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Alex Brooks  6:08  

What if caring for our older parents and loved ones wasn't so much of a crisis or stress that made your pathway to finding something better, more innovative, just something different. Here we're going to talk with carer Mitch Gibson and tea time founder Jimmy Leishman about wild new ways our generation might find caring fathers and growing older. A little bit more innovative, a little bit better. 

Welcome to the two of you. Now, Mitch, you have had a tough five years. You've lost your beloved partner, Mark, who's right here on the table with us today, all while navigating the care of your elderly parents, who have now also sadly passed. What's one word to sum up this carer journey you've been on?

Mitch  7:56  

Oh, one word, I would have to say, surreal.

Alex Brooks  8:02  

I agree. Now, Jimmy, you've got a social enterprise creating connection for older people. Now, what is tea time? Tell us what you do.

Jimmy  8:11  

Well, simplest it's a photo video sharing.

Alex Brooks  8:15  

Okay, now that doesn't sound particularly innovative when we're talking about it like that, but explain how it works in residential care facility, for example, give us, give us a vivid picture of what it might do.

Jimmy  8:30  

Let me tell you. So we got, we got family all around the world. Yeah, we have aging, aging Australians in residential aged care homes here in Australia, beautiful homes. And we have, we have, we have people safe. We have to connect safely. It's not, it's not something you can just set and forget with. You need to have some sort of check and balance when sharing, okay, things in the background. 

Alex

So no scammers, 

Jimmy

no scammers, medication. Individuals that have fallen over, trips and falls very common in aged care. So sharing photos and videos and messages is hugely complex, and it's a lot of consideration. So tea time allows that. It allows for that connection in a very safe way. We can talk about the architecture later, okay, but yeah, it's a it's a beautiful piece of technology that's that's working,

Alex Brooks  9:24  

okay, because we are currently what we're calling the sandwich generation, right? We're all living longer. But one of the side effects of this is that many women hit middle age, and they're not just caring for teenage kids. They're also caring for their elderly parents, their loved ones and sometimes their partners, as Mitch has experienced. Now, the bizarre thing about this in Australia is that while we're living longer and most of us don't want to financially retire, the Australian Bureau of Statistics says most of us retire in our 50s, and a lot of experts are saying this is because. Many of us are caring for others or caring for our own health. So talk to me a little bit about how this what that means to you each like when I tell you that people are financially retiring, there's a sign that sandwich generation shouldering this caring burden. Tell me. Tell me what that looked like for you over the last five

Mitch  10:21  

years, the caring burden. I'm not a sandwich generation person, because officially, I don't have children. 

Alex

You do have cats,

Mitch

I do have very important I have cats,

Alex Brooks  10:32  

and you had a lot of challenges navigating

Mitch  10:34  

exactly. I had a very small business that I had to sell when I decided to care for my late partner, Mark, and so it's just and ever since then, I really haven't worked properly since, because I've only just finished caring for my parents when I passed away two months ago. So it's hit, well, that's why I think the words are real. Yeah, it's been crazy,

Alex Brooks  10:56  

because let's talk a little bit about the diagnosis that changed everything, because most people have these crises, crises in their lives, at an unexpected moment when you just think life's coming along, you might be planning your next holiday, thinking what you're going to do for Christmas, and then boom, suddenly, you're in a car park at a hospital, and you Get some news. And that's typically how some of these midlife caring journeys begin, is in a bit of a shock. So talk to me about what happened

Mitch  11:29  

with Mark. So Mark was 52 he was he'd run his own business. He was a producer. He'd been a producer of all kinds of things. He was a go getter. He was artistic. He was living life. We both were living life together. And he started experiencing a bit of niggly back pain and all of the normal like osteos and chiros and massage and acupuncture, they kind of weren't cutting through it. And then I kind of had a look at the anatomy chart, and, you know, we do enjoy a drink. And I thought, it's going to be your liver. Maybe you should go to the GP. And so the GP, knowing Mark's medical history, obviously, said, let's get you a scan. So they scanned him, and they found some spots on his liver. And then they thought, Okay, well, we need to biopsy that. So they gave him a biopsy, and at this point, I don't, didn't know anything about medical technology, nothing at all. And I was like, hmm, I wonder what's gonna happen next. Anyway, I remember

Alex  12:30  

so quickly, did it just feel unsettling to get that news? Like, just go, oh, wait and see what they tell us.

Mitch  12:35  

Just to be honest, I had so much else going on. I was just running a business, living life. And I was like, Okay, I guess it's something I could stress about, but I'll stress about it when I realize I need to Okay, so it was a bit different than the afternoon. We're expecting the phone call, and they said we'll call you at four o'clock. And so phone call came in, and I'm sitting next to Mark on the couch, just like I'm sitting with Jimmy here, and I'm listening sort of through the phone, and the guy literally said to mark, well, what we found is you have pancreatic cancer, and it's stage four, and there's actually nothing we can do for you. You're not a candidate for surgery, so I'm going to refer you to an oncologist. Good luck with everything. And that's how like that. And with that, our whole world just front forwarded.

Alex Brooks  13:25  

Yeah, and what's so interesting, Mitch, and I know you, you would probably never see yourself as the hero of this terrible journey, but you are now a grief educator, and you do a lot of work with violet, and you are actually an incredible person to be around. So you do. You are very articulate. You've written a few articles for Citro about the journey that I think have been particularly illuminating, because what Mark did was not necessarily stock standard. So you you obviously had a horrific journey navigating the end of life, which we can dive into a little bit, but tell us what he did with his body. That's so interesting, because I think that was a fascinating

Mitch  14:05  

one. Well, it was kind of interesting because we didn't have any end of life conversations until, literally, there was three weeks left. We had to scramble to get a will and to get power of

Speaker 1  14:14  

attorney together. That's the all goes to shit. Kid that. Jim, yeah, but

Mitch  14:19  

we were so, so driven by hope, like we're going to be 5% people that survive this ridiculous disease. We're going to be in that 5% what are they taking? We need to know what they're taking. I was so driven by hope, and so when it came down to, there's no more treatment, that's it. It was like, Oh, what do we do now? It was really surreal. And so to answer your question, that was the time Mark and I finally were able to have end of life conversations that were actually real and going to happen. And he decided, he had decided, that's right. I always knew that he was a big organ. Donation. We both were kind of advocating about it, and at this point, I'm like, sweetie, your body's full of cancer. And so they basically, and they sort of said, well, Mark had already known about this. There was a UTS body donation program that you register prior to your death, obviously, and then you're then accepting the generous donation of your body is approved after you've actually died, and you set all this up beforehand. So they say, you know, thank you. They get all the medical history, they figure out where you are, and they say to you very clearly, so when Mark dies with the hospital, let us know, and we will give you a call, because in case anything else to it happens during the actual death. So sure enough, after Mark died, about four hours later, I got a call from the guy who was the head of the UTS body donation program, wow. And he was always respectful, so respectful and beautiful, you know. And he said, I'm so sorry to hear Mark's gone. We gratefully accept his donation. And here's what will happen. They're going to keep his body at the morgue all night, and we will come to get him tomorrow morning, and we'll keep him at the facility at the inner science faculty at UTS for up to two years, and then you're going to receive his ashes at some time in the next two years. And

