Real Girls Radio - EP 25: Interviewing Milly's mum about her eating disorder for the first time ever...

Episode Date: December 14, 2022

Grab some snacks and chillax whilst we chat about...Milly and her eating disorder with her mum. This is the first time Milly has spoken to her mum about her eating disorder, so it was very hard for Milly to open up about this! Unfortunately it's still such a taboo topic, so we hope talking about this on air can encourage people to open up these conversations.ENJOY! xxSupport this show http://supporter.acast.com/e-1-the-unheard-truth-of-millys-journey. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Love this podcast? Support this show through the Acast Supporter feature. It's up to you how much you give and there's no regular commitment. Just hit the link in the show description to support now. This podcast episode is sponsored by Empower Online Coaching. Okay guys, so I'm sure lots of you already know, but I have worked with Emma, who was my coach when I was going through my weight gain journey. Emma, honestly, when I say it was a game changer, I am not even kidding. Just to have that accountability, support and educational guidance, it was honestly such a win. I loved it. Oh, thanks. No, I'm genuinely so proud of you. Honestly, coaching women through their health and fitness journeys is genuinely one of my biggest passions,

which is why I set up Empower Online Coaching in the first place. I was just fed up with seeing these cookie cutter plans and one-size-fits-all approaches in the coaching industry so I really wanted to reinvent the space and create the ultimate personalized health and fitness experience. So Empower Online Coaching is a safe and supportive place for women to get their guidance that they need to reach their health and fitness goals. Whether your goal is to lose body fat, improve your relationship with food, gain weight or build a bum, Emma and her team are your go-to girls. We're basically your in-pocket cheerleader hype girls who will also educate and support

you to your end goal. Everything will be housed on the Empower app where you'll get bespoke training programmes, nutrition plans, food inspo, educational ebooks and so much more. You can log your progress every week through the check-in feature where you'll receive weekly changes, updates and personalized feedback. And you can communicate with myself and my incredible team through the in-app WhatsApp style chat day or night. But just remember, we aren't robots and do actually need sleep. And we have an exclusive discount code for the Real Girls Radio listeners. We've never actually done a discount code before you know no so this is very exclusive but if you inquire about online coaching before christmas which is 25th december for those of you who don't

know and quote real girls radio you will receive a huge 20 off your coaching subscription. So go to empoweronlinecoaching.com, fill out your deets and quote Real Girls Radio for 20% off. I said Real Girls Radio. I can't guarantee that your bum's gonna look as good as my face but I will give it a good shot. Love that. Hello and welcome to Bro Girls Radio. I'm Millie. And I'm Emma. And we are both very normal bro girls just like you. Here to talk about all things health, fitness and navigating your way through this crazy life. We're your new besties.

We want you to feel part of our weekly chats and we're excited to invite you in to our exclusive girl gang. Grab some snacks and chillax whilst we chat. Woo! Yeah. Okay, I think we've got it. Hello, hello, hello. Welcome back. We were just talking and we actually think this is episode number 25.

Imagine if we got that wrong though. We keep getting things wrong. No, I'm pretty sure it's 25. 25. Quarter way to 100. Wow, so what episode is it for season two? Oh, that's too technical. You guys are stuck around for 25 episodes.

Yeah, mad. Yeah, so first of all, I wanna say, as we are coming up to the end of the year, genuinely, thank you so, so much for listening. Thank you, guys. We actually had a look at our Spotify wrap the other day, and the statistics were crazy. Just crazy.

We actually were blown away. I forgot that we were number two in the charts for like weeks. That's so long, yeah. Matt, we need to get back up there. We'll do it. Get number one. That will be our 2023 goal. That will be our 2023 goal.

Help us get back up to number two. Also, I feel really weird talking to you on the side because i'm talking at you aren't i yes because today we have a very special guest yes my mom mom's been really nervous like i'm fine do you want to hold my hand no you can hold my hand i can i can actually reassure you in a way because i when i had a bit of time off of the podcast because i went yes and stuff and i stepped away from the podcast for a bit and my first episode back i was also so nervous and like i wasn't i nearly tearing up i was like shaking but millie held my hand yeah um fine yeah it's just conversation just

conversation i mean all the followers were really excited and there's no trolling mum was like Millie held my hand and got through it. Yeah, fine. It's just conversation. Just conversation. I mean, all the followers were really excited. And there's no trolling. Mum was like, do you get, like, trolls? Like, are people going to speak badly about me? And I was like, of course not. No, I would actually say you and I are very fortunate when it comes to, like, internet trolls. Like, a lot of people get such horrible comments.

And, like, I feel so grateful that I've never kind of had that before so don't worry about the trolls okay nothing's gonna be bad and sad about you but anyway should we start with our flop and fly start the flop and fly I haven't told you about the flop and fly so you don't need to contribute but you can if you want okay basically a flop is just something a little bit negative that's happened in your week. And a fly is like a positive thing that's happened. And it's just part of the weekly episodes. Okay. So do you want to start first?

