that actually, well it's never happened to me. But
like then when you get it back and it's like,
here's all the things you need to do, that's always
the point at which I want to give back my
advance yes, and say I don't want to do it anymore.
I want to do it. I think part of what
(08:31):
it was is and you know, we talk about this
a lot, but I always overestimate how what I can
do and how much I can do, you know what
I mean. I'm always like, it'll be fine.
Speaker 4 (08:41):
I mean the time it takes you to write, the
time it takes to write it, and the amount of
focus and energy that it takes to because the thing
is that most people write books, and that's their job, right,
But you write books as well as having a full
time job, yes, and doing a hundred other things. And
you know, lots of authors have kids, but most authors
don't also have another full time job.
Speaker 1 (09:02):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (09:02):
So I think that one of the if I learned
something through this book, and I'm sure I learned lots
of things, it was about that about trying to focus,
because I think what happened is when I handed it
in and I've been writing this book for like two years.
It is a big and complicated plot. We're not going
to go into the plot massively here. I want to
talk about some of the themes from it. But it's a
big and complicated plot that has lots of characters, and
(09:22):
it goes over a long period of time, so there's
a lot of moving parts, right, And I think that
I literally bit off more than I could chew in
the way that I normally work.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
Right.
Speaker 5 (09:33):
So when I handed it in my very fabulous publisher,
she pretty much said to me, the last third feels
rushed and not like you have you know, you haven't
landed it yet And.
Speaker 1 (09:45):
Did you secretly know that to share?
Speaker 5 (09:47):
Yeah, but I think that this is one of the
things that you really struggle with when you're writing. Is
you lose sight of your instinct anymore? Like is this good?
Or do I just not think it's good because I'm insecure,
blah blah.
Speaker 4 (09:57):
Blah, because also no one else it was just had
been in your head for so long, Like I remember
when you wrote some of your first books. I think
you talked about this book or this themes around this book,
this idea of a camping holiday with a group of friends,
like years ago, eight years ago.
Speaker 5 (10:19):
I had been thinking about this plot and what to
do with this idea for a really long time, and
then it sort of came together when I sort of
tied it together with this thing about teenagers and teenage girls,
which I want us to talk about in a minute. Anyway,
I think I was really ambitious, so you know how
you said, And it's lovely to hear that. Jesse was like,
she's leveled up. I think I was ambitious and maybe
(10:41):
a bit off more than I could chew. How unlike
us to do that. So when anyway, when my publisher
confirmed that to me, and she said, you need some
more time, you need some more focus. This book is
going to be good. It's going to be good, but
it's not quite good yet. And you probably had fronting.
Speaker 4 (10:55):
But you also probably hadn't mapped out time in your
diary to do that.
Speaker 1 (10:59):
Like how did you write this book?
Speaker 4 (11:01):
I forget because you've written them in lots of different ways.
You've taken stretches off to focus completely and try to
write them in the three month stretch.
Speaker 1 (11:08):
You've done like a day a week for a year.
Tell me.
Speaker 5 (11:11):
The way that I'm trying I try to work now is,
as you know, I stack my mam and mea work
at the front of the week, generally speaking, where I'm
here in one hundred percent Mama, mea world Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday,
and then in theory, Thursday, Friday and the weekend, let's
be honest, is like more creative projects, writing books at
(11:33):
other creative projects rather And that's good in theory, But
have you ever known our lives to go exactly like
in the neat little blocks that we try and put
them in, do you know what I mean? So it's
kind of more everything kind of bleeds.
Speaker 4 (11:45):
Do you think in a perfect world you need to
just go I'm going to take four months or I'm
going to take three months, and I'm like almost like
Matt leave and I'm just going to focus on it.
Speaker 5 (11:54):
I think I think yes in a way. But then
what I've also come to know about myself, you know,
the whole introvert extrovert thing. Yeah, I think I love
writing for its solitude because I do quite like being alone.
But I'm not a pure introvert, like if if I
didn't have the you know, also breaking it up with
coming in here and being with you guys and talking
(12:16):
about So you like the switching gear, I actually like that.
I don't know if it is brilliant for creative process,
but it's good for my mental space. I think if
I was just locked away with the manuscript for and
nothing else. I don't think that would suit me in
the way that I know some writers are very suited
to being purely alone.
Speaker 4 (12:34):
The part where your publisher said the last third feels
rushed is that because you underestimated how long it would
take you to write, or because you just were a
bit sick of it and you.
Speaker 1 (12:43):
Just wanted to end it, Like, why do you think that?
Speaker 5 (12:45):
I also think that what I've learned is I used
to say, you know how that fiction writers always say,
are you're a plotter or a panther? That's the thing
that so plotters are. You will have heard like Jane
Harper talks about this, Not that I'm comparing myself to her,
but you plot out exactly what's going to happen in
minuscule detail before you write the book, so you know
(13:06):
you've got everything, the whole plot.
Speaker 1 (13:08):
Down, like the parents saying, with all the stuff on there.
Speaker 5 (13:11):
Every chapter is Matt, I feel like you used to
do that. Didn't you do that with posts? Well, I've
always done it with I do it in theory but
not in detail. Right, So then, because I'm also quite
like ideas come to you while you do it. You know,
like creative people. You're you'll be writing and you'll be
like this would be funny or that'd be good or
so I resist that kind of structure to a point.
Speaker 1 (13:32):
You resist all kinds of stuff.
Speaker 5 (13:34):
I know, it's it's one of my favorite and I
think that what I learned on this book is I
needed that. I really needed that structure because this was
like trying to wrestle an alligator, and because it was
so big and broad and sprawling, and I was trying
to apply my usual kind of she'll be right techniques
to that last half that wasn't wasn't going to work.
Speaker 4 (13:55):
How many characters are in it, and it because it jumps,
it jumps.
Speaker 5 (13:59):
Five families and they and really the main characters are
Danny and liss Unlockey Well and Sadie. So there are
there are like there are characters who are more major
than minor. But they've all got kids. And that's the
other thing is that so they've all got kids. And
the marriage various configurations of marriage there are like there's
single parents, and there's a gay couple, and there's you know,
(14:21):
two conventionally married couples. And they all met at mother's group,
which is something that did happen to me in real
life is I made good friends at mother's group and
we do actually go camping together every year. They are
very nervous about this book I'm but obviously the rest
of it isn't and the thing that then, so that
is a lot to juggle and I did learn that
I do have to basically be much more structured. So
(14:43):
when I rewrote the last third, and obviously I ended
up rewriting quite a lot of it, then I did
really plan it out in meticulous detail like I gave.
I listened to the feedback about the structure. Editors are
always right, like we talk about this a lot, mere
that you often as you climb a tree in a
creative field, people give you fewer and fewer notes.
Speaker 1 (15:03):
Yeah, which is terrible.
Speaker 5 (15:05):
Yeah, you need more notes. Whether you're like Mike White
making the White loaders for like he's got four hours
of deleted scenes on the floor. Not that I'm again
comparing myself to him, or whether you're writing a book
or whether you're conducting an interview, like you need other
people to be able to say.
Speaker 4 (15:20):
To you, oh yeah, keep doing that saying I'm not
comparing myself to don't happen. I'm not comparing myself to
Mike Quite. You're a best selling author, this is what
your fifth book, sixth book like.
Speaker 1 (15:30):
You're a big fucking deal, hollywayn right, Like.
Speaker 5 (15:33):
Stop and I don't feel like a big deal. When
we come back, Mea and I discuss our own coming
of age stories and that tricky, sticky time between being
a little kid and being a woman.
Speaker 4 (15:49):
Do you still wear the title author a little?
Speaker 5 (15:54):
I think I'm getting more comfortable in it, but it is.
It's really funny how intimidating that feels, that word. And
I think it's because the literary scene, as it were,
is a very compartment lies thing. The other thing I
wanted to say is, as you know very well, I
(16:14):
didn't start writing books till I was in my forties, right,
and it was literally the thing I most wanted to
do when I was a little girl. We're about to
talk about being teenagers, but if there was a teenage
Holly who had a dream of what she wanted, I
was like, I'm going to be a writer. But I
wasn't a writer, you know, I mean I was lots
of other things.
Speaker 4 (16:31):
But you said you you always like when you were
a kid, you would write.
Speaker 5 (16:35):
Stories and way I used to keep I used to
write in these notebooks, these really convoluted stories about me
and all my friends, and we were all dating different
members of Juran.
Speaker 4 (16:44):
Juran oh fanfic before there was Away exactly, I was
dating Simon and the bomb loved it because you're a
main character.
Speaker 5 (16:51):
Because that was the main character. And I used to
go into school in the mornings and literally get my
friends to sit down and we'd all read, and I'd
read to them about what happened, and then they'd be like,
well why would then then there was drama, And then
when there was going to be a sex scene because
obviously I couldn't really write sex scenes then because I was,
you know, kissing though kissing, I'd be like and then
(17:13):
dot dot pause and fade to black. Oh well I
was doing that.
Speaker 1 (17:18):
Then? How old were you when you were doing that?
Speaker 5 (17:21):
Like twelve eleven and twelve like young?
Speaker 1 (17:23):
And I was writing bad poetry.
Speaker 5 (17:25):
Yeah, it's I think it's today age, isn't it like?
And the thing that's mortifying is that we were filling
notebooks with that stuff. But now people are feeling, well,
if people are doing it.
Speaker 1 (17:33):
Well, they're making teaktoks.
Speaker 5 (17:34):
Yeah they are, That's exactly what they're doing, and they'll
and then ten minutes later they're mortified by them. Anyway,
the thing that tied this idea for me together about
the camping is that then I wanted to write about
teenage girls, and I wanted to write about being parents
teenage girls. And this is something that you and I
talk about a lot all the time, and partly because
(17:55):
one of the things and obviously we're going to talk
in broad terms here because we're not going to modify
our teenage daughters anymore than we already do all the time.
One of the things that I noticed the most about
my daughter moving from that phase of being a little
kid in to being a teenager, apart from the changes
in her in terms of you know how, there's a
moment in which they're running around completely un self conscious,
(18:18):
nothing like just being crazy, cartwheeling, dancing, whatever they're doing,
expressing their opinions, and then like a switch flicks, they're
suddenly mortified by themselves, you know, like, yeah, yourselves away
and certainly by you. But the other thing that happens
is when your daughter begins to become a young woman.
Everyone around you changes too. And the thing that I
(18:42):
would notice when we would go away on our not
necessarily with these camping friends, but we live in a
beachy kind of culture, is that suddenly the conversations you're
having all the time, and often from men, actually would
be like, Oh, you're going to be in trouble, aren't you.
