Automatically transcribed, so expect the odd wrong name or word.
What an absolute time to be alive! Welcome to the Virtus Performance podcast for another week. For all you guys that have been diving in week after week after week, a big fat cheers to you. Give yourself a pat on the back, I appreciate every listen, every share, every subscription, it's awesome. It's very very cool to see this community growing, more people listening and learning and starting conversations and all that kind of good stuff. Today's episode is with the lovely Jessica Redmayne. Jess is an actor by trade, she's also a bit of a legend, she's done
a heap of cool shit, she's been on a couple of cool TV shows, she's been a member of High Five which is awesome and I just realized I didn't actually ask her to sing any songs so I'm really upset about that. She also, we spent a fair bit of time talking about dementia as she's, her mother is, has been diagnosed with dementia for about five years ago now so she's been dealing with the regressions and has been caring for her mum with her old man for the last five or so years so yeah we dove
pretty deep into that and talked about what it was like and talked a little bit about I guess the research and what they're doing to hopefully find a cure for this absolutely insane, insane disease so yeah a lot about brain health, a lot about positivity, we talked a fair bit about Jess growing up and about what how she got into what she's doing and then yeah a lot about her mum so without further ado let's get stuck in. My personal and business goal is to be just a little bit better every day. I believe everyone especially normal people have a story to tell.
The Virtus podcast exists to help us all find small ways of consistent improvement by discussing the journey and experiences of each of our guests. Start recording in January. Awesome. I'm going to record it all and then release it. What's the premise of it? That was a tricky question. We're targeting, it's for females basically and it's it'll be directed at like females younger than us so it's me and another girl I was in high-five with and she's 24 I'm 26 and we're basically just going to talk about performance anxiety, audition techniques, conquering all of that kind
of stuff but as well as a heap of other stuff so we'll touch on this kind of stuff a little bit and um yeah it's very broad but we have we that's what we're doing at the moment is we're trying to find what ties it all together yeah because we want it to have a purpose not just be talking to a microphone and then expect people to listen. Yeah I hope people listen. People listen. Riley said it's really popular, that yours is. Mum listens. Yeah. I know a couple of friends mums who've been on the podcast like they listen.
Yeah. That's about it I think. You guys are alright. I hope. I don't know we're recording already so hopefully people are enjoying us talking rabble and we will touch on the fact that you dropped that you're in high-five so self praise, good for you. Oh thanks for that. First question for you Jessica, what gets you out of bed in the morning? My loved ones. Oh good. Elaborate. I should have thought of that before we went live because that was a huge gap. Some people don't know the first question, some people do. You were one of the ones that know it.
And I still didn't prepare myself. Elaborate on that. Talk to me about your loved ones. I think I do a lot of things. This is so deep I was not anticipating this um I think I do a lot of things in my life because of the way I was raised yeah and for the sake of a better word expectations not that you know my parents expect anything of me but we do things to make them proud. We go to work to make money to create a life for ourselves and so I think if I didn't get out of bed in the morning I there'd be a sense of guilt in there which all ties back to yeah my loved ones.
I like that because you almost feel like you're letting them down because they've given you and given us the opportunities to experience this crazy fucked up world we get to experience definitely if you didn't make the most of it and you'd be letting them down to a point. I think they spend particularly parents they spend so much such a long time investing in us I know my parents did they invested my mum did invested in me and so it's kind of a paying it back kind of yeah that's cool yeah that's it that's a unique
answer to that question so good from you very very good what's um so once you do get out of bed and you start paying about how are you paying it back to them at the moment what are you doing with your existence well I just bought an apartment back in May and that was a big goal to tick off I think in life but I'm constantly auditioning for stuff obviously I go to work and pay my mortgage so yeah but like that's the kind of stuff in general that I'm doing yeah when I wake up
I've died there's always something to do I'm always busy good is really a good thing oh yeah interesting question because I've been thinking about that a lot lately that yeah having too much on your plate and burning out is almost worse than not being busy at all yeah sorry you gotta find that balance I think you do and then I think like visa term before and here it's like you have a season like you have a season where you head down by my hustling getting stuff done it's like oh you know you're just putting yourself
out there big expansion phase and then you kind of need to have those seasons where you're like contraction phase you're like filling a cup and looking after yourself and just being okay with what you've got mmm taking a step back and appreciating what you've worked hard for yeah which I find hard to do to be honest I if I sit down for five minutes I go why am I sitting down you know you you do have to reflect on what you've achieved I really stroke why do you struggle because I'm always looking forward I never
look back yeah and I think people constantly remind me I had a man at work this is kind of irrelevant but I had a man at work say to me a couple of weeks ago you own an apartment in Elston wick and you are on TV and I thought and I was really offended by that because I thought is that the be-all and end-all yeah like that is not like that particular day I was having a rough day because of what we're about but um I just thought I couldn't believe that he would put it
down to two very materialistic things yeah like being on TV doesn't make your life like honestly right you made it yeah not at all yeah yeah but it's interesting how different people perceive what that means yeah yeah it was like that whole I think it's a might be Jim Carrey quote it's like I hope everyone becomes rich and famous so they can realize it's not the answer that's a good one yeah yeah because I think it's really easy to like the grass is always greener right like someone who's successful and I just did the air
quotes we're not videoing it I just did the air quotes people are successful and you're like oh they've got it all but they deal with the same shit we deal with and like that's pain and suffering and hardship is a I guess a series in everyone's life like it's not just the people that are you know regular people for lack of a better term so I think it's an important understand to have the people that you may look at and go they've made it they deal with the same shit we do yeah absolutely yeah what
what's it like I know I just said it's not made it but what's it like living that lifestyle and having people have those expectations or those presumptions about what you do um I think it can be tricky because you do have to have people always ask me what's next what are you filming now and yeah I'm no different to the next person I got one break you know I well I did high five and then I went on to the show but I still I finished filming at the end of August last year and then
