How To Fail With Elizabeth Day - Louise Thompson - ‘I asked myself: Am I alive?’

Episode Date: May 29, 2024

TW: this episode contains graphic descriptions of birth trauma and PTSD. You might know Louise Thompson as the former Made in Chelsea star. Or the fitness influencer who launched two businesses and graced the cover of Women’s Health magazine twice. But when she gave birth to her son Leo, all that changed. She experienced a series of life-threatening haemorrhages before ending up in Intensive Care, absolutely convinced she was going to die. Since then, she has suffered PTSD, panic attacks and countless further complications, resulting in being fitted with a stoma in January this year. And yet she has managed to turn her pain into something deeply inspiring. Her story is extraordinary - harrowing, yes, but also uplifting and always unfailingly honest. She talks about her failure to get a ‘proper job’ (one for Made in Chelsea fans…), her failure to advocate for herself during a traumatic birth and the difficult experience of her body failing her in the most painful ways. I’m truly honoured that she has chosen to come on How to Fail to share her story. As always, I’d LOVE to hear about your failures. Every week, my guest and I choose a selection to read out and answer on our special subscription offering, Failing with Friends. We’ll endeavour to give you advice, wisdom, some laughs and much, much more. Have something to share of your own? I'd love to hear from you! Click here to get in touch: howtofailpod.com Production & Post Production Manager: Lily Hambly Studio and Mix Engineer: Gulliver Tickell and Josh Gibbs Producer: Hannah Talbot Executive Producer: Carly Maile 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 [e-mail] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Make your nights unforgettable with American Express. Unmissable show coming up? Good news. We've got access to pre-sale tickets so you don't miss it. Meeting with friends before the show? We can book your reservation. And when you get to the main event, skip to the good bit using the card member entrance.

Let's go seize the night. That's the powerful backing of American Express. Visit amex.ca slash yamex. Benefits vary by card, other conditions apply. Just a quick heads up before we get into the episode that we do discuss during the course of our conversation, Louise's experience of a very traumatic birth. And we go into some detail around that. And we also talk about her subsequent PTSD. Now, it is a profoundly important conversation. And I know that many of you will resonate deeply with it. However, I also know that some of you might be extremely sensitive right now to the topics under discussion. And if that's the case,

I want you to look after yourself first and to protect your heart and maybe give that part of the conversation or this episode a miss for now and come back to it when you're ready. Without further ado, here is the extraordinary Louise Thompson on how to Fail. Hello and welcome to How to Fail with me, Elizabeth Day. In my podcast, we look at and celebrate our unique individual failures, because ultimately, they're the stepping stones to success. Every week I invite a guest to look at their failures and what has come afterwards that might have helped them grow and succeed. Before we begin I just wanted to remind you about my subscriber series Failing With Friends. Today Louise and I look at your questions and give our advice for what it's worth. We covered a failure to stand up for yourself,

social media-induced stress and FOMO, battling physical illness and mental health, and drinking or not, how to combat social anxiety around desire to go sober. And we would love to hear from you. Just follow the link in the podcast notes. just follow the link in the podcast notes. Until 2021, Louise Thompson was known as the former Made in Chelsea castmate turned fitness influencer who twice appeared on the cover of Women's Health. But when she gave birth to her son Leo, all that changed. She experienced a series of life-threatening hemorrhages

before ending up in intensive care, absolutely convinced she was going to die. Since then, she has suffered PTSD, panic attacks and countless further complications, resulting in being fitted with a stoma in January this year. And yet, Thompson has managed to alchemise her pain into something deeply inspiring for her 1.4 million followers on Instagram. Inspiring, yes, but also searingly honest. I've never encountered anyone so willing to bare their soul and share what they're going through as they're going through it, the highs, the lows, and the inevitable pitfalls. Her newly released memoir, Lucky,

is testament to the importance of her voice in the physical and mental health space. It is an extraordinary read, sometimes harrowing, sometimes uplifting, but always unfailingly honest. I'm so honoured that she's on the podcast today. What she went through almost killed her, but as Thompson writes in her memoir, surviving it has given me an awakening. Louise Thompson, welcome to How to Fail. Louise Thompson welcome to How To Fail. Thank you so much for having me and I love your intros and I honestly was thinking this morning if I can get through the intro without crying that will be a really good start. How are we doing so far? I feel really good this is such a big moment for me because I've you know I've admired this podcast for such a long time and being able to come on this platform to speak about my journey,

my story, and hopefully provide, you know, hope to other people that are going through a rough time is kind of actually one of the main reasons that I'm here. That's so meaningful to me. And thank you so, so much. I have been such an admirer of yours for a long time, as you probably know, because of my slightly creepy tendency to leave comments on your Instagram, to creep into your DMs, to be like, Louise, I'd love to meet you one day. And now we're here. It's all led us to this point. And your book is an extraordinary read. You should be so proud of it. It really did leave a lasting impact on me. Describe a little about how that awakening feels today.

