You're listening to a MoMA Mia podcast. Mama Mia acknowledges the traditional owners of land and waters that this podcast is recorded on.
We have this perception in the world, and I was guilty of it. I think too that there's two paths out of cancer, and one is fine and one is dead, and we make no room for the stuff in the middle, which I've also come to realize that so many people are suffering with, but they mostly have to pretend to be fine because that's a narrative. We want. That's easier, that's nice. How we want things tied up neatly in a bow. We want happy endings.
Hello, and welcome to No Filter. I'm Holly Wainwright, and I'm jumping into your feed today with a special extra episode of No Filter to mark the end of Breast Cancer Awareness Month. Now there's something a little bit selfish for me about this conversation because it's actually with one of my really good friends, Lucy Ormond. I worked with
Lucy a long time ago. We're going to tell you a bit of the story of our friendship actually, and we'd stayed in touch, and eighteen months ago everything for her changed in her life when she was diagnosed with breast cancer. Now what I need you to know about Lucy before he listened to this conversation, because I don't think any woman in Australia hasn't been touched in some
way by breast cancer. So it's both a very ordinary and completely upending, extraordinary experience to go through and even
to support someone through. And I really wanted Lucy, who has been through a great deal over the past couple of years, to talk about the things that everybody doesn't know, like what's the most useful stuff you can do when somebody is right in that heat of finding out that everything in their life has shifted in just a few words to come out of their doctor's mouth, Why it's not over when it's officially over, and what really happens to your priority and your life when you go through
something as profound as this. Lucy is one of the most generous, loving, also driven, busy, ambitious women I know, and she has struggled, like everybody does, through this with trying to figure out who she is, what it all means, and now, because of who she is, what she can do to help other women in the same situation. So please join the table with me and Lucy and our conversation about breast cancer. I want you all to meet
my friend Lucy Ormond. Hello, Luce, Hey, Holly Waynwright. That is how she always addresses me.
You know how some people have those names where it needs first name and surname. That's you, Hollywayne Wright.
And Louse. How did we meet?
Oh? We met at Mamma Mia. We did. I'm going to say twelve years ago. Thirteen, it's billing now, eleven eleven.
I started at mom and Mia in twenty fourteen.
Okay, that's too much maths for me.
No, no, yes, so that's eleven years ago.
We met a long time ago. Yeah, at Mama Mia.
Yep.
I had been there maybe a couple of years. It was the first ever of Mamma mea officers. I was a junior writer and you came in as the fancy magazine lady.
And I was very intimidated by all the cool young people who knew what they were doing, Like you not cool. This is the early day. This is kind of the early days of digital media. It's crazy to think about now.
It was insane. It was a crazy, amazing, beautiful, wonderful time. Yeah, where you came into this chaos of just a whole lot of women, and we sat around a table and talked about ideas every day and turned them into content.
It was great.
It was a good time.
And then you left to go and do other things.
I left to go and do other things. After a while, I moved back to Melbourne. I'm from Melbourne. Originally. I moved back to Melbourne, worked in the Mama Mea office down there for a while, and then eventually it'll be my five or six years and just wanted to try my hand at other things and made a bit of a sidestep, still in women's media, but into the events world.
Yes, yeah, so tell everyone what you're doing. So we and we stayed in touch, right, We did in touch, and we would catch up when you'd come to Sydney with increasing regularity, and then we'd go and drink wine, a lot of wine dinner and put the world to rights and looses. As anyone would know if they were watching this video on YouTube. Is quite a lot younger than me. But we because friends. Well, it's true, it's called to have different generational friendships. Anyway. We digress is
just a number. Describe to me where you were the life you were living in March twenty twenty four.
March twenty twenty four, it's what are a year and a half ago, seems like a lot longer than that. So I'd left MoMA MAA or twenty sixteen or something like that, gone off and worked for an amazing organization called Business Chicks, working in corporate events, women's media, traveling the world.
I was always trying to catch you when she was in between. I've been in La, I've been in the Bahamas, I've been in this place. In that she was always working a lot and traveling a lot.
Yeah, working with some phenomenal people, making some really really incredible events for women with some really really big known like thousands of women in rooms with I can't even it was the most phenomenal For years, you.
Didn't really I mean, your home is always Melbourne and always you know, that's where your people are, but you weren't really home for several years, right.
I was totally nomadic, a little bit in Sydney, a lot in LA, occasionally coming back to Melbourne, New York, anywhere. Like we were making events around the country. Yeah, it was. It was fast paced. It sounds glamorous. I mean the reality of travel is very, very different. I never spent more than a couple of nights in one bed. That sounds weird, but you know what I mean. Yeah, it was a beautiful, beautiful time. COVID changed a lot of
that obvious. The world came to a standstill and we couldn't do events anymore, and that very much changed the business. But I found myself sort of just after that. I'd started my own business in twenty twenty three and started working with a whole lot of amazing women, still in that space, but sort of operating on more of a contractor freelancer kind of basis and coming in and creating
events and strategies for some really really cool people. So working with Jackie Oh and JM at Bestie's, working with Gwyneth Paltrow, we did that event the amazing lea Ye, Sarah, I know, I know we didn't get you there. Lee's and Sarah are we're creating disco clubs. I helped them. And then, you know, back to your question of March twenty twenty four, are in this beautiful, beautiful, full circle moment.
I've been contracted back to Mama mea to produce the out Loud Tour, So Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane, bigger than you'd ever done before. We were taking it to the next level and got about two thousand women in each city living along. And I was just in this really really lovely place where back to working with you and MEA and I was flying up to Sydney a lot. My business was feeling like it was starting to get somewhere, but I was sort of happily settled in Melbourne thinking
about the future. I don't know, it was a really nice time in life.
I remember that we went out for dinner one night when you were in Sydney. We went to chester White and Pot's Point. We ate some pasta with cheese, and that's when you told me that you had something going on.
