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Foreign.
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I'm Laura Vinroot Poole and this is what we wore. Amy LaRocca is an award winning journalist who spent two decades at New York magazine. Her book, how to Be well takes a hard look at the wellness industry and its effects on women today. Congratulations on the new book. We have a great friend in common sense, Sabina Schlumberger, who got us sort of back together. And I have to tell you about reading the book. So she gave it to me. She had an advance copy and she had finished it and she gave it to me over lunch a while ago and I started reading it. And the first night, I mean, an hour after, you know, leaving lunch, I was just engrossed in it and I texted her and said, this book is just beyond, you know, I can't, it's too much. And I love it so much. And she said, oh, how wonderful. Tell me what's resonating. I. I actually can't tell you anything because I have under. This poor book has been underlined like 1,000 things. I mean, it's pitiful. I can't give it back to her because every single sentence I was just like, yes. And that. Yes. Huh? Yes.
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A
Oh my God, thank you so much. That means, that's so, that means so much to me because I have to tell you, when I was pitching this book, my agent is man, you know, all the editors who are interested were my men. But still, I think from a marketing perspective, a lot of the publishers kept saying, I don't understand. Are you for wellness? Are you against wellness? Is this like a guide? Is this a takedown? And I was like, no, no, no, no, no. You have to understand, we all live so deeply within this that it can't be like all one or all another. Like we're just in it. And no one I know wants either just like a guide or a takedown.
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B
Yeah, we're not gonna quit.
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A
Yeah, I'm not quitting. Like, I myself, I'm not quitting. But I also don't just want a guy that's like, yeah, it's gonna fix everything. And yeah, do this, do that. Like, it's. It's not that. No one lives that way. And I finally, I was so happy when I found like a few female editors out there and publishers who got that.
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B
Well, let me ask you this, Amy. And I think I'm a little older than you, but we' the same age, number one, I think. Were they about the same age as us? Yes. Okay. That. And then the other thing that I thought was really Interesting that you and I relate on, I think, is that fashion background. And. Because I think it is so intertwined with fashion, which I never. I never realized, really, until I read the book. I was like, oh, my God. Oh, my God. You know, it's like, so. And so this designer that stopped to do this, and this is. I mean, it just. It is so intertwined with what we do.
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A
It's so intertwined. And there's some really basic levels that I think we can be, like, very honest about. That people don't want to be that honest about, like, the kind of thin. Yeah, right. Like, that people in fashion want to be really thin. And I think. Let's just. Let's just say it. Let's just say it out loud, right? Like, all these fashion people getting colonics, like, right. I was like, you know, and. And they would be like, you have to meet my colonic therapist. He cured my eating disorder. And I was a little bit like.
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B
He gave you a new one.
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A
Yeah, right, exactly. Like, am I allowed to point out that you're getting, like, colonics twice a. And you're only eating, like, green food in a certain sequence and starting afternoon, like, I'm so happy for you that you're cured of your eating disorder. Like, what are we really having this conversation? You know? Okay, great. Like, sure. You know, like. But that thinness is totally, like, the goal. And that thinness is the goal of a lot of fashion. Right? Like, let's just say it out loud. And so that's, like, one obvious connection with fashion. But then also, like, the kind of elitism is another connection with fashion. You've. You've been on the fashion circuit, right? Like, know what it's like when people are, like, trading names and, oh, like, I've seen this doctor and I have this tincture. Or like, in Paris, when the ballerina would come and she would do the sessions. Right.
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B
That's what mortified me in reading it was that every single thing, I was like, oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. I know that I did that. I did that. I did that.
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A
Yeah, I did it all. Or, like, you know, you'd see, like, in New York, I remember when there was that guy, and he had the, like, office near Union Square, and you could shake, like, you could go on his thing, and he would, like, shake your whole body. And then everyone was eating those, like, logs of goat cheese that you could get square farmers market. So it was like an access thing. The hilarious interview with Mandishantal bacon in Elle magazine. It came out, like, 10 years ago now. But it was like everybody had something from Prada. Everybody had something from Valentino. Everybody, everywhere was live streaming the Prada show. So, like, you know, being in Milan and seeing the Prada show wasn't such a status symbol anymore. And then Amanda Chantal Bacon was like, for breakfast, I had ground pearl dust in my, you know, pounded copper cup that was made for me by this monk. And it was like this. Suddenly, it was like this new language, right? And it was like, who speaks this language and who knows these things? And it was like the kind of aspirational part of fashion, just totally repackaged. And I really recognized that. And I really recognized that thing of having the insider knowledge and having that kind of. And it's. It's, you know, it's a branding and a marketing thing. And I really, like. I really was like, oh, I know this.
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B
I love this quote. We've gotten very focused on perfectionism masquerading as wellness. Yeah, it's exactly that. Tell me where you're from.
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A
So I am from New York area. I was born in Washington, D.C. we lived in Albany, New York, when I was a little kid, because my dad is. Was involved in government and in New York State. And then I grew up in the suburbs of New York City on the North Shore of Long Island. After a brief stint in Paris, I've been in New York City ever since. And since marrying my English husband about 20 years ago, we've been back and forth to London.
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B
And. What's your first fashion memory?
