#91 My Body My Story 45 Over 45 - Jodie

In this episode, you will learn 10 FACTS about Jodie, what age she would like to go back to, and what advice she would give herself at that age! We also talk about the main causes of body image issues, how they come up, and how she overcomes them. And we discuss what aging means to her and to her body.

10 Facts About Jodie

(at the time of the project)

1. 51 years old.
2. Jodie just got married again after 26 years of being single. She met her husband in Fiji. He is Jodie’s soul mate. Also, Jodie believes that being related does not make you family. Anyone can choose their family and she does.
3. Jodie was born in Camperdown and grew up around Enmore / Newtown.
4. Jodie had a business called She Devilz. It was an adult toy and lingerie party plan. She also owned a truck relocation company.
5. Jodie’s favourite colour is Purple.
6. Her favourite author is Stephen King.
7. Jodie is a mother of two boys and loves being a mum, but her kids grew up way too quickly. One is 29 and another is 32 now. She wanted more kids, but it wasn’t meant to be.
8. Jodie has 11 tattoos.
9. Jodie is a disability support worker and loves it. It is so rewarding and makes her very grateful and humbled by what she has in her life.
10. Jodie just had bowel cancer. When she turned 50 last year and got the free kit that the government gives you, she did it and sent it away. They found a cancer which was a shock because she had no symptoms whatsoever. Jodie had an operation, but still undergoing chemotherapy.

INTERVIEW TRANSCRIPT

(auto-generated)

Hi, you're listening to the My Body, My Story podcast.

 

Just love who you are, love what you've got and just not care what the next person has because they could say chances are, they don't like what they've got.

 

This is the 45 over 45 chapter where we celebrate Rule Breakers and role models, the women who inspire us to live life our way and to show their sensuality beauty, soul, and true essence. Here we talk about what it's like to be 45 Plus, adjusting to the changes that come with time, and we listened to the stories about participants. If you have an interesting story, we'd love for you to participate. You can email us at info@aleksandrawalker.com That's Aleksandra spelled with a K S. Or visit our website aleksandrawalker.com

 

Hello, everyone, and welcome to the My Body, My Story project. And today with us Jodie in the studio. And while she she's sitting in the makeup chair, and Bella is creating her magic I'll be asking Jodie questions. And let's start. Hi, Jodie, and welcome to the studio. Welcome to the project and tell us 10 facts about yourself.

 

Okay, thanks for having me here today. I got married last year at 49 After being single for 26 years. Wow. I'm a mother of two boys. One's 29 and one's 32. I love to cross stitch. I'm a disability support worker. I love my job. It's very rewarding and very humbling. I've got Petra Angeles. What else can I tell you? I love the colour purple, obviously. And I want to travel more. I want to travel a lot more. I haven't been to very many places. So far. Fiji is my favourite place. It is where I met my husband. So it is it's one of my favourite places. And I'm just recovering from bowel cancer.

 

Oh, wow. So you mentioned before we started the interview that you discover it by chance, so you didn't even expect it?

 

No, not at all. I turned 50 last year and got the free kit that the government gives you. And I did the testing centre away and they sent me off to have the colonoscopy and yeah, they found a cancer which was a shock because I have no symptoms whatsoever, like nothing so but I've had the operation that's been removed. And unfortunately, they found it in one of my lymph nodes. So I start chemo next Monday.

 

So it's a great time to do a shoot today and to share the story. And I was going to ask you if you were born in Australia, Sydney?

 

Sydney Camperdown

 

so all your life you've been here.

 

Yep, yep, born and bred in the Enmore Newtown area. And then I moved out to the Campbelltown area when I got old enough and brave enough it was very rural back then. Moved to Queensland for 18 months, didn't like it very much and moved back and I'm still in Campbelltown but it's very hustle and bustle now. There's hardly any farms anymore. It's, it's just being built up around us. It's crazy.

 

So you said your favourite places is Fiji and what other places you’ve travelled to?

 

Overseas wise, I've only been to Vegas, which is as crazy as you see it in the movies. Yeah, Vegas in daytime is very different to Vegas at nighttime. And it was funny because me and my friend went there. And when on the plane, people asking us what casino you're going to first we're gonna gamble. It's like, oh, we're not here to gamble. We've got shows booked and they looked at us like we were just strange.

 

So but what shows Did you see there?

 

The sole reason that we went over there was to see Reba McIntyre and Brooks and Dan at the Coliseum. And, and then we had there was human nature we're playing at the time and one of my friends is actually cousins with one of the guys there so he got us tickets for that. And then we went to a crazy very bizarre but so wonderful show called Zumanity was like a adult version of like that Cirque de circlet or however you say it, it was kind of like that, but just a bit more on the adult side of things. But it was it was done so well. It was just amazing. And we went to the Titanic exhibition over there as well. In the in the Luxor. So that was very surreal. Because the way they set that up, you know, when you walk in, they give you a date, like, they hand out all these cards, and you can pick one. And the card is someone who was actually on the Titanic and you become that person while you're going through the exhibition. And tells you who you are, who travelling with you, why you were travelling, with what class you were travelling in, whether you were staff or a passenger, whether you're rich or poor. And then at the end, you come to a wall that's got all the names, and it tells you whether you lived or died.

