Our Teen Years, Ilona’s Rugby Journey & Sex Ed Lessons From Mom

Speaker 1 I am so excited for this spa day. Candles lit.
Music on.

Speaker 1 Hot tub warm and ready.

Speaker 1 And then my chronic hives come back. Again, in the middle of my spa day.
What a wet blanket. Looks like another spell of itchy red skin.

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Speaker 2 Let's dive on in, shall we? Oh, we're diving in. Breaststroke it.
Like a doggy paddle. Oh, yeah, probably.
We'd never be the best swimmers.

Speaker 2 Welcome to House of Marr, a wave original presented by Samsung. I'm your host, Alona Marr, Olympic medalist rugby player.

Speaker 2 And no matter how old and mature I get, I will continue to add about two spoonfuls of sugar to my tea and coffee.

Speaker 2 And And I'm your host, Olivia Maher, a content creator, creator of Girl Dinner, and severely lacking vitamin D.

Speaker 2 And I'm your host, Adrana Maher, human rights advocate, and I still haven't stopped talking about my two study abroad experiences. Two of them.
Wow. There's so much you don't know about us.

Speaker 2 Let's do a little background. So a lot of people think that I am the eldest sister.
Yeah, a lot of you.

Speaker 2 I don't know if it's maturity, how beautiful I am, or whatever it is, the vibe I give off, but I am not. I am a classic middle child.
It's true.

Speaker 2 The oldest over here, we got Olivia coming in at a roaring 30 years old. See, that wasn't discussed.
She's feeling it.

Speaker 2 Everywhere. I

Speaker 2 feel in my writer that that wasn't supposed to be discussed. I love it.
Yeah, I am the oldest, classic. I think I'm a classic oldest.
Yeah, sure. So you hit every box.
Every box.

Speaker 2 She is our little mommy when our mommy.

Speaker 2 She makes us food.

Speaker 2 She texts us in. She texts us in.
She cleans up after us. You see the kind of money Alona's bringing in.
And it's just, yes, I do the cooking. Yes, I do the cleaning.

Speaker 2 Yes, right, right, right right right right right right and then we have the baby over here the little baby the little baby little baby i would also say classic baby classic baby she got i mean you too though but being younger than me you each got to do the things sooner than i got to do in my life like especially you when i got to do it then you got to do it i'm like but i couldn't do it two years ago and her especially too well i was also really good at convincing our parents i knew how to argue you just had to know um what points to make we couldn't get our ears pierced until we were 13 but mom and dad it's basketball season And so we have to get it before basketball season or else I'm going to have to take it out.

Speaker 2 That's sharp. I got it.

Speaker 2 I was 12. Business mindset, first and foremost.
Olivia and I were always very close in age. I say like when you got to watch the PG-13 movies, I got to watch the PG-13 movies.

Speaker 2 But you were, you're almost like two and a half years younger than me, but like three years younger than me in grade. So you kind of felt left out.

Speaker 2 Yeah, it was tough because you guys were only one year apart in high school together, going through all the same sports teams. And I was still in middle school.

Speaker 2 And at at that age, that just feels so huge. That like distance between us.
Like, and you know, I was still like beginning puberty, and you guys were kind of at the tail end.

Speaker 2 Of course, we're not connected. We had our periods.
Yeah. No.
We were getting blood everywhere. Women.
Yeah. We were women.
I was jealous of everyone else in the hall with their periods.

Speaker 2 Right, right, right, right. Wait to start bleeding.
No,

Speaker 2 every time I go, I was like, please, please, please, let them be blood.

Speaker 2 But we have gotten over that because that was tough for you growing up, being kind of

Speaker 2 not like an outcast, but it definitely was.

Speaker 2 No,

Speaker 2 what's the word for it? We treated in a way, we treated you like an outcast at times. Yeah, because it's four, not that dramatic, you weren't that mean.
Four-ish years between you and I.

Speaker 2 Whoa, five-ish. Five-ish.
You're four and a half. You'll learn Lindsay's not the best with Matt.
All right.

Speaker 2 It got so much better with age. And I think, especially once I graduated high school, I personally noticed a huge difference in our relationships.
It's just like we were on the same level.

Speaker 2 You know, you could see me as an adult. Yeah, absolutely.
I see you as like a best friend. Like, oh, did you guys just see? I saw a tweet that was like, siblings are awesome.

Speaker 2 It's like best friends, you can be evil to.

Speaker 2 I love being mean to my best friends. You two are very similar, too.
As you've gotten older, you've almost gotten like more similar,

Speaker 2 same everything,

Speaker 2 same references. Sometimes they'll just have you having a conversation.
And I'm up to date on what's happening in the world too, but

Speaker 2 they'll be riffing off each other and just saying ping-ponging.

Speaker 2 We do, we are close in that way, but it is funny because we, as close as we are, and as much on the references as you are up, you are also an old lady in many ways.

Speaker 2 Like, it's crazy that you have the most prolific social media presence when you are also the like least technologically

Speaker 2 sound, wouldn't you say?

Speaker 2 Yeah, I'd agree. Sometimes you do something online, I'm like, Lona knows how to do that.

Speaker 2 Same, it surprises us every time. And then, otherwise, she's like, I don't really know what like a cloud is.
Like, what's going on with that? What is what's that? What's going on? Yeah.

Speaker 2 yeah but that has been really cool that we have grown so close over the years um but i think that did start younger when we were growing up one thing that our families family always put in for us was every single night we had to sit down at the table and have family dinner it didn't matter if our mom worked 12 hours if our dad came from home from a shift he was he was cooking chicken to the point where i was like can you just order a box of pizza and please make it on the tv and like a like a normal

Speaker 2 family show?

Speaker 2 Please.

Speaker 2 But I think now being an adult, looking back on that, how much of a foundation that built for us as a family and as people to have that amount of face-to-face time just with one another, with our parents, to tell them about our days and have people that cared and knew what happened the day before and what was coming, I think is just, it formed us into the people that we are.

Speaker 2 And it's like an hour each night to like. connect and bond, you know, and I'm so glad we had that.
And I think, you know, that also attributes to like how close we are now. Yeah.
Big, big family.

Speaker 2 Family dinners every night. Sit down at the table.
And even if you're not making your own food, like we'll do it where we get takeout and we sit around the table. Yeah.
And that's also turned.

Speaker 2 Like my ideal form of fun as an adult is a dinner party. Controlled environment, sitting down with friends.
There's wine. There's food.
We're not out in the world.

Speaker 2 I love going out in the world, but like. I just love doing that and having a conversation around a table.

Speaker 2 I will say, and even when I go on like dates with people, it's like, how well can you hold the conversation? Because have you been on dates with men recently? No.

Speaker 2 they're not asking questions really it's very one-sided so like to me at our hit table it was like I'll ask question you ask question like that's how I was raised and I'm always interested but sometimes it feels like I'm just interviewing interviewing men for a job or something and then are they like I had a great time and it's like yeah no duh can we do this again you talked about you the whole time but that's something that we've grown up we value so much and I think seeing our parents relationship and that they communicate and they have fun together too like you know at their age I think that's important when you go on dates and they're not asking you questions back.

Speaker 2 Yeah. Dad does talk a lot, but he's because he knows.
Oh, that guy does talk. He does.
Yeah. But he knows a lot.
He knows a lot. He's truly one of the smartest people I know.

Speaker 2 Sometimes you just have to supply him with the questions you want to know. I love it.
I'll call him up. I'll ask him.
And then I'm like, okay, my turn. Yeah.

Speaker 2 No, I'll see something going on in the world or I'll hear some kind of historical thing. I'll be like, God, I got to ask dad about that.
He's going to love talking about it.

