Bryony Gordon: How people pleasing fuelled my OCD, alcoholism, and eating disorder

You’ve heard of fight or flight, but what about fawn – the idea of appeasing others to stay safe? Author and mental health advocate Bryony Gordon thinks there’s a reason so many women feel under pressure to people please. In this chat with Fearne, Bryony explores how she feels people pleasing has fuelled parts of her OCD, alcoholism, and eating disorders over the years. Fearne and Bryony also chat about body image, and both reveal some of the insecurities that have consumed them... that likely no one else has noticed. Bryony reckons feeling ‘too much’ and ‘not enough’ are two sides of the same coin, and offers advice on how to confidently take up space. (Or, as she puts it: “step into your mother*cking majesty!”) Bryony’s novel, People Pleaser, is out now. If you liked this episode of Happy Place, you might also like: Break free from people pleasing https://pod.fo/e/3ab356 Poorna Bell https://pod.fo/e/394770 Will Poulter https://pod.fo/e/2bd0dd Child on the line is a three-part documentary podcast series celebrating the Volunteer Counsellors of Childline, and the brave children & young people who contact the helpline service. Listen here: https://www.childonthelinepodcast.com/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy https://acast.com/privacy for more information.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  Hi, I'm Natalie Dormer and I'm proud to be an ambassador for Childline. This year, Childline turns 40. To market, I've made Child on the Line, a three-part documentary podcast. We hear why children needed a helpline in 1986, how it was built against the odds and the challenges children face today, from abuse and mental health to social media and AI. Search Child on the Line and listen wherever you get your podcasts.

• 0:29Fearne Cotton?

  Hello and a massive welcome to Happy Place with me Fern Cotton. This is the place where others don't have to like you for you to like yourself. Today, I'm chatting to Bryony Gordon.

• 0:41Speaker 02

  This is the truth, I wake up every morning and my brain, like the goblin king in my brain is like Bryony, everyone hates you, everything you're supposed to do today is gonna be a failure and you let down everyone yesterday and you're gonna let down everyone today, you're disappointing people, you're too much. And there's a coin, right, that we exist on, on either side of. And one side is too much, you're too much, and the other side is you're not enough. And they're basically the same thing.

• 1:14Fearne Cotton?

  You find me once again at my kitchen table, hence the slight echo, maybe, slightly sort of tinny sound, I don't know. I'm at home trying to get through just all the lists and feed the cat and the bloody tortoise, because, I mean, he's more hard work than the other ones. The cats are pretty easy, they just go about their own business. The tortoise, I've got a bloody hand, feed the guy. Not only that, I have to give him a bath every other day and I'm not getting much back from him, that's for sure. It's a one-way street with that guy. Anyway, I've got laundry to do next, so I'm gonna crack on with this introduction, because this is someone who I absolutely adore. And also someone that's been a friend for, I want to say over a decade now.

• 1:56Fearne Cotton?

  And she's really helped me out in lots of ways, as a mate. But my initial introduction to Bryony was through her books. Her book Mad Girl totally changed my life, actually. That might sound a lot, but it did, it really, really did. Because she talked about things... In a way that helped me eradicate levels of shame that I had about stuff and worry and panic. She's just brilliant. I love her. If you don't know much about Bryony, I mean, I know many of you will, but let me give you a little intro. She is the brilliant, passionate, mental health advocate Bryony Gordon. Now, I've obviously just written Likeable, How I Broke Free From The Need To Please.

• 2:39Fearne Cotton?

  And Bryony, coincidentally, because we didn't know we were going about our business at the same time, has written a novel called People Pleaser. Yeah, we women are really waking up to just how much of our lives have been dictated by the pressure to please everyone else at the expense of our own happiness. So, we talk about a lot. OCD, alcoholism, telling the absolute truth where you can, always feeling too much or not enough, but wanting to put that in the fucking bin. Fight, flight and fawn, a new one to me. I love learning about that. Shame is a massive one. I actually reference a specific story in my own life

• 3:23Fearne Cotton?

  that Bryony, I mean hugely, just changed for me and helped me with. And it's to do with teeth. So listen out for that. And of course, we chat body image because Bryony, this is almost one of her specialist subjects, I would say. You're gonna love it.

• 3:41Speaker 03

  Hello, I'm Joanna Fletcher.

• 3:43Speaker 04

  And I'm Marco Bertella.

• 3:44Speaker 03

  And this is Boots Off.

• 3:47Speaker 04

  We are friends who have spent a decade together, walking up mountains, across deserts and along coastlines with some seriously awesome groups of humans.

• 3:55Speaker 03

  And something happens when you're out there, feet on the ground, surrounded by nature. The conversations just spill out of you.

• 4:02Speaker 04

  This series is about the adversities that lead to adventure.

• 4:05Speaker 03

  The adventures that lead to adversity.

• 4:07Speaker 04

  And how life can be one big adventure in itself.

• 4:10Speaker 03

  Listen every Thursday. Just search for Boots Off.

• 4:17Fearne Cotton?

  Right, here we go. This is the show.

• 4:40Fearne Cotton?

  Bryony Gordon, this is such a treat. We haven't done this for about eight years, we reckon.

• 4:45Speaker 02

  No, I don't. Yeah, what year is it now?

• 4:48Fearne Cotton?

  We're in 2026, just to let you know.

• 4:50Speaker 02

  We did, we did this in 2018.

• 4:55Fearne Cotton?

  We think.

• 4:55Speaker 02

  Yeah. And then again, I think just before the pandemic, as part of like a sweaty Betty thing.

• 5:01Fearne Cotton?

  Yes, that's right.

• 5:02Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 5:02Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, but this is such a treat. And now it's like, it's such a real treat to be here and to see you. It was a real treat to have you here for so many reasons that I'm going to get to. One of them being, we've both weirdly written a book each, respectively.

• 5:16Speaker 02

  Imagine if we'd written the same. Well, we kind of have written.

• 5:19Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, about people pleasing.

• 5:20Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 5:20Fearne Cotton?

  You've written a fiction, I've written a non-fiction. No coincidence. My first question is, because on the front of your beautiful book, it's very pink and shiny and leopard printy.

• 5:30Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 5:30Fearne Cotton?

  It says, Olivia Greenwood, who is the protagonist, is fresh out of fucks.

• 5:35Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 5:35Fearne Cotton?

  Bryony Gordon, how many fucks have you got left?

• 5:38Speaker 02

  None, none at all.

• 5:39Fearne Cotton?

  Really?

• 5:39Speaker 02

  Yeah, I let them all go. No, every morning I wake up with a lot of fucks.

• 5:43Fearne Cotton?

  Okay.

• 5:44Speaker 02

  Yeah, so like I wake up burdened and weighed down by all the fucks I give. Like I wake up and my brain is like, everyone is gonna just look at you today, Bryony, and be like, you're a waste of time. So like even just getting, getting here today, I put on this top and I was like, oh no, I shouldn't wear that top because it shows my arms. Or it shows my bra. I was like, so what? I'm a, I'm a woman with big tits. Of course I'm gonna wear a bra.

• 6:12Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 6:12Speaker 02

  Or my arms. They're, these are my arms.

• 6:15Fearne Cotton?

  They're gorgeous arms.

• 6:16Speaker 02

  I'm a human with arms. All the better to like the front of your book to do that with.

• 6:20Fearne Cotton?

  Correct.

• 6:21Speaker 02

  And I have to kind of remind myself that I'm a grown woman. And so, yeah, I, I definitely, I.

• 6:30Speaker 02

  I try not to have any fucks, but I think with this book, so it was so interesting because I remember when I texted you, you know, that like excruciating bit of book promo where you have to be like, I've written a book.

• 6:41Fearne Cotton?

  Could you read it and do a quote or whatever it is? I have to do it all the time. It's awful.

• 6:45Speaker 02

  Yeah. And you were like, well, it's funny that you, you say that you've written a novel about people pleasing because I've written a nonfiction book about it. And I was like, what the hell? Cause we haven't seen each other for like four years.

