AHHH This one was so fun! Had a few technical difficulties buttttt I got it out! I do truly hope you enjoy our silly little convo!!! You can find all things AJP and
TTFN!
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And we are back.
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This is Taylor with the Curiosity Chronicles.
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And today I have the pleasure of having a chat with Alexander J.
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Porter over at New World Porter on Substack.
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Welcome, Alexander.
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Thank you so much.
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I watched 150 hours of Joe Rogan to prepare for this, to get in the podcast.
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I know the controversy sells.
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I've come with all my controversial opinions.
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Let's cause some trouble.
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Oh my gosh.
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I didn't even think that you would say controversy differently,
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but that was like,
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that's what tripped my brain out of all of that.
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So I was Australian or yes.
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Well, no, you are.
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But, and I knew that just the way some of the words are just different, you know?
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Well, what do you say?
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Controversial controversy.
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The first one.
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Controversial.
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Yes, I brought them all.
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But yeah, thank you for having me.
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Yeah, absolutely.
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Absolutely.
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So for just our listeners,
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people who are not on Substack and would have no clue who you are,
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they just walked up to you on the street for the first time.
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How would you tell them who you are and like your little quote unquote elevator pitch?
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Right.
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If someone comes up to me on the street and speaks to me, I'm gone.
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I'm out of there.
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I don't want to speak to Australians.
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But if forced to, yeah, I'm Australian.
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I'm from, I guess you call the bush originally.
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I live in a big city now.
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I live in Sydney.
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Really, my identity comes down to being a cancer survivor.
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I had leukemia when I was 20.
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And that kind of became the fulcrum upon which my life operated.
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There was a sort of BC before cancer and AC after cancer, I suppose you'd say.
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So, yeah, I'm a leukemia survivor with a bunch of tattoos.
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And I'm just trying to spread my perspective to help some other people around the
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world who might be going through their own challenges,
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whether that's cancer or anything else in life that's tough.
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And, you know, I love that.
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And I am so,
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you know,
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obviously that it's amazing that you've been in remission for 14,
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15,
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14,
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15 years or something like that.
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I was like trying to remember pulling that number out of my brain.
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um which is amazing um so what is so you provide you know a space for people to
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come and just feel less alone whether it's through their own cancer journey or
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other crazy life things you know like what drew me to you is your humor like the
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way you write a story is unlike anyone else it's
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Very different.
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And I really enjoy it because somehow you manage to combine seriousness with like
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this absolute absurd humor.
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And like, that's impressive to me.
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thank you i mean i it it came from once i got out of the cancer space once i went
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into remission and went through all the tough times i remember doing a like a sort
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of youtube video someone invited me along was a bunch of cancer survivors and they
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were like tell us about your experience blah blah blah we'll cut it together we'll
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send you the video and i kind of you know describe what was good what was bad you
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know the nurses were really nice the food was bad just some sort of how i saw it
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and when the video was cut together everyone else's story was so sad
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which makes sense no one's going to cancel but once i got out i was like that's my
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experience was but i'm not particularly sad about it like life is hard and it's
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your choice on the other side of the hard stuff really if you want to pursue
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happiness or sit in a little despair hole so i just kind of moved in that direction
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i wanted people to know like yeah like bad will happen but what happens on the
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other side is really up to you
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I love that.
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And it's so true because I've seen,
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and I'm sure you've seen the people who just sit there and just like allow life to
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happen around them and they don't,
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nothing changes and they just continue to sit in that type of grief.
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And my heart breaks for those people because they're not getting to do anything in life.
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And like life is such a gift.
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It's so short and so precious that it just seems so silly to not, you know,
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not go live it but it's easy to do you know it is easy to just it's it's not it's
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not a you know a natural thing to pull yourself out of one of those holes no one
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grows up thinking they're going to get you know smacked in the nuts by life but if
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you can find a way if you can find support systems or just pull yourself out a
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little bit at a time there's just so much magic on the other side but it is it's
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very easy to sit in those holes uh because it's comfortable and um
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That's really what my message is about.
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What you've gone through sucks,
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but I guarantee there's magic on the other side if you're willing to look for it.
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Yeah,
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and that's such an awesome message,
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especially for young teenage boys who are going through the same thing.
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I was talking to another Substacker on Wednesday about their openness about their gender identity and
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You know,
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I think that's one of the really cool things about Substack is all the kids who
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were us who would have needed this information now have it because the Internet's
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going to pull that stuff up.
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And that's just so cool because I mean,
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I don't know about you,
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but I would have loved to have someone be like,
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hey,
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this this is going to happen a little bit,
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but it's going to be OK.
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Like, you know, X, Y and Z.
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I mean, you're literally describing a great reason of why I got into online writing.
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I've been doing it for sort of 10 plus years now.
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So I was 20 when I was diagnosed with leukemia.
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So only up to 18 is in the children's hospital.
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So I was sent to an adult ward and there was 65 year old blokes and 70 year old blokes.
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everyone was so old and I was so isolated but there was no no one told me as a
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young man what to expect on the on the first day a doctor was like oh you might
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want to think about freezing your sperm because this this chemo is going to be
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brutal and then no one brought it up again for the rest of my cancer experience and
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I was like it would have been nice like if someone had expanded on that that's kind
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of though they just like dropped it in there and then left
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Yeah,
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I remember the first day a doctor was like,
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when we give you the chemo,
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you're either going to get crazy diarrhea or super constipated.
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And we're not sure which.
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And I was like, fuck yeah, sounds good, man.
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Lucky you, appreciate it.
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Turns out it was both, who knew?
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Oh yeah, that's just the best fucking combination right there.
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To move away from diarrhea, as we always should, to go back to your point.
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Yeah,
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that's a big part of why I wanted to write because there was no user manual for
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young adult men going through cancer.
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So that's eventually, I'd like to, like all of us, we all want to write a book.
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I'd like to write a user guide for young adult men that you go, fuck, this is the worst thing ever.
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But look, here's someone 15 years later who's living their best life.
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Here's what's going to happen.
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Here's what's not going to happen.
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So yeah, I'm with you on that.
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Yeah, that'd be a brilliant book.
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It would sell so well.
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Like user's guide for young adult men.
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I haven't put a couple of chuckles in there because cancer is so bloody serious and dull and boring.
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So yeah, if I can make someone see that, you know, it's not all doom and gloom, then that's a win.
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yeah i mean and that's why i picked the title did your kid die too because that's
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how i feel yeah i'm like did your kid die too i want to know like are you like me
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do you have this problem are you constantly sitting with these emotions that you
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have nowhere to put yeah yeah we're very aligned in that way like it's not not
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everyone can sort of put their their trauma if you will for lack of a better word
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like out in the world like that because it's painful to be vulnerable but it's it
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can be so meaningful for someone else so it's worth that pain so yeah
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Yeah,
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the amount of moms that have messaged me saying that me putting my story about Lily
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out there gave them the courage to put their story about their own loss.
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And so many,
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which is kind of tragic,
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but so many bereaved moms are coming out of the woodworks on Substack.
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It's kind of insane how many there are.
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And I bet they all felt so alone for so long.
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Oh, I guarantee.
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Yeah.
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It's, it is such an isolating journey and I'm sure you can relate to that.
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I also hate, I used to hate, really hate the word journey because it felt like so cliche.
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Yeah.
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Very buzzwordy.
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So, okay.