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A
I've got, like, a real fashion mom and grandma. My mom is kind of a New York City fashion legend at this point. People. It's funny, when I worked at New York magazine, I did this column called the Lookbook, which was a kind of really early street style thing. It was way before people did street style outside the fashion shows and things like that. And it was very definitively not outside fashion shows. We had a white seamless that we would put up every, you know, anywhere and everywhere in the city. And sometimes we had real fashion icons like we. And sometimes we just had random people whose style we loved. And the idea was to get people talking about what they wore that day when they set out. We never wanted people to dress up for us. Like, we never would announce where we were going. And I don't know if you remember Gawker, but they became sort of obsessed with finding yes. And it became like a kind of thing where they would, like, sort of stalk us. And they had a column about it, and we ended up Publishing a book of our columns. But in the kind of street style thing that happened, people became kind of obsessed with my mom, really. And all these, like, street style photographers were obsessed with my mom. And when my first daughter was born, I sort of couldn't bear to leave her. And she would come with her. She would. She would come with me to the collections in Europe to hang out with my daughter while I went to shows. The two of them became like a real favorite of street style photographers. My mom has kind of legendary style, and. But before her, my grandmother also had kind of legendary style, but in a, like, kind of what my husband would call like an aircraft carrier landed on her head. And she would be in a Chanel suit with this, like. I mean, my grandmother didn't wash her own hair.
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B
Yeah.
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A
You know, three times a week to the, to the hair salon with a, like, and Chanel suit. That kind of look. Never a color, you know, white, beige.
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B
Wow.
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A
Like neutrals, a gray thing, you know. And so they love to shop, and I always shopped with them. They always were really sort of specific and impeccable in the way they dressed. And. Yeah, I mean, I really. So my fashion memories are always, like, shopping with the two of them and.
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B
It was actually watching them shop or were they dressing you?
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A
They were dressing me. And I definitely, definitely went through, like, my years of, like, it just had. I had to just wear like, army pants and a Patagonia because, like, calm down, ladies.
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B
You know, many years of that.
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A
But I obviously found my way back. And I've always loved clothing, jewelry, Even when I was like, I just want to wear army pants and a Patagonia, please. I was very, very, very specific in my choices.
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B
They had to come from the real Army Navy store. Obviously.
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A
Yes. Like, it was always. So Even when I was being kind of like, no, I reject it. I was so specific.
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B
Sounds very familiar.
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A
So I've never been like, I have friends where it's like they genuinely, like, don't pay attention. And it just like, it boggles my mind.
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B
And so how did writing come into the picture? How did that meet with fashion?
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A
I always wanted to be a journalist. I always wanted to be a writer. I never considered doing something else. I self published a little at my tiny, tiny, tiny all girls school in Albany, New York, where there were like 12 girls a year. I had a little newspaper that I self published with my friend Amelia. Like, I. There was never anything else I wanted to do. I was the editor of the paper at Brown. I like, that's, that's All I ever wanted to do. And.
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B
And what did you love about it? Or how did you. How did you know about it?
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A
I can't explain it. It was like. It's like in my body, like, there was never. There was never anything else I wanted to do. I was a big reader. I love interviewing people. It's very funny. It's been very funny being on book tour and being on the other side. I mean, I met you because I interviewed. Exactly. It was just always the thing that. It was just like. It was very normal and natural. It was like. It was like a magnet.
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B
And you were good at it because you're a great listener and because you love stories. I mean, is that sort of when.
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A
I discovered that there was this field? And it was sort of while I was working on the book, and I was like, there's this thing called narrative medicine. And I was like, oh, well, if I knew that, I could have been a doctor. And. Yeah, if you could make anything into a story, right? Like, if you can tell story of illness through. If you can talk about illness through a story. And of course you can't, because that's. I think what gets a lot of wellness people into trouble is trying to fit, you know, the story of bodies and illness into narrative, which it isn't always, but I think that can sort of happen in wellness is you're like, oh, if. If I just say, like, it's like, you know, when we were talking about the colonic people, like, yeah, if I. If I place the. The lettuce before the bodies don't work in narrative all the time. But that's sort of what happens with wellness. But. But yeah, so I always wanted. I just always wanted to be a writer, and I always wanted to. To tell stories and hear stories and. And I had this really good luck, which is my senior year at Brown. I was taught by a woman named Francine du Plessis Guay. And, yeah, and her. Her father, her stepfather, but really her father figure had been one of the founders of Vogue. So she had an incredible background in fashion, obviously, and writing and fashion. And when I graduated, I went to Paris with her to be her assistant as she finished a biography of the wife of the Marquis de Sade. And so I was her assistant, her research assistant in Paris, and we had an amazing time. And I was like, in the National Archives with her in Paris. And then the book was finished, and, you know, I went back to New York and I found. She helped me find a job, and she was the one, you know, I Obviously loved clothes as we talked about, and I was very like into them. And in Paris I ended up working. So this was 1997, so there wasn't really like a web, so to speak. It was starting, but Yves St. Laurent weirdly had put some money into a project that was covering the couture collections. It was like in real time. And writing reviews of fashion shows. It was called Fashion Week Live. And, and while I was working for Francine, I ended up writing reviews of fashion shows. When I was 21, I didn't know anything and I, so I sort of dabbled in that. And then when I got back to New York, Francine introduced me to the owner of the New York Observer. And it was a very wild place in the 90s. They didn't have a fashion writer. And I was like, well, I've covered.