• 6:56Fearne Cotton?

  This is, I don't think it's a coincidence at all. I think so many women of our age have got to the point in life where they're like, the old ways that I've been working don't serve me anymore. And something has to change. And this is an interesting era for middle forty somethings.

• 7:14Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 7:15Fearne Cotton?

  Because I'm with you. I'm not at a place of like, I don't care. I don't care what people think. I do care. But what I'm willing to do is ride out the discomfort of people having negative commentary about me, saying they're upset with me, me actually visibly pissing people off. That I can ride out. Whereas before, I muddled that with, I'm a terrible person.

• 7:38Speaker 02

  Yes, absolutely.

• 7:39Fearne Cotton?

  I'm the worst person on the planet for upsetting that person. And I don't believe that anymore. And I think many, many women and men, but I think they feel this a lot less, I'm imagining, making assumptions here. But many, many women in their mid forties and above are going, I don't want to, I don't want to do that anymore.

• 7:58Speaker 02

  I, that was what this book, it was, it came, I came, because I've written like eight, like memoirs, nonfiction books about addiction, eating disorders, depression, all of that OCD, those things that I've experienced. And when I ca- I came up with this idea and I was like, I need to write about people pleasing. But I was like, I can't write a memoir saying, this is how I got through people pleasing in the same way that I had, like, this is how I got through alcoholism and got sober. And this is how I dealt with OCD because I was like, I haven't actually dealt with this at all, but it is at the heart of all of the problems I've ever had in my life.

• 8:38Fearne Cotton?

  Yes.

• 8:39Speaker 02

  All of the problems.

• 8:41Fearne Cotton?

  This is what I wanted to, to ask you because I think that's what I realised writing likeable was that so many of my issues were founded in trying to please everybody and not rocking the boat.

• 8:55Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 8:56Fearne Cotton?

  And people pleasing can sound a bit sort of throwaway and like it's just this innocuous little thing that you might sometimes do, but I think the outcomes can be very severe. So would you attribute, I don't know, like if you're looking at OCD or an eating disorder, how much of that correlates, would you say, to people pleasing?

• 9:16Speaker 02

  So I look now OCD as it was, I realised what it was, was it is a very clever way of my brain trying to keep me safe.

• 9:26Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 9:26Speaker 02

  And trying to explain. So I look back, I was, I was really mentally unwell as a child, to the point, you know, I, so this, I had obsessive compulsive disorder that manifested as intrusive thoughts and told me that I was basically the worst person in the world and that I had to say phrases to keep my family alive. And, you know, and it was, it sort of verged on paranoid delusions at times. So I was really, really unwell. But of course, this was a time when we didn't talk about mental health. It was like no shade on my parents. And they obviously saw this very unwell child who often couldn't leave her bedroom, you know, and they didn't know what to do. And it was like, don't be like that.

• 10:11Speaker 02

  Don't be, don't be silly. This isn't gonna happen. You know, stop, you don't have to say these phrases. Get on with it. Get out of, you know, and it was all like, and people pleasing became, it was like a way for me to go, if I can just make people happy, then it's all gonna be okay. And I think OCD was my, my brain's way of like being hypervigilant about the environment around me. And if I can scan and check that I'm not doing bad things, then it'll be okay. And then I won't be making people unhappy.

• 10:40Fearne Cotton?

  How interesting.

• 10:42Speaker 02

  So I, I do, I really do. And then again, like alcoholism, which, you know, I'm nearly nine years sober now, but it was like, it was apps, even though the, my behaviour when I was drinking and taking drugs was not pleasing to anyone, least of all myself. It was how I sort of like stuffed things down, you know, it was like. I would get to the end of the day and, you know, working in the media, it was tough. You know, it was also full of misogyny, you know. And you'd get to the end of the day and I'd be like, I just need to, you know, to drink to make myself.

• 11:21Speaker 02

  Yeah, to make myself, to make everything feel just kind of fucking palatable.

• 11:26Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, numb yourself.

• 11:27Speaker 02

  Yeah, and so, and when I, and as you said, I then got to kind of the age of forty one, forty two. And I was like, this isn't right. None of this is right. And I needed to write something whereby I could almost like cosplay at being the woman I wanted to be. So in People Pleaser, I don't wanna like spoiler it, but this girl, this woman, she's not girl. How dare I call Olivia Greenwood a girl?

• 11:51Fearne Cotton?

  I found myself saying girl all the time in the morning myself.

• 11:53Speaker 02

  Oh, I'm just a nice little girl. No, I'm a grown fucking woman.

• 11:58Fearne Cotton?

  Yes.

• 11:59Speaker 02

  And anyway, Olivia, the protagonist of the novel, is in her forties and she's, you know, she's like. A put upon mum, her career is not going exactly where she would like it to be. And she wakes, she basically goes on a night out with a young colleague who gives her a gummy. And she wakes up the next morning and she can't please anyone but herself. So she starts telling the people, people the truth. So it's like liar liar, but with a harassed mum.

• 12:27Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 12:27Speaker 02

  As opposed to a, an evil lawyer. And I was like, I had so much fun because I was at this stage of my life where I was like, I feel so much discomfort. People pleasing, but I'm still not at the point where I can tell everyone to fuck off. And so it was like, I was basically imagining all the things I would love to say if I actually had the guts, you know?

• 12:51Fearne Cotton?

  And I guess letting that, I'm gonna use the word girl again, but letting the good girl facade slip. Because the first thing she does after she wakes up from that, she's been out with Rose, this mysterious work colleague. She wakes up the next day and she's drinking in the shed in her dressing gown at like eleven in the morning. And her kids and husband are going, who, like, who are you? Because I think there is so much pressure for women and mums, but also women without kids to. Turn up in a certain light wherever they go and for us to be neat and tidy.

• 13:24Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 13:25Fearne Cotton?

  Stay within the lines. And actually, sometimes we wanna be wild and wayward and messy. But there's no room for us doing that without someone going, you're a lunatic.

• 13:35Speaker 02

  Yeah, exactly. The standards are so different and the expectations are so high. And you know what I've realised, Fern, and it goes to this thing of being likeable. It's like, why does it matter so much that people like me? Do you know what I mean? Like, it doesn't, it shouldn't. I remember when I got sober, someone said to me, what other people think of you is none of your business. And I was like, shut the fuck up, it's my only business. And as I got older, as I get older, I'm like, yeah, I don't give a shit if you like what I'm wearing or if you think I'm too much, you know? Yes, I'm, you know, I am too much. I'm too fucking brilliant. I'm too legendary. And for you to be able, not you personally, Fern, but for you to be able to deal with.

• 14:20Speaker 02

  And it's like, I just had to, yeah, I wanted to create this woman who just could do whatever the fuck she wanted. And so I had to like, I asked a lot of my friends, you know, what would you do if you, if you weren't scared of what other people would think of you? Just in a day, if you had that superpower. And people were like, I would sing out loud, listening to my music on the train. It was really interesting, all the different things that people came back with.

• 14:49Fearne Cotton?

  What a great question.

• 14:50Speaker 02

  Yeah, and it was, and I was like, and one of them was like, I would just, I would just spend the whole day drinking in my pyjamas. And I was like, okay, Olivia's gonna do that then.

• 14:59Fearne Cotton?

  What would you do? What would be your thing?

• 15:01Speaker 02

  Um, well, I think I try, I probably do, I try and do this as much as possible. So I would probably like run in my underwear around London or something.

• 15:12Fearne Cotton?

  Ticked it off the list several times.

• 15:14Speaker 02

  If I wasn't worried about, oh, I don't, I think, even though I feel like I am inherently a people pleaser, I try and live my life in a way that is sort of, I don't like, yeah, actually thinking about. What would you do, Fern?

• 15:30Fearne Cotton?

