Olympia Valance has some news…

Published Aug 16, 2024, 2:00 PM

Late last year, Olympia Valance opened up about the difficulty she and her husband, former AFL player Thomas Bellchambers, encountered while trying to start a family. After a roller-coaster four years, which saw them experience multiple pregnancy losses and undergo IVF, Olympia decided to speak out because she wanted anyone else going through the same thing to feel less alone. 

She was also getting to a point where she felt it might be time to close the door on trying to conceive. And then she took a pregnancy test…

Today, Olympia joins Something To Talk About host Sarrah Le Marquand to reveal her baby news, why she feels a little nervous sharing it – and what she’d say to anyone struggling with their own fertility journey. 

This episode deals with pregnancy loss. If you or someone you know needs support, visit Miscarriage Australia  

You can find more from Olympia on Instagram  

Find more from Stellar via Instagram @stellarmag or pick up a copy inside The Sunday Telegraph (NSW), Sunday Herald Sun (VIC), The Sunday Mail (QLD) and Sunday Mail (SA)

Hello, and welcome to Something to Talk About the Stella Podcast. I'm Sarah Lamarquin, your host and Stella's editor in chief. Every week I sit down with some of the biggest names in the country because when Australia's celebrities are ready to talk, they come to something to talk about.

And my guest today, well, she has something very big to talk about.

Late last year, Olympia Vlance opened up about the difficulty she and her husband, former AFL player Thomas Bell Chambers, encountered while trying to start a family after a rollercoaster of four years which saw her experience multiple pregnancy losses and undergo IVF, Olympia decided to speak out because she wanted anyone else going through the same thing to feel less alone. She was also getting to a point where she felt it might be time to close.

The door on her fertility journey.

And then earlier this year, Olympia took a pregnancy test.

Eight weeks went by, and then nine weeks went by, ten weeks went by, thirteen weeks scan went by and yeah.

I'm pregnant.

Joining me on today's episode is Something to Talk About. To reveal her long awaited baby news. Olympia admits she has mixed feelings about going public, knowing firsthand how bittersweet such announcements can be.

I haven't posted a photo on Instagram for a couple of months because I obviously look pregnant, and I've got this sick feeling in my stomach about announcing, because of what that feeling, what that will do to other people.

Olympia and I.

Get into all the details, including a gender reveal and a few hints on the baby name. We also chat about Logi's red carpet fomo, why so many of our most famous actors really do love their neighbors, and whether she has any plans to follow her sister Holly's lead by speaking out about politics. Before we begin, a warning, this conversation touches upon pregnancy loss. If you or someone you know is struggling, then you can find links in our show notes for support. Olympia, Welcome to the Stellar podcast and something to talk about.

Thank you, it's so nice to be here. Haven't done a podcast for a while.

Well, we're very nice to people, so hopefully this will be a good experience for you and get you back into podcasting more regularly. Olympia You are a regular fixture at Stella. You have been in the title many many times over the years. Your last appearance was in October of last year, where you were speaking about you had just recently opened up on Instagram and gone public with your experience as you and your husband, Tom Bellchambers were trying to start a family. You spoke about how you had gone through multiple pregnancy losses, you had embarked upon IVF that was ten months ago, and wanted to bring you back over to you what's been happening since then?

Ten months ago?

It's been quite the journey, hasn't it. Yeah, I guess the last time I spoke to you guys, I was just I think I was just starting IVF, and to be honest with you, it was it.

Was quite an easy process. Like I had.

I was going into it very very very nervous. I was scared about what, you know, the hormones would do to me body changes. I'm not good with hormones at the best of times.

Like I've taken.

Drugs to help ovulation and things like that, and it just mentally it didn't sit well with me. So that was a part that I was incredibly scared about. But when we kind of got into it, I think think it was because we were taking a step forward to the direction that we wanted to be, we wanted to have a child.

It just it was quite easy.