Speaker 2 He's going to love talking about it. He's going to love it.
He's going to love it. But yeah, no, we were very close.
We had very cool kind of birthday parties.

Speaker 2 We loved our mom loved a theme birthday, but not a theme like you would expect. No.
Right? No. Like I had one of my favorites growing up was this fairy themed party.

Speaker 2 I had it too. You had it and you had it, but in a separate location many years later, and she, once again, she'd honed her craft, but she went in.
Yeah.

Speaker 2 And like, I'm pretty sure, obviously, like, not, maybe not the best thing for the earth, love the earth and everything, but we was like this nature walk that she brought my whole party through, but she had gone through beforehand and dropped marbles and sparkly things and little gems.

Speaker 2 And like, there were things along the way. There was like a pin the braid or pin the crown on a on a princess, like that she had nailed to a tree in the middle of the walk.

Speaker 2 That nail is there to this day. Yeah, yeah.
I went on that a few years ago.

Speaker 2 Mom found the nail. Yeah, yeah.
I walk by it every time. I go, there's the nail from my like, what, sixth birthday party? Yeah.
Gordon. And then there was like a hidden treasure chest underneath that.

Speaker 2 Like we were following a map to this treasure chest that was buried under the slide at the playground. Like

Speaker 2 incredibly just like intricate, magical stuff that like made our childhood magical in that way. She did that for you, right? Well, legend has it there is so glitter at Ethan Allen Holmes

Speaker 2 from those legendary parties. Absolutely.
I had a fairy birthday party. I had a mermaid birthday party.
Oh, you do. Remember that with the big mermaid sign?

Speaker 2 With the cutout, like the

Speaker 2 cut-out one, that was oh my god. That just like brought something out of it.
I love to find it. My most favorite, though, is fun thing about me.
I love a grocery store. You know that.

Speaker 2 I love roaming the halls of a grocery store. Especially in a foreign country.
Especially in a foreign country.

Speaker 2 I love an expensive grocery store so I can, you know, judge the prices and whatnot, see how fresh it is. A general store.
A general store. Oh,

Speaker 2 don't I love it?

Speaker 2 What? I don't even eat tin fish, but I got to go look at the tin fish. Oh, the beautiful packaging.
This cheese was made right down the road from the Cal Bessie. All the hens are named.

Speaker 2 Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Anywho, okay, so my birthday party, our local shopping market at in Vermont was called the Hannafords.
Shout out New England. Shout out to Hannaford's, New England.

Speaker 2 New England.

Speaker 2 My mom went, I don't know why she thought of this idea. I had a birthday party at the supermarket.
Me and a bunch of my little friends went to the deli counter. We went into the bakery.

Speaker 2 I think I was employee of the month. I think I got assigned being employee of the month.
You were a little name tags. I got hand name tags.
We were walking through Hannah Ford's. Yeah, I remember.

Speaker 2 I mean, that was awesome. What about the freezer? I wonder what happened when she was like, hey, I got a great idea for my kids' birthday party.
Who'd she know at Hannah Ford's? Make that happen.

Speaker 2 Who did she have to talk to? I've been, she probably knows some people. She's been wheeling it.

Speaker 2 she's been in that town hasn't been in that town crap she'd be talking to the butchers yeah and let people slicing the ham she loves to chat them up it does that's like and like who thinks of that but she knew that you loved a grocery store so she was like let's make that even as a young kid what a weirdo yeah i just loved a grocery store i didn't even have money no yeah what was i buying there right right right you just liked it you're there for the free cookies but dad does too dad loves just to wander around a grocery store he'll just like go and i think also me to this day i don't buy lots of things at once to like stock up i very fortunate to live close to some grocery stores that I just like, oh, I feel like this today, so I'll go gather those little supplies.

Speaker 2 So I'm always just like gathering little by little, and that's what dad does as well. He goes and like buys a loaf of bread.
He's like, Oh, I'll go back to the store. He loves that.

Speaker 2 Being an adult is just

Speaker 2 when is the next time you're gonna go to the grocery store. I don't mind that.
It's just planning, planning when are you gonna head to the grocery store again?

Speaker 2 I go probably three times a day, and you, you gotta, you gotta put a backpack on to get to New York City.

Speaker 2 There's a hill when you come up to my apartment, and by the end of it, my shoulders are aching, right? But I still go. I've got friends who get like groceries delivered.

Speaker 2 And I don't want to do that. I want to see what's there.
No thrill. No through at all.
Let me walk the halls

Speaker 2 and the aisles and see what calls to me. 100%.
Do I spend way too much money by doing that? Yes. If it's on sale and it's a little something I've never tried before, I'm getting it.

Speaker 2 I'm getting it. I'm spending $40 and just weird stuff.
Let's explain our mom a little bit. Yes.

Speaker 2 She is

Speaker 2 the best cook in the world. Oh, my God.

Speaker 2 I'll put money on it. Yeah.
I say that's how we got to be the size we are. That and pints of milk at dinner.
Everything. Every night at the moment.
Every night, like two miles. Glasses of milk.

Speaker 2 Glasses of milk. Chug, chug, chug.
Everyone's like, ew, milk. I'm like, okay, well, I'm from Vermont.
What do you want me to do? Water? Big time.

Speaker 2 Yep. That is water.
Amazing cook. She can, like, you can say, hey, mom, I want like a

Speaker 2 chicken curry.

Speaker 2 with a little bit of this and that and she like just can create it she'll literally commune with the universe and be like got it and then she makes the most amazing amazing baking from scratch too like she's not buying anything she's like putting the ingredients together like if it starts with flour it's starting with flour

Speaker 2 she doesn't grow it herself she's a homemaker she loves bringing people in cooking for people olivia's really gotten that now she loves to cook for people loves to make people feel comfortable and uh my mom cooks with butter milk or whenever you come back for like in between training and you're wanting to get greens and she's like well i'll make you brussels sprouts and there i watch her make it i'm like there's a lot of butter in that.

Speaker 2 I don't know if she's a little bit

Speaker 2 of Alona.

Speaker 2 She wants to grease. No, she, she cooks with like love and full fat.
You know, it's absolutely amazing. She is our biggest supporter.

Speaker 2 Whenever people ask her a question about me, they're like, tell us a little bit about Alona. She's like, you know what? I actually have two.
I have three daughters and all of them are so amazing.

Speaker 2 Oh, my God. She just won bronze.
Like, tell us about Alona. She's like, well, she is great.
But Adriana, she

Speaker 2 has a windowless room in New York City that she is so proud of. And Olivia, she's on the internet, right? Like, she's so, and then she'll get to you.

Speaker 2 She's like, she needs the world to know there's three, she has three amazing babies. To the point where you've had to be, oh, like, we've had to, you can talk about Alona.
It's fine.

Speaker 2 Please, we're like, mom, don't mention us. Please, it's about Alona.
Like, if she's winning, we're all winning. So talk about Alona, please.

Speaker 2 Unless we're at a rugby tournament and, like, we're at a restaurant about to go in and she's, season opening with the waiter. And she's like, we're actually here for, yeah, the rugby.
My, my daughter.

Speaker 2 plays

Speaker 2 her. Yes, so you can find her online.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then she gives him a sticker.
I'm like, mom, that guy doesn't know who I am.

Speaker 2 She's going to throw that sticker out.

Speaker 2 She has my stickers. She'll give them out to anybody who recognizes me.
So I'm there taking a picture. And then I walk away.
And it turns out she's back behind me like, hey, sticker.