Well, thank you for reading it. And it's a really big moment for me and, you know, releasing the depths of what's happened to me in the memoir. I haven't really felt comfortable enough to go into all of the details of things for two years because it's taken me so long to kind of really come to terms with it and there are still things that I have like still questions unanswered. It's kind of an evolving process isn't it like seeing what you know that next chapter brings out in terms of like being able to help people and responding to the feedback and opening up more of the conversations out there around birth trauma

and PTSD and the other like mental health conditions I've struggled with. There is a purity and a courage to your honesty is that something that happened as a consequence of everything that you went through or have you always been like that a truth teller? I can't lie like I have something in me and that's why I should never have been on a reality show I actually can't lie and I can't act I can I only know how to be honest to myself and that's really hard because sometimes I don't want to have to show so and I'm an incredibly emotional person too and and sometimes I don't always want to have to be that vulnerable and that emotional so it's always served me really well to be particularly honest.

I feel that it's something you possibly share with your brother Sam Thompson also was on Made in Chelsea and then went on to win I'm a Celebrity you're very close aren't you? We are really close we live next door to each other and we actually did renovations at the same time we've now built a massive barricade between our houses but he still manages to peek through the like tiny slats in the trellis between the garden walls we're quite close in age two and a half years apart we've had moments throughout our lives where we haven't been that close I really didn't want him to to join the show. I didn't think it would be good for him. I didn't think he had the stones for it.

He's now way more confident than I am. He's so confident and I'm still working on it. I mean, his career is completely skyrocketed. It's been hard over the last couple of years because our worlds have gone in completely different directions. He has really grown and my my entire career basically crumbled and my entire life crumbled you know and weirdly actually on the

note of my brother and I don't know why this is popping into my head when I really nearly died and spent a month in hospital when I came out I felt like I had a different personality like I literally felt as though I was a completely different person I couldn't remember anything about my old self and hated a lot of of what I stood for before and I I remember having a conversation with my mum we were sat outside the pharmacy like waiting to collect my medication before being discharged and and I said to her like really seriously I was like Sam needs to stop everything he's doing he needs to stop working this is all this is all terrible like

he's going to end up where I've ended up you know we need to slow down and we need to stop all of the all of the social media stuff like it's it's not good it's all really I don't know like performative performative and and anyway now as I've continued to get better I've realized that I just shouldn't take anything in life quite that seriously because I can totally understand it because there you are you've almost died and you thought with absolute certainty that you were going to die and then to come out into this world that values superficial things must seem so disjointed you are my favorite kind of guest in that you not only provided me with three failures you provided me with six and each one was a banger so I've chosen three from the six but I hope to

weave in the other three along the way and so thank you so much for that and for committing yourself so seriously to the task in hand your first failure as you describe it is your failure to have a proper job it's so embarrassing well tell us about that because you relate it to your maiden chelsea years so how did you end up on that show because there you were you're a geography student at the university of edinburgh really talented student and gone to a great school, and then suddenly you're on Made in Chelsea. How did that happen? Well, it's a good question. And first of all, I just want to say thank you for acknowledging the failures because I have loads of them. But also a lot of people's failures stem from childhood and failing at school. I was the total total opposite so I was a complete nerd and a do-gooder

and really a straight-a student and always did really really well and that followed me through like into kind of into university and I guess it all fell apart really when I started drinking and hanging out with boys and they became a priority and also then when I was asked to be on Maiden Chelsea so when I was at uni I guess I was probably on course to get a serious job when I left university because I would have got a degree and maybe ended up with a completely different career but I yeah I think I was in my third year and the show had just started so I I did four years Edinburgh. I might have been in my second year, sort of halfway through. Made in Chelsea had started and I kind of had known a lot about it

because my good friend Rosie, who I was at school with, ended up being on it. And I dated Spencer and I was going out a lot with Hugo, Millie and all of the kind of main cast. I was going to say the A-team. So the show was split. Really? People used to call that.

I didn't say I this was not my doing Francis Bull Francis the b team is now one of my best friends binkies so I shouldn't even say that but it was Jessica binky and Ollie and so we were just split into two they obviously weren't the b team they probably got more airtime but yeah no I so I was I was friends with one of the friendship groups and then the producers really wanted me to join and I kept saying no because it was just not what I'd ever wanted to do like I've never wanted to be famous I've never wanted to be on TV it was actually just me and Rosie but the two girls who never who didn't do

drama out of our friendship group because we couldn't get on stage and we just had, it just wasn't for us. So it was really weird that we ended up on the show. I said, no, no, no. And I'd even been quite rude about the show because I thought it was a waste of an education. Reality TV was such a new concept. I didn't really know anything about it. in the end I think I'd gone through quite a rough breakup up in Edinburgh and I was slightly ready to try something new and I just couldn't keep saying no and they they just kept framing it slightly differently so they obviously managed to twist my arm somehow and they said oh we'll just do it for one one scene like one episode and then

you never have to do it again which would have been way worse like as if that was a good selling point then I've associated myself with the show and if I left after one episode then that would just be terrible because I wouldn't have reaped any of the benefits but I did end up doing it and yeah I came to London and it was it was a funny old time for me because I was trying to be a serious student up in Edinburgh and had like cool friends up there. They're all a bit more academics and studious and into different things. And then I was going to film on me in Chelsea, where we were just filming in nightclubs and driving fast cars and that kind of thing.