 

Oh my god, what an experience it was.

 

it was Yeah,

 

So, you didn't travel much but you travelled really like not quantity but quality.

 

Yeah, yeah. Me and my friend used to travel like twice a year, and we've done a lot we do a lot of Queensland, Coffs Harbour, Port Macquarie, Melbourne, Ballarat, we lived in a plains, the snow mountains at dinner plains, Mount Hotham. And then we've, up until COVID, I was going to Fiji two, three times a year as well, because I've got some friends and God children over there. And then as I said, it's where I met my husband. So he's been over here since 2019. Now so finally. Yeah.

 

But he's now with you in Sydney.

 

Yeah,

 

So do you dive as well?

 

No, I've never been a scuba diver. I'm not a real lover of water. I love being around water, and on the water, but I'm not a real consumer. See, you know, he said, he'll take me one day. But we'll see how that goes. Because he's, he's over at now. He's been there and accomplished everything that he wanted to do. And he actually got an award not long after he came over here for being 25 years with the company that he's been diving with. So they sent him like an award and a certificate in a present to kind of thing saying, Oh, wow, yeah.

 

So cool. Great. So, in case we didn't name 10, facts about you, probably, we'll get there by the end of the conversation. So let me move to the ageing subject. My next question is What does ageing means to you?

 

It means I've been blessed, because it's been denied by a lot of loved ones that were unfortunately taken too soon. So ageing, yeah, it means that you've been blessed, and you should be honored and you should enjoy and be thankful for every day that you've been given.

 

So, if but if you could go back to any age, what it would be and why, what advice would you give yourself at this age?

 

Back before I was five, when I was living with my Nana, and I would stay with her, I wouldn't feel obligated to go back to my mom. Now that I know what I know. I would have stayed with my nana and had a much better life for it. What would I tell myself? Stay away, you know, your loved. Don't feel obligated just because a person gives birth to you doesn't make them your mother.

 

Interesting how a five year old child can feel obligation already. So how come

 

Me and my mother had a very turbulent relationship. I don't feel as though she ever wanted me or any of my sisters, either of my sisters. My mom was a very troubled, very broken woman. And we were born to try and trap the men at the time that she had in her life. And it didn't work. So we were dragged along for the ride thereafter. So the only place I ever felt loved and protected and safe was my Nana's house, with my auntie and my uncles.

 

So if we start talking about body image, and if your body could talk, what do you think it would ask you to tell you?

 

Give me a break. I had an accident in 2017, where I was hit by a truck. So now my left side of my body is very problematic. I need a hip and knee replacement. So I've got a lot of issues going on with that. And then with now with the bowel cancer and the upcoming chemo, I just feel at the moment I feel old, like really just broken and old, but I don't let it beat me. I get up every day I still go to work. I feel like I'm doing it slower and slower each day, but I'm still doing it. But hopefully, if I have when I have my knee replacement and a hip replacement shortly, I'll start to feel rejuvenated and feel better for it and be able to accomplish things a bit more easier than what I currently Do

 

So give me a break. Yeah, you think that we don't let ourselves rest enough?

 

Not at all, not at all that the last couple of weeks since I've come out of hospital has really let me reflect on that. And my husband, and my friends have, like, been very strict with me, because I'm not that sort of person to give up or to give you and I would have gone back to work two weeks earlier if I could have, which my doctor never claimed me to do anyway. But yeah, but my husband, you know, he went back to work, but he said, if I see that you've washed up that cup or that glass, you know, he says, there's going to be problems. You know, I mean, he says, Because I'm telling you, your job is to rest and do nothing, that that's your job, like you listen to the doctors, you listen to me. So, so I had to, you know, do that to keep his mind at peace, too. Because the the hardest thing about this cancer has been my husband, it broke him. It really broke him, it was very hard to see him go through that. So I'm so used to being on my own and doing my own thing and being able to hide things from people put on the happy face, but just do your own stuff behind the scenes kind of thing. Yeah. But it broke him. And that was really hard. So the least I could do was make things easier by helping him to do what he asked me to do. Yeah, yep.

 

So they say it's true. They say that women are much stronger than men and the men don't take the hard times.. how to say it...