as of you know the next day I was unemployed again and I think people really forget that that like you said we're no different to anyone else you still have to go out and work hard and fight for the next thing and so ever since it's been a year now over a year and I've been auditioning like a heap since then yeah but the act the acting industry is very like it's so particular that you need to fit a brief you know to a T you need to be that character so specifically yeah and that
might not happen again for another five 10 15 years you just kind of have to play it out so you've got to have a you got to create a life around it around it or even before that I've always sort of lived with ever since leaving uni I realized that you need to build a foundation of a life where you are content and you are you are happy with that life and then you attempt to be an actor or a performer or a singer musician no matter what craft it is because if you continue if
you live a life where you're unhappy but you're continually striving to be a successful actress or whatever it may be yeah I don't think you'll really find happiness in it yeah because yeah like I said I mean filming finished and I was unemployed again but I was more than happy to come back to my life in Australia and you know because I loved my life before filming and I loved it after filming that's pretty cool because then and then all of the things you achieve or don't achieve your you're not putting your happiness in things
you can't control mm-hmm it's like everything that you are is different to what you do when people ask you like what do you do what's your answer interesting it depends who I'm talking to yes so prior to working on 800 words I I often wouldn't say that I'm an actor because I wasn't an actor I wasn't a paid actor yeah which a lot of people actually 90% of actors and again air quotes yeah are unpaid actors so only 10% are paid in Australia well so prior to that I would say that I'm an event manager
which I am I'm a freelance event manager but when there's not events so you know when it's in the middle of winter there's very few events so I waitress so I work in hospitality to fill the gaps and I still do that no problem I might be doing that for the rest of my life who knows but um I will often say I'm a freelance event manager yeah and I perform on you I'm an actor but now depending on who what circles I'm moving in I would say that I'm an actor good do you have
you always been a performer yeah yeah was like like what were your hopes dreams ambitions growing up I was when I was really young I was incredibly self-absorbed and thought if I'm not famous by 18 then I'll never make it so I as a child I seeked fame and then I became an adult and realized fame is not what I wanted at all yeah I wanted to pursue music theater so I went to uni and I studied musical theater but throughout studying I realized that not only was I not completely cut out to be that
person my singing wasn't as strong as the rest of my class and all that sort of stuff but I also thought where's the longevity in this if I because I was a dancer I danced for 20 years if I broke my leg tomorrow what am I gonna do yeah and in the same breath I was loving acting classes I just absolutely loved it I doubled my acting classes I enjoyed it so much and so when I left uni I decided to do more courses in film and television specifically and so then I went and pursued
that Avenue so it really has it's changed a lot over the course of you know 15 20 years went from wanting to be famous to wanting to be singer-dancer on Broadway to now pursuing acting in all realms when did you start to realize that if I broke my leg tomorrow you know I'd have to do something else because that's something that's fairly it takes a fair bit of self-awareness to you know kind of not not that you weren't all in but to kind of go I need to have things fall back I was like you
know the from a sporting example the guys that follow a sport their entire life and then get to the time where they might get drafted on my get picked up and they don't and there's like oh shit what's next was that a big realization for yours it's something you worked on as you grow up I think I think it was a big realization because I danced all my life and I really relied on it I thought that I would dance for the rest of my life so I think I was roughly 2021 I was in
my second or third year at uni and as soon as I made the realization I put all of my energy into my acting because I thought I could still be an actor when I'm 80 yeah hopefully and I just loved it more than I ever loved dancing which that's cool was very interesting considering I danced for so long was that a struggle to go to make that realization I love acting just as much or if not more than dancing um I don't know if it was a struggle immediately but I now I now go and
watch performances of dances and I really have such a yearning to dance and such a slight bit of regret I think but then the logical part of me goes mmm I think I made the right choice yeah I think God I love there's gonna be some days where you're like no I made the wrong choice some days yeah I constantly want to go to a dance class and it ties in with self-confidence and all of that because when you're an actor you go into an audition and you're the only person in that room when you're
a dancer you go into an audition and there's a hundred versions of you yeah so it's that that yeah that had a lot to play with the decision as well I think because I just didn't believe that I was the best dancer in the room yeah yeah that's really interesting does it has that like self self-confidence and belief in in you changed since you moved from dancing to acting and what way it is it where do you kind of sit with it all now they're very different as as an actor I film I guess my
ego is a little bit bigger because I I because they're such different things right two dancers could dance next to each other and do the same choreography yeah and one of them is always going to be better than the other whereas two actors could be next to each other performing the same script but they're both going to bring different nuances they're both going to be very different actors definitely no one's the same as anyone else when it comes to acting and I think that's why I feel far more confident as an actor than I do
as a dancer yeah cool you know like that because then no matter like you're gonna be you no matter what yeah it's not like I guess with choreography there's a certain parameters and certain bandwidth you've got to work with you yeah whereas as an actor you can be you even though you're being someone else that's kind of cool yeah that's awesome so before we start talking about all the other stuff like what's and I know you hate that question like what's next but what is your next like two three four years look like is it
just auditioning and working and chugging along or yeah basically as an actor it's very much fear of the unknown because for example when I auditioned for well I left high five um that was on the 24th of December and then I auditioned for 800 words two weeks later yeah so I I auditioned for 800 words and then I was in New Zealand seven days later from auditioning so that's how quickly your life changes as an actor so I could audition for something next week and have to fly to Vancouver or LA or you know that
I doubt that that will happen anytime soon but no but um it's very much a chug along situation I just adapt when it happens yeah do you look at that like kind of lack of or fear of the unknown as a positive or negative a positive I think I pursue this career because I enjoy change and risk yeah because if I didn't well I hate a nine-to-five job I've tried it and I cannot do it I can't do the same thing every day five days a week I'm very I often believe that I've got a
