“I think the worst!” How to manage anxiety and intrusive thoughts

Fearne’s anxiety and OCD have been pretty loud recently, so she wanted to find a bit of solace in listening back to some other people with their own experiences of feeling anxious, low, having panic attacks, going through therapy, and accepting they’ll never be fully ‘fixed’... In this episode – -Musician Perrie Edwards explains why she brings her therapist to work with her -Actor Will Poulter’s taking a personalised approach to his OCD -Comedian Julian Clary reckons age and perspective have calmed his anxiety -Broadcaster Vogue Williams chats about medication and catastrophising -Musician YungBlud talks through learning to like yourself -Writer Natalie Lue explains how to recognise what’s beneath the anxious thoughts Listen to the full episodes here: Perrie Edwards https://pod.fo/e/279633 Will Poulter https://pod.fo/e/2bd0dd Julian Clary https://pod.fo/e/2b6890 Vogue Williams https://pod.fo/e/326783 YungBlud https://pod.fo/e/25cf34 Natalie Lue https://pod.fo/e/2e61b9 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 mark it, 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, a massive welcome to Happy Place with me, Fern Cotton. Now, look, I'll be honest with you, as I always am, I'd had a pretty good run of not feeling that anxious for a while there, but the last month, I'd say, my anxiety has been kicking in again. So I thought we would do an episode today all about anxiety.

• 0:50Speaker 02

  I feel the tingles in my neck and I feel the anxiety creeping in. I start panicking and then I spiral.

• 0:55Speaker 03

  I would never wish OCD, depression or anxiety on anyone.

• 0:58Speaker 02

  My adult just goes offline and then it's just my little child self like, help me, help me.

• 1:02Speaker 03

  But in a weird way, I think my capacity to feel that kind of darkness also allows me to appreciate the sunlight.

• 1:09Fearne Cotton?

  With anxiety, you can, loads of people, you find a different way to manage it and it can only be managed, it will always come back and go away and come back and go away.

• 1:16Speaker 04

  To get them like in a supermarket queue, I would always get claustrophobic and feel trapped and often have to abandon my trolley.

• 1:23Speaker 05

  It got really bad and I got through it. That'll probably come again and again and again and again in different skins from my life.

• 1:30Fearne Cotton?

  A bit of a light bulb went off because now when I noticed where the people pleasing was showing up, I was able to go, oh, I'm anxious about something. So like I said, my anxiety has increased massively in the last month. And obviously anxiety comes in different flavours, so how my anxiety looks will be very different to yours, but this month, little bits of OCD have been creeping back in, lock checking obsessively, hob checking obsessively.

• 1:59Fearne Cotton?

  All that kind of jazz, all the usual stuff, which is, I find it boring now because it's just like, oh, I can't bother to do this again. But I know the score. I know what I've got to do. And it was actually really interesting, listening back to the little bits of episodes that you're going to hear today, because in all of them, I talk about how I'm actually in quite a good place. No panic attacks for a while. And that actually remains. I haven't had a panic attack, touch wood, because I was having them in big, big bouts back in the day. But there's also lots of chat about how this stuff isn't linear, as I am demonstrating in my life currently. We're never going to be fully cured of all of our anxious thoughts. We maybe just have to learn our own ways of coping a little

• 2:38Fearne Cotton?

  bit better each time shit hits the fan. Which it will. But anxiety to you might mean hypervigilance. It might mean feeling very low and edgy. It might mean hiding away. It might just be a low hum in the background. It comes in all different flavours. So I want us to be able to hear from loads of people who all experience anxiety in their own ways, in the hope that if you are going through a rough patch, you know you're not the only one. Perrie Edwards brings her therapist to work with her, and she actually brought her therapist to the recording of this episode. Will Poulter's taking a personalised approach to his OCD. And Julian Clary reckons age and perspective have calmed his anxiety.

• 3:20Fearne Cotton?

  Then chats with Vogue Williams about medication and catastrophising. Youngblood about learning to like yourself. And the brilliant Natalie Lu about how to recognise what's beneath the anxious thoughts.

• 3:35Speaker 06

  Hey, we're Nick and Jack, hosts of The Best One Yet. Behind every episode, there's research, emails, spreadsheets, and our shared Google Doc, the headline hammer. With Google Workspace with Gemini, Google's AI is built right into the premium versions of tools we already use, like Gmail, Docs, and Sheets. No new tools or extra logins, just personalised AI for the way we work. That means less time on the work around the work, and more time finding the stories worth talking about. Get AI tools for work. Upgrade to Google Workspace with Gemini at goo.gle/workspacewithgemini. That's goo.gle/workspacewithgemini.

• 4:08Speaker 07

  Hello, this is Suzy Ruffel. And Maisie Adam. And together we host Big Kick Energy. Hey Mais, what is it? Only the best podcast ever. Yes! 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. Yeah, and a fair bit of gossiping, too. Oh, and a lovely bit of gossip. Chow down on the gossip. Num, num, num, num, num. You can listen wherever you get your podcasts, you just need to search Big Kick Energy. Grab a knife and fork and tuck in, baby.

• 4:41Speaker 07

  Right, let's do it. Here's the show.

• 5:05Fearne Cotton?

  So you've got this therapist who is seemingly really working out for you. Brilliant that you've got her with you when you need her because you shouldn't be having to deal with anxiety and suffering unnecessarily. So talk to me about this anxiety. Where's that come from? What was the catalyst for that?

• 5:24Speaker 02

  It's random, but it started a good few years ago when me and the girls were in Vegas. So something happened and I'd just started experiencing like panic attacks out of nowhere. And it was really scary and I thought I was dying at the time. Like I thought I was having a heart attack. And then I went to the hospital and they were like, "What drugs have you taken?" And I was like, "Nothing. I haven't taken anything. I'm a really good girl, I'm clean, I don't even drink alcohol hardly, but something's happening to my heart, like I'm gonna die." And I was having a panic attack. And then I flew home and from that point on, they just kept occurring like all the time and I didn't know what was happening. I thought I was literally going insane. Like I even asked my mum if she was gonna put me in a mental institute at one point because it was so bad.