Yeah, and I mentioned it, you know, in a night where we jumped around to you know, your classic female dinner ding ding ding bermitt Bam. Somewhere along the lines, I said to you, Oh, I found a lump in my breast. Don't worry, it's nothing.
We were sitting at the bar in chester White. I remember eating like cured meat.
I reckon in this game of that night we spent thirty seconds on it, probably because it was too scary to talk about and I was evincing myself that it wasn't anything. So we passed by that very very quickly, and we moved on to the next thing.
And then the next time we talked about it. Yeah, in my memory is when we came down for the Melbourne show and we caught up quickly before the night before the show, and you said.
Yeah, I finally let you into what was really going on. And it's something that I've realized about myself, is that I try and shield people from what's happening, to protect them. But the truth of what would happen, what had happened, is that i'd actually to that point of that night where I told you that I'd found a lump, had actually been about three or four months earlier, end of twenty twenty three. I was thirty six at the time, and I stumbled across a lump in my right breast.
And I say stumbled across because I wasn't checking for it. I can't tell you exactly what happened, but at some point I sort of grazed across my boob, felt a sort of rid and a tenderness in that area. My mum was with me at the time. I said, do you feel what I feel? She said yeah, and I
booked him to the GP straight away. GP sent me off for an ultrasound and I went for that ultrasound pretty quickly, and I remember lying there and saying to the ultrasound technician or the soamographer, I think we call them, can you see what I'm feeling? And she said no, I can't, so she out relief. She said, I can't find it what you're feeling, and she checked it with her supervisor and she said, we can't see anything here. But here's what we want you to do is give
it a few months. If the lump is still there, if you can still feel it, go back to your GP, and then we'll reassess. And what we put it down to that point, I don't know. I had done a couple of rounds of elective egg razing that year, two rounds of it, and we thought it might be hormonal, and I'd done one really recently, so we thought that it just might be something to do with that. So yeah, I put it away, locked in a little box, and I'd say the next few months I thought about it,
but not too much. I didn't because that was still scary, yeah, because if it was still there, I'd have to do something about it. So maybe I'd sort of go off live my life, do fun things, and then resolf and I'd be like, oh, I should check. And some days it was really really present. Other days I sort of
struggled to find it a bit more. I reckon in hindsight, that might have been again hormones with your cycle, you know, get bigger for a bit in this small life, So it might have just been where I was with my cycle, that it was maybe sort of masking in there. Eventually I got to a point, and this leads us back to when we were, you know, on tour we'd just done Sydney, where I kind of couldn't deny it anymore.
There was a lump there. It was still there, and it started to sort of consume every single part of my life, like I couldn't think or concentrate about anything on anything because I kept thinking about this lump. So so again not telling anyone one friend, I told I may went back to the GP, who sent me off to a specialist, and I went to see that specialist who sent me off for a mammogram as the first step. That mammogram fell the week after our Sydney show, just
before we did our Melbourne show. So by the time I saw you on the Wednesday, I was kind of in the thick of the process of getting diagnosed, I would say. And so that night I shared with you that I had gone to get a mammogram and a notious sound had a just pretty standard to me. That morning, left there, going home, was on a call with some clients.
I was having a rollicking good time with them. She was just chatting about our plans and I looked down at my phone and there was a text from the mammogram technician and said, Halo c this is blah blah from the blah blah hospital. We'd like you to come in for some additional images, either this afternoon or tomorrow.
Oh gosh.
And at that point you're like, they're not fucking around.
When they say no, they say this afternoon or tomorrow.
They're like and then I Okay, So my clients, I'm like, I gotta go. I gotta go. Jumped in the car and called the hospital on my way there because I'm like, I'm not waiting I'm going to go right now, got back to the hospital, walked into the waiting room, said who I was. I didn't even get to sit down before they came out and got me and took me straight back into the room for more mammograms. And I say more mammograms because they put me in one time.
And then she said, I'm going to take these images and go and show my supervisor. And then she came back in and she said, I'm just going to take a few more images, and then she took them out, and then she came back in and she said, IM going to take a few more images, and then she went back out, and then she came in and the radiographer came in with her, and that's when they said to me, there's something suspicious here and we'd like to do bilpsi.
So the words were at that moment it wasn't it's cancer.
No, no, And that's the thing I've come to learn, like through speaking to a lot of women, it can be lots of things. You know, there's cis, there's benign lumps, there's ridges of tissue. So yeah, biopsy was the next stage in that. Well, you know it's something, yes, and they said to me, we'd like to a biopsy. They said we need a refer or. I said, can you do it now? And they said, oh, we need a referral from your specialist to do it now, so that might take her some time. And I was like, call
it okay, cool, call her okay. Yeah, no, so they called. They said go away for an hour and we'll get this organized. At that point, I turned that one of the women who was helping me earlier. Her name was Hannah, and I said, do you think I should call my mum? And she looked at me in the eye and said, I would want my mum here about you. So at that point I'm going outside the hospital and just called Mum, called one of the girls from Mom and me are actually because I was like, I can't.
You were meant to be.
I was supposed to be working out, doing a lot of work, and we were doing this. Bless her. She's like, don't worry about a thing, I've got this and just sort of walked around the hospital in a days for a couple of hours. Mum got there pretty quickly and we waited and had a biopsy.
And that was the day when everything really changed.
Yeah, I would say so, and then that was so that was the Monday. Sorry I'm jumping around here. It gets very very detailed in this world. By the time I saw it was the Wednesday and had the biopsy. I'd had an MRI. I'd met with my specialist who was sort of like, there's something, but until we get the results of that MRI and the biopsy, we don't know.
So when I saw you, I was like, hey, hoole, all this stuff happened in the last few days, and tomorrow morning before you go on stage and we do the out loud show in Melbourne, I'm going to go in and get some results. Yes, is their heads up?
Yes, that's all I remember, Yes, and yeah, and tell me what they said on that morning.
I went in. Weird experience to go in knowing that you kind of know at that point, when you've gone through all those things, you've had enough time to sort of get your head around it. You sort of know what's coming, and you know that once you go through that door, your life is going to be divided into the before and after. But I went and I sat down, and they don't beat around. There's no niceties when I'm
talking about the weather. She gets out of his paper and she says, so it is a breast cancer.