For £25 a day, I was shocked to discover in your book. That was how much you were paid. Yeah, at the beginning it was £25 a day. Then it went up to £50 after one series. And then after a while I was paid £200 a day and that was capped at that. So that was the absolute max. Which is just obviously, you know,

not a lot than when you're expected to be driving a Ferrari and I would then spend all of my money on clothes just to wear to look semi-decent on the show there's an amazing line in your book that I'm trying to find and it was about the fact that on Made in Chelsea, it was always the men who won. Yeah, I did feel like the men always came out on top, which is ridiculous because most of the people working on the show were female. They were celebrated for being naughty and for being mean and for playing us around. And, you know, I shouldn't, I should be more specific because it was, it was, it was a personal thing. I always felt as though I was fairly nice and treated people with respect. And yet I would end up looking really weak and like a doormat. And it's really odd that the nation seemed to always be backing someone that was horrible.

Yes. And, you know, it was it was really it was tough everything was really real and I was in some serious relationships on the show and I would then end up you know going through a breakup which is hard enough at the best of times and I've never been good at breakups by the way I've always really struggled with change and kind of falling out of love with people and go through all of that is really tricky anyway and especially when you're in your late teens early 20s and then for that to be shown to the world is for people to have an opinion about is extra tough so I would go through these breakups I'd be genuinely really upset you know people would watch it and think

that I was weak for crying which just doesn't make any sense to me. And then, you know, you'd be like pitted against one of the other girls because your ex was then dating someone else. And they might have been slimmer or taller or prettier or had a like a punchier like catch line. You know, they'd say something that was cool. And I don't know, it just, it was really tough. I'm so sorry. You don't think, it's terrible, really, the amount that reality TV is consumed as entertainment without value being ascribed to someone's lived experience that you are sharing on screen. And I wonder, you describe yourself as the ultimate people pleaser in your book. And that fear of rejection and wanting people to

approve of you is all wrapped up in that. And that must have been a very uncomfortable space to inhabit. You must have really questioned your identity. I did. And I really struggled to grow up like a normal person would because I couldn't, I was then basing my decisions on what other people would want from me and whether that was the producers giving them what they wanted, kind of being a bit of a nodding dog and just agreeing to say whatever they wanted or trying to second guess what the, what the public would want from me and I couldn't be myself have you ever watched any of it back so we were forced we were forced to get on with my words when um I was quite lucky that was one of the advantages of being at university really far away is that I wouldn't have to watch

all of the I wouldn't have to go to the screenings. So typically there would be a screening every Monday where all of the cast would have to watch the episode together. Yeah. In the same room. Sorry. Because often I'm imagining that's the first time that people have seen other people on the cast talking about them in a certain way behind their back, but it's on screen.

Yeah. And you have no idea sometimes that someone's backstabbed you and said something awful about you and then you're confronted with them right in front of you. And there are things that are better left unsaid and unknown. And that was the weird thing about reality TV is you always know, like, especially for new people. I remember them coming in, they'd shoot their scenes and then we would watch it back and often people would run out crying. Wow. and often people would run out crying. Wow. But I didn't really watch it and I wouldn't always have to go to those because I did have lectures on that day.

But then the people that I shared a flat with in Edinburgh enjoyed watching it. So we would joke about it. Like it's not all doom and gloom. And I thought you met your fiancé Ryan on the show but you didn't, you brought him on. Is that right? Yeah. No, he never would your fiance Ryan on the show but you didn't you brought him on is that right yeah no he never would have ended up on the show if it wasn't for me he's really not that sort of person I met Ryan when I was supposed to be running part of a tri doing and taking part in

like in a virgin triathlon and I didn't end up doing it in the end because I was I have I hate running it gives me so much anxiety but I know I was going to be paid to do it and I had to pull out a few days before and I'd done all these interviews with running magazines the full shebang for the people visa because I couldn't say no as well I should have just said running's not my bag that's a no job for me this is something I more easily yeah and Ryan was tied up in that so he his sister-in-law was doing all of the PR for that so we actually met through that and I was in a relationship with someone else at the time so nothing came from it but then we did weirdly the the this is quite strange actually so the the day that me and Alec broke up oh my gosh Alec sorry I know I totally forgot about Alec I'm sorry I've literally watched every single episode of me and Chelsea I'm sorry yeah when Alec and I broke up weird I basically I woke up one morning

and I knew something weird had happened between Alec and I I'd had this this kind of premonition dream that he cheated on me and I couldn't get hold of him for two weeks. And that was very odd because I was supposed to move there. Um, and he, he'd always been, you know, a relation, the relationship was balanced. I'm not going to say that he was more into me than I was him, but he was very keen for us to have a future together. And overnight that just completely changed. So I sort of woke up one day and was like that's actually it's done like this doesn't feel right I had a bit of a gut instinct and and I was then going out and telling everybody that we'd broken up without even really having the conversation with Alec himself at Uber drivers I was like this is done I've gone through a breakup

and Ryan messaged me that day and I'd never heard from him I didn't even know he had my number because we'd met once he trained me for this the running with the running job and he said do you want to do you want to work out together I thought yeah because I'm now single so I'd like to feel good yes this connection yeah was clearly something that was in the ether. So before we get onto your second failure, reflecting on the Made in Chelsea years, do you regret doing them? I can't really visualise it. And it wouldn't necessarily be a better place. I'm really grateful for a lot of the things that it's offered me. An amazing platform, amazing career opportunities,

an amazing experience and stories, really. It would be easier to do it now, knowing what I know and just being much stronger. Final question on this. Will you allow Leo, your son, to watch Made in Chelsea when he's old enough? Yes, there's a lesson on how not to live his life. I love that.