• 6:07Speaker 02

  And I couldn't make sense of it all in my head, but I think now... It's almost like I'm at the stage where instead of trying to avoid the anxiety, which I do, like as soon as I feel the tingles in my neck and I feel the anxiety creeping in, I start panicking and then I spiral. Whereas instead, I'm trying to learn to like be with the feelings and be like, okay, why do I feel like this? It's obviously something internal is trying to tell me it's protecting me from something, whatever it is. But in this moment, like I'm safe and it's fine, but it's hard to rationalise that because my adult just goes offline and then it's just my little child self like, help me, help me, what is happening? So I think like I said to my therapist, I said, look, I love our sessions, but it's really hard for me to take all of the stuff

• 6:50Speaker 02

  you're teaching me and use it in everyday life. So when the panic occurs, I'm not thinking, oh, what, what, what, what do I have to do? I'm just like, help me! Like, I just go off on one. So now she's obviously coming with me to work to put it into action more. So like,

• 7:08Fearne Cotton?

  So great.

• 7:08Speaker 02

  Yeah, because I just think if I'm not facing it head on, I'm avoiding it. I avoid it. I don't leave the house unless I have to. I avoid any situation where I might be in front of my anxiety and I just can't bear it. I hate it so much.

• 7:20Fearne Cotton?

  So what might trigger it? I mean, I, I, listening to you speak, I totally get this. Like, I've been there. And I, what I'd like to say, I guess, to you is I've so been there to the point where I stopped doing TV, stopped doing radio. I'm still not doing TV. I don't feel like that's something I necessarily want to leap back into at this point.

• 7:42Speaker 02

  Right.

• 7:42Fearne Cotton?

  But I've gotten myself to a place, maybe over the last seven years, where I'm not having panic attacks.

• 7:48Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 7:49Fearne Cotton?

  I've probably had one in the last six months, maybe more.

• 7:55Speaker 02

  Wow.

• 7:56Fearne Cotton?

  Um, and I was having them all day, every day.

• 7:58Speaker 02

  Right.

• 7:59Fearne Cotton?

  And my anxiety has gone from being sky high to

• 8:04Fearne Cotton?

  Really not present in my everyday life.

• 8:07Speaker 02

  And how did you get there?

• 8:09Fearne Cotton?

  Therapy.

• 8:10Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 8:10Fearne Cotton?

  And having someone to really validate what I'd been through, what I felt because of the things I've been through.

• 8:19Speaker 02

  Mm.

• 8:19Fearne Cotton?

  The self beliefs that I'd built up.

• 8:21Speaker 02

  Mm.

• 8:22Fearne Cotton?

  And to really go, oh no, I I understand why you would feel this way. And just to have one person.

• 8:28Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 8:29Fearne Cotton?

  Say that to me was so powerful. I felt so lucky that I have a therapist, so lucky. Because it's just not the case for so many people out there. And I have found it personally, find the right person, life changing.

• 8:43Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 8:43Fearne Cotton?

  So, you know, you're in the thick of it now.

• 8:46Speaker 02

  Mm hmm.

• 8:46Fearne Cotton?

  And I've I had people say this to me when I was in the thick of it, like, this isn't forever. Because I thought, oh, my life's, this is it.

• 8:53Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 8:54Fearne Cotton?

  This is it. I will have to always watch my triggers and see where I'm at.

• 9:00Speaker 02

  Kind of walk on eggshells.

• 9:01Fearne Cotton?

  Walk on eggshells and stop myself doing so many things. And then I still do have things that I won't do and I'd like to get to, like, sleep's a real big one for me. I'm very anxious about sleep still, so that's still got to be tweaked. But I am so far from where I was.

• 9:16Speaker 02

  Right.

• 9:17Fearne Cotton?

  And that is absolutely possible for you with all of the hard work you're putting in place, which is so.

• 9:24Speaker 02

  I feel so much better now. Yeah, it's great. But I feel like my anxiety, like, I know it sounds awful, but I feel like my anxiety and my panic had to get worse. Had to get worse before it could get better.

• 9:34Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 9:35Speaker 02

  And I don't know why, because obviously I've had this anxiety for years and I've suffered from panic attacks. And my fear is like the fear of being on my own. And having a panic attack and maybe dying and no one being there to help me. So that's why I've like associated me being on my own with that. So there's always people around me. I always have family around me, friends around me, um, security with me, like, it's it's a thing. But I think that's because a lot of things have happened in my life as well that's brought me to this, if that makes sense. So I think, yeah, having the therapy. Has helped me massively and I've never put the the physical things that I'm learning with her into practice. I've always just sat in a room and spoke about my feelings. I've gone back to my childhood and gone over traumas. And I'm like, how is this helping me get forward?

• 10:17Speaker 02

  That's what I struggled with. I've tried so many therapists. I've seen so many doctors. I've tried literally everything. Like, there's nothing out there I haven't tried. But what I do with my therapist now, I just feel like it's the one thing that works for me. Because I'm having to step out of my comfort zone and feel the anxiety, which is what I've been putting off for years. I'm like, ah, don't wanna feel it. Just sign me out, I'm off. Like, literally, get it away from me. Whereas now, I'm like, okay. I'm I'm I'm feeling it. I'm feeling tingly. I'm starting to go a bit numb, but it's fine. And then I'll do like my tapping and I'll tell myself like in this moment I'm safe. And like, I love a bit of reishi chocolate. Don't get me wrong, it's lovely.