And I did get pregnant the first couple of times that I did IVF, but I couldn't hold them, and that was I probably haven't spoken about that since. So, yeah, we did go into IVF and it was an easy process, but it was also a very sad process as well, and I was always planning to continue to document it, but when you're in those trenches, you're just sat, you know. And I would have liked to be able to talk more openly about it because I know that people were kind of waiting for an update, but I just found I just didn't want to talk to anyone. Literally barely picked up the phone to my friends, my mom, anyone.

And then.

We realized that I have a funny shaped uterus that I think I think it's called a biicornial uterus, but was quite extreme, and the next the next stage was like, Okay, well you are getting pregnant, but you're just you're constantly miscarrying. And the next stage was to have this surgery where basically they sew your uterus up and make it look like a normal uterus to give the baby more room to grow. And that was scheduled for January of this year, and then I accidentally got pregnant a week before that surgery, and I just went into like a deep, deephole and I was like, oh my god, I'm going to I just I don't know if I can do another miscarriage. And I was almost I was also saying to the fertility doctors, I was like, should we just do like I know that I'm not I don't want to go another eight to ten weeks and then have a miscarriage that I know that I'm going to have. Should I just bought the baby and then do this do the surgery? And they were like no, no, no, you know, miracles happened, like let's just go through with it.

But I miscarried that baby as well, and so I was just exhausted, exhausted.

So going from like a miscarriage to like three weeks later, going and to this surgery and then the surgery didn't take. They couldn't, they weren't able to perform the surgery. And so after that, so I wake up, you know, drugged out from you know, the anesthesia. And I woke up and I and they told me that they couldn't complete it. I'm like, well, that's it, you know, that's the end of this. And over that past couple of months, I was kind of already looking at life without a baby, and all these things kind of were happening around me, Like I was seeing these terrorist children around me. I'm like, well, I don't want that anyway, you know. And I was like okay, just trying to protect myself, like okay, well, and I was saying to my husban and I was like, you know, well, will this just be enough, you know, you and I And he's like absolutely, and I'm like great, because it's enough for me too, And we were really happy. We got to a stage where okay, well this isn't working, and if later down the track we want to pick this up again. There's always options. We live in a day and age where there are options. There's surrogacy, there's you know, there's options. But I needed a bloody break. I didn't want to think about it anymore. I wanted to just stop thinking about it. I wanted to live my life. I was sick of It's been like four years of just thinking about babies.

I'm like, I'm completely lost myself.

And I didn't, you know, I don't know career. I didn't know what I wanted my career anymore. I wasn't driven Acazola was thinking about was this.

And then.

Thomas and I were being very very careful, like using protection and it was like we were just dating again, and then one slipped past the goalie and it was very very depressing. It wasn't a happy moment, you know. There was tears, and I'm like, I can't believe, you know, we were being really careful, and I was also like a couple of weeks away from getting an IUD put in, and I'm like, I just can't believe this has happened, like just out luck. And then eight weeks went by, and then nine weeks went by, ten weeks went by, thirteen weeks agan went by, and yeah, it just kept growing and growing and growing.

So it's the miracle. Baby, I'm pregnant.

Congratulations, My goodness, Olympia, what an absolute roller coaster you have you and Tom this past four years. This fab I news. I can only imagine the complex emotions you have gone through in the past few months. How far along are you as.

You and I speaking in mid August.

Twenty five weeks. Yeah, so I'm alone.

I know a lot of people that have experienced pregnancy loss talk about that trepidation that you have then the whole time, And of course you have also touched upon this yourself, where there is that twelve week period, that conventional period, and you're holding your breath. Has there been a point where you've thought, Okay, I can start to allow myself to let some of the guarded walls I've built around myself to come down a little bit.

Yes, I think it was at this because I've been getting more scans than usual because it's a high risk pregnancy. I think it was at sixteen weeks when we were at our skin at our scan and the baby looked like a baby now, like it had hands, and you know, it was kind of waving and you could see the face. And then probably last week, a couple of weeks ago, when I'm feeling the baby kicking and Thomas is feeling kicking.

How was that moment?

Wild? Like I've always wondered what it felt like to have to feel something inside your stomach, like it's the one feeling I was.

I wonder what that actually feels like. And it is a weird feeling.