Speaker 2 I have to order them like special for her. I send them to the house.
I mean, my favorite fact about our mom, though, is we grew up, nobody believes us, quite socially awkward, except for her.

Speaker 2 She was quite cool. I mean,

Speaker 2 well,

Speaker 2 no,

Speaker 2 you were better than us. You got better than us for sure.

Speaker 2 You make friends.

Speaker 2 You make friends usually than we do. Yeah.
I know that's true. So we went to a very tiny Catholic school in Vermont from Alona and I preschool to eighth grade.

Speaker 2 So a large chunk of our, you know, young lives, right? And growing up. And the school, the people we went to school with stayed the same, but like did get smaller and smaller as we went.

Speaker 2 So I graduated one of six people. How many did you have? Nine.
One of nine people. I graduated one of six with one boy in my class in eighth grade.
Hate to beat you. One of five.
Wow.

Speaker 2 In one year, it was four because someone went to a different school. That's

Speaker 2 easy. But then the school like closed due to under attendance.
Crazy. What? I don't understand that.
That's crazy. But it was so like these people were like our siblings growing up.

Speaker 2 Like I had my sisters and we, they were in the other classrooms, but then the small core of people, like those were our siblings growing up. So we only socialized with them.

Speaker 2 We didn't really socialize outside. Yeah.

Speaker 2 So when we did end up going to the public high school it shook us to our core shook us to our core to our core i mean except for her so she got to go to public middle school though yes and i'm so glad yeah for that it was

Speaker 2 it was a war i i think i may have lost i lost so many battles

Speaker 2 yeah maybe the war itself but i came out and actually I am still friends with most of my

Speaker 2 friends to this day from middle school. And it was just like, I was so confident and ready in sixth grade.
I was like, I'm going to make friends.

Speaker 2 I had my sights set high for the popular girls, which is why middle school was then so difficult.

Speaker 2 I think it would have been difficult no matter what, because middle school girls are brutal, especially in public school. I don't know what your experience was.

Speaker 2 Oh, no, yeah, yeah, but it was tough, but it made me stronger. And then, going into high school, I had established friendships,

Speaker 2 and

Speaker 2 high school's kind of just fine. Not us, not us.
No, Ajana was actually cool. I still remember the first time I talked to a boy in high school vividly.
Shout out Alex

Speaker 2 walking in the hallway next to him. I was so tense, so nervous.
I was like, this is happening.

Speaker 2 Really cool. And it was just a normal encounter.
It was a normal encounter. We were just going from class to class, but I only had three boys in my class, and they were like my brothers.

Speaker 2 Like the thought of any, like when I went to public middle school for sports, they were like, oh, and then I kissed this boy. I was like, y'all are kissing boys.
That's not me.

Speaker 2 You guys are layering Lacy tank tops and kissing boys. That's crazy.
And there's push-up bras involved. Whoa, not me.
This is the other side. I got another side.
I got a jump layering. For real.

Speaker 2 Yeah, we got to put our, we got to put our little uniforms on.

Speaker 2 Get back to our six people in the classroom. Get back.
And go to church once a week. Yeah.
That's twice a week when they made us do it on the weekdays, too. Oh, yeah.
That was crazy. That was so fun.

Speaker 2 Good lord.

Speaker 2 Amen.

Speaker 2 And we went to Catholic school. Fun fact, back to our mom.
She was a sex educator at Catholic school. Yep.
Yep. Very fun fact.
I actually didn't mind it. She was a school nurse.

Speaker 2 So she was a school nurse. So she didn't, she just came in to teach sex.
Absolutely.

Speaker 2 Some random

Speaker 2 stuff. She was like, I'll do it.
Oh, she's doing it. I'll know what I'm doing.
I'll talk about it.

Speaker 2 But she was, there were like, because it was a Catholic school, there was restrictions on what she could talk about. But she did a good job with it anyway.

Speaker 2 There was a bit of a shock and awe factor about it. Absolutely.
Didn't a girl faint in your class? Well, she, a couple girls feigned it. Yeah, no, sorry.
One, just one girl fainted.

Speaker 2 Still friends with her to this day.

Speaker 2 And then my mom would walk in and just yell, penis. Yeah.
Cold costume quiet down. These Catholic school kids, like, what is she about to talk about? Yeah.
And I thought she was cool.

Speaker 2 I feel like I don't remember ever being embarrassed by her doing that. No.
I was like, that's my mom. I remember feeling that I should, but then I didn't.

Speaker 2 And she'd already given us like the sex talk outside. And I remember like, because she could only say certain things in this, because it was, you know, abstinence, like that's what the teaching was.

Speaker 2 Whereas I'm like, that's not the tune you were singing. Like, you're doing you're singing safe sex and birth control.
And I don't think you're ready now.

Speaker 2 But when you you are like come to me and let's do it the right way yeah and i think because of that i never felt that pressure to be like when we did get to high school and it seemed like everyone was having sex like we i was a virgin we were you know what i mean like we didn't do that for a while but because i had my mom who instead of going don't do it and us being like well what is it why it was kind of like cool i hear it less cool made it less cool like how kind of which maybe she tried it maybe that was i think that's reverse psychology she said that on us

Speaker 2 but i also don't know if i had the opportunity to do it. Yeah.

Speaker 2 You probably did.

Speaker 2 Miss Hottie over here.

Speaker 2 My favorite story. Everyone in high school, oh my gosh, you and Olivia are twins.
You guys look so much alike. Tell me why I'm not getting any attention.

Speaker 2 Tell me why all the boys are barking up Olivia Street and I got nothing. Stop telling me that then.
We're not twins. There's something wrong here.
Something. I don't know.

Speaker 2 Sometimes it's a little different. Yeah.
A little different. You're doing the math.
You're doing something. Yeah, I was doing the math and I was like,

Speaker 2 nobody's talking to me. Right.
Well, we were also, we saw her grow up first and we're like, get boobs. Right.
Boobs are cutting.

Speaker 2 I've been slow to say it, but it's because of her gorgeous boobs. Thank you so much.
Thank you so much. Yes.
And I was waiting for that day. I was like, it's in my genes.
It's going to happen to me.

Speaker 2 Oh, yeah. It's going to come.
And you got some. Me on that hand.

Speaker 2 You got luscious, gorgeous hair. Okay.
Oh, yeah.

Speaker 2 Yeah.

Speaker 2 No, it's your brain, Alona. Yeah, right.
It's my brain.

Speaker 2 Olivia and I would make fun of each other because I got like boobs first and I was like, sucker.

Speaker 2 Look at you over there, flat chest, loser. As soon as mine came, they stopped.
Hers, boom. I said, kept growing.
She's like, hold my, hold my, hold my mouth.

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Speaker 2 You know what? Let's give a little sex ed class now to our viewers that mom used to give us. I have some really good ones.
I think some special ones that you guys didn't get from her.

Speaker 2 She loved an analogy. I think she was workshopping for your guys' talks, and when she got to me, she figured it out.
She had two to this day. She doesn't remember them.

Speaker 2 She's like, I don't want to say that. I'm like, yes, you did.
This is a vivid memory. We were in the car to swim class.
You said, having your period, it's like making an apple pie.

Speaker 2 You know, you start by making the dough and you put that on the bottom. Layer it up the walls.
Uter and lining.

Speaker 2 And then you add in the filling and you put it in the oven. And I think that's kind of where I got lost too.
Because this one is just kind of, it was supposed to be about how a period happens.

Speaker 2 So then I guess. It goes away by taking away slices.
Right. But the better one, in my opinion.
And then you make another pie. Yeah, then you make another pie.

Speaker 2 Each month you're making a pie.