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B
The shows in Paris couture.
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A
So then I was covering the shows in New York and then that led to a job at Vogue and then I was hired at New York magazine and stayed there for 20 years.
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B
Rewind a minute. At 21, writing about the shows. Have you reread any of that? Do you know what any of it says?
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A
You know, I don't think they even archived them, but I would, thank God.
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B
Were you opinionated about it? Did you even know?
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A
I had no idea what I was doing. Looking at.
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B
Did you show it to Francine? I mean, did you show it to any of your professors?
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A
I mean, did I show it to Francine? I, I don't even know if I did. I mean, I remember going to meet like so sort of running back and forth between like doing the research for Francine and going to the shows or going to do a designer interview or whatever it was. And I remember like learning, like learning certain, certain things from Francine. Like there was always a kind of circus going on at the Cafe du Flor. But the real, like, the real like glamour, like the, the sort of Left bank royalty ate upstairs. So all the tourists would be downstairs sort of hoping to catch a glimpse. Meanwhile, the real action at the Cafe.
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B
De Fleur was upstairs or at Lip across the street.
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A
Yeah, that's right, that's right. So I would have these kind of translations or files or whatever other work I'd done for Francine. And I was always like delivering it to her upstairs at the floor. And I did go in one day and she was having lunch with Pierre Bourget and you know, meeting all these kind of people as the, you know, 21 year old gopher. But, you know, they'd invite me in to have like. I remember going up one day when the Beaujolais Nouveau had arrived and getting to sit with Dean and Pierre Roger and deliver like this paint, like, you know, these translations of things, you know, that were really sort of like insane because it was the Marquis de Sade. So it was like stuff about like the Marquis de Sade had come up with some sort of like thing he thought was an aphrodisiac but had really given all the prostitutes like diarrhea. And his wife had written a letter to her mother about this horrible incident and like had all these transl. And I was like, you know, just sitting there with telling Francine and Pierre Verger about it upstairs the cafe floor and thinking like, how did this happen? Like, this is the best thing ever, you know, so getting to like do all of that and I think knowing that like asking her to read my like weird, totally horrible reviews of some second rate fashion shows and thank God they were not.
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B
And what about your family? I mean, did your mom and your grandmother.
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A
They didn't have like, they didn't have the wet. Like, they didn't have. You know, what do I remember? I remember my mom like telling me to stop picking up French boys in bars. But yeah, they thought it was amazing. They were so happy I was getting to do it. Like they were, you know, they thought it was great. But I don't think at that point, like, I think I'd taken myself like hyper seriously when I was in college, like running the college paper. I don't think I thought that fashion journalism was what I was going to do. I think I thought of them as very separate.
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B
Were you a journalism major?
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A
We didn't have that at Brown. As a literature major, like, I did the paper. I did the alternative weekly paper that we did with. I didn't do the. There were two papers. There was like an alternative weekly that we published with RISD students and then there was a daily paper. So I did the weekly. I've always liked that sort of like the slightly slower. Like I. I would always think of myself as a magazine journalist rather than.
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B
A newspaper journalist because you had a week to do it rather than a.
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A
Day, like slightly longer form rather than like a daily piece. But so, yeah, so it was called the College Hill Independent. And I didn't think I would like, I, I don't know, I didn't. It didn't really occur to me that like, you know, I always liked clothes and I always liked stuff, but. And it was really Francine who Said, no, no, you can do sort of serious, interesting work inside fashion. Like, it doesn't. She was definitely the person who was like, no, no, no. This can be serious, interesting work.
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B
That's really important just from working in fashion for 30 years. I remember, I mean, I would say the first 10 years, it was so important to me for people to know that I wasn't just like a fashion person.
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A
Well, I remember I interviewed Mitra Prada once when she was doing that. It was like she did the Met Ball and it was like Prada and Schiaparelli. And I interviewed her right before it and she said something about like really resenting the ways in which people didn't take fashion seriously. Something about like women's decision to spend money on fashion as a luxury item, like, was so dismissed. And men could spend money on cars or watches or whatever. Like men's sort of so called frivolous expenditures were treated with a sort of gravity that fashion wasn't.
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B
Julie de lebron had a lot of really interesting things that much just said to her, I think she's a really wise, brilliant person.
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A
Yeah, I think she blew my mind the coolest.
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B
Like super cool. And like, you know, has this incredible collection of jewelry. She's a big jewelry person. Yes.
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A
Vintage jewelry. Oh my God.
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B
But just to see an intellectual person that can, that takes that seriously and that is not, you know, that it's not frivolous actually. It's really a serious thing that she loves and it's okay because she loves it.
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A
She loves it. And it's like, you know, it's self expression, it's art. And I think now, like, especially with, you know, influencer culture, which just makes it like takes it way down.
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B
So your first job out of college, I guess it was Vogue first or internship at Vogue. And then no New York Observer.
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A
No, it was Francine in Paris and then back to New York it was the New York observer, then it was Vogue and then it was New York Magazine.
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B
And his first two are those two year stints or so.