bit of ADHD like I just have to keep doing something different which is why event management is fantastic yes it's always different one project then yeah one project then another but um what was the question Oh positive or negative having that fear of the unknown yeah and knowing things could change two weeks I think my with my positive my personality or other it's a positive I can see why so many people would see it as a negative though yeah I guess it depends on what type of person you are right like yeah I remember slightly
different example but all through uni I was in a course that didn't give you a job at the end so it wasn't like teaching where you end up being a teacher or it wasn't like an accounting where you end up being an accountant it was this kind of arts degree for people like sport and exercise and stuff like that so it was like something that I really struggled with for a couple of years I used to complain about it and be like you know I don't know what to do and there's no direction and stuff
like that but I know whether it was just getting older a little bit more mature and you get to the end of it and you're like well this is awesome because I've got all these different opportunities to to do like yeah I almost flipped and felt bad for the people in degrees with one thing you could do some people do four years of a degree and I go no I don't really yeah want to be a scientist or I don't really want to be an accountant or whatever and it's just you know for me I
had that blown wide open so it wasn't an issue yeah I imagine that you're the kind of person that feels the same way definitely whereas some people just like I need to know what train tracks I'm on some people just like I just wanna drive my car wherever hmm it's interesting it is interesting I think it's very depends on your personality absolutely hmm and I think it's important to understand what kind of person you are because it helps you make you all your decisions in life like we had a lot of students come through and
through vertice and kind of say oh I don't know what I want to do like just think about it what do you actually want to do what do you want to spend your life doing and then start to formulate decisions around that because you're you know you're gonna be in hell if you're someone that like structure and then does your does your job for a living yeah if you or vice versa if you like like yeah new things and change then if you're in a nine-to-five job it's gonna be the worst thing ever mm-hmm it's
understanding your patterns what was it like being high five oh gosh how widespread just ask I just load up oh oh this is totally honest I went to that audition really not wanting the job I didn't want to be in high five I wanted to be an actor so I was dreading it but then going back to that self-confidence thing I walked in not caring and so therefore I went into the dance call and I just nailed it because I didn't care yeah and I I didn't have a desperation for the job yeah and so
I got the job and then it was four shows a day basically six days a week seven to eight weeks in a row in another country I think and then you come home for a week or two and then go to another country and do it all again yeah and you're doing the same songs in and out each show yeah and it just wasn't right down to my core wasn't what I wanted to be doing but I knew however that it was going to be a stepping stone which is why I did it and it
was I don't think I would have gone on to the next thing if I hadn't have high five yeah I think that applies to a lot of actors we do a lot of unpaid gigs and a high five was paid obviously but we do a lot of unpaid work to sort of build our CV to get to the next thing it's very much a stepping stone career yeah so you're never really gonna fall into the thing you like you love doing but I guess for any any career yeah really true you've got to be at
the bottom rung or you know right through the shit to get to the good stuff sweep the floors to start with you gotta earn the right to pick and choose what you want to do yeah that's really interesting yeah so many people would so many people would look at that and go oh my god high five being in high five must have been amazing well yeah it was but also you're you're taken away from your family your friends your loved ones you put into a foreign country and you've got to live there for however long
it may be and sing and dance for children but I mean don't get me wrong it wasn't all bad I learned a hell of a lot what was your like if you could kind of like stop and I know this might be hard for you because you know that kind of person if you could stop and like reflect and look back what are the main learning experiences you had either about yourself or about your career or whatever hmm gosh I firstly learned how not to run a business they won't be listening to because they really
it was very poorly run gosh I don't even know I I became very angry throughout that period of time and it taught me I said I said to lucky earlier for classes happiness lies in an atmosphere of growth that's probably your best quote ever you claimed it for your own I read that book that it's from which is called the happiness project I read that I read that while I was on tour yeah because I was very unhappy and so I needed something I needed to find my happiness again and so I realized the biggest
thing I took away from high-five was that money can't buy you happiness because I was making money but I was not happy I was very unhappy because I wasn't with my loved ones I wasn't you know I was taken away from my partner from a lot for long periods of times and that was a burden on our relationship because that was really tricky dealing with that and yeah it was just I wanted to be doing other things it and no matter how much money I was making it didn't I didn't care about that so what
was the transition like from coming back and finishing that up on December 24th like coming back to you I assume you love once for Christmas and then having your audition two weeks later it was a huge weight off my shoulders because I'm a bit of context I had a six-year contract and yeah I did one year and I kind of tapped out and and left so and I made myself physically ill to making that decision because again it all came down to money I was like I could have six years of stability and at the
end of it probably be set up for life and I said no to all of that which was huge it made me yeah I was really nervous to to turn it down but then when I'd finally made that decision and I couldn't turn back I felt such relief and so I came home and I spent that time with my family and and it was just lovely and I think that's probably that could be associated with why when the audition for 800 words came about I was fresh I was feeling revived and rejuvenated and so I
probably went into that you know guns-a-blazing already to go so the timing was probably good yeah hmm yeah well not when magical things happen the timing tends to be pretty good hmm that's that's good would you make you'd make exactly the same decision again yes good definitely awesome so what was it like getting that call or being told that you got the gig for 800 words it was I remember I was standing I think Riley and I were about to go oh I was about to go and put resumes down Chapel Street yeah yeah to
get a hospitality job and I went to open the front door and my phone rang and I saw that it was my agent and I just dropped everything and started shaking and went and sat down on the couch because I thought here we go this is gonna be usually if it's a no if you don't get the job it'll be an email sorry the phone rang and I sat down and I just wrote I was ecstatic I was so excited and I think that that physical sensation of being excited probably lasted five to ten minutes