How do you feel in that moment, Like, as you say, you've had the time and a way to stress, worry panic about this, know that it's not nothing. But when they say those words to you, how what happens?
Do you know what? I perflect on this a lot and thought about that moment. It's not what I thought it would be. It's not this like yet there's an absolute pity in your stomach and nerves like I've never experienced. At the same time, it's not that sort of like harrowing cry kind of there's not a lot of shock
in it. Like I said, because you've sort of had the time for me, this weird thing happened, and I can only talk to my own experience that I felt an insane amount of clarity in that moment, clarity in how I wanted the next phase of my life to look, and almost how I wanted the rest of my.
Life to look, and what was that Who.
I wanted to be with me was really really clear, Like I sort of had this vision. It was almost like I got like a circle where I knew who I needed to let know who was going to be part of this. When I said journey, people have a big problem with the word journey. I don't it's a journey. I don't know what else to call it, wild ride, adventure, fuckery, I don't, you know. But also how I wanted to go through whatever it was that was to come. I knew straight away I didn't want to be angry and
I didn't want to be too sad. Something in me was saying fun and love. I just want to try for the best part. I'm not just SAT's not to say that there hasn't been moments of extreme sadness and anger and frustration, and it has been really really hard. But I knew that I wanted to somehow try and harness some element of love and joy in it. So
that was kind of happening. At the same time, there's something you're knowing what it is, and I've learned through this whole process, and I know we'll get into it that when I have a plan and I know what's coming, I'm okay. I can deal with that. It's knowing that is the worst. So that lead up to the diagnosis, or you know, after surgery, you get you know, you're waiting sometimes seven ten days for the results or before scans,
after scans. That is the part that is so incredibly uncomfortable and horrendous, and you know you can't I can't function in those moments. But when she said it's breast cancer and here's what we're going to do, I'm like, Okay, cool, let's go do it.
We're going to take a break, but please come back, because Lucy has a lot more to share about this extraordinary time. One of the reasons why I really wanted, obviously to talk to you for Breast Cancer Awareness Month was because your story is like ordinary and extraordinary at the same time right now, as in you know, this
happens to a lot of women. It happened to so many And one of the things I wanted to get across right is that on that day when you found that out, and it was the day of the Melbourne show, obviously you did tell me like the time we had to spend together that night. No one else knew, well one of the person knew on our tour, so I kept like holding your hand of you okay, all those things, but you got through it like the pro that you are not that that's anything to be fated, but that
was just your situation. But what I wanted to get to is the like I remember obviously being super worried for you, super anxious for you. But also, and I think a lot of people have this, I kind of probably had a level of complacency about it too, because I thought, she'll be fine, She'll be right, Like it'll probably just be a little bit of maybe radio therapy or whatever, which is not nice, but you know whatever, it'll be all right, Like this is and when I
think about that now, I'm like idiot. But also I think that people who aren't close to breast cancer for lots of reasons, kind of think it's solved. You'll like or that it's not. It's you know, we've got so good at it now.
You know.
You just hear people saying that all the time if you catch it early and so on, which I know we'll get to that, but like, no biggie kind of and obviously it's a biggie for you.
When I was scared, but you.
Know what I mean. And then so I want to go to the day a little later. In that time, it was a time when you were about to find out kind of what was going to happen, and you know, we'd all been saying, and you'd been saying, and you know it would probably just be a little it won't be a big deal. And I remember that I was waiting for a call from you about that, and I was in Sydney, New and Melbourne and the call didn't come,
and I was like, oh. And I messaged a mutual friend of ours, Mon's, and I was like, I don't like this. I don't like this. And she called me, She's like, what do you mean. I was like, it's taken you long. I don't like it. And that was the day again where you found out that what was ahead of you was not like, well just a little bit of this or that, not that there's any such thing. I know that, and being close to you and you're explaining to me lots of different kinds of cancers. I
know that. But the day that that all shifted again, Yeah, tell me about that.
I mean I think that I was the same. I didn't think it was I knew it was big, but I didn't realize how big it was. And I think as a society or a world, we are aware of breast cancer but we're not really aware of breast cancer. And I even think about what I was initially diagnosed. Like back to that conversation, I said to this specialist. She told me, like, we're going to start with surgery, we will definitely need to do radiation, question mark on chemotherapy.
It's definitely some other stuff, you know, and you only hear a little bit. But I said to her, I'm going to the US in July. And I said, is that still okay? And she said to me, if you're not doing chemo, you'll be doing radio. And it was like, oh, okay, it's a bit more serious.
Yeah, you're not going to the US.
And but to your point, the day that you're talking about is post surgery. So they go in and they take the lump out. For me, it was a lumpectomy rather than a full mistectomy. It depends on the patient.
And after the surgery, you go in and you find out the results of the surgery, because what they do is they take out the lump and then they'll often test the area around the lump to see if there's any residual cancer there, and they'll also test a couple of your lymph nodes to see if the cancer is spread. And so I've gone in for this results. I went on my own. I was very I just wanted to go on my own. I don't know why I wanted to, Like, I was like, I'm going on my own. I don't
know what it's about. And I went in there and I knew from the start, from as soon as I walked in. And you can just tell, you.
Can tell from the energy in the room, look on the doctor's face.
And they basically said that they tested those margins and there was still cancer in those margins and that the two lymphonones they had tested were both positive as well. And what that meant, and she kept reassuring me, she was so beautiful. You know, it's still curable. It's just going to take a little bit longer. And I've got
you know, we've got this. It's all manageable. But what it meant was that the road out of this just went from maybe some surgery and some radiation to like, Okay, this is going to take a while, and this is like life is fully on hold while we figure this out. And that's when they start talking about whole body treatment, which means chemotherapy. But they ease you in in a really beautiful way. So we're going to do some whole
body treatment and I'm like, is that chemo? When she's like, that's chemo, and I remember saying, oh, that's a dang, and she goes it is indeed a dang. Quite a long road of huge yeah. Yeah. So from there we were looking at it was we'd definitely have to do more surgery to get that cancer out. Five months of chemo on the cards almost straight away, then looking at radiation, then looking at more therapies after that, intend tablet form.