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To, to, to digress a little bit with this subject, I swear this is connected.
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You got married.
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i did get married no divorce yet 100 percent success rate of staying in it so
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that's good yes yes the first year no divorce that's good yeah isn't the first year
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meant to be the hardest don't they say that i heard that wrong you know you're
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asking the wrong person uh considering i got divorced at 28.
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well you probably learned a lot from it so i did i did positives
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Yes, I learned a lot.
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I learned a lot.
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You learn a lot when you get married young.
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But that's awesome.
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So how's it going for you?
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What is it like balancing the discussions of the grief and the trauma?
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It's not difficult at all, to be honest.
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A big part of that comes down to sort of my ethos is that
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there's no enemy within the enemy outside can do us no harm i love that expression
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i live my life by it that's why i'm such an open book to everything and and my wife
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amelie and audience in general i think sort of support that message so i'm whatever
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has happened to me i just put it all out there i got i got catfish in hospital for
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nine months i was victim of a sextortion plot at one point like i i met i met not
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in hospital like all the stuff that i've been through i just put it out there and
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um yeah the people in my life know like
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it's it's for for a good reason he's so ridiculously transparent yeah that's pretty
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cool though because i so you at such a young age like started with that philosophy
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to life which is really awesome because like as we know i did not take that
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approach to life and hit everything um so and now we're like oh i can't imagine
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that's corrosive eventually you know it's it doesn't those things don't belong in
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there
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No, no, they don't.
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It's very corrosive.
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I spent years and years with so many health issues and then Lily came along and
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just compounded everything.
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And you would think that it wouldn't have taken me till almost 30 to figure that
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shit out,
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but whatever it did.
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So here I am.
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Yeah, exactly.
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I'm here.
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Yeah.
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I'm still here.
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I'm still going, you know?
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So yeah,
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Okay, you have your Substack.
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Do you have any other like public writing outside of that?
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Do you do anything outside of that?
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Yeah, I have like sort of 40 million odd views or something sort of across the internet.
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So I've been read and written somewhat widely.
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But Substack's where it's at now.
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Substack is the future.
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You've had like 40 million views.
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Yeah, content views generally across the internet, yeah.
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That's really fucking cool.
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Well, I think people are drawn to the
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the authenticity, the vulnerability of it.
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It's not, it's not, it's nothing like a lot of more people have a lot more views than that.
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The number is a number.
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Like they could all be Russian bots for all I know,
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but a lot of it,
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I get a lot of messages from people who,
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a lot of people who got catfish,
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I get messages from them quite a lot.
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That's a pretty big one.
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A lot in this sort of sextortion space.
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I get a lot of messages from women and stuff there.
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So people, people are responding to it, which is that's, that's the point, right?
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It's more about the impact than anything else.
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For sure.
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I mean, and that's why I share all the shitty things I did before I got divorced, because same thing.
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I've got women messaging me telling me they're in the exact same situation that I was.
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And that is exactly what needs to be written about,
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because if they can avoid doing the horrible things that I did,
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that's that would be.
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be real nice and then your publication grows and you get views and everyone wins
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exactly exactly it's win-win regardless so you got cancer at 20.
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yep where did your life go after that like what did your life look like before and
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then during and after before the before alexander was a very different to the after
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i really through years of therapy afterwards sort of came to the realization that
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that Alexander died almost in hospital in a manner of speaking.
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And I grieved for a long time because that one was gone, but I was just a very,
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very different person before i was like incredibly shy i had i just couldn't speak
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to women so i was like borderline a gold star virgin at 20 and to lie in hospital
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and be like i'm gonna die a virgin was like brutal mentally it was really like i
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think i would have felt pretty devastated if i like at 20 years old was going to
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die aversion i know like 20 is old enough as it is a lot of people beaten up by a
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long way but
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It was just terrible.
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I'd send my dad to McDonald's to get nuggets and jerk off in the bathroom.
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Didn't even have a lock on it.
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It was just chaos.
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You haven't lived until you get the thrill of a nurse potentially knocking on your
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door like,
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yeah,
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all right,
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man.
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And you're trying to finish.
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But again, I digress.
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I digress.
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So to come out the other side of cancer after that, I was just a completely different person.
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I don't know how it changed.
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It changed my perspective on life.
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And I finally managed to not be a virgin anymore.
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and yeah it was a real it was a grieving process because that that alexander was
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gone maybe for the best i mean again it's very relatable for me given that like
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the person I was before Lily no, no longer exists.
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And that's a good thing because like she was selfish and self-centered and it's
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sometimes she crawls her way back in a little bit.
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Oh yeah.
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Oh yeah.
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Yeah.
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Creeping in a window.
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Right.
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Right.
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And they're like, Oh, hi.
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That's good though.
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Then it's sort of perspective.
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It's like, okay, I see what I need to keep giving myself distance from.
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Yeah, exactly, exactly.
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And so it's interesting,
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but I don't know how long you went through the grieving process of your old identity,
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but I think for about two years after Lily died,
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I really didn't know who I was or what I was supposed to do,
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why the fuck everything was happening that was happening and why I wasn't happy.
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Because, like, I had this new baby.
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I should be happy.
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And that was, like, none of that was happening.
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And that probably adds layers to you.
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You probably felt some sort of guilt, like, you know, why I have this right here.
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I mean, that loss is, every loss is difficult.
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But that sort of, I feel like that pales in comparison to what I went through.
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The sort of loss of the sense of self is not the same as what you've been through.
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So I commend you and applaud you for being so public and open and moving forward with it.
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It's a beautiful thing.
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Well, thank you.
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I appreciate that.
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It's, you know, everyone is very, I shouldn't say everyone.
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I'm very bad about just like lumping everything in together.
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See, I used everything.
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There is a lot of tiptoeing around the topic of death.
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And I think there's going to be,
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I know there's going to be,
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cause I'm just seeing it a lot more,
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a new,
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um,
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wave of how we how we treat death, how we treat grief and just everything in between.
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And it used to be such a taboo topic to talk about.
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And talking about struggles was, you know, you don't do that.
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So
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I, people didn't want to listen to the realness of the people around me.
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Didn't want to listen to the realness of what it was like and how much it sucked.
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And so I just stopped talking to anybody about it.
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It's uncomfortable for people.
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I mean, death is always an uncomfortable thing.
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And if you haven't,
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you haven't sort of danced with the devil in that regard,
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like you don't,
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you don't know the steps,
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you've got two left feet.
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It's just, people don't want to get on the dance floor.
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You know, they just want to stay out of the way.
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Um, but,
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Yeah.
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Yeah.
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I don't, it's obviously no one wants to die.
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No one's looking forward to it,
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but my having lay in a hospital bed,
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I find very different sort of thoughts and approaches to death and dying.
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Dying is no fun.
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As someone who's like laid in a bed, like, Oh, there we go.
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That's the finish line.
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I'm going to slide towards it.
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That's no fun.
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But death itself is a very different piece for me that it does.
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I don't feel the same way about it.
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It's just the dying.
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It's not much fun.
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yeah and that like on a very like logical level that makes sense you know because
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the if you're in the process of dying you're suffering yeah
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Because the only time you don't have a process of dying is if you're killed instantly.
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And that typically is not how cancer works, unfortunately.
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Right.
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There's just such a long, a long drawn out process.
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My grandmother got leukemia.