  I don't know. As you were saying that, I was thinking, what would I do? What would that thing be? I think I'd probably, I'd probably take a few more risks work-wise because I think that's been a big, big one for me is I feel still now, like when I released Likeable, I had to, you know, do all the press stuff that you have to do to sell a book. It's really hard to sell a book. We all know that. So you go on to break it down and be really like a base level about it. You need to go on a TV show. You need to do a book tour. And I felt really overexposed in that moment. I wasn't. There's people who were on TV every day. But I just felt like this is opening me up to a lot of criticism that I don't know if I can handle. Not even about the book, just about me existing or me saying something.

• 16:15Fearne Cotton?

  And of course, you know, on social media, you're going to get every variation of comment, whether it's, oh, I love the book or like your top or people saying, I think that you're this over self-analysis is narcissistic and, you know, whatever people want to say.

• 16:31Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 16:32Fearne Cotton?

  And all of it just makes me want to run away and hide and hide in a little hole. And I think if I really stopped caring, I would be doing so much more. I would be doing all sorts of work stuff that I don't want to put myself out there for because it feels.

• 16:46Speaker 02

  Embarrassing.

• 16:48Fearne Cotton?

  I just don't want that feedback. I just don't want it. I, I, I really, it's a real, that one is a real tricky one for me. But I, I need to think about that question more. Maybe it's going to percolate throughout the day. Cause I'd really love to land on a solid answer of like, what would that one thing be? I think everyone listening to this should have a think about that too. Cause it's maybe writing it down is going to be a helpful tool as well.

• 17:10Speaker 02

  Yeah. I think it would actually, you know, you've touched on something there, Fern, and it would be, yeah. If I, if I really could really dump people pleasing for one day, it would be that thing of like standing in my absolute motherfucking majesty. You know?

• 17:28Fearne Cotton?

  In your power.

• 17:29Speaker 02

  Any fear of what people were going to say about it. And it would be doing the dazzling things, you know, because I often do do that thing of like, yeah. Yeah, like promoting this book. I was, I went the other day to do a post and I was like, oh sh- I started writing shameless self-promotion. And I'm like, what the fuck? This is my Instagram. Like, if I can't do this here. And it's also, it's also a book that I have like sw- like sweated blood and tears over. And also, how am I modeling to the people that follow me? Like, no, I've done this and this isn't shameless and this is fine, right? So I think I would just be less apologetic. I would be less apologetic.

• 18:14Fearne Cotton?

  Be more American about it.

• 18:15Speaker 02

  Yeah, I wish, oh my god, it would be like bold, brash and more brilliant, even more brilliant. That's what I do. And I wouldn't be like scared to say that, you know, I think that I should like be on Strictly Come Dancing and win it.

• 18:32Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, exactly.

• 18:34Speaker 02

  I think that I, I wanna be like, I think I should be in like Bad Bunny's casita, you know, dancing sexually. I would, all of those things.

• 18:43Fearne Cotton?

  All of those things. I know, because the thing is, the one thought that helps me push through those feelings is imagining myself, hopefully, at ninety, ninety-five. And looking back, and I would not regret any of those things. There might be other stuff I regret. I think having regrets is quite normal. But I wouldn't regret giving something a go or being all in. Like you, I'm an all-in person. I am like open-hearted, all-in. I give everything my absolute one hundred percent in all areas and to my detriment a lot of the time.

• 19:18Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 19:19Fearne Cotton?

  And I don't wanna change that about myself. And I've worried so often that people think, oh, she's too much. Like, she talks too much, she's too loud, she's too over the top. She's too huggy, she's too whatever. And I really want to care less about that. And I think, going back to what you said a moment ago about being likeable. And you know, when people throw negative opinions about you, whether it is you're too this, you're too that. The two things that I've landed on are, first of all, are they saying something that actually highlights a worry or insecurity we have that would be interesting to look at? Not to berate yourself or turn against yourself, because that's what I've historically done. Like, oh yeah, I am a piece of shit, I'm just a piece of fucking shit.

• 20:01Fearne Cotton?

  But actually go, right, you've just said over and analysing yourself is narcissistic. Do I have a bit of an insecurity about that? Maybe. How can I get curious about that? How could I dive deeper into looking at where that's come from? If any of it, I believe, is true or not?

• 20:16Speaker 02

  Well, also, doesn't it say more about the person that's left the comment?

• 20:19Fearne Cotton?

  I think it absolutely does, but I think it can still be really interesting to analyse why it's caused a reaction. Because if you said to me, oh, you're too purple, I'd go, no, I'm not, I know I'm not.

• 20:31Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 20:31Fearne Cotton?

  But if you said you're too, like, too much, I'd go, oh, why does that feel?

• 20:36Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 20:36Fearne Cotton?

  Like, am I worried about the rejection?

• 20:38Speaker 02

  Because you believe fundamentally at the heart of it that you are.

• 20:42Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 20:42Speaker 02

  And that's the problem, isn't it, Fern? It's that we, as women, and it is very, I think, specifically as women, are, it's, it's, there's, there's a coin, right, that we exist on, on either side of. And one side is too much, you're too much, and the other side is you're not enough.

• 21:00Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 21:01Speaker 02

  And all, they're basically the same thing, right?

• 21:03Fearne Cotton?

  So we need to land in the middle and be perfect.

• 21:06Speaker 02

  But it's all about fundamentally keeping yourself small. Keep yourself small. Don't inhabit the space that you live in. Don't, don't step into your motherfucking majesty. That's gonna be my life. I need to go and get that tattooed.

• 21:18Fearne Cotton?

  On your face.

• 21:19Speaker 02

  Oh, actually, on my face, yeah. Uh, let's go and do it. Come on, everyone. Um, and, you know, and that is, it's a way that the society, and I don't think it even consciously does it, you know, but it's like, whoo, don't rot the boat, you know, be, be good, because it is a safety mechanism, you know? We hear a lot about fight, flight, freeze, you know, as in terms of a kind of, as trauma responses to danger. But what we don't hear about is fawn. Which is this, this, this quite like, it's this hypervigilant response where to get someone on your side or, you know, something that you, that is a threat to you, you're nice to that thing, you know?

• 22:00Speaker 02

  And that is absolutely a hundred percent my way of dealing with things. Yeah, same. And I think for a lot of women it is. And yeah, as in my forties, I often think, and I say this, like, you spend the first forty years of your life trying to be the person you're told. If you are this thing, then your life will be good, you know? If you get married, if you get this job, if you, you know, you get a house, you have a baby, you do, you know, you, you, you know, your skin looks like this and all of that, then you'll be happy. Yeah. And then we get, we do all of these things. We work really fucking hard to do all these things. And it's like, oh, hang on a second. Why do I feel, still feel like something is wrong?

• 22:44Speaker 02

  And it's like, well, because you're none of, some of those things you might wanna do, that's okay. But then the next forty years of your life, if you're lucky, are kind of going, actually, who do I wanna be? And what matters to me? And so when I first came up with the idea for this book, it was like, I wanted it to be kind of magic, you know, like very much like Freaky Friday or Big, you know? A spell is cast over this, over Olivia, and she needs to work out how to undo the spell. And then I got to this stage where I was like, hang on, she doesn't need a magic spell put on her because there's this thing called perimenopause, which does it for you, right?

• 23:26Speaker 02

  And like, I really felt, I got very low in my early forties. I mean, I'm saying this, like, this was like decades ago. This was literally like, I'm gonna be forty six in a couple of months, right? And I got really low and really uncomfortable with all the people pleasing. It was like, I can't do this anymore. It makes me feel so dirty and disgusting. It's a bit like, I don't, if anyone has ever like tried to get sober and they go to twelve step meetings, but they carry on drinking. There's this phrase, which is like, it's fucked, you fucked drinking for yourself, right? Because you've got like a head full of recovery and a belly full of beer. And it's like, oh.

• 24:07Fearne Cotton?

  God.