Alex Brooks  16:23  

this is the thing about this very generous gift. I think a lot of us are looking at new ways to do funerals and end of life. I mean, I definitely don't think the way, you know, our grandparents had stuffy funerals where, you know, childr

en were seen and not heard and, you know, there was just a wake with sandwiches. You know, I don't know if that's going to cut it for our generation or even our parents, really, but I think the beautiful thing you wrote about with that was that obviously you don't have a same kind of funeral service as a traditional end of life, because there's no body to bury or cremate, which is what most of The ceremony is about, right? Instead, you just have to wait for the random call and tell us about what the service that they give you.

Mitch  17:09  

Well, the service they give us was, it was interesting. They said up to two years. So I sort of filed that for two years you had a few other caring responsibilities besides.

Mitch  17:20  

You have blinding grief and all of that. But I remember one night, I was trying to get my cats in because we were going to bed, and I noticed a letter sticking out of my letter box. This is three months after he died, and it was 11 o'clock at night, and I opened the letter. Was like, hi, we've got his ashes come and collect. I'm like, Oh God, I'm so not

Alex

ready for this. Oh, so that would have been quite an unexpected meltdown.

Mitch  17:41  

Had a meltdown. It was just another meltdown. Just when I went to when I went to collect his ashes, I took a friend with me, which was just lovely. Oh, that's nice, yeah, that

Alex

is nice. But you also so you had to collect his ashes. And then later they had a bit of a service at the cemetery,

Mitch  17:58  

yeah, like, 18 months later, yeah, covid. And everything was all finished, because there was still covid and lockdowns. And so when all of that was sort of gone, I got an invitation from I received an invitation from the UTS body donation program, and now I having like a memorial, like a group memorial, for all this year's donate, donors. What is donors? Yeah. And we, they were invited out to Rockwood cemetery, which is the

Speaker 1  18:25  

which is the

biggest cemetery where my granddaddy's buried, yes, and that's where the same

Mitch  18:29  

extraordinary place, yes, soon as you drive in a non creepy way, yeah. So what I didn't realize is the UTS program has this little dedicated space which is a permanent fixture. And if you want a place to go, to be with your person, or to remember your person, that's the place I can go. So they held this really beautiful ceremony that afternoon, and they had the Dean of the Faculty of Science speaking about how important the donations are. They had a few of the actual science students speaking about not only how important and how respectful they are, but it's like, I remember clearly this one student, she said it made the pages on the textbook literally come to life. Yeah, yeah.

Alex Brooks  19:15  

So it's a very different way to commemorate one's life,

Mitch  19:20  

right? It is, but it's really purposeful,

Alex Brooks  19:22  

yeah, exactly. And what I mean, what sort of funeral, after all the grief you've been through, Mitch, what sort of funeral Do you want?

Mitch  19:31  

Whoa, that's a great question. To be honest, I've never even thought about really, yeah, too busy playing.

Alex Brooks  19:40  

I think that's so hilarious. So I remember being young, and we used to all talk about, what would be our funeral song, yeah. And, you know, the song choice at a funeral is a bit like song choice in a way. It's like, what does it mean, you know, and people leave it in their will as an instruction. And I was obsessed with, you know, pretty in pink, and all the. The all those teenage movies from the 80s, and there was the simple mind song, Don't You Forget About Me, which was my narcissistic funeral choice. I don't think my funeral song anymore. Do you have a funeral song choice?

Mitch  20:16  

I don't have a song choice at the moment, but now that you've come to ask me about funeral I'm gonna have a living awake. I don't want to miss out on the lovely things people say about you when you're already gone. Yeah, I want to hear all that stuff. What

Alex Brooks  20:28  

about you, Jimmy, what's your funeral song? Oh, again, I've you haven't thought about most of us don't, right, we do need to think about these things. What about your parents? Do you know what they want for their funeral.

Jimmy  20:41  

You know, my parents, they

Speaker 1  20:43  

will live forever. I think that's what everyone thinks I

Jimmy  20:49  

have. My sister has, they have. I think

Mitch  20:51  

everyone they will live forever. We might need to have a talk,

Alex Brooks  20:56  

because the reality is, half the reason grief and bereavement is so hard is that we don't like to think about it. It's we close the door and what is the basic reality of life? None of us get out of here alive, right? Yeah, well, it's the problem

Mitch  21:12  

we're so weird about. I just don't know

Alex Brooks  21:15  

why. Well, I think when you've come into this great age of longevity like we have, you don't see a lot of death anymore. And just 50 years ago, you know, a lot of kids didn't even make it to the age of five, right? Like, until we had widespread childhood vaccination, you know, kids would be dying. And now we think everyone lives a long time, and then covid came along and showed us a little blip. And you know, you've got grandparents living into their hundreds. Now, I know the stats actually show that the longer you live, so the healthier you are into your age, the longer you're going to live. Now the flip side of the longevity is that you've got this decaying health span

Mitch  21:58  

and quality of life as well.

Alex Brooks  22:00  

Yeah, and Mitch, talk about what happened with your parents. And obviously you're navigating the chronic, terrible time you had with Mark's illness. Right when your parents do what was their diagnosis and what happened?

Mitch  22:16  

It was a weird thing. This is all before Mark got sick. 2014 they both had a pretty horrible year. They were both separately diagnosed with different things. My dad had this really aggressive skin cancer on his forehead.

Alex  22:28  

That's the Australian curse. You're very lucky.

Jimmy  22:33  

We SPF

Mitch  22:35  

every day. Yeah, good, yeah. So my dad had this big, aggressive melanoma, and my mom bulged a disc onto a nerve, so she had to have spine surgery with some metal put in there. I've got this photograph of mum in recovery after her surgery, and dad, his head is bandages, and they're just standing there going, so shit, it was like the same time, exact same time. So Mum was in hospital for 10 months that year. My dad, his radiation was really successful. So by the time got mum home, she ended up having a stroke, after a series of I'm not gonna bore you with it, but she had a stroke. So she came home visually impaired, physically impaired, with a stroke brain, and we had to get age two different aged care packages for both of them at home, so they both went straight to level four packages. And it was hectic,

Alex Brooks  23:30  

because that's quite a lot of admin from a carer's perspective, isn't it? Yes, and our gene Kitson podcast talks to some of that, and she gives a lot of really practical advice. But what about emotional bitch? I mean, that's the thing that people can't be prepared for.