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A
New York observer was two years, Vogue was less than a year. I would have stayed longer, but New York magazine was kind of a dream job.
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B
Tell me about that. How did you find your way there? They called.
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A
I mean, the thing about being a writer and I think this is kind of unique to being a writer when you're. Is that your work is out there. So you don't. You tend to get called rather than.
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B
Yeah. Looking.
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A
It's like, it's like your resume is on display for all to see. So that makes it a little bit easier. So when a place needs. When. When a publication, at least in those days, had a role to fill, you know, you've sort of been auditioning for it without unconsciously. Right. Like, your work is just out there. So the way I went to Vogue and the way I went to New York Magazine is. They call you because your resume is. Is on display. So I had left the observer for Vogue, and I was having a great time. I'd sort of realized at Vogue that, like, if you're a writer, it's a good place to work, but if you're a stylist, it's a great place to work. And so I was having a good time, but I didn't feel it was really a writer's place. And then New York Magazine called, and I really would have stayed longer at Vogue. The timing wasn't great. I sort of wished it come, like, maybe a year later, but New York Magazine's a dream, and, you know, all I wanted to be was a new journalist, like, you know, Nora Ephron or Tom Wolf, you know, and that was where they'd been. Right.
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B
And so what was the first role, Amy?
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A
The first role? I had a column called Gotham Style, and I had a series of really amazing editors and a lot of freedom. I could pitch a cover story if I wanted. I could really just. The whole city was available, and that was so fun. Like, there were no boundaries. Really. Anything I wanted to do, I could do. So I had. I had to write my Gotham Style column every week, but I could add anything I wanted to that. And it really opened up the city. Like, you know, in my. At that point, I was only 24, and to be 24 years old and. And know that, like, anyone in the city would take your call, and you could sort of call up anyone and say, I'd like to interview you. I'd like to come see your show. I'd like to come. You know, just any. Everything was available, and everything was kind of open. Was such an exciting and fun way to live in New York. And also, they didn't mind if you freelanced. So things like Domino would call, would you do this piece? Or, you know, I couldn't have written for the Times, or I couldn't. I couldn't write for the Times. Right? I couldn't write for a direct competitor, but I could still write for Vogue. I could still, you know, Glamour would call and say, can we fly you to LA to do a cover story on Scarlett Johansson? And I could see yes. So it was really, really like, I just had a tremendous amount of freedom. And so I stayed for 20 years.
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B
Yeah, well, I mean. And what a time to be. I mean, American fashion, too, and just the whole fashion in general. What an exciting time.
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A
So I stayed, and I eventually became fashion director.
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B
And tell me what you loved about covering fashion.
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A
I loved covering fashion, particularly for New York Magazine, because it was about fashion. Like, I mean, it was. It was not in fashion. It was about fashion, if you can sort of see the difference. So for a while, it was doing the lookbook, and it was street fashion and high fashion. And, you know, I was going to couture, but I was also setting up my seamless on the street and talking to New Yorkers about what they were choosing to wear. But then I was also, you know, interviewing Karl Lagerfeld in the Oak Tour atelier. So it was like. It was like the whole thing. It was like, asking some crazy, like, lunatic on the street, like, what are you trying to tell us? While also, you know, interviewing you to Prada? So it was like. It was like a whole range. It was, like, everything about clothes and how people get dressed and all the high art of making incredibly beautiful things, and it was just incredible. So it was like. It was like the full spectrum, and it was also the kind of the zeitgeist of trends and how things are. Like, how and why people are drawn to things and how it moves and how fashion moves through culture and, like, why trends. Kind of, like, I remember, like, the moment when, you know, we were all so obsessed with Phoebe Philo, right? Like, and then Alessandra Michele came along and, like, sitting in that room, and there were, like. I remember he brought his collection to New York, and we were in Chelsea, and we were in, like, a garage in Chelsea, and he'd brought, like, all these rugs and these chandeliers, and the models were wearing, like, all these kind of layers, and it was like, all anyone had wanted until that minute was, like, clean Phoebe Fy. Like, all these lines. And then all of a sudden, just, like, feeling that switch and being like, what happened? Why did this happen? Why do I want to, like, throw everything on top of me now after, you know, spending the past five years? What does that mean? What does that mean about where we are? What does this mean about femininity? What does this mean about us as women? How does that happen? How does that switch happen to us collectively? So I just. I just liked all of it.
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B
I love also that it's not really focused on the Business of fashion. It's more the. I don't even know how to say it. It's like the personal experience of living.
- [25:15]
A
Living it. Right. Because I mean, this is something I talk about in the book a little bit, where it's like. And this is a thing where I really see fashion and wellness intersect, where it's like, look, we all have to get out of bed every day and get through life. And what are the things that help us do that and make it interesting?
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B
Yeah.
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A
And I think the line I use in the book is like, elevate the banality of the everyday. Fashion's certainly one of them. Wellness is as well. How am I gonna make this interesting? How am I gonna make this feel like something? And fashion does that for us and wellness does that for us.
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B
It does, definitely. I mean, I think that's why I related the whole time. It was just. It was sort of a hand in hand the whole time. Wellness plus fashion. I'm just trying to fix something. I'm just trying to. But it is, it's sort of this.
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A
I'm gonna get through the day over here.