• 10:58Speaker 02

  I love a healthy mushroom. And I just think all these things I'm doing with her and like lifestyle changes and changing my diet and changing my outlook on things and. Like, there's just so much, I can't even fit it into one podcast, but there's so much I've learnt from her and I'm so like appreciative of it.

• 11:15Fearne Cotton?

  It's one of those, it's it's the mental health condition that's still sort of joked about, you know, oh, you're neat and tidy, you've got, it's not quite that, guys.

• 11:21Speaker 03

  I know, yeah.

• 11:22Fearne Cotton?

  And it's really important that we talk about all the different shades of of how it can manifest. It's not, you know, it might be turning on and off light switches. It might be having to touch everything in a room and, you know, all sorts. But it might also jump onto the worst case scenario and play that image in your head a hell of a lot. And it's horrible. Has that ever crossed over into your work? Has it ever impacted you being on set or doing something you really want to do?

• 11:47Speaker 03

  Yeah, you know what? Actually, that's one of the things I'm quite grateful of is that I think as I've taken better care of myself. Offset and in between jobs, I think my my work has gotten easier. Like, I think it's made life in general a little bit easier. Not easy, but easier. And I think I've been able to sort of practise a little bit more emotional regulation and control. Because, you know, the intrusive thoughts often used to come right when the pressure was highest at work. Or I knew, for example, really, really difficult scene, you know, we have to get it in one take. And. My intrusive thoughts would be, you're terrible, you can't do this, you're atrocious,

• 12:32Speaker 03

  it's the end of your career after this take, you're the worst actor ever, you know, whatever it was. And that would obviously get to me. And, and now as I've learnt a few different coping mechanisms, and I think through therapy and medication too, I've just got a little bit, uh, just a little bit more of a handle on it. Let's not say that I don't still have, you know, really difficult days. Um, but yeah, the intrusive thoughts often used to rise up at the, you know, the, the, just at the moment when you don't want them. And that is quite often when they present themselves.

• 13:04Fearne Cotton?

  It's the pits. I've so been there. Where I feel like, I'm floating out of my body, guys, and I'm about to do a live TV thing and I'm not even in my skin anymore. I'm up in the corner of the room over there. It's always the worst, worst moment. Has it ever got to the point where you thought, I can't do this anymore? I can't do acting anymore?

• 13:22Speaker 03

  Um, thankfully not. And it sounds so odd. I mean, I would never wish OCD, depression or anxiety on anyone. But in a weird way, I think my capacity to go to those depths or, or feel that kind of darkness also allows me to appreciate the sunlight and, you know, the, the lighter moments and, you know, feel things in an antithetical way where, where I'm, where I'm, you know, happier for it too. It, it's really odd. And, you know, I think maybe that's just a coping mechanism in itself, right? A, a, a choice, a way of identifying a silver lining in it. But I'm oddly thankful for my mental health conditions

• 14:04Speaker 03

  because it's allowed me to appreciate the moments where I am more happy or more content or just more stable.

• 14:09Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah. I think when you could, you know, it's a funny thing, isn't it? Because I, I think I used to obsess about reading stories about people that certainly had depression or anxiety and go, oh, and they're not in it now. How, how did they get to the bit where they're not in it? And cling on to that like it was some sort of ascent rather than it being a big wiggly line, which we all know it is.

• 14:29Speaker 03

  Big wiggly line. Big bowl of pasta.

• 14:30Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, exactly. There's like peaks and troughs and there's bits which are really awful. And then you have moments where you're feeling really great again. And that's amazing and to be celebrated. But I think. That's the interesting thing is I used to think that you just would crawl out of it and then you're just like happy forever and everything's great. But actually, if you can learn to lean into those bits where you're not feeling anxious. At the moment, I feel I don't have any anxiety at the moment.

• 14:52Speaker 03

  That's great.

• 14:53Fearne Cotton?

  Maybe a combination of, you know, doing therapy, which you feel very lucky to do and a few other things going on. And that's not to say there's zero, but it's a damn sight better than I was, say, seven years ago, where I was just having panic attacks all day long. And I think when you can really appreciate those moments where it's not around.

• 15:10Speaker 03

  Hmm.

• 15:10Fearne Cotton?

  And trust that, you know, you you're in it now and, you know, and it might last for a while. It's it's so lovely to have that appreciation for just normal, level-headed.

• 15:21Speaker 03

  Right.

• 15:22Fearne Cotton?

  Feeling balanced, grounded life.

• 15:24Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 15:24Fearne Cotton?

  I totally get what you're saying.

• 15:26Speaker 03

  Hmm.

• 15:26Fearne Cotton?

  And also, I totally understand what you're saying about, you know, having that access for for these characters to evolve and to be brought to life, which makes you bloody great actors, because you believe it, you see it and, you know, and bring it to a character.

• 15:40Speaker 03

  Yeah, a little bit and, you know, rather like every actor's sort of process is different. Like everyone's sort of mental health experience is different, right? I think one of the things that constantly gets overlooked in the subject of physical and mental health, and and the two need to be spoken about as being more intertwined, because I believe they they are more intertwined than kind of we maybe, you know, talk about. One of the reasons I think it's it's kind of interesting when we talk about dieting or training regimes in the context of physical health, there is this kind of one size fits all attitude. And that's really interesting because everyone's digestive system and, you know.

• 16:20Fearne Cotton?

  Yep.

• 16:20Speaker 03

  Microbio and, you know, their um.

• 16:23Fearne Cotton?

  Family history.

• 16:24Speaker 03

  Family history, genetic, you know, all of that body type, all that stuff is is so wildly unique that the idea that sort of one size fits all just just doesn't make sense to me. And and the same is true when we talk about mental health. I think look no further than, you know, a complicated organ for your brain. It's like everyone's neurochemistry is so unique and different. And it's also fascinating to me that I think neuroscientists. And this is some real like back of a napkin math here, but neuroscientists sort of openly say that they kind of only really understand thirty percent of the brain.