Mitch  23:49  

No and the thing is, I didn't understand the concept of anticipatory grief back then, and for those out there that don't understand what that is, it's your person is still alive and in front of you, but they're so not the person they were, and they are deteriorating, and they're sort of slowly, you're losing them in stages, even though they're still alive and still here.

Alex Brooks  24:08  

And this is actually the challenge for carers, really is that's the nub of it, because everyone dances between wanting to have a, you know, very human engagement, like you talk about with tea time. You want to love that person and just be with them. But you've also kind of, you've got to, you know, make sure they're showered, make sure that the care appointments booked. You've got to make sure the doctor appointments, sort of the medication.

Mitch  24:32  

You have to be this really high functioning, well organized person while you're in heavy duty, anticipatory grief and those little benchmarks that just pop up randomly, like all of a sudden she doesn't know who you are. Oh, hi, and I'm Michelle. I'm your daughter, and I eventually became known by mom as you have a nice lady in the green dress that visits me all the time.

Alex Brooks  24:58  

I was like, would that Brooklyn? Hard into a million

Mitch  25:01  

pieces over and over again, but it's just, you know, I've learned so much about dementia in the world of dementia and what's helpful and what's not helpful,

Alex Brooks  25:11  

because dementia, and this is a horrible fact, but dementia is the leading cause of death, and many women will end up either caring for someone with dementia or potentially having it themselves. And so making your wishes really clear is quite important, so that before it all goes to shit exactly,

Mitch  25:32  

but once it has gone to ship, you need to learn how to meet them where they

Alex Brooks  25:37  

are and talk about that. Because I think you've had some interesting things because, because, yeah, my husband's mom had dementia, and she never failed to recognize her kids, but she often failed to place me, because, obviously, I wasn't a child. There's a lot of capacity, yeah,

Unknown Speaker  25:54  

but talk about the

Speaker 5  25:55  

fact that a lot of people try to correct the dementia patients view. All

Mitch  26:01  

I can say is asking a person with dementia, do you remember Blah? Blah is like, say to a blind person, can you see that fan over there? Yeah, okay, no, I'm blind. I can't see. No, I don't remember

Alex Brooks  26:14  

that conversation. So how can you have those engaging moments? So what you

Mitch  26:18  

can do instead of, do you remember? You can own it yourself and say, I remember this time when we had a picnic down at Bobbin head, and we've got these hire boats and something in her might light up and go, Oh yes, I do remember that, especially if it's a long term memory. But if it just happened last week, you can't say, do you remember? I can say, Well, I remember I was I learned this thing last week. Let me teach it to you, or let me tell you about it. Do you want to hear about that? Yeah, that's so

Alex Brooks  26:45  

interesting. And Jimmy, talk to me. You've just been at a great conference where age tech is becoming a new thing, right? Let's talk a little bit about some of the technologies that are coming to help us with some of this shifting health, span, lifespan, care dilemma that is currently a real financial and emotional burden for a lot of

Jimmy  27:07  

people. Sure. Thank you for sharing your story. Yeah, I feel, I feel you. And I think a lot of our tea timers, if you like, yeah, that's our community, tea  timers, they are their families that are somewhere

Mitch  27:21  

really difficult place to be, but it can be really healthy, absolutely. I think, yeah, you articulate it so very well.

Jimmy  27:32  

 , I see care tech. I just see care tech everywhere. Now it's, I feel like I'm very selfish in the way I'm building an aged care that I want to be

Alex Brooks  27:41  

 I don't think that is selfish. I actually think that's selfless, because no one wants those places where they just lock people away to, you know, do nothing like you want to be. You want to be connected to people. And you can see like with with my own aging parents. You know, my father did pass before he got the chance to age, but you know my mother, you can see the mobility is becoming a bit more limited, and they can't do as much as they used to, but they're still a human being, right? Absolutely and Absolutely. How do you bring that humanity into these new environments and these new ways of living for

Jimmy  28:21  

us, it's always been. We don't we're not looking for a problem. We know the problem. Yeah, we're close to the problem. We spend a lot of time in aged care facilities, memory support units, all different individuals at different stages. I was Aged Care

Consultant before, you know, creating tea time with

my co founder and trick before the lightning bulb here,

Speaker 1  28:46  

yeah, the moment, this will just be better.

Jimmy  28:49  

This is it tea times. Here, we ran towards that. Before that, we spent hundreds of hours in aged care facilities.

You’ve got to know the problem? 

Alex

That's right? 

Jimmy  28:58  

You've got to know it. You've got to fear them for us, connection, social connection, family, memory, meeting, the aging Australia is where they are now. You mentioned just then, little things, little moments, quiet moments in between. Care leads world to individuals and the world to carers as well. And they're a universe unto themselves. You know, you walk into an aged care facility now, they're there. They're amazing. They're, you know, they've come such a long way from the Royal Commission. And I think we can be on that. We can talk to that. But really, to your point, the aging Australia, they had their national conference two weeks ago in Gold Coast, beautiful event.

Jimmy  29:46  

It's the national peak body of aged care. But we all come together, and we kind of, you know,

Speaker 5  29:50  

we trauma bonds, but we also, it'd be so nice if it wasn't a trauma bond.

Jimmy  29:55  

I feel that there's an impact. There is an enrichment happening. Here we are. We. Coming through a hyper jump, if you like, all my care tech friends are there, all our aged care providers there, our policy makers are there, governments there. And the one thing I'm seeing now is that person centered innovation, that individual comes first. What we build is around those Australians, and it's to improve their lives at all costs. And I'm very proud to be part of that, you know, I think of dementia innovation. I can name more to their food innovation. So talk

Speaker 1  30:28  

to me about dementia innovation, because I'm sure Mitch would have wished that into existence.

Jimmy  30:34  

Fantastic dementia Australia that you know, have so many resources which are amazing. But when I think of, you know, let's think of a startup. I think of a little guy, Richard Bray, an individual, I think, from UK, here in New South Wales. He started heart Street. And that is an application. Probably get it wrong here, but it's really it was inspired by his experience with his mum going through dementia, and he coded it himself. And essentially, it's probably changed a lot now, but memory music, being able to share stories from family to this resident to help with their stimulation journey home. So he's done amazing work. 