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B
But it is, you know, and clothes really are sort of an armor to protect you and build you up and make you feel better and all of the things. I mean, it was clear to me that wellness was the same. How did you know that it was time to move on from New York magazine?
- [26:23]
A
Well, I went through so much when I was there. Obviously in 20 years. I started as a single 24 year old. I left as a married mother of two. You know, so I went through so much personal change. I left during COVID Oh, wow. When I, you know, my first day, there was Bush v. Gore and I left to go live in London with my family and put my kids in an open school after proving my utter uselessness.
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B
Homeschooler.
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A
Homeschooler, yes. So I was like, where is there an open school? So it was a lot of things. The magazine had been sold. My beloved, you know, editor in chief had moved on. We had a different owner, it was a different enterprise, and I was a different person. So there were those. And I wanted to be based in London and I'd sold a book. So the writing was on the wall. And actually given, even with all those circumstances, I had taken one year of a part time contract from the new owners and then just didn't renew. I was like, it's time to cut the cord. I wanted to write this book. I wanted to be free, which I hadn't been. Like, I wanted to Be like, fully free, you know, I didn't want to be, like, on a different time zone, taking or closing pieces, which I'd never done before. So, yeah. So it just was time. And I wanted to be fully focused on the book. It was time. And it's still people. I think a lot of people think I still work in New York magazine.
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B
Well, 20 years, kind of. Kind of a long time. Will you share the career advice that you got from your mother in law around that time?
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A
Oh, yeah. So my mother in law is an absolutely incredible woman who I love very, very much, and she was the editor in chief of the London Review of Books.
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B
Wow.
- [28:26]
A
Or she was one of the founders and she ran it until very recently. She actually left while we were living over there. So one of the reasons we were based over there for that period of time was to help her with that transition away from the paper as. As we call it in our family. She was in Paris with me helping out with kids while I was doing collections. And I got a call to. For a really big job. And I. Well, not with the kids. She was helping with my older daughter. And I was massively pregnant with my younger daughter. And I got a call to be an editor in chief of a big magazine. And I was like, you know, is this like a dream job? Should I be wanting to do this? And I'm like, waddling around the shows and I've got a toddler. And she looked at me like I was crazy. She was like, well, you can't do that job right now. And I felt like that was like the exact opposite advice that I expected from, like, a career woman or was kind of the exact opposite advice that like every sort of feminist, like, I felt like the kind of feminist message you were always getting was like, well, you can do it all and you should do it all. And she was like, you've got to get your kids situated. And in five years when your kids are sort of up and running, why don't you have this thought, this conversation? Then I was like, but they're calling now. She was like, they'll call again. And it was so amazing to me that I could. That. That we. You were allowed to actually admit difficulty because I felt like so much of the kind of feminist messaging was that women could never admit frailty or difficulty or that things were challenging. You had to just say, oh, no, I've got it. Oh, no, it's no problem. And I was so grateful to her and relieved. Yeah. The thing I didn't know was that a Few months, two months from that conversation, my daughter would be incredibly sick and was born and hospitalized in the NICU for three months and then had home nursing for six months. And then there's no way I could have taken that job. And it was just, it was impossible. But even if that hadn't happened, I shouldn't have taken that job.
- [31:03]
B
Do you think that you'd have gotten the same advice if you'd been in New York and asked friends?
- [31:07]
A
Absolutely not. And I think all of those same friends who would have told me, well, you have to take that job, of course, or would have felt the need to pretend to ignore the toddler at my side and the massive stomach in front of me would have told me they worshiped my mother in law and that she was one of their career.
- [31:25]
B
Icons, you know, and also, don't you think that that perfectionism and the like, we can do everything. The wellness part is a big part of that. It's like, we really can't do it, but we're trying to get the wellness part to make us able to do it.
- [31:39]
A
Well, there was like, yes, I think you're completely right. And there was like, I remember once reading an interview with Gwyneth Paltrow, like the, you know, the horror version of like, oh, we can be perfect. And it was, she said something like, well, I love to hire working moms because, like, if I ever have anything really difficult, I say, give it to a working mom, she'll get it done. And I'm like, go easier on the working mom. Like, don't pile it on her. Like, she's gonna have nothing to do. And then if you give it to the work mom, she's gonna feel like she has to say yes.
- [32:11]
B
Yes. Because she can't be out of the workforce. Yeah. Or she can't show weakness.
- [32:15]
A
She can't show weakness and she can't show frailty. Or she can't ever say, this is really difficult. And it's really difficult. It's really hard. But we're, we're, we're half. We have to say, like, oh, no, who, me? I have like this superpower. But, like, we have to be like, better than, better than, more than, more than. And it's, it's exhausting.
- [32:34]
B
There was one point when I did nearly throw the book across the room. Not, not for you, but for an interview with somebody who's the person saying it was. It's the same. I've heard it 1,000 times. It's the person saying, like, I like to wake up at 4:30 in the morning. Morning. To have some private time and meditate. I'm just like, what are you talking about?
- [32:55]
A
Oh yeah, I was taking meditation course and I was like, I, I, I, yeah. He's like, why don't you just get up at 4:30 to do your meditation? I was like, are you kidding me?
- [33:02]
B
But haven't you heard it 1,000 times? You're like, who the hell can do that?
