Louise O’Neill - ‘Full Recovery Is Possible’

This episode contains references to and descriptions of eating disorders. Louise O’Neill is a bestselling, award-winning Irish author whose fearless writing has helped shape modern feminism. Her fiction is taught on the Irish curriculum and Paul Mescal starred in a critically acclaimed stage adaptation of her work. Her second novel, Asking For It, catapulted her into the public eye in 2015. Now, with her eighth book, A Bigger Life, O’Neill turns that same unflinching gaze on herself. Her memoir follows the extraordinary dating experiment she embarked on in her late 30s after the end of a long-term relationship: dating a different man every night, across three cities - Paris, London and New York. What began as a challenge, inspired by something her father said, became an unexpected journey of self-discovery. In this episode we discuss topics covered in her memoir, A Bigger Life, including: finding hope after heartbreak, pressure on women, extraordinary dating experiences and recovering from a debilitating two-decade-long eating disorder. A Bigger Life is out this month. IN THIS EPISODE: 00:00 Introduction 03:24 Writing Her First Memoir 04:58 Roots in West Cork 08:21 Dating for a Bigger Life 09:26 Choosing Hope After Heartbreak 13:22 Marriage Expectations and Milestones 16:57 Beauty Pressure and Aging Fears 27:12 Fear of Vulnerability 28:48 Aging and Shame 30:34 Trusting Your Instincts 33:35 The Millionaire Date 36:40 Recovery After 17 Years 42:57 Rewiring the Mind 48:35 Good Girl Burnout 52:07 Redefining Success 💬 QUOTES TO REMEMBER: I didn’t want the break-up to define me. Life falls apart around us, and then we have to rebuild. The trick is to keep your heart soft. If I’m setting the narrative, I want it to be hopeful . I had to rewire my brain - I had to become an entirely new person. Then it became second nature. 🔗 LINKS + MENTIONS: Louise O’Neill’s memoir A Bigger Life is out now: https://harpercollins.co.uk/products/a-bigger-life-louise-oneill?variant=55970156118395 Join the How To Fail community: www.howtofail.supportingcast.fm/#content Elizabeth’s Substack: www.theelizabethday.substack.com 📚 WANT MORE? Dolly Alderton - swap.fm/l/XM98joc3GFEMTsLfkEfR Caitlin Moran - swap.fm/l/CaitlinMoran 💌 LOVE THIS EPISODE? Subscribe on Spotify, Apple or wherever you get your podcasts Leave a 5⭐ review – it helps more people discover these stories 👋 Follow How To Fail & Elizabeth: Instagram: @elizabday TikTok: @howtofailpod Podcast Instagram: @howtofailpod Website: www.elizabethday.org Elizabeth and Louise answer listener questions in our subscriber series, Failing with Friends. Join our community of subscribers here: https://lnk.to/7i0moR Have a failure you’re trying to work through for Elizabeth to discuss? Click here to get in touch: askhowtofail.com Production & Post Production Coordinator: Eric Ryan Engineer: Matias Torres Assistant Producer: Shania Manderson Senior Producer: Hannah Talbot Executive Producer: Alex Lawless How to Fail is an Elizabeth Day and Sony Music Entertainment Production. Find more great podcasts from Sony Music Entertainment at sonymusic.com/podcasts To bring your brand to life in this podcast, email [email protected] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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

• 0:00Speaker 00

  From the age of like, yeah, 14 to 32, so nearly 20 years and all of my adult life. I went between anorexia and bulimia. For that entire year, every time I woke up, the one sentence that kept going around my brain was, "I'm going to die soon." And then the therapist said, she was really firm on this, she said, "Oh, no." She said, "People make full recoveries." Like, my failure to recover and then, so it's the subsequent, like, almost like, as I said, rewiring of my neural pathways has actually led me to be an adult that I think has a lot more freedom.

• 0:35Elizabeth Day?

  Hello and welcome to How To Fail with me, Elizabeth Day. This is the podcast where each week I ask a guest about what failure has taught them. It's sometimes surprising, sometimes funny, sometimes moving, but it's almost always uplifting. Before we get started on this conversation, please do remember to like, follow and subscribe so that you never miss a single episode.

• 1:01Elizabeth Day?

  Confession time. I have a tendency to postpone certain decisions for far longer than is sensible. Not the big life decisions, oddly enough, those I can usually handle. It's the smaller ones that somehow become disproportionately complicated. For me, rugs fall squarely into that category. I've known for a long time that a rug can completely change how a room feels, but I've always found sizing for a space tricky. That's why Ernesta appealed to me. Ernesta makes designer quality rugs, custom cut to the exact dimensions of your space. So instead of making do with something that's close enough, you're choosing something made specifically for your home.

• 1:42Elizabeth Day?

  I also love the fact that you can order five oversized 12 by 12 samples for just $10 before committing. And Ernesta's design team will help with sizing completely free of charge. Visit ernestacom and order five samples for only $10 and you'll get $50 towards any rug of your choice. That's ernestacom. Louise O'Neill is a bestselling, award-winning Irish author and former journalist whose writing has been a shaping force in modern feminism. Her fiction is taught on the Irish curriculum. Paul Mescal starred in a highly acclaimed stage adaptation of her work. Her debut novel, Only Ever Yours, won multiple awards,

• 2:26Elizabeth Day?

  but it was her second, Asking For It, published in 2015, that catapulted her into the public eye. It told the story of Emma, who wakes up the morning after a party on her front porch with no memory of how she got there. It's only when she sees photos on social media that she realises she's been assaulted. The book caused a national discussion in O'Neill's home country, raising issues of consent and sexual violence. Her subsequent work has tackled similarly crucial topics: coercive control, female shame, toxic masculinity, and the dark sides of fame and social media.

• 3:06Elizabeth Day?

  Now, with her new book, she has ventured for the first time into memoir. A Bigger Life turns this unflinching lens on O'Neill's decision, after the collapse of a long-term relationship in her late 30s, to set herself the challenge of dating a different man each night in three different cities: Paris, London and New York. The experience taught her more about herself than she could have ever anticipated, and it was inspired by something her father, Michael, said to her. "My life at 38 looked nothing like the one I had envisioned for myself," O'Neill recalls. "I felt like I had failed in every possible way and I had no idea how to fix it.

• 3:50Elizabeth Day?

  He listened to me and then he said, 'Louise, if you want a bigger life, you're going to have to take bigger risks.'" Louise O'Neill, welcome to How To Fail.

• 4:01Speaker 00

  It is so surreal, listening to you, because I've been, like, I've been a fan of the podcast for such a long time, to actually hear, like, me getting the How To Fail introduction. I'm just like, this is insane, this is very surreal, I can't believe this is happening.

• 4:17Elizabeth Day?