And I think of Andromeda just

Alex Brooks  31:14  

Yes, I was gonna ask you, I'm just gonna hold it up because Mitch, how much might a little robot have helped with some really practical things, like getting the jacks and cheese to come to your bedtime to not interrupt the conversation you're having? I suppose it would have, yeah, like we're talking about a massive future shortage of care workers in Australia, right? Like hundreds of 1000s of people missing that they need to train, that we need to bring in. And I mean, a lot of technology could be used for good and harnessed to help augment. And then, of course, technology is never gonna replace it

Jimmy  31:58  

Augment, not transform. Augmentation, yes, and it's about place. Placing tasks on roles.

Alex Brooks  32:04  

That's exactly right. Fundamentally,

Jimmy  32:06  

that's that's what we're looking at. Abby, the humanoid companion, yes. So that's the name of the robot, and it's Grace Brown, a friend of mine, I would say, you know the founder and creator right there? Yeah, picture as well. Andromeda is the company

Speaker 4  32:23  

that's amazing work with social innovation connection,

Jimmy  32:28  

90 languages, I believe, wow, Abby speaks, and you got to think about reverting back to your mother tongue when you're at that stage, and being able to speak Mandarin, or being able to speak, yeah, exactly.

Mitch  32:39  

Australia disadvantage in aged care. At the moment, the language Abby is

Jimmy  32:44  

just doing amazing work. And then we've got, you know, likes of science. And here Sam Bridgewater from pure foods CO, at the moment, pure food CO, and they're making texture modified foods so you can have nutritious meals.

Alex Brooks  33:00  

Yeah. Yeah. Is Seriously, my biggest fear of residential aged care is that you'll get, like, hospital food, and it's just so, like, I don't want my mashed potato in an ice cream. So thank you very

Unknown Speaker  33:15  

much. I just find that gross

Speaker 2  33:17  

care is number one. Food is number two. I would, I would, I would agree, like everybody

Alex Brooks  33:22  

agrees with that connection, human connection and isolation are the flip. Is the flip side, right? And aging is that's definitely, there's definitely a risk of that. And they talk about isolation being as bad as smoking. It's actually can set off some of the really terrible health cascades. But also, I guess there's this, how do I describe it?

Mitch  33:44  

There's these

Alex Brooks  33:46  

wishes or longings that the change doesn't happen, which is part of why we keep definition covered and don't talk about it. But how much do we just need to have our eyes open to what's realistic, versus keeping it locked away and living

Unknown Speaker  34:01  

in denial. What's your thoughts on that Mitch to

Mitch  34:04  

keep it realistic, as in, to keep where your person is at realistic. And

Alex Brooks  34:09  

also, I guess, if you could talk to that Mitch before she had to hear through the phone call about stage four cancer, what would you say to her? Ah,

Mitch  34:24  

I literally say, buckle up, babe. What seems to be the biggest shit show of your

Alex Brooks  34:31  

life, and this is the reality for a lot of caring journeys, right? Is it goes from Oh, life's rocketing along to, oh, hang on and then hang on. And, you know, I've spoken to a lot of people since working at Citro about this stuff, and they're navigating massive financial challenges as they try to work out how they can get care support. They're navigating who gives up work that

Mitch  34:58  

often happens like that. Phone call. You know, your mom's in hospital, there's been an accident, or there's been a fall, or there's been a heart attack, or there's been a something, yeah, and all of a sudden, your world just flips upside down. And do you

Alex Brooks  35:10  

think I Mean Jean Kittsontalks about being prepared, but of course, no one can be prepared for it, right? It's like, it's like being

Mitch  35:16  

prepared for children. If I can agree entirely with that, I think no matter how healthy or unhealthy your parents are, I really believe that end of life conversations are so helpful no matter how far away your end of life may seem, because it can be updated the wishes. Your end of life wishes can be evolving

Alex Brooks  35:34  

exactly right. And so let's talk about how to bring up those end of life wishes without being a ghoul or death obsessed. My grandmother would have smacked that conversation way straight away. She never liked talking about death, and that's because she grew up in the era where friends did die polio. Kids went to the beach and dressed because they weren't know how to swim like you know, death was all around previous generations.

Jimmy  35:58  

Jean Kittson said it right. It could be a movie, yeah, it could be a moment. You know, somebody's unwell on TV. You go, well, that person's not well. What about you, Mom, how you feel? Yeah, so I think that's an episode we watched recently, and she said it, well, yeah,

Unknown Speaker  36:14  

that's a really cute idea. I

Speaker 1  36:16  

remember seeing that gene as well, yeah, cute idea. What else though, like?

Mitch  36:20  

I think it depends if, if deterioration is already in the room, and it's looking like you're going to be stepping up as a carer pretty soon, yeah, maybe you already are it. I would not make it about them and their death. I'd make it about me. So as you shift the emphasis off, you know, you need to tell me what you want. I actually want to know, because I'm going to be the one that has to get this right.

Speaker 6  36:46  

Thought about okay, you want. Have you ever been to a

Mitch  36:51  

really great funeral? What was it like? What was it? What

Alex 36:54  

made it? What's your funeral song? What's your funeral song?

Mitch  36:57  

Usually, people have a funeral song in there somewhere, or they've thought about it. Well, much Christians. And they were both like, yes, we want this Bible verse. We want this prayer Catholic. And was writing as fast as they

Speaker 1  37:09  

could, is that a Catholic? No, yeah, really, yeah. What was their song?

Mitch  37:14  

Oh, see, they must

Speaker 1  37:16  

changed. Oh, thanks, too, narcissist. But the

Mitch  37:22  

thing is, no, when their numbers up. No whatever your last decision was, we're going to go

Alex Brooks  37:28  

with that. This is right, and it's just it is so challenging because I had to navigate like my dad literally just died abruptly. I think I told, yeah, I told Jean this he was going to buy a packet of ciggies and, you know, just croaked it in the street. And then I, I was the one left who had to organize a funeral. I knew what he wanted, because he made it so clear that he wanted to be at Waverly cemetery where his grandfather was buried. We had a family pot. He left no instructions whatsoever. Well, it was a verbal, you know, conversations,

Speaker 6  38:06  

that's what you've got. I remember one day he said this

Alex Brooks  38:10  

thing my dad used to say a lot. He was quite obsessed with labeling cemetery best ocean view in Sydney. And then I had to spend, you know, two days talking, navigating, how I found the family plot

Jimmy  38:24  

that God knows every time I go home to the UK Cambridge takes me upstairs, shows

Alex  38:29  

me his briefcase. Does he have a briefcase?

Jimmy  38:34  

You know, black kind of old school briefcase. Reminds me that's got a lock on no one's ever gonna take this briefcase to this, this law firm. And that's really, yeah.

Speaker 7  38:48  

Past 15 years, he's been

Speaker 1  38:51  

telling me he's prepped up. Yes, they're British.