• 24:07Speaker 02

  And it was the same, I felt like this with, with people pleasing. I was like, oh, I'm saying yes to things I really don't wanna do. And I just feel gross. And anyway, I was really low, really very depressed. And I think there were lots of different reasons for that. And I, you know, and then I realised I was perimenopausal and I was like, fuck, actually, this is an opportunity. Like perimenopause, menopause is not this like awful thing where everything shuts down and that's it. It's like, it's an opportunity and the stuff it brings up for you is like your body and your brain going, are you gonna deal with this, babes? Because if you don't, the next forty years of your life are gonna be tricky too.

• 24:50Speaker 02

  So like, fucking go for it. And that, that was what I was like, oh, Olivia, it's just a forty something woman who's like, fuck all of you. I've had enough.

• 25:00Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, I can't, I cannot take anymore. And like what you said a moment ago about keeping small, you can really get a sense of that at the start of the book, where Olivia is doing that, like, she's grateful for the little tidbits she's given at work, like, I'm so, I'm so grateful. And that's one thing that definitely fucks me off is if a woman ever says, I want more, or I want better for myself, or I want this, or I want to, I wrote a poem the other day about like, women stretching their arms as fucking wide as they can get them and knowing there are no edges. Like, keep fucking stretching your arms out. You don't have to go, like, gratitude is amazing. And that is just a baseline for all of our happiness, to be grateful for the things that we know make a difference in our lives,

• 25:42Fearne Cotton?

  whether it's our health, our family, our friends, a beautiful thing to do. But to be grateful for things that you know are not enough.

• 25:49Speaker 02

  Well, also, I'm not gonna be grateful for you paying me for the work, for doing the work. Yeah, like, and also I'm really good at, this is the other thing, yeah. Like, I, I very much felt that. And like, I really needed, on behalf of, and this is a novel. Right? So like it's it's it's it's made up, okay? But it is very much fucking rooted in the experiences that uh me and my friends had in our twenties working in the media.

• 26:18Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 26:18Speaker 02

  And I was like, actually, it doesn't matter. Like, it could be any industry where you put up with breadcrumbs.

• 26:25Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 26:25Speaker 02

  You put up with shit and you're gaslit and you're told, be grateful and all of that stuff.

• 26:30Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 26:30Speaker 02

  And then you get to your forties and you're like.

• 26:32Fearne Cotton?

  It stops women's ambition, I think. It stops women going, oh, I could, if you want, it's not for everybody. Be the CEO, ditch this job, do something I really love, be a founder, whatever. It stops women from doing that because we're told, well, you should be grateful for what you've got. Yeah, I'm grateful for the things that I know I'm very lucky to have, whether it, like, we just said, all the base, all the basics. But when it is, you know that you're being kept down, kept small, because you're simply a woman. Like, that's where we need to spread our our wings widely.

• 27:03Speaker 02

  Yeah, absolutely. And also, I just, that thing of like, I had, I had quite a lot of fun writing. There were so many scenes, I just loved writing where, and that, the, when, and when it opens up and Olivia is like, all, she's going through all the things she has to do on a daily basis to make herself like, likeable.

• 27:25Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 27:25Speaker 02

  You know, and all these things where she's like, you know, it's the the three hundred pounds she has to spend every few months on her roots or her, you know, on the, the, you know, the botox that she thinks she has to get to look like this, the certain way. Obviously, this is not a judgment on anyone, you know, who does do do any of these things. But she's like, also, it's like, the eyeshadow that she, you know, the perfect palette so that it's not too much and she can't wear red lips and eyeshadow and all this stuff. And I was like, oh, my god, all of these things.

• 27:58Fearne Cotton?

  All of these things.

• 27:58Speaker 02

  That we don't even realise that the energy and the effort that we put into them before we've even got out of fucking bed.

• 28:06Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 28:06Speaker 02

  And I was like, imagine, imagine if we didn't have to think about this shit, you know, like what we could be doing with our lives.

• 28:14Fearne Cotton?

  Anything we want. Anything we fucking want.

• 28:21Speaker 05

  At Humana, our Medicare Advantage plans are easy to understand and easy on your wallet. Like offering more benefits than you'd get from original Medicare alone. And including dental, vision and hearing coverage in every plan. And the best part is, every plan has a $0 or low monthly plan premium, which makes it easier to save too. So this Medicare planning season, plan well with Humana. Learn more at gethumana.com. Humana is a Medicare Advantage HMO and PPO organisation with a Medicare contract. Enrollment in any Humana plan depends on contract renewal.

• 28:51Fearne Cotton?

  Hello, this is Susie Ruffel.

• 28:52Speaker 06

  And Maisie Adam.

• 28:53Fearne Cotton?

  And together we host Big Kick Energy. Hey Mais, what is it?

• 28:56Speaker 06

  Only the best podcast ever.

• 28:57Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 28:58Speaker 06

  A comedy entertainment podcast with a focus on all things women's football, all things hilarious, all things friendship. It's a laugh is what it is, Ruffel.

• 29:08Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, and a fair bit of gossiping too.

• 29:10Speaker 06

  Oh, and a lovely bit of gossip. Chow down on the gossip.

• 29:12Fearne Cotton?

  Num, num, num, num, num. You can listen wherever you get your podcasts. You just need to search Big Kick Energy.

• 29:18Speaker 06

  Grab a knife and fork and tuck in, baby.

• 29:24Fearne Cotton?

  As you said, fictional character, but very much works in the job that you did back in the day. Now, an interesting point that I love that you brought up in the fiction is even as a people pleaser, when you work for a newspaper.

• 29:39Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 29:40Fearne Cotton?

  On one hand, you're trying to people please editors, so you want to get the headline. You want to get the scoop.

• 29:45Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 29:45Fearne Cotton?

  But often that is then at your detriment because the people reading it or the person you've written about is up in arms and you've been outrageous to please your boss.

• 29:55Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah.

• 29:56Fearne Cotton?

  How did that sit with you when you were working in the media back in the day? Knowing that you've got, you know, hundreds, thousands of people who can then attack you and say, I don't agree with what you've just written in this week's column.

• 30:06Speaker 02

  Yeah, well, I don't know. It was really weird. I think I've always been just used to just getting abuse. Like I always remember, like from a very young age, that's you become quite conditioned to it. And again, it's like you're told be grateful that people are telling you that you're a worthless piece of shit under your columns because that means people are reading it. You know?

• 30:28Fearne Cotton?

  But did that on a deeper level not make you feel?

• 30:31Speaker 02

  Of course.

• 30:32Fearne Cotton?

  Like I go into self-loathing still when that happens. But I'm now at an age where I can check myself and go. You don't need to listen to Shaun from Shropshire. It doesn't matter.

• 30:42Speaker 02

  Shaun from Shropshire is why.

• 30:44Fearne Cotton?

  He's a made up guy.

• 30:45Speaker 02

  I feel sad. No, Shaun from Shropshire is not a made up guy fan.

• 30:48Fearne Cotton?

  They exist.

• 30:48Speaker 02

  Shaun from Shropshire is, it's like a tongue twister. Shaun from Shropshire. Shaun from Shropshire absolutely exists and I feel sad for him. And that's how I've had to come to this place where I've never, like, I've never done that thing in journalism of tearing people down.

• 31:07Fearne Cotton?

  No.

• 31:07Speaker 02

  For the.

• 31:08Fearne Cotton?

  That's not your style.

• 31:08Speaker 02

  That's not my, that's not my style, unless they absolutely have done something terrible and it's warranted, like Andrew Man.

• 31:17Fearne Cotton?

  Can't even say his name.

• 31:19Speaker 02

  Andrew from Norfolk.

• 31:22Speaker 02

  Um, but I, uh, and I've always tried to be, the purpose of the stuff I write is I write about stuff that makes me feel bad about myself in the hope that it makes other people feel good about themselves. And then if Shaun from Shropshire doesn't like that, you know, um, I just, I, I think about Sally from Swindon who.