So yeah, really really long road I wanted. I didn't let you know because I just didn't know what to do, I know, but then you.
Did, and I remember, I remember really clearly, not that this is about me, but I hope that some of the people listening to this as well as obviously women who were thinking about themselves and their journeys, but friends and loved ones. That's what I want to ask you about now, because I remember very clearly where I was when you told me that. It was in our old office downstairs, and I was trying to find a corner.
I remember, I remember really clearly. Anyway, when you get that news and you have a beautiful inner circle has discussed and your mum, and so the news goes out. Yes, this is going to be a hell of a year, half a year, more than a year. Whatever happens. This loose is this is it. Can you tell me a little bit about what helped what didn't help? You know? You know how people always say I don't know what
to do. Like, so you know, I was listening to you, and obviously in another city whatever I mean, I decided quickly. I just wanted to let you know that I was thinking of you, and we established a little rhythm of that. But like, what's helpful? What do you want people's villages to know about moments like that.
In those moments when they've just found out someone they love has breast cancer or cancer or any big shitty life thing, big shitty life thing. Yeah, do something. Yeah, I know that we can get really really lost in I don't know what to say. I don't know what to do. I don't know what she needs. I don't know if I should be dropping around, I don't know I should be calling. I do something. Just let that person know that you love them, and you don't have
to find the perfect words, I don't think. I remember one friend texted me and after a couple of days and she said, I heard through you know, another friend, and I didn't want to text you on that day because I thought you might be doing this. And then I wasn't going to text you the next day because it was Mother's Day, and then I thought I won't text here, and then in the end, I just wanted to say I love you and I'm thinking of you,
and that's all you need to do. And I'm not saying like if people don't text you, nothing is personal in this world. Like we're all just trying.
To well, you've got something very big in front of you.
To deal with your I'm not worried about thinking to him, just trying to get through and think about what is next, which is huge, like trying to come to terms with you know. At that point, I think I also like I was just I was really really worried about my fertility and all that, and I'd said have said to them I did have some eggs on ice, and they were like, if you want to do one roll round,
you can do it now. So like you had a lot of yeah, just one thing happens, and then suddenly, like you're on the phone and you're getting injections, and then you're getting organized to get ports put into your chest so that they can administer the chemo easily, and then you're you know, within a week. It's all just it's all moving suddenly. It is moving so fast, and at the same time, you're sort of trying to tell
the right people. I didn't tell the whole world for a long time, like in terms of like putting out to my wider circles, but I chose who I wanted to know, and I called them all one by one. I think what I really learned is that the person who's at the center of that circle doesn't know what they need or want. So a question like how can I help or let me know is so well intended. I don't know the answer. So statements are amazing. I'm going to come by your house at three pm and
put this on the doorstep. I could do. I've got an afternoon free here. I can do X y Z for you, like I can either A come and lie in bed with you, B take you shopping, or see do this choose also the words no need to reply, yeah, we love those words.
Ye always put the no need to reply on.
I just think you can't go wrong. Really just do something, and it's not about you. If you don't, if someone doesn't right back, or they don't acknowledge whatever, it's not about you. But they probably really love you and they're really grateful. They just don't have the capacity at that point. There is just so much going on in their world.
Of course I could.
Talk about that stuff forever, but yeah, it's a it's a really tricky one. But I just have learned through all of this about the goodness of people and how there are so many ways to show up for someone. And it isn't just still as I now or flowers like, but they're great too. I love flowers. Everyone's like, don't send flowers, Please send flowers. It's so nice. I loved it. But there's so many ways that you can show up. And can we talk about glimmers?
We can talk about glimmers because I didn't know how to show up for you necessarily after I sent you a box of biscuits.
That's a whole other.
Time, whole other stories, and then joke between us about these particular type of biscuits. I send your box of biscuits.
Send me like, just to be clear, she sent me like a hundreds. It wasn't just a box of biscuits. It was like this like sort of big Australia post box. It was just feel like I couldn't get to the bottom of the biscuits, which it just made me laugh, you know.
Idea or kind of like okay, but anything candle. But yeah, so people obviously, but beyond that, glimmers is what we decided to do. Tell me about the glimmers.
I mean, it was the most beautiful thing I think anyone's ever done for me. And when I love it about it is that it's free. So we also, like when we're showing up for someone who's in crisis, we didn't have to spend a lot of money either. You sent me a text just after i'd suld have found out that big news that the road was going to be really long and the cancer was pretty dang serious. You said to me, I'm going to send you glimmers. You can send them back if you'd like, but there's
no pressure to. And you started with and the glimmer was just little things from your day that were making you happy or showing you about the simplicity of life, the beauty of life in the little, tiny moments. And you sent me a picture of flowers that were on the on the ground and they looked pretty Bryan neg flowers, and I was like, I love this, let's do it. Not. I don't think either of us fully knew what we were signing up for in that moment, or you especially,
but you just kept sending glimmers. Every single day. You would send me something from your life that was bringing you joy. But it was never like a flex like you don't listen, we've learnt about glimmers and what's okayted Ascent. But you would never be like, oh, you know, here's like the amazing holiday that I'm going. Here's the cup of tea that I had. Exactly. Glimmers are simple. They are like dogs and flowers and tea and a tree.