Okay, I'll start first. So I put up my Christmas tree last week. Oh, yes. Oh, my God, I saw. Oh, my God. Okay, I'm not even exaggerating when i say about 20 spiders the size of my palm came like crawling out of the box that my 20 there were loads okay um i put i stupidly put my christmas tree in the garden shed and i kind of live in the middle of nowhere so it was just

stupid but um put up the tree and me and my friend were about to decorate with all the baubles and like literally the biggest spiders were crawling out and then there were like woodlouse and moths oh no and then we'd like we'd catch one put it under a carpet and then we were gonna like move them outside and then once we catch one another one would come out and then they were like all over the walls oh my god no i would absolutely die so i ended up having to like because the bag was just infested with all these these bugs i had to like throw out all of these decorations you actually threw them out i had to there was just like wood last yeah thank god you went by yourself doing that oh i would have fully freaked out wouldn't i mum i hate i hate spiders i hate spiders so much our house at home at my parents house it's like also like kind of in the middle of nowhere like

near a farm and we're like near like loads of fields and it's prone to getting massive spiders really really big spiders it's not fun have you guys put up the family tree yet do you remember when we had the rat infestation? Rats. We had rats in the loft during lockdown. And when I was sleeping, I could hear them scrolling across the ceiling. And it was awful. Do you really want to tell everyone that?

What? I have rats in my house. Because I still live there. It's quite an old house. It's a lovely house. But it's near a farm so it's gonna have lots of rodents around. But we got rid of them though, we don't have them still do we? No.

You got rid of them? Well, really? We heard, dad and I heard something the other night. Oh man. I think it might have been a cat on the roof. Oh okay. Let's hope. Or a squirrel. Have you guys put up your tree yet?

Yeah. Like the family tree and then... Well, I put up the family tree this week. I mean, it was going to help me, but... Yeah, but mum has this tree that she bought from Amazon. I think it was Amazon. It's brown and shiny and fake. What is fake?

It's brown. Brown. It's green, actually. It's a green one so this one's now green but we used to have a brown shiny one it's awful

and I used to always be like angry at mum for putting that up every year so no we got the the green one up yeah we got the green one up but I didn't

I haven't put the decorations no I did it on Wednesday yeah but lovely I've got my Christmas tree but we haven't decorated it yet yeah it's such like a

it's a nice activity but it's also a bit like, oh. It's a little bit of effort, isn't it? A lot of effort. And what's your fly? My fly is that I have my Empower team Christmas party at the weekend. Oh, I didn't see. That was cute. It was so nice.

We actually had pretty much the whole team. And we had a meal at this really nice place kind of like near bath and it was just so lovely to have like a whole team there together because they are all incredible like my team know how much i love them um and we obviously just see each other like on google meets and like on you know face times and stuff rather than like actually in person so it was nice to get everyone together. Very- Do you have a whole sit down meal?

Yeah, it was like a free course meal and then we just played some games. Nice. Yeah, it was lovely. What's your flop and fly? My flop and fly. So my fly is, I've got my Madre on the podcast. Woo boo.

That's my fly. Okay, Thank you. And then my flop is... Well, that's a great thing, that you're struggling to think of a flop. Yeah, I guess so. You know what, I've been so, I could say this every bloody time,

I'm so busy recently that I actually haven't had time to dwell on anything. Do you know what I mean? So there's actually not really anything that I've been like, oh, that's a shit time of the week or whatever i don't know i mean i had therapy the other day and it wasn't a great therapy session but i don't think that's a flop because i think you need those therapy sessions yeah and like in the last podcast you were talking about how you were like almost questioning therapy so yeah i guess that could even make like help you

to realize that how important it is how like it comes in waves yeah and you're gonna have good therapy sessions and bad therapy sessions but they're all worth it yeah exactly so yeah i wouldn't call it a flop but if i had to choose one it would be that oh well that's great i'm glad you had a good position to be in yeah do you have one mom or is it putting you on the spot because i haven't told mom about flies flies not a quite good week really i had a good week with uh well we had a good day with Do you have one, Mum? Or is it putting you on the spot? Because I haven't told Mum about the flopping flies. Flies? No, I've had quite a good week, really.

I had a good week with, well, we had a good day with Hallie. Hallie, on the weekend. On the Monday for lunch, that was nice. Oh, yeah, on the Monday. So, for lunch. So, that's my little granddaughter and your niece. Oh, yeah, you went home at the weekend, didn't you? Oh, I still have me at home.