Speaker 7  38:58  

I've gone yeah, yeah. No worries, no problem. I just thought he was now, only now, like, Oh, my God. He was planning,

Alex Brooks  39:06  

but also planning not to be a burden for his kids, which I think exactly that's a value. So my dad did not have that in mind whatsoever, whereas my mum kind of does right, like she's, I told you she's got a phone list of where I take the antique vase to get the best price. Like she's totally got it nailed.

Mitch  39:26  

Some people are like that, yeah, and some people are just the exact but they're actually helpful. At end of life, the control freaks that have left instructions, you're going

Alex Brooks  39:37  

to be so thankful. Well, I because I did feel like I was just and you feel as a loved one, you feel like you're letting them down if you don't make the right decision. I know that's a waste of time thought, because they're kind of not around to know, but that's how you judge it when you're the grieving person. Grief is such a jumble of weirdness, right? Yes, and grief. You know, this anticipatory grief, I think, is a really interesting phenomenon, because while we've got, you know, shrinking health span, but longer life span, the anticipatory grief, it's not just in the circumstance of dementia, for example. It can happen in all kinds of situations, I guess. How do you acknowledge that this might be what you're feeling each I mean, I have no idea, I guess, because I'm so

Mitch  40:25  

familiar with it, you know, I've lost my mark, I've lost my parents, I've lost one of my cats. I'm about to lose my last cat. So I know, I know it's too much. It is too much, but I guess there's an advantage of it. So I know the terrain, we know what's coming. I think the worst part of my first experience, which was losing mark, it was the biggest one, yeah, of course. And then, you know, that was such a whammy. And I didn't know he was going to die until a month before we actually left. And it's, it's a lot to take in, like, if I had known before that I would have done more things to pad out. I would have got more video recordings off.

Jimmy  41:09  

Oh, really, yeah, there you go. I think this is, this is exactly We. Are we? I am so incredibly happy you mentioned that because the amount of video for because the amount of video 

footage and photos being shared, 50,000 such a

Mitch  41:30  

short period of time. Yeah, it's all old photos, real moments. Yeah, you can hear their voice. You can see their eyes. I only got one from Mark, and it is my most prize possession hands down. Yeah, and that's why I got 1600 million

Alex Brooks  41:45  

of my mom. Oh, and a lot of people say once a loved one has died, they'll just ring to get the voicemail

Mitch  41:53  

you're allowed to actually sent me his voicemail you requested they have a bereavement package. Oh, I

Alex 41:59  

didn't even know this,

Speaker 1  42:02  

yeah, things we need to know about. That's one

Mitch  42:06  

of them. Yes, I've I've run, I've listened to it, just to hear his normal voice, not his. I'm dying voice, which are two very different things, and because it all happened so slowly, his deterioration, you forget what the sound of his normal voice was,

Unknown Speaker  42:21  

yeah, which is obviously what you felt relationship over

Mitch  42:24  

like, Oh, I feel like reading, my God. Didn't have like, two hours to sit and sob over this. So no, I'm not going to do it and

Speaker 5  42:30  

just talk about those brief moments because, because they come and hit people. There's a really great book called everybody died, so I got a dog, which brought grief to life for me in a whole new way, because it's one of the funniest books I've ever read, as well as one of the saddest. You will enjoy it. It's very, very funny. So this woman's sister dies first of horrific cancer, then her mother dies of MND, then her dad dies of dementia, and then she's like an orphan in the

Mitch  42:57  

world. Sounds familiar? Yeah.

Alex Brooks  42:58  

And so she finally gets a dog, and the grief she just talks about, you know, she called them kitchen floor nights where she just lies, or being on the kitchen floor, you couldn't go out as planned. The thing

Mitch  43:11  

is, you know, you have to have mercy for yourself, because you just, like, I don't want to be doing this. It's like, do it. You need to go through it. If you avoid it, it's gonna

Alex Brooks  43:20  

be worse. And talk about violet and this service or resource that's there. So explain how that works,

Mitch  43:27  

the violet initiative, violet.org.au I've been a violent volunteer guide, and I love the word guide because it means someone who's walked this path before. Yeah. So in order to be a guide, we give support, phone support, to people who are caring for someone with a life limiting illness and or grief and bereavement. So there's often crossover. Once their person has died, we switch our support to bereavement support, and it's just the thing I loved about Violet is it popped up on my Facebook feed about six months after Mark died, and I was like, what survive? I've never heard of them. So how did Mark Zuckerberg know that you needed me sobbing on the

Unknown Speaker  44:09  

kitchen, maybe,

Mitch  44:14  

but yeah, and they were asking for they were trying to make a new recruitment of new guides, and in order to be accepted into the training, which was phenomenal, you had to have lived experience in both caring for someone with a life limiting illness, tick and grief and bereavement, tick. And I must admit, at the time I just went, this is perfect. I want to do this because I had received absolutely selfless help from such incredible total strangers from opposite ends of the globe. There's a woman named Linda in the UK, there's a woman named Jill in the USA. And when I was literally drowning in cancer and cancer management, they were like, Okay, I will take your hand. I will show you how to do this. Here's the protocol. He's. What you need to do. They spent hours with me, and they expected nothing other

Unknown Speaker  45:05  

than we've been there. We know what it's like. Would you

Mitch  45:10  

feel absolutely Why would I not want to pay that forward? I can't pay them back, but I will never forget them

, and I am compelled to pay that forward. And I know what it's like to be dying and drowning, and when someone just says, Take my hand. You're like, Oh, my God, there's someone

Unknown Speaker  45:29  

there. Yeah. Why would I not want to do that? I

Alex Brooks  45:32  

think that's amazing. Interestingly, Mitch, you've got a very interesting background, yoga guru. She's taken people up the Harbor Bridge. She's She's a very interesting woman. I was a Bridge

Mitch  45:45  

Climb leader.

Speaker 4  45:46  

Bridge Climb leader the people that bridge, yeah. I used

Mitch  45:49  

to lead the tours, yeah. And such a fun job.

Alex Brooks  45:52  

Anyway. Example, you just obviously harbor all day. Well, you chained to the bridge when you're up there, so be very hard to get a high jump going.

Unknown Speaker  46:06  

Some other person's done yoga. I remember when

Alex Brooks  46:11  

I was first a journalist, and arriving in Sydney, I interviewed one of the bridge monitor people, and I said, What's the strangest story of the Harbor Bridge? And they said we found a shopping trolley on the top of the Harbor Bridge. How shopping trolleys?

Jimmy  46:27  

You find them everywhere. Someone

Speaker 1  46:39  

tell me where this like the surreal mystery of life now

Mitch  46:44  

being replaced by E black. So I reckon they'd be an E bike

Alex Brooks  46:49  

up there somewhere. We could probably ride up the bridge on an E bike. But tell me though about some of the really good self care rituals you can do while you're caring, while you're in this space of overwhelm and looking after everybody except yourself.