Because you can feel you can feel it just kind of swimming around in there and it just goes kick. It's like little flutters. It's a very nice feeling. But I'm told that I'm at a good point now where I'm kind of not too big everything, Like, I feel really good at the moment, and I'm told it just kind of goes downhill from here.

I think it's called the golden trimest the it's sort of literally the golden period in the middle.

I think every.

Trimester has its high and low points, so there will be great times they have.

I'm sure that's right.

You are glowing as I speak to you. I wanted to ask you about telling people. So first of all, thank you, because what an absolute privilege to be sharing this news today. It's a tweet thing for journalists to say. I'm really honored that you have spoken to me about it, but I am genuinely honored and Limpia that you have trusted us and our audience with your.

So you guys have been along the journey with me.

I feel like we have, and that's why we really when you were ready, obviously did want to pick it up because I know part of the reason that you've been generous with your journey at times when you first did open up about it late last year on social media, was because you first found when you were encountering issues when you and Tom decided to start a family, that there were just things that you didn't know. Oh, you didn't realize a lot of women, I think would feel this same way that you did, where you said you spend so much of your young life, your twenties thirties. For people that are experiencing these issues further along than you are in your twenties, we think I've been trying, not absolutely, and then all of a sudden run into it. It's obviously very validating and helpful for other people to hear those stories. So is that something that has surprised you the way that your story has resonated with so many people as this journeys continue.

Absolutely. It's the thing is it's not just me.

There are so many so many people have come to me since I started talking.

About fertility issues.

So many people are going through the same thing, and there is still you know, a little bit of a taboo around it, but I think that we're heading in the right direction where.

People are talking about it more. But yeah, you're right.

You know, you spend so many years trying not to get pregnant, and you think that, you know, when we started, I was twenty eight, it's like, well, why isn't it kind of happening?

And you do? You feel like.

You totally feel like a failure, like your body isn't doing what it's meant to what it's meant to do. One of the big things that I wanted to really talk about around that kind of fertility is egg freezing. Like I wish I'm actually one of the lucky ones where I actually have a lot of eggs. But I've realized that the egg freezing process is also incredibly easy. So if you're you know, in your early twenties, mid twenties, go and do it. It takes two weeks out of your life and it doesn't even stop your life. You're just doing an injection every day because they're the best quality eggs that you can have when you're in that you know, that age bracket, because they dramatically decline as you know to say you can actually see the egg. You can see it change every year, and it just gets worse and worse and worse, and it just kind of lets women have this freedom where they're not thinking about their biological clock. They're like, Okay, well I've got I've got great eggy's in the bank, and when I'm ready, when I decide that I'm ready, not when I'm forced to find a partner that I don't really you know, want to be with because I need, I really want to have a baby, and you kind of stop your career because you've only got this kind of bracket of time. No, I mean, you can freeze your eggs at a really early age and have a baby whenever you want. And I think a lot more like I've got girlfriends. They're like, oh, you know, I haven't met any when I go. Have you phrased your bloody eggs yet? Because it's one less thing that you have to worry about because you know that they're there, and everyone should do it should be taught at school. Go freeze your egg as soon as you leave, because they're your best eggs.

It's such a great moment in time for women to have all of these options, isn't it. We know that there's parts of the world where women's bodily autonomy is actually being restricted, but we're so fortunate here in Australia that, on the contrary what you're just talking about there, Olympia, especially for young women looking ahead, there really is. There's so much medical advances, technology, science support available, which is why it's so important, whether it's somebody talking to their sister or to their friend, or to a colleague or somebody like you in the public eye sharing this story through interviews like this or on your own social about just empowering women to know that there are actions and go.

And I didn't know about those options until I was going through IVF. It wasn't until they said, you know, we've had a massive increase of young women coming to freeze their eggs, and I'm like, it's not a difficult process. It's actually a really easy process. But I just had no idea about it because it's just not talked about.