Yeah, that's cute. I haven't had any flops, really, this week. Any flops? Nothing? No. no no you know road rage anything oh i don't forget that well i don't know it's just that it's been really cold yeah oh it has been freezing i went outside of my house yesterday and there was like chunks of ice covered my card i'm too cold i'll tell you another fly i had as in good i went out for a walk uh as i do with the

dogs about 7 15 day before yesterday which was thursday and it was absolutely beautiful and a full moon and a planet and it was beautiful it was just like picture postcard oh yeah with the sunrise in the morning yeah seven it was gorgeous yeah i noticed that about the moon the other night so much that i googled it and i was like, why is the moon so bright? And it was talking about like, it was the peak illumination of the moon. My therapist told me about the full moon. She said it was a great time to...

Well, she said like... No, she said like, it can make you feel anxious. Like there's a lot of like things releasing. Do you believe in that? Because I know a lot of people... I think I do, you know. Do you know why because we are all made up of atoms and like energy right we're literally all made up of the

same thing and the moon has so much energy it literally controls the tide of the sea yeah right so i'm like god if it has that much force on the sea there must be some sort of force on our energy on our like on energy I've really I actually want to buy a book about all of that because I find it so interesting there is some skeptical stuff but then I do think there must be some sort of element of truth that mmm it's fascinating very oh well I had both of you don't really have any yeah just my spider it's a big flop for me I would say that would be awful not fun anyway should

we dive into the questions we asked you guys what you'd want to ask my mum as she's on the podcast so wait did we want to start with some icebreaker questions oh yeah i love i love a little ice we've got some icebreakers okay i prepared some um okay so what is your favorite thing that you bought this year? Oh, my favourite thing. She buys a lot of things. Oh really? Are you a shopaholic?

No, the Amazon order is every day. Things coming every day. Yeah. Aren't they? Love that. I, I bought lots of nice things really.

Yeah. But favourite thing? It's all your Kristen Jewell bag and I've actually got one the same because Lucy but favourite thing so your Kristen Jewel bag and I've actually got one the same because Lucy got one no but it's not real no it's not real

no but I still like it yes it's a real fake a real fake it's a real fake genuine genuine

yeah that's my sign what did you say that's your best yeah I think it's really nice yeah I like it what colour is it

I thought you bought multi-colour like pinks and greens yeah Would you say that's your best? Yeah, I think it's really nice. Yeah, I like it. What colour is it? I thought you bought... Multicolour, like pinks and greens. Yeah. What about the air fryer? That wasn't this year. Yeah? Was it this year? Yeah.

Yeah, that's really good, actually. She loves the air fryer. Although I don't use it, Dad uses it. Yeah. Because Dad nails the cook. The next icebreaker question. Okay, if you could take three things to a desert island apart from food and water what would they be and why let you get

the food and water oh gosh if that is put me on the spot probably take my family oh is that thing I think it might be objects. Objects. Like material things. Just think which one of the questions is it? Well, I'd take a nice lounger, something nice and comfy to lie on. Yeah. Oh, nice. Oh, yeah. A book.

Okay. And probably some music. Yeah. It's like a speaker or something. Yeah. Yeah, I think that's good. Okay, final icebreaker question. What does your perfect day look like?

My perfect day is get up bright and early, have a lovely dog walk, go, we've got a gym in, Amelia's created the garage into a gym. So I go on the Peloton for about half an hour, have a lovely shower, get ready to go out for maybe some coffee or brunch have a little shop and a mooch a little shop and then come back and then probably get ready to go out for a lovely supper with Neil all the family lovely yeah perfect day

I love that right okay so should we go through some of the listener questions I sent you some of them didn't I you did

oh I guess we'll just take it you told everyone I'm completely not prepared for this yeah so I haven't prepared mum because I was like

mum it's just gonna be a conversation like just chill and then I I told her some of the questions and they're all about me like what don't you like about Millie Like, just chill. And then I told her some of the questions. And they were all about me.

Like, what don't you like about Millie? So let's start with that one. It was like, what's an ick that you have for Millie? What is her biggest flaw? Yeah. What's one thing that annoys you the most about me? It can be a little bit unpredictable. It can be unpredictable. In way can you expand sometimes you're in a good mood well mostly and then sometimes you can just be a bit

off that's like my sister it's really horrible to be around people that is me that is me for no reason at all it's just her mood yeah. But I wonder where I get that from. No, not me. No. I'm dad. Literally where I get it from. Yeah, but I'm definitely getting better though. I'm a lot better.

You're much better. You're a lot better. You're less stressy. Yeah. The next question, do you want to, it was about what I was like growing up. Yeah, I'm interested.

What was I like as a kid um well you were just how can I say mum we can be as brutal as we yeah you just quite like to be in the center of not the center of attention but you just quite demanding was she she? She was, as a baby, she was very cryy, moody. There's a typical photograph we've got of the family in a sunflower field, and Amelia just wouldn't stand and stand in the sunflower. She turned her back with her arms folded. I did this, didn't I?

The naughty child. Not gonna see me. She was just a bit stroppy. Yeah. So to set some sort of context i was the youngest child in a big family yeah so and we all as a family are very quite loud people yeah and to get attention there's a lot of competition there's a lot of competition yeah a lot of competition so i guess that's why i was like that yeah can ask, what did you see Millie doing when she was younger?