and then logical me when you'll be unemployed in September so it didn't last very long but I did I did obviously I was ecstatic for the next six to seven months of filming like it was so much fun but yeah that that physical sensation didn't last very long it never does yeah well so what was it like going through that process did you allow yourself to detach from the fact that you knew you'd be unemployed again September to just enjoying being there yeah I think so because because there was the joy of the show actually
airing I had that to look forward to yeah so and I kind of I also had the fact of coming home to look forward to so I wasn't I wasn't sad or disappointed or I didn't feel that at all when we finished filming I was actually really excited to come home which was good because we filmed it in New Zealand yeah and then I did I didn't work for like a month or two I just sort of chilled out and saw friends and stuff and which was great but the having to get a job again
didn't probably sink in until like October November I had stuff lined up so I wasn't it probably wasn't until this year that I kind of went hmm I better start making some money yeah yeah so the reason why I show on the podcast was a little bit different to all that that whole story very different fill me in fill the fill the listeners in so well I guess my mum was diagnosed with dementia five years ago so I'm here to talk about dementia what it is how it works how it affects the body the brain
the journey that you go on yeah so what's what's it what was it like when I guess so many questions what was it like when your mum was diagnosed like how did she deal with it how did you guys deal with it what was the kind of process like I she was actually so she was diagnosed in December of 2014 I was in the Philippines on to our working and then I went to the States for four weeks so I wasn't even in the country when we returned Riley and I came back from the stage
that's Riley by the way we drove up the driveway to see my parents for the first time and my mum came up to me and started crying and said Jess everything's changed I've been diagnosed with dementia yeah and I I didn't I didn't have a emotional reaction to that at all I just hugged her and said it's okay mum that's just a that's just a title we knew we knew this which we did we very much knew that she had dementia we we knew it um now it's just been confirmed um yeah yeah I think
it would have hit her far more than it hit us because as I said we yeah she started to show symptoms five years before diagnosis so we were we went on that journey well and truly before she was diagnosed but when I think a doctor said to her face you have dementia that would have thrown her world because she watched her mother die from dementia yes the first thing that she kind of kept saying to me was I don't want to turn into my mom I don't want to turn into my mom so I think
it hit her much more than it hit us because we knew we were just waiting for it was almost it was almost a sigh of relief that she'd been diagnosed because we were watching this woman change so dramatically we needed a reason we needed an answer as to why yeah yeah what's what's the last I guess five years supporting her and going through it with her what's that been like a roller coaster yeah I actually um someone said to me just the other day that it's similar to babies go through milestones so they you know
get their first truth or whatever a journey with dementia is like hitting milestones so every three to six months you will hit a new hurdle you've got to figure out how to get over that hurdle adapt to it and then you you plateau again for another three to six months stages right yeah yeah but I disclaimer every case is very different yeah so this is everything I'm about to say and I'm not a scientist I'm not a I'm not a you've done pretty big over the last couple years yeah I yeah this is everything I'm
saying is from experience yeah yeah yeah and I think it's important to understand that no matter what illness or diagnosis someone has there's you know a thousand different thousands of different ways that people can show the symptoms or have have issues or whatever so you know whether it's something really simple like a hamstring injury right might take some people three or three weeks to get back some people six weeks to get back dementia yeah obviously completely different kettle of fish but you're gonna have people that regress really quickly or some people that you know plateau
for a long period of time so yeah definitely because it's a very personality based disease so depending on what that person is like will depend on how it affects them if they're aggressive then they will show even more so their aggression because they're losing their independence they're losing their ability to do everything for themselves yeah which is pretty insane what so what kind of person what was your what was your mom's personality like prior to being diagnosed or be that's starting to have symptoms so if you don't know me personally then you won't know but
I am she's very much like me she is loud she wins she was the life of the party not that I'm the love of the party but she um she would get oh god she'd get up and sing at parties and play guitar and she was she thought she was hilarious she had a big personality basically and she's a little woman she's five foot she's tiny yeah but her personality made up for that but she was a chef a seamstress she was a bookkeeper she was incredibly intelligent she kept herself overly busy going back to
what we're talking about you know too much stuff on your plate and burning out this is her burnout I you know I personally believe because she did not stop yeah hmm yeah so how's how have you seen her personality change as this has progressed ah I wouldn't say that her personality net like I seized still see glimmers of her humor and yeah her charisma even though she can't form a sentence you can still see that in her face and the way she little nuances that she does that with her body language but she lost her
confident it was a big hit to her confidence she was a very confident person and when someone else has to assist you to go to the bathroom or change you or put you in the shower that's a you know massive hit to your ego so that was the biggest change in her personality that she completely lost her confidence and became quite distressed a lot depression kicked in and she'd never I mean I was only a teenager and a child so I never saw that side of her if there was that side yeah so yeah what
were they like the main of the big like signs and and kind of symptoms that you guys started seeing initially and how has that progressed over the last ten years or so sorry she started to repeat herself a fair bit she would ask the same question a lot she would make a cup of tea forget that she'd made a cup of tea put it in the microwave and then forget it was in the microwave so that was a big telltale sign we'd come home every day that was bound to be a cup of tea in
the microwave she would go down to the supermarket to get milk and she'd come back with like detergent or something and then she'd realize oh we need milk and she'd go back to the supermarket she was very slow driving the car so we'd be going down we lived on Baxter Turin Road and that's a hundred K Road and she'd go like 60 70 K's and being the ignorant you know self-absorbed teenager that I was I didn't really read into that but it's not until now that I go oh my goodness that's why because she was
so she got really cautious driving I said there was that but mainly the repetition repeating herself because she was not like I said she was a bookkeeper she was so intelligent yeah when she started to repeat herself repeat stories that's when your ears prick up and go why is she doing that so was it was after kind of the diagnosis that you started diving into the literature and starting to learn about it or was it more as she progressed as she progressed I was at uni and I was in my own little world and I
