Should I Delete That? - OUR BEST BITS - PART THREE: Our mums, Laura Bates, Lily Phillips and more…

Episode Date: January 19, 2026

We’re celebrating Should I Delete That by sharing with you some of our best bits and favourite moments from the past four years - we’ve had so many incredible guests join us on the podcast, and we hope you loved them as much as we did! IN THIS EPISODE:Al’s Mum (May 2024)Liv Thorne (August 2025) Laura Bates (May 2025) Lily Phillips (September 2025)Em’s Mum (September 2023) Payzee Mahmod (November 2024) James Bellringer (March 2025) Body Image Series - Giles Harrison (January 2025)Callie Thorpe (August 2024) Our final episode (December 2025)Our entire archive will be staying live - so if you enjoyed any of these segments, you can go back and listen to the episodes in full at any time. Follow us on Instagram:@shouldideletethat@em_clarkson@alexlight_ldnShould I Delete That is produced by Faye LawrenceStudio Manager: Elliott MckayVideo Editor: Celia GomezSocial Media Manager: Sarah EnglishMusic: Alex Andrew Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hello and welcome to Shoulda Delete That. You are listening to the best bits from the past four years. We hope you enjoy. I've got to say, I am fascinated by this place because I want everyone to know that I don't really follow Alex. And the problem being is that she was brought up in a non-bad language house. Right, we didn't swear in front of her. So the effing and chething, I find,

really hard to get along with her and both her dad as well. We both go, what did she just say? No. Listen, I blame M. I blame my mum. My mum has genuinely got the most appalling language in the whole word. Really? She has a C word.

No. My mum has something called, I'm not going to say the word to you because I'm scared. But she has the C word test. And she deploys the word in conversations for people when she meets them. And she gauges their reaction just to try and work out if she'd get on with them. Oh, I'd be like that. Oh, excuse me. I'm like, I don't want a jeering on and so going on.

Yeah, my mum's got really bad language. But she still tells ourselves, like, I can still, because my sister's really bad. Yeah. Her language is awful. But what's going to happen when the baby? Oh, we don't know. You know, you've got to be so careful. I know.

Yeah, you don't want the baby going to nursery saying, good morning. I think we're going to make another generation of retrovates it's my fear I'm more worried with my mum's language in front of the baby than my own Well you're coming to the live show Oh yeah you can take it up with her then Perfect

That'll be good for I can't start out at the live show And it's definitely a family of her then Because we're all coming Oh yeah Yeah yeah So that'll be yeah I know

I love how many of you there are Yeah I know There are four of us here today Well four daughters here No three daughters Yeah Two missing Unfortunately three daughters

Two grandchildren Yeah. And you. And me, yeah. Yeah. I'll tell you. Oh, gosh. Well, I mean, the, us, your daughters are the reason that you're here today. Yes. Yes. Talking on the podcast. Yes. Yeah. And this is a topic that's come up. Actually, we've talked about this topic throughout my whole life with you. Yeah, yeah. It's something that is like at the forefront of your mind still. But we've talked about it more recently since the kids, Jen and Catherine, became moms and then me. which is about what you went through after having, after having me, after I've ruined your life. I've never been the same since. She hasn't, she hasn't been the same since.

It's like, it was very, very traumatic. Yeah, very traumatic. And it's something that you feel very passionate about. Yeah. And you've been very on top of, with Jen, with Catherine, with me, and it's your post-atal depression. Mm-hmm. And your struggles with breastfeeding, which fed into that. Yeah, yeah. Didn't they? They yeah, yeah, yeah, definitely. Yeah, I actually think that the breastfeeding was, you know, obviously had a very traumatic birth, you know, 30-odd hour labour, you're pushing for two hours, you know, cut to ribbons. So, you know, starting off wasn't great. But I used to work on a paediatric ward, I'm a nurse, and was very used to small babies, could handle them, thought I knew exactly what I was doing. I had a niece and.

the nephew, seen them, spent lots of time with them, thought I knew what was doing. But then they give you this child of your own. And you suddenly think, oh my goodness. And being a nurse and my sister was a very senior midwife at the time and went to NCT classes. And there was no other way to feed your baby other than breast you know formula was never discussed it was just not not even thought about so I mean this is 36 years ago oh this is 36 years ago yeah so it will have been and I'm afraid it just didn't work honestly it was and I was desperate absolutely desperate you know because breastfeeding having a baby and breastfeeding you know for the majority of women, that's what they want to do.

Yeah. It's what we're supposed to do. Yeah. And I think, you know, we're told that and we're told that. And, you know, and there are some women who, I know women who do not want to breastfeed, don't even want to think about it. Yeah. And fantastic. That's their choice. But for me, at that time, I desperately wanted to breastfeed. And we struggled on for six weeks and probably, I cried, you know, 24 hours a day and she screamed 24 hours a day. Sorry. And in the end, we just, I remember dad coming home and saying, right, that's it.