Because I feel like all parents have some sort of idea of what their children will become and what they might grow into. Did you have any idea of what Millie might become or what she might do with her career and stuff? I had no idea that she'd be doing this, this sort of work. I didn't really have any sort of forethoughts what she might be. She was always interested in most, you know, academia, English and maths, dancing.

Yeah. Like a wide choice of things. I mean, all the children have gone into completely different careers. Nothing medical like, you know, Neil and I. So I had no real idea they were always very I was very sort of happy whatever they wanted to do you had no like vision basically vision of me going into more of a creative thing as opposed to a you've always been very creative yeah yeah interesting that's a great question yeah and for the listeners just so they have i guess a bit

of context what do you and millie's dad do for a living yeah what do i do yeah oh so i'm an ultrasonographer so i do obstetric and gyne that's a very big word i don't think anyone's gonna know any of that jargon okay so if you're pregnant i do all the scans and if you've got gynecological problems or infertility i do those sort of scans and I'm still working three days a week and Neil is a retired dentist so we were both we met guys many years ago guys hospital yeah you you guys met at the hospital yeah oh he was training to be a dentist and I was training to be a radiographer wow well you're not a nurse at some point no I've never I've always trained to be a radiographer. Wow. Were you not a nurse at some point?

No, I've always trained to be a radiographer and then I went to specialise in ultrasound. Okay, yeah. And you still do that now? Yeah. Yep. Still do that. So no career change? No.

I've always enjoyed what I do. It's more difficult to change your career once you've sort of established what you've been doing all the time. Yeah, for sure. But Dad didn't want to be a dentist. He wanted to a pilot he wants to be a pilot yeah damn it that would have been a great three flights yeah but then you wouldn't have been here because i wouldn't have met dad true yeah think of it that way do you want to ask the next question um okay so we know i know

we just asked your mom what her biggest ick was yeah so what did you say again i'm unpredictable unpredictable we used to be a bit that's what you used to be i think you're better now what am i now oh no you're lovely you're you're love you're my favorite i think you were just anxious and stressy as a teenager growing up which was yeah well now my therapist says that i was in an unpredictable environment which can okay lead to that well that fits in then yeah it fits in quite well so what would you say your biggest ick about your mum is oh don't give a list um

i would say I would say what would I say my biggest I think it's such a mum thing to do but you don't you just don't listen to me so when I say

can you please not move my clothes for example she will move my clothes I'll tighten them up yeah I'm a big put things places that I don't know and then she she's quite forgetful so you you don't know what you put it in the end so I've lost a lot of clothes or a lot of items a lot of things in my lifetime so maybe yeah you don't listen okay so we got one person who doesn't listen and another he's unpredictable what a lovely recipe god yeah guys most of these questions is what annoys you about each other oh that's not very nice can we not be positive yeah what's one thing you love about me then

oh we're so proud of you i was gonna ask that. What are you most proud of about me? That you've just decided to go from university and just create this career on your own back. And I'm just very proud of you for doing that. Thank you. And you're now financially independent. Yeah. You were a bit worried about me doing that though, weren't you?

Well, it was just a new sort of vogue i hadn't sort of heard of really it's just evolved london you sure you can afford the rent in london i was worried about you yeah because you're the baby i'm the baby yeah and look at her now i know always been my baby though so you're proud of me absolutely absolutely thank you oh i think everyone's proud of you come on you've come pretty far but um talking of that i mean of course a lot of these questions are also largely about millie's journey and what she's been through with her eating disorder how far she's come not just like in a career sense but also with her mindset and her, you know, relationship with food and training and her body

and all of that, which is, you know, inspirational to so many women around the whole entire world. Like, no, it really is. So a lot of the questions are about Millie's journey. And I guess one good one to start with is, was there like a certain time or like an age where you noticed there was something up with millie around her behaviors with food and exercise her body training it was when the she i can't really remember the probably about 14 do you think when she was at

dance school and the dance teacher came up and she said oh mrs goldsmith do you know i can see amelia's vertebrae is she eating and i said yes of course she's eating well that's such a rude comment to say in that way she yeah and i just you know she said do you think you should um take her to the doctor's i said well you know because amelia she was eating because i made sure she was but i didn't realize that what Amelia was doing behind my back or our backs like not eating and restricting her food so I had no idea yeah and then she came you saw she's not anorexic I said no she's not anorexic oh the dance teachers were not all of them but there was one particular one that was very just old fashioned and very like,

we just, I didn't like her. Didn't like her. And obviously when you hear something like that from her, it's gonna make me like, not like her even more. So I'll be like, oh, I don't like that. Like, ugh. Makes me feel like, ugh, uncomfortable and gross. I remember you telling me, you were like,

you came into my room and you were like, I just had a call with your dance teacher. And she'd called me up personally. I was very concerned. And then. I was very honest, sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt. I was very honest and told you about it.