And some days I would send them back to you, yep, you know, and it might be like but there was no expectation, no expectation if I didn't, And often it was just you coming at me with the glimmers and that's okay. Sometimes you'd get a double double tap heart from me. Sometimes you got nothing. Some days it was like glomma tanness were like back forward, back forward. Some days it would be like my piece of veggie might toast in bed, or my friend's dog coming to visit,
you know, really really simple stuff. But it was just this way of us staying connected, very very connected, because you and I like in our relationship. I think you know, we'd had moments over the years or we wouldn't talk for months, but then we'd come back together and that. But then suddenly we're in contact every single day, which could be a lot, but it wasn't. And you just kept showing up and it just was the most beautiful
show of support. Because as cancer goes on and the treatment gets harder, people do drop off, and it's not intentional. Life gets busy and that real drama part of the diagnosis is over and it's the hard stuff and other stuff's come up and that's okay. But in you committing to Glimmers, you had to kick shall we up?
Look? The reason that's the most beautiful, the reason why Glimmers were right for us is as we say, we weren't in the same place. I couldn't be there doing But also to be really honest, there'll be people listening to this too. I'm not very good at that kind of thing, Like I mean, if you live around the corner, of course I would be shutting up.
But like you're so far away.
Sending lasagnas and doing all that stuff is not really my love language. I mean, I can make a good
look that one day, I would definitely do it. But I was thinking of you every day, and when we were in the rhythm of the Glimmers, which we ended, we did for a full year, the thing I would see would make me think of you, and I knew that sometimes more than other times you were having a shit time, sometimes you weren't sometimes, and I just wanted you to know that I every day, at some point at least I remembered Lucy, and I was sending you love. And that was all, like, it's not about really what
the picture is. Although the other great thing about Glimmers is it ends up being good for you too, because you start to notice the Glimmers, which is good.
And I did. And there were days where I was so sick, like where you can't lift your head up from the pillow, kind of sick like just feeling so
insanely crappy. But I would think about it, like what is that glimmer and like, you know, one of my and it just made me say the goodness there was goodness everywhere, but it you know, like I'd look across to my bedside table and it'd be the most beautiful rose that one of the neighbors had picked and put on the doorstep, and then Mum would come and put it. I moved back in with mum, Mother, this is all happening,
and I'm still there. Now, Well we'll get to that, and you know, the roads would be next to my bed or even the glimmer was like, oh my god. I was like I was going through a treatment right at the Olympics were on. My glim was that I was awake at four am when the athletes will winning the gold medals one. No one else was absolutely awake because I couldn't sleep because of the drugs. So my glimmer as I watched that live, I.
Am watching the Olympics in the drug you.
Know, on the on the TV that my cousins had so beautifully said, We're going to put a TV on your wall because you're going to be in bed a lot and it was. It was the most amazing gift. If anyone wants a real flex gift to give someone, that's amazing. On the wall, Oh my.
God, this is the range. This is like a bridal registry. The range is like glimmers are free, is a free mount wall on the you know, I said.
To the other day, there's so many good free things, like you've got someone in crisis gift. Then the logins to your streaming services. That's a great, such a help.
I know that we could. I don't want to rush through this, but at the same time, I want to get to the point where so you, as you discussed, you're going through this very, very grueling period and you've just said some of the things that helped you a little bit through that time. A typical if there was such a thing day week about time, what was it like what might be happening in your world when your whole world is cancer at that time? Because it was like it's.
Your whole world. Yes, yeah, I mean everything grinds to a whole really really really really quickly.
You had to obviously stop working.
Oh I stopped working. I gave my client, you know, got people to step in and take on the work that I was doing.
The phone to me sometimes going like I think I could maybe do this job in between this and this and this, and then they're like stop it.
Anyhow, Yeah, everything came to a whole, moved home to mum's house, simplified life massively. And it's a weird feeling like that just before came. I starts like, you've had so surgery. I didn't find too bad in terms of recovery. It's big, and it's it's messy, and it's yucky and it's a bit sore, but it wasn't it wasn't terrible. But then when you know that chemo's coming, you're like getting ready to be sick, which is a really really
interesting feeling. And you know, even I remember on that drive two chemo on that first day, it's like it's a yeah, getting yourself ready for that.
But is there any part of you? This might sound like a really silly question, but this is an experience that thankfully most of us will not have. But you've all seen it on the telly, right, We've all seen what chemo therapy looks like on the telly. Is there any part of and we know it makes you sick. That's what that's mostly what we know. The things I would have known. It makes you lose your hair, and it makes you sick. Is there any part of you that's like, it's not going to make me sick.
I will be the one who doesn't. And you know what, I sort of. They tell you so many things, but you can't attach to a lot of it. And one of the things they tell you is that we give you steroids. At the same time that you're getting your chemo, we're giving you steroids. And the technology has come so far these days that they can offset a lot of the side effects with other drugs. But I remember I came home from the first chemo and I woke up the next day and I'm like, I'm fine, I'm good.
This does not affect me. I am I am okay. And I went for a walk and about twenty minutes, you know, Muther called Mum when I was like, my chest hurts, and I ended up at home on the phone to the doctors at the GP getting acgs. And the next day I just came crashing down. And so what I learned is that you've got a couple of days of feeling okay, and then it hits you. So back to your question about what though that time looked like. I started with four rounds of very very intense chemo
they call it the Red Devil. That was every two weeks, and so you sort of would go in, have your treatment for a couple of days of feeling okay, and then it would sort of hit. So I've had treatment on the Thursday. By the Sunday, I was really starting to feel it. By the Monday, I couldn't get out of bed. And that was a few days of that, and then you to de fine. After about a week,
you're sort of starting to feel yourself again. You have a couple of days of grace where you like, let's fucking live for a couple of days, and then you get yourself ready to go back in and do it again. And so I did four doses of the very very intense chemo and then twelve doses which became weekly. Still an incredibly intense chemo, but not quite as as like that.
That part I found excruciating. It just felt like I think I remember at dose five or six, I kept saying to people, I feel like I'm running a marathon where the adrenaline of the start has worn off. I'm like at a kilometer of fourteen or something, you know, like I cannot see the finish line for the life of me, and I'm just in it. And that part was really hard. Yeah, And it was just monotonous and boring.
And you know, I remember I probably said to you, like, don't most people like write books or something while they have cancer? Like I'm not doing enough? Was watching TV.
This is very classic Lucy.