Oh she's going to be in she's going to be trouble. Oh,
I don't envy you. And they're making all these comments,
usually to the dad, usually to the dad, yep, about
(19:06):
this girl who's just moving through the world and changing.
And it's a lot, It is a lot.
Speaker 4 (19:13):
I remember the first time my daughter got sexually her assed.
She was walking, she would have been twelve, and she
was walking to a friend's house and a guy walked
past her and sort of licked his lips and said something.
Can I remember, you know, it's one of those times.
(19:33):
And not long after that, we were out in Bonday,
just for dinner, and we were just walking to the
car and a car load of guys cat called and
she thought they were cat calling me, but I knew
they were cat calling her. And it's that disconnect period
in your daughter's life or your own life. I'm sure
(19:54):
we can all probably remember it where you cross this
rubicon from being a child in the eyes of others
to being a you know, sexually available or a source
of sexual gradification for men. And it always happens way before.
(20:15):
There's always a disconnect because it always happens earlier than.
Speaker 1 (20:18):
It you can see it.
Speaker 4 (20:20):
All I can think about is that brilliant scene in
the Barbie movie when Mago Robbie comes to the real
world for the first time and she's walking down the
street and she for the first time becomes aware of
being perceived in the male gaze, and she says, I've
got this weird feeling. It's like I'm aware, but like
aware of myself, And to me, that is an absolute
fantastic portrayal, but in faster time of what it's like
(20:42):
to be a teenage, that's.
Speaker 5 (20:43):
Exactly what I thought, and it made me a bit
emotional for that reason. Do you remember that happening to
you yourself? Can you put yourself back in the first
time you remember being a lot like that on the street?
Speaker 4 (20:54):
Yeah, I can, well, I can remember the first time
I noticed it in myself, which was when I was
at the beach and I was walking and the sun
was coming down and I could see my shadow and
I could see my shadow went in at the waist
and I really noticed that, and I was really quite
chuffed about it. And then I remember trying on like
(21:17):
tight clothes and looking at myself in the mirror and
trying on the persona of looking sexy, but not really
understanding what that was. And then of course I remember
being you know, sexual, I guess now you'd call it
sexual assault. When I was at the Easter Show and
with my friends, and I would have been twelve or thirteen,
(21:40):
and it was a sort of a crowd and a
guy walked towards me, grabbed me in the by the
vagina and or grabbed me in the volver the crotch area,
and kept walking.
Speaker 1 (21:51):
And I remember feeling so just shocked, horrified.
Speaker 4 (21:57):
Dirty because it that, and I couldn't even process that.
I didn't even I didn't even tell anyone because I
didn't even know.
Speaker 1 (22:06):
What it was.
Speaker 5 (22:08):
It's such a profound thing when you suddenly realize it's
like you shift into being your sudden like oh, I'm pray,
yeah right, yes, But I didn't really think I was,
and probably especially for our generation and maybe even more
so for our daughters. You can do anything, you can
go anywhere, you can be whatever you want to be.
You're just like the boys. And then suddenly, oh, I'm
(22:28):
not like the.
Speaker 4 (22:30):
Message because I'm pray so much. Yeah, was it gen
X women growing up?
Speaker 5 (22:36):
We did, but it was a different stage of feminism.
But but you suddenly if you ever thought that you
were just like the boys, if you were one of
then you're suddenly like, oh, I'm not. And then there's
this really interesting period I think as you gory and
grapple with that whole idea, and then often what a
lot of young women will do is they'll figure out
(22:57):
a way to make it work for them in a way,
you know, like in how do I harness? Which bits
of this new world do I like? And which bits
of it do I really not? And in the book
Lyra who is and who her best friend's dad may
or may not do something inappropriate to her, but certainly
hasn't an appropriate relationship with her, and that he calls
(23:19):
her and they talk and he's kind of she hasn't
got a father who's around, and he tries to step
into that role. But in a creepy way. She remembers
the very first time she sees the way he looks
at her, and you just know, you just have a
sense that the way he's looking at you is different
to the way he looked at you last summer when
you were also in a swimsuit in the pools.
Speaker 4 (23:38):
And the irony is not the irony, but the biological
reality is that for many of us, the gaze of
lights and our daughters when it is removed from us
at that same time, and both things are kind of imperceptible.
Like you know, you can think, oh, people don't cat
(23:59):
call anymore, but it's like oh, and then you're walking
down the street with a younger woman and you go, oh,
they just don't cat call me anymore. And you're like, right,
I can walk past a building site and not have
to And it's not because man are more evolved. I
like to believe that, but it's actually just because I'm
not in their sights anymore. I'm no longer pray. And
of course that feels, I mean, different women have different
(24:21):
reactions to it. It feels like a lovely relief. Some
women feel, of course, a great sense of loss.
Speaker 1 (24:29):
Do you ever.
Speaker 5 (24:29):
Feel you know how there's a trope that it makes
us jealous. Do you ever feel that? No, I don't
feel that. No.
Speaker 4 (24:35):
And you watch some women on TikTok or you know, celebrities,
and you see the ones that are struggling with it,
and it's usually the ones, I guess who've really defined
themselves by how they look and have defined themselves through
the male gaze and through through the validation of that.
(24:56):
And like you look at them with their daughters and
like they're trying to look like their sisters. And then
and then you know, a man, or you must be
as if I want to be told that, like, that's
not my aim.
Speaker 1 (25:10):
Is to look like my daughter's sister.
Speaker 4 (25:13):
Like I'm very happy to sort of back off that
stage that I never was particularly inamate of being on.
But I'm very like, this is their time.
Speaker 5 (25:22):
Now, It's no time to be object to find and.
Speaker 1 (25:25):
Say, yeah, rastically, what am I even saying?
Speaker 5 (25:28):
I know exactly what you mean me. I also but
and it's also interesting that when it started to happen
to my daughter, that when I saw that shift, it
brought out the protective mother and me in a way
that few things do. Is that when I see an
old particularly an older older man, look at her in
a certain way. I want to kill them. I really do,
(25:48):
even though I understand it because and this is what
the complicated thing that's kind of I was trying to
explore a bit in this book is that, you know,
there's there's a point in the book where Lockie says
to one of the other guys, you know, mothers want
to keep treat their teenage girls like their babies. But
we know that they're basically the monsters who tortured us
at high school. Like that they are God, yes, and
(26:10):
that they know exactly what they're doing.
Speaker 1 (26:12):
And that's awful.
Speaker 5 (26:14):
I know that that's awful.
Speaker 4 (26:15):
It's like these these adult men, and of course not
all adult men, course not, but there is a certain
type of adult man who is trying to correct the
experience that he had in high school where he didn't
have any power and now he's got power by the
virtual of the fact that he's an adult and she's not.
Speaker 5 (26:33):
Oh, I know, And there's a there's a to very
much the point of not all adult men. I talk
quite a bit with the men in my life about
how they handle that shift of suddenly all the girls
in the pool or at the beach or whatever. Who
are your daughter's little friends?
Speaker 1 (26:50):
Do all look different and they're all wearing their up
their bamborkini?
Speaker 5 (26:52):
And I asked Brent. And you know, I'm not suggesting
that men are going to be completely honest with any
woman about this, but I asked Brent once like, because
I noticed the way that some men were looking at
the girls, And I said, is it hard? Is it hard?
And he said no, he said.
Speaker 1 (27:09):
Eyes eyes down, eyes down.
Speaker 5 (27:13):
It's just like you're an adult and you just have
to keep that like eyes down. Like it's not hard
not to stare. It's not hard not to be lacivious.
I don't know, but.
Speaker 4 (27:22):
Don't you remember that time when you become aware of
the male gaze? But then you and you're also you know,
your horny, you've got your hormones going. It's not you know,
puberty has an effect on girls as they become young women.
Speaker 1 (27:39):
But you think you can control it.
Speaker 4 (27:41):
So you want the male gaze, but you only want
the people who you like to look at you.
Speaker 1 (27:47):
You don't want that old guy on the bus to
look at you.
Speaker 4 (27:50):
But you want to wear the booty shorts even if
you can't articulate this. You want to wear the booty
shorts because you want that guy that you have a
crush on to like you, or that good looking older
guy that you think is cute. And that's what's a
really tough thing, is the mother of a young teenager
to try and explain that nuance where they can get
(28:10):
very old. But you know, that's his problem. He shouldn't
be looking at me. It's like, well, you're right, he shouldn't.
But you can't control who looks at you when you're
in the booty shorts.
Speaker 1 (28:20):
You can't.
Speaker 4 (28:22):
So and are you are you mature enough to be
able to understand that?
Speaker 1 (28:28):
And that you know? I remember settling. You know, there's a.
Speaker 4 (28:31):
Sometimes joke that there's a moment in the for every
teenage girl where their mother will slut shame them. She
won't mean to, but you're like, you can't.
Speaker 1 (28:42):
Go out like that.
Speaker 4 (28:43):
And for us, that's because we're fearful of of that.
But then the feminist in us is also like, well,
she should be able to wear whatever she wants. We
can't stop men from looking at her. But so I
say to my I started saying to my daughter, I
(29:04):
know this isn't fair. I know this isn't right, and
we will I will not stop fighting for you to
be able to wear whatever you want, whenever you want,
and be completely secure and free from unwanted male attention.
But at the moment it's not that way.
Speaker 5 (29:24):
It's really complicated because we've discussed this before, but there
was one of the things that's really tricky, I think
for in this teenage time when you're figuring out all
of this stuff, is you are proud of your changing
body in a way because you realize that this is
going to be a part of being Yeah, but you
also feel a lot of shame about it. And what
(29:45):
I want to do in talking to my daughter about
it is not to add to that shame. But it's hard.
And I remember a while ago we were at a
thing with lots of kids and my child was younger
than she is now, and the little boys were teasing
her about her boobs or whatever, and she was really
upset and I said to her, put a jumper on.
Speaker 3 (30:05):
I know it wasn't that I didn't say put a
jumper on because I thought it was okay, And obviously
that the whole when I found out later what those
little boys have been saying like it was a whole thing.
Speaker 5 (30:18):
But my firsts also because I wanted to stay at
the place and do whatever. You know, what I mean
was to do that. But that was kind of saying
to my daughter, were you're asking for it? That these
eleven year old boys are teasing you.
Speaker 4 (30:29):
I remember my daughter came back from a camp or
something and like, oh, this guy hit me in the
playground or grabbed me or something. I'm like, Oh, that's
just what boys sometimes do when they like you.
Speaker 1 (30:39):
And then I was like, oh my.
Speaker 4 (30:40):
God, it's true things that we've internalized, and it is
just such a head scramble for us as gen X
feminist women because what we want to be true is
not necessarily what we know is true. And also that
disconnect between we see danger and threat where they don't
(31:03):
yet because they haven't caught up with how they're viewed
in society because they still probably sleeping with a teddy bear,
but they've got boobs.