yeah and I think that associated to why because I moved out of home at 18 and that's when she started to decline and I think she declined faster because she didn't have me she waited on me and like she took me to dancing made all my dancing costumes like yeah and then I disappeared out of her life yeah so before diagnosis I was very self-absorbed I didn't pay attention I just knew that my mom was repeating herself and would go and get frustrated yeah like the teenager that I was once she was diagnosed I went
okay what is this let's read into it because my nana had it mom obviously has it I could get it so that's where I went yeah how do I prevent this what is actually happening yeah to her brain yeah what's so what are the like statistics around it being hereditary and is it no idea they don't even know if it is hereditary mom went to Royal Melbourne last year and she gave blood and they they're going to take my blood and do a whole thing on the hereditary side of it because because they've got no
idea whether it's hereditary or not yeah do you think it's and obviously there's a few theories out around like why it happens do you think it's more I guess you think it's more environmental or it's more you know it's what I'm looking for just nature do you think it's just the way we are oh that's a very look there's a huge question yeah yeah um trauma technology there are so many factors that there's not one answer right no not at all what what after you know you diving into the research and and spending time with
your mom obviously over the last few years what opinion have you formulated around either the causes or the reasons for it and again just an opinion right mom specifically yeah she had an incredibly traumatic life right from being a child and I we weren't going to that because it's really that's heavy she went through some heavy stuff so I believe that trauma is a huge I mean there's statistics that support trauma there's a huge percentage of the 9/11 responders yeah because that was over ten years ago now there's a huge percentage of them that now
are being diagnosed with dementia because of the trauma of being a first responder yeah to 9/11 so trauma is proven to be one of the the reasons to develop dementia however I mean it's not the one and only reason because I've met and I've spoken to people that either have it or have a loved one that have it and yeah there's no and and I've also on the other end of the spectrum my 92 year old grandmother that passed last year she was a sharps attack you could ask her any of our family's phone numbers
she would just off the top of her head tell you yeah but she had a traumatic life as well so it's not to say that if you're you have traumatic life you will get this correlation that's the thing so yeah what is there like certain things actions you're taking certain things you're doing to I guess do your best to avoid this happening to you to prevent yeah uh yeah definitely yeah coffee is a big one so we were told at a seminar about two or three years ago that caffeine takes 12 hours to to no
longer be on the brain and there's a chemical that flushes through your brain when you're in a deep sleep now if you have caffeine you if you have a caffeinated drink at say midday yeah it'll still be on your brain at midnight and therefore you don't go into a deep sleep which means that that chemical that flushes through your brain can't do its job and if you don't go into a deep sleep at all in your interest eight hours yes so I assume as I heard that I stopped I was having like four coffees a day and I could have one at like 4 p.m.
5 p.m. still sleep yeah and yeah but now I have one before I try my best to have one before 10 but I do not have one after midday and same goes with alcohol I think alcohol has the same the same effect that it stays on the brain and sleeping getting adequate sleep so trying to get more than eight hours sleep a night I'd certainly do that other than that to be honest there aren't huge I mean they talk about a Mediterranean diet so if you eat a lot of tomato based foods olive oil all
of that kind of that's supposedly correlation around like some high certain high-fat foods and brain health which is which is really interesting yeah me three like feet fish yeah so what you eat but I mean they they always say or do brain games like as in crosswords and all these kind of thing and I my dad said that some scientist from somewhere said at this seminar that they don't do squat they don't help you can do as many brain games as you want they're not gonna prevent you from getting dementia yes interesting one because we
don't know and like you know that scientists could be wrong morning could be right yeah exactly we're not gonna we're not gonna know yet what's what's your mom like with her own awareness around it now after now yeah right now no no awareness of where she is usually who people are so depending on the day she might not know who I am majority of the time she does but I know that there'll be a point in time where she won't anymore she occasionally knows who my dad is but other than that you don't get much
out of her if it was anyone else that went to see her that knew her for years and years yeah she wouldn't respond her awareness I was thinking about this just the other day um the pivotal moment of when her awareness changed was last year she went into a nursing home for respite for two weeks yeah in October so that was 2017 she she was very aware of where she was yeah she knew that she was in a nursing home and she said to me about five or seven years earlier please don't put me in
a nursing home so she knew where she was and then she went into she went back into that nursing home for another two weeks of respite in January so a few months later and she had no awareness of where she was so I think through those couple of so that's four years after diagnosis of where her awareness became no more she didn't realize which is in a way for us it was kind of good because it made it made it slightly easier for us to put her in there yeah because when she knew where she
was it was even more heartbreaking to say goodbye to her each day so yeah was that so was because obviously it's all incredibly difficult and hard to deal with but was that middle period where there'd be bouts of awareness and bouts of not like not knowing where she was was that the hardest part for you guys to support her through um yeah I think so because there were like I said there was depression so she would she did really struggle with the coming to terms of me assisting with going to the bathroom and getting her
dressed and she would apologize a lot because she thought that she was being a burden because she was also a very independent woman like she was the breadwinner like she was so I don't need no man kind of woman she she raised me with that kind of mentality she was always like find a man that respects you and all that and she loves rightly by the way she looked she saw him just about two weeks ago and she looked up at him and she smiled and she had that face of recognition like she knew who
he was which was really yeah she loves him so that's good tick but um yeah I think it was certainly difficult but it wasn't the hardest part about it I don't think yeah is there one hardest part or is it just the whole thing heavy I guess the hardest part is that you're essentially people might hate me for saying this that you're mourning the death of a person that's not dead yeah yeah it's it's it's a tough and like heavy heavy is a good word right because it's it's important to feel that and to see
that and to experience that and obviously it's like it's an emotional thing to talk about but is there how do you like you know there's the emotional response is the intellectual response like intellectually you can say that and believe it and feel it but then there's the emotional like feeling of what what is it actually like to you know see your mum and have her not recognize you hmm it was pretty awful but like the thing is is that ten years ago when I sat in the nursing home and spoke to my Nana and sat