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The one that you get from chemo.
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Oh, right.
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Okay.
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I don't know.
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Yeah.
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So she had breast cancer twice and then she got diabetes.
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She collected the whole set.
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Oh, yeah.
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And then and then she got bone cancer and then then leukemia with the bone cancer.
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for one yeah yeah yeah it was just it's but her the process was so long i mean she
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spent a year just in horrific pain going through treatments and trying to you know
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stay alive and sometimes i kind of think like
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And this is horrible because I've never had this perspective.
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So you can totally tell me to fuck off.
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But like,
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these are the,
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those are the moments where I completely understand assisted suicide,
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like medically assisted suicide.
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Yeah.
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And a lot of people opt out of the tree,
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like the chemo itself for,
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and people,
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you know,
(00:18:45):
it's one of those things you can't understand if you've been through it.
(00:18:47):
It's like brutal.
(00:18:48):
So I can see why people opt out in my case.
(00:18:50):
So I was 20 and the doctor told me maybe two days after being diagnosed, I was in hospital.
(00:18:56):
I was, you know,
(00:18:57):
didn't know what was going on, ready for the next step.
(00:18:59):
And he said,
(00:18:59):
the normal treatment of chemo we give you works sometimes,
(00:19:04):
you know,
(00:19:04):
it has cured people,
(00:19:05):
but it will damage your heart because you're so young that you'll have heart
(00:19:09):
problems in middle ages and later in life.
(00:19:11):
Or we can put you on an experimental trial that I guarantee will not damage your heart,
(00:19:15):
but it may not work at all.
(00:19:17):
So let us know tomorrow morning what you want to do.
(00:19:19):
And I was sitting there as a 20-year-old, like, far out.
(00:19:22):
I was dealing with this whole diarrhea versus constipation issue,
(00:19:25):
and now I've got to choose between these two things.
(00:19:27):
So I went for the trial, and here I am 15 years later, no heart problems, still kicking around.
(00:19:34):
That's so fucking cool,
(00:19:36):
especially because,
(00:19:36):
like,
(00:19:37):
so one of my favorite things about Australia is the ability,
(00:19:42):
the government's ability to do research.
(00:19:44):
Mm-hmm.
(00:19:45):
the most like maternal fetal infant type research ob gyn all of that is done in
(00:19:53):
australia because yeah the regulations there are different and the doctors are more
(00:20:01):
free to do things so which is really cool um but yeah like they just gave you less
(00:20:08):
than 24 hours and you're like
(00:20:10):
they had to be able to start it was it was quite it was like so i had aml acute
(00:20:13):
myeloid leukemia which is a more aggressive than sort of all or um there's a cll
(00:20:19):
chronic cml or whatever it is chronic one um so they had to we had to start chemo
(00:20:24):
like asap so i had to decide straight away so how did they even find it in the
(00:20:29):
first place like what led to that diagnosis well this is not a super um sort of
(00:20:35):
exciting story in that i didn't have many symptoms so it really snuck up i wasn't
(00:20:39):
you can't usually get bruising really bad for no reason because you know your white
(00:20:43):
blood cell red blood cells whatever very low i was just a bit worn down but i was
(00:20:47):
going to university going to college at the time so i was like i'm probably tired
(00:20:50):
from my exams or studies or drinking too many beers or whatever
(00:20:53):
um and i was just pretty exhausted and then i felt what i described as a humming in
(00:20:57):
my chest it was like someone like a phone was vibrating in my chest which i assumed
(00:21:01):
was because my blood levels were going chaos so i just got a blood test and an ecg
(00:21:06):
and then i went home and that night my gp called up and was like like you got to go
(00:21:10):
to hospital right now you have leukemia
(00:21:14):
that's crazy that lends itself to the different person i was my parents you know
(00:21:20):
god bless them they said i'll pack an overnight bag the doctor says you just need a
(00:21:24):
blood transfusion and i went yep fair enough makes sense and looking back my brain
(00:21:28):
was just protecting me and just shutting off from reality like that doesn't make
(00:21:31):
sense an overnight bag and what i'm coming home tomorrow and i'm good and then i
(00:21:35):
got to hospital and didn't come home for 244 days
(00:21:38):
Oh, my God.
(00:21:40):
That is such a long time to be in the hospital.
(00:21:43):
It was home.
(00:21:44):
By the time I left, it was like leaving a prison.
(00:21:47):
I was like, fuck, I can't leave this place.
(00:21:48):
Like, this is where I live now.
(00:21:50):
It was weird.
(00:21:51):
And I remember they're all so nice to me, as they should be.
(00:21:55):
And I'd been through cancer.
(00:21:56):
And after I left, I took the clock off the wall and wrote a message behind it, put the clock back on.
(00:22:00):
There's like a secret message from my room I'd lived in.
(00:22:03):
And a doctor saw me and was like, what are you doing?
(00:22:04):
Don't do that.
(00:22:05):
And I was like, oh, sorry.
(00:22:06):
I thought...
(00:22:07):
Sorry, I was just having a bit of fun.
(00:22:08):
They were like, get out of here.
(00:22:10):
They weren't too happy about my little message.
(00:22:12):
Hopefully, it's still there.
(00:22:12):
It was permanent marketing.
(00:22:17):
really funny that a, that you were doing that and B you got caught doing that.
(00:22:22):
Um,
(00:22:23):
but I also understand to the feeling,
(00:22:25):
like,
(00:22:25):
I can't even imagine how much it would have felt like home because we were only
(00:22:30):
there for five weeks and,
(00:22:31):
you know,
(00:22:32):
some of the,
(00:22:33):
some of the nurses,
(00:22:34):
I'm still,
(00:22:34):
I still talk to them,
(00:22:36):
you know,
(00:22:36):
it's been 60 years and I still,
(00:22:38):
still talk to them.
(00:22:39):
Um, and I know that's the case among like so many people, which is why like,
(00:22:47):
I love nurses.
(00:22:47):
I have a huge, I mean, you developed the nurse fetish, so.
(00:22:51):
Oh yeah.
(00:22:51):
It's problematic.
(00:22:52):
So I'll be outside on Halloween.
(00:22:55):
There's too many people dressed as nurses.
(00:22:56):
That's my day to be inside with the windows closed.
(00:22:58):
But yeah, nurses are the best people.
(00:23:00):
Doctors are great too, obviously, but the nurses are the ones who are there all the time.
(00:23:04):
I went into shock at one point in hospital and the nurses like unbelievable.
(00:23:07):
Oh my goodness.
(00:23:08):
Bring me back, which was really nice.
(00:23:09):
So yeah, I got a lot of time for this.
(00:23:11):
Yeah.
(00:23:13):
Yeah, it's really nice for them to bring you back from.
(00:23:15):
Yeah, I appreciate it.
(00:23:16):
Just casually drop that in there.
(00:23:18):
Like your whole body didn't just try to.
(00:23:20):
That's what hospital was like.
(00:23:21):
Every day was like an absolute nightmare.
(00:23:24):
Nothing you can do about it.
(00:23:26):
The only way through it is to go through it.
(00:23:27):
So, yeah, that's the case with any tough stuff.
(00:23:32):
Oh, for sure.
(00:23:33):
I mean, you've heard, you know, Gemma talk about it.
(00:23:36):
Just keep fucking going.
(00:23:37):
Like that's her, her life mantra.