Speaker 2 And the pie is your uterine lining. Wow.
Shedding. And did you understand it? Or were you like every month like, God, womanhood is exhausting.
I have to make a pie every month.

Speaker 2 Only a woman is to perform. To be able to make pen.
Do you have to be a good baker?

Speaker 2 What feeling are we talking about, mom?

Speaker 2 Why does it have to be apple? What is this? Yeah. Should it be cherry?

Speaker 2 What about rhubarb? We have rhubarb in there. Something red.
I don't know. But my favorite was

Speaker 2 her hotel room because obviously our Oma and Opa had a motel growing up, so she worked and she would help make rooms and stuff.

Speaker 2 And so she told me a period is like I don't know why I needed two analogies.

Speaker 2 Um, a period is like um a motel room, you know, you're expecting visitors, and so you are changing the sheets, you are fluffing the pillows, you are getting the room ready, but the uh, the visitor doesn't come, so well,

Speaker 2 um,

Speaker 2 But the sheets are now old. They need to be refreshed.
This is a nice motel.

Speaker 2 Oh, right.

Speaker 2 So you have to take away all the sheets and you have to wash them and get them out of the room, which is the period happening. Wow.
My hotel is like one of those cool new

Speaker 2 hotels that are like made to look old. Absolutely.
We're talking about like artsy.

Speaker 2 Actually, there's a garden.

Speaker 2 What are those called? Boutique hotels. Boutique.
My hotel is like a boutique hotel. Right.
Your uterus. My uterus.
My boutique

Speaker 2 Anything else you want to add about this? Are you having visitors?

Speaker 2 No, I keep it ready for visitors for

Speaker 2 changing the sheets. Yeah, I've changed the sheets.
Yeah, fluffing the pillows. Fuffing the pillows on there.
Right, right. It's like, yeah, it's like luxury.
It's a luxury. It's a luxury experience.

Speaker 2 Absolutely. Yours, a rundown

Speaker 2 CD motel. That's that's

Speaker 2 a motel six? A motel six.

Speaker 2 She's prepping a motel six. I'm prepping a motel six.
It's smoking a cigarette.

Speaker 2 There's water stains. There's

Speaker 2 black mold on the tiles.

Speaker 2 Just to be clear, Olivia is perfect. Just to be clear.

Speaker 2 Well,

Speaker 2 somebody watches this. Hey, I saw you describing your

Speaker 2 vagina. I'm so excited about this date, but

Speaker 2 could you let me know if anything's happening? There's like a Google Maps link I can see?

Speaker 2 Like, where this mortal six is. I don't know.
No, it's actually

Speaker 2 beautiful.

Speaker 2 It's really beautiful. What the hell?

Speaker 2 No, yours is good. It's fine.
So funny.

Speaker 2 We have analogies, though. She's like, I'm proud of you.

Speaker 2 We did. That was a period analogy.
Yeah. Annie's like, water your garden to bloom.
No, I think she knew that that needed to be really clear. Oh.
Don't mess around.

Speaker 2 I do remember the first time. Again, this was the same car right to swim practice.
And she was

Speaker 2 busy. And she was telling me, she was like, so you know, a penis can actually fit into a vagina.
And I remember that age. I was like, and like, why would it do that? I was like, cool, fun fact.
Why?

Speaker 2 I didn't understand what she was saying. I was like, just a unique coincidence.
Like, what's going on? Why are you telling me?

Speaker 2 Did she open the conversation with that? I think

Speaker 2 maybe.

Speaker 2 Because it was silence in the car.

Speaker 2 She's like, did you know?

Speaker 2 And I was like, I'm in my swimsuit ready to go.

Speaker 2 I'm just trying to swim some lap forward.

Speaker 2 Can we talk about this another time? Yeah. You said we can go to the dining hall at the Cool College afterwards.

Speaker 2 You can make your own creamy soft serve. Creamy.
We're from Vermont. It's called a creamy.
It's not soft serve. We, I don't remember if we got any analogies, but we loved those American girl books.

Speaker 2 The care and keeping of the book. The care and keeping of the...
They've changed that. I actually loved reading those.
I loved those books. I'd sit there and just read.

Speaker 2 I'm like, we shared the same one. Went down through hands.

Speaker 2 And it's still in my room to this day. My daughter is getting that book because they've changed it.

Speaker 2 I think they took out like the peer or the tampon insertion. I was just thinking about that part.

Speaker 2 But I can't, like, how many girls did that book help? Like, I can only imagine. You know what I mean? Who didn't have a mom that was like as helpful as ours or, you know, as informational?

Speaker 2 Like, that must be so, like, like, how to check your, like, breasts for, for cancer, for things that I, like, stuck with me to this day that I'm like, oh, yeah, I should check my breasts because the Care and Keeping of You, American Girl doll book, told me, the illustrated guide taught me how to do it.

Speaker 2 I do remember looking at the, maybe I manifested

Speaker 2 my, my, my rack because there was,

Speaker 2 there was like images in it. We gotta, we gotta pull this.

Speaker 2 We need the care and keeping of you available right here where it was the bra fitting, but it was also like that breasts come in all shapes and sizes.

Speaker 2 And like, it was like girl, different girls looking in the mirror. And I've been like, I want that one as if it was a toy catalog.
I think Christmas, too. yeah didn't manage it

Speaker 2 you didn't do it as hard as i did yeah i guess not yeah

Speaker 2 circling it

Speaker 2 stars gold stars

Speaker 2 this would be great but we've always been open about talking about that talking about our love lives with each other and how that all works even with our mom i think she's gotten to a place where She always wanted to be a place for us to share things like that without judgment so that we would come to her.

Speaker 2 So I think even in those talks with us, she made it so that it was like this is something you're gonna do it's okay to do by doing that we were more open to sharing with her knowing she's not gonna judge us like that was really important for us and even to this day i mean i call her she probably regrets that now the thing she tells her i call her i'm like mom you're never gonna get you're never gonna believe you're never gonna believe what happened she's probably like i tell the story i i called mom the day after i lost my virginity heterosexual debut sorry my sexual debut didn't lose anything i ate for stuff wrong you up with the girls oh yeah

Speaker 2 I was in a parking lot too. And then,

Speaker 2 I remember it vividly. And then mom was at, we had family over.
I was like, mom, I got to talk to you. She's like, all right, I'll go upstairs.
She goes upstairs to the bathroom.

Speaker 2 And I'm like, mom, I lost my virginity. And she was like,

Speaker 2 okay.

Speaker 2 Oh,

Speaker 2 wow.

Speaker 2 And

Speaker 2 you, she's an adult woman. Yeah, this was in my 20s.

Speaker 2 And I was like, so you're probably going to need to schedule a diner for me right now. I imagine I'll be pretty busy from now on.
Yes.

Speaker 2 Hotel is open. Hotel is open.
I'm changing the sheets. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Constantly. You know, like, I just think that's probably the way it is.
So we'll get that in, get some stuff, you know.

Speaker 2 I'm going to be busy. So she accepted the news, was like,

Speaker 2 okay.

Speaker 2 You know, be safe and blah, blah, blah, blah. And I will get that scheduled for you.
I guess, I don't know, she goes back down to sit at the table with like the family friends there. And she's silent.

Speaker 2 She's silent. silent like, just like catatonic.
She's like catatonic. Doesn't sleep a wink that night.
Whereas I'm like, that's it.

Speaker 2 Look at worlds. Legs first.
Woman's here.

Speaker 2 Legs first.

Speaker 2 I am here.

Speaker 2 But yeah, she's always been that. We can all talk to her about pretty much anything to the point where I'm like, I probably shouldn't have shared that, but

Speaker 2 that's good. I would continue to.
But then she did. She stepped up and helped and she got the appointment.
I remember. About the gyno.
About the gyno. Got the birth control.