  Well, I had an additional pressure because you are one of my favourite people and we are really good friends. And I didn't want to get a single thing wrong. Is this your eighth book?

• 4:27Speaker 00

  Yes, I love the way you say that and I'm like, I'm actually not sure. It's my eighth, yes, it's my, I have written seven novels and then this is my first memoir.

• 4:34Elizabeth Day?

  How did you find it turning to non-fiction?

• 4:36Speaker 00

  Oh, my God, it is so hard. I really struggled at the beginning to get the voice right, which is so funny because it's my voice. But there was a part of me, I think with fiction, you're so used to writing in a character's voice, that I was really concerned at the beginning, does this feel too chatty? Does this feel too informal? Because it was very much coming from me. And then the second part is just how incredibly exposing it is. And I mean, you know this because, you know, you have written non-fiction, but also have been so incredibly generous with your life experience and with everything that you've gone through. And I'm always really impressed by how you managed to do that because even with just writing the memoir, like, I feel very vulnerable,

• 5:21Speaker 00

  like, in a way that I think you can kind of hide with fiction.

• 5:24Elizabeth Day?

  Yes.

• 5:24Speaker 00

  So if you have any tips, please give them to me.

• 5:27Elizabeth Day?

  For me, that goes to the root of something that you examine so brilliantly in A Bigger Life, which of course I loved, and I think you're such a phenomenal writer. But it goes to the core of this idea of womanhood, being conditioned to please others. And that's something that we have to fight against every single day. And in a way, your anxiety or any fear of exposure is a sign that you're doing it right.

• 5:52Speaker 00

  Yeah, oh, okay. Well, then, given the level of anxiety, then I must be really, really doing it right. Yeah.

• 6:00Elizabeth Day?

  Let's talk about your dad. He's a butcher in Kilkington, West Cork. It's a family, it's a butcher that's been in the family since 1990.

• 6:08Speaker 00

  Yes, it's a very longstanding family tradition, sort of passed on from Michael Joseph O'Neill, the first to the second and now the third. And then he had two daughters, neither of whom are that interested in becoming butchers. So I'm not sure what's going to happen once he retires. But yeah, it has been in our family for a very long time. There's something really interesting about growing up in such a small town. Like, I grew up in Kilkington, West Cork, and having like those kind of roots that like go so deep. And in a way, I think I found it very stifling, actually, as a young person, because it felt as if my future, or let's say the expectations that other people had for me,

• 6:50Speaker 00

  were really like set in stone according to who I was and, you know, who my family was. And I think I had such, I don't know, such hopes and such like huge dreams and such ambition. And I mean, I was lucky, I suppose, that my family, particularly my parents, were like incredibly supportive of that, which I think if you've read A Bigger Life, like, you'll see that. But I definitely think that I needed to move away in order to, I don't know, come into my own or find myself. And then I was able to come back, I think, once I had done that, once I had sort of grounded myself properly and this is who I am as a person outside of, like, you know, the fact that my father or my father's family

• 7:33Speaker 00

  have owned this butcher shop on the main, on the main street of Kilkington for generations.

• 7:38Elizabeth Day?

  Do you think that butchery has taught you anything about the art of writing?

• 7:43Speaker 00

  Well, I don't know, I think the way my dad approaches things. And I think it's the, he's very meticulous and he's a real perfectionist and like has very high standards for himself, which I think have been really helpful. And that kind of willpower, you know, I think that as a writer, you need that because so much of it is, you know, like, there's no one looking over your shoulder, like, checking your work. You have to be very self-motivated. So I think having a parent who sort of set that example, you know, for all, I think the example that he set, I think constitutionally, I was just someone, I think, who really, and I think it probably was stemming from a fear of not being good enough.

• 8:24Speaker 00

  So then anytime I made a mistake, anytime I failed in any way, like, this incredibly strong instinct kicked in of like, "Well, this is more proof, like, you're not good enough." And then, so then failure began to feel like terrifying, like, it felt like a death. And, and you know, at the start of A Bigger Life, like, you know, my five-year relationship has broken down. I'm about to turn 38. All of a sudden, I'm like, okay, you know, marriage, children, like, these things might not happen for me. We had just bought a house six months previously. Like, the shame that I felt around that failing was so intense

• 9:06Speaker 00

  because again, it was, are people going to look at me and think, "Why can't she sort of make a relationship work?" Yeah, I think the shame was almost corrosive, really.

• 9:19Elizabeth Day?

  We're going to get into that more because of your first failure. But before we kick off with that, I want to talk a little bit more about A Bigger Life because yes, it is about this dating experiment, but it's about more than that too. It is about women and what it means to be a woman right now. And one of the things that I really appreciated about it was your radical optimism. Because you go through these really tough times and that causes you to explore in this sort of questing, curious way that you have. And the dates that you go on, by and large, you point out that they were good experiences.

• 10:03Elizabeth Day?

  They taught you something necessary. And you also examine everything from kind of botox to consent. And there's always, underneath it all, I feel, this drumbeat of sisterhood that I loved and is quite rare to read. How aware were you, when you were writing this book, that you wanted it to be that radically optimistic?

• 10:28Speaker 00

  Do you know, it's interesting, when the breakup happened, one of my first instincts was, I don't want to get stuck here. And, you know, I talk about this in the book, that like, when I was 14, my uncle died, and he was 30. And, you know, we had, because my parents were so young, having us, like, I spent a lot of, my sister and I spent a lot of time with my maternal grandparents. And two of my uncles were still living at home. So they were all really more like big brothers than anything else. And I remember when that happened, you know, my grandmother was obviously so devastated. And, but what I thought was really striking, because this happened in 1999, and, you know, for an Irish

• 11:10Speaker 00

  woman of that generation, she was so determined not to let it define her. Like, she went to group therapy sessions, again, this would not have been, you know, and I think she said that she had seen other people who had gone through something terrible, and how it had sort of like, they had been crystallized in the grief and became, like, I suppose, difficult to be around, you know, like, when someone is that sad for that long, that she said, she didn't want to become isolated, and she didn't want to be left alone, because all she had was her grief. And I think watching someone really make an effort to sort of move through that, to feel her feelings, but also like, to heal from it, from like,

• 11:52Speaker 00

  the worst loss that you can possibly have. So I think that was kind of in the back of my mind with the breakup. And I just was like, I don't want to allow this to define me. I don't want to become bitter. I don't want to become resentful. And I also don't want to carry this with me. So like, I did so much work in 2023, in order to heal, because, and I suppose I kind of figured that out by the end of the journey, was that, that is what life is about, is that we fall apart, life falls apart around us, and then we have to rebuild. And actually, the trick is, is keeping your heart soft. And I think