Speaker 5 (31:12):
And when you think about it, it's a lot to
get your head around. Everything is changing. But you know,
I'm reading because I'm interviewing Ioni Sky for this show
It Soon, and I'm reading her memoir, and one of
the things she's really good on she's in Generation x
Icon is her she talks about herself as a teenager
and to your point earlier, how horny she was and
(31:34):
that she was inappropriately young in inappropriate situation. So she's
on movie sets and she's like fourteen and fifteen and
model in those days or they were all getting emancipated
from their parents because they allowed you to work adult hours.
So Hollywood, the studios would say, you can have this part,
but you have to get emancipated so that you can
(31:55):
work adult hours. Otherwise we're going to have to have
a teacher on set and you're gonna have to work
or a lah blah blah. And she talks with really refreshing,
non judgmental honesty about her first movie. Keanu Reeves was
her co star, and she just wants to have sex
with him, yeah, because he's Keanu Reeves and he is
unbelievably hot, and she goes, she tries, and she turns
(32:18):
up in his seat. She was fifteen and he was
only a bit older, and he's like no, And then
she goes on to have relationships with Anthony Keith Is
from The Red hot chili peppers and he's eight years older,
and she moves in with it. But the thing that's
really interesting reading it through our lens now is we've
(32:38):
I mean, and I'm not suggesting that that's all fine,
and there's plenty of room for exploitation abuse in that paradigm,
but we have extended childhood to a point I think
of as gen X parents, we've extended It feels shocking
to think about fifteen, sixteen, seventeen year old girl behaving that.
Speaker 1 (32:55):
Way, but moving out of home when I.
Speaker 5 (32:58):
Was fifteen, sixteen seventeen, I thought I was twenty one,
Oh god, yess, and I was gordgeous going for what
I wanted and I didn't understand why it was inappropriate.
Whether it's appropriate, of course, and so it's kind of like,
should you be ashamed of that? Do you know what
I mean?
Speaker 1 (33:17):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (33:18):
I think we do a lot of It's really hard
because at a time when we want to be telling
young girls to explore their sexuality and lean into how
they're feeling, and there's nothing wrong with that, I often
have really weird conversations with parents of teenage girls, particularly fathers.
(33:39):
I remember when I used to look after Dolly magazine,
and the dads were really against the sealed sections and
the Dolly doctor and stuff, but the moms knew that
girls want access to that information way before they're going
to act on it.
Speaker 1 (33:53):
You know.
Speaker 4 (33:54):
They want to understand sex, they want to read, you know,
they want to try on what it's like to be older.
Speaker 1 (34:01):
And so even though you know, you know that, I
don't know.
Speaker 4 (34:07):
It's just really challenging being the mother of a teenage girl,
it really is. And I always say, like, you know,
the best place for a young girl to explore her
sexuality is within a committed relationship, whether it's with another
girl or with another guy. But what you should want
as a parent is for your daughter when she's old
(34:28):
enough to be fooling around with someone who really cares
about her. And I think that this idea that you
have to put off sex or you know, lock your
sexuality in a box for as long as possible, and
that's the goal. It's like, whoever's daughter lasts the longest
without doing any of that stuff wins.
Speaker 1 (34:48):
I don't know, maybe.
Speaker 4 (34:49):
Because I learned, you know, had a great I guess
sexual awakening with a committed boyfriend when I was around fifteen.
And that was amazing because a lot of women our
age have really awful stories about, you know, their first
sexual encounter or when they were teenage girls, and I didn't.
And I think that has paved the way for a
(35:10):
really good relationship with my sex life and with myself
and with sexual pleasure and all of those things because
it was in a committed relationship.
Speaker 5 (35:20):
That's that's so interesting, because it's true. Everybody kind of
marks you as a teenage parent of a daughter of
as whether or not she is the exactly They're not
saying that out loud. The questions people always ask me
about my teenage daughter. Sometimes I'm just like, come on,
like really, you know, it's really probably I'm the one
(35:41):
that I tell you. But that's okay. I know you're allowed, but.
Speaker 1 (35:44):
I know what you mean.
Speaker 4 (35:44):
It's like as if a father's job.
Speaker 5 (35:47):
Is to the shotgun on the porch.
Speaker 4 (35:49):
Yeah, and to hold that off for as long as possible,
And it's like.
Speaker 1 (35:53):
Is it?
Speaker 5 (35:53):
I mean, I know anyway, I always ask you for
parental advice, and you are one of my village of
oracles because you're always a bit ahead. You've always been
ahead of me, and often the thing. The pattern that
plays out is you go, you tell me this, and
I got that will never have happened, all right, yeah, yeah, yeah,
I don't think so. And then of course I.
Speaker 4 (36:14):
Can't imagine until it happens, right, And my mum did
the same with me, like I would talk to her
about because I've got an eldest son who my son's
twenty seven, my daughter's nineteen, and i've got a younger
son who's sixteen. And I remember saying to her about
my eldest son, oh, I don't think he's drinking yet,
and she's like, darling, if you think he's not drinking,
he's drinking. And I'm like, do you think so? Of
(36:34):
course he was drinking. But I think you can be
a little bit blind to what's going on with your
own children. And even where I thought my daughter was
up to when she was younger, you know, now she's
at the age we have a great, very open and
honest relationship.
Speaker 1 (36:48):
And I thought we did then, but.
Speaker 4 (36:50):
Now she tells me there are a whole bunch of
things that I had no idea about.
Speaker 5 (36:54):
Oh my mother has not still has no idea.
Speaker 4 (36:56):
Yeah, and exactly my mother doesn't either, So I think that,
you know, teenagers are rat bags in all the in
good ways, like because that's their job in some ways,
so rat bags, their job is to push the envelope.
Speaker 5 (37:12):
When we come back, MEA and I are talking about
parenting and friendship. I wanted to ask you though, because
obviously I know you, and I know your family, and
you seem to have really good relationships with your kids.
I've always thought that, like, I see them around you
when they don't think anybody's looking, and they're affectionate and
they take the piss out of you, which I think
(37:33):
is very healthy in parental relationships. But you know you're
obviously very close. Do you have any words of advice
for how you get through that period of well like this,
because we've often talked about how your kids are little
and they think you're amazing, and then they go through
adolescents and they think you're an idiot and they want
and the door closes, whether they're boys or girls in
(37:54):
different ways at different times, the door closes, and you're
just then the desperate I sometimes feel like a desperate
girlfriend who's like, and you want to go to the
shops with me? Do you want to come out with me?
I'll buy you a thing. I'll buy you a thing
if it means we can hang out. Yeah, And I
am always kind of I'm in a conflict with myself
(38:14):
about how much to just respect the closed door and
let the space, or how much to stay close. And
I think what I probably want more than anything from
my parental relationship as the kids get older is that
I just want them to be close to me. Yeah,
like I want I want that relationship. I don't expect
them to tell me everything, but I want that relationship
(38:35):
to be a positive one. What's your best advice for
getting through the closed door?
Speaker 1 (38:39):
Look, I'm no guru. I think that the worst thing.
Speaker 4 (38:43):
Is to try and knock it down or even to
knock on it all the time. You've just got to
sort of sit outside and wait till the door opens again.
And when it opens a crack, you have to try
and be disciplined and not like rush through it. And
I only know this through trial and error. And what's
interesting to me is the difference in sons and daughters.
(39:05):
So in my experience, boys pull away around puberty time,
and that can be devastating from mother Like that's been
a massive source of grief for me. But they do
come back, but they can be gone a couple of years,
like a good few years. And with girls though, that's
(39:29):
when you clash, like it. Sometimes you wish they'd pull away,
you know, but they don't. They are all up in
your grill, giving you a character assissment. Yeah, and it
can feel like a bit of an abusive relationship sometimes,
because you know, my mother always said to me, if
(39:51):
your kids not that you want to encourage them treating
you like shit, but if they can tell you things
that are uncomfortable, it means they feel secure that you're
going to be there on the other side.
Speaker 1 (40:07):
Of that, you know.
Speaker 4 (40:08):
And the biggest challenge is to just stay strong and
stay solid so that they can act out. They can
do this, they can do that, but they know that
they can depend on you and rely on you.
Speaker 5 (40:24):
It's hard not to get offended sometimes. By the end
the book, Ginger, one of the characters, says that she
feels with her teenage daughter like she's given birth to
her own ana critic. Like the yes, her own voice
in your head that's always telling you all the things
are wrong with you. Yeah, your shadowed by your childhood
telling you all the things that's wrong with you.
Speaker 4 (40:42):
It's like your worst in a monologue like that follows
you around and gives you a character assessment.
Speaker 1 (40:47):
And I noticed that.
Speaker 4 (40:47):
Even with my own mother, Like I remember once I
was in my twenties or my in my thirties, and
I was just I was at her house and I
was like bitching about this and why have you done
this and this thing? And I was just being really
critical and she's like, can you just stop being mean
to me? And it was like, oh, yeah, right, Like
(41:09):
daughters are tough on their mothers, like really tough, And
I think that you've got to hold that line between
not letting them treat you like shit but also not
getting too wounded by it.
Speaker 5 (41:20):
Yeah. Last thing I want to ask you is there's
a lot of talk as we're recording. There's lots to
talk about this around the White Lotus, which is so
centers on these three women who are friends when they
were teenagers. But there's a lot of discussion about are
you stuck, Like are you who you were as a teenager,
and whether or not that person still exists or not.
Do you think you are still the same Maya, the
(41:42):
same fifteen year old Maya? Yeah, do you what's the
same and what's different. I mean, your clothes are still
I think my clothes is still silly. I mean very still,
very intense. I'm still very People used to tell you
that when you're a teenager that you were intense.
Speaker 4 (42:01):
No, because that's not how teenagers are. That's probably how
they talk.
Speaker 5 (42:04):
No, you're so right. No one spoke like that or no, tea.
Speaker 4 (42:08):
They didn't, you know, but I am certainly very focused.
Like my female friends are still everything to me. There's
such an important part of me. I was close to
my family then, even though I had did the same
thing to my mum, and my kids are close to
me now, and I'm still close to my parents. You know.
(42:31):
I wanted, I needed attention and I needed validation. I
was pretty extroverted, but also needed time on my own.
Speaker 5 (42:38):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (42:38):
I think essentially I'm the same.
Speaker 4 (42:41):
And when I think about my school friends, my girlfriends
from school, it's funny.
Speaker 1 (42:46):
After watching White Lotus, I felt the.
Speaker 4 (42:47):
Need to reach out to them again, which we also
did when COVID started, a lot of people reached out
to their school friends. It was like this primal thing.