• 16:58Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 16:59Speaker 03

  It's a little bit like being a geographer and being like, well, yeah, we understand the the green bits, but the blue stuff we're still trying to work out. Like the seventy percent of the world, like the the sea, we don't know what's going on there.

• 17:09Fearne Cotton?

  No.

• 17:09Speaker 03

  But we can tell you what's going on with the green. Like, that's what's going on with our brains. And so the idea that the same meditation practice or the same medication or the same form of therapy or the same self-care regime is going to yield the same results for everybody is just is just untrue. So there is an element of trial and error and and there is um a real degree of sort of finding what works for you. And so bringing it back to the acting conversation, I I know that to be true of of acting because I know it to be true of of my, you know, experience with my own mental health. And it's such an intimate relationship with psychology acting. I think that's why I I love it.

• 17:51Speaker 03

  And it's a study of human beings and it's a study of the human condition and psychological development. And so for me, I can't really approach it all that differently. And I think I'd be lost if I didn't draw on my own personal experiences. And it's fascinating to see different people's approaches.

• 18:09Fearne Cotton?

  It is, because I guess, you know, you don't want to dig around in tricky parts of your own psyche for your job and be left in that state, surely, to go home feeling slightly re-traumatized or like you've taken yourself to a place of deep depression because your character needed it. And do you have anything that then gets you back to, and I'm going home now and I'm going to cook a meal and go to bed like I would normally?

• 18:32Speaker 03

  Yeah, you know, um being around like friends and family and reconnecting with people I really love and care about is is huge. I think that that's probably a mistake I made previously whereby. Post a job, I sort of went straight back into chasing the next thing, or I don't know. I I I would sometimes just not be as sociable as I ought to have been. And I sort of almost forced myself into contact with with people post jobs because I know how restorative it is. So I I do that now. It's it's it's, you know, company. Um, and I'm really lucky that I have, you know, great people in my life with whom I kind of uh can talk openly about mental health as well, should anything kind of arise. I mean, I talk about it very regularly.

• 19:17Fearne Cotton?

  Would you on set? Because I think especially with anxiety, if you if you're feeling certainly panic, the worst thing you can do is just internalize that and not say anything and be in your head going, oh, my God, I'm gonna have a panic attack and no one knows. And do I look normal? And you're just, everything is just wildly out of control in your head. But actually, as soon as you say, I've had it before and I've said to someone I'm working with, I feel like I'm back to have a panic attack, so I'm just gonna step to one side for a minute. And then it goes because you've said it. The worst thing is when it's sort of breeding and percolating in secrecy in your own mind. Would you, would you feel comfy to do that on set to say, I'm just feeling a bit off here, guys? I need a minute.

• 19:54Speaker 03

  Yeah, it's really interesting, isn't it? Because just returning to that idea of the distinction between physical and mental health. And there is, of course, some distinction, but like I say, they're not really spoken about as being as intertwined as I believe they are. If you were physically ill or you had broken your leg, you know, saying that, explaining that, you wouldn't feel nearly as much, you know, discomfort.

• 20:19Fearne Cotton?

  No.

• 20:20Speaker 03

  Or, you know, self doubt as you do if you say that mentally you're you're struggling with with something. And I think that I don't have really any issue when when it comes down to, you know, struggling with my mental health and and saying as much. And in my experience in recent years, I've seen an increasing level of kind of empathy for that and less and less sort of call it friction around, you know, that being a problem or or someone sort of making allowances or uh compensations around, you know, not being in a great place mentally. I've been really, really actually sort of encouraged by how much empathy there has been

• 21:01Speaker 03

  within the industry around around, you know, mental health struggles and and recognizing mental health as I think we we ought to with the same level of respect as we have for physical health.

• 21:12Speaker 04

  A bit of nerves, a bit of adrenaline sharpens the brain. I don't, I used to, like 20 odd years ago, and it's very addictive if you start having self doubt and panic attacks.

• 21:24Fearne Cotton?

  So how, is it just time and experience that has stopped you from having that moment of panic? Or like you said there, it's addictive, the nature of anxiety, would you say is addictive? That you get into a habit? It's like a habitual process that you have to go through before you set foot on stage, or back in the day?

• 21:40Speaker 04

  It's not just on stage. When I was getting a lot of those, you'd get them like in a queue, a supermarket queue, I would always get claustrophobic and feel trapped and often have to abandon my trolley. So then any kind of queue situation would bring it on. I think your brain just kind of clicks in. So yeah, that was a long period of that. So I just talked myself through it in the end.

• 22:04Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, I mean, I used to get them all the time. This was maybe about six, seven years ago. One of my big things was driving on the motorway. I just totally stopped doing it. There was no way I could do a motorway journey if I was driving. I could just about pull off the A road onto it and then it would instantly hit me and I'd have to quickly pull over or get off. And then I just was so scared of it for about five years, I just didn't do it at all. And I did a bit of therapy that helped, but I think maybe you do have a period where you grow out of it and you're just, your brain, you know, stops, that trigger stops working so frequently and potently because it feels so overwhelming in the moment that you feel like you've got no control over it at all. It's pretty debilitating.

• 22:47Speaker 04

  Horrible. And I have had them driving as well.

• 22:49Fearne Cotton?

  It's horrible.

• 22:49Speaker 04

  And I had a thing where I thought all the cars were going backwards.

• 22:52Fearne Cotton?

  Oh yeah, I've had that, yeah.

• 22:53Speaker 04

  It's dangerous as well, because you know, and I had, you just have them on the A40, you know, that flyover bit?

• 22:59Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 22:59Speaker 04

  Where you often, there's a queue of traffic and you stop right at the top, and you look down at the edge where a road, that would be a point.