Yeah. But that just, because I wasn't ready to even admit to myself, I was like an angry kid. You were an angry teenager. i was an angry kid and i always felt like attacked from that if she didn't call that up would you have noticed my vertebrae well i always knew that you were slim and i always stuck up for you because i knew you were eating i just didn't realize that you were restricting so much so was it kind of like you would eat like

with the family and you'd like have like a normal meal um but then when you were kind of like on your own or like out with friends or at uni or like on school whatever you were then restricting i think it was more like lunchtime, I was probably not eating enough. And then I was doing a lot of activity. I was walking home from school. I was sometimes walking to school. But that was like not out of my own choices.

It wasn't mainly out of my own choice. Like my mum was a busy woman working all the time. So like sometimes I just had to walk to school had to walk home so it wasn't like you were like oh my god i need to walk to school to burn up no it wasn't like that well it didn't start like that okay but then it led to that yeah and then and then also i was dancing after school every every day three hours like it does catch up on you so can i ask like when you would sit down and have like a meal with your family yeah did you have like thoughts in your head when you were eating like oh I shouldn't be eating this or

well sometimes you didn't really sit down as a family and eat well we're all Sundays we always on Sundays we did but during the whole week we didn't yeah well I would always cook we're here were here then everywhere yeah and yeah but yeah I definitely was like yeah like oh I don't want this okay it's like making me uncomfortable in my head yeah and then at what point would you say you started to feel like concerned about maybe how Millie looked when yeah interesting she did start to lose um well i was concerned when she well she said that her period started then they stopped and i said well that's not right i said you need to go to that we need to go to the doctors and that was before she was 18 and i guess especially because that's something you work directly with like

and i took her probably twice. To the doctors. Which I remember so vividly and I hated it so much. They were against me but I knew it was the right thing to do. Yeah. But the doctor wasn't, I remember her not being nice. No, she wasn't very empathetic with you.

She wasn't. No. And it just made me feel like, I was like, just people were not liking me because of it really yeah like i felt attacked from my mum obviously mum i wasn't i wasn't obviously i just said obviously mum wasn't this is this is what happens when you have an eating disorder you feel like everyone's attacking you and it's not the case you're literally just loving me and you're wanting to look after me but in that head

space when you're in that mindset you don't understand that so I felt like that and then I also felt like the doctor was being really mean to me I felt like my dance teacher was like attacking me it was like all of this negative energy towards me and I was like people don't like me I'm not good enough and then do you feel like that maybe pushed you even more yeah yeah yeah but that's what happens with so many people like if they're not ready to admit to themselves they will just stay in denial and then they will unfortunately not listen to people around them who are telling them what's like the best thing and they'll have to find out the hard way which is you know sometimes suffer years and years with

it and then realize when they're a lot more mature and understand like okay maybe this isn't actually the best way to be living or eating so you weren't actually listening to me when i was trying to help you no i didn't want to listen to you which are two different things of not listening to not wanting to yeah did any of your other kids have like any struggles with their food or no no I mean I think my sister did she was in the other way though she always wanted to diet yeah didn't she what about you well i i like my food we all do you're always weight watchers aren't you oh yeah i mean i tried to sort of you know i'd lost you know quite a bit of weight yeah i've never been like no no no you've never been that way or you've never been the other way no but you've actively wanted to lose weight yeah yeah i think you'll find in the world most people

yeah on some sort of thinking what they eat which is why i'm trying to change that yeah i think you're doing really good i was very proud when you decided to come home during lockdown you were forced to come home because of university closing and then turned it all around yeah but lockdown was the worst lockdown was the worst and then it got better it's like i had to go through that worst bit to then get better yeah i see that version of you like a different millie i know like it's not this is why do you not see that mom yeah do you see me as a different personie. I know. Like it's not you. This is what I do. Do you not see that, mum? Yes. Do you see me as a different person? Well, absolutely. You're a much calmer,

less anxious person. I was anxious. I was an anxious child. You can even see it like in your old videos, your pictures, like you just look like a bit dead in your face.

You look happy. Yeah, you look happy now. Did you think i looked dead did you think i looked i did i knew that you weren't happy because you were anxious you were quite stressy quite angry yeah and all that combination but i didn't know how else i could help you because you wouldn't listen to me or anybody you weren't because as you admit now you were in denial so you weren't willing to yeah to listen but i remember there was a phase where like no one spoke about any of it for like a good few years good five years in the room isn't it yeah that's it the elephant in the room

and i don't know in the room no this is the thing's it the elephant in the room and i don't know in the room no this is the thing like you this is when like you feel like people are like talking behind your back and stuff and then going against you and it gets so twisted like you get so in your head like oh my god people don't like me people talking behind my back but that's all the negativity it brings rather now you're into positivity yeah but what i want to try and help educate people into removing it as a taboo topic and being able to talk about it yeah i'm sure people will like mums follow me and they you know talk to me about their children and they don't know what to say and i'm like it's never easy to talk about but the more we talk about the easier it's going to be