I don't know what it was about, but I'm the
same as I am. When I think about who I
am around them, it's the same, Like it's the same
as who I am. Yeah yeah, yeah, But it's the
(43:08):
same as also who I am now, Like it's not
like I would be a completely different person around my
school girlfriends.
Speaker 5 (43:16):
What do you think teenage mea would have been like
in the age of.
Speaker 4 (43:19):
Oh my god, you would have loved I would've bet
it would have destroyed me like I would have. I mean,
thank god, because so much no impulse control, no sense
of consequence, loving attention, always wanting to do more things.
I think it could have been a really, really bad,
bad thing for me. I mean, I would have loved it,
(43:40):
but it would have I just don't think it would
have served me well.
Speaker 5 (43:43):
You always say that we're parenting in a time where we,
for the first time, we didn't face any of the
things that they're dealing with, And I think that being
a teenage girl, one of the problems now is that
there are all these traps there for you, that all
the worst things you think about yourself can now be
reaffirmed by strangers, correct, friend groups.
Speaker 4 (44:02):
Correct, Because all that you know, we had ideas about
popularity and you kind of every girl teenage girl knows
who are the popular the girls and who aren't. And
yet we didn't have empirical evidence in terms of likes
and followers and things going viral and comments on our posts.
You know, all that stuff lived in our head. I
(44:25):
can't imagine you know me neither.
Speaker 5 (44:27):
Maya Friedman, thank you for coming on and talking to
me about my book.
Speaker 4 (44:29):
Congratulations. He would never. Five families, fourteen years of friendship,
one long weekend.
Speaker 5 (44:35):
It's your best work but by so far. Thank you
so much, friends. He would never is in shops on
April twenty nine. If it sounds like something you'd love reading,
please follow the link in our show notes of this
episode to buy or pre order it. It would mean
(44:57):
the world. And while you're sitting down doing that, please
also hit follow all like on this podcast wherever you're
listening to it. It genuinely helps other people find the
show if you feel like leaving a review even better.
An enormous thank you from me to Mia Friedman for
changing my life in many ways, but also for coming
and sitting down with me for mid I know sitting
(45:18):
down is her least favorite thing, but I told you
there was a surprise at the end of this episode,
and there is I wanted to read you an exclusive
passage from He Would Never, one that very much reflects
what Mea and I discussed.
Speaker 1 (45:31):
In the show.
Speaker 5 (45:32):
What You're about to hear is part of a chapter
told from the perspective of Lyra, a fourteen year old girl.
The book is about her mother and her mother's friends,
who all met at mother's group when their kids were babies.
They're not babies anymore, and when we meet Lyra, she's
thinking back to the time she felt her world tilt
in the way Mia and I were discussing today. The
moment was in a swimming pool at her mum's best
(45:54):
friend's house, and Lockie Short, who she's been encouraged to
consider as some kind of uncle, is talking to her
in a way she hasn't heard before. The executive producer
of mid is Nama Brown, the senior producer is Grace Rufray.
Our producer is Tylie Black, and we've had audio and
sound designed by Jacob Brown. Enjoy this little bit of
(46:14):
he Would Never. Tia was Lyra's best friend, but they
were pretty different. They went to different schools. Now Tia
went to a really posh school with no rules, and
Lyra went to Saint Deirdre's, which was medium posh but
had lots of rules, mostly to do with god. Tia
did dance and drama and Lya did netball and soccer,
(46:37):
so they didn't see each other as much as they
used to when they both went to Bronte Public and
didn't have so much to do. But Tia was still
the one who Lah felt most comfortable with of all
her friend group. The others you always had to watch
what you said, or sometimes you might get to school
and find out through a feeling in your stomach or
in the way one of the girls was talking to you,
(46:58):
or in how they didn't answer or even open your messages,
that there had been a shift. That's how you'd find
out you'd done something. You were out, and you'd have
to work your way back in. It was time. She
was never out with Tia. They could be silly together
like babies, or they could be teenagers together trying on
who they might like to be next. It didn't matter.
(47:20):
It was always easy. Lyra thought about the first time
tears Dad Lockie had spoken to her in a way
that was different from how the other grown ups did
the first time she was confused. She had been at
Tears and they had all been in the pool. One
of the first swims of last summer. Auntie Liz had
a swimming pool with an infinity edge, like you saw
(47:40):
in fancy hotels on TikTok. Auntie Liz said, it made
you feel like you were drifting out to sea, as
if that were a good thing. Everyone was getting out,
except Lyra, because there was nothing Lira liked more than
floating on her back looking up at the sky. Tia
and Lis and the little kids had all piled towards
the kitchen to get food, but Lockie had stayed behind,
(48:01):
and he was looking at her. You look a lot
like your mother, he'd said, which wasn't what she'd wanted
to hear, but okay. Then he said, you know she
is extremely dear to us, don't you. And there have
been something about the way he said it words that
people don't usually use, a question that didn't need an answer.
Adults were always asking questions that weren't questions, but they
(48:22):
usually used normal words. Liz would do anything for your mom,
me too, Auntie, Lis is very good to us. Lara
knew to be grateful to the Shorts the number of
times over the years that she'd heard her mother say
she didn't know where she'd be without liss. Lyra wanted
to get out to go and find tea, but there
was something about the way Lockie kept looking at her
(48:42):
that made her want to stay covered by the water.
It was the year that eyes had started moving differently
over her at the beach. On the street, Lyra was
wearing what she and her friends were always wearing, but
suddenly it all meant something different. It was like a
spotlight was suddenly pointed right at her, and sometimes it
felt good to be picked out secene, but sometimes it
(49:04):
felt scary, and she hadn't ever thought about it feeling
scary with people. You'd always known that maybe all men
had that light with them, and they could shine it
at you whenever they wanted. I should find tea, she'd
said from the water, but she didn't move to pull
herself up and out onto the deck. Go Away, she remembered, feeling,
turn away. Someone needs to look out for you, girls,
(49:25):
he'd said. Now you're growing up. Your mum's so busy.
We're fine, she'd said quickly, and then remembered thank you.
Lockie had picked up a towel Auntie Lissa's house had
the best, thick soft towels, big enough to wrap around
your whole body, and took two steps towards the edge
of the pool, where Lyra's arms were resting. She'd put
her chin on them and looked down at where the
(49:46):
water was licking in and out of the shiny little
square tiles, anywhere but up at him. Come on, then,
he said, squatting down holding the towel out, Let's go
and get some food. How many times had Lira jumped
out of this pool and run into the kitchen in
a little sunsuit, in a swimming lesson one piece in
a bikini, without thinking, without even being aware of herself,
(50:08):
of her arms and legs and tommy and chest. Why
did she feel in that moment when she glanced up
and saw the crease around Lockey Short's eyes and the
particular curve of his closed mouth smile, like everything was different?
She remembered the rough grout scratching her stomach as she
pushed her whole self flat against the pool wall, hiding
her bum, her thighs, her flicking feet. Lockie hadn't moved
(50:32):
he'd stayed close. Towel and hands. You girls should get
bigger cozies, he'd said, and she could hear something like
a tease in his voice, friendly, maybe a tone that
suggested everything she was feeling was ridiculous. But then, if
you don't want to be looked at, and she remembered
feeling sick in her mouth,
You're listening to a MoMA Mia podcast.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
Mama Mia acknowledges the traditional owners of land and waters
that this podcast is recorded on. It's Annals dropping into
your feed here with a very special episode of MIT
Mama Mer's podcast for Women who Are Anything But. Season
five kicks off with a very special guest. Holly Wainwright
is talking to Miya Friedman.
Speaker 3 (00:34):
Now.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
They've had a million conversations in their lives, but she's
never been on mid until now, and Holly kicks it
off because Mia has read her brand new book, He
Would Never It's a beautiful story about the limits and
power of female friendships, and also it really shines a
light on teenage girls and the teenage girls we were
(00:57):
in the nineties are very different than the teenage girls
of today. It's a conversation between two women the same age,
but at different parenting stages.
Speaker 1 (01:06):
So enjoy.
Speaker 4 (01:08):
It's that disconnect period in your daughter's life or your
own life. I'm sure we can all probably remember it
where you cross this rubicon from being a child in
the eyes of others to being you know, sexually available
(01:28):
or a source of sexual gratification for men. There's always
a disconnect because it always happens.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
Earlier than you can see. You can see it.
Speaker 5 (01:38):
Hello, I'm Holly Wainwright and I am Mid, Midlife, Mid Family,
Mid Mayhem. Welcome back to our show Mid Conversations for
gen X women who are anything. But this is our
first episode of a news season, and as you'll know
if you're a regular listener, it's starting a little differently
(01:58):
and that's because I've got something special for you later
at the end this season on Mid, we have got
gurus and health experts. I have nineties icons and household names.
I have Melinda French Gates. Yes, we have carefully planned
every episode to bring you something that makes life a
little bit better, a great story, a very useful idea,
(02:20):
something to try, someone who reminds you of you. And today,
for the first episode of this new season of MID,
I have a friend. I think you know her. It's
Mia Friedman. If you listen to Mamma Mia out loud,
you know that I spend a lot of time talking
to Mia, along with our beloved co host Jesse Stevens,
(02:41):
disagreeing with Mia quite a lot, laughing till I snort
with her, gossiping with her, setting the world to rights,
with her, but I'd never asked her to be on
MID before. And the reason that I wanted to for
the first ep of season five was twofold. I wanted
to talk to her about my new book. It's called
He Would Never, and it's out in a hot minute.
(03:03):
I nervously slipped Mia an early copy of it over
the summer holidays, and she immediately messaged me this say
she wanted to talk to me about it on MID
and not before, so I have been waiting nervously to
hear what she wants to tell.
Speaker 2 (03:16):
Me about it.
Speaker 5 (03:17):
But also it's because of the themes of the book
I think they're going to resonate with you as listeners
to MID.
Speaker 1 (03:23):
It's about the power.
Speaker 5 (03:24):
And limitations of female friendships. It's about narcissistic relationships. It's
centered around a knoddy little mystery, and it's about the
sometimes confusing shift of little girls into teenage ones. This
is something that Mia and I talk about off Mike
a lot. She's the first person I ask for parenting
advice about teenagers because although she and I are exactly
(03:47):
the same age, she had her kids a lot younger
than I did. She's a grandmother now for God's sake,
so she's always a few big paces ahead in lots
of ways, of course, So we talk about guiding teenage daughters,
and we also reflect on our teenage selves, who appear
to have existed in an entirely different universe. What we
got right, what we got wrong. We talk about all
(04:08):
of that, and we talk about writing and ambition and
confidence and friendship. But we start, of course with me
asking Mia a very bald question about he would never
and getting the kind of honest answer I would only
expect from the extraordinarily honest, funny, brilliant, generous MEA Friedman.