• 23:08Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 23:09Speaker 04

  As well. Funny, isn't it?

• 23:10Fearne Cotton?

  It is so funny, but it can be.

• 23:14Fearne Cotton?

  I mean, I was gonna say a nuisance, it's more than that. I, you know, I stopped doing certain jobs because I couldn't do it. And I hadn't, I stopped doing live radio, that was just a massive trigger. I haven't actually forced myself to start that one again. Maybe I will in the future, but I was having huge panic attacks the night before for hours on end. I wouldn't sleep a wink. And I'd be okay just about on air, I'd get through it, but I would be exhausted, the amount of adrenaline pumping through my body. And I just didn't want to feel that level of fear for that sustained period of time. Do you, do you think it affected or impacted your work at the time you were having them?

• 23:48Speaker 04

  Yeah, it wasn't good, you know. But there is that thing of forcing yourself, which I'm kind of quite up for that.

• 23:58Fearne Cotton?

  Are you?

• 23:59Speaker 04

  Yeah, and I was wondering if, after you did your radio show, did you not feel better? Because you thought, well, I've got through, I've done it?

• 24:04Fearne Cotton?

  Well, I mean, to a degree, yes. But then the next night would be exactly the same again. And I just couldn't keep doing it. I think if I did it now, it might be different, and I would feel that sense of accomplishment. And, okay, I'm past that period. But I just haven't forced myself into it. Maybe I need to be a little bit more, I don't know, forceful about the whole situation.

• 24:22Speaker 04

  I think, I think what happened, you just one day forgot to have a panic attack. You know, I was in a queue. And I think if you distract yourself, if I was thinking about something else, rather than, oh, I'm in a queue, I'm in a queue, it's going to start. And I came out the supermarket, and I thought, oh, I forgot to have, you know, a panic attack. So I don't know, someone will know, won't they, the psychology of all that. But it does pass. And as we know, as you get older, you get happier, and you sort of care less about things.

• 24:55Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, I've heard you say this in interviews before, that you definitely feel that. The older you get, the happier you feel. Apart from perhaps that, you know, your brain's creating new neural pathways, you're moving on from these periods that are triggering and tricky. What else do you think has led you to that conclusion that you feel happier today?

• 25:12Speaker 04

  I think it's the realisation that things aren't that important, you know, being

• 25:19Speaker 04

  Um, if I died at death on stage, that might have been what I was worried about. Well, the worst thing that can happen is that, that no one laughs and you get booed off. And so what, you know, it's not the most terrible thing in the great scheme of things, is it? Maybe I've, maybe I've reasoned with myself like that. But as you could already, I think everything's just a bit calm and you've, you've done certain things that you wanted to tick off and so, and everything's a bonus really, when you get to my age.

• 25:51Fearne Cotton?

  Hmm. I guess, you know, I totally get that feeling of, you know, you've, you've bombed on stage or something at work didn't go how you thought it would go, or you humiliate yourself in front of people. I've certainly had moments of that in my young years where it's been such a huge deal, disproportionate to the actual event happening. But, you know, and I'm in my forties, but I certainly feel like that is driving me a lot less today. If something goes wrong at work, I probably can reason with myself like, oh, it was just a bad day and get over it. But I think when you are younger, it just feels huge.

• 26:26Speaker 04

  It does. And it's sort of vanity really, that you're so important, you know, that this matters. So it all passes.

• 26:34Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah. And maybe also, I guess, because you've had so much more life experience, you've been through stuff that's properly awful and shit, and you have a better gauge of that is worth worrying about and, and that not so much maybe.

• 26:48Speaker 04

  Yeah, I think that happens and you know that you'll survive.

• 26:56Speaker 06

  Hey, we're Nick and Jack, hosts of the best one yet. Behind every episode, there's research, emails, spreadsheets and our shared Google Doc, the headline hammer. With Google Workspace with Gemini, Google's AI is built right into the premium versions of tools we already use, like Gmail, Docs and Sheets. No new tools or extra logins, just personalized AI for the way we work. That means less time on the work around the work and more time finding the stories worth talking about. Get AI tools for work. Upgrade to Google Workspace with Gemini at goo.gle/workspacewithGemini. That's goo.gle/workspacewithGemini.

• 27:30Speaker 08

  Hello, I'm Joanna Fletcher.

• 27:32Speaker 09

  And I'm Marco Burchella.

• 27:33Speaker 08

  And this is Boots Off.

• 27:36Speaker 09

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

• 27:44Speaker 08

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

• 27:51Speaker 09

  This series is about the adversities that lead to adventure.

• 27:54Speaker 08

  The adventures that lead to adversity.

• 27:56Speaker 09

  And how life can be one big adventure in itself.

• 27:59Speaker 08

  Listen every Thursday. Just search for Boots Off.

• 28:07Speaker 08

  All right, let's get back to the show. Here's Vogue Williams, Youngblood and Natalie Lu.

• 28:12Fearne Cotton?

  You've been really open over the years about anxiety and panic attacks. Where are you at with that at the moment?

• 28:18Speaker 10

  Actually, this week is a good week. The last two weeks weren't good weeks. And I think what I do is that's why I'm not going to drink for a while because that really gets it for me. And I feel like if I train, like people think I'm insane because I love, when I go on holidays, I don't want to go on holidays, drink loads, not train, just eat rubbish and go home feeling crap. So I'll always go away and I'll train and people think that's kind of weird, but I just, it makes me feel like it kind of regulates me. It makes me feel better. It's really good for anxiety, I find. But I do have, I have medication as well. If I'm having a really bad time with it, I'll take medication and there's no problem with that either.

• 28:55Fearne Cotton?

  God, no.

• 28:56Speaker 10

  No, I love having a little backup of it, especially if I'm hungover as well.

• 29:00Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, if like.