and the more like open the child is going to be to talk about it i guess you have to build that relationship with your parent to then feel comfortable talking about it no who was the first person you told when you were like really struggling um wasn't it your friend yeah yeah but i don't think i told her fully she just met she just reached out she was like are you okay and then she was a bit concerned and i was like oh god really okay maybe like i was like slowly easing into the conversation but i didn't fully open up and then once i started to actually gain weight that's when i was opening up because I was like removing myself from that person so I was no longer her so it was like okay now I can talk about her without being her did you ever like feel like you wanted to just open up and tell your mom what was going on

in your head no no never did you guys ever have that conversation no I wanted amelia to talk to me yeah but she's an angry teenager she wouldn't and then when she became an adult then she's not going to tell me anyway it's shame you're just like spectating waiting for her to slowly realize the photographs and see the difference you can as you say you can see like an unhappy yeah teenager And I felt very... It's okay, don't cry. I mean, don't be sorry. You can cry. You can cry. You can absolutely cry.

Don't be sorry. Crying is good. I just felt to blame, really. It wouldn't make me cry. You're not to blame. You're not to blame. No one, there is nothing to... There's society to blame you're not to blame no one there is nothing to society to blame

you just say it's in the household well there's things there's factors that come in there's no one solid direct component to it because if you're such a strong character you're able to turn it around yourself and it's only you that could do it yes exactly that I always say I'm very proud

that you can do that yeah because you don't like being told at all anything do you want to expand on that do you know what I mean you know you because you're you're your own person you you have your your own personality that you definitely want to know what you want to do you just don't like to be I don't like to be told what to do I think that must be why you struggled so much to actually get coached because you don't like the idea of being told what to do yeah I just feel like I'm just like you're very you don't you don't like if I if anyone knows me better it's me so for someone to tell me what to do i'm like well no i'm gonna do it my own way yeah me progressing my best way do you know

yeah that's fine you've achieved that so that's okay it's just in your own time yeah yeah yeah yeah i actually think like that applies a lot to relationships like a lot of people will be in relationships that they're not happy in and they can hear it from everyone else like you need to get out of this good for you you need to you know move on but they might know that deep down but they just have to wait and do it in their own time and that's definitely the case so true yeah yeah you just have to do it in your own time what would you say our relationship was like? I think it's really good.

Are you close? Yeah. How often do you talk? We talk quite a lot. We message quite a lot. Cool. And so if media says, oh, I'm busy so I can't talk to you.

Yeah. Cool. We have this thing in the family, don't we? Who's the favourite child? Who's the number one? Are you about to announce it as well? No, I'm not going to say it because there isn't one. What is there a favourite child?

I mean, he likes to think she is. Everyone likes to think they are. I think I am. No, I don't think I am, to be honest. I think... Okay. So you've got four children. If you were to rank them...

No, I'm not going to say that if there's one thing you favor no how can i question that you're not the favorite child there is no favorite child i'm the best at something and what's that in your eyes what you do have the best bum i mean i don't i've not seen your siblings bum so i don't know but i'm guessing you once said that it's not seb so we ruled one out why well i hope you're not watching um okay right let's change it up what is the funniest story oh my god of millie when she was a kid or just something funny or stupid oh when we were on holiday in spain um everyone says like silly things and we passed this shop and i can't remember this. It comes up all the time.

And it was funny because you just said, do cows have tails? Because we passed this shop and it's like I had this plastic cow. I don't think it's funny. I think it's funny because we were all laughing. Yeah, but you're about ten. Wait, do cows have tails? Are you asking that question? Wait, what?

You said what's the funniest thing. Do you think cows have tails are you asking that question wait what you said what's the funniest do you think cows have tails yeah okay it's just a question that crossed my mind this is me in a nutshell i ask weird questions and i've discovered this recently as well like i keep asking weird questions and so obviously it probably stemmed from that yeah i mean that just reminded me of the most embarrassing thing i once asked my nan in front of about 15 family members at a Christmas meal. I can't remember how old I was. I think I was like seven and I meant to say vegan but I stood up and really loudly said to my nan, nan are you a virgin? Oh no. Everyone's just like what?

Oh no. Oh God. Would you say that's the funniest story then? It's just something that came to my mind. Surely I've done something. Okay, most embarrassing thing. You should have prepared me for this so I could think of things. I didn't know these questions either. Most embarrassing thing. Oh I've done a lot mum.

What embarrassing? What did you tell me? As you say I haven't got a very good memory. I've done a lot mum. I've done a lot mum. I've done a lot mum. I've done a lot mum. I've done a lot mum.