And don't forget to stay listening at the end of
(04:30):
this conversation for your surprise, me A Friedman, Holly Wayne, Right,
there's nothing like getting you in a studio and putting
in front of a mic and asking you did you
like my book? Not really, I've read better.
Speaker 1 (04:45):
No, she's just fucking loved it.
Speaker 4 (04:47):
So what happened was you gave it to me, and
then I was away with Jesse, our third co host,
and kind of like our little sister and friend on
out loud, and she read it first.
Speaker 1 (05:01):
And you and.
Speaker 4 (05:02):
I often get given books by friends and in some
ways they land, and you just go, this is a
job because you know that your friend will be very
anxious and that you've got to read it, and then
you've got to obviously say nice things about it, even
if you don't really like it. And so then Jesse
(05:24):
started reading it first, and she was just like she
spent the whole weekend just like I just want to
I just want to go and finish holly book. I
just all, it's all I want to read. It's all
I want to think about. So I was like, okay,
this is a good sign. So when she was finished,
I started reading. And as soon as I started, I
(05:45):
realized why you had been such a nutcase for before,
because I said to Jesse, what's so good about it?
Because She's like, I'm just desperate to read it. I
just want to get back to it. I just want
to get back to it. Can you hold the baby?
I just want to get back to Holly's book. And
I'm like, what's so good about it? And she said
she's gone to like she's gone up three levels. What's
(06:07):
she said? I understand why she's so stressed. What she's
tried to do is extraordinary. She's thrown a lot of
balls in the air, and she's bitten off a lot
and she's pulling it off.
Speaker 5 (06:20):
It must be tiresome for you to have to watch
me having a breakdown every time I write a book.
Speaker 1 (06:24):
That was a long answer to your off shot question.
Speaker 5 (06:26):
And thank you for all those lovely things say, because
Mia does have to watch listen watch me have a
breakdown every time write.
Speaker 1 (06:33):
Yeah, I have.
Speaker 4 (06:33):
It's just so funny because I don't write books anymore,
but all my friends do, including you and Jesse, who
took my closest friends, and also Jesse's sister Claire recently
wrote her first book. And you will have breakdowns in
very different ways. You will have complete breakdowns, but differently,
and you have different breakdowns from book to book. This one,
(06:57):
i've never seen you go so sort of the one
that you did before, which is a Couple Upstairs that
was quite dark, and when I read that, you went
quite dark, and I understood You're like you were really
insecure when you were writing that, which is interesting because
it was like going back to a time about an
emotionally abusive relationship and there were some dark themes in it.
(07:20):
With this one, it felt different. I felt like you
were like wrestling an alligator. Yeah, for a really long
period of time. And I've never been one of your readers.
You've never given it to me early, which I appreciate,
thank you, but.
Speaker 5 (07:35):
It really would be a job.
Speaker 1 (07:36):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (07:36):
I know you have other readers, and I also know
that you didn't give it to them this time either,
and I yeah, it was just once I read the book,
I understood everything.
Speaker 5 (07:47):
It's funny because I told you this at the time
because obviously we record together, you know, three five times
a week, so we see each other all the time.
And for years, I when I haven't only spoken about this,
but when I handed the first draft of this book in,
it got handed back to me like they were like,
you need it needs some more work. And you didn't
tell me that at the time, because I was really devastated.
(08:10):
And tell me why, Like is that because every author,
I mean, I know what it's like to hand in
a book and all you want is no notes. It
isn't that actually, well it's never happened to me. But
like then when you get it back and it's like,
here's all the things you need to do, that's always
the point at which I want to give back my
advance yes, and say I don't want to do it anymore.
I want to do it. I think part of what
(08:31):
it was is and you know, we talk about this
a lot, but I always overestimate how what I can
do and how much I can do, you know what
I mean. I'm always like, it'll be fine.
Speaker 4 (08:41):
I mean the time it takes you to write, the
time it takes to write it, and the amount of
focus and energy that it takes to because the thing
is that most people write books, and that's their job, right,
But you write books as well as having a full
time job, yes, and doing a hundred other things. And
you know, lots of authors have kids, but most authors
don't also have another full time job.
Speaker 1 (09:02):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (09:02):
So I think that one of the if I learned
something through this book, and I'm sure I learned lots
of things, it was about that about trying to focus,
because I think what happened is when I handed it
in and I've been writing this book for like two years.
It is a big and complicated plot. We're not going
to go into the plot massively here. I want to
talk about some of the themes from it. But it's a
big and complicated plot that has lots of characters, and
(09:22):
it goes over a long period of time, so there's
a lot of moving parts, right, And I think that
I literally bit off more than I could chew in
the way that I normally work.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
Right.
Speaker 5 (09:33):
So when I handed it in my very fabulous publisher,
she pretty much said to me, the last third feels
rushed and not like you have you know, you haven't
landed it yet And.
Speaker 1 (09:45):
Did you secretly know that to share?
Speaker 5 (09:47):
Yeah, but I think that this is one of the
things that you really struggle with when you're writing. Is
you lose sight of your instinct anymore? Like is this good?
Or do I just not think it's good because I'm insecure,
blah blah.
Speaker 4 (09:57):
Blah, because also no one else it was just had
been in your head for so long, Like I remember
when you wrote some of your first books. I think
you talked about this book or this themes around this book,
this idea of a camping holiday with a group of friends,
like years ago, eight years ago.
Speaker 5 (10:19):
I had been thinking about this plot and what to
do with this idea for a really long time, and
then it sort of came together when I sort of
tied it together with this thing about teenagers and teenage girls,
which I want us to talk about in a minute. Anyway,
I think I was really ambitious, so you know how
you said, And it's lovely to hear that. Jesse was like,
she's leveled up. I think I was ambitious and maybe
(10:41):
a bit off more than I could chew. How unlike
us to do that. So when anyway, when my publisher
confirmed that to me, and she said, you need some
more time, you need some more focus. This book is
going to be good. It's going to be good, but
it's not quite good yet. And you probably had fronting.
Speaker 4 (10:55):
But you also probably hadn't mapped out time in your
diary to do that.
Speaker 1 (10:59):
Like how did you write this book?
Speaker 4 (11:01):
I forget because you've written them in lots of different ways.
You've taken stretches off to focus completely and try to
write them in the three month stretch.
Speaker 1 (11:08):
You've done like a day a week for a year.
Tell me.
Speaker 5 (11:11):
The way that I'm trying I try to work now is,
as you know, I stack my mam and mea work
at the front of the week, generally speaking, where I'm
here in one hundred percent Mama, mea world Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday,
and then in theory, Thursday, Friday and the weekend, let's
be honest, is like more creative projects, writing books at
(11:33):
other creative projects rather And that's good in theory, But
have you ever known our lives to go exactly like
in the neat little blocks that we try and put
them in, do you know what I mean? So it's
kind of more everything kind of bleeds.
Speaker 4 (11:45):
Do you think in a perfect world you need to
just go I'm going to take four months or I'm
going to take three months, and I'm like almost like
Matt leave and I'm just going to focus on it.
Speaker 5 (11:54):
I think I think yes in a way. But then
what I've also come to know about myself, you know,
the whole introvert extrovert thing. Yeah, I think I love
writing for its solitude because I do quite like being alone.
But I'm not a pure introvert, like if if I
didn't have the you know, also breaking it up with
coming in here and being with you guys and talking
(12:16):
about So you like the switching gear, I actually like that.
I don't know if it is brilliant for creative process,
but it's good for my mental space. I think if
I was just locked away with the manuscript for and
nothing else. I don't think that would suit me in
the way that I know some writers are very suited
to being purely alone.
Speaker 4 (12:34):
The part where your publisher said the last third feels
rushed is that because you underestimated how long it would
take you to write, or because you just were a
bit sick of it and you.
Speaker 1 (12:43):
Just wanted to end it, Like, why do you think that?
Speaker 5 (12:45):
I also think that what I've learned is I used
to say, you know how that fiction writers always say,
are you're a plotter or a panther? That's the thing
that so plotters are. You will have heard like Jane
Harper talks about this, Not that I'm comparing myself to her,
but you plot out exactly what's going to happen in
minuscule detail before you write the book, so you know
(13:06):
you've got everything, the whole plot.
Speaker 1 (13:08):
Down, like the parents saying, with all the stuff on there.
Speaker 5 (13:11):
Every chapter is Matt, I feel like you used to
do that. Didn't you do that with posts? Well, I've
always done it with I do it in theory but
not in detail. Right, So then, because I'm also quite
like ideas come to you while you do it. You know,
like creative people. You're you'll be writing and you'll be
like this would be funny or that'd be good or
so I resist that kind of structure to a point.
Speaker 1 (13:32):
You resist all kinds of stuff.
Speaker 5 (13:34):
I know, it's it's one of my favorite and I
think that what I learned on this book is I
needed that. I really needed that structure because this was
like trying to wrestle an alligator, and because it was
so big and broad and sprawling, and I was trying
to apply my usual kind of she'll be right techniques
to that last half that wasn't wasn't going to work.
Speaker 4 (13:55):
How many characters are in it, and it because it jumps,
it jumps.
Speaker 5 (13:59):
Five families and they and really the main characters are
Danny and liss Unlockey Well and Sadie. So there are
there are like there are characters who are more major
than minor. But they've all got kids. And that's the
other thing is that so they've all got kids. And
the marriage various configurations of marriage there are like there's
single parents, and there's a gay couple, and there's you know,
(14:21):
two conventionally married couples. And they all met at mother's group,
which is something that did happen to me in real
life is I made good friends at mother's group and
we do actually go camping together every year. They are
very nervous about this book I'm but obviously the rest
of it isn't and the thing that then, so that
is a lot to juggle and I did learn that
I do have to basically be much more structured. So
(14:43):
when I rewrote the last third, and obviously I ended
up rewriting quite a lot of it, then I did
really plan it out in meticulous detail like I gave.
I listened to the feedback about the structure. Editors are
always right, like we talk about this a lot, mere
that you often as you climb a tree in a
creative field, people give you fewer and fewer notes.
Speaker 1 (15:03):
Yeah, which is terrible.
Speaker 5 (15:05):
Yeah, you need more notes. Whether you're like Mike White
making the White loaders for like he's got four hours
of deleted scenes on the floor. Not that I'm again
comparing myself to him, or whether you're writing a book
or whether you're conducting an interview, like you need other
people to be able to say.
Speaker 4 (15:20):
To you, oh yeah, keep doing that saying I'm not
comparing myself to don't happen. I'm not comparing myself to
Mike Quite. You're a best selling author, this is what
your fifth book, sixth book like.