• 29:03Fearne Cotton?

  All the pills. I mean, why struggle if you're having a terrible time? Again, I think it's all personal choice. There should be no judgment around any of this stuff. I took antidepressants for a while. And if you're in a bad way, you've got to, you've got to do what you've got to do.

• 29:16Speaker 10

  I feel like with, with anxiety, you can, loads of people, you find a different way to manage it and it can only be managed. It will always come back and go away and come back and go away. And for me, I wanted to, I do therapy, which I do kind of irregularly now, but I was struggling to like sleep properly. And then if I wasn't sleeping, I was more anxious the next day. So I couldn't really get to the point where I was able to do even therapy because I'd just be going around like this the whole time, clenching my fists and just being anxious. So. Then I got what they're called beta blockers off my doctor. So that kind of allowed me to calm down a little bit and then to be able to actually think about what was making me so anxious and then to try and deal with it through that way. But I wouldn't say it gets that bad all the time. I think

• 29:58Speaker 10

  when you go through big life disturbances really is probably when it gets the worst.

• 30:02Fearne Cotton?

  So what would you say sort of triggers it on a every every kind of week basis if there's stuff that's bothering you? What triggers it?

• 30:10Speaker 10

  I could catastrophize anything. Like I booked flights to Turkey the other day and like the flights didn't go through. So then I decided it was a really bad omen and then I was really anxious that like I shouldn't be going to Turkey because there was a reason they didn't go through. And just like if my mind is anxious, I'll catastrophize absolutely anything and think the worst is gonna happen with anything. And you you kind of can't stop it. So I just, after a while, I realize how ridiculous it is. And then it's only after you've kind of come through it, or if you're having a panic attack and like Spencer, my husband, he doesn't get anxiety. So like when he first saw me having a panic attack, he was like, what have I married?

• 30:50Speaker 10

  And then the next day, you're kind of like, sorry about that. Because it's so, it just consumes you and you can't get out of it. And you're just, you're you're just in a panic, basically, and you can't stop it until it kind of runs its course and you exhaust yourself in a way.

• 31:04Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, spirals. I mean, those, I mean, for me, it could be like intrusive thoughts almost where you believe like, this is a fact, this awful thing is gonna happen and you can't get out of that cycle of believing it. And I think even in the moment, you can intellectually tell yourself, I know what this is. Like, this is an intrusive thought, it's not real, or I'm totally catastrophizing. But it doesn't stop the manifestation of the panic bit. You just have to, like you say, go through it, go with it.

• 31:32Speaker 10

  Yeah, kind of write it out. And I think that like, I know that anxiety almost feels like a newer thing. But like, I remember back in Ireland, it'd be like, oh, her nerves are at her. Like, that's what they used to say about like, any anyone, I remember my parents' friends and stuff like that, somebody who would have just had anxiety, but it was called your nerves are at you. And I think that now, life is full for everybody. We're all trying to do a million things and go a million miles an hour and be the best at everything that we're doing. And actually, it's causing more stress and more anxiety. And you just kind of have to be a bit nicer to yourself. And I think that's why trying to look after yourself in certain kind of ways, trying to like, Be healthy in certain kinds of ways. It's just helpful for how fast paced our lives are now.

• 32:15Fearne Cotton?

  Are you good at being nice to yourself?

• 32:17Speaker 10

  Um, yeah, kind of. I feel like I'm always on the move. I think the juggle with parenting and working, you always have that guilt. No matter what you're doing, if you're doing more of one and more of the other, like even yesterday, my son was like, why do you have to go to work? And I just said, I'm, I'm, I've been with you all day.

• 32:36Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 32:37Speaker 10

  And I had to go do a podcast for an hour, but you kind of, you'll just always have that guilt and that causes anxiety as well. Cause you're just like, I wish that you could just stay with them and, and do stuff all the time. But that's not good for them either. They need to be going out and doing their own stuff.

• 32:52Fearne Cotton?

  Too right. And they, and they are fine. I think that's the other worry we have. It's like, they're not fine unless I'm with them 24/7. They're fine.

• 33:00Speaker 05

  I've felt like that my whole life. I've felt like every interaction I've ever had, I've got to kind of like, be like, yo, I'm not mental. I'm just like myself. You know what I mean? And kind of by the end of five minute conversation, 40 minute conversation, an hour, every TV show, every interview, everything ever. I'm all just like, please like me. You know what I mean?

• 33:23Fearne Cotton?

  Which is also so refreshing to admit. And I feel the same, you know, I've, no one likes being disliked. I think people often will go, I don't give a shit. I don't care if people don't like me. I care deeply. I can't think of anything more uncomfortable than someone giving me shit or abuse about how much they dislike me. Because it does make you question yourself and your choices, who you are, why am I getting it wrong? Why am I unlikable? It's a horrible feeling. So I think it's really awesome that you've admitted that.

• 33:52Speaker 05

  Yeah. It's so bizarre. It's just like, kind of, I think, I, I, last year especially, I was in a pretty dark place with it all. I feel like, kind of every day, like, I think, cause I'm so myself, people have a problem with it. And I think, I was saying the other day, when you read shit in real time. I think that's what's the darkest thing about our world and our generation. I think like, it really got on top of me, the fact that like, I almost became addicted to it. I almost became addicted to finding hateful things about myself because it was like, I don't know, it was almost like a form of self sabotage or like a form of like darkness that was like, yeah.