- [33:08]
A
Set your alarm for 4:30 and just do a little quiet meditation.
- [33:12]
B
I like to have coffee alone. What an incredible mentor to have. And at the right exact moment. I mean, how, how rare is that?
- [33:22]
A
Thank God she was with me in Paris, because I would have like, I don't know, I feel like my New York friends would have strapped me into like a slimmer.
- [33:30]
B
Exactly what were the initial articles that you wrote that sort of inspired you to even think about writing the book?
- [33:38]
A
It was really a piece of, to be totally frank, I was like starting to think about like, what would my next steps be? Like, should I be thinking about moving on to the magazine? And I don't know. It was like I sat up in bed one night, I was like, I know what I'm going to do. It was really one of those moments. And I had, I have a sort of best friend editor. And the joke about me at Nerd magazine was I was always laying on the couch in his office like magazines chatting. And I walked into his office and I got my spot on his couch and I said, I'm gonna write a cover story in the wellness industry and then I'm gonna sell it as a book. And he said, let's do it.
- [34:17]
B
I mean, I remember now that you say that. Yeah, yeah.
- [34:21]
A
So, yeah, so that's what I did. I don't know. I just saw it very clearly. I was like, this is taking over. This word, this word. Wellness. Wellness. Wellness. And I was like, that's it. And then as I wrote the story, I was like, I don't know how I'm going to organize this because it's too big. And then, and I wrote the story and then took the story and I called my agent and I said, let's have lunch. Gave him the story. And I said, can you sell this as a book? And he was like, it's too big. And he was right. He was right. And he said, I want a hundred pages before I try and sell this because it's so big. You're going to have to really show me and show publisher your plan because it's too big. There's Too many ways it could go. That took me a long time to really wade through it and say, okay, here's a hundred pages.
- [35:20]
B
What was that process like? Was that harder or.
- [35:23]
A
So much harder than I expected. I was so flip when I said, I'm going to do this, and then it was so hard. I was like, oh, yeah, I'm just going to do this because my agent was right. It wasn't a straightforward topic. And then Covid happened, and everything just kind of, like, went berserk, and I had to, like, throw out a lot of what I'd done, start over, reconsider. I basically, like, wrote a book, threw it out and wrote a new book.
- [35:51]
B
Well, I mean, I think. I also think people's connection to wellness probably changed a lot in those two years.
- [35:56]
A
So much. So much. Yeah.
- [35:58]
B
So how many years of. Of wellness experiments and interviews? Other than your whole life, too. But did you do. Did you put into the.
- [36:05]
A
I did five years.
- [36:06]
B
And did you know that it would take that long? Did that.
- [36:08]
A
No, I thought it would take about half that.
- [36:10]
B
Did you ever have a moment of wanting to walk away?
- [36:13]
A
Yeah. Really? A moment? A million. I was like. I even came up with, like, a whole alternative career for myself in the middle, but I didn't.
- [36:25]
B
Why do you think that so few of us have thought about or, like, challenging the wellness industry? Because I don't think we really do. I mean, women don't. I don't think.
- [36:33]
A
I think because we're so conditioned to the beauty industry. I think because, like. And I think because we're so conditioned to this idea that we're supposed to be improving ourselves all the time and feeling less than, I think because we're so worried about caring for our families and looking after our families and making sure we're. We're doing it correctly. I think for those reasons, I. And. And many others, I think there's so much fear that we're not doing it right. There's a better way. I think we're also really conditioned to think that there's, like, a secret out there that someone else knows that they can tell us about ourselves, and we don't trust our own instincts. And that's not to say that we know best when it comes to medicine. You know, I really. There's something I hate more than when someone says, oh, I'm not gonna do the cancer treatment, or I think I know. You know, like, I really do believe in doctors, and I really do believe in science, but I also think there are certain things when it comes to Wellness separate from medicine, where we kind of say, I don't know, this doesn't feel right, but I'm going to do it anyway. Because wellness.
- [38:05]
B
Yeah. But also you think about like even say obgyns and women just started to become obgyns when our mothers were. I'm 53 also. I thought the menopause discussion was really, really interesting because it is completely new and nobody's ever talked about it. Nobody's ever. Even when I would ask my mom about it, she would say, oh, I don't. Yeah, I don't remember. I don't have any. I have no idea. Because I don't think you are allowed to talk about it.
- [38:30]
A
I think you weren't allowed to talk about it. Absolutely. And I think, you know, and I think like, it's. There's this weird, like wild pendulum swing with the menopause thing that's happening right now. Where it went from being like, you couldn't talk about it. These medications are dangerous now. It's like all we can do is talk about it and act like the medications are going to fix everything. And of course the truth lies somewhere in the middle and it's actually quite boring. Yeah. Okay. So it's probably going to suck. And there are some medications that are going to help you with some aspects some of the time, but nobody wants that. Right. Like everybody wants. Like these medications are going to be amazing.
- [39:11]
B
Yeah.
- [39:12]
A
And of course, like, we're moving towards such a for profit model with medicine that they're really being sold as these like magical cure alls that are going to fix everything for everyone all the time. And a lot of times medicine's really dull. Like, okay, so this might help you with some of the temperature stuff, but it might not help with the anxiety or it might not help with, I don't know, it just, it just, it's. And it might help your friend, but not you, or it might help you for like a year and then stop working.