I've done a lot mum. I've done a lot mum. I've done a lot mum. I've done a lot mum. I've done a lot mum. I've done a lot mum. I've done a lot mum. I've done thing? Oh, I've done a lot, Mum. What, embarrassing? Surely. As you say, I haven't got a very good memory.

I mean, I've wet my bed. Yeah, but most children do that. No, but I wasn't a child. What? I wet my bed when I was 19. Oh, I didn't know that. When I was travelling. I wasn't even drunk.

I was completely sober. Oh, my God. I was having a dream when I was weeing. And then I woke up when I was we. I wasn't even drunk. I was completely sober. Oh my God. I was having a dream and I was weeing and then I woke up and I was weeing in my bed. Oh my God. Yeah, that wasn't good.

And then I had to go tell the Airbnb person. Wait, so were you in like a hostel or something? Well, I was in like Airbnb hostel like shared room thing and I was on a bunk bed.

I was at the top of the bunk bed. Oh no. Gosh. I went to bed. That's embarrassing. 19. But yeah, you weren't there so no well i started traveling with you you don't no way yeah well you guys japan which japan oh i didn't know that we're very we're a very well-traveled family aren't we yeah we're very privileged in that sense so where did you go on holiday like where would you go on like family holidays um south africa south africa we've been to australia

what part of south africa cape town cape town or went to johannesburg didn't we yeah just for a short time but mainly cape town in the cape town wow it looks beautiful it's new york a couple of times also a special done a couple of cruises with you the cruise ships my grandma loves a cruise ship. You recently went on a cruise with your grandma, didn't you? Not with my grandma. Where did you go with your grandma? Last time I went with my grandma was to Singapore and Thailand. Oh.

But we went to Hawaii. Yeah. No, you went to Hawaii with grandma. Oh, that was just with grandma. You and I went to Caribbean. Honduras. Yeah. Florida.

Mexico, down there. Did you ever notice any disordered eating habits with Millie when you went on holiday? No, Amelia always used to love going out for really nice food. She always went to nice restaurants, but I didn't realise she was preparing herself to to eat this food so she if you were gonna go out it had to be really nice places I get I get my expensive taste from my mum right yeah I remember grandma was always like oh you're so skinny you're too small look at your

arms those sort of things those sort of comments did you used to find that triggering or like at the time almost a bit reinforcing because i guess in your head for the wrong reasons you wanted to get smaller so did you see that as like a trigger or did you like it no i didn't like it no no i never liked it when someone said that yeah it was weird because you'd think i would like that but no i was like oh don't say that like in my head really yeah yeah there'll be like moments where i get really scared like i look too skinny and i'll be like oh my god i don't like this so what would be like a compliment to you your legs look nice

just nice yeah right no like actual adjectives yeah i don. No, I don't. Yeah, I don't know. Or like abs. Right. That was always one. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But no one would see your abs though normally. If you had clothes. Well, yeah. Or like if I was in like the school dance show

and we're like sports bras or something, I'd always be like, oh yeah, get that out. Yeah, no, I remember I used to be like that. I remember, I swear to you about this, I remember I would like literally not want to go to the gym unless it's like first thing in the morning because then that's when my abs would be like, I probably-

You did say that, I remember that. So stupid. So silly. Should we ask one more question? Yeah. Oh, okay, this is one, mum. Mm-hmm. Don't, if you don't want to answer it

don't worry what is your biggest insecurity well I'm generally an insecure person anyway so there's no particular insecurity well there would be one that shines no no so I'm always what makes you an insecure person i don't know just always have been really interesting so what would you say is something you love about yourself come on there must be something you love about yourself i don't know oh my i i i love um i just love to be with friends and i love the fact that people like i like to be liked it's not the right thing but you need to be liked by yourself i do like myself self love club i do like myself but what sometimes you like about yourself?

It must be something. You're very outgoing. I'm very outgoing, yeah. You're very, you know, very curious and very busy. I don't like to sit down. Very often. You do not like to sit down.

Millie, you get that from your mum. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I get a lot of things from my mum. Would you say you guys are similar? Yeah. I think we are. Yeah. But I think I'm very similar with dad as well. But I get my fid busy. Would you say you guys are similar? Yeah. I think we are. Yeah. But I think I'm very similar to Dad as well.

But I get my fidgetiness from you. I wouldn't say I'm fidgety, but I just like to have things done. I've got a little bit of OCD, really. Yeah. A little bit. Okay, quite a lot then. A lot. Okay, the one thing I like about you is your eyes.

Oh, thank you. Sorry? You do have very pretty eyes oh thank you good listening i've got one more question which i think might be helpful for because you know you said you get moms messaging you asking like how to kind of like navigate it with their kids who may have disordered eating i know you kind of said like millie wanted to kind of like navigate it with their kids who may have disordered eating i know you kind of said like millie wanted to kind of be left alone and do it in her own time but would you do you have any tips or advice on how to support a child with eating disorder um it's difficult because it's now in retrospect in the sense i didn't know that amelia had a eating disorder which sounds i please don't think that i i didn't care she just withheld it from us

really which i think is one of the big parts of one of the big symptoms of people with any sort of eating disorders so as a mum i would just always just keep all those lines of communication open. So just encouraging, just keep an eye on them. Yeah. See, even keeping an eye on them. Try to. You know, I was encouraging her to go to the doctor because there must be a reason why.