Speaker 2 yeah yeah that's her yeah it's special to have that sort of relationship with your mom but i think yeah she was very comfortable talking to us about it and she was also i mean people your whole thing is body positivity body appreciation and living in the body that you're in and you're always you know pushing that messaging which is so important but it's like we also did we were raised with a naked mom um she was naked around us like right like she would get changed in front of us we would see what a woman's body looks like in all of its forms and you know having being pregnant and then giving birth and moles and and stretch marks and to us that was so beautiful and we got to experience like what a woman's body is and now being in a woman's body i love and appreciate it because i saw it in all of its forms whereas i have friends who you can sometimes just tell they weren't raised with a naked mom they are not comfortable in their skin they're not comfortable with other women in that way um at all but i so i think we're very lucky to have been raised with a mom who even if maybe she wasn't feeling as like you can't be body positive all the time but she didn't ever put that on us and she still like just was she just existed and she never

Speaker 2 never talked about our bodies in any type of way she never talked her about her body in any type of way when we were growing up and i think that sticks with you absolutely all of our features were made to feel the most beautiful yeah our height our shoulders our athleticism was always um spotlighted as this amazing trait that we have

Speaker 2 um and i remember you know obviously i have fairer skin and freckles and will you have have freckles too, but mom and dad would always be like, and those are so beautiful. You really shine.

Speaker 2 And I always felt so beautiful. And I'm so glad I had that basis because I know other people who have freckles that constantly cover them with a foundation.
For me, that is a wild sentiment.

Speaker 2 I'm like, why are you covering them up? That's your face. It's beautiful.
So they really made me appreciate who I was at a young age.

Speaker 2 I saw this thing online where it's like start to compliment girls more about like their smarts and whatnot instead of how they look. I thought that was interesting.
I think there's a balance there.

Speaker 2 Like, Like, because I see so many girls, and I also like, oh, you're so pretty and whatnot.

Speaker 2 But I started to say, like, oh, you look so strong, or you look so, you know, you look so smart or something like that.

Speaker 2 So I've seen that, that that's like kind of a change that can be done because we focus so much on beauty at times, that there's so much more to a person. It's so simple.
Yeah, simple.

Speaker 2 I think mom did a good job. It was like, well, your shoulders are doing so well.
Like, you get to, you're doing amazing in sports because of these big shoulders. Or, oh, you're so smart.

Speaker 2 You should do this. So I think there's like a balance.
And I'm learning every day too, how to like handle, you know, young fans, how to talk to myself, and whatnot.

Speaker 2 I think you do a great job with your young fans. Thank you.
You love it, you love seeking them out. Like, no matter how tired you are, you're there.

Speaker 2 You're like crouching down with them, like telling them how cool they look and like how strong they look and what they can do, asking if they play sports. Like, that's got to be so.

Speaker 2 But I think that's how mom would have acted. Yeah, you know, that's how mom, if she was like that, she would have said all those things as well.
So, for all our listeners, you are strong,

Speaker 2 you are smart, and you are important. You are important.

Speaker 2 I don't know if you wouldn't use that. We just came up with that, actually.
Yeah,

Speaker 2 that's a house of more original.

Speaker 2 And her thing for us the past couple of years, which I love and it connects all of us, is we are adult women. And I think she started to be like, where, what do I get them for Christmas?

Speaker 2 What do I get? You know, I got pots and pants from Costco at 22 years old. I was like, well, that's...
That's our wrap-on from fun birthdays, huh? Okay. So this is adulthood from here on out.

Speaker 2 Great pots and pants. I have them to this day.
I was like, you'd actually be really excited to get that, wouldn't you?

Speaker 2 But I was like in college so i was like okay um

Speaker 2 but now she gives us sister jewelry uh every christmas it's a new thing she started with um these initial necklaces because you you actually started it you bought us those little initial necklaces at some like gift store in like australia or somewhere on tour but they got green really they got they were like not good metal but we still we loved them you started something um you started something remember you got those those little like tiny i still have it i don't it sounds i think i it's coming back what the hell man it's coming back but you started and mom saw those and she's like i'll get them like real ones that they can have for life because like actual pieces of jewelry is something that we can carry with us for the rest of our lives and we'll use and not just be like oh whatever it's just another you know gift so she got us those in real gold and then every christmas from there she makes us a piece of sister jewelry um and so we each like we're kind of we're blinged out currently like this is all the the necklaces you see us wearing are what she had made for us and they're each in our own medals like I don't know what's your medal?

Speaker 2 I'm a yellow gold because I was wearing a lot of yellow gold, a lot of gold. Um, I am nervous of like, what if I don't think I look good in gold one day? And no, this is my assigned medal for me.

Speaker 2 I think you're good, you're good with your coloring, it'll be like one of those color matches, and they say

Speaker 2 never wear gold again. And you look like a spring, yeah.
Why are you wearing gold? You're a spring, you're a spring, throw it out, throw out all your gold, turquoise only.

Speaker 2 And so, then you're mine, mine is white gold because I wore a lot of silver jewelry anyway, and yours is titanium gold. Yeah.
Something like that.

Speaker 2 Because Alona would wear this one titanium ring that our mom got for her 30th nursing

Speaker 2 anniversary, basically. So now she makes all of our jewelry in those color schemes.
But we're kind of being like, hey, we're kind of running out of jewelry space here.

Speaker 2 Like we, what are we going to go on to like brooches?

Speaker 2 I got almost every finger with a

Speaker 2 lot of Olympic rings and she has national championship rings. So she's, her hands are quite heavy.

Speaker 2 Pimping. wade um

Speaker 2 but we our latest our latest one was is this one here and it says uh coffee tea wine which is the flow and we're home in vermont we start the day with coffee and we go into tea later in the afternoon and then wine as we wind down our day um that's just how we like to live our lives and i think we're also gonna do this show in much the same way start with a jolt of energy but a bit of caffeine the coffee to start uh we'll have a bit of tea time later on and then we'll wind things down which I just think is

Speaker 2 the perfect way to welcome people into our house because that's how we do things. The House of Mar.
The House of Marr. As you all know, we are very online.

Speaker 2 So I thought we'd kick things off with us out in the wild, touching grass, being real. What's been going on? Not touching grass, but touching the coldest water possible.

Speaker 2 You guys made me do a cold plunge. Right.
Which I thought I'd done them before.

Speaker 2 No, not that cold. That's why I kept asking.
And I felt like I was being annoying because I was like, but has she?

Speaker 2 Because I feel like there would be a stronger reaction to her answers so i was so confident going in and i was like cold punch done that you did so good well the first one i did decent and then i kept getting worse i just which is interesting because usually you get better yeah yeah yeah

Speaker 2 my calves were freezing off it started to get painful yeah um but i'm proud of myself i mean it's kind of cool because you actually did it the hardest way you got in and then you tried to get out which was like and then you got yourself under the water which is incredible i was like the fight or flight you could see it happening on your face and you you pushed through it was great it was the pressure um of you guys in the pool i was like they're in it i gotta do it i gotta do it i can't back out that's embarrassing it was tough it was cold

Speaker 2 and i can't imagine how often you do that i don't ice bath as much as i as people would think for athletes just because i find it uncomfortable but i have gotten into saunaing i mean peace sauna seems to be the thing everybody's doing so i do sauna get them out so we we went to this place here in Bristol called Civa Wellness, and it's like a wood fire sauna.

Speaker 2 You throw wood in there and you're sitting there. It's like

Speaker 2 out in nature. The birds are chirping on me.
You're there.