- [39:46]
B
All of the things, you know, all.
- [39:47]
A
Of this is true, but like, you're only going to get the message that like, miracle cure, you know, it's going to be amazing and join this subscription website and it's going to cure all of your things in menopause. Doesn't have to happen for you, but menopause does have to happen for you. It's part of life.
- [40:03]
B
Yeah, that was an, There was a great quote in there about basically like wellness is supposed to curb aging, but you're not really supposed to curb aging. You know, like, well, it's like this.
- [40:13]
A
Thing where they keep saying, get you back to yourself. Get you back to yourself. And it's like news for you. Like, yourself is like a moving target, right? Yourself is aging, if you're lucky. And they keep saying, like in wellness, like, oh, we're going to get you back to your pre baby self. And it's like, well, I have a baby now. What are you going to do? Take my baby away? Like, you know, I don't like your premenopausal self. Well, guess what? Like, I'm turning 50 this year, so I'm not going to get back to myself before I was 50 because, like, I'm going to be 50 in December and like, whether I take this pill or not. So I would like to feel like the best possible version of 50, but the best possible version of 50 is not necessarily 28.
- [40:55]
B
Yes.
- [40:57]
A
And so it's like fighting this losing battle all the time. And I think when you ask like, why we do this all the time, it's because we're always being told, like, if you're always chasing the getting back to yourself, getting back to yourself and you're always chasing, you are going to fail. And so if you're like always doing that, you're always going to be like, buying more stuff, feel like you're failing, trying again. I think that's what sort of inevitably ends up happening and that's why we're so, like, trapped in it. And I, I do not, like, take myself out of that equation. I am, like, in it. I am in it. And being able to see it doesn't mean you are not in it.
- [41:37]
B
Well, I mean that I felt that in reading the book, I was like, yes, I do that. Yes, I do that. My mom had breast cancer several times and ultimately died sort of from it. I have spent my whole life trying to run from breast cancer because I look just like my mom. I have all and. And ended up actually getting it in the exact same place that she had it had a double mastectomy. And I think that I can look back at those ages 25 to 49. When I was, when I had my mastectomy, it was chasing this thing that would magically make that not happen to me. And every single thing was like, maybe, you know, this, this will make it not happen. Or if I eat this food, if I take this supplement, if I do this thing. And then when I finally got it, I mean, it's not fun fun, but it was almost a relief. And reading this book was so cathartic to Me, because I was like, oh, yeah, I did. That was at 35. I was doing that. That was at 37, I was doing that. That was when I was 44, I was doing that. All these things that just obviously didn't work, you know, and. And I'm. I'm probably more well than I've ever been, you know, post that whole period and all of it. I guess my point is it's tiring. It's like, really, really exhausting.
- [42:50]
A
So do you feel released from.
- [42:52]
B
It was the weirdest relief and release ever. I mean, I. I really. And I. I don't know. Like, I feel. It's interesting, too, to work with all women and all women of all ages. I work with women from 18 to, you know, my age and older. I was talking to somebody yesterday who's 44, and she was like, yeah, I'm having such a hard time seeing, sleeping. And I was like, I was. You know, I gave her a couple recommendations, but I said, also, yeah, 44 to 47 were some of the worst years. I just was really uncomfortable in every single way. I had every single symptom. And some things helped, some things didn't, but really kind of didn't help, you know, like, you just have to, like, get through it. People don't want that answer either. You know, like, they just.
- [43:35]
A
Yeah, of course.
- [43:36]
B
I had never thought about that, really, until reading the book. Book about that. That was my last 25 years was actually. It was sort of. It was trying to stave off this illness that I ended up getting that was not that bad.
- [43:48]
A
And relief when it happens, if you're always expecting it, then the relief when it's there and you can actually deal with it.
- [43:55]
B
What's been the most meaningful feedback that you've received from a reader?
- [43:58]
A
I mean, there's been so much. And it's been kind of amazing going to so many different places because people have reacted in so many different places. Like, you know, I brought the book to Louisville. I brought the book to Montecito. You know, it's been like bringing it to Brentwood. I'm bringing it to Brentwood. I'm so excited.
- [44:17]
B
I am, too.
- [44:18]
A
Yeah, I'm really excited. I think it's really like, God, the most meaningful feedback from a reader. It's been so varied. I think it's mostly just having these conversations with women like you where it's like, we get to have these conversations and say, oh, yeah, it's not all one thing, it's not all another. We're all kind of in resonates because we can kind of laugh about it and also know that it really means something that we've all been in this struggle. Because I think you can feel really alone. Like, am I the only one?
- [44:58]
B
Well, because you're not sharing it.
- [45:00]
A
Yeah. Like, is everyone else Gwyneth back to menopause thing too?
- [45:05]
B
One thing that I really noticed in my 40s was that I was having. I really had every single symptom. And I would ask, even my best friends, I would say, you know, are you having that problem to be like, no, I don't know. That's not happening to me. What are you talking about? Then you just stop asking because you're just like, okay, I guess it's just me.