(00:23:39):
And, you know, she lost her husband to cancer and, and it was very quick, very, very quick.
(00:23:47):
And you said you listened to it.
(00:23:48):
So you probably heard some of it.
(00:23:50):
Um,
(00:23:51):
but it just clicked with me that there,
(00:23:54):
I read an,
(00:23:55):
an,
(00:23:56):
a newsletter on sub stack two days ago,
(00:23:59):
I want to say,
(00:23:59):
and,
(00:23:59):
um,
(00:24:02):
her son went through the exact same thing and it was leukemia um and when you said
(00:24:10):
the type of leukemia i was like it connected the dot and he was also 20.
(00:24:15):
and then someone else yeah someone else in that comment in the
(00:24:21):
commented saying that their son also died from leukemia nine months of treatment
(00:24:29):
they were 20 years old like it came out of nowhere wow collecting all these 20 year
(00:24:35):
olds what's going on warning to all the 20 years yeah seriously and i i that just
(00:24:40):
intrigued me because
(00:24:47):
Now I'm like, okay.
(00:24:49):
And most of them, I think were probably, their kids would be your age, probably.
(00:24:55):
And that makes me wonder,
(00:24:57):
like,
(00:24:58):
what was going on environmentally that was affecting the,
(00:25:02):
because these were both in England.
(00:25:07):
And so it just makes me wonder, like, what's causing that, you know?
(00:25:12):
had that concern with mine i asked the doctor once i was like is there something i
(00:25:14):
did wrong like did i eat too much cheese or something what could i have done to
(00:25:17):
avoid these things like he was like nah this was just a cosmic click of the fingers
(00:25:21):
it's like there was nothing you could do just the cells just went crazy and we're
(00:25:24):
gonna and i remember the when i was in there and then straight shooters these
(00:25:28):
doctors he said um you know 70 not 70 years ago in 1970 this was a death sentence
(00:25:34):
but we're not trying to prolong your life we're trying to cure you and i was like
(00:25:38):
Far out.
(00:25:38):
Lucky I was born when I was born.
(00:25:40):
And that's why in the future, I am excited for whatever is happening behind the scenes.
(00:25:44):
Hopefully,
(00:25:44):
I think cancer survival rates keep getting better,
(00:25:46):
although the environment is probably giving people more cancer.
(00:25:49):
But I think the survival rates are going up.
(00:25:53):
Yeah, I think you're probably right, just given the knowledge that we have.
(00:25:58):
It's so challenging because I think your perspective on the medical system and just
(00:26:05):
everything that,
(00:26:07):
you know,
(00:26:08):
encompasses having quality health care.
(00:26:12):
No, I didn't pay for the thing.
(00:26:14):
The government paid for all of it.
(00:26:15):
It was just all my treatment, all my MRIs.
(00:26:18):
I had surgeries.
(00:26:19):
I had a lot of surgeries during hospital times.
(00:26:22):
Came out, you know, nothing.
(00:26:25):
Yeah.
(00:26:26):
And so that was us.
(00:26:27):
But that was only because my ex-husband was in the Marine Corps.
(00:26:34):
And so we were at a naval hospital.
(00:26:37):
And so we didn't pay anything, but I know what those bills would have looked like.
(00:26:40):
And I saw some of them.
(00:26:43):
But that is not normal.
(00:26:46):
You know, some people hear stories about Americans.
(00:26:48):
They sort of have to forgo treatment almost sometimes like they don't have a choice.
(00:26:52):
So, yeah, no, that's that's very, very common.
(00:26:58):
And there are families who file for bankruptcy because of medical debt from their child's treatments.
(00:27:05):
But
(00:27:05):
it's like okay you either don't save your child's life yeah exactly and it's so
(00:27:12):
shitty that everybody's being put in this position when the government already has
(00:27:17):
the skills and ability to run a system that would work and that's what frustrates
(00:27:22):
me because and and not that you know the military health care is like out of this
(00:27:27):
world but it's not like poverty and it's not like
(00:27:34):
Lily was very well taken care of.
(00:27:36):
And the kids that I know in the military that had medical complications,
(00:27:40):
all of them are very well taken care of.
(00:27:44):
So we know how to do it.
(00:27:46):
It's just greedy people.
(00:27:47):
You just got to get everyone to join the military.
(00:27:49):
If every single American joins the military and they can all get a health care problem solved.
(00:27:52):
Yeah.
(00:27:53):
You have a massive military.
(00:27:56):
They don't want to be Israel.
(00:28:00):
So what does winter look like there for you?
(00:28:03):
Winter,
(00:28:04):
it's,
(00:28:05):
I consider it very cold,
(00:28:06):
but I imagine you would come here,
(00:28:08):
you'd probably have like shorts and a t-shirt and you'd think everyone here had
(00:28:11):
like some sort of chromosomal problem or something that they couldn't handle it.
(00:28:15):
But yeah,
(00:28:16):
just,
(00:28:16):
I didn't grow up with the cold weather,
(00:28:17):
so I struggle with it,
(00:28:18):
but it's really,
(00:28:19):
I'm told it's very mild.
(00:28:21):
When is the usual like winter temperature for you?
(00:28:24):
Well, we're going to be in Celsius Fahrenheit here.
(00:28:27):
Yeah.
(00:28:27):
We're speaking different languages.
(00:28:28):
Is that still going to work?
(00:28:28):
That's okay.
(00:28:29):
Yeah, yeah.
(00:28:31):
Like probably low teens or like even single digits, but nothing, you're not getting freezing.
(00:28:36):
It hasn't snowed for me since like 200 years or some unbelievable amount of time.
(00:28:40):
I think it snowed once in like 1800 or something like that.
(00:28:42):
Don't fact check me.
(00:28:43):
I don't know.
(00:28:43):
Maybe I made that up.
(00:28:45):
That is super interesting.
(00:28:47):
I didn't realize that like, I mean, that's not like cold, cold, but it's not necessarily like not cold.
(00:28:55):
it's not so bad i didn't see snow until i was in like my 20s and i was one of those
(00:28:59):
losers running around with their tongue out like trying to catch people like what
(00:29:01):
are you doing stop so embarrassing where did you see snow for the first time i saw
(00:29:08):
it on the ground in new zealand and i threw some at my mate and it was like a rock
(00:29:10):
it was like ice it wasn't a good time and then i saw it falling in new york um of
(00:29:15):
all places for the first time it was magical and everyone else it becomes sludge by
(00:29:20):
this time next week and for me it was like a disney movie i was
(00:29:23):
Oh, I bet.
(00:29:24):
It was great.
(00:29:26):
I mean,
(00:29:27):
yeah,
(00:29:28):
New York during the wintertime when it snows,
(00:29:31):
like it is definitely very much like a magical Hollywood moment.
(00:29:34):
So that's pretty cool that you got to have that.
(00:29:36):
Although I've been sold a lie.
(00:29:37):
I was made to believe in pop culture that December, like Christmas in America is snow.
(00:29:42):
And that's not always the case.
(00:29:43):
It snows in like January, February, March sometimes and stuff like that.
(00:29:47):
Yeah.
(00:29:47):
I thought white Christmas was the go.
(00:29:50):
That would be amazing.
(00:29:51):
I think that must stem from like the northern hemisphere,
(00:29:53):
like the north-north hemisphere,
(00:29:56):
which is where Santa's from,
(00:29:58):
technically.