Speaker 2 The sun is out.

Speaker 2 Like, talk about touching grass. Yeah.
I do love the sauna too because it's like you can't take your phone in there. You just have to kind of be present.

Speaker 2 And then the cold tub.

Speaker 2 I was impressed by both of you. I think

Speaker 2 I don't really like to do it. I started to get into it because I did it more during Dance with the Stars, but we just got to be there together and recover.
Yeah. From what? For us.
For you guys.

Speaker 2 I don't know. My plan, right? The long life, dude.
The long winter here. Yeah.
No, I loved it, though. I've gotten more and more into it, and I do sleep like a baby afterwards.
I don't know if that's.

Speaker 2 We all took a nap. I took a nap immediately afterwards.
Passed out on the couch. She was snoring on the couch.
You may have paused in the nose. Like, dung.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. But it was fun to do it.

Speaker 2 And it was interesting because I just, I had, for some reason, I had a feeling you hadn't actually really done like a cold plunge, cold plunge So I was excited to get it on camera and that was it was just a good time good thing to do all together Good thing to do also very brave of me you recorded it posted it and now it's got a like two million views

Speaker 2 I wonder if it's because you could kind of see the bottom of my feet I blurred it out. She blurted out.
Okay. I was working on it because I saw the views on that and I was like, what the heck? I know.

Speaker 2 These foot freaks. Foot feet freaks for real.
She blurred it out, but I do feel like somebody's puzzling that together. Because the thing is, I waited.

Speaker 2 I was like, either I blur out the dogs or I keep them in and like if you don't people will be like oh free feet oh

Speaker 2 that's on wiki feet and that's on wiki feet and you but instead i blurred them so everyone was like oh the blurred feet so it's like six and a half dozen of another i mean i think it helped actually

Speaker 2 like people commenting on that yeah like checking out our engagement whereas i wanted people to focus on how funny her faces were that entire time but oh that was an almost an out-of-body experience oh and then because we do it again like you do the contrast therapy and she was like i don't know if i need to do it again We're like, you're doing it again.

Speaker 2 Because, like, you first go into the sauna for like 10 minutes, and I'm having a great time. I'm with my sisters and chatting.
And then, oh, cold plunge.

Speaker 2 And then as I'm in that cold plunge, I'm only in there for a minute. I'm like, how many more times do I have to do this today? So when he got back to the sauna, I was now dreading it.

Speaker 2 I was like, I've got 10 minutes of peace. Then I have to do that again.

Speaker 2 Almost ruined it, but it didn't.

Speaker 2 Okay, I'll be real with you. My Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra is basically my true AI companion at this this point.

Speaker 2 It's packed with AI features, which means it doesn't just help me, it actually thinks ahead for me. And honestly, I'm never going back.
You know what I don't have time for? Doing everything myself.

Speaker 2 Texting, searching, scheduling, it's too much. But you know what's not too much? AI on my S25 Ultra because it literally does things for me.
Let's say I want to grab dinner after practice.

Speaker 2 I don't need to stop what I'm doing. I just say, find an Italian restaurant nearby and text it to my friends.
Boom, done. Like I have a true AI companion.

Speaker 2 My sisters and I recently went to an Italian restaurant recommended by my Galaxy S25 Ultra, and it was legitimately delicious. It's like having a superpower, but without the secret identity struggles.

Speaker 2 Meanwhile, I get to live my life undistracted. Less time with my face and my phone, aka no tech neck.

Speaker 2 And honestly, I feel like a boss, which technically, I'm not, but thanks to Galaxy S25 Ultra, I kind of live like one.

Speaker 2 So, yeah, the S25 Ultra isn't just a phone, it's an AI-powered life upgrade, and I'm here for it. Disclaimers, compatible with select apps, requires Google Gemini account.

Speaker 2 Results may vary based on input, check responses for accuracy. Google and Gemini are trademarks of Google LLC.
Something else we've done out in the wild recently was Magic Mic XXL Live.

Speaker 2 I've been watching this for a while. I've seen the videos constantly.

Speaker 2 So I saw one video recently and I commented, I would like to go to there.

Speaker 2 So then they followed me, I followed them, and we started chatting. We were in London a couple weekends ago and we decided to go, brought myself, my agent, Olivia,

Speaker 2 and then one teammate, her girlfriend, and then another rugby player. And it was a magical experience.

Speaker 2 This show, Magic Mike, and they're doing it. This show was designed for women.

Speaker 2 You get a little nervous when you first get there. You think it's going to be like a show, a classic

Speaker 2 misogynistic. They give you the old bait and switch.
Old bait and switch. They do.
And it was scary at first.

Speaker 2 We don't want to obviously give away the show because you should see it. And it was really fun.
But I also do now need to go see every show around the world. I want to collect them, like Pokemon.

Speaker 2 And they start, they opened in such a way where Alona was like, I messed up. Like, I, what did I do? Oh my gosh, I dragged some friends here.
This is so embarrassing. Like, what the hell?

Speaker 2 But thankfully, like, we were like, what the hell? Like, we need to get out of here. But we switched it.

Speaker 2 They switched it. Sorry.
I fell in love. Yeah.

Speaker 2 Did you find love too?

Speaker 2 I found love. I don't think he found love in me.
I would per se. Yeah.
Like, I was like, oh my God, he looked at me.

Speaker 2 And then I'm like, he just looked at her her too what the hell Rick but it was it was like there's dancing there's so much going on the music so fun I got danced on at one point and all I was just like thank you so much thank you so much and then he would like take my hands and place them on him and I was like yep and she was like when he first got there she was like it's happening to me it was awesome so exciting it's so different than like I think maybe other ship goes where men would just be kind of like trying to touch the woman and they like they were like literally I was like sorry you better be respectful of your space here man can you do your thing

Speaker 2 and then he's like

Speaker 2 okay is this okay is this is a safe zone to touch

Speaker 2 it was awesome you're like we up all of a time too

Speaker 2 they make the show so fun it's for women to enjoy there's like a slow dance portion and a guy sings and plays piano

Speaker 2 yeah he was singing there's acrobatics it's it's really something they're jumping on the banisters yeah i gotta get bougie i know you wanted to be one of the people that got to go like on stage i wanted to be one of the people on the stage but then i realized they then have have to like, they pick the girls up.

Speaker 2 They pick the girls up and like around their waists. I'm like, not that we aren't petite.
Not that I'm not, you know,

Speaker 2 unable to be flung around. Yeah, but the size of these guys

Speaker 2 out of Mike

Speaker 2 Old Mike down there wouldn't be able to lift me up. If anything, you'd fall.
So it was for the best I wasn't down there. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
But it's honestly great to take your girls to. Wow.

Speaker 2 It's a good time. It's a good time.
I think that I'll be going again. You could find me in Vegas.
I got to to go. You'll find us in Vegas on a Magic Microsoft.
We'll take you. You got to see this.

Speaker 2 Please. I think if I went again, I would sit alone.
So they had to dance on me. Ew.

Speaker 2 Because a lot of women will dance between people. And so, like, they didn't come dance on me.
So they're going to dance on the weird

Speaker 2 lonely girl. Who came by herself? Who came by herself? Or me sitting like this?

Speaker 2 That's not mysterious on a Magic Micro. That's weird.

Speaker 2 She's from. Just sit on the end, at least.
It's me and the XXL margarita.

Speaker 2 Come Come here. Come to mama.
Come to mama, big boy. I'm sat like this the whole time.