It's interesting talking to you today, Olympia because just last weekend the guests here on the Stellar podcast were Andy Lee Harding, who recently engaged and we were discussing you know, some of the public expectation that they have encountered over the years about you know, when you're going to get married, when you're going to get married, carrying you know, it's well meaning sentiment, but you carried the way to sentiment. And that then led into this conversation around the etiquette and I think the ethics of asking people, asking women in particular and women in the public eyes, such as yourself, are you going to have a baby when you're trying for a family? That sort of thing. We had a really interesting conversation around and I realized, then, you know, you are my business week and we're now talking very open about this, and I'm asking all these sorts of questions. But in my mind, that's because if we have parameters and the conversation is driven by the person who is when they are ready to speak, it actually makes these conversations more powerful because I would never dare ask you about this unless I knew it was something that you actually felt quite strongly that you wanted to do.

Yeah, it is a funny thing, you know.

Obviously, early as soon as Thomas and I got married, it was the next question everyone asked, So when are.

You having babies?

And I think people are kind of now becoming aware that that's not kind of an appropriate question because you just don't know what's going on. I'm okay, like I'm happy to go. We're trying, you know, we're trying and it's not working. But other people that's not an easy question to have to answer. And also education around that is necessary as well. Like I've heard some real horror stories where girlfriends have just had miscarriages and someone's going, you know, are you you know you're looking pregnant. It's like, no, I've just you know, had a miscarriage. They just kind of questions you don't you don't ask like, you know, you don't ask someone, oh, are you pregnant and they're not.

We've stopped asking.

People that exactly. You never know what someone's going through.

And eighty percent of the time it might be innocuous, but the times that it is and it's already so.

Yeahful, Yeah, it is coming up.

Olympia on wrestling with the guilt to sharing her big news, and we talk about her relationship with her big sister Holly. I know, Olympia, when we spoke to you late last year, you spoke about again, I think so many people will relate to this when you have experienced pregnancy loss or you're or in the middle of a fertility journey, and then it feels like everyone around you is either pregnant. I remember when one of my best friends had gone through pregnancy lost. She said, I went to the shops today, I'm telling every single woman there was, you know, six months pregnant. You talked about, you'll go on to social media or the magazines, everyone is pregnant. And then I just wanted to talk about that because again, I think you're aware or getting so much better about being aware of that and handling this with sensitivity, which is why I think your story is such an important one, because there's so many layers to it of you know, difficulty and complexity and some of the things you talked about at the start about thinking, well, what would my life look like if we didn't have children. We would be okay with that, but then also this really happy news that you have that you should be able to bask in. But then you're also aware that it could be unsettling for someone.

All I think about now, it's like, even you know, there's a part of me that doesn't even I haven't posted a photo on Instagram for a couple of months because I obviously look pregnant, and I don't, you know, obviously didn't want to announce until I was one hundred percent sure that this baby was you know, okay. And I've got this sick feeling in my stomach about announcing because of what that feeling, what that will do to other people. But it's also I have to celebrate these little times, like there's been so many years of bad news.

I've just got to celebrate this one. You know, this is good news. But I do I think I think about.

I'm too much empathy.

It's it's such an amazing quality empathy, and you're handling it always such sensitivity and empathy, and I for what it's worthing that is the best we can do in these situations where there is no.

Ana, what can you do?

And you are It's such wonderful news, and I'm genuinely so happy for you, and I know everyone listening will be and want to come back to the people in your life. Let's come back to you. You're announcing it literally as we speak, you are in the golden trimester. I love to talk a little bit about the reaction first of all, of because obviously not you know, most people don't know, but who does know. You know, you're very very close with your mom, for instance, you've told us in the past, is really your best friend?

Yes?

How has the reaction been from the few people that are in the in the has been.

Really hard on the parents.

I'm Thomas's mom my mum, and they're petrified to ask how anything's going because they feel the pain just as much as we as we do. So they also had the same feelings as us along the way. It's like no one could be happy, no one could be excited. There was never that where preglan, you know, we never got that. So they've been just as anxious as us. But you know, as the weeks go by, we say, you know, we tell them like, okay, well that scan went well, but just you know, don't get too excited, don't get too excited.

Because we know that we're gonna let them. You know, we're gonna let them down just as.