(00:30:00):
But I think I've only had snow on Christmas like twice in my entire life.
(00:30:05):
And I've lived in the northeast.
(00:30:07):
I've lived in the Midwest.
(00:30:09):
Obviously, the southwest never got any snow really ever.
(00:30:13):
So it's too warm there.
(00:30:15):
The real magic is in a super hot Christmas.
(00:30:17):
Hot Christmas is where it's at.
(00:30:19):
Oh yeah, that's what I was going to ask you.
(00:30:21):
What the hell is that like?
(00:30:23):
Like to me, Christmas is cozy and comfy and fuzzy pajamas and all that kind of stuff.
(00:30:31):
What the fuck does Christmas look like for you guys?
(00:30:34):
Seafood is really big.
(00:30:35):
A lot of people have seafood on Christmas day.
(00:30:36):
So the hot weather goes really well with that.
(00:30:38):
Everyone's at the beach.
(00:30:39):
You know, Bondi beach is very famous.
(00:30:40):
Everyone fills up Bondi beach.
(00:30:43):
Yeah.
(00:30:43):
Hot Christmas.
(00:30:43):
Like you guys love summer.
(00:30:45):
You love going outside in July.
(00:30:47):
Just imagine if you had that beautiful weather on Christmas, best of both worlds.
(00:30:50):
But I get it.
(00:30:50):
There is something about like a cozy winter Christmas.
(00:30:53):
It's pretty like I've had a couple in my day and it's pretty nice.
(00:30:56):
Yeah.
(00:30:57):
I'm not a summer person.
(00:30:58):
So that sounds horrible to me.
(00:31:00):
I mean,
(00:31:01):
to be fair,
(00:31:02):
I appreciate any Christmas because when I was diagnosed with leukemia,
(00:31:05):
it was a week before Christmas.
(00:31:07):
So it was just the worst timing.
(00:31:10):
Like I'm sure for my family, it wasn't very fun.
(00:31:13):
So any Christmas that I'm not cooped up in a little bed with some family is a good Christmas.
(00:31:22):
That's so true though.
(00:31:23):
Christmas,
(00:31:24):
it's Christmas brings a lot with it because that was one of the things that really
(00:31:27):
like fucked with my head.
(00:31:29):
when Lily was born because like I had no idea how long she was going to live and
(00:31:35):
she was born in fucking February and she had a life expectancy of six months.
(00:31:40):
So that was August.
(00:31:42):
Um, so we tried to do things.
(00:31:45):
We tried to do Christmas in July, but my children like to make their own timing, which is,
(00:31:50):
they're my children, so that's not fucking surprising.
(00:31:53):
Right.
(00:31:53):
Yeah,
(00:31:54):
I'm sure once you got to sort of December,
(00:31:56):
there was a sense of,
(00:31:57):
you know,
(00:31:57):
so something's profoundly missing.
(00:31:59):
I'm sure it was a very difficult Christmas, yeah, once you got there.
(00:32:02):
yeah it probably was made easier by the fact by the time christmas rolled around i
(00:32:07):
was magically already pregnant again okay so yeah that was like my ivf clinic's
(00:32:14):
goal was to get me pregnant before christmas that's nice it was it was in hindsight
(00:32:20):
i do think they probably should have forced me to wait a little bit longer because
(00:32:25):
I literally was pregnant less than six months after my first child died.
(00:32:30):
And that must have been stressful, too, just to carry all those what ifs and, you know.
(00:32:34):
Oh, my gosh.
(00:32:35):
And that's why I won't do another pregnancy,
(00:32:37):
because like I already struggle mental health wise while pregnant.
(00:32:41):
And then you add in that layer of the child death and it's like it was torture for me.
(00:32:46):
I think you've earned the right to take away from it all.
(00:32:51):
yeah yeah so i i made that permanent i got a hysterectomy and i adopted out the
(00:32:57):
rest of my embryos to a friend of mine oh that's awesome yeah they have a really a
(00:33:03):
really pretty baby now granted she's part of part me but oh that's that's awesome
(00:33:09):
good for you
(00:33:10):
Thank you.
(00:33:13):
You talking about your sperm count made me think about that for families in those situations.
(00:33:18):
That was what we wanted.
(00:33:18):
There was no way I could mentally handle another child.
(00:33:23):
So I was like, I'm not just going to let these sit here.
(00:33:26):
That just seems weird.
(00:33:30):
So,
(00:33:30):
yeah,
(00:33:31):
and they,
(00:33:32):
the friend I adopted them out to was actually a family whose daughter died of the
(00:33:36):
same condition.
(00:33:39):
Yeah, and they're, Lily and her daughter were actually born only two weeks apart.
(00:33:47):
But her daughter, unfortunately, only lived for six weeks.
(00:33:51):
So she really didn't get much time with her.
(00:33:53):
And then they tried IVF and it just wasn't working and it wasn't working.
(00:33:58):
And I said, they ran out of money.
(00:34:00):
And I said, hey, I have these embryos, would you like them?
(00:34:03):
So I tried.
(00:34:06):
paid to ship them out there.
(00:34:07):
We got on the call with her reproductive endocrinologist talked about a protocol and everything.
(00:34:12):
Cause it's different.
(00:34:13):
That's the craziest part.
(00:34:14):
It's different for people who have our genetic mutations.
(00:34:18):
We struggle more, um, to stay pregnant because of the long chain amino acids for some reason.
(00:34:27):
Um,
(00:34:29):
So it requires an unusual IVF protocol.
(00:34:33):
Not unusual.
(00:34:34):
It's just not like the straight and narrow normal way.
(00:34:37):
But she now has a healthy, almost two-year-old daughter who's named after both of the girls.
(00:34:43):
And that's just the sweetest, most precious thing ever.
(00:34:45):
Oh, that is beautiful.
(00:34:46):
I love that.
(00:34:47):
Yeah.
(00:34:47):
I mean, I'm carrying around endless people's blood.
(00:34:49):
I've had so many blood transfusions.
(00:34:51):
I've probably got zero blood.
(00:34:52):
I know I make my own blood now.
(00:34:53):
But just the idea that you can give a part of yourself to help other people, it's bloody beautiful.
(00:34:59):
it really is and like there's it's very blood transfusions are so so important and
(00:35:05):
there's always i don't know how it is in australia but in america we have a huge
(00:35:11):
need for blood donation and it's on trying to get yeah yeah yeah lots of do you
(00:35:18):
guys get prescription ads
(00:35:20):
no they're insane right anytime i go to america you have those ads it's like a
(00:35:23):
beautiful family on a swing and then that little voice comes in like because you're
(00:35:27):
hard to stop working because death it's like that's correct you guys have the
(00:35:30):
wildest ads that stuff does not pass whatever regulatory body is yeah but that's
(00:35:36):
one of the things where i'm like why the do we do this yeah okay what do you call
(00:35:41):
doritos there like cool ranch are they still doritos are they american flavored or
(00:35:47):
are they cool ranch it's the blue one right
(00:35:49):
yeah yeah okay yeah yeah i don't think we're that culturally different it's so it's
(00:35:56):
so interesting to me because like some places it's in extremely culturally
(00:36:03):
different even though like for the most part they're very english but then other
(00:36:10):
places that are the same are so
(00:36:13):
like so similar and then so different it's super interesting to me and i think
(00:36:17):
that's really cool that like humans can exist in all these different places we're
(00:36:21):
pretty much america light in a lot of ways like we grew up in all the pop culture
(00:36:24):
and so the accent is so normal to hear an australian accent like a film is so
(00:36:27):
jarring it's like oh like that freaking because you're so used to like the american
(00:36:32):
accent so yeah it's very american yeah interesting interesting okay that that is
(00:36:38):
except no tipping which is probably the best difference you guys oh god money
(00:36:43):
yeah what is planning okay this is a really weird question but what is what is it
(00:36:49):
like planning for a trip to america as someone who's not american like what do you
(00:36:53):
have to plan for uh the tipping a lot of that and knowing when and how much and it
(00:36:59):
doesn't even seem to be related to good service you just seem to have to do it
(00:37:02):
regardless someone could just like you know drop the plate on your table and you
(00:37:05):
still have to tip them yeah
(00:37:10):
Yeah, I mean, it's because they don't make a real wage.