Speaker 1 (15:30):
You're a big fucking deal, hollywayn right, Like.
Speaker 5 (15:33):
Stop and I don't feel like a big deal. When
we come back, Mea and I discuss our own coming
of age stories and that tricky, sticky time between being
a little kid and being a woman.
Speaker 4 (15:49):
Do you still wear the title author a little?
Speaker 5 (15:54):
I think I'm getting more comfortable in it, but it is.
It's really funny how intimidating that feels, that word. And
I think it's because the literary scene, as it were,
is a very compartment lies thing. The other thing I
wanted to say is, as you know very well, I
(16:14):
didn't start writing books till I was in my forties, right,
and it was literally the thing I most wanted to
do when I was a little girl. We're about to
talk about being teenagers, but if there was a teenage
Holly who had a dream of what she wanted, I
was like, I'm going to be a writer. But I
wasn't a writer, you know, I mean I was lots
of other things.
Speaker 4 (16:31):
But you said you you always like when you were
a kid, you would write.
Speaker 5 (16:35):
Stories and way I used to keep I used to
write in these notebooks, these really convoluted stories about me
and all my friends, and we were all dating different
members of Juran.
Speaker 4 (16:44):
Juran oh fanfic before there was Away exactly, I was
dating Simon and the bomb loved it because you're a
main character.
Speaker 5 (16:51):
Because that was the main character. And I used to
go into school in the mornings and literally get my
friends to sit down and we'd all read, and I'd
read to them about what happened, and then they'd be like,
well why would then then there was drama, And then
when there was going to be a sex scene because
obviously I couldn't really write sex scenes then because I was,
you know, kissing though kissing, I'd be like and then
(17:13):
dot dot pause and fade to black. Oh well I
was doing that.
Speaker 1 (17:18):
Then? How old were you when you were doing that?
Speaker 5 (17:21):
Like twelve eleven and twelve like young?
Speaker 1 (17:23):
And I was writing bad poetry.
Speaker 5 (17:25):
Yeah, it's I think it's today age, isn't it like?
And the thing that's mortifying is that we were filling
notebooks with that stuff. But now people are feeling, well,
if people are doing it.
Speaker 1 (17:33):
Well, they're making teaktoks.
Speaker 5 (17:34):
Yeah they are, That's exactly what they're doing, and they'll
and then ten minutes later they're mortified by them. Anyway,
the thing that tied this idea for me together about
the camping is that then I wanted to write about
teenage girls, and I wanted to write about being parents
teenage girls. And this is something that you and I
talk about a lot all the time, and partly because
(17:55):
one of the things and obviously we're going to talk
in broad terms here because we're not going to modify
our teenage daughters anymore than we already do all the time.
One of the things that I noticed the most about
my daughter moving from that phase of being a little
kid in to being a teenager, apart from the changes
in her in terms of you know how, there's a
moment in which they're running around completely un self conscious,
(18:18):
nothing like just being crazy, cartwheeling, dancing, whatever they're doing,
expressing their opinions, and then like a switch flicks, they're
suddenly mortified by themselves, you know, like, yeah, yourselves away
and certainly by you. But the other thing that happens
is when your daughter begins to become a young woman.
Everyone around you changes too. And the thing that I
(18:42):
would notice when we would go away on our not
necessarily with these camping friends, but we live in a
beachy kind of culture, is that suddenly the conversations you're
having all the time, and often from men, actually would
be like, Oh, you're going to be in trouble, aren't you.
Oh she's going to be in she's going to be trouble. Oh,
I don't envy you. And they're making all these comments,
usually to the dad, usually to the dad, yep, about
(19:06):
this girl who's just moving through the world and changing.
And it's a lot, It is a lot.
Speaker 4 (19:13):
I remember the first time my daughter got sexually her assed.
She was walking, she would have been twelve, and she
was walking to a friend's house and a guy walked
past her and sort of licked his lips and said something.
Can I remember, you know, it's one of those times.
(19:33):
And not long after that, we were out in Bonday,
just for dinner, and we were just walking to the
car and a car load of guys cat called and
she thought they were cat calling me, but I knew
they were cat calling her. And it's that disconnect period
in your daughter's life or your own life. I'm sure
(19:54):
we can all probably remember it where you cross this
rubicon from being a child in the eyes of others
to being a you know, sexually available or a source
of sexual gradification for men. And it always happens way before.
(20:15):
There's always a disconnect because it always happens earlier than.
Speaker 1 (20:18):
It you can see it.
Speaker 4 (20:20):
All I can think about is that brilliant scene in
the Barbie movie when Mago Robbie comes to the real
world for the first time and she's walking down the
street and she for the first time becomes aware of
being perceived in the male gaze, and she says, I've
got this weird feeling. It's like I'm aware, but like
aware of myself, And to me, that is an absolute
fantastic portrayal, but in faster time of what it's like
(20:42):
to be a teenage, that's.
Speaker 5 (20:43):
Exactly what I thought, and it made me a bit
emotional for that reason. Do you remember that happening to
you yourself? Can you put yourself back in the first
time you remember being a lot like that on the street?
Speaker 4 (20:54):
Yeah, I can, well, I can remember the first time
I noticed it in myself, which was when I was
at the beach and I was walking and the sun
was coming down and I could see my shadow and
I could see my shadow went in at the waist
and I really noticed that, and I was really quite
chuffed about it. And then I remember trying on like
(21:17):
tight clothes and looking at myself in the mirror and
trying on the persona of looking sexy, but not really
understanding what that was. And then of course I remember
being you know, sexual, I guess now you'd call it
sexual assault. When I was at the Easter Show and
with my friends, and I would have been twelve or thirteen,
(21:40):
and it was a sort of a crowd and a
guy walked towards me, grabbed me in the by the
vagina and or grabbed me in the volver the crotch area,
and kept walking.
Speaker 1 (21:51):
And I remember feeling so just shocked, horrified.
Speaker 4 (21:57):
Dirty because it that, and I couldn't even process that.
I didn't even I didn't even tell anyone because I
didn't even know.
Speaker 1 (22:06):
What it was.
Speaker 5 (22:08):
It's such a profound thing when you suddenly realize it's
like you shift into being your sudden like oh, I'm pray,
yeah right, yes, But I didn't really think I was,
and probably especially for our generation and maybe even more
so for our daughters. You can do anything, you can
go anywhere, you can be whatever you want to be.
You're just like the boys. And then suddenly, oh, I'm
(22:28):
not like the.
Speaker 4 (22:30):
Message because I'm pray so much. Yeah, was it gen
X women growing up?
Speaker 5 (22:36):
We did, but it was a different stage of feminism.
But but you suddenly if you ever thought that you
were just like the boys, if you were one of
then you're suddenly like, oh, I'm not. And then there's
this really interesting period I think as you gory and
grapple with that whole idea, and then often what a
lot of young women will do is they'll figure out
(22:57):
a way to make it work for them in a way,
you know, like in how do I harness? Which bits
of this new world do I like? And which bits
of it do I really not? And in the book
Lyra who is and who her best friend's dad may
or may not do something inappropriate to her, but certainly
hasn't an appropriate relationship with her, and that he calls
(23:19):
her and they talk and he's kind of she hasn't
got a father who's around, and he tries to step
into that role. But in a creepy way. She remembers
the very first time she sees the way he looks
at her, and you just know, you just have a
sense that the way he's looking at you is different
to the way he looked at you last summer when
you were also in a swimsuit in the pools.
Speaker 4 (23:38):
And the irony is not the irony, but the biological
reality is that for many of us, the gaze of
lights and our daughters when it is removed from us
at that same time, and both things are kind of imperceptible.
Like you know, you can think, oh, people don't cat
(23:59):
call anymore, but it's like oh, and then you're walking
down the street with a younger woman and you go, oh,
they just don't cat call me anymore. And you're like, right,
I can walk past a building site and not have
to And it's not because man are more evolved. I
like to believe that, but it's actually just because I'm
not in their sights anymore. I'm no longer pray. And
of course that feels, I mean, different women have different
(24:21):
reactions to it. It feels like a lovely relief. Some
women feel, of course, a great sense of loss.
Speaker 1 (24:29):
Do you ever.
Speaker 5 (24:29):
Feel you know how there's a trope that it makes
us jealous. Do you ever feel that? No, I don't
feel that. No.
Speaker 4 (24:35):
And you watch some women on TikTok or you know, celebrities,
and you see the ones that are struggling with it,
and it's usually the ones, I guess who've really defined
themselves by how they look and have defined themselves through
the male gaze and through through the validation of that.
(24:56):
And like you look at them with their daughters and
like they're trying to look like their sisters. And then
and then you know, a man, or you must be
as if I want to be told that, like, that's
not my aim.
Speaker 1 (25:10):
Is to look like my daughter's sister.
Speaker 4 (25:13):
Like I'm very happy to sort of back off that
stage that I never was particularly inamate of being on.
But I'm very like, this is their time.
Speaker 5 (25:22):
Now, It's no time to be object to find and.
Speaker 1 (25:25):
Say, yeah, rastically, what am I even saying?
Speaker 5 (25:28):
I know exactly what you mean me. I also but
and it's also interesting that when it started to happen
to my daughter, that when I saw that shift, it
brought out the protective mother and me in a way
that few things do. Is that when I see an
old particularly an older older man, look at her in
a certain way. I want to kill them. I really do,
(25:48):
even though I understand it because and this is what
the complicated thing that's kind of I was trying to
explore a bit in this book is that, you know,
there's there's a point in the book where Lockie says
to one of the other guys, you know, mothers want
to keep treat their teenage girls like their babies. But
we know that they're basically the monsters who tortured us
at high school. Like that they are God, yes, and
(26:10):
that they know exactly what they're doing.
Speaker 1 (26:12):
And that's awful.
Speaker 5 (26:14):
I know that that's awful.
Speaker 4 (26:15):
It's like these these adult men, and of course not
all adult men, course not, but there is a certain
type of adult man who is trying to correct the
experience that he had in high school where he didn't
have any power and now he's got power by the
virtual of the fact that he's an adult and she's not.
Speaker 5 (26:33):
Oh, I know, And there's a there's a to very
much the point of not all adult men. I talk
quite a bit with the men in my life about
how they handle that shift of suddenly all the girls
in the pool or at the beach or whatever. Who
are your daughter's little friends?
Speaker 1 (26:50):
Do all look different and they're all wearing their up
their bamborkini?
Speaker 5 (26:52):
And I asked Brent. And you know, I'm not suggesting
that men are going to be completely honest with any
woman about this, but I asked Brent once like, because
I noticed the way that some men were looking at
the girls, And I said, is it hard? Is it hard?
And he said no, he said.