Hi, I'm Matt Lewis, historian and host of a new chapter of Echoes of History, a Ubisoft podcast brought to you by History Hit. Join me and world-leading experts every week as we explore the incredible real-life history that inspires the locations, the characters and the storylines of Assassin's Creed. Listen and follow Echoes of History, a Ubisoft podcast brought to you by History Hit, wherever you get your podcasts. damn time. I mean, it's hard work being this opinionated. And correct. You're such a Leo. All the time. So if you're looking for a home for your worst opinions, if you're a hater first and a lover of pop culture second, then join me, Hunter Harris, and me, Peyton Dix, the host of Wondery's newest podcast, Let Me Say This. As beacons of truth and connoisseurs of mess,

we are scouring the depths of the internet so you don't have to. We're obviously talking about the biggest gossip and celebrity news. Like, it's not a question of if Drake got his body done, but when. You are so messy for that, but we will be giving you the B-sides. Don't you worry. The deep cuts, the niche, the obscure. Like that one photo of Nicole Kidman after she finalized her divorce from Tom Cruise. Mother.

A mother to many. Follow Let Me Say This on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. Watch new episodes on YouTube or listen to Let Me Say This ad-free by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Talking of Leo brings us on to your second failure, which, as you put it, is your failure to advocate for yourself during his birth. So explain to us what happened. You found out you were pregnant and your pregnancy wasn't easy in the sense that you had had a miscarriage before, I'm so sorry, and therefore as is often the case, your pregnancy comes riven with anxiety because you're constantly worried that your baby won't make it and you have this gut instinct that you needed

a c-section take us from that moment it's really actually quite strange because I, looking back more recently, actually wrote myself a message on a WhatsApp group I have with myself, which was actually created to kind of track how I was feeling throughout the pregnancy. So symptoms, kicks, that sort of thing, not necessarily that healthy, but I was, you know, it wasn't obsessive, but I was tracking a lot because of the anxiety following the miscarriage and I'd written myself a note saying I need to have a c-section or I'm really worried that I'm going to die and I just can't believe that I wrote that I I I'd always wanted a c-section I wasn't somebody that ever felt particularly womanly I've got the body of a 14 year old boy and I don't feel bad about saying that it's just the way that I am you know I'm quite narrow and very small I don't it's not a you know I just I didn't love the idea of giving

birth naturally I know people that love it I know people that have home births that some people pop them out like smarties. I knew that it wasn't going to be right for me. I know my body and, and I really did struggle towards the end of the pregnancy. I felt incredibly heavy. I put on an awful lot of weight. The bump was enormous. I couldn't breathe. I couldn't sleep. I was in a lot of pain and I was having some fainting episodes. I just, I wish that I'd advocated for myself better. So I, you know, you do have various appointments throughout the pregnancy at different milestones. And I'd said to a number of midwives, it was really tricky because I was speaking to a lot of different faces that didn't feel like there was an awful lot of consistency throughout the pregnancy. But I'd mentioned it to a lot of different people.

I'd really like to have a C-section. I think that this is the best option for me. I really don't feel good about having a natural birth. And then even to the point where I started looking for problems, and I thought, oh, but I've got my inflammatory bowel disease. But I kept getting met with so much resistance. And then I started to feel like I was looked at with judgmental eyes that was sort of

suggesting you're too posh to push and that this is a luxury and the reality is it's not it's actually a human right to choose the birth that you want whether that's a home birth a birth center birth like a consultant at birth or a c-section and I didn't know any of this and actually if anyone out there is listening there is an amazing website called birthrights and their website is birthrights.org.uk and they break it down for you on there things like you can choose your birthing partner you can even choose the hospital if you're not happy with a consultant you can go to your GP and ask request for someone else it's such a sensitive and vulnerable time in a woman's life, especially that first birth when you have nothing to base this experience off. It's a really sad, sad story because the

outcome could have been so different. And I sit here today and I'm doing really quite well. You know, I'm 95% really back to me and happy. But that doesn't make up for the moments actually that I've lost and that I will never get back. And it doesn't make up for the fact that I won't have any more children naturally. And I guess from the kind of the refusal with the C-section, I wrote emails that weren't responded to. I then was texting. I was involved in a house fire only a month before giving birth, which should be reason enough in itself because we didn't really have anywhere as a base. I just wanted to have control over some element of this of the childbirth and knowing where we were going to be and maybe what day it was going to be it kind of all fell on deaf ears

and I was it was a game of pass the parcel and in the end I did speak to somebody on the phone and they were asking me the reasons for the anxiety and she said oh maybe you're not sleeping and tried to prescribe me some promethazine and that wasn't the point like it wasn't that I wasn't of course no one sleeps towards the end of the pregnancy or just don't feel great it is it's a it's a lot to go through and I was actually offered a c-section at a different hospital after my due date and I went into labor on on my due date which is funny but I knew that I I was going to and me and my brother were both born on our on our due dates before we get on to

what happened during the birth which do you mind talking about it no I really don't okay thank you for being so considerate though it's I can't even imagine what it is like to relive when you retell the story. Before we get onto that, how much do you think the medical establishment doesn't listen to women? And is that to do with an intimidation that some of us might feel that doctors must know best? I mean, there's definitely an element of white coat syndrome. It's whenever you're faced with a medical professional, often people become intimidated and kind of revert back to being a child again. I've, you know, I would go into some of these appointments so kind of geared up with what