- [45:20]
A
So I think it's just been really nice to be like. Like, oh, yeah, no, we're all, we're all doing this. We're all doing it. And we're all super conflicted and like, we're all sort of just, you know, like, we all do this. It's okay. Like, you do what you got to do. I'm gonna do what I gotta do. And like, it's fine. It's totally fine. We're all just trying to get through the night here and to just try and like, have a totally, like, judgment free zone where you do what you got to do. And we're all just like, trying to. And raise daughters to be slightly less insane than we are.
- [46:01]
B
Well, that's what I was going to ask. What do you, what do you most wish for your daughters to be slightly.
- [46:05]
A
Less insane than we are? I just hope that they, that they have less of that noise in their heads and can move through all of the things that they're sold with a little more confidence to say, yeah, no, it's not for me. I don't need it. That's really all I hope for for them is, is that, like, they're going to get bombarded. They already do get bombarded. They're 12 or 14 and they're bombarded.
- [46:34]
B
Drunk elephant with drunk elephant.
- [46:36]
A
I mean, I did teach them to. So it's like, you know, they have their allowance and it's like, well, if you spend all your money at Sephora, you're not going to have anything left to go for bubble tea with your friends. Right? Like, or you could spend your money once at Sephora and when it runs out, we could put the cetaphil in the drunk elephant containers.
- [47:04]
B
And you could.
- [47:05]
A
Go to get bubble tea after school every day and they're like, yeah, that sounds cool. So I feel like we've had one small victory.
- [47:14]
B
And tell me about your mom, what she thinks about the book.
- [47:16]
A
They love the book. I mean, I think some of it is, I think some of it is hard to be honest for her because I think some of these things are religion to her. You know, I think some of the food restriction and that kind of thing is gospel for her and for her generation. So I think, I don't think they question. And I think that's been hard for her to hear me question it because I think those things were taught to me as the sort of cost of being a woman. Yeah. So I think, I think that, yeah, think ideas around like food restriction, presenting your best self, not asking, not doubting, you know, things around like deprivation and self presentation, I think are just, you don't, you don't question. So I think, I think, you know, reading some of that, I think she's been magically supportive and excited and all the rest of it. But I don't know that some of my kind of questioning of it has been easy.
- [48:22]
B
Do you think being married to an Englishman has made it easier for you to do that?
- [48:26]
A
Yes. And he's been amazing and he's funny and one of my favorite things my mother in law ever said to me was I had a jacket that I had put in New York magazine, this Amazon jacket. Do you remember the Amazon jacket?
- [48:38]
B
Yeah, yeah.
- [48:39]
A
So I had said to the girls in the office once, I was like, you guys have to do something on this. For the strategist. I was like, you guys have to do something on this jacket. Tip, hot tip on this. And I, we always joke that like I've been at the magazine for 20 years and all I'm going to be remembered for is the Amazon jacket. And so I had to give away my Amazon jacket because I couldn't, I was just, I cannot. So my mother in law was visiting and I said, take this jacket back to London. No one's going to have it there. And it's like the thing, but I cannot wear it anymore. And she said, oh, it's not going to fit me. It's going to be way too small. And I was like, you have body dysmorphia. And she said, God, I hope so. And I was like, that's the best comment ever. That's perfect.
- [49:35]
B
What did you wear to your prom in Albany, New York?
- [49:38]
A
At that point? I was in Cold Spring harbor on the north of Long Island.
- [49:42]
B
Okay.
- [49:43]
A
And it was 1993. The Laura Ashley vibe was still going strong.
- [49:50]
B
Yes.
- [49:51]
A
But I did not want to wear Laura Ashley. I had stopped with the Laura Ashley by then, but my classmates had not. So my mom and I went to Soho and I wore a black Vivienne Tam. Remember Vivian?
- [50:12]
B
Yes.
- [50:13]
A
Okay, so it was like tight black, like it was like a stretchy black Vivian Tam with like a sheer black overlay that. Yes, like, you know. You know.
- [50:26]
B
Yes, yes. I think I know this dress basically.
- [50:29]
A
Yeah. It was like. It was like. And it was mini cute. It was like a. Like a skin tight black Vivian Tam mini dress with like a shirt, sheer black overlay. I wore my hair sort of straight and then we got these like big earrings, big hoops, and BCBG platform sandals.
- [50:49]
B
Nice.
- [50:51]
A
My date's mother had him pose for pictures with one of the girls in Laura Ashley.
- [50:56]
B
No, I love that.
- [51:02]
A
Yep. I could not wait to leave. And then I spent my summer in Paris.
- [51:09]
B
I'm gonna need a picture of that.
- [51:12]
A
You know what, I'm gonna be out when I go to my parents house in Sack Harbor. I think I know where the picture is, but picture that me alone. Because the Larry had to pose with one of the girls in her, like, you know, bride of war and Jeff's outfit.
- [51:26]
B
Exactly. Oh, my God.
- [51:28]
A
That is. That's so funny.
- [51:29]
B
Thank you, Amy, so much. Thank you.
- [51:32]
A
This was really fun.
- [51:34]
B
What We Wore is produced by Capitol and Balto Creative Media. The original song Someone so Enchanting was composed and performed by Britt Drazda. Please follow us on Instagram at whatweworepodcast for additional content and show updates. QueenCityPodcastNetwork.com.