Speaker 1 (27:09):
Eyes eyes down, eyes down.
Speaker 5 (27:13):
It's just like you're an adult and you just have
to keep that like eyes down. Like it's not hard
not to stare. It's not hard not to be lacivious.
I don't know, but.
Speaker 4 (27:22):
Don't you remember that time when you become aware of
the male gaze? But then you and you're also you know,
your horny, you've got your hormones going. It's not you know,
puberty has an effect on girls as they become young women.
Speaker 1 (27:39):
But you think you can control it.
Speaker 4 (27:41):
So you want the male gaze, but you only want
the people who you like to look at you.
Speaker 1 (27:47):
You don't want that old guy on the bus to
look at you.
Speaker 4 (27:50):
But you want to wear the booty shorts even if
you can't articulate this. You want to wear the booty
shorts because you want that guy that you have a
crush on to like you, or that good looking older
guy that you think is cute. And that's what's a
really tough thing, is the mother of a young teenager
to try and explain that nuance where they can get
(28:10):
very old. But you know, that's his problem. He shouldn't
be looking at me. It's like, well, you're right, he shouldn't.
But you can't control who looks at you when you're
in the booty shorts.
Speaker 1 (28:20):
You can't.
Speaker 4 (28:22):
So and are you are you mature enough to be
able to understand that?
Speaker 1 (28:28):
And that you know? I remember settling. You know, there's a.
Speaker 4 (28:31):
Sometimes joke that there's a moment in the for every
teenage girl where their mother will slut shame them. She
won't mean to, but you're like, you can't.
Speaker 1 (28:42):
Go out like that.
Speaker 4 (28:43):
And for us, that's because we're fearful of of that.
But then the feminist in us is also like, well,
she should be able to wear whatever she wants. We
can't stop men from looking at her. But so I
say to my I started saying to my daughter, I
(29:04):
know this isn't fair. I know this isn't right, and
we will I will not stop fighting for you to
be able to wear whatever you want, whenever you want,
and be completely secure and free from unwanted male attention.
But at the moment it's not that way.
Speaker 5 (29:24):
It's really complicated because we've discussed this before, but there
was one of the things that's really tricky, I think
for in this teenage time when you're figuring out all
of this stuff, is you are proud of your changing
body in a way because you realize that this is
going to be a part of being Yeah, but you
also feel a lot of shame about it. And what
(29:45):
I want to do in talking to my daughter about
it is not to add to that shame. But it's hard.
And I remember a while ago we were at a
thing with lots of kids and my child was younger
than she is now, and the little boys were teasing
her about her boobs or whatever, and she was really
upset and I said to her, put a jumper on.
Speaker 3 (30:05):
I know it wasn't that I didn't say put a
jumper on because I thought it was okay, And obviously
that the whole when I found out later what those
little boys have been saying like it was a whole thing.
Speaker 5 (30:18):
But my firsts also because I wanted to stay at
the place and do whatever. You know, what I mean
was to do that. But that was kind of saying
to my daughter, were you're asking for it? That these
eleven year old boys are teasing you.
Speaker 4 (30:29):
I remember my daughter came back from a camp or
something and like, oh, this guy hit me in the
playground or grabbed me or something. I'm like, Oh, that's
just what boys sometimes do when they like you.
Speaker 1 (30:39):
And then I was like, oh my.
Speaker 4 (30:40):
God, it's true things that we've internalized, and it is
just such a head scramble for us as gen X
feminist women because what we want to be true is
not necessarily what we know is true. And also that
disconnect between we see danger and threat where they don't
(31:03):
yet because they haven't caught up with how they're viewed
in society because they still probably sleeping with a teddy bear,
but they've got boobs.
Speaker 5 (31:12):
And when you think about it, it's a lot to
get your head around. Everything is changing. But you know,
I'm reading because I'm interviewing Ioni Sky for this show
It Soon, and I'm reading her memoir, and one of
the things she's really good on she's in Generation x
Icon is her she talks about herself as a teenager
and to your point earlier, how horny she was and
(31:34):
that she was inappropriately young in inappropriate situation. So she's
on movie sets and she's like fourteen and fifteen and
model in those days or they were all getting emancipated
from their parents because they allowed you to work adult hours.
So Hollywood, the studios would say, you can have this part,
but you have to get emancipated so that you can
(31:55):
work adult hours. Otherwise we're going to have to have
a teacher on set and you're gonna have to work
or a lah blah blah. And she talks with really refreshing,
non judgmental honesty about her first movie. Keanu Reeves was
her co star, and she just wants to have sex
with him, yeah, because he's Keanu Reeves and he is
unbelievably hot, and she goes, she tries, and she turns
(32:18):
up in his seat. She was fifteen and he was
only a bit older, and he's like no, And then
she goes on to have relationships with Anthony Keith Is
from The Red hot chili peppers and he's eight years older,
and she moves in with it. But the thing that's
really interesting reading it through our lens now is we've
(32:38):
I mean, and I'm not suggesting that that's all fine,
and there's plenty of room for exploitation abuse in that paradigm,
but we have extended childhood to a point I think
of as gen X parents, we've extended It feels shocking
to think about fifteen, sixteen, seventeen year old girl behaving that.
Speaker 1 (32:55):
Way, but moving out of home when I.
Speaker 5 (32:58):
Was fifteen, sixteen seventeen, I thought I was twenty one,
Oh god, yess, and I was gordgeous going for what
I wanted and I didn't understand why it was inappropriate.
Whether it's appropriate, of course, and so it's kind of like,
should you be ashamed of that? Do you know what
I mean?
Speaker 1 (33:17):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (33:18):
I think we do a lot of It's really hard
because at a time when we want to be telling
young girls to explore their sexuality and lean into how
they're feeling, and there's nothing wrong with that, I often
have really weird conversations with parents of teenage girls, particularly fathers.
(33:39):
I remember when I used to look after Dolly magazine,
and the dads were really against the sealed sections and
the Dolly doctor and stuff, but the moms knew that
girls want access to that information way before they're going
to act on it.
Speaker 1 (33:53):
You know.
Speaker 4 (33:54):
They want to understand sex, they want to read, you know,
they want to try on what it's like to be older.
Speaker 1 (34:01):
And so even though you know, you know that, I
don't know.
Speaker 4 (34:07):
It's just really challenging being the mother of a teenage girl,
it really is. And I always say, like, you know,
the best place for a young girl to explore her
sexuality is within a committed relationship, whether it's with another
girl or with another guy. But what you should want
as a parent is for your daughter when she's old
(34:28):
enough to be fooling around with someone who really cares
about her. And I think that this idea that you
have to put off sex or you know, lock your
sexuality in a box for as long as possible, and
that's the goal. It's like, whoever's daughter lasts the longest
without doing any of that stuff wins.
Speaker 1 (34:48):
I don't know, maybe.
Speaker 4 (34:49):
Because I learned, you know, had a great I guess
sexual awakening with a committed boyfriend when I was around fifteen.
And that was amazing because a lot of women our
age have really awful stories about, you know, their first
sexual encounter or when they were teenage girls, and I didn't.
And I think that has paved the way for a
(35:10):
really good relationship with my sex life and with myself
and with sexual pleasure and all of those things because
it was in a committed relationship.
Speaker 5 (35:20):
That's that's so interesting, because it's true. Everybody kind of
marks you as a teenage parent of a daughter of
as whether or not she is the exactly They're not
saying that out loud. The questions people always ask me
about my teenage daughter. Sometimes I'm just like, come on,
like really, you know, it's really probably I'm the one
(35:41):
that I tell you. But that's okay. I know you're allowed, but.
Speaker 1 (35:44):
I know what you mean.
Speaker 4 (35:44):
It's like as if a father's job.
Speaker 5 (35:47):
Is to the shotgun on the porch.
Speaker 4 (35:49):
Yeah, and to hold that off for as long as possible,
And it's like.
Speaker 1 (35:53):
Is it?
Speaker 5 (35:53):
I mean, I know anyway, I always ask you for
parental advice, and you are one of my village of
oracles because you're always a bit ahead. You've always been
ahead of me, and often the thing. The pattern that
plays out is you go, you tell me this, and
I got that will never have happened, all right, yeah, yeah, yeah,
I don't think so. And then of course I.
Speaker 4 (36:14):
Can't imagine until it happens, right, And my mum did
the same with me, like I would talk to her
about because I've got an eldest son who my son's
twenty seven, my daughter's nineteen, and i've got a younger
son who's sixteen. And I remember saying to her about
my eldest son, oh, I don't think he's drinking yet,
and she's like, darling, if you think he's not drinking,
he's drinking. And I'm like, do you think so? Of
(36:34):
course he was drinking. But I think you can be
a little bit blind to what's going on with your
own children. And even where I thought my daughter was
up to when she was younger, you know, now she's
at the age we have a great, very open and
honest relationship.
Speaker 1 (36:48):
And I thought we did then, but.
Speaker 4 (36:50):
Now she tells me there are a whole bunch of
things that I had no idea about.
Speaker 5 (36:54):
Oh my mother has not still has no idea.
Speaker 4 (36:56):
Yeah, and exactly my mother doesn't either, So I think that,
you know, teenagers are rat bags in all the in
good ways, like because that's their job in some ways,
so rat bags, their job is to push the envelope.
Speaker 5 (37:12):
When we come back, MEA and I are talking about
parenting and friendship. I wanted to ask you though, because
obviously I know you, and I know your family, and
you seem to have really good relationships with your kids.
I've always thought that, like, I see them around you
when they don't think anybody's looking, and they're affectionate and
they take the piss out of you, which I think
(37:33):
is very healthy in parental relationships. But you know you're
obviously very close. Do you have any words of advice
for how you get through that period of well like this,
because we've often talked about how your kids are little
and they think you're amazing, and then they go through
adolescents and they think you're an idiot and they want
and the door closes, whether they're boys or girls in
(37:54):
different ways at different times, the door closes, and you're
just then the desperate I sometimes feel like a desperate
girlfriend who's like, and you want to go to the
shops with me? Do you want to come out with me?
I'll buy you a thing. I'll buy you a thing
if it means we can hang out. Yeah, And I
am always kind of I'm in a conflict with myself
(38:14):
about how much to just respect the closed door and
let the space, or how much to stay close. And
I think what I probably want more than anything from
my parental relationship as the kids get older is that
I just want them to be close to me. Yeah,
like I want I want that relationship. I don't expect
them to tell me everything, but I want that relationship
(38:35):
to be a positive one. What's your best advice for
getting through the closed door?
Speaker 1 (38:39):
Look, I'm no guru. I think that the worst thing.
Speaker 4 (38:43):
Is to try and knock it down or even to
knock on it all the time. You've just got to
sort of sit outside and wait till the door opens again.