(00:37:13):
In most states, they make, like here in Oklahoma, I think they make like $2.50 an hour.
(00:37:18):
That's insane.
(00:37:20):
Oh, it's absolutely asinine to me that we self-function.
(00:37:23):
They have to subsidize salaries and wages for people.
(00:37:27):
Oh,
(00:37:27):
and I could go off on the idiocracy that is the American government,
(00:37:33):
but we don't need to torture ourselves with that information.
(00:37:35):
Yeah.
(00:37:38):
okay so you i saw you mention that it was four years ago that you started working
(00:37:46):
for yourself so before that you were working for like an ad agency or marketing
(00:37:51):
doing copywriting for them
(00:37:53):
Yeah, so I was a bartender for nine, ten years.
(00:37:55):
Okay.
(00:37:56):
First up, and back to the tips thing, Americans would come in.
(00:38:00):
I worked at a bar near Sydney Harbour.
(00:38:02):
You could see the Opera House,
(00:38:03):
see the bridge,
(00:38:04):
and they would be prepared to tip,
(00:38:05):
and I would say,
(00:38:06):
don't worry about it.
(00:38:07):
Like, Sydney's expensive enough.
(00:38:08):
I would get...
(00:38:09):
thirty dollars an hour or something just to stand around and do nothing like so i
(00:38:13):
didn't need their tip money but i was a bartender for for nine years i managed a
(00:38:18):
lingerie bar for for three or four years in that time i'm sorry wait stop you
(00:38:22):
managed a lingerie bar
(00:38:24):
it was like a regular it was like a sports bar with waitresses who wear lingerie so
(00:38:28):
it's kind of a mix between i don't know it was hooters i suppose in a way but yeah
(00:38:34):
yeah and then the clientele was obviously exclusively man but it wasn't i also
(00:38:37):
worked in a strip club for a little while but this one was just a it was like a
(00:38:41):
sports bar and they would walk around and pay the service and you'd thanks for the
(00:38:45):
drink and you'd leave a dollar or five dollars or whatever you wanted to tip them
(00:38:48):
um so i managed that for four or five years or something that was good fun
(00:38:54):
But yeah, I was in bars for nine, almost 10 years.
(00:38:57):
And then I think I was like 29 and it was four in the morning and I was ready to go home.
(00:39:03):
And the boss came and was like,
(00:39:04):
oh,
(00:39:04):
we forgot to roll cutlery because you have to roll the cutlery for tomorrow's shift.
(00:39:08):
I said, all right, we're going to roll the cutlery.
(00:39:09):
And the two girls working with me was like a 19 and a 20-year-old Irish backpackers.
(00:39:13):
And they were talking about they weren't even going to go to sleep.
(00:39:16):
They were going to go out in the morning and get on the beers.
(00:39:18):
And I just realized I'd aged out of the industry.
(00:39:20):
I was like, I can't be doing this anymore.
(00:39:23):
And I resigned the next day and left bartending behind.
(00:39:27):
Yeah, I mean, that makes complete sense.
(00:39:30):
I probably would have came to the same conclusion.
(00:39:32):
I don't know if at 29 I could have handled the... Yeah, it was no good.
(00:39:36):
But everyone should do hospitality or retail, I feel.
(00:39:38):
It teaches you a lot of lessons about customer service and about how to not slap
(00:39:42):
people when they come in.
(00:39:43):
Yeah, it was fun while I had it.
(00:39:48):
yeah okay so you you went to uni and then you so you got cancer at 20.
(00:39:54):
you were diagnosed at 20.
(00:39:55):
how long was your like treatment like how long did it last
(00:40:00):
so i was in hospital for 244 days okay um every every 30 or to 40 days i could go
(00:40:07):
home for one or two days when my so i'd go through i had seven rounds of chemo and
(00:40:12):
after each round my white blood cell count would obviously bottom out and you're so
(00:40:16):
at risk of getting anything and once it got just high enough that i was safe they
(00:40:19):
would let me go home for one or two days um so it was about 244 days in hospital
(00:40:23):
and then
(00:40:27):
Um, yeah, then they just sent me home and it was just good luck.
(00:40:30):
Get on with the rest of your life.
(00:40:32):
So were you in school when you got diagnosed?
(00:40:36):
I was at university.
(00:40:38):
I went to the University of Sydney to do a history degree,
(00:40:40):
which is colloquially known as a basket weaving course because it's just useless.
(00:40:44):
It does absolutely nothing for you.
(00:40:46):
I got a psychology degree, which is very much known as the MRS degree, which is very true.
(00:40:52):
All I wanted to do was get married.
(00:40:54):
Psychology seems very practical and useful.
(00:40:59):
don't use it at all it's such a joke of a degree you don't do anything yeah the
(00:41:03):
bachelor's you get nothing from it really it's fun but it's very much a social
(00:41:09):
degree yeah the my degree was kind of like that too it still looks cool it's framed
(00:41:13):
my mom's happy i got something framed on the wall that's really the whole point i
(00:41:17):
was halfway through that and i had to defer
(00:41:20):
for a year or two years, I think.
(00:41:21):
So I took two years off and then I went back and finished afterwards.
(00:41:25):
But they're all perks.
(00:41:27):
You used to have to do the little,
(00:41:29):
I don't know if American university or college is the same,
(00:41:31):
but you do like small group classes,
(00:41:33):
tutorials that had like five to 10 people.
(00:41:36):
So you could really focus on small group discussions.
(00:41:38):
Is there a similar thing in colleges or is it just lectures?
(00:41:42):
So it depends on the degree path, but that often...
(00:41:50):
was more like a lab they called it a lab but you know it happened in all different
(00:41:56):
degrees because like we had them in english and they they were just basically small
(00:42:01):
groups i don't know why they called them labs right yeah yeah we we had them and
(00:42:06):
they were mandatory if you missed more than one they they threatened to fail you
(00:42:09):
but when i got out of hospital and i was in remission i would have just a little
(00:42:13):
thing of i think they were vitamin c tablets and i would tell that i just didn't
(00:42:16):
want to be in them sometimes i didn't want to participate or have to give a speech
(00:42:19):
or anything so i would be i got to take these pills i'm in remission and they would
(00:42:22):
just be like
(00:42:23):
you do whatever you want and now just leave.
(00:42:25):
And they'd be like, he's off taking his pills.
(00:42:28):
He had cancer, leave him alone.
(00:42:29):
There were perks coming out the other side to finishing my degree.