Mitch  47:09  

Okay, I want to speak to the overwhelm, and it's about asking for help. You have to get comfortable with asking for help. And how do you do that? If you well, comfortable, you just have, well, if you're going to try and you're going to literally buckle under the weight of all of this, if you don't receive help, and you will have zero level of self care. So when you get sick, so yeah, you need to stay well enough to be able to do what needs to be done. And there's also, there's a saying, it's like, participate in the human urge to give. Just say yes, because humans want to help, especially someone they love. When they did a friend, I can see you're dying over there. What can I do? And that phrase, that throw away phrase, you

Unknown Speaker  47:56  

know, if you need anything, just call me. That's call me.

Mitch  47:59  

It's not good enough. Just show up with a lasagna and leave it on the door and send a text saying, Go outside. There's a lasagna. Just read the room. Do they have kids? Does she do a school run? I will. I'm coming. Just text the night before. I'm coming. What time do I need to be there? I'm taking the kids to school, and I will take the dog for a walk as well.

Speaker 1  48:17  

Absolutely don't agree with me. Okay, so you just got to get really show

Mitch  48:22  

up. You get bossy. No one's going to say no to food on the doorstep. No one's going to say no to I'm coming to do your laundry for me. No one's going to say no to that. Okay. It's like, okay. I kind of learned that

Jimmy  48:36  

through her Lebanese family. Oh, really, I open up my mind, and my father was there cutting the grass and me.

Jimmy  48:48  

One every time, every morning I would be in the shower, as you do, and the door would fly open. There he is, got any washing? You got any washing?

Speaker 5  48:56  

The Brooks are very prudish about bath on easy. After six weeks, I was like, Yeah, no worries. Washings down

Unknown Speaker  49:05  

there. I stopped resisting. Resisting

Jimmy  49:09  

took me a while to learn this. Ah, I do believe you just show up and you contribute just and you don't wait for the the the request.

Mitch  49:19  

Do you know what? There's this other thing, which I can't not mention, there are apps. And the one I know and like is called

Speaker 7  49:27  

gather my gather my crew.

Mitch  49:30  

It's, it's kind of like the WhatsApp situation. You know, we all have a whatsapp family. You just add people to it, yeah, you add your friends to it, and you put the tasks that need to be done, school, run, wall is shopping, all that sort of stuff. And so the people that are on your team, they can see what you need, and they'll they'll wait for it. They'll go, yep, tick, I'll do that tomorrow. Recruit friends, and you get them on this app, and it's so good meals. And what are you what are you dietary restrictions? Well, we've got one that's gluten free in the. Other ones, vegetarian. So great, at least,

Alex Brooks  50:01  

you know, so what was the most helpful thing in your surreal journey? What was the really

Unknown Speaker  50:10  

helpful thing? I can't remember. I'm too scared. Most

Mitch  50:15  

helpful thing was when it finished, which is awful, because you lose your person. Because I had, okay, here's the thing I just remembered. Mark's sister lives in Melbourne, and Mark was spent most of his illness in covid, times in lockdown, especially the last year of his life, which was very Melbourne, was very long. Melbourne was very locked down. And you know, bless her, she was dying to come up, she would conference call in all the oncology appointments. She was very hands on from afar, and we all knew she was busting to come up and just get her hands on him. And as soon as they were let out of lockdown, she arrived. And there's a saying, and it's something like this, you honestly don't realize how much help you need until the help shows up, and you're literally like, okay, there's lists, there's a million alarms, there's ridiculous amounts of medicines and pills every single moment. And I remember I had to go out for a few hours one time, and I said, Okay, well, here's the list, and all this has to happen. And I remember getting home, and she's standing there in the kitchen with this look on her face. I said, You're right. She goes, this is unsustainable. I'm like, yeah, no, did you do all the things? She goes, yeah. I'm like, we just have to keep going.

Alex Brooks  51:27  

You've got no choice but to keep going. But can you make it Kinder on yourself?

Mitch  51:33  

Question, it depends on how hectic the given situation is, and that's why I'm such an advocate for you need to recruit people. Yeah, sometimes it's just such a lot if you're caring for your parents in your own home. I take my hat off to those people. Well, this is going

Alex Brooks  51:53  

to be the reality, right? And perhaps that is where a lot of aged care tech would be really interesting, because most of us are going to age in place, at home. Residential aged care is going to become more of a rarity for all the reasons we've talked about, there's not enough workers out there. You know, funding is so difficult. We also know there's all these changes coming, and we, you know, we're probably all going to need to pay a lot more for our care in some way or contribute in some way. And I guess, you know, what's the I guess what's the good bad, and get over it. Of that, like, what do we need to do to prepare to care for people better at home and as part of our busy lives? Right? So it doesn't just, you don't just go from, oh, I'm happy, happily planning my life and I'm gonna go caravanning or travel Europe, and then, you know, oh no, you've got stage four cancer. How do we how do we make it easier and get with it, rather than deny it from aged care? I think the

Jimmy  52:59  

public conversation for you, yeah, having the conversation like we are now, yeah, celebrating innovation like we are now. Yeah, and understanding that, you know, consulting with those at that stage there's so much to learn so they can offer in terms of what, what do they want? In which manner do they want to age? That's right, where would they like to age, ask the question like you would anything. Ask the question, be curious. That is a really good way to be curious, because you might very well learn I have seen it residential aged care. It's not where we think we want to go, but I have seen aging Australians choose to go to residential aged care. For the social they're very lonely for the for the square meals, three square meals a day,

Mitch  53:45  

plus social interaction, plus activities.

Jimmy  53:47  

It depends on the individual. It really does make sense for potentially yourself or for whoever, because you've got lovely home, you've got like people around you. But for some, they've been lonely for five years, and I've had countless conversations, and when they enter the caring environment, suddenly,

Alex Brooks  54:02  

yeah, well, at least for them, yeah. We had a very big conversation with Andrew boal and Alice Stolz from domain about the fact that, yes, everyone thinks they want to stay in their home, but you know, you don't want one person living in a five bedroom house with three bathrooms. You know, especially because none of none of those three bathrooms probably enable a carer to come in and easily shower them anyway. And we sort of need this whole fit for purpose kind of ways of living which perhaps don't exist yet. And as limited imagination, people that prefer all the bad stuff back of our brains, we're not imagining what can happen and how things can change, because I certainly saw that my mum moved to a sort of over 55 retirement community place, which is very much more affordable, super connected, really well designed, so that everyone runs into each other all the time, and it's just they have friendships and. Make new friends, and how do we foster that more? I mean, how do we make sure that we're continuing to have these

Mitch  55:12  

conversations? It's a really interesting question. I it's sort of not. I never remember any time at all at school. We learned all we learned at school. But I never remember anyone going and by the way, sometime, probably during your 50s, your parents are going to turn to shit. It's going to be inconvenient, it's going to be a nightmare. It's going to upend your entire world. And good luck with that. Well, this is coming. People

Alex Brooks  55:39  

is coming. Well, it is coming because that's the privilege of having people you love in your life. And you know, some people would love to have their parents around.