• 12:30Speaker 00

  that, you know, people talk about the dating scene, and how terrible it is, and how dehumanizing it is. But actually, I think a really big problem is that most people who are dating have been really hurt. You know, they've been through a breakup, they've been through a divorce, they've had their heart broken. And they're kind of going back into this with like, their defenses up, and kind of really like, on alert for danger, and very quick, I think, to take offense if, you know, someone says something or does something that they, that they see as that danger. And then it's really hard to connect. And I suppose I just wanted to do my best to heal, so that when I started dating again,

• 13:11Speaker 00

  or even if I didn't, that I would just be open, and, as you said, optimistic. And every time, like, you know, I went on a lot of dates, and every time something went wrong, and every time, you know, I went on like, a date that, you know, wasn't great, or, you know, there, you know, there's one I talk about in the book, where, you know, he frightened me, you know, there was a man in Central Park, and he grabbed, I said something, and then he answered, and I didn't quite hear what he said. And he grabbed me by the face, and he said, I was talking to you. And I remember just like, instantly kind of going into that like, fight or flight. I left, blocked him, and then I was like, I'm gonna shake that off. And like, went out on another date that night, and that date was wonderful.

• 13:53Speaker 00

  And I decided to allow that be what defined that day. And I'm not, again, I'm not saying this is easy. Like, I've, you know, been through my own trauma, and like, my own grief, and like, you know, all of those things. And I know how easy it is to be triggered in those situations. But I think, I suppose, I just wanted to feel like, that I was setting the narrative, and that if I was setting the narrative, I wanted to be, it to be hopeful.

• 14:17Elizabeth Day?

  What an answer.

• 14:19Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 14:20Elizabeth Day?

  That was amazing.

• 14:25Elizabeth Day?

  One of the things I hear a lot from listeners is how tiring it can be when your mind just doesn't settle. And I can only imagine this feels even heavier with intrusive thoughts. It's that quiet sense of being worn down by something you never asked for, and never wanted, but just can't seem to switch off. If you struggle with this, I want to tell you about NoCD, because it's a resource that genuinely helps people. NoCD provides specialized treatment for OCD. And what I appreciate about their approach is how human it feels. You're matched with a licensed therapist trained in ERP therapy, that's Exposure and Response Prevention. And over time, you learn skills that help your OCD symptoms become

• 15:06Elizabeth Day?

  manageable, so you can live more of the life you want to live. If you're struggling with OCD or unrelenting intrusive thoughts, NoCD can help. Book a free 15 minute call to get started at learn.nocd.com/fail. Okay, let's get on to your failures. Your first failure, as you put it, failure to have a marriage like my parents. So when did they meet and marry and have children?

• 15:32Speaker 00

  Okay, so my parents, this is so funny, because my mother went to boarding school in Kilkilte, where I'm from. And she really didn't like it. And I think was a home bird, and didn't, you know, so did not want to be at that boarding school, which funnily enough, turned out to be the school that my sister and I both attended. So when she left, she said, I'm never going back to Kilkilte. And then she met my father at a football match, of course, everything centers around GA. And, I mean, the way, this is how they tell it, she was like, he had a sandwich with him, and she was like, oh my God, would he not buy a sandwich out, you know, that kind of way, like, what's, and then he said she was the most beautiful woman he'd ever seen, and he was instantly absolutely obsessed

• 16:15Speaker 00

  with her. So I think that was 17. And I think they maybe broke up for a little bit when they were maybe 19, but they were married by 21.

• 16:23Elizabeth Day?

  Wow.

• 16:24Speaker 00

  Yeah. And then had my older sister when they were 23. And then they had me when they were 25. I don't know, there's just something about watching people go through their entire lives together, like, you know, they have known each other, as I said, since they were teenagers. And, and I think constantly meeting these new iterations of each other, and learning how to love this new version of that person. And I think just this real, like, it's just been this kind of masterclass, really, in, in unconditional love. And I think I've been really lucky to sort of have that. I mean, which is kind of funny, given that, like, you know, that I had really struggled to, I suppose, emulate that. But I don't

• 17:09Speaker 00

  know, there's, there's a certain loss in knowing that, you know, I will never be a young bride, like, I will never be a young parent, and I will never have this sort of relationship. I mean, they've been together for 40, married for 45 years together, you know, 50.

• 17:23Elizabeth Day?

  I remember turning 40, and feeling that it was such a big deal, because I could remember my parents turning 40. I was cognizant enough, as an individual, I was grown up enough to vividly remember that.

• 17:38Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 17:39Elizabeth Day?

  And it highlighted the fact that, just as you're saying, I didn't have those children who would ever remember me turning 40. And that's a strange thing, when you come to terms with the idea that there are versions of your life that will be forever unlived.

• 17:55Speaker 00

  Yes, exactly. And I think, you know, I'm 41 now, and like, to think of them at 41, because again, I have, I mean, I was 16 when they were 41. They had a 16 and an 18 year old. And they had a house, a business, all day home in Spain. I'm like, what am I doing? And I understand that, let's say, you know, things are different now. And I do think that's part of the millennial curse, nearly, is that inability to tick off those markers of adulthood, that I think our parents were able to do, well, it seemed like effortlessly.

• 18:26Elizabeth Day?

  Yeah.

• 18:27Speaker 00

  But there's, there's, I don't know, like, sometimes, like, still, if I have, like, I don't know, if something, if I have a stain, and I can't get the stain out, I will go to my mother, like, I'll go into the house, and I'm like, how do I get rid of this? And I said to her one day, I said, when you were 41, or what was the, oh no, I asked her, would she help me with my car insurance? That I said to her, I said, when you were 41, were you asking your mother to do this? And she looked at me, and she was like, absolutely not. Like, dead in the eye, like, of course not, you absolute loser. I was a proper adult.

• 18:58Elizabeth Day?

  One of the things that you write about so brilliantly in A Bigger Life is the tweakments that you have.

• 19:05Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 19:06Elizabeth Day?

  And I've always appreciated this about you, and we've exchanged lengthy voice notes on the topic, because you make no bones about the fact that, as a car carrying feminist, you understand that it is also an inherent contradiction.

• 19:17Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 19:18Elizabeth Day?

  As do I.

• 19:19Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 19:20Elizabeth Day?

  To pursue the desire to look the best that you can at any given age. But would you tell us where you are with that?