She wasn't gaining weight. She just wouldn't take it. So I just stopped dead. Just said, right, that's it. Bottle of SMA and a ginatonic. Thank you very much. But it all went downhill from then on. I became really, really unwell.

just the guilt, the terrible, terrible guilt. I can't explain. And, you know, a thing having a traumatic back, you're starting off on the wrong footing, and then on top you can't feed your baby, which, as I said, there was no other way to do it. So suddenly, and the shame, I remember being ashamed, you know, going out with other women

who, you know, who stick their babies on and no problem at all. you know and I'm jealous, you know, looking and thinking, oh, why can't, why couldn't I have done that? Why? Anyway, I, insomnia kicked in and it has stayed with me for the rest of my life. I just, yeah, I just became highly anxious. You, I was just terrified. It was just really horrible.

So that happened to me and I would say it took you know a good two years to kind of get a little bit better and thought well may as well have another baby as soon as

because you know Why not? Yeah exactly you know Any normal person would have said but I have thought I need to dispel all this because we always said we'd like a large family so

Genevieve came along and I just said right after what I've been through, I am going to try and I would love it to work, I'm going to try, but if it doesn't, it doesn't. And I can remember, I think she fed for about 12 hours and the minute I put her to the breast, all those old memories came back, the hurt, it hurts, you know,

it's not nice. And I said, no, not doing it. Not doing it, you know, and I had all the bottles, everything ready and had a completely different attitude. I just thought, I really don't care what other people think. I'm not doing anything to harm my baby. I just think that it's better for her and for me, if we're both happy.

And that is what I did. How did you go about? Finding the sperm that you wanted. Again, I went to Google. Yeah. Because I was like, talk to me about sperm. Yeah. How do we do this?

And I'd seen a BBC documentary like four years before about Danish sperm. So therefore everything I knew, which was minimal, was about Danish sperm. Okay. So I was like, cool, I'll get some from Denmark then. Love that. Good answer. It's their biggest trade. Exactly.

It's like, that's what I know now. And we don't do it in our country. We don't have a national sperm bank. We did. I'm not going to say the facts because I'll get them wrong. Okay. But it was open for something like three years. And then they had to close it because there were no donations.

Really? Why are we so stingy? I just don't think we talk about it. And maybe the Danes big up for it. Maybe that's what they chat about. But yeah, we just don't. And if you speak to a man now, still, if you say, if you ever considered sperm donation, they get really red and sort of giggly and like, you know, that's sort of, um, whereas perhaps

Danish men don't do that. I don't know, but we just don't, well, like anything in this country, we don't talk about anything that's not. I'm not going to have any perception of Danish men other than their sperm. They go. That's sperm. Yeah. Um, and so yeah, we didn't, but just. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. So we didn't have, we don't have it here. private sperm banks but no national sperm bank and but again very minimal quantity to choose from so i was like okay i'll look at the Danish one ample people to choose from but there lie if another problem what am i looking for so again this was eight years ago so i suspect it's changed now but

you go onto a website there's no logging in or um and you just filter down So there's just a thousand taxonomies of height, weights, hair color, eye color, ethnicity. Wow. I can't remember any of the others. And at the beginning, I was just, I'd hold myself up at home for two days. I was like, I'm going to do this. Two days, I had a box of magnums. So it's all going to be fine.

Some chocolate ice cream, will I be away? But at the beginning, I was really looking at as if it was a dating site. Like, oh, he sounds fun because he's mentioned. whatever, kayaking. I don't know what I said that. But that, like, what's that got to do with? Oh, my God. Yeah.

Like, literally what has him liking pizza and whatever got to do with me and possibly a child? So eventually I realized that that was insane and that I needed to think about other things, perhaps. Yeah. And so I looked for their familial health was the number one. because our family is riddled with cancer. So it was like, okay, if I look to make sure the people that they've got are good enough. And actually, they're screened really heavily. So it would never be that someone who had a specific disease that could be passed down would be allowed to.

But again, I was just trying to, I was trying to think of anything. Like, come on. And then it was, I think. Oh, I went with hair. No, I didn't go with hair color. I didn't go with anything like that. Then it was just like they sounded like a normal human being. Like they say they do a little speech about why they're donating and they talk that through so you can hear their voice.

Oh, wow. Yeah. And again, that might be different now. Was it all in Danish? No, of course it was in English with a beautiful Danish accent because they speak. Because they speak English better than we do. Okay. This is like in the sound of those plays.

And then. Yeah, what else? You don't have a photo. There was a baby photo. You don't get photos of them as an adult. So it's literally just words on a page. And some of them have this voice note. And I just whittled it down and then just went, okay, that one.