(00:42:33):
I'll probably get my degree taken away, ripped off if anyone hears that now.
(00:42:37):
No.
(00:42:38):
Not that it's worth much anyway.
(00:42:40):
Right?
(00:42:40):
I paid fucking $90,000 for mine and I don't even use it.
(00:42:44):
Oh, yeah.
(00:42:45):
Oh, yeah.
(00:42:46):
Doesn't that debt like follow you around forever now?
(00:42:49):
Oh, I still have $30,000 of it left.
(00:42:51):
Oh, that's good.
(00:42:52):
You got a good chunk out of the way.
(00:42:53):
I mean,
(00:42:54):
it's taken me nine years,
(00:42:55):
but it's,
(00:42:57):
you know,
(00:42:58):
it's been crazy because I was on a music scholarship.
(00:43:03):
So, and an academic scholarship.
(00:43:05):
So some of my like tuition was covered and I still have that much.
(00:43:09):
Is the interest accruing on that?
(00:43:11):
Is it growing at the same time?
(00:43:12):
Yeah, that's why.
(00:43:13):
Because I was, this is the crux of being a middle-class white American female.
(00:43:22):
There's nothing for you, which understandably our lives are not hard.
(00:43:26):
Like they really aren't in comparison to a lot of other people in the country.
(00:43:30):
So yeah.
(00:43:32):
but it's you know and then i chose to go to a private school but thankfully i know
(00:43:38):
i know thankfully i i graduated in three years so i had one less year i had to pay
(00:43:44):
for but
(00:43:46):
yeah your country is something else but that's oh another day oh yeah that could be
(00:43:52):
that could be a whole thing no especially not yours you're probably like see you
(00:44:00):
america yeah what is it like so i have family that lives in sydney and they're very
(00:44:10):
involved in american politics
(00:44:13):
And I find that they still they're American.
(00:44:15):
They still vote.
(00:44:16):
No, no, they are Australian citizens.
(00:44:21):
They lived in America, but their mom is Australian.
(00:44:24):
And they've lived there for 30, 40 years now.
(00:44:31):
But they're super involved, like just constantly talking about American politics.
(00:44:38):
And I have Canadian family and it's the same way.
(00:44:40):
And I just don't.
(00:44:41):
quite understand why they care i don't it's because you're in it it's hard to see
(00:44:47):
that perspective i personally don't care very much either but i can see why a lot
(00:44:50):
of people do it's you guys are sort of the you know the fulcrum upon which the
(00:44:54):
world balances so it's pretty interesting i guess but it's more that stress to my
(00:45:00):
life that i don't need so i just have no interest in it
(00:45:02):
Oh, same.
(00:45:03):
I mean, I live here and I don't even pay attention to it.
(00:45:05):
I stopped listening to pretty much any news source because it was just,
(00:45:09):
it was just so foggy and depressing.
(00:45:11):
And I was like, I've already had enough shit in my life.
(00:45:14):
I don't, I don't need more of this.
(00:45:16):
And I feel someone would say, oh, that comes from a state of privilege.
(00:45:19):
Like some people have to care.
(00:45:20):
And like, that's, I agree.
(00:45:21):
That's fine.
(00:45:21):
But that's, I guess that's my state of privilege.
(00:45:23):
I've got enough health stuff going on.
(00:45:25):
I don't care about it.
(00:45:27):
Right, right.
(00:45:27):
I feel like I earned this state of privilege to not care about that kind of stuff.
(00:45:31):
Yeah.
(00:45:33):
so you does it impact you just having the leukemia impact you like in any other way
(00:45:42):
besides the fact that like you have to get white blood cell check like count checks
(00:45:47):
every now and then i don't even get checked anymore oh
(00:45:51):
They just leave me alone after I was in a trial for the, for my experimental chemo.
(00:45:56):
And they would give biopsies that were like so unbelievably painful.
(00:46:00):
And it was meant to make you forget.
(00:46:02):
And it wouldn't make me forget.
(00:46:04):
Nurses would hold me down.
(00:46:06):
They'd be like, this is what are we doing?
(00:46:09):
So that my doctor kindly said, I'm just going to tell the study that you opted out.
(00:46:13):
I'm just going to make that executive captain's call for you.
(00:46:15):
And so the study left me alone.
(00:46:17):
And then I was getting checked every day.
(00:46:19):
year or two years.
(00:46:20):
And after I think five or 10 years,
(00:46:22):
my doctor was like,
(00:46:22):
you're statistically the same likelihood to get leukemia as anyone else now.
(00:46:27):
So just stop coming in, get on with your life.
(00:46:29):
So I don't even get checked anymore.
(00:46:30):
That's so awesome.
(00:46:32):
Yeah, that's pretty cool.
(00:46:35):
The only sort of lingering stuff, I had a weird sort of like
(00:46:39):
I woke up with just, you know how they say like, what's your pain out of 10?
(00:46:42):
And everyone's like, oh, seven, eight, even though it's actually not that bad.
(00:46:46):
Like a true 10 out of 10 pain in my leg and the head,
(00:46:49):
they brought in the head doctor because they couldn't figure out what it was.
(00:46:52):
And he was like,
(00:46:52):
based on what you're telling me,
(00:46:54):
it could only be that you like snapped your femur in your sleep,
(00:46:57):
which is impossible.
(00:46:58):
Like, but that's the level of pain you seem to be in.
(00:47:00):
And it turned out I had like a rare infection in my muscle that was sort of eating
(00:47:04):
my muscle from the inside,
(00:47:06):
just because you get weird infections when you're really sick.
(00:47:09):
So I had to have surgery to remove that.
(00:47:12):
And that I have sort of like a little divot,
(00:47:14):
little sort of like hole,
(00:47:15):
like someone whacked a golf ball out of me on my right hip where the muscle is missing,
(00:47:19):
which leaves my spine slightly out of balance.
(00:47:22):
And my body's always overcomplicating to rotate back, which gives me like back pain and stuff.
(00:47:26):
That's about the only like long-term physical things,
(00:47:29):
obviously a shit show in the brain,
(00:47:31):
but physically that's the only thing that I have to put up with,
(00:47:34):
which is nice.
(00:47:36):
I don't think you can be a millennial and not have your brain be a shit shot.
(00:47:39):
Oh, yeah.
(00:47:39):
We're all struggling inside, but we're struggling together.
(00:47:42):
Right?
(00:47:43):
Like, I will say that.
(00:47:44):
We are all collectively struggling together and all in it together.
(00:47:48):
If I could just touch on the physical thing, that's what I'm most...
(00:47:54):
appreciative for because i've done some some um fundraising with the leukemia
(00:47:59):
foundation here in australia and i met a bunch of other great people i met this guy
(00:48:04):
who also had aml the exact same thing as me the exact same age and he had to have a
(00:48:10):
um a a bone marrow like with a
(00:48:14):
where they give you a transplant or whatever.
(00:48:15):
Yeah, transplant.
(00:48:17):
And his body rejected it so bad that his skin sort of burnt from the inside out.
(00:48:22):
He's completely – doesn't look the same.
(00:48:24):
The best bloke you'll ever see.
(00:48:26):
He's such a nice guy.
(00:48:28):
But he had the same thing as me, but for the hand of God or fate or Buddha or whatever is up there.
(00:48:34):
his path, it was so much more difficult and he's had so many health struggles out the other side.