• 19:29Speaker 00

  Yeah. I mean, it's funny, because I think, you know, and I write about this in the book, my relationship with my appearance, my appearance has always been a difficult one. Like, you know, I developed anorexia, and then bulimia, when I was 14, and really struggled with that. You know, there was periods of maybe like, six months here, or like, five months there, where I might be almost what I would consider like, a dry drunk, where that I wasn't properly healed, but the symptoms weren't there. So I, from the age of, like, yeah, 14 to 32, so nearly 20 years, and all of my adult life, I, yeah, went between kind of anorexia and bulimia. And like, it was a, it was a really, like,

• 20:11Speaker 00

  it was very, you know, of course, any Asian disorder is serious, but like, this was a huge part of my life. I was very, very, very unwell. And I think when I recovered, so much of that was almost trying to be neutral about my appearance, do you know, like, trying not to think about it too much. And, but that it was always a little bit tricky, like, you know, I say that, it's, it's like a broken bone, like, you know, that it'll mend, but it never quite feels the same, like, you know, it aches in cold weather, that kind of thing. I don't know, I suppose then, that kind of wanting, you know, particularly in this job, like, I feel like most of the time, I barely think about it. But I don't know how you do this, where you're on camera all the time, and like, just that awareness

• 20:53Speaker 00

  of like, that aspect of yourself. I just don't know if we're meant to.

• 20:57Elizabeth Day?

  No, I agree.

• 20:58Speaker 00

  Be looking at ourselves. And I think everyone, actually, not even just a job, like, there's anyone who is on Zoom, or anyone who, like, you know, takes photos of themselves, or like, you know, for social media, whatever, you'll have that understanding of, we're almost looking at ourselves too much. And I think it can be really easy to become very obsessive with that. And I often say that, like, the fear of aging, I nearly feel like is replacing diet culture, because I think like, a lot of millennials have sort of, have done a lot of work to unpick diet culture. And now the fear of aging has, has kicked in. And like, I did spend all of my 20s hating my body, and I don't want to spend all of my 40s hating my face. So I'm really trying my best to kind of heal that relationship

• 21:42Speaker 00

  as well. But I suppose also...

• 21:47Speaker 00

  You know, like wanting to look my best, like, you know, and it's, I don't know. And I mean, I think, you know, people will listen and who are listening will, I think, definitely have like such different opinions on this because it is, I think, quite a contentious topic of conversation. And, you know, I, I, I do Botox maybe like once every eight months to a year. Like I've had Scultra and, and microneedling and like, you know, all of these things. I think that when the breakup happened, I was just about to turn 38. And Elizabeth, I thought my life was over. And I know you've listened.

• 22:25Elizabeth Day?

  Yeah.

• 22:25Speaker 00

  I know. And I remember, because you sent me the most amazing voice message talking about this breakup that you'd been through. Was it 38 or 39?

• 22:31Elizabeth Day?

  Exactly the same age.

• 22:32Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 22:32Elizabeth Day?

  I was, but I was just about to turn 39.

• 22:34Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 22:34Elizabeth Day?

  It was three weeks before I turned 39.

• 22:35Speaker 00

  Yes. And I remember that. And I, I, I still remember I was walking on the beach and you'd sent me a voice message and I was listening to it. And I held on to that like so tightly, just this sense of like, okay, because I think that sometimes, you know, we talk about the hope, like you need that hope, like to just kind of pull you through. I was like, okay, if it can happen to Elizabeth, maybe it can happen to me, you know. And I think as well, and loads of women, I think, listening to this will understand that there's so much pressure put on you, particularly, I think, in your like mid to late 30s around fertility and making decisions and this idea of time running out, which, I mean, again, we could talk about that for a very long time, about like what those are really, a

• 23:15Speaker 00

  lot of that is based on very outdated scientific information. But, and again, and also I think that rhetoric that if you're over 35, the dating apps are hell. If you're over 35, no one is going to be interested in you. If you're over 35, you may as well be dead. And that was not my experience. And actually, I think those ideas are so harmful because I think they're keeping women trapped in relationships that they do not want to be in for longer than they should, because they are afraid that there are no other options. They are afraid that this is the best that they can do. They're afraid that they go out onto the dating app that is just going to be a hellscape. And, you know, a friend of my mother's, whose husband died a few years ago, just, you know, fell in love with

• 24:00Speaker 00

  this amazing man. She's 66. She told me about a friend of hers, whose mother has just gotten a new boyfriend. The mother is 83. So like, do you know what I mean? I'm like, I just feel like we have to. So actually, by the end of the book, I think I was so much less afraid of aging. And at 41, I feel so much younger than I did at 38. Does that make sense?

• 24:22Elizabeth Day?

  It makes complete and utter sense. And I can, I utterly agree with you. Like, yes, everything that you just said.

• 24:29Speaker 00

  Yeah, thank you.

• 24:30Elizabeth Day?

  I know a number of friends who, because I'm of that age now, where a lot of my contemporaries are getting divorced.

• 24:36Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 24:37Elizabeth Day?

  And they've had enormous healthy success on the apps.

• 24:41Speaker 00

  Mm hmm.

• 24:41Elizabeth Day?

  Because they're looking for something different than what I was looking for when I was 39 and on the apps. And I did still want children. And I did feel this sort of undercurrent of my own desperation. Whereas my friends have had their kids if they wanted them. They've got divorced. They're looking for something that is companionship without too much responsibility.

• 25:03Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 25:03Elizabeth Day?

  And actually, that's such-

• 25:04Speaker 00

  They're looking for good sex, is what you're at.

• 25:05Elizabeth Day?

  Yes, they're looking for great sex. And that's such an attractive-

• 25:09Speaker 00

  Companionship. I was like, what? Are we on a Jane Austen novel?

• 25:11Elizabeth Day?

  I'm 47, Louise, and that's my language.

• 25:15Speaker 00

  We just want companionship.

• 25:16Elizabeth Day?

  As a Gen Xer.

• 25:16Speaker 00

  I'm sorry. Yeah, sorry. Over the age of 45, you're not allowed to have sex anymore. I forgot about that.

• 25:20Elizabeth Day?

  But actually, some of them have ended up with friends.

• 25:25Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 25:25Elizabeth Day?

  Who started out as romantic prospects, but because they're going through something similar, whether it be co-parenting or aging, they, they've ended up as friends. But it's such an attractive prospect.

• 25:36Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 25:36Elizabeth Day?

  Actually, that kind of person. So I think it's really important to put that narrative out there. Looking back on this failure, this failure to have a marriage like your parents, you have said to me that you had a series of unhealthy relationships. What do you think the root cause of that dysfunction was?

• 25:55Speaker 00

  Yeah, I know. Because when you were saying, when, when I've had this like wonderful example, and actually, I think, and I, I talk about that in A Bigger Life, because that was such a huge part of the journey. Because I remember when I came back from Paris, and I was telling you about all these really hot men.

• 26:10Elizabeth Day?

  My God, the Frenchmen loved you.