with my mum watching my mum watch my Nana yeah I even back then or just a little bit after that knew that I very first voiced it when I was 19 I said my mum will forget who I am yeah bear in mind that's four years before she was diagnosed yeah so I've known for a very long time that my mum would forget who I am doesn't make it easier oh my god I really thought that it would but it doesn't it absolutely doesn't it nothing prepares you at all no nothing that anyone says you
know you could have a manual on how to do this and how to get through it and it still would not like make it less of a challenge yeah Seth Rogen has a great quote and I know you love quotes okay and oh gosh I'm not gonna get it correct word for word but it's something like paraphrase I'll say it you don't know how brutal the disease is until you see it firsthand yeah and I think that's absolutely true because I could explain it until the cows come home but I don't think people really ever
get it until because she could be having a good day and you see her on a good day yeah and then she has 50 bad days after that good day so it's so we've had to prove to Centrelink to doctors you know she has to sit there and they have to ask her questions and dad can't answer for her because she's essentially got to prove that she and this was early on that she had a brain disease so that we could get some form of um what do you call it a disability pension because my
dad had to they had to stop working to care for her full-time and that's incredible she could sit there and a doctor would say what's your name and she would say Christine and then the doctor would say where do you live Christine and she would go yes and then we a little bit and literally it's gibberish some words will be coherent and it and so you're watching the first ten seconds could be oh she's fine she's mentally sane and the next the next few minutes it's like oh okay right so it's very it's so I
used to get really embarrassed not embarrassed but I felt awkward taking her into the disability toilets the disabled toilets because if you looked at my mom two three years ago you would think what's wrong there's nothing wrong but the woman can't sit herself down or take her pants off by herself or lock the door or even and you'd you'd kind of want to carry a sign around with you and go yeah you know please please be respectful of this woman has to I think I think if anything it teaches it should teach people that everyone's
dealing with something whether it's you know like and it's all relative right like but whether it's dementia and you know your mom can't sit down by herself or lock the door or whether it's you know death of a loved one or or whether it's you know stuff going on at school like yeah we all deal with shit and most of the time it's not a physical impairment that we can see you know someone rocks up in a moon boot and they've rolled their ankle then you're gonna oh shit what's wrong like how like are you
okay and all that kind of stuff but you know someone's dealing with depression they rock up and they've got that fake smile on their face we're not gonna ask them how it is so it's it's such an important thing to understand for society to realize that everyone suffers I think that's the biggest thing that I have learned across the past ten years is because my dad used to say to me all the time when I was a child the world doesn't revolve around you Jess and it wasn't until I went through this that I went
oh oh my god the world absolutely doesn't revolve around me but not only that you do you you could meet a stranger on the street and you've got their mother could have passed away last week from cancer you don't know yeah and that and I it's kind of a new lease on life that you look at life in such a different perspective yeah yeah yeah that's what so you're you've kind of had a bit of a mission lately of or lately over the last few years of like pushing this awareness how have you done that
and why have you done that I'll start with why well how I've just sort of its dementia awareness month so September is always dementia awareness month and I just kind of pop some stories on my Instagram about experiences that I've had and the reason why I do that is because I think that although the statistics are so high I had never known I didn't know that people of 42 39 there's a six and ten year old in Europe well they'd have dementia it is not an elderly disease because that's what everyone expects or thinks exactly
because they think Alzheimer's or they think dementia and context dementia is the umbrella term for over a hundred forms of dementia and Alzheimer's is the biggest one yeah but so many people are not educated about what it is I felt I felt like I hold the golden ticket in a way that I've got all of this information why not share it because there's so many people that are going through this journey completely blind they've got no idea what they're in for yeah and if someone was to say to me five years ago it's gonna get
really tough to get dressed here's a couple of tips that'll make it easier I would have I would hope yeah gone okay yeah interesting I'll apply that yeah definitely so I think at the beginning of this month the first couple of days I found it really difficult I thought God how am I gonna get through the month but I just got out of bed in the morning and I did it because I thought I've got an obligation to do this because there are so many people going through it but they don't talk about it because
I can understand if they don't want to yeah yeah but yeah it's um it is a hell of a journey and there are so many obstacles and I think if someone was out there making it that little bit easier then and it's a win why not yeah yeah so what's obviously what are we 20 days through the month have you and obviously like these kind of things you do it to raise awareness and to help other people deal with it have you learned anything more about either dementia or yourself or your mom throughout those last
these last 20 days of like diving into it and actually projecting it out there I think of new things all the time like constantly I'm recalling things that that she did three four years ago and I think oh I forgot that she used to do those odd things yeah like hide her jewelry under the bed she she thought we were being robbed all the time she went through a phase where she was just misplacing things and so she thought we were being robbed yeah um I don't know if I've specifically it's actually her funnily enough
the past month has been probably the hardest of the year and not because it's been awareness month yeah but because she's just recently gone into a home permanently yeah and so I've been having to deal with that so yeah that's been challenging they just so happen to fall within the same month but yeah I don't know if there's anything specific that's come up over the past 20 days that's new yeah I did I was listening to a podcast and I did good crap - happy with teeth to fall and she talks to a psychologist and
she told a story about all our scientific study in the 1930s and 40s nuns when they went into with a convent they had to write biographies and they also had to donate their brains to science and they would compare these scientists will compare their brains with their biographies and they found that the the negative biographies were associated with brains that had dementia and they also died seven to ten years earlier than brains that didn't have dementia or Alzheimer's but the ones that didn't have Alzheimer's were paired with biographies that were incredibly positive which was incredibly