• 34:37Speaker 05

  Like my anxiety, it was kind of fulfilling my anxiety in my head. It was going like, yeah, you are that, you are that, you are that, that. Kind of voice that says like, you're fake, you're a cunt, you, all your imposter syndrome, all that like, you're not good enough, you know what I mean? Like, every little dark thought, like, things about my body, things about my voice, things about my personality. I was almost addicted to kind of finding those because it was like, fueling or fulfilling that dark side of my brain, which was pretty weird. And then I kind of uh, really just for the first time said I needed to stop, because we've been doing Young Bloods for like five years and kind of really assess what,

• 35:18Speaker 05

  what I wanted to do um at the start of this year. And I think like, it was, it was like the best thing ever because I kind of, really realised that I wasn't made of glass. Really important to have that time to like look inward and really like protect yourself and kind of surrounding myself by, I think, people that were like really important in my life and started seeing my family more and started kind of realising that like, I got myself here. You know what I'm saying? I think you kind of, when you're in a whirlwind, you forget that shit and you kind of forget that like, for some reason, people like me and people like the way I am and people like it when I'm unfiltered and people like it when I think it gives them

• 36:00Speaker 05

  energy to, to be like that. And I think I realised that at, at the start of this year. So like, I don't give a fuck because I give a fuck. You know what I'm saying?

• 36:11Fearne Cotton?

  You know what the consequences are for you to take that on board?

• 36:14Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 36:15Fearne Cotton?

  Because you've been there.

• 36:16Speaker 05

  And it didn't kill me.

• 36:17Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 36:18Speaker 05

  You know what I'm saying? I got, that's what I'm saying. It was like it got really bad and I got through it and I probably do, that'll probably come again and again and again and again and indifferent. Different skins for my life, but I got through it. So I was like, oh, you know what I'm saying? So it's kind of like, it it's such a mental, mental shift. Cause I'm like twenty seven next. So I'm kind of like going through that period of my life and I'm really changed. I can feel myself changing. I don't know where, I don't know where I'm gonna arrive at. So I'm like in this free fall at the minute. And I think with me, I always like, I always got to know where the door is. You know what I'm saying? Like, and at the minute I don't. So it's a bit of a trip.

• 36:57Fearne Cotton?

  Twenty seven's a big one.

• 36:58Speaker 05

  Yeah, that's crazy.

• 36:59Fearne Cotton?

  Twenty seven's a big one because thirty's there, you can kind of touch it.

• 37:04Speaker 05

  Hundred percent.

• 37:04Fearne Cotton?

  But also there's this whole Saturn returns thing.

• 37:06Speaker 05

  All that thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 37:08Fearne Cotton?

  Which, I mean, anecdotally, I think we can say is a thing.

• 37:12Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 37:12Fearne Cotton?

  There's a big shift between twenty seven to thirty where your world gets turned upside down in good and bad ways. But you start to figure out a little bit more of who you are and where you wanna go.

• 37:25Speaker 05

  I think what really matters in life, really, you know what I mean? I think like, yeah, it's, it's been, it's been a trip, but it's also like, it's also amazing and, and kind of like really looking inwards for the first time i- in myself, in my business, in my life, in my career and everything. I think like really stopping to try and appease everyone else because their, their opinion of you is gonna change or not change based on something that you can't control.

• 37:53Fearne Cotton?

  Well, based on how well they feel.

• 37:55Speaker 05

  Yeah, exactly. Hundred percent. You can't control anything in, in terms of something else. You can only control what you're doing. And I think like, at the start of this year, I really looked at myself and looked at everyone. I was like, let's, let's just really do things inwardly. And that like allowed me to like finish a book and start a festival and make an album that I wanna make. Uh, you know what I'm saying? Without any opinion, I really just put down the doors and was like, right.

• 38:23Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 38:23Speaker 05

  No one's getting in except from you lot. You got, you got a pass. Everyone else don't get in because it's, it was just like, it, it was either. I was just gonna derail.

• 38:34Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 38:35Speaker 05

  Like gonna go completely off and I'm so happy at the last minute that I went, no, this is wrong, stop.

• 38:41Fearne Cotton?

  It's too noisy out there, but it's so important when we understand, and this is for anyone in the public eye or not, that everything feels extremely noisy outside, whether it's friends, family, or in your case, people you'll, you haven't met or you might never meet that want to desperately tell you their opinion of you. The only way we can deal with that is to go inwards and look at, why does that hurt?

• 39:05Speaker 05

  Hundred percent.

• 39:05Fearne Cotton?

  We don't have to give it any extra weight even, we don't have to say, oh, because I am a piece of shit. We can go, but why, why do I have that insecurity or why do I feel that level of pain? That's all we can do, but that takes a lot of work. It's a lot harder than just sitting there and going, everything's awful, everyone hates me. It's so much more hard work and effort to go in and look inside and see what's going on.

• 39:27Speaker 05

  And just unrealising that fundamentally, like, the power to allow something to affect you is yours. And that is something that I really learned. If anyone can throw anything your way and you can either internalise it and let it affect you, or you can literally, I think if you look inward and you kind of work on yourself and you kind of, I don't know, heal your insides a little bit and, and make it squishy. That's what I say, like, make it squishy inside and like, really just kind of like, look at that as deeply as you can. And anyone can almost say anything to you and you won't swallow it because it's like,

• 40:11Speaker 05

  it's a waste of time and it's a waste of your energy. I think when you figure out that the power to internalise something is only yours, then it's like, oh, that's crazy. You can say anything to me, but I'm like, I either, yeah, I know. And I've been told this forever, so whatever. Uh, and it almost does become that sticks and stones, mate.

• 40:32Speaker 11

  I think we find it very easy to be caring and compassionate and empathetic to others. But I always say that compassion, empathy, they're full circle gigs. But how are you able to give out this stuff to everyone else, but you're not giving it to yourself? You're leaving yourself out of that. And if you're doing that, that's not really empathy and it's not really compassion.