I knew I wanted to say. And then the moment I would sit in that chair I would just end up agreeing with everything that they had to say yeah and assuming that they did know best and I really struggled to speak up for myself to the point where I even then brought Ryan into an appointment and still like we couldn't get the answer that we wanted. I've done that repeatedly by the way from a different angle through fertility procedures. And whenever I tried to advocate for myself, I would always undermine myself and imagine that they knew best. But then instead of feeling assertive, I felt really emotional and started crying. And then that would always undermine it further in the eyes of predominantly, it was mostly men that I was dealing with in positions of power and I think that it is a hugely potent thing in this space

and I'm so glad that you are talking about it I know so many people will relate it's funny what you say there it was not funny at all but it's thank you I'm so sorry about everything obviously you've been through an absolutely horrendous time too and I and I try to be sensitive when even talking about my childbirth experience because you know I am very lucky and very grateful that I have that I have a beautiful son but when I speak to the professionals in a similar way I now feel like I have to and it's it's something because I've spent so much time now in that environment, having had no experience before, never even stepped foot in a hospital before. You'd only taken paracetamol once, you said, for period pains. Yes. And now I'm really experienced. I've been in and out of the hospital every week,

practically, for the last couple of years. I've become much better at advocating for myself. So now I really do know what my rights are and I know that I can question things, refuse things, ask for IV paracetamol versus the tablet form because it's more effective for me. It's a very unique and personal experience, but also it's a bit more expensive. So the NHS don't necessarily want to give it to you but when I speak to doctors I'll often preface it with I know that I know that I know very little and that you know everything and I feel like I'm always having to justify my questions almost yes and having to put myself down even though I am pretty well researched now especially you know some of the stuff that I deal with. That's not great. There's so much really to talk about in terms of what needs to change.

Let's talk about The Birth, which is one of the most visceral passages in your book. And I was very grateful for it because I've never read anything like that before. And I think it's so important to share the stories of births that are deeply traumatic to mitigate this kind of fairy tale idea of what it is to have a child. Louise, would you mind telling us what happened to you? So I went into labour on my due date and we went into the hospital. And I think this is quite common is that people get sent home if they're not dilated enough. I think that they only have a capacity for a certain number of women. So that was challenging in itself. And I was in an immense amount of pain actually from from the get-go because Leo was back

to back so his spine was kind of grinding against mine and it was agony and I went and nothing really could have prepared me for that level of pain and I thought that I was quite a tough cookie I'm someone that at school would be like yeah yeah give me a Chinese burn and I just wasn't anticipating it at all and I'd written out my birth plan and I knew what I was okay with and what I wasn't but at the back of my head obviously I really wanted c-section so I still you know I still was gunning for that then when I when we did go back to the hospital I was dilated enough to stay there and unfortunately it was an evening and it wasn't a weekend. And the hospital felt really dead. I hate to use that word when talking about a hospital.

And I moved into a side room on the labor ward. And I just felt really, really unsupported. And because it was my first birth and the only, you know, I'd done kind of a hypnobirthing course quite last minute when I realized that I had like resigned my fate and I wasn't going to have the c-section I thought okay well I've just got to you know teach myself everything there is to know about a natural birth and I'd done the NHS NCT course which was all online over zoom and it was still slightly covid-y rules but I didn't know you know to shout out and say oh please can I have the gas and air that's in that corner of the room you know I didn't know what was in the room that was an offer to me. I was already in so much pain

and I did see a bouncy ball. I was bouncing on the ball and someone came in, um, the lady actually who had checked me in, in, in a different department. And she came in after an hour or so and, and, and said, why is no one, why is no one telling you what to do? And then even she was helping Ryan saying, get some water on this towel, put it on the back of her neck. Here are some options. Okay, here's the gas and air. She might need that. Do you need an epidural?

And she really cared. And that was the difference. I hate to say this, but it shouldn't be luck of the draw as to who you get and as to whether they care or not she I stayed in contact with her for a while afterwards even recovering she would come to my house that's how much she cared she was a beautiful beautiful soul the Spanish lady called Suzanne but she had to clock off it was the end of her shift and it was a tricky time then to be to be in in that position because of the changeover then I kind of endured an overnight labor experience that was really

really grim and lots of things went wrong and I was really sick and blood pressure and then sepsis and temperatures and they um they broke my waters and there was myconium in them, but nothing was escalated. And it got to the point where I was actually hallucinating. I was really, really freaked out and just not in a good place. And every time there were a couple of junior doctors who would come in to check on me overnight and I was begging for a C-section. I said, I just, this is, please, please, please, can I have that? And it was sort of their mission to just convince me that things were okay and just to keep going. I had, sadly, the epidural took many different people, many different attempts to try and get it in. And there's kind of a window of what's acceptable.