 

I understand what you're trying to say. My husband had a very troubled life in Fiji as well. And we pick ourselves because we met each other in 2006. And why it took us so long to get our shit together. You know, we often kick ourselves about it now. But and he, you know, he said, I didn't wait and go through everything and fight with God because he's a very Christian man. And I'm an atheist. So, it's very interesting. But he said, you know, he didn't, you know, fight with God to finally get what he wanted, which, which was me and coming over here and to then lose me to something, you know.

 

That's a fear of loss.

 

Yeah, very much. So very much so because he's lost his parents, he's lost two of his brothers. He's only got one brother left. He lives in Canada. He's not close to him. And my family has embraced him. And he feels so blessed and so loved by everybody. And he just but since I've had the operation, he's been very, very he's been my rock. You know, he's been very attending very mother hen style around me. And with the chemo he it's not what he wants, not what any of us wanted, but he's but he's going to be there for me and we'll get through it and yeah, he's the positive one. And he's the one that prays and has the relationship with God and yeah, so it's great to have such support. Yep.

 

So, what do you think are the main causes of body image issues?

 

the media, these influences whatever that even means the these want to be Barbie doll. Kardashians and I don't understand it. I you know, look back to the 30s 40s 50s when the movie stars were actually beautiful, beautiful bodied women you know, they were naturally you know, beautiful and this this wanting to have tummy tucks and facelifts and Botox and fillers and lips. I don't get it. Ageing, your body tells a story. You know, when I was a little girl I used to sit up on my Nana's lap and play with her wrinkles of her neck and her chest or the decolletage area and then play and then touch the ones around her, her eyes or her mouth. And I'd say What's this wrinkle from? What's this wrinkle for? And she said this is from when I used to laugh so much or this is when I used to be angry at the Boys and you know so she said every wrinkle tells a story. And I've embraced that because your body tells your life story and why keep trying to erase it or why try and like you look at some of these. These shows and these actresses have no expressions. There's no they look so fake and so, so scary. You know, they don't look real. It's just I don't understand how that became beauty. I just I don't get it.

 

I think it comes from fear to not to be picked up or not to get a man you want to something I don't know if you're getting old.

 

But it's something it should be something you should look forward to. It's something you should embrace. It's something that you should be feel as though you're privileged to get to that stage and embrace it, instead of trying to look like a doll or to look like you've never, like you've just been born, and you don't have any wrinkles, and you don't have any creases. And, you know, how can how can you read the expression of someone if they can't show you an expression on their face? You know, it's crazy.

 

So how do you think negative body image can affect relationships, and I'm talking about all sorts of relationship not only men, woman, but friendships, Mother children, how it affects that

 

It can create jealousy, it can create worry, stress, eating disorders, it can create all sorts of problems. Like you're not good enough, or you're too good, or you're fat shamed. You're skinny, shamed. You know, it creates all sorts of problems. It's the biggest form of bullying in the world, really, because I mean, when someone's being bullied, they're being bullied for something about their body. You know, the hair, the weight, the skin, the the race, the eyes, whatever it is, it's usually body related. And it's just, it's just such a biggest form of bullying. And it's just like, why can't we embrace our differences? Why can't we just accept that we're not all alike? And that's okay, because I mean, we don't want to be clones. So why can't we just love each other for who we are. And jealousy will always be a thing, like, someone's always going to have gorgeous blue eyes, or gorgeous legs, or really nice, beautiful hair, or, you know, so that kind of jealousy is okay, but to be jealous, where you're going to actually go and bully them or pick on them, or cut their hair on them or something like that. It's just, it's horrendous. I just, I just don't understand.

 

Don't you think it's also starts in school? Because I know that they say kids are very cruel. And you know how they like that? Yes. Even though I remember my time, somebody was bullied all the time.

 

I was bullied at school for different things, and for various things, to the degree that I stopped going to school, and I ended up in therapy and everything. And it was about three or four weeks into it. I wasn't really talking much. I didn't see the point in the therapist, we were sort of talking a little bit, but not a lot. And then he said to me, why are they better than you? And I said, What? He said, Why are they better than you? And I sat up off the chair and lean forward. No, they're not. And it was that penny that dropped. It was that penny that dropped in that afternoon, I went and hunted every single one of them down because they're always they're always in a pack. You know, I went and hunted every single one of them down one on one, one on one. And the biggest bully that was after me at the time at school. I couldn't find her. She had made my life hell every day for so long. And then when I wanted to find out, I couldn't find her. It took me over a week to find her. And I had it out with her in the main street of race be where we lived at the time. And I just said to her if she wants me, here I am. I'm ready to take whatever she wants to give me. She hasn't got her pack behind her now. So it's one on one. Let's go. But I'm done. I'm not going to be scared. I'm not going to live in fear. And I'm done. So give it your best shot. She didn't do anything. She couldn't believe you know, you know she was stuttering in there. It's like I'm done. I said, so if I see you so much as picking or looking at anybody at school in the wrong way. I'm coming for you now. I said I'm the tables are turning. I'm going to come for you, shall I? Yeah, you and his army. I said don't need an army. Just me. Just me. And that was it. Nobody ever looked my way again.