Much as as as we get leapt out as well. But God, now gay Thomas's mom is sending Thomas's little clothes from when he was a baby. I can't believe she's kept all of those mom has sent me. I can't even begin to tell you the list of Greek baby names she sent me. Some of them are actually written in Greek. I'm like, I don't even know what that says. It's gonna be like Zeus Spell Chambers. Oh my god, God, one hundred hundreds of names and they're all spirras.

And do you know if you're having a boy or girl? And if so, are you able to share that? Obviously no problem, we're having a boy. Gratulations I mean, I did think sus much. Oh yeah, well I'm getting a bit nosy there.

We're having a love boy.

Oh, how wonderful. I'm a mom of two boys.

They're the best.

And speaking of boys that grow into men, I wanted to ask about your husband, Thomas Bell Chambers and his Obviously I'm not asking you to speak for him Olympia, but of course it's a very unique and complicated situation, and the enjoyful situation when there's wonderful news, of course for fathers to be.

How's he feeling at the moment?

Oh god, he is so sweet.

He's a doting, doting a husband at the moment, you know, it was when Thomas and I first got together. It was only you know, the first couple of months we knew, like you know, we fell deeply, deeply in love, very very quickly. And one of the big questions came from him, you know, like do you want kids?

And I'm like, damn, because.

You know, he comes from quite a big family. His brothers have kids, and you know, he wants a baby very very bad, as do I. But so we both we both wanted kids very strongly from day one. But seeing him now is so sweet. He's just this big you know, obviously he's six foot eight and you can just I just at these scans, his face just turns into like a child again.

It's like so sweet.

It's so sweet to watch, and he's just going to be the best dad and the whole entire world because he's the best.

Husband in the whole entire world.

Oh I just I just imagine him with this tiny little baby in his big poor.

I can't wait.

Tom of course is a former Essendon player, so we've got afl former player dad. We have a well known actor. Mum, what do you think I mean? We're not going to you know, predetermine the career. Well, I'm certainly not going to as an onlook up for baby or whatever other fabulous names your mum has collated. But what do you think would you be either of you be supporting either a career in footy or enacting.

I don't want him to play football only because I look at Thomas. He's thirty five and he's had fifteen surgeries. He can you know, he limps everywhere. He's got no cartlidge in his ankle. I'm like, I don't want that. Our sign can play golf and maybe tennis, but yeah, those those contact sports, Like he's just poor.

Thomas's body is just cooked.

And I think there are better sports to play that don't harm the body as much as AFL does.

What about acting, in your experience in the industry, is that's something that you would support your son?

Oiny of future chore.

Absolutely.

My whole side of my family is all in the arts.

I mean, my.

Stepdad Ross is a singer Athena. My little sister is going gangbusters with her punk band Gut Health. She's traveling, she's touring Europe at the moment. My other okay, there's eight of us. My other little brother is studying acting and arts in Brisbane at the moment, and he's just killing it. Obviously there's Holly as well, who was always in the arts me acting that world, I know, So if he wanted to go down that road, absolutely, because I can help down that road.

This weekend is also the Logi Awards. Now you have been nominated for Logis in the past. You were nominated for Most Popular New Talent for your role on Neighbors when you first started in the industry, in your breakout role just under ten years ago. So you've done that thing and I'm sure we'll in future where you're you know, squeezing into address for the red carpet. Obviously, this pregnancy is being under wraps any fomo tonight, are you just like I'm just glad that I could just watch it.

It actually would be.

Fun to get a ball gown made for a pregnant stomach. That would have been really, really fun. And the Logis was always Oh god, I loved the Logis.

I loved dressing up.

I loved every year doing something outrageous and I normally did I normally we normally know whoever we were using to design our Logis dress. We always did something that was a little bit crazy and out there.

That part I loved.

Sitting through the whole logies was tough, but the red carp.

It's always fun.

But yeah, it would have been nice actually to wear a I mean, I've been, like I said before we went live here, I've been a bit of a hermit inside my house for the past couple of months. And thank god you can't see below because I'm wearing my husband's tracksuit pants because my tracksuit pants don't fit me at the moment. And this cookeye top that literally looks like a crop top. Now I haven't I haven't. I haven't gone out and bought some new clothes.