And I don't quote me on it, but I think it's about 90 minutes from requesting one to receiving one because obviously if you're in that level of pain and you need pain management it's undignified not to have it and that was that was really horrendous and but and even after the epidural I was still in an awful lot of pain and yeah and when I say it's kind of hallucinating, I mean, anything that then Ryan or someone around me would say, I could hear it played back. It was kind of echoing around the room. So mentally and physically, I was in a horrendous state. visualizing what I needed to get to in terms of like being dilated and then I suppose it was only then when there was a staff changeover again on the on the Monday morning um when the consultant came in and and um checked me and you know and I I'm really honest so I don't know how much I'll be really honest and then you know yeah I don't I don't want to just petrify people. But, you know, she would put her whole arm inside me and try to sort of twist the baby out manually.

And it was really unpleasant. And it wasn't working. So then she said, well, can we do the C-section? And I honestly was just, yes, yes, please, please can we do the C-section? Because honestly was just yes yes please please can we do the c-section because I've been begging for this for months and thank goodness actually that this we're going to put an end to all of this whatever the resolution is like let's just we need to try something else because this is not working and so we went into theater and it did feel frantic, and I know people that have had more of an emergency situation in this kind of stage, if you like, because perhaps the baby's heartbeat

has stopped beating, or there's a lot of fetal distress, but it was, everything moved very quickly, and then when we were in the theatre my understanding was the c-section can be done in 20 minutes but tends to be around half an hour and is is I don't want to say a simple procedure because it is major surgery but it's something that's done all the time and I have lots of friends who have who have done it and had an amazing experience with it can I just ask in the midst of that horror so that cesarean Zarian where your uterine wall gets torn. You start kind of bleeding out. There is nothing between you.

There's not even a sheet in between. There is. Yeah, so there is a sheet. So I can see the blood just splashing all over the sheet. Oh my God. And Ryan is next to me. So he's actually witnessing this all as well i i genuinely was lying on this table paralyzed watching all of this blood splatter against this

sheet with blood all over the floor as well i could feel shaky hands pressing them down really high up against my ribs and there was just a complete state of panic in the room and there wasn't once one person who looked at me and said or touched my hand and went it's gonna be okay I didn't have that single I didn't have that friendly face and and I have to say since then because I've had a number of surgeries since then. And I have met those people at the hospital. And I've had some amazing experiences with people who have an incredible bedside manner and who have made all the difference. But in that moment, I really, really could have done with somebody popping their head over the curtain and just filling us in with what was going on. Because we had no idea.

because we had no idea and and then there was the kind of um one of the hardest parts was the kind of false finish if you like I because I I really thought that I couldn't stay alive for much longer so I kept turning to Ryan every it felt like 15 seconds it probably wasn't that and I kept just saying am I alive am I alive because I couldn't understand how I was alive. And I said, I just, I don't think I can keep going for much longer. And I wouldn't have even had the kind of capacity to make the decision myself to say, hello over there, please, can you put me to sleep now? And anyway, so Ryan then did ask how much longer we were going to be, how much longer was left. And they said, we're about to start closing her back up now. And then there was, and then they discovered that there was a lot of blood that they couldn't. So I had that sort of false hope

in my head thinking, okay, I can hold on for like another 20 minutes if this is it and they're going to, and it's all going to be over. And then unfortunately it, it wasn't. And then there was a considerable amount of time longer that they were still operating on me for. And I suppose, you know, even the fact that I haven't mentioned Leo throughout this whole, whole account just goes to show how, how traumatic it was because I didn't have space in me to care about the fact that I had a baby that had been pulled out of me. Forget all of the skin on skin and like, you know, I was going to call them luxuries, but it's that's it's normalities that most women experience I mean everything that I'd seen or heard in the in the hypnobirthing and the other stuff it couldn't have been further from my scenario he came out I did hear some some crying and then he was whisked away quite quickly. And so there was a point where Ryan was between us both,

genuinely thinking that he was going to lose us both. And I shouldn't say this, but even he, you know, but he couldn't leave me because we had a relationship already established. He had to be by my side he didn't go off and then follow leo and to nikku you know he he was there and and i actually don't know what i would have done if he hadn't been there i'm so sorry for what you went through i'm so sorry for what you went through. I'm so sorry. You describe it with such truth that I can visualize it and see it. And I can only imagine what you went through, the terror that you've experienced. And the fact that that was then only the start of a series of very severe health issues that led you into ICU some weeks later when you had another massive hemorrhage at home. And this idea of death, of thinking that you're already dead or that you're bound to die, that resurfaced in ICU, didn't it?

Can you explain that? that because again I've never heard it expressed before so I suppose that the the moment where I felt the closest to death was following the hemorrhage so when I was yeah and and you can you can read more a little bit more about it in the book when I was yeah witnessing myself without the medical help for an extended period of time losing losing a lot of blood very quickly. So I think I lost five and a half liters in a very short space of time. And for context, I think I probably only have about four liters because I'm a very small person. Witnessing that, knowing that there was nothing I could do because it's not my arm and that's not to make light of if someone's arm gets cut off but I couldn't tourniquet myself I couldn't put something inside