• 31:47Fearne Cotton?

  Who you've really helped.

• 31:48Speaker 02

  Who's get, you know, and so, yeah, but obviously journalism is a, a cutthroat industry. And I, I sort of don't really know how I've managed to navigate it in a way.

• 32:00Fearne Cotton?

  I don't.

• 32:01Speaker 02

  Whereby it, I get to, but I think it's because I, in a way, maybe that was the non-people-pleaser-y thing that I've always done, which is that I've always written about what matters to me. And for some reason, I was gifted this ability to speak honestly about really dark stuff that I was personally going through in my life. And that happened to please my editors back in the day because people wanted to read about, you know, someone speaking openly about mental illness and alcoholism and stuff like that.

• 32:37Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, it's bloody powerful.

• 32:38Speaker 02

  But I don't, yeah, I don't, I don't give much truck to Shaun from Shropshire.

• 32:46Speaker 02

  And what he thinks about my waist or how, you know, or, oh, how narcissistic I am or how self-indulgent I am. And there's, there's one guy. Who used to go around and count the number of times I wrote I in a column. You know, like as a way of kind of make it. And I was like, God, what a tr- what a sad little man.

• 33:09Fearne Cotton?

  What a life. Go, go and get a hobby. Oh, and also if you're writing a column about your mental health, you're gonna have to write I a few times. Count how many times I write it in likeable, fucking loads.

• 33:21Speaker 02

  But also like, what's wrong with me talking about myself? Like, I hate that. This isn't, you know, when a man writes, uh, when a man writes a memoir about the, you know, addiction or the, the stuff that he's gone through, he gets a fucking Pulitzer.

• 33:34Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 33:34Speaker 02

  And when I do it or we do it, it's like, you know, I don't know.

• 33:38Fearne Cotton?

  There they are, whanging on about themselves again.

• 33:40Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 33:40Fearne Cotton?

  Well, I have to say, and I should have said this right at the start, but we've, we've talked about so many brilliant things already that specifically your book Mad Girl was a game changer for me. I mean, this is not news to you because I, I can't remember how we first got in touch, but I remember having this game changing conversation with you where I met you at your office at the time. I think I'll be on your podcast.

• 34:02Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 34:03Fearne Cotton?

  And I had never even said the word bulimia out loud. I felt, I don't even know if it was shame. I think it was more this weird disconnect where I just thought, I don't associate what I was doing with that word. It feels like a thing. And the thing I was doing, that wasn't a thing. You know, I'm not doing it anymore and it's in the past and I couldn't say the word out loud. And reading your book Mad Girl, it was so liberating to see you just talking about bulimia, OCD, depression, anxiety in a way that was just everyday conversation as hopefully it can, it can become more like that. I don't think we're ever gonna get to a place where it's just commonplace, but

• 34:47Fearne Cotton?

  I think it should, we should be able to talk about these subjects without it being either, I don't wanna hear your story, you're a narcissist, or, oh my God, I can't believe they're talking about this. You know, you've brought so much liberation to these subject matters. But for me personally, it was game changing because I couldn't move on from it without recognizing it.

• 35:04Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 35:04Fearne Cotton?

  I was just stuck in this thing of like fingers and ears, la, la, la, don't think about it. And having that chat with you and you talking about like the lowest of the low moments within your bulimia allowed me to go. Oh, right. I actually feel really sorry for my younger self going through that. And why did I go through that? What led me to that? And oh, this is actually a mental health issue, not just me being problematic, doing something I shouldn't have done.

• 35:31Speaker 02

  Yeah, well, first of all, thank you for, I'm glad, I'm glad, well, I'm sorry that you, I obviously, I'm not grateful that you've gone through that, but I am grateful that you shared that and that it helped. And I think that's the thing, it's the shame we feel about all of this stuff. Like, I just spent like decades, I'm only forty five, right? And I have spent over half of my life, two thirds of my life, I would say, feeling ashamed of who I am. Like, at my heart, I'm like, I, I just, yeah, just so ashamed, ashamed of, you know,

• 36:11Speaker 02

  and, and, and not even ashamed of the things, like bulimia, for example, like, I didn't think that was a bad thing. You know, like, in fact, that was weirdly something that I was like proud of, because I thought it was making me smaller and it was making me take up less space, you know? But looking back, like, fuck, you know?

• 36:29Fearne Cotton?

  Same, same. And actually, do you know what? Now you're saying it, I do have shame around it. Because the one thing I remember, you helped me through the shame of, I've still got like gum damage at the bottom of my jaw here, like receding gums. And I still feel shame about that now. I still feel like-

• 36:47Speaker 02

  Oh, my god. You know, I don't think about this, but I have-

• 36:49Fearne Cotton?

  You told me you had a missing tooth.

• 36:51Speaker 02

  I have a missing tooth. I still have a missing tooth. And I never got it filled back in, because it reminds, it can, you know, like, it reminds me of like how dark my life used to be. And how, yeah, that I was like throwing up so much that like, I literally rotted one of my teeth.

• 37:10Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, yeah. But you telling me that was enough for me to go, okay, I don't want to go around showing people that I've got receding gums on the bottom, but I feel like I can say it out loud. Like, I don't have to sit there going, like, I used to look at other people when they were talking and like, study their gums and like, oh, my god, their gums are perfect. They go all the way down to the bottom of their teeth. Like, I'm so envious and I used to feel so gross about it. But you, just kindly, me and you, we weren't near a microphone, we were just having a cup of tea. You showing me that you had a missing tooth was like- Oh my god, I cannot tell you the weight that took off of it and like just eradicated the shame immediately, immediately. And that's why, let's not give a fuck about Shaun

• 37:52Fearne Cotton?

  from Shropshireshire saying, you're a narcissist, because for me, that is the power of it. People sharing stories about themselves lets other people know, I'm not drowning in this alone. And that is fucking important.

• 38:05Speaker 02

  It is, well, it's, it's actually the only thing there is fun. Like, I remember when I went to rehab and we had to sit around in this circle. I was like, it was, you know, as you'd imagine in a rehab, and tell like the worst stories of the worst things that we had done in our active addiction. You know, some of us, that was alcohol, some of us, that was drugs. It was like, you know, it was a whole thing. And, and I remember that it was like, right, it's your turn, Bryony. You know, you've got to talk about, tell us about one, a night, or when things, you went out and you thought that you were just gonna have, you know, a drink and you ended up, it went crazy. And I was like, where do you want, like, I could pick any number of occasions. And anyway, and I remember

• 38:50Speaker 02

  being like, I can't, you know, I can't do that. And this woman, this counsellor said to me, you know, Bryony, shame dies when you expose it to the light. And I remember, because I remember at the tail end of that, like, active alcoholism, being so ashamed. I was like, I am the worst mother in the world, you know, because I, there's like, no other woman is, no other mum is behaving like this. I am the only one. And then I remember going to rehab and the first person I met was another woman, same sobriety date as me, child the same age, literally lived a mile up the road. And she's like, my sobriety best friend to this day, you know. And I realised, oh, fuck, like, I wasn't special

• 39:33Speaker 02

  or different. And I wasn't a terrible human. I was just someone with an illness. And my whole, like, at every point, all of my work has been like, I have lived in this shame. And then I've realised that actually, I'm just a very normal human. And there was nothing to be ashamed of. And I could get better and stop living in the shame. And it like properly breaks my heart, Fern, to think of us all out there, like feeling ashamed of our

• 40:01Fearne Cotton?

  I know.

• 40:02Speaker 02

  receding gums or feeling ashamed of, you know, whatever it is, like our size, our, you know, there's always something, you know, we are taught, we have been programmed as women to pick ourselves apart in the name of belonging, you know? It's not like, what do you think is great about you? It's like, what would you change? Oh, my arms, my whatever, you know? I wish I didn't have pores, you know, my pores weren't visible. I'm like, what the fuck?