It's hard. It's hard shopping for this new body type.

It's amazing that you have kept it under wraps for so long.

It's you know, keeping.

A baby bump from prying eyes is no mean feet.

Honestly, we've just recently moved house, and we've been very.

We've been moving.

And now that I'm in the new house, I'm kind of nesting in the new house and I don't want to leave because I love it. So it's kind of been I realized this is actually the third time I've left my house in the past month, actually left.

And I'm like, oh my god. As i was driving in my car, I'm like, why do I have so much petrol? Like because I haven't driven anywhere.

What do you think the next few months are going to look like for you? Maybe go out and you know, explore some maternity clothing options over the company I've been trying.

I was actually gonna I'm very lucky that I've had worked with a stylist for ten years, Maggie, and she's had two boys herself. And I literally called her the other day and I'm like, I think I'm going to need your help because I went to Chadston and I went.

I don't know what I'm doing here. I went into a few shops.

I'm like, this is depressing because I don't know how to shop for myself anymore. It's really hard. And I've looked at the maternity stuff. It's just it's not pretty.

You mentioned your older sister Holly there. She of course played Flick Scully and Neighbors, and just recently, the fabulous actor Janet Andrewata, who played her mom Lives Scully on Neighbors.

Passed away.

It's a massive outpouring of support, and Holly spoke about, you know, what a fabless support and mentor and friend Janet had been to her on set. I think it also really cut through the fact that there's something about neighbors, isn't there at Olympia that everyone the alumni never seemed to distance themselves from it. We've seen, you know, obviously Kylie Minogue and Jason Donovan came back, Margot, Robbie, all of the young actors that have come through over the years, including yourself, never seemed to be embarrassed by It does really seem to be a real solidarity.

Even Margot always talks about neighbors, and Holly also, you know, I think it's just such a big part when everyone starts on neighbors, they're very young, and I grew up there, and all of those all of those people grew up there, you know, where some are really young, some are sixteen fifteen, you know, I was eighteen, nineteen, twenty twenty one, like my formative years were there, and the people around me were my second family, you know, Kate Kendall, beck Ol Malogolu, you know, they were literally my second moms. And there were you know, I've got a group chat with my mum and them like my mom's and you know, I literally grew up there. And the person that I am today is because of things that happened on neighbors. And you know, I would be a very different person if I if I didn't have that, and also that structure at that age that I didn't have, and the fun and the work ethic and the people.

You know, I don't really have.

A bad word to say about neighbors, And that's why everyone always goes back to. You know, that's where I started. It's just a it was a beautiful place to grow up. And I think everyone feels the same way.

Do you see a return and for you a limp here on neighbors? I know that the EP Jason Herberson has said.

He'd love to have I've gone back a million times. I've you know you I was there for four years full time, and then I think I went back for thirty five years. Then I think I've been back three times since then. I'll come back whenever for little stints. I like my little stints there. You go in, you work hard for a month or so, and then and then you leave.

But I love that place so much.

And yeah, it's just it was second home, like going in, going into that building through security. Nothing's changed, Everything's exactly the same. But yeah, Holly came back for the final of Neighbors and I didn't know, so I was like, people like, we'll Holy come back. I'm like, I doubt it, you know, I doubt there's you know that she's just not her thing. And then Holy came to my honeymoon because she got COVID for my wedding, Holly and the family, and while we.

Were there, it was the final episode.

And then I get all these articles while she's sitting in front of me.

Saying, Holy Lance return to Neighbors.

And I'm like, bitch, you didn't tell me.

What are you talking about?

You were there. I've told so many publications that there's no way you're returning to the show, Like, you didn't even tell me. But it was as a really nice touch that her and Nat in Briulia they did.

They filmed at her house.

Holly obviously is living in the UK now, and I mean her life looks very different. She is a mum of two children. Do you see each other a lot?

Do you think there'll be an opportunity.