• 40:50Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah. Why are we like that? I find myself doing that all the time. You know, someone could tell me the thing they deem the worst thing about themselves and I would have zero judgment. You know, it's like a great friend of mine, I'll give them a big hug and say, oh my God, you know, you mustn't worry about this or whatever. With my own things, I'm nowhere close to having that level of compassion with myself. And I know it, but I still feel like I'm unable to exercise it. How do we start tapping into that self compassion? Because I do think I can see with my own people pleasing tendencies or times when I've said yes, I mean no. It's all rooted in this, in believing that I'm a bad person or, you know, all these other hangups that I have about myself or things in the past

• 41:31Fearne Cotton?

  that I just cannot find that compassion to apply to that situation. How are we cultivating that?

• 41:38Speaker 11

  So something that really helps in my understanding of people pleasing is recognizing that people pleasing is a response to anxiety.

• 41:48Fearne Cotton?

  Right.

• 41:49Speaker 11

  So we're anxious about something. It's often out of our awareness, but when we reflect back, we go, oh my gosh, I was anxious that I was going to be judged. I was anxious that I wasn't going to get the thing I was looking for out of this. I was anxious, you know, that there's going to be conflict or criticism or something. So it's a response to anxiety. And then so what we try to do is soothe the anxiety with the people pleasing. And of course, just more anxiety comes back.

• 42:16Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 42:16Speaker 11

  So it's like a response to anxiety and an anxiety management tool that then creates even more anxiety. So in recognizing this, I was like, oh, a bit of a light bulb went off because now when I noticed where the people pleasing was showing up, I was able to go, oh. I'm anxious about something. And that started to halt me in my tracks around certain things I was doing. The other thing then that I've also found really helps is that people pleasing is like creating a debt and expecting other people to pay it off. And when people realize this, they go, uh-oh. Because it's like, we don't realize that we have a hidden agenda of people pleasing. We don't like to think of ourselves that way, but it's like we're trying to get

• 43:00Speaker 11

  or avoid something with the people pleasing, and it creates debts between us and the people around us. And if what we really want is, you know, that love, that intimacy and all those things, why are we trying to villainize people all the time by acting as if, oh, my God, if I turn around and say, no, the most terrible things are gonna happen. So these things started to make me go, okay, I can pause for a moment, check in. What am I doing here? Why am I doing this? And each time I was noticing, oh, oh, this anxiety driving this, I've got a bit of a dodgy intention here. That allowed that bit of compassion to start coming through. It felt like, oh, I'm getting into a more truthful relationship with myself. And, you know, I say, we have these people pleaser feelings.

• 43:45Speaker 11

  Anxiety, resentment, guilt, irritation, frustration, feeling low, helpless, powerless, overloaded, overwhelmed. Those feelings tell us that we said yes to something, that for all intents and purposes is a good thing, but we've done it for the wrong reasons. Yeah. So find the why, because this is where you can really have a gateway into that compassion and empathy. But sometimes, actually, we're perfectly fine doing the thing. It's not even a dodgy thing, it's just the approach. Yes. Like me, I go and do something, I have the best of intentions, I'm excited about it, put my people pleasing perfectionist myths all over that thing, and I take the fun. Yeah. Out of it.

• 44:27Speaker 11

  I have to notice where I'm pushing and striving. And so if we can be compassionately curious about how our people pleasing shows up for us and notice, oh, like for me, it's that pushing, striving energy. And sometimes, yeah, it's that resentment because I am pissed off after I realize, oh, I forced myself to go and do this thing and I'm not even getting what I want out of this thing. And it's like, whoa. Resentment's in the room. Hold up, Natalie. Go check yourself. And this has forced me into a more compassionate place because you know what? I don't go around judging people for when they figure out that they've done something for the wrong reasons. I don't judge people when they, when they make mistakes. I don't judge people for having various different reasons for why they're afraid of saying no, because the only reason we don't say no is because of emotional

• 45:12Speaker 11

  baggage. So once we understand this, it's like, oh, okay. Well, something about my past inhibits me from doing that. But now that I know that's there, what might present day me want? What does future me even want out of this?

• 45:25Fearne Cotton?

  Oh, God, that stuff that Natalie talks about around people pleasing and it sort of covering some sort of deeper anxiety. I mean, when I heard that the first time around, it hit me between the eyes, not stopped thinking about it. Well, look, listen, like Will said, it's so important to just say it in the moment if you're feeling overwhelmed or panicked. Don't let it fester. So if you ever want an outlet for how you're feeling, please come and chat on Instagram. We're always there at Happy Place Official. There's always so much support for each other in the comments, as well as hopefully some helpful tips as well. It's a very gorgeous space. Okay. Massive thanks to everyone you heard from today. There'll be links in the show notes if you want to listen to the full episodes, which I urge you to do. To the producer,

• 46:10Fearne Cotton?

  Anushka Tate at Happy Place Studios. Thank you, thank you, thank you. And to you, you are the best.

• 46:42Speaker 06

  Hey, we're Nick and Jack, hosts of The Best One Yet. Behind every episode, there's research, emails, spreadsheets, and our shared Google Doc, the headline hammer. With Google Workspace with Gemini, Google's AI is built right into the premium versions of tools we already use, like Gmail, Docs, and Sheets. No new tools or extra logins, just Personalised AI for the way we work. That means less time on the work around the work and more time finding the stories worth talking about. Get AI tools for work. Upgrade to Google Workspace with Gemini at go.o.gle/workspacewithGemini. That's go.o.gle/workspacewithGemini.

• 47:15Speaker 12

  Help I Sexed My Boss is the podcast where manners meets mayhem. I'm William Hanson. I'm Jordan North. And together we take on the hilarious challenges of modern life. William's the arbiter of etiquette. And Jordan's the chaotic yin to my perfectly polished yang. So if you want laugh out loud stories and brutally honest moments, then you'll love Help I Sexed My Boss. Watch and listen every Tuesday and Friday. On YouTube and wherever you get your podcasts. Just search Sexed It. Be warned, it's a bit rude.