Why Phoebe Burgess hasn’t gone on a date in 7 years

Something To Talk About

Phoebe Burgess discusses her transition from a high-profile media career to a life centered on single motherhood in the NSW Southern Highlan

Key takeaways

• Phoebe experienced a loss of professional identity after stepping away from journalism and social media.
• She describes the 'limbo' phase of life for women where previous milestones have passed but new ones haven't arrived.

Main topics

• Identity and job titles
• Single motherhood

Notable quotes

I don't have a title anymore. Like, I don't have something that I am.

Conclusion

A moving exploration of resilience and the reclamation of self during

Transcript preview

Speaker 1 (0:07) Hello and welcome to Something to Talk About, the Stella podcast. I'm Sarah Lamarquand, your host, and every week I sit down with some of the biggest names in the country because when Australia's celebrities are ready to talk, they come to Something to Talk About. When Phoebe Burgess was filling out the census this year, she really wasn't sure what to write down when it came to job description. Content creator, journalist, mum, or Speaker 2 (0:34) maybe media Speaker 1 (0:35) person? Speaker 2 (0:36) I don't have a title anymore. Like, I don't have something that I am. I would have no idea what to put in my Instagram bio to indicate what Speaker 1 (0:45) I Speaker 2 (0:45) do. So Speaker 1 (0:46) I just don't put much. Phoebe's life looks very different from what she once imagined. When her marriage to former NRL player Sam Burgess ended seven years ago, she moved to her parents' home outside of Sydney, where she still lives today with her two children, Poppy and Billy. Since then, motherhood has demanded most of her time, but it's also changed the way she shows up online. Not Speaker 2 (1:10) everything is amazing. Sometimes life is just life. Speaker 1 (1:13) On today's episode of The Stellar Podcast, Phoebe opens up about reclaiming her identity. and whether she'll ever be ready to date again. She also shares what it feels like to see her former husband build a new life and family overseas. And as she launches a new project with Below Deck Mediterranean star Hannah Ferrier, she reflects on what else might come next. Phoebe Burgess, welcome to the Stellar Podcast. Speaker 2 (1:41) Sarah, thank you so much for having me. Speaker 1 (1:43) Phoebe, I haven't seen you for a while, but more importantly, I feel like a lot of the people of Australia haven't seen you for a while. You do have a new project coming up, which we will be talking about in a minute, but because... It has been a hot minute since you have done an interview. I was thinking earlier about the way that we identify people, as in here is a journalist, here is television presenter, and I'm not sure if you've had any reason to be filling out any incoming passenger cards flying through an international airport lately. Well, Sarah, Speaker 2 (2:17) the census. The census. The census, of Speaker 1 (2:19) course. I was filling it out Speaker 2 (2:20) and I thought it was the same thing when I was going through the legal system and you had to put a job. And I think I've been scarred by that because I go to think, I think, well, I'm educated in, you know, I've got a bachelor in marketing communications, Sydney, but I was a producer and then I was a bit of this and then I was a professional wife and then I wasn't. And Jeremy, you're right. There are so many. And it actually got me thinking about identity a bit as well. Speaker 1 (2:46) There isn't just one hat. Speaker 2 (2:47) Like there isn't. And so I think I just write down sort of media person. And just leave it at that. Or writer, but I haven't written anything in a while. Journalist, but I'm not really breaking any stories lately. And Sarah, for so long, I think since the age of, like I didn't take a gap year, I never stopped. I was very gung-ho when it came to career or what I was doing next. And like you were saying, I've sort of disappeared a little bit for the first time in sort of forever. what I do to earn money or as a career for a living, it kind of stopped. I don't know if this is maturity. It stopped informing how I perceive and value myself. And I know that sounds heavy, but for a really long time, what I did and what I was called, what I told people I did was really important. That was the big umbrella. And, you know, now. We can't really just say when I was doing the census, you know, you can't say domestic. And I realized things needed to change when I was filling out how many hours of domestic work I did. I was like, okay, we need to find something else here, Faith. But, you know, in a sort of really real sense, I think going through, you know, the fire and coming out the other side, what was important before. you know, being quite publicly humbled or humiliated or going through something that wasn't on my little list of, you know, what's coming up for the next 10 years. I think it kind of shed all of that. And I just don't care. Speaker 1 (4:21) Not Speaker 2 (4:21) as in I don't care, but I know what I do. But I don't have a title anymore. Like I don't have something that I am. I would have no idea what to put in my Instagram bio to indicate what I do. So I just don't put much. And even more weirdly, people date now on apps. And there is no way I'm stepping foot anywhere near trying to describe my life, do you know what I mean, in one or two sentences or words. But no, it's been interesting going sort of through that, getting to this point. Speaker 1 (4:54) It sounds very liberating at the risk of editorialising, and I'm sure that's something that we'll chat further about in our conversation today. But Phoebe, you mentioned their Instagram bio. I haven't seen a lot of Phoebe online lately. as a very high profile personality, media person. I'm presuming, of course, Phoebe, it was intentional that you have retreated a bit more from social media, but I'd love to ask you a little bit about your role and your relationship with social media these days, not only as a content creator, but also as a content consumer. Speaker 2 (5:31) Great question. And I think that's sort of come along in this. It was on purpose, Sarah, but it also wasn't. I think when life starts happening and life gets suddenly really full, it's just something I didn't reach for. And I'm still the consummate documenter. I have a lot of content. I've cut content. I've edited things. I've made beautiful videos. I've sort of tapped in, but I tapped out a little bit of what I was sort of not enjoying much. anymore and I think I do have the desire to be there but I really started thinking about what people would be interested in or not and I wanted to have something more of value to say and I think for a while I started posting things that were sort of a bit incongruous they didn't really line up with what was truly happening and I thought if I'm not sharing the sort of real things that are going