• 26:11Speaker 00

  Oh, the Frenchmen. They were, they were, they're just incredible. And you said to me, you know, you said, what did you learn about yourself? And Elizabeth's like, ever the interviewer, do you know? Ever, let's get deep. And one of the things that I, I suppose I really did learn about myself was that I could sort of see, looking back, that I had this pattern of either going for like emotionally unavailable men who, you know, really would not have had the capacity to have the relationship that I claimed I wanted. And then I became like almost obsessive about like trying to win their approval, trying to like make them love me. Because I suppose a part of me felt, well, if this

• 26:52Speaker 00

  person who clearly has no interest, if I can make them love me, then maybe I can believe that I actually am lovable. And then kind of flip-flopping then to like another type of man who, you know, professed to love me so deeply, and that I perhaps didn't love them as much, but that I felt safe in it. Because I thought, they love me more, therefore they will never leave me, therefore they will never hurt me. And even if they do leave me, I'm not going to get hurt because I'm not fully sort of emotionally invested in this anyway. And actually, I suppose what I was able to sort of trace it back to, which again, was in the process of, of writing this, because, you know, I talk about at

• 27:36Speaker 00

  the end of the book, you know, that I met someone. And my friend, one of my best friends, said to me, you know, you must be so relieved not to have to date anymore. And when she said it, I got this like real shock, because my instinct was, no, the dating is easier. Because the dating, I can go, it's one date, I can be dazzling. Like, I can just be this perfect woman, and I will never let them close enough to hurt me, and I'll never be close enough to disappoint them. Whereas actually, you know, I think being vulnerable in that way felt really terrifying, the idea of true intimacy. And, you know, I, I do think that, you know, it stems, and again, I, you know, I mentioned this in the book,

• 28:18Speaker 00

  where like, when I was 14, my uncle died. And, you know, I think it is that experience of like your entire life changing in a phone call, where, you know, we were, it was my aunt was getting married, and my sister and I were going to be bridesmaids. So we're in the department store, and we have, you know, we're trying on the bridesmaids outfits. And I can hear my mother's mobile ring. And she answers the phone. And then all I hear is her saying, is he dead? And I turn around, because I thought maybe she was talking about dad. And, you know, that's just that terror. And she was like, we have to go. And, you know, you're tearing off the dresses and getting into the car and like driving over home. Sorry, that's what I call my grandparents' house. And opening the door, and I could

• 29:01Speaker 00

  just hear this screaming. And, you know, he was engaged to be married to this really lovely woman who was only like 25. You know, she was only a baby herself. And I think witnessing that level of grief, I, I just, the message that I internalized was, this is what happens when you love someone. And this is what happens when you lose them. And I just thought, I'm never going to let that happen to me. And I think I, you know, I think sometimes when that happens at such a young age, you almost forget. And then you don't understand in adulthood why, you know, this pattern is kind of playing out

• 29:44Speaker 00

  and why all of these things are happening, until you, I think, have that moment and go, because I was like, I can't let this, you know, I'm about to turn 40, and I've never allowed myself to be vulnerable enough to truly be in love. And I was like, I can't live the rest of my life like this. You know? I mean, they're talking about failure. I mean, that is a big failure to be looking down the barrel at 40 and think, I've never had that.

• 30:13Elizabeth Day?

  Have you opened your heart to it now?

• 30:16Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 30:17Elizabeth Day?

  Okay.

• 30:17Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 30:18Elizabeth Day?

  I'm so sorry you went through that devastating loss when you were 14. What was your uncle's name?

• 30:25Speaker 00

  His name was Michael as well. Listen, listen, Irish people of a certain generation, they all, they have about five names. Michael, Mary, you know, there's just, there's a few. John, Anne. Yeah, he was wonderful, you know, and just too young.

• 30:40Elizabeth Day?

  I just wanted the chance to say his name and to remember him.

• 30:44Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 30:45Elizabeth Day?

  And thank you for sharing that. And-

• 30:48Speaker 00

  And also, can I just, sorry, just to say, because I think, you know, when we talk about the fear of aging, I think a part of me almost felt ashamed around being afraid of aging. Do you know, like of, even with getting the Botox and like getting these things? Because I know that what the alternative is.

• 31:06Elizabeth Day?

  Yeah.

• 31:06Speaker 00

  Do you know? Like, I know what that, like, aging is a privilege. And even, you know, I, I, when my grandmother died, like I sat with her, I was alone with her. You know, we were taking shifts and she, just I was there with her when she died. And, you know, I was singing Be Not Afraid to her. And, you know, she passed. And I remember just looking at her and, you know, it's this, it was this incredibly profound moment, because I had this realization, someday I'll do this with my own mother. And I looked at her face, and every wrinkle on it, and I could see what my face would look like, you know, in 50 years' time. And it's just, there is, as I said, that feeling of like

• 31:47Speaker 00

  a tiny bit of shame around, like, what's the goal to kind of look 35 forever? To not see my mother's face appear on mine in the mirror? To not see my grandmother's face appear too? Because of the incredible facelift-

• 32:00Elizabeth Day?

  Incredible clam and sperm facials you're having.

• 32:02Speaker 00

  The incredible facelift I'm gonna get. No, I'm joking. Please buy the book in order, this is basically a GoFundMe for my inevitable facelift.

• 32:10Elizabeth Day?

  But I think, I think there's, I want to release you from that.

• 32:14Speaker 00

  Oh, thank you.

• 32:15Elizabeth Day?

  Granule of shame. Because I, for me, it's also about health, and your skin is an organ.

• 32:21Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 32:22Elizabeth Day?

  And it's about keeping it healthy.

• 32:23Speaker 00

  No, that's very true.

• 32:23Elizabeth Day?

  In the same way that we go to the dentist. And if we are lucky enough to be able to invest in that, then I find that to be valid.

• 32:32Speaker 00

  Yeah, thank you. Thank you for that.

• 32:34Elizabeth Day?

  Final question on this particular failure. When someone dies before their time in a shocking way, when a relationship ends brutally, in a manner you hadn't anticipated, one of the things that often happens is that you lose faith.

• 32:52Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 32:53Elizabeth Day?

  You lose faith in your own judgment.

• 32:55Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 32:55Elizabeth Day?

  And you lose faith in the reliability of the world around you. Is that something that happened to you after this relationship ended when you were 38, that you lost faith in your judgment?

• 33:06Speaker 00

  Oh, yeah. I mean, I think that was probably the hardest thing. I mean, I was blindsided by the end of the relationship. But- I had had an instinct, you know, that like we weren't right for each other. And I hadn't listened to it. And I think a lot of that was because in recovery, you know, I started recovering at thirty two and I got into this relationship at thirty three. And I think a part of me in recovery wanted everything to look right.

• 33:33Elizabeth Day?

  Yes.

• 33:33Speaker 00

  You know, because like I think anyone who's, anyone who has experienced addiction or who has dealt with like something like an eating disorder, it really sort of stunts you emotionally. So in a lot of ways, you know, I did start it when I was fourteen and then I recovered at thirty two and I kind of looked up and looked around and thought, I am so behind. Like, you know, my friends who have been sort of having these normal developmental stages are getting married and having children and buying houses. And I am really like, for all intents and purposes, like a teenager. And I think then all of a sudden I was like, I just want things to be orderly.