I've got two older brothers, so I know what it's like when sometimes their nieces and nephews young adults. Almost by the time you're having children. The gap obviously is not that pronounced between Holly's children and yours. But as you mentioned, you've all got a huge family, and then obviously Thomas's family as well.

Yeah, it's hard. Holly's always lived overseas.

She's always you know, since she was sixteen and she moved to La I think, and then to the UK, and you know, she's always been far. But they come back a fair bit to Australia. And when they came over to Greece when we're on our honeymoon, the girls were at like such a perfect age because you know, Holly always shows photos of us and you know we talk sometimes, but they were really young. But they're at this age where they're like, oh, that's AUNTI Olympia, and you know, we really bonded there and now when I see them again, we had that really special moment. But I would love to see them more. It's just, you know, like we were saying before, we should be in Greece.

It's just hard.

It's hard to get over to Europe for us, it's.

Long and expensive.

Obviously, Holly, she's started speaking out a fair bit about politics for you will IMPI is that anything you would feel interested in? Are there certain social issues or political issues that you think that you would start to speak out about publicly.

There are things that I feel strongly about, for sure, But.

I also.

Don't feel that you know politics at the moment.

Is it's.

The politics environment is a scary environment. At the moment, no matter what your beliefs are, someone will have something to say and come at you so so hard, whether you're left or right. I just don't want that anger towards me.

For whatever my beliefs are. You know, Holly and me.

You know, I had a someone asked me a question a couple of months ago about Holly, and my answer to them was, you know, Holly and I have very different political views, but she's my sister and I love her. And then that became serious clickbait Olympia slams Holly, and I was like, this is why I don't want to talk about it, because.

My words get twisted.

And everyone has a right to say what they believe, whether you agree with it or not, but I just want to keep my peace.

Absolutely, it's such a shame.

This actually a bit of a recurring theme on this podcast is that we're in this hyperpartisan time, and I also find it very disappointing that there's this perception that if somebody may feel differently from you, or vote differently, whether it's a friend or a colleague or a loved one, that somehow that means that you couldn't possibly respect and love one another. I don't know when that notion became so common.

Yes, you know, it never used to be like this, where where if you wanted to talk to someone, now there's no conversation or debate or it's just like you're wrong, there's no middle ground, and there is so much anger towards someone with a differing view, and it's just it's scary out there, and I don't really want to, you know, I don't want to. I definitely have strong feelings about lots of different things that are going on in the world, but.

I don't feel the need to talk about it publicly.

Absolutely very fair and very valid.

You obviously have helped make a lot of women feel seen feel less alone by being so open about your journey, and I know that this latest chapter in it is just such fabulous news. My final question for you, Elympire is if someone's listening to this and they're still where you were six, seven months ago, a couple of years ago, what would your advice be to them, or what would you simply say to them?

What you're feeling at this very moment is valid, and I understand your struggle, and it does get better, it does get easier, whether that's acceptance which really changed me, like we were talking before, where I was like, Okay, maybe this is not the path that my life's going. Let's try and accept a different path.

But it's tough.

It's a really, really tough journey. And I see you, I hear you. I wish it wasn't happening to you, but just keep going.

And I hate that.

You know, everything will Everything happens for a reason, and what will be.

Will be, but it will be.

Olympia, thank you so much for your time today, for your generosity. It's been an absolute joy and, like I said earlier, privilege to have you shared your story with us. I cannot say congratulations enough to you and to Tom and to everyone in your family who has been a long this time for you.

Will.

Thank you so much, so nice to get out of the house and chat. See you have a human being.

Will We will see you soon rocking some Hailey Beaber outfit.

I am sure that'll be next.

Olympia.

Thank you so much for joining me today and thank you to you our listeners. We recently won Best Interview Podcast at Radio Today's twenty twenty four Australia and New Zealand Podcast Towards, so thank you so much for your support. I hope you've enjoyed this episode. Make sure you're following us because we'll be back with another exclusive guest on Something to Talk About next week.

Something To Talk About

From the title that sets the news agenda every week, Something To Talk About sees Stellar editor-in- 
Social links
Follow podcast
Recent clips
Browse 212 clip(s)