Yeah, so long hard time.
Yeah, you know how I said. What we all know about chemo is it makes you sick and you lose your hair. You've got hair? What did you do?
I do have hair.
I remember. I remember, like you being having a lot of thoughts about that, feelings about that.
I still do. Yeah, you know, I was convinced I was going to our good mate Sally Hapworth took me a wig shopping. She did, yeah, preemptive wik shopping, and I still have the week that we bought in my carpet. I there's a technology they offer some rest cancer patients called a cold cap, which is essentially what it does is it's a it's a cap or like almost like a helmet that you wear on your head. During chemo, and it pumps freezing cold liquid across your head.
That sounds awful. It was awful, but it's probably the least a few problems in that minute.
It's probably one of the harder parts. I really love it, yeah, and it really hurts. But the way it works is that it essentially freezes the hair follicles so that the chemo doesn't hit them because the chemo is attacking cells that are multiplying which hair hairs. True, so I decided to give it a go. It never is one hundred percent effective. They say fifty sixty percent if you're lucky. And so I still lost a lot of hair, like the cap of my head, and I've got this like
weird re growth going on at the moment. I spent a lot of time pushing it down and the sides, but I did keep my hair a lot of it, And I don't know if it was worth it, to be honest, Like you have to wear it for an hour before camo, during camo, on an hour after. So when I was in the chair for five or six hours at a time with this cap, it's like having a really bad brain free.
But you must have felt strongly enough about not wanting to your head to put yourself through that was that an identity thing?
I think at the start, you're trying to hold on to everything who you were. And I remember very very clearly at the start, like I've got journal entries where I was so scared of losing myself in all this and who I would become afterwards. So I think, yeah, they're giving you the option to lose your hair, which is, you know, like how you look and how you present. I thought I may as well give it a go.
About three or four sessions in I almost let it go because it was so painful because my hair was falling out anyway, and I kind of was like, I've come this far in hindsight, if I had my time over again, would I do it? I mean, it's hard to say, but I mean it did. During treatment, to be able to go out in public and not feel like you were the cancer patient was quite a beautiful thing.
You know, I looked, I didn't look well. Let me be, I did not look well, but it sort of allowed me to sort of pretend like I was a regular person in the world. But yeah, just if anyone's wondering, that's that's why I have here, and it's it's another thing that they don't always mention it, the doctors. I've got other friends who do wasn't off at his adoptions, so it's something to ask.
About coming up. Lucy tells us why it isn't over when it's over.
Now.
As I said, I don't want to rush to no. I know I get the end in inverted comments because it's not the end, because that's what I want to talk about.
Right.
You've told me in many ways that the end of treatment. The perception is right. This is my perception again, back to my perception of the things I don't know about.
But my perception too going into this is despite us being i would say, reasonably smart.
One yeah, right, reasonably empathetic, silly, sometimes you get you get to the end of treatment and hopefully you get good news or the hope the promise of some good news, and everything's fine. Everything, everything's fine. Back to now, I want you to talk to me about this part because I know I'm not as you just described. It's not like this bit's worse than this bit or whatever. You've been through a no unbelievable thing. But what we've been
talking about a lot lately. And what your substack that you've started a year of healing is about is kind of what happens when it's over in inverted commers, because A, it's not really over and be everything has moved around. Yes, So talk to me a bit about that. Talk to me a bit about the snow globe.
Oh, the snow globe. The snow globe. Look, there's so many parts to this. I think the thing you learn when you're in treatment is that it's ever changing. I think you have a treatment plan, but then with every surgery, with every scam, with everything, it changes, you know. So for about a year, I mean the thick of it, you know, and just like I end up having three surgeries, six months of chemo, five months of chemo radiation and that.
So I come to the end of the radiation and you're kind of like you're like headed for that line. Like I'm just like everything in me is going towards that line and being done with radiation or what they call the active treatment, and I hit it expecting to fully be like amazing, cool, I'm done, you know, we
can move on with life. And everyone around you is like, you did it, You've you know, you've climbed the mountain or you've beaten the thing, and I just can't stop crying because you go from this life that you've thrust into so incredibly quickly, which is then completely taken up with hospital visits and doctors and scans and whatever. It is like you know, for a while, and still my Google Maps thinks that the hospital is work because we
go there so often, like that is your life. And then suddenly you're done, and everyone's like, cool, well done, and it's like, I don't know who I am anymore. I don't know how to be. I don't know. I don't know where I belong. I don't know, like do I work. My body doesn't feel like it used to. I'm still overcoming all the you know, the physicality of it all, like all the surgeries, all the chema, all the radiation.
And you still also on a lot of medication, medication.
And so I don't know. My body doesn't feel like mine. It's not really capful of much. And my head is just starting to catch up with what just happened. But will let's go on with life? And I just sort of did that. I was like, okay, let's go started taking meetings with clients, moved home to my house with my gym that had become my like sanctuary, like somewhere to go and to move through everything gently. Just was
all in at the same time. I just started on this very very quite growling, ongoing treatment ragime like so for certain types of breast cancer, and you do learn a lot. There's so many different types of breast cancer that affect treatment plans and you know, survivorship and everything like that. To start on this big treatment regime of drugs that will go on for many, many, many years, and I'm off, like let's go, and I just came
crushing down completely. I ended up in hospital with a fever sicker than I've ever felt, but supposed to be better, and I couldn't quite marry up at all, like what was going on here? But my head was just spinning and I, yeah.
Do you get offered as a patient, because this must be what happens to so many people? Do you get offered counseling to deal with this? And what kind of things do they say to you?
I say, this is incredibly normal, and I'm so lucky, Like I was just the public hospital system, like I went through public. There was a question of whether I'd go private. I didn't have enough cover for that, but I was considering paying for it. And then actually a conversation with me as friend who's a research and she was like.
Oh my god. At the sidelines of the.