• 34:15Speaker 00

  And everything had gotten so chaotic in the sort of the death throes of the eating disorder, which again, I think anyone dealing with an addiction will understand that, like how out of control everything had become. That I wanted things to be orderly, I wanted things to be neat. It's like, yes, you know, here I am, I have a savings account and I have, you know, this man who's perfect on paper. And, you know, we've just bought our first house together and, and, you know, tick, tick, tick, I'm okay. And then I suppose, but was any of it what I actually wanted? Do you know, and I think that was the thing was that I didn't give myself enough space to think about that. And I didn't trust my own instincts.

• 34:57Speaker 00

  And then when it fell apart, actually, that was probably the hardest bit was being so angry with myself. Because I thought I should have left when I was thirty four. If I had left at thirty four or thirty five, I felt like those extra couple of years, particularly, you know, because of all of the, I suppose, the fear mongering that we hear around fertility, that that would have given me a little bit more of a cushion. And then it was, you know, I can't trust myself, I can't trust my judgment. And like, again, so much of this journey was me figuring out how to trust myself again.

• 35:35Speaker 00

  And like, I think you really see that, you know, let's say, you know, in the book, I talk about like, you know, I meet this, this man who is incredibly wealthy, do you know, like wealth, I know, I know.

• 35:49Elizabeth Day?

  One of my favourite anecdotes, okay. Only Louise O'Neill could go on the dating apps and get a multimillionaire to fly from the States to come and see her.

• 35:59Speaker 00

  On the first date.

• 36:00Elizabeth Day?

  On the first date in West Cork.

• 36:01Speaker 00

  I know, I know. It's funny though, because two men drove from Dublin, which is an eight hour round trip for a first date as well. And my mother said, one of them was the Easter weekend. And she said, he's not driving down for a first date, is he? On Easter weekend? And I said, yeah, and she said, well, I hope he doesn't die in the M fifty. I wouldn't want a man's life on my conscience. I was like, okay.

• 36:24Elizabeth Day?

  Your mother's iconic.

• 36:25Speaker 00

  Yeah, oh, she is.

• 36:26Elizabeth Day?

  She is in so many ways.

• 36:27Speaker 00

  And then my dad, when this man, as you said, flew in to take me on our first date. And I had to drive sort of like, you know, I won't give distances, but I had to drive to sort of meet him. And my dad thought, well, really now, why is he making you drive? Like, do you know, this kind of like, nothing would be good enough, you know? He was really kind and he was really handsome and he was, I mean, it was really interesting being pursued by someone who had obviously, you know, experienced an enormous amount of success and kind of knew what he wanted. And then really moved to get what he wanted. And he's like, you are what I want. And, you know, kind of laid out the life that we would have together, you know, he said, we'll, you know, winter at his estate in Hawaii.

• 37:08Speaker 00

  And, you know, he said, I, you know, then we can go between New York and Ireland. And then he did say to me, this, this part really hurt me, he did say, he was like, he started looking at property in West Cork that he would buy for us. A free house. In this, do you have any idea how bad? Do you have any how bad the property market is in Ireland? That I was like, oh, my God. You know, this is like, as a writer, like the idea of like never, because it's such an inherently insecure job, both financial and otherwise. And I think the thought of never having to worry about any of that ever again, you know, it's like switching off my brain, becoming a Pilates princess, living my best soft life.

• 37:48Speaker 00

  But like, there was such a strong instinct, like in my gosh, going, this isn't right. And I couldn't explain that in the same way that if you had asked in the, like in my previous relationship, like what is that instinct? It's like, it doesn't, it doesn't make logical sense and there is no explaining it and there is no reason and there is, you know, it's just this felt sense in the body. And I think that we're all, I think we've really like lost that art of sort of tuning into our body and what it's trying to tell us.

• 38:20Elizabeth Day?

  Yeah.

• 38:21Speaker 00

  And I had to say to him, I was like, I just don't think this is going to work out. And, you know, he was upset and, and, you know, I think he was right to be upset in some ways, but like, and like all my friends were like, please don't break up with him, we want to go in the private jet.

• 38:40Elizabeth Day?

  There are so many things I wish I'd known when I started this podcast and my production company, Daylight. Like, why am I spending hours trying to make a website look good? Why am I designing everything from scratch? And why am I spending all my time just doing admin? What I really needed was one place that could do all of this for me. Enter Shopify. Shopify has beautiful, ready-made templates that make your website look polished without needing to become a graphic designer overnight. Its AI tools can help you get your site up and running quickly. And Shopify Checkout makes it really easy for customers to actually go from, ooh, I like that, to, yes, I'll have one.

• 39:20Elizabeth Day?

  If Shopify had existed when I started out, I could have saved myself a lot of time, stress and some rogue design choices. If you're ready to hear the of your first sale today, head over to Shopify.co.uk/fail to start your free trial today. That's right, start your free trial at Shopify.co.uk/fail. Let's actually talk about your recovery, because that is one of your failures. And you have put it as a failure to recover for seventeen years. So this idea of not trusting your body or seeking to control it and be, be something, whatever that illusion of perfection might be,

• 40:03Elizabeth Day?

  lasted for, as you say, almost two decades. How did you recover? I know that's probably an impossible question, but there'll be so many people listening and watching who will want to know.

• 40:12Speaker 00

  I know. I mean, yeah, it was, as I said, nearly, nearly two decades. And also, like by the time I recovered, I really had no sense in my body of what it was like to eat normally. Because fourteen, like is, you're still a child. So for all of my adult life, I had had an eating disorder. Like the way in which I think my neural pathways were wired was in service of that eating disorder. Every time I failed to recover, because, you know, my parents found out that I had, I think they figured out I had bulimia at seventeen. So they made me start seeing a therapist.

• 40:52Speaker 00

  And so funny, looking back, because what year, I was seventeen, so like two thousand and two. And like the thought of seeing a therapist was so shameful that I remember telling people that I had pernicious anemia. And I had to go get iron injections every week because she didn't see people after four. I think I had a few months where I thought, oh, I'm going to get better and then relapsed. So it felt like every time that I like recovered for a little bit and then would relapse again, it just became harder and harder to believe that I would ever get better. And like, there was a couple of times, like I remember when this one time in, I think I was living in New York and I had come home for, was it maybe Christmas?

• 41:34Speaker 00

  And my mother had, like, I was really, I mean, like so underweight at that point. So was eating very little and then if I did eat anything, I would make myself get sick. And she, I came down, I think she was sitting at the kitchen and she was just very still. And I remember coming down and saying, just trying to talk to her and she just looked at me and she said, I know what you were doing. And I said, you know, tried to lie, like I was like, what are you, you know, I wasn't doing anything. And she said, just don't lie to me. And she said, I'm so tired of you lying to me. And I said, I promise, mom, I won't do it again. And then she, again, she just said, Louise, I don't believe you. And you could just tell, like, it was breaking her heart.