Mitch  55:48  

Everyone's situation is different, like, I have two siblings, and you know, people start well, you know, between the three

Alex Brooks  55:55  

never works that way. Works that way. So Rachel Laine and Stephen Huppert, there's another podcast coming up with them, and Rachel a hilariously calls these people Teds, thinking big Ted, little Ted from playschool, which said Ted is The Elder’s Daughter or daughter in law, because it's usually a woman. And she says the TED is the one shouldering the burden, and there's often a lot of friction around, how do you share the caring Yeah, well, how do you think it? Oh,

Mitch  56:33  

okay, yeah, I am a TED. You are carrying 10

Alex Brooks  56:36  

and can you explain how to share the caring burden with siblings, because it's very difficult to

Mitch  56:42  

navigate these conversations. Right? Thing is, if they don't want to do it, they're not going to do it. And this is true. This is the hardest, the hardest we see on Tea Time. We have

Jimmy  56:52  

families who join to connect with their loved ones, yeah, and some families sharing and communicating, and we try to get to them. We give them opportunities to join, just, just from, you know, adoption, perspective, perspective, and there's nothing you can do. There's no interest. So and some families don't talk. Some siblings don't talk. We have to create separate groups for one resident and they want to see each other.

Jimmy  57:18  

It's so complicated, so

Jimmy  57:21  

complicated. I think families are

Mitch  57:24  

very, very complicated. Of course they are. Since clients, I've had a personal experience, you know, estrangement within families, it

Alex Brooks  57:32  

really is, and I think it's very traumatic as well. Maybe we should talk a little bit to some of the trauma, because while it's all fine to say, Oh, we can have a nice conversation. Sometimes you can't, right, and conversations get shut down. And sometimes the estrangement is very real, until a few years after the death, right? Like I've seen it in some of my own friends, lives, where people, who I think are perfectly they would never throw a basket of croissants at their siblings, but they did in this instance, and it led to massive fracture. The visuals made hilarious. It's kind of like because these are people that I never would have thought, like I would totally do something like that. But no, not these people. And yeah, it's all happening around death and bereavement, and so family dynamics that have been laid the ground 30 years might come to the fore, stress in many different ways. And how do you counsel people through that brief and bereavement

Mitch  58:36  

that's kind of there's a bit of a thing about acceptance, like they have their experience, they're doing it the way that they need to do it. Okay, even though you desperately want slash, need their help. Yeah, it's like they've made it obvious it's not coming, and so they're spatting your head against bashing your head against a football. But there's also factoring in different relationships. I had a very different relationship with my mom, my two siblings did.

Alex Brooks  59:07  

Yeah, did. And look, you know, parents never want to talk about favorites, like, you know, I've got two kids, and no one's my favorite. But sometimes, you know, there isn't there. Isn't favorites, but sometimes things are just easier, and it depends what the task or the issue and is, right? And I'm sure it becomes the same around caring, because carer burnout is very, very real, right? So Australian senior did some research, and they're saying care burnout costs $18,000 a year. And the Productivity Commission has an even more startling financial statistics, which is that it will cost you to care for someone. It will cost you around $375,000 plus around 190 575,000 do. In your superannuation that you don't earn, so that there's some numbers that some research, and they're all Australian numbers that put the figure on caring, because we don't care enough about caring. And previously, we did have a lot of unpaid women at home that we don't have

Mitch  1:00:18  

anymore. Previous generation, it always fell to the women, and they often left Primary School at

Alex Brooks  1:00:23  

year six. Yes, because I had a sick mom or a sick grandma, brothers and sisters or and and it was women's work back in those days, absolutely. And look, it definitely still is, but there's got to be ways. I mean, men aren't the way they used to be at how do you recruit people who don't want to care into caring? Mitch, what can you do

Mitch  1:00:47  

from a family perspective? Just cross

Alex Brooks  1:00:49  

your fingers and yell. Like, what

Mitch  1:00:50  

I've done, the yelling I've done the you've tried all the Brooks done, all of those ridiculous approaches. And it's like, well, the job has to be done. So there's also outsourcing, like, what else can we do? If there's literally nothing, then I would start asking friends, okay, I'm drowning here. How can we help

Speaker 1  1:01:08  

me? So, okay, start with family, go to friends, and obviously go any organization,

Mitch  1:01:14  

anyone who loves you, anyone who vaguely even gives a shit about you. Ask them, yeah.

Alex Brooks  1:01:18  

Okay. And then what boundaries do carers really mean? Because obviously, we've got this duty to others versus your duty to look after yourself. What do you need to think through

Mitch  1:01:29  

little things like, for example, if you've got yourself in a routine of I have to visit her every day. Is that really necessary? She won't die if you don't come so if you are really sick, okay, just bone exhausted, give yourself a day off. She won't die. They won't die. That sort of thing. Tell Ourselves these stories. And we do get so entrenched in this new identity that's so important to that person, it's destroying everything you've got, your personal life, your health, your mental health, it's taking such a toll while you dig your heels

Alex Brooks  1:02:10  

and go, I have to do it this way. Yeah. Now, yeah. I think it's definitely challenging, and it helps to be able to talk about it and connect over it. But Jimmy, I guess. What do you hope getting older looks like in another 30 years time? Yeah, what's your magic? Dignified,

Jimmy  1:02:29  

dignified choice? Yeah, really, really important fundamentals, I think, first and foremost, yeah, I think I hope it would then be fun. There would be there'll be life after those, you know, connection, there storytelling, and there'll be opportunities to still make mistakes. And I

Speaker 5  1:02:55  

mean, I think, yeah, I think the joy is sometimes in the mistakes. I mean that that's been my life, all over. They ever do is make mistakes.

Mitch  1:03:04  

The thing is, who's honestly been to carer college?

Alex Brooks  1:03:10  

Well, there are literally million unpaid carers,

Mitch  1:03:15  

3 million. It's a shit show. And you just riding by the seat of your ass, and it's like, how do I do this? I don't know.

Alex Brooks  1:03:21  

You just learn. I think we just need to care more about caring, right? Because it's a fundamental human need, and certainly we can, you know, put numbers all over it as much as we want. But the reality is, we care for people because we love them, and it's not always a privilege or happy to care for people who might be in the you know, have a life limiting illness, or, you know, have high needs care, or there can be

Mitch  1:03:53  

other complexities involved.