Side Sydney show, I was in this Oh my god, my head was spinning about do I go private and have a surgery like five days before the option of the public surgery. It was going to cost me a shit ton of money, but I was like, I need to get it done now, right, you know, and all the public option and mea said cave achat to my bait and she was like, you are fine to wait for the public system. Best thing I could have ever done. I have had the most phenomenal care and treatment across
all that. So yes, they offer counseling, Yes they offer everything. They are the most. I cannot could not fault them. I call them my happy hospital. It has been absolutely incredible. But what they tell you is that everything you are experiencing is incredibly normal for cancer patient. But I've come to realize that I think we have this perception in
the world, and I was guilty of it. I think too that there's two paths out of cancer, and one is fine and one is dead, and we make no room for the stuff in the middle, which I've also come to realize that so many people are suffering with, but they mostly have to pretend to be fine because that's that's a narrative. We want that, that's easier, that's nice. How we want things tied up neatly in a bow. We want happy endings. And it is a happy ending. It just kind of hurts a bit on the inside.
It's not over that thing is really the ending.
It's not the ending at all. And I didn't answer a question there about snowglows, but the snowglobe theory is one that my psychologist shared with me when I was in one of these these phases of going I just don't know where I fit in anymore. And I'm still in that phase, to be honest, Like I'm six months out of active treatment, but only eighteen months since diagnosis. Not even every day. It's still occupies so much of
my thoughts and my beings and just my life. I'm still in appointments all the time, even though I'm clear out. The snow globe theory, she said, you know. I was talking to her and she picked up a snowglobe and
she held it to the camera. We do our sessions on zoom, and she said, I want you and imagine that your life is this snow globe and you're in the middle of it, and you know, you're going about your day and then boom, and she shook the snow globe quite vigorously, and she said, all those little flakes that are that are flying around now, they are your values and they're your priorities, and they might be the same as what they were before, but she said, they're
all falling into different places. So the things that you once cared about, maybe you don't care as much anymore. The things you didn't think you cared about, they're kind of more important now. And you're kind of just stepping your way through the snow and trying to figure out where you belong in it all. And when she said that, that was the most helpful thing I've ever heard, because I was like, Okay, it makes sense now the snow is still falling.
Stop putting the pressure on yourself answers, and not to be back to normal is normal?
There is no normal. We call this the re entry wobbles and they're going to go on for a while. And she says, you know, typically two years is probably from end of treatment is what it will take a cancer patient to figure out what their new normal.
Is, you know, in that snow globe analogy, because the other thing, which all not preconceptions is an experience like yours. It is absolutely life changing, but that it changes your perception of everything and what you want and clarity. Now you said you got that clarity in the room when they diagnosed you. Sitting here now like, do you feel like this is a different Lucy. I want different things and I know what I want.
Do you feel that? Yeah? I mean I'm not sure of myself, you know, classic self doubta imposter syndrome through all of it.
Are you proud of yourself?
I'm really proud of myself. Yeah, I'm really really proud. And I think when I look back at cancer treatment, it's the one thing in my life that I didn't have a roadmap for how to do it. I wasn't able to look at other people and so of say, not that I've fit my life or my career following other people.
Kind of like I'm very pit and ambitious.
But it was sort of the first time in my life that I'd been really able to go this is only me going through this with a huge amount of support, like I am just the most beautiful family and network of people who were behind me, but it's I'm the only one in there, and how do I want to do this? You know? And I was able to do that. And back to that point where I said that I wanted to find the fun and the love in it. And I know people might roll their eyes at that
and be like, cancer fucking sucks, because it does. Somehow through it, we were able to find that fun and that love. Not all the time, but you know, that night after I found out that I had chemo, I called my family. I said, please come over. I'm making pasta I don't know, And they came over and we had dinner and we put the music on really loud,
and we just danced. That's one of my favorite memories from my whole life, which is crazy, and you know, just through it all, I just learned so much about people and humans and our capacities to be there for each other and to support each other and just to like I just at the end of the day. I
just people are all the matters to me. Now I' just nothing else really, So my whole world now has become I've always had a very very close family, but I'm leaning in harder and going I just want to spend time with you, and I just want to spend time with my friends, and I want to I want to be present with people. I've got no desire to rush through life anymore, so I don't over and never don't.
I don't like to overschedule anymore. I like to have open, open days, or like, you know, if I'm seeing a person, I'm not there's not something straight after us, so I want to stay and hang for a while. I'm going to do that and really really be with them. I've also let the people I've had these huge networks, and I was still like the first time in my life I was able to kind of the world. But there
word boundaries is actually one that I don't love. I have a complex relationship with it, but I will, for the first time in my life to be like, actually, I can't do that, or I don't want to do that.
Or it's given you a clearer filter and what to say.
Kind of hide behind cancer in a way because I shouldn't say, but it was there. It gave me a way to say no to things that I hadn't had before. I hadn't had the ability to do the.
Extreme people pleasing behavior to need cancers.
You're extreme. You know you get to play the card a little bit. I need to.
I've got two more things, yeah, okay, to ask you right. One of them is about the Year of Healing, Yes, because I remember when that came about. But tell me how that's going, yeah, and how we extended it to two years of healing.
It's going to be a lifetime, yes, I think it is. It's like for you, Yeah, I mean the Year of Healing came about, you know, about that time that I had that full on extreme breakdown and you were there for part of that. There was a night I was in Sydney and I just lost it and I was somehow, Holly, you may seem to be around for the big points. We have this hotel, this hotel that we both stayed at and we now call it the Breakdown Hotel, and I'm not going back there, I know, Dar.
I'm staying there tonight, the Breakdown Hotel tonight.
Yeah, everything was coming crashing down, and I realized that I couldn't keep going at that pace and I wasn't going to go back to normal. And so a very very wise friend had said to me, who sort of deals in this sort of sort of stuff, had said to me, you need to take a year. You need to stop for a year and do the work and just get.
Yourself better, you know, And you've been writing about it.
And then I knew what happened because you the most so loose.