• 40:29Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, what are meant to be these sort of like weird android humans that are just smooth and shiny everywhere? We have no hair and it's like, what the fuck?

• 40:36Speaker 02

  And it makes me furious. It makes me furious because it's like, fuck me. Like this is all, like perfectionism is a tool of the patriarchy to keep us small. And we are, we are colluding with it and it's not, and it's not our fault. This is not to shame anyone.

• 40:55Fearne Cotton?

  This is centuries old shit that we're dealing with here.

• 40:57Speaker 02

  That has been, that we have been sort of taught to kind of actively take part in. Because I look back at my twenties and some of the things that happened there and some of the things that I like said yes to, do you know what I mean? And I didn't even know they were wrong. It's like, we're all sitting there now, watching America's Next Top Model going, oh, I cannot believe it. At the time, no one was saying, I can't believe, it was just, it was what?

• 41:19Fearne Cotton?

  It was there.

• 41:20Speaker 02

  It was there. It was like, we breathe this shit in, you know? Like, what's wrong with, you know, what it was all about? What is wrong with me? What can I change about myself? You know, and

• 41:31Fearne Cotton?

  It's very hard for women to like themselves, very, very hard. Do you like yourself, Bryony?

• 41:37Speaker 02

  Yeah, I really do. I do, I genuinely do now, but I have times where I spend a lot of time thinking about how other people. My baseline is.

• 41:50Speaker 02

  This is the truth. I wake up every morning and my brain, like the goblin king in my brain is like, Bryony, everyone hates you. Everything you're supposed to do today is gonna be a failure. And you let down everyone yesterday and you're gonna let down everyone today. You're disappointing people. You're too much. You know, someone's cross with you. That is literally what I, as the moment my eyes ping open and I'm like, oh my fucking god. And I immediately have to kind of go about disproving it and remembering.

• 42:25Fearne Cotton?

  And how do you do that? Cause there'll be many people listening to this who'll wake up with that dread.

• 42:29Speaker 02

  Well, I just get, I just have to get out and out of the house as quickly as possible. Because it's like, go outside.

• 42:34Fearne Cotton?

  Running, walking, what do you do?

• 42:35Speaker 02

  Yeah, I love, I love, I love running. Uh, I am an elite athlete, actually, Fern.

• 42:40Fearne Cotton?

  How many marathons have you done now?

• 42:41Speaker 02

  Uh, well, I've done, I've only done three.

• 42:44Fearne Cotton?

  Only?

• 42:45Speaker 02

  Yeah, I'm gonna do.

• 42:45Fearne Cotton?

  Three more than me?

• 42:46Speaker 02

  I'm gonna do my fourth, hopefully in a few weeks' time. That, that's, that's gonna be an underwear one I'm doing with Adele Roberts for the Bowbabe Fund.

• 42:56Fearne Cotton?

  Love Adele.

• 42:57Speaker 02

  And we're doing it in our underwear because Adele wants to show off her stoma Audrey.

• 43:01Fearne Cotton?

  Love Audrey.

• 43:02Speaker 02

  So yeah, so me, Adele and Audrey. Anyway, I get up, I run and that is just emotional regulation for me. But it's also, isn't it? It's like, oh, look, the world is still going and people are getting on with their lives. And I am not a piece of shit the world revolves around. Like, my head wants me to think it's a piece of shit. I'm a piece of shit the world revolves around. But I'm just another person, right? And like, no one is actually paying that much attention. And even the people that I think are paying attention, so even like Sean from Shropshire, right? He's actually thinking about himself most of the time.

• 43:38Fearne Cotton?

  Course he is.

• 43:38Speaker 02

  Do you know what I mean? Like, so just let's get on with it.

• 43:40Fearne Cotton?

  Even his projection, this, you know, fantastical figure we've created, even his projection onto us is, like you said, about him, you know?

• 43:49Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 43:50Fearne Cotton?

  As we all know, it's the most basic thing to say, but happy people don't say shitty things. We all know that. People that feel good in their skin, that are moving about their day just fine. They don't need to go and send someone a shitty comment online right into a, you know, someone who's written a column in a paper. They don't need to do it. They're, they're just happy with their lot. And I think people that feel. You know, a good level of baseline happiness, also understand that they're not going to have the same opinions as everybody else, and that's okay. That they can rub along with people that think differently to each other. And I think people that don't feel good need everybody to think the same as them, for them to feel okay.

• 44:30Speaker 02

  And well, that's also, and that is kind of what people pleasing comes from as well. On the flip side of that, it's like, one of the big things, you know, that I have had to learn is that, like my bestest bestest friend, she always says to me, Bryony, I don't agree with you on that, but do you think our friendship isn't like, do you think we're not solid enough that our friendship can get through the fact that we don't agree on the same, like, I don't know, like some sort of nuance or whatever, you know, and it's true. And one of the biggest things I've had to learn in recovery, you know, from OCD, from depression, from alcoholism, from all of it, from life, right?

• 45:10Speaker 02

  Is that every human is, you know, like, I have to respect that every human is big enough to deal with their own emotions. Like, I am not here to caretake for someone else, you know? I am not responsible for how you feel, or how Shaun from Shropshire feels, or how my mum feels.

• 45:28Fearne Cotton?

  This is a big one.

• 45:30Speaker 02

  Yeah, and that's hard. And it's like, and it is almost like, here we go, right? It's almost, you know, when you hear people talk about delusions of grandeur.

• 45:38Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 45:39Speaker 02

  You're right. I almost have the opposite, which is delusions of inferiority. And I think that I have the power to make people feel terrible, to like ruin people's days.

• 45:50Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 45:51Speaker 02

  And I just fucking don't, you know? And my brain is like, you need to work hard to make people happy. I don't have that much power.

• 45:58Fearne Cotton?

  No, I used to be exactly the same as that, and that's something I've spent the last probably two years unpicking, is I assume that if I made even a sort of stranger or someone that I knew very loosely on the school run or something, if I had made them feel a little bit unseen, or not valued or whatever, they would go around and I would have wrecked the rest of their week. And it's like, what the hell am I do- that is mental, but also would absolutely take on the burden of the responsibility of everyone's wellbeing in my circle. And I think actually-

• 46:32Fearne Cotton?

  Parenting has hugely helped me with that one because I'm learning on the job now and in real time like we all are, that we cannot, if we try to keep our kids happy all the time, we're doing them a disservice.

• 46:45Speaker 02

  Oh my god.

• 46:45Fearne Cotton?

  We're not preparing them for life. So now, the trick for me has been using that same model in the rest of my life. So say if, you know, one of my kids says, like my son, I really want these golf clubs. And I'm like, mate, we need to start a chart so you can start saving up to buy them. I'm not buying them today. Oh, my friends have got me. They kick off or whatever happens. And to allow that and to go, he's upset. And that's okay.

• 47:09Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 47:10Fearne Cotton?

  He thinks I'm an absolute knob at the moment. That's okay.

• 47:12Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 47:13Fearne Cotton?

  Or whatever. This is all fictitious. But do you know what I'm saying? It's an example of. And then to take that into my friendship groups, if I don't, if I can't commit to something that all my friends are doing, or a work thing, and to know that it's okay that they don't feel all right.

• 47:26Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 47:26Fearne Cotton?

  That's been a game changer for me.

• 47:28Speaker 02

  Also, conflict is okay.

• 47:29Fearne Cotton?

  It's fine.

• 47:30Speaker 02

  You know, it's like, we're not-

• 47:31Fearne Cotton?

  It's how you deal with it.

• 47:32Speaker 02

  We don't want to go around, like, pissing people off on purpose, like Olivia.

• 47:37Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 47:38Speaker 02

  But, but actually, yeah, difficult conversations are okay, you know, and it's fine. And the world won't wobble on its fucking axis.

• 47:47Fearne Cotton?

  And it doesn't make you a terrible person.

• 47:48Speaker 02

  No, it just makes you a person.

• 47:50Fearne Cotton?