(00:48:39):
And as, as I see it in hindsight, once I left hospital, that was it for me.
(00:48:43):
I never had a relapse.
(00:48:45):
My body looked exactly the same as,
(00:48:47):
you know,
(00:48:47):
it was tough in my brain,
(00:48:48):
but as you said,
(00:48:49):
it's tough in everyone's brain.
(00:48:50):
So I'm just so appreciative because, you know, but for the flip of a coin, that was me.
(00:48:55):
That, that is, I totally get being appreciative of that because I,
(00:49:02):
We got off so easy with Lily.
(00:49:05):
I mean, we didn't get any medical bills.
(00:49:08):
We didn't have any horror stories with the hospitals or the doctors or anything like that.
(00:49:14):
And we had nothing but great care.
(00:49:16):
And so sometimes,
(00:49:18):
I don't know if you feel this,
(00:49:20):
but sometimes I feel guilty because we didn't have to deal with half the shit that
(00:49:25):
other people have to deal with on the day-to-day basis.
(00:49:27):
I get that for sure.
(00:49:29):
I really understand that.
(00:49:30):
yeah so okay you're 34 35 35 okay so what is your like you traveled a lot you have
(00:49:42):
a giant instagram following yeah i've traveled a bit australians love to travel
(00:49:48):
because they're so bloody far from everything it's once you finish school you just
(00:49:52):
they go people go to europe for a year and don't come back like you have to just so
(00:49:56):
far like it takes six hours to fly
(00:49:59):
still in australia you can fly six hours you're still in australia i can drive for
(00:50:02):
12 hours and i'm still in my own state like australia is that big and far away from
(00:50:05):
everything so yeah yeah yeah i'm assuming after you know after you go through all
(00:50:13):
the cancer that you went through that you're like okay i need to see the world
(00:50:16):
because like it's short
(00:50:20):
Yeah, true story.
(00:50:21):
And I got a Yeah, there's just too much cool stuff to say.
(00:50:23):
And one day,
(00:50:24):
we're all going to be lying in that final bed,
(00:50:25):
whether you know it or not,
(00:50:26):
which is very morbid,
(00:50:27):
but it's can be it's freeing.
(00:50:29):
And if,
(00:50:30):
if like me at the time,
(00:50:32):
you have a chance to look back,
(00:50:33):
like you're gonna want to look back at some cool stuff.
(00:50:34):
So yeah.
(00:50:37):
What's your favorite place that you visited?
(00:50:39):
Um, Easter Island, you know, the Moai, the big statues.
(00:50:42):
Yeah.
(00:50:43):
Yeah.
(00:50:43):
It was always,
(00:50:44):
it was my dream to go there when I was in hospital and I went 10,
(00:50:48):
maybe less than 10,
(00:50:49):
nine,
(00:50:49):
eight or something years later and just burst into tears when I got there.
(00:50:52):
Cause it was such a,
(00:50:54):
such a release and a relief to be like,
(00:50:55):
fuck,
(00:50:56):
I'm like,
(00:50:57):
it's another way to like free myself for that part.
(00:50:59):
So Easter Island was amazing.
(00:51:00):
Columbia was great.
(00:51:01):
I went to Russia.
(00:51:02):
That was pretty funky.
(00:51:03):
Like a lot of cool places.
(00:51:04):
That's super cool.
(00:51:06):
You saying the Easter Island reminded me of the article you wrote about that,
(00:51:11):
which was fucking hilarious.
(00:51:13):
Which one did I write about Easter Island?
(00:51:17):
You said something about you got some shitty souvenir.
(00:51:20):
It was a joke, you know, your typical way of how you write.
(00:51:24):
But my brain is not...
(00:51:27):
pulling anything on brain now it's too fucking early um about a bit i remember i
(00:51:31):
went there and i went to take a photo in front of the moai and a dog got in front
(00:51:34):
and took a shit while i was that's what it was yes yeah you talked about that just
(00:51:40):
this dog just straining fucking trying its best and i was like that's life it's
(00:51:45):
whatever you do shit's gonna happen literally and metaphorically so just do your
(00:51:49):
best
(00:51:50):
yeah yeah so what does the way forward look like for you sorry i thought my dog was
(00:51:58):
stealing my other dog's food i was like sir stop this um yeah they're they're
(00:52:06):
ornery they're giants um so what does like your future look like like what are you
(00:52:12):
what are your goals what are you wanting to accomplish is there anything that you
(00:52:15):
have like you really want to make sure you do before you die anything like that
(00:52:20):
Yeah, what a probing question.
(00:52:21):
What a fantastic question.
(00:52:23):
Before I die, there is another Alexander Porter who's also Australian and he is an Olympic cyclist.
(00:52:29):
So if you Google his name,
(00:52:30):
he comes up and he was even more famous because during the Olympics,
(00:52:34):
his handlebars fell off while he was riding,
(00:52:35):
which is crazy that that would happen.
(00:52:37):
He fell over and smashed his face in the ground.
(00:52:39):
So there's all these pictures of him, blood all over his face.
(00:52:42):
So I would like one day when people Google Alexander Porter that I come up instead of...
(00:52:46):
the cyclist and his bloody face but outside of that not too much i'm just going to
(00:52:51):
keep telling my story if it helps people good certainly helps me so that's a that's
(00:52:56):
a win-win and um just just keep living because one day we won't as you know all too
(00:53:01):
well with the difficulty you've been through we're all gonna we're all gonna find
(00:53:06):
out what happens next eventually and we owe it to ourselves to do as much as we can
(00:53:10):
until that day comes
(00:53:11):
I love that.
(00:53:12):
I love that so much.
(00:53:14):
And that's so, so fucking true.
(00:53:17):
So, well, it has just been absolutely wonderful talking to you.
(00:53:22):
Do you have any questions or anything you want to ask me?
(00:53:26):
No, I mean, you are such a, like I've said, beautiful open book.
(00:53:30):
With what you've been through, a lot of people would clam up and, you know, just shut down.
(00:53:33):
And shutting down is easy to do in life,
(00:53:35):
but it's not a meaningful or impactful or purposeful way to live.
(00:53:39):
So I commend you for everything you've been to.
(00:53:41):
Keep telling your stories.
(00:53:42):
Keep inspiring people.
(00:53:43):
And, you know, the world will keep spinning.
(00:53:46):
Well, thank you.
(00:53:47):
I appreciate that so much.
(00:53:49):
And the same goes to you.
(00:53:50):
You know,
(00:53:51):
there's going to be a lot of teenage boys out there who are really going to look up
(00:53:56):
to you because you're not the average cancer patient.
(00:53:59):
So that's going to help them a lot.
(00:54:02):
I went and got chemo for both of us, whoever's listening.
(00:54:04):
So I've got a bit of perspective to share and he's struggling in life a bit.
(00:54:07):
Feel free to read my stuff and we'll figure it out together.
(00:54:11):
Exactly, exactly.
(00:54:12):
Well, it has been absolutely a pleasure.
(00:54:15):
Thank you so much, Alexander J. Porter.
(00:54:18):
And I will make sure that everybody knows where they can reach you at New World
(00:54:23):
Porter and how they can find you and all the other goodies to get to know you.
(00:54:28):
Thank you so much.
(00:54:29):
It has been my pleasure.
(00:54:31):
Yes, absolutely.
(00:54:32):
Bye for now.
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