Also, I know you don't want to hear deal with compliments, but you are the most beautiful writer. And I hadn't read anything that you'd written for so many years because sifted right, and you've been doing other things, and so also, you know, you've been writing about this journey the word Okay, let's do it on the air of healing, and it is so beautiful and it's connecting so beautifully. That's a gift to peop.
I mean, I kind of had this inkling when I decided that I was going to give myself a year. I don't know what came over me, because you know me as well. I've spent my whole career in the background, like I've always been the producer or the behind the scenes. Even coming here today, I was like, Holy, I've never done this before. But for some reason, I wanted to do it publicly, and I thought that if I put a name to it and I told the world that I was doing it, that it might hold me to it.
It's not really complex. It meant going back to mum's house for a while and just being taken care of while I figure it out. And it meant looking after your body, looking after my body. Yeah, taking time like health is a big priority for me, going to the gym, trying all kinds of weird and wacky therapies. Wo woo shit. I'm also into it. Let's do it more time with the people I love. Let's focus on needing to get back into the work or the stress or that any
of that. And yeah, it's just about time and writing about it and just reflecting. And there's a lot of healing in the writing. And instead of putting those thoughts to paper, I've been able to kind of figure out how I feel about it all to you.
And for other people, I think, Okay, let's we've got to leave people with this. I want you to tell me what you want every woman hearing this to walk away thinking about because we're releasing this at the very end of Breast cancer Month, right, Breast Cancer Awareness Month. And I think in the same way that I was saying at the beginning that I think that in lots
of ways we've become quite complacent about breast cancer. I think even in Breast Cancer Awareness Month is like this haze of pink and we're like, yeah, yeah, yeah, But like, what's the thing you really want people to hear from this conversation?
Yeah. Like I said before, I think we're all aware of breast cancer. The month has on its job. We know that breast cancer exists, but do we really know what it entails. I don't think we do what I want people to know. And this is you know, I think October is amazing because it does give us a reason to talk about it and a focus. But you know, this is ongoing. What I've learned is that early detection to save lives is there's a line they say. I think it's really easy to think that it's not going
to be me. I didn't think it would be me. You know, I'm too young for breast cancer. I have no family history, I'm not too young for breast cancer. I've got a whole lot of new friends, you know, I mean a support group that's all young people with breast cancer. We're not too young for breast cancer. And most of us don't have family histories. And we've also you know, come to know that. I think it's over ninety about ninety percent of people who are diagnosed don't
have a family history. There's a real misconception on that. I just want people to this beautiful campaign at the moment out by Breast Cancer Network Australia. It's all about knowing your breast. So you could head to their website and have a look and they talk you through how to know your breasts and that's through look so by looking at them, also by feel so that if something does change, whether it is you can feel a lump, there can be other signs like your nipple can be inverted.
There can be god a rash or indent or something like that that you're aware of it. And then also if you're eligible and it's over forty in Australia, you're eligible for a mamogram. I don't think that necessarily means you have to run off and get one, but talk to your GP about whether you should be getting one. And if you're over fifty, you'll actually get letters from the government to say, hey, have you been lately. I want us all to be asking our friends. So, Holly, when was your last mamogram?
I go religiously now, so it was about six months ago. I'm over fifty, so I get my letter in the mail. It's amazing, it's free, it's quick, it's easy. The women there are great. And I have an am sometimes guilty of ignoring my body and what it's telling me because I'm like, busy, busy, busy, busy, too busy, But this, I don't fuck around with this, especially not since you and I know that you talking about this, which doesn't,
as you said, doesn't come naturally. But you've already really helped some people who found things because you've nagged them about it.
Yeah, I was telling you earlier. Two women have now come to me and said, like I said, it's not natural for me to be the one to talk about
staff and to share my story. But two women have now come to me and said, either they have been diagnosed or a relative of theirs has been diagnosed, because they've read something that I've shared or something you know, heard something that I've said, and I sort of had this realization that Okay, I can do something with this and we can make a bit of a difference, and yeah, check you Boob's girls. Because as aware as we are,
there's still I think it's over twenty thousand women. Man actually today, actually on the day we record is male breast cancer Wednesday.
It's not even something you think about.
But they're getting diagnosed her and that's really important to know. And there's a real shame that comes with it, come with a man. And I really feel for them because, yeah, so the man and the women just check and beware that goes for all parts of your body. Just if something's not right, I really really urge you just to go to the doctor, to the GP. And I heard something beautiful on a podcast the other day from a
woman in the US who has breast cancer. And she said, because I think it's easy for gps to often be like no, you know, to say you're too young. Well that's probably not that. If you are really worried, she said, pretend that you know me, Like, don't just say I heard this thing. Say my friend Lucy was thirty seven when she was diagnosed, so I'd really like you to send me for an ultrasound or to refer me to the right places, like please don't dismiss me and say
it's probably not right. And I thought that was really helpful if you can sort of put a name to it and say my friend. So please, I'm your friend.
Well I'm lucky enough that you really are my friend.
That's nice, isn't it.
So thank you Lucy Ormond for coming on and telling us your story, because you know, I love you and I'm I'm so proud of you and in awe of you. And also I just can't imagine what you've been through, even though I've been there, like to a point, I can't imagine it. And I just want everyone listening to this to do what Lucy tells them to do.
Thank you, hollywaen Right, I love you.
I love you too. Thank you so much for listening to No Filter today. This episode means a great deal to me. I'm sure you know why, and I'm sure it does to you too. And just sending enormous love to anybody listening to this who's been touched by cancer of any kind. If you want to find out more and find some resources to help you or anyone you know or love. We're going to put a link to the National Breast Council Foundation and to some other really
useful sights in our show notes. Sending enormous love to you all. The executive producer of no film What is nam A Brown? The senior producer is Bree Player. Audio production is by Tina Mattaloff, and video editing is by Josh Green. I'm Holly Wainwright and thank you as always for listening to nofeld Mamma Mia acknowledges the traditional owners of the land. We've recorded this podcast on the Gadagal
people of the Eora Nation. We pay our respects to their elders past and present, and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torrestrate islander cultures.