• 42:17Speaker 00

  She was like, I just don't believe you anymore because like you have said this so many times. And then after that, I was okay for maybe six months and then I relapsed again. So every time it happened, I just thought, I probably am never going to get better. So I think when I was thirty two, it was after Asking for It Had Been Such a Success.

• 42:37Elizabeth Day?

  Second novel.

• 42:37Speaker 00

  Yeah, my second novel, sorry, which had been such a success in Ireland, but it also brought a huge amount of like trolling and backlash and a lot of attention, both, you know, some positive and some really negative. And, you know, because that book was dealing with sexual violence, people were really sharing their stories with me. And that was such a huge privilege, but you do an event and someone would tell you like the worst thing that had ever happened to them. And then I would go back to the hotel room and just feel utterly hollow. The only way that I knew to fill that void inside was by abusing food. So that was like the best year of my life professionally and just the absolute worst in terms of like health.

• 43:21Speaker 00

  So then I think it just became untenable. I was like, for that entire year, every time I woke up, the one sentence that kept going around my brain was, I'm going to die soon. I'm going to die soon because there's no possible way that a body can withstand what I'm putting it through. And, you know, having watched my mother, like, having watched what she went through with my uncle.

• 43:50Speaker 00

  Like it broke my heart that I was like, I'm going to do this to her again.

• 43:53Elizabeth Day?

  Yeah.

• 43:54Speaker 00

  I couldn't seem to stop. And, you know, I then, I suppose, and you know, it's interesting because often when we talk about these things, there's such a huge amount of privilege in it because due to asking for it doing so well, I suddenly had more money. And having more money meant that I could put, like, I could kind of throw everything at like, every sort of treatment that I could get. And I started, you know, working with an incredible, like, a therapist who specialised in eating disorders. And she said to me, she was like, I want your parents to come in. And we had done, like, I'd been in an inpatient in a hospital when I was 21 for three months. So we had done some family therapy.

• 44:38Speaker 00

  But they came up to see her and she said to them, she said, you know, what do you know about Louise's eating disorder? And they sat there and they said everything. And I think what was so shaming was that, I suppose, I thought I had been really clever. Like, I thought that I had managed to disguise a lot of it or hide a lot of it. And they just knew everything and they just looked so broken at that point, like. And they were like, look, she's an adult, like, you know, we've, we've tried, like, you know, we, and, and then I'm not sure which one of them said it, but they said something like, you know, we've accepted that Louise will always struggle with this, but we just want her to be happy or to live like some sort of normal life.

• 45:24Speaker 00

  And then the therapist said, she was really firm on this, she said, oh no. She said, people make full recoveries. She said, I've seen it. She said, I've seen it countless times. And in the same way, when you messaged me saying that thing about, you know, that you had gone through this breakup at 39 and then had met the love of your life, there was something that went off in the back of my brain that went, okay. The hope that something is possible is so incredibly powerful. Because if it's happened to someone else, maybe it can happen for me. And I kept that with me, just this idea of like, full recovery is possible, full recovery is possible. And it was so, like, it was such hard work. And like, a lot of it was, like, you know, we talk about like the neural pathways in your brain. Like, I had to completely rewire the neural pathways in my brain. I had to become an entirely new person.

• 46:10Speaker 00

  And then it started to become like second nature. And that was when I was like, this is crazy. Because I think it really showed me like the power of the mind. Because all of a sudden, it's like something just clicked. I wonder, is it like learning a language?

• 46:26Elizabeth Day?

  This is so fascinating. So was it therapy that helped with that? So it would be like, stupid example, but say I desperately wanted to be blonde.

• 46:35Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 46:36Elizabeth Day?

  I would wake up each morning and instead of thinking, I so desperately want to be blonde, I would force myself to think, I love being brunette.

• 46:42Speaker 00

  Yes, yes, okay. And also, what I did was every time a negative thought came up, and this was tiring because there was thousands of them a day. Every time a negative thought came up about food or weight or my body, I would say, is that the ultimate truth? And then I would look for like evidence that that didn't have to be true. So if I had this thought about food, let's say that that food is really bad for you. And then I think, well, that's interesting because I saw Imra eat that the other day and Imra looks great. Do you know, or something like that, or Imra ate it without any kind of qualms or didn't, you know, it was just food. Do you know, she just ate it as food.

• 47:21Speaker 00

  And, and the more that I did it and really like dedicated myself to it, it just became like second nature. To the point where now it's almost hard for me to think of that person because it feels like an entirely different Louise. And, and actually in a weird way, like my failure to recover and then, so it's the subsequent, like, almost like I said, rewiring of my neural pathways has actually led me to be an adult that I think has a lot more freedom around food and around weight than a lot of other women my age who never would have had eating disorders, but had sort of like, you know, I mean, hello,

• 48:00Speaker 00

  we, we grew up being told that a balanced diet was having, you know, two bowls of Special K and then for breakfast and for lunch.

• 48:07Elizabeth Day?

  And a sim fast, yes.

• 48:09Speaker 00

  Yes, I think we're entitled to compensation. Like, I really think we should do some sort of mass action.

• 48:13Elizabeth Day?

  And it's so interesting you say that because you and I have had conversations about weight loss jabs and their prevalence for, I would say, celebrities who don't need them and are potentially using them as a way to have a medicalised eating disorder. And you have said that it does not affect you in the way that some people might think it would. It does not trigger you because you know what that costs, you know the pain of that. And I find that so inspiring.

• 48:46Speaker 00

  But it's so important because, look, when it comes to GLP-1s, like, in the same way that if we were sitting here and you told me that you were on medication for blood pressure, I'd be like, okay, I mean, that's between you and your doctor. So like, if someone is taking a GLP-1 for like, you know, a medical reason, absolutely. I think, as you said, the issue is when you're seeing already thin women using it to become what looks like very frail anyway, from the outside. I would argue, yes, that it's medicalised anorexia. And that if I had been, if I was still in an active eating disorder, I would be doing anything, anything to get my hands on these, whether through like a legitimate source or like buying it on the internet.

• 49:28Speaker 00

  Because I would be like, incredible, like, this is sort of the answer to my dreams. And actually, what I think is so important for women, and actually particularly younger women, because I think that when you're in your twenties, you're not thinking about things like fertility. You're not thinking about things like your hormonal health. You're certainly not thinking about your bone density. And, you know, you're not thinking about like muscle mass. And like, when you're in your forties and you're sort of like looking at like the metopause down the barrel, like, all of these things, you're like, okay, in order to survive this, I am going to need to be healthy. And I am going to need to be at like my body's like natural set point.