Speaker 2 I think you just had to sit on the end. Yeah, no, it's true.
And I noticed that because

Speaker 2 I was taking notes the whole time of who was getting danced on, and it was the girls on the end. I was trapped.
She was in the middle, so she would have gotten danced on. Yeah.
You just missed it.

Speaker 2 They definitely wanted to dance on. No, they wanted to.
They wanted to the way they were for sure. The way they were looking at me was like, yo, he sees me.

Speaker 2 And he sees everybody else in the auditorium. Because he was also seeing me.
Right. So, Alana, you have gone from

Speaker 2 the Olympics, winning medals, doing the whole thing, into Dancing with the Stars, into being over here in England. You know, how are you feeling about it all? I'm tired a lot, but I also

Speaker 2 am so excited for everything I'm doing.

Speaker 2 Like, I posted a video where I think Taylor Swift said, I get tired a lot, but I don't get tired of it.

Speaker 2 It's been amazing. I think I was unsure about doing Dance with the Stars because I knew how hard it would be.

Speaker 2 And it was during a time where I was still kind of coming off the Olympics and I was the talk of the town. And I didn't want to, I wanted to use all these opportunities to go here and there.

Speaker 2 And so I was like, oh, if I go to Dancing with the Stars, not that I thought it was like

Speaker 2 an old show, but people were like, oh, it's a show where, you know, if you're at the end of your career, you go on until you can get a burst of fame.

Speaker 2 And so I got nervous about that because that's what people were telling me when I said I was going to Dance with Stars. They're like, oh, are you sure about that?

Speaker 2 And so I got nervous, but you and my age were so, you know, I think this will be the best for you. And it was the best decision for me because what it did was like, I was in the Olympic mind.

Speaker 2 Everyone thought of me as the Olympian.

Speaker 2 But then being on Dancing with the Stars, being on people's TV screens every Tuesday, posting out videos constantly, I was in their minds continuously again for another three months.

Speaker 2 And so I think it just did wonders for my career as well in media and in the U.S. to show who I was.
You showed that you're an entertainer. Like you're an Olympian, but you also are an entertainer.

Speaker 2 That's why you do so well on social, absolutely. And I think like Dancing with the Stars has, it's like anything.
It's ebbed and flowed.

Speaker 2 But I think throughout all all of that, it's always meant something different to Olympians and to the athletes that are on it.

Speaker 2 And I was so excited for you to have that experience and that, you know, in the beginning there, it was like, it's gonna be good, I swear.

Speaker 2 And I'm like, oh my gosh, what if I'm like pushing in the wrong direction? What if it's not good? But then it was so, so fabulous. And you'll have those memories for life.

Speaker 2 It was an amazing moment in time. And I'm so happy I did it, but it was a lot of work.
It was seven days a week. Like we trained every day and something that's so not natural for me.

Speaker 2 I've always done things that I'm good at. And then here I was doing something completely unnatural.
But while we were doing that i got an email or i got a dm from one of my teammates abby ward

Speaker 2 and she was at the bristol bears was like hey you know the coaches from the bristol bears would love to chat with you and i told her well i i can't i'm doing this with stars i wouldn't be free until january but i'll still take a call with them and we took a call with them they were they were late on it i remember that and i was like how are they gonna start off with by being late but now my

Speaker 2 now my coaches dave and tom they think it's funny we hopped on a call with them and they're like you know we even if it's just for those last those first three months of the year, we want you for that time.

Speaker 2 And we think we can put in appeals.

Speaker 2 We think you can get you over because it was that I wasn't eligible to play because I hadn't played for my national 15s team in a while because this would be 15s rugby, which in the Olympics I played sevens rugby.

Speaker 2 So this is

Speaker 2 a completely different form.

Speaker 2 But I wanted to play this form because there's a World Cup coming up this year in 2025.

Speaker 2 And so I wanted to get into 15s a little more. So we kind of made just like that decision from right from Dance with Stars to go out to England and start playing rugby here.

Speaker 2 And it's been amazing because it's also now set me up in the rugby space to show what I am, who I am as a figure in rugby. And I got to, I was, you know, got to play and really get into it.

Speaker 2 But the impact that I think I've had has been really cool to see.

Speaker 2 I mean, records were set and people were so excited because of this girl who, you know, posted the videos and it just showed the power, I guess, I have and made me want to keep doing it.

Speaker 2 I think it was like interesting at times. It's always interesting.
It's a, it's a weird battle I have to kind of deal with of like play rugby or

Speaker 2 do things outside that would make me so much more money like if i could i would just be an athlete but i've said it so many times before i'm just not going to make you know money being an athlete so as as a rugby player as a female rugby player i have to do so much more off the field and it gets to the point where it's almost like rugby

Speaker 2 You have to do it more for passion.

Speaker 2 Whereas I could be making this and this and doing this outside.

Speaker 2 Yet I love this game.

Speaker 2 the stuff that you've had to build on the outside yeah whereas i think what you're saying is like male athletes if you play in the nfl you are you know you make a certain type of paycheck where you can just play the sport that you love whereas you've played the sport that you love while building stuff on the outside and now you're at that not a crossroads because rugby is your love and your passion but the money that you make in rugby versus the money that you could make to help set yourself up for the future you know it instead of playing a sport that is just so brutal it's tough on the body but at the same time like i think it is so tough on the body that it is right now It's like you're playing it now, and these are the years to be doing it.

Speaker 2 So, I think your head's in the right place to be continuing on. It is hard, though.
And we, you know, you and I were chatting about it a lot this season.

Speaker 2 Like, I'm putting my body on the line for something that is giving me a lot, but at times I feel like I'm giving it much more.

Speaker 2 Like, I'm going out there every day with the possibility of, you know, getting injury, as happens with any sport, but there's that possibility every time.

Speaker 2 And I'm like, gosh, why am I doing this to myself?

Speaker 2 Like, you know, I could be, I could be just living and making a living doing, you know, media now, yet I get tackled every day and I sit farm and I tackle other people.

Speaker 2 And it's a lot on the body for, I guess, for a lot of my teammates. They're putting their whole bodies on the line for very little reward.

Speaker 2 For a lot of them, it's semi-professional. A lot of them aren't getting paid.
If they're getting paid, it's very little. A lot of them are working full-time jobs.

Speaker 2 We have doctors and nurses on our team and teachers. So like,

Speaker 2 We're in rugby doing this for passion, but at what time can it be

Speaker 2 like

Speaker 2 for as a job, as a career? Because nobody calls rugby their career or they say it, but it's really not a career. You do it for this kind of fleeting moment.

Speaker 2 And then I have teammates from sevens who have gone back to desk jobs who are, you know, back into the workforce. Like it never happened.
Like we never traveled the world playing rugby together.

Speaker 2 But I think this was the best option for me. I've met so many great people.
One of my favorites is Sarah Byrne, who's you know, one of the best players, my personal best player in the world, I think.

Speaker 2 And I want other people to know that as well but i think what was so great about the bears is we have so many amazing players on there abby ward jazz joyce from all sorts of countries i got to learn so much from all of them and it just set me up for success and i think also they were really happy that i was there for what i could bring it sounds like you found a really wonderful new team culture and community on the 15s team and i wonder

Speaker 2 You're going to go back to the sevens team maybe one day and it's going to be a whole group of girls. Are you ever nervous to go into a new team again with this amazing experience you've had here?

Speaker 2 Yeah, I think this experience was like unlike any other. I felt so much a part of the team from the moment I was there.

Speaker 2 And when I go back to, I don't know if I'll go play for Bristol Bears again.

Speaker 2 I think it was a lot to move over here to England to be two hours away from London and whatnot because my livelihood, everything

Speaker 2 is... over in America in New York or LA where I do shoots and deals.
So it's like, it was very hard to manage that because we had to pass up on so many things while I was here in Bristol.