 

So, it just shows this principle that people treat you the way you allow them

 

very much.

 

So, time, once you stop allowing people treat you a certain way. They stop bullying you.

 

Yeah. But bullies are bullies because of something going on in their life as well. Always. It's always something, you know, because they aren't feeling powerless somewhere with someone over something. And then so they have to find someone weaker than them to then, you know, lead out their frustration and lead out their hurt. And that's just a vicious cycle. So, yes, all this sort of stuff does start in school, but it starts in the homes, that the parents are the ones that instill this stuff in their children. And it's, you know, the parents need to be educated. The kids need to be educated. You know, we need to learn acceptance on every level, especially today. There are so many different things and so many diff font families and so many different people out there today that we need to teach acceptance.

 

Yeah. Or if it's not acceptance, at least not bullying, you know for being different.

 

Yeah, we don't have to agree. You know, we don't have to agree. Just accept that that's that person for that reason. And that's it that you don't have to be friends with them even. You don't have to like it. But just accept it and move on. Don't make it a big deal and don't become a bully over it and don't make their life hell for it.

 

You have rights to be different.

 

Yeah.

 

So, when you have any body related issues or insecurities, we will have from time to time, what's your go to method to deal with that?

 

I don't, I don't worry about it. I am made. I have been me. I tried once back when my first husband died. I was 23 years old. He died a couple of weeks after he turned 24. And I got it in my head that I wanted to prove him wrong, that I wasn't worthless, I wasn't everything that he called me. And so I paid for a personal trainer, went to the gym four days a week, busted my butt to get to what I want it to be. And I succeeded. But I never lost any weight from my bust, or my bum. And now we're the two places I really needed to lose it. And it didn't happen. And so now that I had this, this trimmed and toned body, which was which was great, but it just enhanced my two parts of my body that I try and hide the most. So it was like, Oh my god. So, what have I done? Yeah, very much. So very much so. And it's like, oh, God, what's the point. So, I just went back to just not caring, like, just really not caring, because I'm enough as I am. And I don't care. Literally, I do not care what anyone thinks. Or says about me. As long as I don't hear it. Because if you don't know me enough to have an opinion, you're not entitled to an opinion. And if you do know me, and you have an opinion, well then talk to me about it. And we can usually, you know, me and my friends and family, we're never negative against each other. We embrace all of our quirks and our craziness and you know, but yeah, so just love who you are, love what you've got, and just not care what the next person has. Because they could they chances are they don't like what they've got unlucky, you know? So, because they want to be, you know, a condition or they want to be an influencer, or they want to be the girl at the beach in the bikini that everyone's looking at. But, you know, I've never been that sort of person. I've never I've never wanted anybody looking at me. I just want people to know me, and accept me for me. And if they don't, I'm okay with that. That's already me.

 

Yeah, that's why you decided to stay on your own for so many years. And just because you are enough

 

Yes, everyone needs to say to me, you're going to be on your own forever. You never you know, you're never gonna find a man. It's like, do I need a man? I don't need a man. You know, I don't even know what you want in a man. No. But I know, I knew what I didn't want in a man. And that was a start. So, if I ever met anybody, and they were they were like that, you know, not not interested. If they had four out of the five things I wanted. Not good enough. I didn't need to settle. So, I never had any intentions on doing so. And yeah, so that didn't faze me.

 

Excellent. You answered my question. That's what's the what was the ways to bring yourself back to norm when you were younger? You already answered that question. And my last one is, what is your favorite saying or quote about being a woman? Or maybe your own thoughts,

 

Empowered women empower women. And the most powerful thing you can do as a woman is never, never, never need a man. Yes. never need a man. Know that you're enough. You know, just embrace who you are. And know that you're enough. Just be strong willed and just never been never be apologetic about being strong willed, or setting your own goals or aiming to achieve what you want. Regardless of whether anyone else thinks that you should. You should go for it or not. Be you. That simple. Just be you.

 

Nicely said. Thank you Jodie. Thank you very much for sharing your story today with us and I hope you will have a great rest of the day and you will enjoy a photo shoot.

 

Thank you.

 

If you have an interesting story, we'd love for you to participate. You can email us at info@aleksandrawalker.com That's Aleksandra spelled with a K S. Or visit our website aleksandrawalker.com

This is the 45 over 45 chapter of MY BODY MY STORY podcast, where we celebrate rule breakers and role models - the women who inspire us to live life our way and to show their SENSUALITY,  BEAUTY, SOUL, and TRUE ESSENCE.

 

For more information about the project visit:

https://www.aleksandrawalker.com/45-over-45

 

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