And I knew she was thin, but she was still eating, so I just didn't get her. Yeah. Just always be that sort of loving mum yeah i think yeah just do it without making them feel like they're being watched in the best way possible or like forcing anything yeah so I know my mum used to like really try to force me to eat or always make comments like have you got food you've not eaten you've not had anything to eat today have you like you need to eat something and it would be so like pushing me so much that I'd get my back up yeah and almost like push her away and it would force me into

this even more whereas I think what you're saying is really good just to kind of like in like reassure them that you're there you're loving you care you're there to support them but they have to come to you and you're not gonna interrogate them or push anything on them you're like i didn't ever think i was ever pushy no i think that's that's the best way like no i hope and i wasn't in denial at all because i didn't know what was going on which sounds yes you could have been in denial because you didn't know what was going on right i know but because you withheld it from me yeah and i guess it's hard as a parent to accept that your child has an eating disorder like you don't wanna even if that is the truth and like deep down you might kind of like know that might be what's happening.

Like it's hard to accept that as a mother, that your child is going through that. Especially if they're not admitting it to you. And they don't want to admit it to you. You're like, oh. You'd rather just kind of believe that it's not happening. And however many times I might have broached the subject, it would all be, no, I'm not, you know, that's not true.

Why are you asking me so then what can you just think well i can't do any more yeah i guess it's very different because i think a lot of people with disordered eating like that you know it's all over the spectrum like some people will be able to kind of do it i guess how you did how like it's not so apparent to your family but then other people might quite literally be refusing to eat and like- So open. Open, like obviously. Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Going through a very clear eating disorder. So that is very different. I guess it's just very individualized. It depends on what your relationship is like with your parents, how secretive all is. And if, even if you've got a sibling, see if you can talk to them.

Or a friend. Yeah. But you'll never change if you're not ready to change yourself. Yeah. So I think the person, the individual will only be the person to change that. I think it's very difficult for outside people to help them unless I they're willing to be wanting to change I agree completely I think the

most important thing is having support and you know guidance and help to like keep that person kind of moving in the right direction but yeah it's fully got to come from them well we're both very proud of you thank you really it's funny because mum and I don't even talk about this like even at home so to talk about this on the podcast you guys are in for a treat

so we're going to end the episode with a quote we are indeed again I didn't tell you about the quote mom because i feel like you were already overwhelmed in itself so i just don't want to overwhelm you even more um quote for the week this is actually quite fitting i didn't mean okay go on i think mine's quite fitting as well you know it really was not planned okay you glow differently when your confidence is fueled by belief in yourself instead

of validation from others no no no no no i i didn't screenshot i actually was gonna screenshot that one i was literally but then i was like i think i said that in another episode but if yeah that is you you glow differently now that your confidence is fueled in your self-belief rather than seeking validation from other people i i just think that's so true that's so true you just have to be so confident and believe in yourself and you will shine yeah you do glow very differently now you do thank you that's sweet it's that um highlighter i bought you yeah it is the hourglass I think that's helped um so my one is if you don't like something just take away its only power your attention yeah you know if you don't like something take away its only power and that is the only power

that it has it's like saying eating disorder the only power that that has is your attention to it. Do you know what I mean? I know what you mean. Yeah. I would say always believe in yourself. Always believe in yourself. Is that, would you say that's a quote that you live by? I try to.

Yeah. I think anything, like any goal you have, it all starts with self belief. Yes. Like if you don't genuinely believe deep down that you can achieve that, like you're limiting yourself. Literally, yeah.

You're already setting yourself up for failure. Yeah. Well, thanks mum. My pleasure. Thank you so much. Thank you Emma, thank you Amelia. How did you, yeah also mum calls me Amelia, not Millie. It's funny, I call Amelia, Amelia,

but I always sign the cards Millie. Always. Yeah, you do. I actually think Amelia, but I always sign the cards Millie. Always. Yeah, you do. I actually think Amelia suits you more. You think more? Yeah. Should I go by Amelia now?

Amelia. You're such a mouthful. Oh, do you want your full name? Oh. What's the full name? Have you found the podcast? It was fine, thank you. It wasn't that scary. No, it wasn't scary.

You know, it's hard being you know put on the on the spot not knowing what to say you did well mom did i do okay sorry that one that's okay it's all part of the emotions though isn't it how much are you going to edit out that's what i have to listen we actually don't really edit much no we don't but we'll see we'll anyway yeah thank you so much for listening guys thank you so much we'll see you in the next episode catch you later have a great week