• 50:09Elizabeth Day?

  Fighting weight.

• 50:10Speaker 00

  Yeah, exactly, exactly. And again, focusing more on, and like, you know, I know this sounds so tedious, but like, it is important, like strength, like, you know, particularly, let's say, if I end up single and child free at 90, or okay, maybe 85, whatever, I want to be able to live independently. And like, I'm not going to be able to do that if I'm dieting at this point, to the point of making my bones brittle. Because that is, I remember getting a bone density scan, like, maybe it was 30. And they were like, we can see already like signs of osteo, the one before osteoporosis, like osteomalacia or something like that. And they were like, this is reversible if you start strength training, and, which I did at 32, which has been an incredible help.

• 50:55Elizabeth Day?

  Thank you so much for opening up about that. And if we are to leave any listener or viewer with one phrase from today, I would say that it is full recovery is possible. What an extraordinary gift for you to give others through the painful journey that you have travelled.

• 51:12Speaker 00

  And it says, I would also say that like, it's very hard work with that you have no, oh god, I even get shivers thinking of this. But I'm like, you have no idea of the peace that's on the other side. Like, you have no idea of the level of freedom that's on the other side. There is so much joy waiting for you. And I think that is, again, coming back to hope.

• 51:31Elizabeth Day?

  And hope does by its nature make life bigger because there's more potential, there are more opportunities. Your final failure weaves into everything we've been speaking about, which is, as you put it, the failure of trying to be quote unquote, the good girl. What did the good girl represent to you?

• 51:52Speaker 00

  I suppose because I think for my entire life, I had this sense of like, if I work hard enough, everything will work out. And then, you know, I think that had, and that had really held true for me in school. It had really held true for me in my career. And then I think when, like, when the relationship fell apart

• 52:13Speaker 00

  and all of a sudden I was just left with this sense of, but I worked so hard.

• 52:18Elizabeth Day?

  Yes.

• 52:19Speaker 00

  Like, I tried so hard at this, like, why is it not, like, why has it fallen apart? Why has it failed? Like, this isn't fair. To be honest, I feel like this every time I have a breakout, I'm like.

• 52:32Speaker 00

  What else do you want from me? I'm doing everything. And I think it is that like almost like having to accept that sometimes life isn't fair, that sometimes you'll do all the skincare and not eat any sugar and I'm still going to get like, you know, a spot like just before my period. Or that like the relationship isn't going to, isn't going to work out. And actually, I think letting go of that need to be, I don't know, like the good girl, to be thin enough, to be pretty enough, to be smart enough, to be successful enough. And kind of this realisation that no matter, every time I, I hit a marker, every time that I, I don't know, achieved something or achieved a goal or had some sort of external validation of success, that it was so temporary, the feeling of satisfaction.

• 53:17Speaker 00

  And then instantly, the hunger started again. Like, what's next? And it is this, the constant driving force that I think that I thought for such a long time that I needed it. I thought for such a long time that it was responsible for my success and that if I didn't have it, then I would just become lazy and I wouldn't have any motivation. And then I think I really started to realise that actually this is like a really cruel taskmaster and I'm absolutely exhausted. And still, despite all of that, everything's falling apart anyway. And like, you know, I told, you know, in 2023, after the breakup had happened, again,

• 54:01Speaker 00

  the instinct was, well, I'm just going to start working. I'm going to throw myself into my writing and by the end of this year, I'll have like probably two novels finished and maybe a collection of, you know, poetry. And maybe I'll write like a, you know, thinly veiled, I don't know, screenplay based on this and, you know, all of these things. And, and then it was like my brain had broken. Like, I just couldn't seem to focus. Like, I felt like I had lost my words. I felt like I just had lost myself. And that was terrifying because again, it was, who am I without the work? Who am I without the identity of the good girl or the one who delivers? And there just comes a point, I think, where it's like, these identities that we put so

• 54:46Speaker 00

  much weight upon, you have to let go.

• 54:49Elizabeth Day?

  And they're not ours to carry in so many ways. I mean, so much of what we've been talking about and what you've written about is this idea that we thought we had a plan for life and it didn't turn out that way. But so often the plan isn't instinctively ours. It's something that has been conditioned into us or we've inherited in some way.

• 55:09Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 55:09Elizabeth Day?

  And I wonder if we could bring this to a close by talking about success and what that means to you. Because a bigger life ends, and I know this annoyed you at the time, because you didn't want it to be this sort of neat, pat ending that made other women feel excluded. And by the way, it's not, because you do a lovely job of handling it. But you meet someone. That's not the overarching story of this book. It's about so much more than that. And if anything, I think it's about being in a loving relationship with yourself and how to get there. What does success mean to you now, having written this book?

• 55:49Speaker 00

  I think after, again, as I spoke about earlier, after asking for it, my second novel, took off in the way that it did in Ireland and feeling very much like the kind of eye of that storm. And also feeling like I almost had like a target on my back. It was really interesting afterwards to see how afraid I had become of success. Because to me, success meant that it almost felt dangerous. Like, it felt, as I said, like having a target on my back. It felt like people hating me. It felt like people, honestly, it felt like being back at school and like overhearing, like someone bitching about you in the toilets, do that way, as in just this complete level of overexposure that felt genuinely terrifying.

• 56:32Speaker 00

  And I think I've really almost had a push-pull sort of relationship with it ever since, particularly around like visibility and being seen, because as I said, that had felt so destabilising at the time. And actually, I suppose, writing this book, which is so personal and is so raw, and again, that feeling of like really, yeah, I suppose like being vulnerable in that way. But I kind of felt like I had to write it because, I suppose, I remember how I felt at 37, just about to turn 38, when I just felt like my life is over and I will never,

• 57:17Speaker 00

  I'll never be happy again. And all of these things that I wanted are now like, they're not going to happen. And like, there were times during that year where I would like, I just felt like I wanted to lie down on the floor and never get up. I don't know, I suppose I wrote the book that I wanted or I needed to read at that point. And I suppose for every woman who's gone through or going through something similar, that I would hope that this book would be that beacon of like, of hope. And I suppose now, success looks like writing a book that I really hope will be that kind of form of connection between me and the reader and between the reader and themselves ultimately.

• 57:59Elizabeth Day?

  Louise O'Neill, I am so, so grateful for you.

• 58:04Speaker 00

  Oh, I love you so much.

• 58:05Elizabeth Day?

  I love you so much. Thank you so much.

• 58:07Speaker 00

  Sorry, the readers or the listeners are like, oh my God, give over. We're like, I love you so much.

• 58:11Elizabeth Day?

  Sorry, we kept it professional until the last moment. Louise O'Neill. Thank you so much for coming on How to Fail.

• 58:16Speaker 00

  Thank you so much for having me.