me you know I can't put my arm inside my vagina I don't I wouldn't know what to do and I went in I just I clicked into a mode where so at the beginning I was I was screaming because Ryan was on the phone to A&E to the ambulance and they said that they were going to be 10 minutes and so then I called and then they were going to be they came incredibly quickly so I'm very very grateful for that and then pure fear and then I sort of started thinking tracking back through my brain trying to remember any nugget of information I'd ever learned about anything to do with bleeding and how I might be able to somehow remarkably slow it down and I couldn't remember anything so I started breathing and yeah I kind of cycled between like feeling utterly calm utterly petrified angry and

shouting that we weren't moving quickly enough because I couldn't understand how time was moving so slowly incredibly slowly and you know it's only retrospectively that I look back, I understand that, you know, they've got to fill out a form, call ahead to find space in a hospital. It was in the middle of the night to check which hospital might have a consultant that might be able to fix me. But when you feel like that, you just don't understand how everyone around you isn't crying and screaming with panic because that's how you feel and then when I arrived at the hospital I was in a in a side room and that was the scariest moment for me because then I was actually not with Ryan and not with anybody because he wasn't allowed through the A&E doors and again I've had some experiences since then that have been completely different

like night and day and that is because well not solely because of this but having the comfort of having somebody there that you can look into the face of and just hold it makes a big it makes a big difference so I was I was on my own it was the middle of the night yeah and I and I laid down I was lying there and I felt completely paralyzed and I just thought this is it and I really thought I cannot believe I've wasted so much of my life worrying about such ridiculous things namely like work money doing up a stupid house that I spent so long building, because I was never going to live in it, and I was never going to live in it with my family, and that made me really sad. And then another thing that made me feel terrible was just imagining my family which I couldn't have my parents go through the heartache of it that made me really sad like imagining them crying all the time so it was

horrendous and then I think I had just all this like weird burning sensation basically in my brain which sometimes comes to haunt me when I have a flashback so then when I they had made a plan for me they were going to move my body and take me up and this it all would have happened quite quickly but it felt like forever I just remember being on the trolley and I and I literally was actually begging for them to put me to sleep just begging begging begging just shouting put me to sleep put me to sleep because I couldn't tolerate being alive anymore the pain was so bad I didn't care I didn't think for a second about whether I'd wake up or not I just needed to be out just take it away and and then you know thankfully they did but not before I had to sign some which is crazy because I was in just an outer worldly state at this point I think I had to sign some

form yeah and then the next thing I know I did wake up in in intensive care and I had tubes down my throat and I was numb everywhere and I my brain just hadn't really processed what had happened because I hadn't gone into the operation and there's very different situations going into an operation with with an understanding of what's actually about to happen and having time like I've had a number of planned operations or slightly less emergency operations and it's it's very different because you're compass mentis when you're put to sleep so then when you wake up you're a bit more compass mentis so you you know what to expect yes I had no no one had told me like I'd never seen ICU

before I didn't know that I might wake up there I didn't know what the tubes down my throat were so I assumed that actually my voice box had been removed and I couldn't feel my legs so I assumed that they'd been amputated oh my gosh yeah it was really bad you poor thing I'm so sorry for what you went through and I'm so grateful to you for your courage in in telling us this it's so so important what you do Louise and I never ever want you to doubt it. Thank you. Will no one rid me of this troublesome priest? This is a time of great foreboding. These words, supposedly uttered by a king over 800 years ago.

These words supposedly uttered by a king over 800 years ago set in motion a chain of gruesome events and sparked cult-like devotion across the world. I'm Matt Lewis. Join us as we unwrap the enigma and get to the heart of what really happened to Thomas Beckett by subscribing to Gone Medieval from History Hit. You know that feeling when you're like, why isn't there more of this? The show is so good. That was how I felt when I started to get really hooked on Black Butler

that I think is just incredible. Oh, we, yeah, it's coming back. It's coming back. He's like, I'm on top of it. I got it. I'm very excited. After like a 10-year hiatus. And this is The Anime Effect,

the show that allows celebrities to nerd out over their favorite anime, manga, or pop culture. The Akatsuki theme song, you know what it is. I listen to that one all day. That thing go crazy. That thing can be in the gym going and they're like, what is he listening to? Oh, it's not even in the gym. I be on the field.

I'm Nick Friedman. I'm Lee Alec Murray. And I'm Leah President. Damn, I be on the field. I'm Nick Friedman. I'm Lee Alec Murray. And I'm Leah President. Find out which live-action anime adaptations David Dostmalchian is praying he'll get to star in.

Or how Jamal Williams uses the mindset of Naruto for his NFL career. Listen to Crunchyroll Presents The Anime Effect every Friday, wherever you get your podcasts. Can I ask you how it feels that the day of your son's birth is also the day that started your worst trauma? I know that you have such an amazing relationship with that beautiful baby boy now, but that must be so conflicting in so many ways. but that must be so conflicting in so many ways. I don't connect him to the birth at all, which is really brilliant because for a lot of people, they are triggered by certain dates in the calendar.

And I honestly think that Leo was sort of born into my world six months after. That was when we started getting to know one another. For the first six months I was I had to just focus on living I had incredibly bad PTSD anxiety living in perpetual fear was petrified of most things in my house even just waking up I was petrified and and working through that was really tiring very scary I didn't have a lot of space for anybody else. I don't even think that I'd asked Ryan a question for a really long time.