  Just makes you a human.

• 47:51Speaker 02

  It just makes you a person. And I, yeah, like, oh, I don't have to make everyone happy.

• 47:56Fearne Cotton?

  No, no, no.

• 48:00Speaker 05

  At Humana, our Medicare Advantage plans are easy to understand and easy on your wallet. Like offering more benefits than you'd get from original Medicare alone, and including dental, vision and hearing coverage in every plan. And the best part is, every plan has a $0 or low monthly plan premium, which makes it easier to save too. So this Medicare planning season, plan well with Humana. Learn more at gethumana.com. Humana is a Medicare Advantage, HMO and PPO organisation with a Medicare contract. Enrollment in any Humana plan depends on contract renewal.

• 48:30Fearne Cotton?

  Hello, this is Susie Ruffel.

• 48:31Speaker 06

  And Maisie Adam.

• 48:32Fearne Cotton?

  And together we host Big Kick Energy. Hey Mais, what is it?

• 48:35Speaker 06

  Only the best podcast ever.

• 48:36Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 48:37Speaker 06

  A comedy entertainment podcast with a focus on all things women's football, all things hilarious, all things friendship. It's a laugh is what it is, Ruffel.

• 48:47Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, and a fair bit of gossiping too.

• 48:49Speaker 06

  Oh, and a lovely bit of gossip. Chow down on the gossip.

• 48:51Fearne Cotton?

  Nom, nom, nom, nom, nom. You can listen wherever you get your podcasts. Just need to search Big Kick Energy.

• 48:57Speaker 06

  Grab a knife and fork and tuck in, baby.

• 49:03Fearne Cotton?

  Hey, I feel like it would be remiss of me to not talk about body confidence because you have been such an advocate for being happy in your skin. And I think it's the biggest problem for most women still to this day, that they just don't like their bodies. If you said, what do you not like about yourself?

• 49:21Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 49:21Fearne Cotton?

  It would be a physical trait, more than an emotional expression.

• 49:25Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 49:25Fearne Cotton?

  All day long, for most women, not all women, most women. And you are like running these marathons in your underwear, pushing this new attitude that you are so hoping catches fire, that other women go, I want to run in my underwear.

• 49:42Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 49:42Fearne Cotton?

  I want to feel good in my skin.

• 49:44Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 49:44Fearne Cotton?

  What would you say to someone listening right now, who's like, I hate my physical appearance, I hate being in my body?

• 49:52Speaker 02

  I would say, of course you do. Of course you hate being in your body, because you have grown up in a society that has taught you to be. So first of all, I would say, don't shame yourself because, for not being happy and content in your skin, right? Because this message is now, like, you know, be happy in your skin. And it's like, well, hang on, why, why am I, why should I feel happy in my skin? The way that you feel is actually appropriate, right? You have been conditioned to feel this way by society, by patriarchy, by all of these things, okay? So that's what I would first say. And then secondly, I would say that you are a fucking miracle. You are a miracle. So this is what I want to say to

• 50:35Speaker 02

  you at home. Like, we don't want to think about our biological parents, like, getting it on, right? But just for a moment, just let's think about your mum and dad getting it on. So like, I'll think about my, I'll do it with my parents.

• 50:51Fearne Cotton?

  That would be good for us, thank you.

• 50:52Speaker 02

  If that makes you feel a bit better, okay? So, 46, whatever years ago, right? If my mum and my dad, they're like, Barry, the, the like, Barry White was playing, or whatever, and...

• 51:04Fearne Cotton?

  The milk tray's out.

• 51:05Speaker 02

  Yeah, the milk tray's out. But if the doorbell has like, run, and, you know... Interrupted them, or if more likely, my dad had said something that annoyed my mother and they hadn't got it on, I may not exist. You wouldn't. No, exactly. So like, as we all know, right, biology lesson here, and I'm sure, I apologize if you've had this. It's just sex education. I'm gonna give you some sex education. Okay. So to get it on, and my dad releases millions, your dad releases millions of sperm into your mum's body. Because your mum's body is fucking amazing, as is yours, right?

• 51:43Speaker 02

  Your body is like, I don't want any old sperm fertilising the egg. If there's an egg there, by the way, as well, because as we know, the majority of the calendar month, there is no egg there, right? It releases acid to like, kill the weak sperm, like, die, die. Weak sperm. All of those versions of you, gone, right? And then the remaining sperm, they have to like, do like, an uphill Iron Man. That's the equivalent of getting to the fallopian tubes, where the eggs might or might not sit, right? And they have to like, punch through like, membranes, that's like, us having to go through walls. It's like, really hard. Lots of them get very fucking tired, they die. So those versions of you, ah, ah, out the way, right? And then they get to the, they get to the tubes, right?

• 52:28Speaker 02

  And half of the remaining ones are like, am I gonna go left? Am I gonna go right? Half of them take the wrong turning, ah, ah, all of those versions of you gone, right? So the remaining, the few sperm that remain, right? They get to the egg, and the egg, the egg is surrounded by white blood cells who act like nightclub bouncers. And they're like, you ain't coming, we don't want any old riffraff coming in. No. So eventually, the sperm fertilises the egg, and then as we know, that is no guarantee that, you know, that it's going to like, go the distance, you know? We know that miscarriage, all sorts of things happen, right? Uh, and then, but say it does, and you get to nine months or whatever,

• 53:11Speaker 02

  and that, the day you're born, most doctors say is the most dangerous day of your life, right? And then every day, up until now, you have stayed alive. No.

• 53:21Fearne Cotton?

  In your beautiful body.

• 53:22Speaker 02

  In your beautiful body. The universe wants you here. It wants you here and it wants you here looking like you. Not like Kim Kardashian, no disrespect to Kim Kardashian, doesn't want you looking like, you know, Emily Ratajkowski. Again, no, you know, it wants you looking like you and we need you here, you know, and your body is miraculous. And I don't know about you as well, in my forties, Fern, I, you know, I have lost friends in the last few years.

• 53:50Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 53:51Speaker 02

  You know, suddenly from cancer, from, you know, and, and we're not, this isn't a given. This isn't a fucking given, you know, aging is a miracle, it's a privilege. And I just would say to you at home, and that isn't to shame you and be like, oh, are you lucky to be, again, I'm not like gratifying.

• 54:10Fearne Cotton?

  But it's the perspective shift you've just given us is what we need to hear.

• 54:15Speaker 02

  And yeah, and so I like, don't care that you have cellulite or that your stomach is, you know. And I, the most important thing about you, it, you know, is not how much you weigh or some numbers, your dress size or whatever. And I think we really need to remember that, especially now, we're in an age of weight loss jabs, GLP ones, whatever. And diet culture is back. It is back, baby, you know, and I would just say that you are worth so much more than some numbers on some scales or whatever, and you deserve to exist, whatever your body looks like, whatever shape it is.

• 55:00Speaker 02

  And you deserve to get out there and enjoy life. And, you know, I'm a, I'm a larger, you know, like, I don't know. I don't even know, like, what is large now? I weigh like, I have no shame in saying I weigh like 210 pounds. I'm like, I don't know what that means.

• 55:13Fearne Cotton?

  I don't even know what that means because I do stone.

• 55:15Speaker 02

  I'm like 14 and a half stone or something, whatever, like, I don't know, because it's been a while since I weighed myself, because I don't do that. I only do it.

• 55:21Fearne Cotton?

  No, nor do I.

• 55:22Speaker 02

  I only do it when like I have to go to the doctors or whatever. But like, you know, but I run marathons. I'm really fit, you know, like all of this stuff we've been taught. A lot of it is bollocks and just question why you don't like yourself. Question why, be curious.

• 55:40Speaker 02

  Because everyone, all humans are worthy. You know, even the ones who behave like absolute assholes, unfortunately. We only get one life and we may as well go out and enjoy it. And that is what I try to, that is where gratitude comes in for me. It's like, because one day I won't be able to run, you know, and that actually might be like next week.