And when it opens a crack, you have to try
and be disciplined and not like rush through it. And
I only know this through trial and error. And what's
interesting to me is the difference in sons and daughters.
(39:05):
So in my experience, boys pull away around puberty time,
and that can be devastating from mother Like that's been
a massive source of grief for me. But they do
come back, but they can be gone a couple of years,
like a good few years. And with girls though, that's
(39:29):
when you clash, like it. Sometimes you wish they'd pull away,
you know, but they don't. They are all up in
your grill, giving you a character assissment. Yeah, and it
can feel like a bit of an abusive relationship sometimes,
because you know, my mother always said to me, if
(39:51):
your kids not that you want to encourage them treating
you like shit, but if they can tell you things
that are uncomfortable, it means they feel secure that you're
going to be there on the other side.
Speaker 1 (40:07):
Of that, you know.
Speaker 4 (40:08):
And the biggest challenge is to just stay strong and
stay solid so that they can act out. They can
do this, they can do that, but they know that
they can depend on you and rely on you.
Speaker 5 (40:24):
It's hard not to get offended sometimes. By the end
the book, Ginger, one of the characters, says that she
feels with her teenage daughter like she's given birth to
her own ana critic. Like the yes, her own voice
in your head that's always telling you all the things
are wrong with you. Yeah, your shadowed by your childhood
telling you all the things that's wrong with you.
Speaker 4 (40:42):
It's like your worst in a monologue like that follows
you around and gives you a character assessment.
Speaker 1 (40:47):
And I noticed that.
Speaker 4 (40:47):
Even with my own mother, Like I remember once I
was in my twenties or my in my thirties, and
I was just I was at her house and I
was like bitching about this and why have you done
this and this thing? And I was just being really
critical and she's like, can you just stop being mean
to me? And it was like, oh, yeah, right, Like
(41:09):
daughters are tough on their mothers, like really tough, And
I think that you've got to hold that line between
not letting them treat you like shit but also not
getting too wounded by it.
Speaker 5 (41:20):
Yeah. Last thing I want to ask you is there's
a lot of talk as we're recording. There's lots to
talk about this around the White Lotus, which is so
centers on these three women who are friends when they
were teenagers. But there's a lot of discussion about are
you stuck, Like are you who you were as a teenager,
and whether or not that person still exists or not.
Do you think you are still the same Maya, the
(41:42):
same fifteen year old Maya? Yeah, do you what's the
same and what's different. I mean, your clothes are still
I think my clothes is still silly. I mean very still,
very intense. I'm still very People used to tell you
that when you're a teenager that you were intense.
Speaker 4 (42:01):
No, because that's not how teenagers are. That's probably how
they talk.
Speaker 5 (42:04):
No, you're so right. No one spoke like that or no, tea.
Speaker 4 (42:08):
They didn't, you know, but I am certainly very focused.
Like my female friends are still everything to me. There's
such an important part of me. I was close to
my family then, even though I had did the same
thing to my mum, and my kids are close to
me now, and I'm still close to my parents. You know.
(42:31):
I wanted, I needed attention and I needed validation. I
was pretty extroverted, but also needed time on my own.
Speaker 5 (42:38):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (42:38):
I think essentially I'm the same.
Speaker 4 (42:41):
And when I think about my school friends, my girlfriends
from school, it's funny.
Speaker 1 (42:46):
After watching White Lotus, I felt the.
Speaker 4 (42:47):
Need to reach out to them again, which we also
did when COVID started, a lot of people reached out
to their school friends. It was like this primal thing.
I don't know what it was about, but I'm the
same as I am. When I think about who I
am around them, it's the same, Like it's the same
as who I am. Yeah yeah, yeah, But it's the
(43:08):
same as also who I am now, Like it's not
like I would be a completely different person around my
school girlfriends.
Speaker 5 (43:16):
What do you think teenage mea would have been like
in the age of.
Speaker 4 (43:19):
Oh my god, you would have loved I would've bet
it would have destroyed me like I would have. I mean,
thank god, because so much no impulse control, no sense
of consequence, loving attention, always wanting to do more things.
I think it could have been a really, really bad,
bad thing for me. I mean, I would have loved it,
(43:40):
but it would have I just don't think it would
have served me well.
Speaker 5 (43:43):
You always say that we're parenting in a time where we,
for the first time, we didn't face any of the
things that they're dealing with, And I think that being
a teenage girl, one of the problems now is that
there are all these traps there for you, that all
the worst things you think about yourself can now be
reaffirmed by strangers, correct, friend groups.
Speaker 4 (44:02):
Correct, Because all that you know, we had ideas about
popularity and you kind of every girl teenage girl knows
who are the popular the girls and who aren't. And
yet we didn't have empirical evidence in terms of likes
and followers and things going viral and comments on our posts.
You know, all that stuff lived in our head. I
(44:25):
can't imagine you know me neither.
Speaker 5 (44:27):
Maya Friedman, thank you for coming on and talking to
me about my book.
Speaker 4 (44:29):
Congratulations. He would never. Five families, fourteen years of friendship,
one long weekend.
Speaker 5 (44:35):
It's your best work but by so far. Thank you
so much, friends. He would never is in shops on
April twenty nine. If it sounds like something you'd love reading,
please follow the link in our show notes of this
episode to buy or pre order it. It would mean
(44:57):
the world. And while you're sitting down doing that, please
also hit follow all like on this podcast wherever you're
listening to it. It genuinely helps other people find the
show if you feel like leaving a review even better.
An enormous thank you from me to Mia Friedman for
changing my life in many ways, but also for coming
and sitting down with me for mid I know sitting
(45:18):
down is her least favorite thing, but I told you
there was a surprise at the end of this episode,
and there is I wanted to read you an exclusive
passage from He Would Never, one that very much reflects
what Mea and I discussed.
Speaker 1 (45:31):
In the show.
Speaker 5 (45:32):
What You're about to hear is part of a chapter
told from the perspective of Lyra, a fourteen year old girl.
The book is about her mother and her mother's friends,
who all met at mother's group when their kids were babies.
They're not babies anymore, and when we meet Lyra, she's
thinking back to the time she felt her world tilt
in the way Mia and I were discussing today. The
moment was in a swimming pool at her mum's best
(45:54):
friend's house, and Lockie Short, who she's been encouraged to
consider as some kind of uncle, is talking to her
in a way she hasn't heard before. The executive producer
of mid is Nama Brown, the senior producer is Grace Rufray.
Our producer is Tylie Black, and we've had audio and
sound designed by Jacob Brown. Enjoy this little bit of
(46:14):
he Would Never. Tia was Lyra's best friend, but they
were pretty different. They went to different schools. Now Tia
went to a really posh school with no rules, and
Lyra went to Saint Deirdre's, which was medium posh but
had lots of rules, mostly to do with god. Tia
did dance and drama and Lya did netball and soccer,
(46:37):
so they didn't see each other as much as they
used to when they both went to Bronte Public and
didn't have so much to do. But Tia was still
the one who Lah felt most comfortable with of all
her friend group. The others you always had to watch
what you said, or sometimes you might get to school
and find out through a feeling in your stomach or
in the way one of the girls was talking to you,
(46:58):
or in how they didn't answer or even open your messages,
that there had been a shift. That's how you'd find
out you'd done something. You were out, and you'd have
to work your way back in. It was time. She
was never out with Tia. They could be silly together
like babies, or they could be teenagers together trying on
who they might like to be next. It didn't matter.
(47:20):
It was always easy. Lyra thought about the first time
tears Dad Lockie had spoken to her in a way
that was different from how the other grown ups did
the first time she was confused. She had been at
Tears and they had all been in the pool. One
of the first swims of last summer. Auntie Liz had
a swimming pool with an infinity edge, like you saw
(47:40):
in fancy hotels on TikTok. Auntie Liz said, it made
you feel like you were drifting out to sea, as
if that were a good thing. Everyone was getting out,
except Lyra, because there was nothing Lira liked more than
floating on her back looking up at the sky. Tia
and Lis and the little kids had all piled towards
the kitchen to get food, but Lockie had stayed behind,
(48:01):
and he was looking at her. You look a lot
like your mother, he'd said, which wasn't what she'd wanted
to hear, but okay. Then he said, you know she
is extremely dear to us, don't you. And there have
been something about the way he said it words that
people don't usually use, a question that didn't need an answer.
Adults were always asking questions that weren't questions, but they
(48:22):
usually used normal words. Liz would do anything for your mom,
me too, Auntie, Lis is very good to us. Lara
knew to be grateful to the Shorts the number of
times over the years that she'd heard her mother say
she didn't know where she'd be without liss. Lyra wanted
to get out to go and find tea, but there
was something about the way Lockie kept looking at her
(48:42):
that made her want to stay covered by the water.
It was the year that eyes had started moving differently
over her at the beach. On the street, Lyra was
wearing what she and her friends were always wearing, but
suddenly it all meant something different. It was like a
spotlight was suddenly pointed right at her, and sometimes it
felt good to be picked out secene, but sometimes it
(49:04):
felt scary, and she hadn't ever thought about it feeling
scary with people. You'd always known that maybe all men
had that light with them, and they could shine it
at you whenever they wanted. I should find tea, she'd
said from the water, but she didn't move to pull
herself up and out onto the deck. Go Away, she remembered, feeling,
turn away. Someone needs to look out for you, girls,
(49:25):
he'd said. Now you're growing up. Your mum's so busy.
We're fine, she'd said quickly, and then remembered thank you.
Lockie had picked up a towel Auntie Lissa's house had
the best, thick soft towels, big enough to wrap around
your whole body, and took two steps towards the edge
of the pool, where Lyra's arms were resting. She'd put
her chin on them and looked down at where the
(49:46):
water was licking in and out of the shiny little
square tiles, anywhere but up at him. Come on, then,
he said, squatting down holding the towel out, Let's go
and get some food. How many times had Lira jumped
out of this pool and run into the kitchen in
a little sunsuit, in a swimming lesson one piece in
a bikini, without thinking, without even being aware of herself,
(50:08):
of her arms and legs and tommy and chest. Why
did she feel in that moment when she glanced up
and saw the crease around Lockey Short's eyes and the
particular curve of his closed mouth smile, like everything was different?
She remembered the rough grout scratching her stomach as she
pushed her whole self flat against the pool wall, hiding
her bum, her thighs, her flicking feet. Lockie hadn't moved
(50:32):
he'd stayed close. Towel and hands. You girls should get
bigger cozies, he'd said, and she could hear something like
a tease in his voice, friendly, maybe a tone that
suggested everything she was feeling was ridiculous. But then, if
you don't want to be looked at, and she remembered
feeling sick in her mouth,
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I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.