on I don't think that that offers any value and it felt a little bit insincere. So I think until I was ready to sort of step back in and do it faithfully, I did sort of just take a little break from it, a little bit of a hiatus, more so in terms of, I think, I don't know, just assessing my own value and what I contribute. And that's how sort of what we're doing now sort of came about. It had been a minute since I had found something that made me feel excited. And I've got this one sort of precious baby. I'm about to sound like a politician, actually. I'm working on this one project over here. And then haphazardly, I got a call and something great happened over here. And it sort of just, I don't know, lit the fire again a little bit. I was excited about my life again, as in what I can contribute to a conversation. And I sort of learned that this... sort of stage we're in, Sarah, and I don't know if you felt this as well, you move past that announcement era where you go from, oh my God, check me out. I've got this new job. Now I've got a rock on my finger and oh, we're getting married and we got married and here's the baby and here's baby two. And all of a sudden you get to this sort of limbo. That's how I felt. Anyway, it's a limbo. However, when it comes to women, and no two women being the same, this is actually a really interesting stage of life, I think, because you're finally living all the things that you've built and set up for yourself. You're in the thick of it. And when a bomb does go off in this little limbo phase, it's quite extraordinary. You know, a lot of us will sort of take different career turns as it pertains to our lives, you know, the people we care about, what they need. And I altogether stopped thinking about things that I wanted, Sarah, or things that I needed. They just haven't backed it. And to be honest, as the kids have gotten older, their lives have gotten even bigger, which I thought was a nasty little surprise. I thought, you know, when the poo wiping and the screaming and the mummy, mummy, mummy stopped, that things would settle and I'd have time for my secret projects. Speaker 2 (8:52) It's not happened at all. You know, I've got Poppy, who is a competitive horse rider, and that's something that had we stayed in Sydney on my original family track, that wouldn't be something we would do. So that's a lovely surprise. And that's most afternoons, weekends at competitions. She's decided to be this, you know, pre-Olympic sprinter, and she's just gifted and winning Ipsha and CIS and setting records. You look at your child and you think, okay, that's another thing I'll have to start taking a little bit more seriously. And, you know, and then Billy is just growing into this beautiful little boy and he's discovering what he's great at and what he's not so great at. And now that they are thinking autonomous opinion, having little people, it's actually, they want more from you, Sarah. Like I need to be plugged into the wall. I think like, I just. So that sort of has taken, they need all of me, put it that way. I'm sorry. I know I've gone on this little journey here, but they've needed so much energy and attention and time and love. And it is just me. So I don't know. I think I feel that anything else that's taking energy or power away from what I'm doing here with them. I don't know there's guilt associated with that. Even when it is, I do have to earn a living. I do have to feed them. They eat a lot. You know, school fees and just, I've been so lucky to be able to live at home with my parents. And that's a decision I made very consciously for everything I wanted to give my children by way of safety and home and having that really strong base that you always go back to. But there are so many things that... I don't think about it often, but that I've given up or not done. You know, I'm not bringing a hot date every Friday night back to mum and dad. So do you know what I mean? There's just things that I don't have anymore. The other make up for it. Nothing's missing. But no, I definitely haven't had any sort of exciting things to share by way of announcements. It's just life. And I think I'm thinking of starting to share from that perspective more often. Not everything is amazing. Sometimes life is just life. Speaker 1 (11:03) When you were talking about your two children there, Phoebe, and they are at school now, and I imagine you like a lot of parents out there. I'm putting my hand up here, might have thought, yeah, when they get to school, I'll get a little bit more time back. And as you say, the complexity that comes with what you hope for, they're making autonomous decisions and their own lives becoming fuller and more complex. But also that means more demanding and taking up more time of you. I think that is something that we don't necessarily talk about enough. Speaker 2 (11:35) We don't. And they're telling us who they are. Speaker 2 (11:40) One thing I've learned, because hindsight is very beautiful, and I think I've been able to really lean into my hindsight a little bit more and the things that I've learned along the way, no matter what I had envisioned for my kids or what I thought might be coming next, I've got to stop doing that. It just doesn't happen that way. And learning to roll with it and go with them and also, obviously... make sure that you're raising, you know, respectful, happy, healthy kids. It's not a small thing. And it does take up a lot of energy and life to sort of follow them on that path. It's not something that you can look away from and come back to. And, you know, the minute I go to drive up the highway to Sydney, they don't have phones, thank goodness. And they've got iPads though. And it's all connected to sort of my, you know, the family sharing thing. So I'll get three little FaceTimes as I'm driving up to get a coffee or whatever it is. And it's lovely. And I think, oh my gosh, that's what I do to my mum. I'm 37 years old and I do the same thing to my mother. But I do get it. The one thing though that I'm trying to be more aware of is that they are going to continue growing this quickly, Sarah. And if I don't make sure that I have something that's my own apart from them. which it simplified everything for me when I realised what the most important thing was. It made life actually pretty easy. But when I really think about the fact that they are beanstalk growing, they are going to be great people and head off into the world. And, you know, I don't know if Pop wants me to be living in her basement. So, you know, just sort of thinking of my future is something that started to bubble away at, sort of niggle away at me. It's scary though. I had 10 years ago, I knew what the future may or may not look like. I knew that I was going to pack the kids up and we were going to live in a, you know, villa in the South of France and be French for a year. And we were going to have these adventures and you, I think doing it on your own. And I say that not