• 56:04Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, I mean, I can't, my knee, as I said, my knee is hanging on by a thread. There is no running. I've said goodbye to running for now, which is fine. I've replaced it with other things. It's all good. But you're so right. Like, we're never gonna get, like, my daughter said something really profound yesterday morning. She didn't mean to say anything. You know how kids' brains are just flitting from big question to big question because they're figuring it all out. And we were leaving the house to go on the school run. She went, hey mum, she went, we're never gonna get this day again, are we? And I went, no, like, this, once this day is done, it's the next one.

• 56:38Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 56:38Fearne Cotton?

  And it's those simple things, you know, that ten year old perspective of, oh, so this day is just, it's now and then it's just, it's gone. And it's the simple stuff like that that we forget when we're worrying about.

• 56:48Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 56:49Fearne Cotton?

  Oh, my bum looks like this, or my tits are too small, or my hips are too big, or whatever thing we've been conditioned to believe. Stops us actually just going out there and living our lives and enjoying it. And I'm so grateful for everything you're doing around not only body image. This full spectrum of mental health and looking at how we can actually connect the dots with all of it. And that it is possible to break free from all of these things. You know, when you're in it, when I had bulimia, I thought. I'm fucked. There's no way out of this. I cannot see a way out of it. Or even when I was having panic attacks, I definitely thought. Oh, this is me for life. I'm never gonna be able to drive a car again. This is gonna go on forever.

• 57:30Speaker 02

  I remember that, you going on a motorway.

• 57:32Fearne Cotton?

  I drive all the time in the motorway now, like all of this stuff. Yeah, I love it. But all of this stuff is possible. It's gonna take discipline, it's gonna. To take a whole reframing of everything, dismantling all old beliefs, but it is, it's possible.

• 57:49Speaker 02

  It's totally possible.

• 57:50Fearne Cotton?

  You're sat here as a living proof of all of those things.

• 57:53Speaker 02

  I had a, I had a thought the other day, like, I'm really lucky to be able to go and see my therapist like once a month. And I had a moment where I was like, wow, and I, and I feel this generally for just women generally who grew up in like the eighties, the nineties, the naughties, who came of age, like, I'm like, God, it's a fuck, like, I was talking about this, like, watching America's Next Top Model and like, when people flash up magazine covers from the nineties and it's like, get that bikini body or like.

• 58:21Fearne Cotton?

  Circle of shame.

• 58:22Speaker 02

  Yeah, or like please men from the, you know, from the bedroom to the boardroom and all of that kind of shit, yeah. And I was like, wow, it is, it's amazing any of us is still alive, given everything that we were like programmed to do and. But I also think of that with like, I think of how unwell I was as a child and how unwell I was in my teens and my twenties. And into my thirties, I didn't get sober till I was thirty seven, you know, and like, I'm like, wow, look how far you've come, babes. You know, look how far you've come. Like, I'm sitting here, I've written a book, you know, um, I don't drink, I don't dri- I don't, I don't drink. I don't drink and take cocaine anymore, fun.

• 59:01Fearne Cotton?

  It's amazing.

• 59:01Speaker 02

  Isn't that miraculous?

• 59:02Fearne Cotton?

  It is, it's brilliant.

• 59:04Speaker 02

  I wake up on a Saturday morning, this still doesn't get fucking old. I wake up on a Saturday morning at like seven thirty. And I get up and I go for a run and then I go for like, to like an AA meeting, bro, I shouldn't say that, but I know I'm in a sleep or whatever. And then I like, you know, and I, I don't know, I'd be like, oh, I'm just, you know, I like to go to bed at like eight thirty so I can read a book, you know. And I'm like, who am I? Who is this wholesome woman?

• 59:32Fearne Cotton?

  So wholesome.

• 59:33Speaker 02

  It is I. Because you know, like ten years ago, I was literally like head down in a bag of cocaine, like in crack dens in South London, about to lose everything, about to lose everything.

• 59:45Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, you can cha- you've changed your whole life and as you're may, it is just. The most beautiful thing to see, the most beautiful thing. Before I ask you where your happy place is. We wanna make a happy place playlist. What are you putting on it?

• 1:00:00Speaker 02

  Oh, uh, I'll put on some Bad Bunny, because I love, I love a bit of Bad Bunny. And which song shall we put on? Let's put on the one about, the one where he sings about his auntie.

• 1:00:13Fearne Cotton?

  Okay.

• 1:00:13Speaker 02

  Asking him about all of his girlfriends. What is it? Titimi pregunto. And I, I think I'm probably more, it's like that oi, oi. On VIP, on VIP. It's got, it's like banging beat and it makes me, and I'm like, yeah, I, I, I imagine that I'm one of Benito's girlfriends. But I'm actually more like his auntie.

• 1:00:34Fearne Cotton?

  You're his auntie, good.

• 1:00:35Speaker 02

  But that's fine. This is, it's for the aunties. We, you know, big up the aunties. Aunties who love Bad Bunny. I imagine lots of them listen to Happy Place.

• 1:00:45Fearne Cotton?

  I think so, all the aunties do.

• 1:00:47Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:00:48Fearne Cotton?

  Hey, where's your happy place?

• 1:00:50Speaker 02

  My happy place is, uh, on a beach in Cornwall with my daughter, my husband.

• 1:00:59Fearne Cotton?

  Beautiful. I love that.

• 1:01:01Speaker 02

  It's always the same. Or, I'm gonna give you, actually, more, but more realistic. It's running around my local common, listening to Bad Bunny.

• 1:01:08Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah. Would you like a picture?

• 1:01:11Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:01:12Fearne Cotton?

  It's so good. You're in, you're in the zone, right? You're in it.

• 1:01:15Speaker 02

  Yeah, my happy place, I'm really excited. I did like book tickets to go and see Bad Bunny in Lisbon. I was like, we're going, we're going on a cultural trip to Lisbon.

• 1:01:23Fearne Cotton?

  To see Bad Bunny?

• 1:01:24Speaker 02

  Yeah, like, I love that. And I don't care. And I'm not embarrassed. I'm not embarrassed that as a 45-year-old.

• 1:01:29Fearne Cotton?

  What should you mean?

• 1:01:30Speaker 02

  I'm a 45-year-old woman who, like, wears leopard print.

• 1:01:33Fearne Cotton?

  Yes.

• 1:01:34Speaker 02

  I'm, uh, you know, I'm just a fucking legend and I really fucking fancy Bad Bunny.

• 1:01:44Fearne Cotton?

  And there we shall end this conversation. Bryony Gordon, I love you.

• 1:01:48Speaker 02

  I love you, Frank Gordon. Thank you for having me.

• 1:01:52Fearne Cotton?

  Oh God, that was so great. I mean, obviously, me and Bryony are gonna continue that chat away from the mic, probably while stomping around a park somewhere, putting the world to rights. I love chatting to Bryony. So that is a good question, isn't it? What would you do if you didn't care what anyone else thought? I think that's such a fucking great question. Why don't you come over to Instagram, @happyplaceofficial, and tell us? Tell us what you think. All right, I'm gonna be back in a few days with more chat about the little things that are making me and team Happy Place feel really good, and what just feels a bit heavy right now. But until then, a massive thanks again to brilliant Bryony, to the producer, Anushka Tate, at Happy Place Studios, and to you. Do whatever the hell you want.

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• 1:03:54Speaker 06

  It's the most wonderful time of the year. Halloween!

• 1:03:59Speaker 06

  And you guys know we don't do Halloween by halves. Full costume, full prosthetics, full commitment. I'm a rat. And I'm the chef. It's our Ratatouille special. Ben, we're grabbing our broomsticks for the witches.

• 1:04:12Speaker 06

  Got a spooky hotline caller. An update from our woman who was in love with the ghost of Prince Albert. And your tarot card dilemmas. Listen to our Halloween specials. Search for The Girls Bathroom.