Alex Brooks  1:03:55  

There really can. But I guess let's cut to my two word, my two question. Part of the of the chat, I'm gonna just cut to you first, Jimmy, and I'm gonna get you to think through your very first answer. Because you're British, I'm just gonna guess them. If I, if I hit you with tea or coffee, what's your answer? Which time I mean, say that I just miss

Speaker 5  1:04:19  

Oh, look at you. Look at hearing another polish.

Speaker 6  1:04:26  

Yeah, with lemon fridge if you want. Okay, FaceTime or face to face time, face to face, skin on skin, okay?

Alex Brooks  1:04:40  

Tech first, or people first? Are

Jimmy  1:04:43  

people first? People First People First

Speaker 5  1:04:48  

people first. Okay, AI or human touch, oh,

Speaker 7  1:04:54  

I would say, well, it's human touch. It's human touch, you know. Okay? I. Now, are you an early bird or a night out?

Jimmy  1:05:04  

It's changed. It has changed

Speaker 1  1:05:06  

is that just because you have young children? Yes, first caring duty that makes you wake up

Jimmy  1:05:12  

with the birds is having young kids. I used to be a night owl. Yeah.

Alex Brooks  1:05:16  

The irony is, many children leave home like mine have. I still wake up at 2530 to 6am to 6am I like they're not even there for me to need to do that. It's so annoying.

Speaker 1  1:05:28  

Short term or long game. Short

Unknown Speaker  1:05:31  

term, okay, always go short live in the moment, okay, comfort

Unknown Speaker  1:05:35  

or convenience,

Unknown Speaker  1:05:41  

expectation, what do you mean by that?

Speaker 7  1:05:45  

Well, I want good things to happen. Okay, they will Okay,

Speaker 1  1:05:50  

that's good. What about thinking cap or party

Speaker 1  1:06:01  

hat? Good time. We're here for a good time, not a long time. So

Speaker 5  1:06:05  

that's what they say. All right, Mitch, I'm gonna go to you first. I'm gonna say Tim Tam or mint slice.

Speaker 1  1:06:13  

Who likes mint slice? I do like thm. Do you like yeah, do I really dislike them intensely. I like the texture. But

Mitch  1:06:19  

who doesn't like the texture. I

Speaker 5  1:06:26  

just think Tam Tim's the winners out out damn spot that is outrageous.

Alex Brooks  1:06:36  

I know a lot of people do say this to me and I'm outraged. What understand what's the height, because it's chocolatey creaminess,

Mitch  1:06:47  

just the right amount of crunch that I agree. There's zillions of flavors there are.

Alex Brooks  1:06:51  

Now, you know what else it is? I think it's the British chocolate is. They think it's better, but it's not. It's sort of it's not because we have a our chocolates made to withstand higher and so we like the creaminess of a tin tan and our chocolate. But the Brits you like, you don't like that, and I think that's why you don't like the tin tan. This is just my field. It's good to know, okay, okay, palliative care at home or hospital,

Mitch  1:07:25  

there are pros for both. Okay, sorry if you're in hospital. Yeah, you get to as carer. Nurses are nice as a carer. Nurses are really nice for the most part as a carer. To do it in hospital means you don't have to care anymore, so all you need to do is love them out of this life. And that, I would pick that over home care, yeah, okay, that's interesting. You're allowed to bring your pets into the palliative care ward,

Unknown Speaker  1:07:52  

and they have a bar cart up.

Mitch  1:07:55  

Do they, which is the one of the weirdest things I've ever experienced.

Alex Brooks  1:07:58  

Just tell me about what's on the bar

Mitch  1:08:02  

cart in the morning, probably about two days away from his death. And there was a soft knock on the door. And I opened up, and this woman, she's got a fully laden bar cart. She's got every spirit is, everything, price, glasses, all of it. She goes, Do you want something? And I went and today, it has cancer. He can't have any of this, but it's not for him, it's for you.

Alex Brooks  1:08:25  

Oh, that is so great. So that's a secret. So what else do they give you that we don't know about? So you can get free voice messages after death. You can get drinks. You can get drinks

Speaker 6  1:08:41  

in palliative care? That's a great question. Maybe I should write a blog on that. Yeah, you really should. All right,

Alex Brooks  1:08:47  

here's my back to my questions, because I'm very good at distracting myself brave face or breakdown.

Mitch  1:09:01  

Look, there's something to there's something to be said about having a breakdown, because it's a reset,

Alex Brooks  1:09:05  

okay, forces you to stop, okay? And that's helpful when you're either caring, yeah, okay, plan ahead or wing it.

Mitch  1:09:15  

Plan ahead now that I know what I know.

Speaker 5  1:09:17  

Okay, that's really interesting. Laugh or cry.

Speaker 6  1:09:25  

Sick of crying, yeah, well, it's, it's you

Speaker 1  1:09:28  

kind of been through a hard time. So control or surrender?

Mitch  1:09:39  

I'm gonna say control, because it's oozing out of me.

Speaker 5  1:09:45  

That's okay. That is absolutely okay. So morning

Alex Brooks  1:09:49  

exercise or midnight crying, midnight,

Speaker 5  1:09:57  

crying. On that note, I'm going to ask you. To think one more time what your funeral song would be. I want each of you to explain

Speaker 5  1:10:08  

mine this time. So one that stuck in my mind is Monty Python's Always look on the bright side of life. I was so surprised. It was like a somber judge. You know, it was a friend of mine's dad, and he was always so, you know, earnest and like

it. And then at the end of the funeral they play that song. It was just hilarious. Like, it just does get absolutely like, the mood. Yeah, so, yeah, have a think funeral song.

Mitch  1:10:34  

Oh God, this is off the cuff. I wasn't bad for this. I'm just gonna go with massive attack. Unfinished Sympathy. Oh, I'm

Jimmy  1:10:41  

gonna go with Wham, Tropicana,

Alex 1:10:46  

just because it's a happy soul.

Mitch  1:10:49  

Just a great song. What

Alex Brooks  1:10:51  

do you think George Michael played at his funeral?

Mitch  1:10:54  

I don't know. I'm gonna Google it after this, though,

Alex Brooks  1:10:57  

because it's a really good question. I know he died so young. He was in his 50s. I think his mum might have even had to be his funeral, which would have been, I feel like that would be the most distressing thing for any parent. So I think Always Look on the bright side of life. I think that's all you've got. You're here for a good time, not long time, right? We don't know how. None of us know how long we've got. None of us know what's around the corner. And that's part of the joy and the delight, but not as joyous as having both of you talk with us today. So thank you for being here.