Speaker 2 But I think this was, again, like Dancing with Stars was a moment in time. This was a moment in time for me that I'll always remember.

Speaker 2 And when I go back to sevens, I think, I think, again, I'll just be learning a whole new group of people

Speaker 2 and seeing how, I guess, I fit in, seeing where I fit in. I know you talk a lot about...

Speaker 2 That rugby, you're doing it almost for a passion and that, you know, you're not making,

Speaker 2 you can't really make a livelihood out of just rugby. And you can go into entertainment at this point.
Do you ever worry about no longer having that rugby current rugby player title attached with it?

Speaker 2 I think that's one of the reasons why I came here to Bristol to play because I don't want to be just known as a content creator influencer. I always, I hate it when people just say that about me.

Speaker 2 Oh, she's just an Instagrammer.

Speaker 2 Oh, she's like one guy commented on a video of me or on a video of Bristol Bears like, oh, are you going there to see the Instagrammer or are you going to, you know, watch the team?

Speaker 2 First of all, I'm an Olympic medalist. First of all, I'm a great rugby player.
But people sometimes forget about that and just put me in that box.

Speaker 2 And I think it's important to be known as an athlete, especially in America. Like we love athletes.
We think athletes are the top of the top. We love athletes.

Speaker 2 I'm proud to be, yeah, I'm proud to be an athlete.

Speaker 2 Something that I've always kind of really associated with my sense of self. And I want other people to know that.

Speaker 2 So I think this was for me solidifying myself as a rugby player in what is the traditional form of rugby.

Speaker 2 It's almost like a double-edged sword of like, you love rugby so much, but you have to put your body on, like, on the line for it, but it's still rewarding rewarding to have that title of rugby player yeah yeah which is crazy that you're like an olympic medalist in a sport but it's it's rugby sevens so it's like the people like over here are like okay well that's that whatever like this is everyone kept being like welcome to england english rugby and you broke your nose and stuff it's like okay yeah it's just it also kills me because you won three national championships

Speaker 2 as a 15th player the game has changed a lot in college yeah

Speaker 2 you've got some exciting things going on you've also been really trying to up your personal game, your personal brand. And I think it's really paid off for you.
I'm trying.

Speaker 2 I kind of, I had sort of like a, like, a moment of like come, coming into the light where it's like, yeah, if I want to, if I want to make content and I want to travel the world doing that, I need to make content and travel the world.

Speaker 2 It's not just going to happen. You got to do it to do it.
But I've always... made silly little videos on YouTube, you know, terrible edits if you watch my stuff from over 10 years ago.

Speaker 2 But like, I did that and I put that out there. And then slowly but surely, but I think like anyone posting is a very daunting thing.

Speaker 2 And I always credit you and how much, how much, I mean, you're very different the way you approach things. It's kind of like, hey, I got something to say.
I'm going to say it. I'm going to post it.

Speaker 2 And that's that. And that's why people relate to you.
And that's why you feel so authentic to people is you just are like, you know what? Post it. Post it.
Post it.

Speaker 2 And that's how I came up with Girl Dinner. was I had a thought.
I was realizing and I was like, I can't be the only person that does this. You know, my one friend was like, hey, I do that too.

Speaker 2 And I was like, yeah, I think a lot of women people probably do that. And I looked a mess, recorded myself making that video.
And I remember having this moment: like, oh, I don't look good.

Speaker 2 Normally, I'd edit. I don't think I'll post it.
And then I was like, if Alona were here right now, she'd say, post it. So I posted it.

Speaker 2 And it obviously, like, it's just what it is today. It's in the dictionary.
It's so exciting. I get to make food content.
What did you just tell us? You're something I learned.

Speaker 2 I'm a, oh, maybe I'm going to pronounce it wrong, though. That's dumb, but I'm a neoologist.
Neologist.

Speaker 2 Yeah. Neoologist.
How do you spell it? big word birdie over there yeah big word over there what about master's degree over there

Speaker 2 neologist

Speaker 2 yeah so and that's someone that um invents or creates new words or phrases um and you're especially bad if it is then in the dictionary which i'm putting that in dating profiles that's i got up there it's on my resume for sure i mean i don't have a resume right now

Speaker 2 if i did for those that don't know olivia is my manager as well right so she is uh my top employee employee of the month employee of the month every month for the past my year now my christmas gift i kept saying was an employee appreciation like

Speaker 2 my it's part of my benefits package so like she does that for me and she handles like all my emails and she does so much for me allowing me to do my best on the pitch and whatever but now she's gotten like offers to go i think you possibly had an offer to go to hong kong sevens hong kong sevens which is so exciting because that's just for me and the the audience that i've built and the content that i make it's not you know i obviously have a large rugby following i mean that is because i travel the world watching you play, but it's not attached to you.

Speaker 2 It's just me. It's an offer for me to go and experience and capture the weekend.
And I'm like, I would love that. I've never been to Hong Kong.
So hopefully that works out.

Speaker 2 I've done a lot of work with Cherry Bomb magazine, which we all just were the cover stars for. Cover Girls.
Cover Girls, which is our first ever magazine cover together, which is...

Speaker 2 so special that it's at home at Cherry Bomb, which is also my first magazine ever that I've been a part of.

Speaker 2 Really went from zero to 100.

Speaker 2 Thank you for

Speaker 2 And I mean, they have their event up in April, their annual Jubilee celebration, which I'll be going to in New York City. And it's just so exciting to be in spaces full of women in that way.

Speaker 2 I mean, always on my vision, I make a vision board at the beginning of every year, and it's the background on my laptop, and it's the background on my phone.

Speaker 2 So you're always like seeing what you're working towards. And I always have like a little portion that's about events, and I want to go to more things and meet people.

Speaker 2 And, you know, I guess networking, but also just like making connections.

Speaker 2 And the Cherry Bomb events, like Jubilee is unbelievably cool, powerful, incredible women in the culinary and media space in one room talking, just being themselves. And yet it's so inspirational.

Speaker 2 It's just women. It's, again, it's a, it's a space of female enjoyment and just being like, look at like how much farther we can all get when we work together.
I'm emotional.

Speaker 2 Like I'm on the edge of tears the entire time. And it's essentially a conference, you know, with delicious food and bev in New York City.
So I have that coming up and I'm just loving it.

Speaker 2 I just, I'm, I'm proud of myself for putting myself more out there. It wasn't a quick process.

Speaker 2 I learned from you, but I'm still getting better about it and just putting it out there, but truly just realizing you can't do it unless you do it. So

Speaker 2 do what you got to do. It's like everything you want is maybe it's on the other side of like being cringe or embarrassment, right?

Speaker 2 And the only people that are going to judge me are the ones that wish they could be doing what I'm doing and don't have the

Speaker 2 balls to. The massive

Speaker 2 or in your case

Speaker 2 I still have that little voice in my mind of always like someone from high school could see this and I'm like right now who cares I don't see them right you're fine it doesn't matter yeah get past that because it's holding you back what's that thing that's like the people that matter won't mind and the people that mind don't matter boom bars stay there

Speaker 2 write that down folks Mar House of Mar original thanks so much for coming over and watching our first episode of House of Mar a wave original sponsored by Samsung.

Speaker 2 Be sure to watch and subscribe on YouTube and listen wherever you get your podcasts. Plus, follow the show on social media at House of Mar to keep up with the best clips throughout the week.

Speaker 2 See you next time. Bye.
Bye-bye. See you right back here.
Close the door. On your way out.
On the way out. Thanks.
Bye.

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