very interesting but there was one particular nun who her biography was overly positive it was incredibly positive and she lived a really long life she lived into her eighties and when she died and they looked at her brain bear in mind context she didn't have she didn't die with Alzheimer's she didn't even she didn't show a single symptom but when they looked at her brain after death she was in her final stage of Alzheimer's Wow but didn't show anything but didn't show a symptom and her biography was incredibly positive yeah and apparently she lived a
really positive life and so therefore her brain she's essentially fought off yeah Alzheimer's just living a positive life pretty cool which is incredible it's just amazing and again I think that kind of ties in with well it doesn't a little bit of a tangent but meditation and how meditation has been proven to you can change your DNA by meditating because you can adapt the the whatever it is the things yeah it's not being because I'm reading a book at the moment I've been like fighting in my head whether I actually mention or not but you
know the side that says it's gonna mention one it's called biology of belief so it's about how much your mindset and environment affects what happens to you as you grow older so it talks about obviously laughter lifestyle diseases and diseases stuff diseases like dementia and Alzheimer dementia Alzheimer's yeah it talks about how important it is to understand the need for community and the need for positivity and the need for collaboration and communication things like that it's called biology of belief by Bruce Lipton it's um it's awesome I'm like halfway through it but it's just the
importance of the way you think will lead more to the way you are than the things that are outside of our control for those that aren't readers there's I think there's two one-hour lectures from him online talking about it all yeah but it's just one of those books that you know because I'm like diving deeper into the spirituality side of things even I come from that scientific you know I was dotted T's crossed area but just the important we don't understand consciousness at all we don't know where it comes from we don't understand the implications
of the way we think yes and this is a book that kind of starts diving into that this is someone who's research over you know his career has dived into that so it's it's really it's a really interesting one in that there's studies like they're not the the nun one that just shows that you know what we think directly influences who we are or what we are yeah and how our body deals with things like the placebo effect is obviously one of those effects it is has been proven to to influence so many different studies
and the audio book I'm reading at moments called you are the placebo so I'm kind of diving into a few around that same same area but does it does my this is the longest question ever but does reading things like that and seeing things like that and hearing about that study does that give you hope or hopes the right workers yes I'll say yes yeah yeah yeah because I have I've always been one for meditations great but now that I've heard the science behind it I put it into my daily practice and also the positive
thinking thing I just if I can if my chromosomes or it's not chromosomes it's them all of them mutation if I've got the mutation yeah which I could very there's a high chance that I've got it yeah let's say I do have it but I could fight it off with a combination of things of you know not having a coffee after 10 meditating and living a positive lifestyle then why not why not like I'm also only 26 so I'm you know hoping that they'll find a cure before you know but that might be the cure
just that yeah that lifetime of positivity and you know we look at this is probably going off a little tangible we look at like diseases and we go we need to find a cure but so much of a cure is the all of the things that lead up to you being diagnosed with that disease so I think it's that you know positivity and you know consistent movement and exercise and you know challenging your brain like maybe brain games aren't the way to challenge your brain maybe it's conversation and and discussion or well maybe it's just
connecting with a community of people to actually that's a big one connecting with the community of people because I'm pretty firm believer that mum has lived a very long life with dementia this statistics are kind of that after diagnosis you leave for you know three to five years maybe a bit longer yeah but I mean she's in her fifth year after diagnosis but she's been living it with it for close to ten but I think because we've kept her in the community we she's lived with my dad you know ever since she was diagnosed yeah
and we talked to her we continue to talk to her even if her responses aren't coherent because if you make them if you include them then they will live longer yeah their brain will last longer and then she has a purpose to keep going right and like you mentioned mentioned early on that when you moved out of home that was when she started to decline right like she had her purpose was to help you be the best Jess you could be and there's been a lot of studies around Japanese culture they never retire so I
can't remember what the there's one certain part of Japan that has the longest life expectancy in the world and they never retire they continually contribute and have a purpose to themselves their families their community and you know I think that's a that's an area where we in Western culture miss out on like that whole like I want to retire when I'm 65 thing or seven you know 70 or whatever then what like he's gonna hang out and sit on a beach yeah and what's your brain doing yeah exactly and drink cocktails and then you know
30 cocktails down a week in you're just like well this sucks so I don't know I think that for me I look at it you know we can only deal with things that we've experienced but I kind of look at my future and go well I never want to retire I want to cultivate a life where I love what I do every day so much that I want to keep doing it and I think that will allow me to hopefully create an environment where I'm able to keep contributing and like you said before you want
to be acting while you're 80 yeah like I want to be contributing to my community when I'm 89 hundred hundred twenty maybe we'll see how we go is there a community of people that you've been able to lean on and get help from either I guess dementia related so it might be a support group or something like that or just the people you love we so when we were living in Devon Meadows we approached the council to seek help yeah and you know with no disrespect to that council they did squat that was there was
no one to talk to when mum and dad moved down to Venus Bay that was whatever Gippsland Shire I don't even know what the council is but they were fantastic because they put us in connection with dementia Australia and the the support groups that they have so there's we don't go to them anymore because it's kind of it's really tricky to sort of mum sleeps a lot during the day if she's sleeping yeah but when we did go to them there was one in one faggy that was just a general carers and dementia patients would
come and we'd all have lunch together and there would be music and it was great there was another one in Pakenham that was specific to early onset dementia so prior to 65 so that was anyone that was younger than 65 with dementia and going to that one in particular was really challenging for me the first time because you're sitting in a room with just clones of your parents yeah and it really hit hard that we were not the only ones going through this and that was like I know my mum and and I've watched my
mum go through it so therefore I am not immune but you know there's that feeling but if you see 20 to 30 other versions of your mom in a room it's like god my heart but yeah but it was a fantastic platform you know avenue to meet other people that are going through the same thing and it was really great for my dad to chat to other men that are caring for their wives you know all women caring for their husbands because they could talk about the struggles that they're going through and give each other