I didn't know. I completely shut everything out. Me and Leo kind of started connecting after that. Even if my head was in la-la land, if I would lie down on the floor next to him and get a book and I would, I was just about able to like read the words, but I couldn't, I couldn't concentrate on anything, but I just knew that I was putting in like a tiny, tiny bit of effort, even if that was sort of five minutes at the beginning and then building up from there.

And I would say to Ryan, can you take pictures pictures so I would ask him to take pictures to create for the memories so that when I was better that then there wasn't this huge gap in time I would have these sort of savior moments where I would have a day where I would actually feel kind of okay they really did keep me going we're now three years on almost two and a half and I'm aware that we need to get on to your third failure because it's connected with all of this but where are you now with motherhood I now really enjoy being a mother. And it's very cliche for me to say this, but I really mean it. I know I am a better mother having been through the trauma because my whole perspective has changed. And I know what I've had to fight to to get to this place.

So I really appreciate it. I'm not going to waste this moment because I know that anything could be around the corner. I just want to take a moment. Thank you so much for talking about that. Your third failure is your body failing you. And obviously a lot of that is wrapped up in what you went through with your deeply traumatic birth. But before that, in 2018, I think, you were diagnosed with ulcerative colitis, which is something that has plagued you for quite a long time. And you recently made the decision to go public with the fact that you've been fitted with a stoma, which again, I just think is so incredible and empowering. And stomas have never looked so hot.

Thank you. I just salute you. Thank you. But tell me why you wanted to pick this one as a failure. As someone who historically had been so into fitness on the cover of Women's Health magazine twice, how much of a shift has it been for you in terms of your relationship with your body? Well, I think the way I've framed it

is really harsh on myself saying that my body is has failed me because my body has also actually lived and has lived through an awful lot of physical health problems so I think what I mean is that it is the the drastic change and from being someone that has always treated my body so I say always not when I was drinking and partying a lot but I've spent so much time really looking after my body and I really made some big changes when Ryan and I started dating and he's introduced me to an incredible lifestyle and I really like love love my body and not not in a vain way but I just I he really taught me how to kind of respect my body and everything kind of

was just getting better and better and I'd I'd not really faced any adversity and I was getting stronger and life was really good and then I'd kind of been on this roller coaster my body took a really long time to get get back into a place where I recognized it and in fact it had actually taken two full years for me to actually look in the mirror and think oh I think I've got my I think I've got my old body back and I haven't had to not through you know hounding it but just like it's taken two years just for things to level out and for me to go back to being me like Louise Thompson whatever my norm is which is not the same as anybody else's but it that was the window and it maybe it took a really long time because I wasn't able I've really struggled with exercise over the last couple of

years I feel immensely triggered by it I I always tend to feel really, really exhausted the following day. And that's a really hard adjustment for me because I was someone that preached exercise as being like the answer to most people's problems. So yeah, I've done a complete 180. And I've had to be really, really gentle and compassionate with myself and just do like the bare minimum basically but but just looking after Leo is is a fair amount of of you know energy do you think you've befriended your body finally yes and and now I really do love my body and I see it in a completely different, in a different light to what I used to. I used to pick on things like having, you know, I'm a bit top heavy, like my arms are much used to bother me whereas now you know and even people say that I'm very brave for sharing the fact I have a stoma I just see my body as a vessel for carrying organs that keep me alive like I really do this like little gray bag is such a small price to pay for health I'm kind of at peace with it and

I don't I just don't fixate on it in the same way like when I look in the mirror I don't I it's not I'm looking for health like I'm not looking for how I look but the scare one of the scariest times for me recently which was post having the ileostomy bag which was so I had my whole colon removed I think it was called a total collect me to remove the ulcerative colitis which was across the whole thing and then they pulled my small intestine out of my stomach about like three weeks after the surgery I lost an immense amount of weight in one week so I think I lost seven kilos and I know so many people are just constantly, we spend so much, we waste so much time trying to lose weight.

I don't know why, like, is women always wanting to lose weight or be skinnier? It's like celebrated big things. Make ourselves smaller. It's horrendous. Yes. And then, you know, losing all of that weight really, really quickly was the most petrifying thing I've ever experienced, really, when it comes to weight. Because it was completely out of my control and it wasn't intentional and actually having meat on you is an indicator of health and being able to absorb your food properly so it's something that I will

never take for granted is actually being able to put on weight Louise I think you are one of the strongest people I've ever met I am so grateful to you and for you. I think you have done something utterly extraordinary with everything you've been through. I think that in your pain, you have found your purpose. And I never want you to doubt that and to doubt the immense power of what you do. It is so crucially important and we are so thankful for it. And I personally am so thankful that you have come on How To Fail. Thank you for being one of the most extraordinary guests I've ever met. Thank you so much for having me

and for just making this conversation so easy to have. and for just making this conversation so easy to have. I loved that episode with Louise so much. And you can hear more of us chatting and discussing your failures and mulling over your questions on failing with friends. This is the kind of thing you'll hear us talk about over there. Sometimes in life like you actually have to slow down in order to speed up and in order to improve the recovery process that

you have to take time for yourself and and you never know what you might discover in this time of this like quieter period. And remember to follow us to get new episodes as soon as they land on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or wherever you get your podcasts. And please, please share a link with everyone you know. This is an Elizabeth Day and Sony Music Entertainment original podcast. Thank you so much for listening.