tips yeah on how to make it easier yeah so I really become kind of like foresight for yeah everyone else but yeah for the next person what's it been like to I guess see your dad go through it looking after his partner oh my god Lachlan I'm sorry I had to ask that question the worst thing in the world yeah yeah how does does he is are you able to have conversations with him about it all um he's broken me um I need I need manage it somehow he is a very strong man he doesn't
show his emotions at all because he's mad um so we don't really talk about it yeah and I think that my people probably listen to this but I think we don't really talk about it because I think he wants to if he shows that he's being weak he might think that it's making it harder for me yeah so he doesn't want to burden me by showing his weakness I think that is the mindset he comes from but I've never seen someone love someone so much it's pretty amazing hmm do you think that if you were
able to have those conversations with him do you think it would make it easier or harder and because we never really know until you have it but it might be the best thing to not necessarily talk about it all the time but then again it might help you guys work through it yeah I don't know um I have no idea to be honest at this stage I don't really want to find out yeah the answer to that question I think we kind of give each other the smile and the nodding we both know on some
level yeah how the other one is feeling something's the best not necessarily needing to talk about it yeah I think it would be just as heartbreaking for him to watch his daughter lose his mom her mother yeah so yeah yeah it's kind of nice not just I don't know yeah I got a few questions for you to finish up okay what are you grateful for still having my mom yeah yeah I have a lot of friends that you know they lost their mom young and she's still here although we can't hold a conversation or go
shopping together or sit in the cafe and enjoy it she's still yeah she's still she still giggles and she's still lights up and says oh my Jessie and that's yeah what advice would you give 15 year old Jess Oh how long you got open your eyes the world doesn't perform dude yeah hmm take the cotton wool out of your ears and put it in your mouth Eric Thompson told me that that's good advice for everyone I think I asked for his advice on set one day I said what would you like what's your advice to
anyone you you know a new bunny makta yeah and he said take the cotton wool out of your ears and put it in your mouth I'll never forget that that's exceptional advice I'm gonna use that a lot what have you had a defining moment in terms of everything just everything yeah I don't know I think I've had a pivotal moment and I think it was only recently I can't quite pinpoint when it was but I think I became an adult about a month or two ago yeah I think I finally made the transition because amongst
everything that's been happening you know you you start to realize what is important in life and it all kind of goes back to that you're on TV and you have an apartment you know what more do you want it's like so much more that's yeah you could strip that away from me and I would say I'll have my mother back thanks yeah a healthy brain but yeah there wasn't any one specific moment where I went I'm an adult now it's just kind of a lot of listening to podcasts a lot of research yeah it helps
that's why I love the podcast I guess medium the platform because it allows you to not just hear a snippet of someone's story it allows you hear the whole long-form you know warts and all the good stuff the bad stuff and you can you know some of this some of the most I had alternatives not the most basic but the some of the simplest podcasts I've done or I've listened to have been the ones that have been made the biggest impact to some people it doesn't necessarily have to be the you know the crazy climbing
mountain stories or the you know stupid achievement it's the simple shit of just you know loving your family and making the most of every second that people get the most value from yeah yeah I think also the fact that Riley and I moved into this new apartment just recently and it's really sort of settled not just the the both of us but I feel far more grounded now yeah which I think attributes to the becoming an adult thing because I don't I no longer just think about myself which I did for a very long time
I always thought what am I doing where am I going it's not me me me or III and never is and it never will be yeah I think as we get older it becomes less meaning you know because once you add kids and once you add you know family and everything so I yeah yeah definitely that going again I'll say it for the fun at the time the world doesn't revolve around you I think that was when that light bulb went off and that was the moment where I went yeah I think I need to
relish in the smaller things more and less in the when am I gonna get my next big break kind of yeah you know it might be important to my career but it's not important to my whole life yeah the joy is definitely in the little things yeah and appreciate the appreciation of the little things and awareness of the little things apart from your parents who do you look up to and why it's corny but I look up to Riley I think he makes me a better person because he brings a lot to me that he
teaches me a lot I think we'd sort of teach each other a lot you know that's why a partnership should be yeah um I want to say my dancing teacher yeah the her name's Rebecca Anderson and she well I mean I haven't taught I haven't learned from her in years like the decade but I always looked up to her and I think I sort of I took so many little things away from how she taught and how she held herself as just a human being and I went I want to be like you because she
was so decent and respectful and she just she respected everyone no matter whether you were the best dancer or the worst or she's just a really genuine authentic person and I really aspire and continue to aspire to be that version of myself like that that's cool that someone that you haven't seen for 10 years can make such an impact on who you want to be mmm last question if this was the last time you saw me what would be it won't be just settle down if this is the last time you saw me what would
be the one piece of tangible advice you would want me to live the rest of my life with kind of be something I've already said of course can happiness lies in an atmosphere of growth like it how can people get around I guess dementia awareness and you and all the cool stuff you're doing um well it is the 20th of September but I will still be next year too well we are true um I can follow my Instagram which is at Jed main we're just typing Jessica red mane I've got a vlog that I'm gonna
be popping up soon was it my I did with my little cousin because she's got her own little vlog uh I'll have a podcast coming out next year but the title of that is to give a TBC yeah yeah um but in terms of dementia you can always if you want to learn more you can always go to dementia Australia dog if you feel the desire to donate you can always donate to that because I mean they're constantly trying to find a cure obviously and even prevention and um but they've also got lots of tips
so if you are going through the journey or even if you want to seek out counseling through through dementia Australia which I need to practice what I preach I need to do that getting around to it yeah they've got a lot of avenues that you can go down that you can reach out to people and they've got spreadsheets of tips and tricks on all sorts of different things so yeah thanks coming on thank you very much for having me sorry for making you cry (upbeat music)