Oh my God. Because there's no right answer. There is no right answer. And there's no way of. I don't like that. Me neither. I would be there for years. I don't like that there's no right answer.

And so that's how I had to give myself a time limit. All the answer is the right answer. Every answer is the right answer. Exactly. So then what do you do? Right. But then that paralyzes you because then which. But then they're all the right answer.

Then which one does it matter because they're all the right answer? Well, no, I wasn't convinced by it all being the right answer. I was just terrified by the whole thing. Of course you. I feel I'm just for you right now for the year of eight years ago. Did you go for the one with the voice notes? Yeah, there was a voice note. That feels nice.

Yeah, there were a couple of other things that was said in it. And I was just like, okay, yeah, tick, fine. But again, I mean, he could have been lying in this thing. Of course. Yeah, could have been. And it could have been any of it. And that clinic, they do a little description of what the staff described the donor as. Well, that's nice, true.

Yeah, but he might describe them as, oh, my God, didn't, you know, he was lovely, had kind eyes. And he'd be like, yeah, but he was a bit arrogant on the way out. Do you know what to me? Yeah. Again, it's so subjective. And I was, yeah. I feel like that's so much. I was feeling quite grand.

And now I'm glad. No, I know. And like how their grandparents died and what their grandparents did for a living. And I was like, I know much more about herbs, sort of DNA than mine. Like, because it was so much. Yeah. So much. But yeah, I just, it was him.

I was like, right, well, we're done here. because I can't and that was then very much, it's that or nothing. Question. Yes. So you had, you knew that you were faced with multiple rounds of IUIs. Does that mean that you had to go for someone who had a specific amount of sperm? Right. So, honestly, I'm anxious thinking about it again because there is no, again, again, now you can buy bundles apparently. So you could get a three pack or. Subscription service. And then there's like, um, What's it called?

Oh God, I'm going to get this one. I think it's MOT, the MOT, which is the speed of the sperm. Okay. And again, I was like, well, which one do I need? Do I need the highest? Presumably I need the highest. Otherwise, why are you telling me? But then I'd speak to the clinic.

They'd be like, no, kind of anything. Well, no, at this stage, I'm going high. It's like when you go to petrol station and it's unleaded or premium, unleaded it on. I don't know. I know. I always go for premium because I think my car will fight me, but it's more expensive.

I don't know why I'm doing it. Whereas I always go for the other one because I'm like, no, why did you need that? Oh gosh. You're so weird. I know. And so I was like, okay, well, I need the highest MOT, obviously. And then I was like, but what if it, what if there aren't four vials available?

And I don't want to buy all of them now because then I might be wasting three because I was convinced I'd get pregnant on the first go. And then you have to pay for storage and you have to pay for a la la la la la. You have to pay to get it shipped over. And when you're shipping it over, it's like, do you want container A? Or the jazzy ice container? Jaze ice container. And I've got the jazzy ice container.

I'm already giving you all my money. You may as well have the extra 200 at this stage. I'll take the gift wrapping, thank you. Yeah, because why. It was. It was like Rowan Atkinson and you love actually like, and another thing. Yeah, okay, sure. And the chocolate button.

Uh-huh. Yeah, like give it to me because I don't know. what any of this means and I don't know what will make it work. Like, yeah. How much is sperm? How much did you pay? Do you know what's worrying is that I can't remember? I'm going to say some words.

Okay. Please, if anyone's listening who is going to then put this in a spreadsheet, dear Rennery. I think it was about 950. For one vial. For one vial. That's really expensive. I seemed, yeah, I think it was that. and then the IUI was about two and a half grand.

I think it was basically about three and a half grand ago. Okay. For, and that's entry level. Yeah. Things may have got cheaper. Things may have got more. And I know now you can buy bundles, like I say.

But I didn't want to, but the whole thing was just like. But then there's the risk that if he doesn't work and then someone buys the other ones. And then he's not there. And then I have to go through the whole kerfuffle again. Yeah. And in between. So the ending of the story is I got pregnant on my fourth, my fourth girl,

predictively. Oh, really? Wow. And in between three and four, I had like a six-month break because I was too scared. I ended up buying three vials. I was too scared to log on and look to see if he was still there. Because I was like, if he isn't there, I'm going to pass out at this stage. I relate to you.

And the way your brain works. Because I can't go through that choosing again because now he was in my head. his genetics whatever was in my head and that was the right one. Yeah. And of course he was there and it was all fine. And, you know, but I... See, he was the right one. Yeah, there was the right answer.

He was the right answer. Yeah. I was like, deal or no deal? If you could give your advice to anyone who's got either a daughter or a son, someone that, you know, they're trying to raise in this world and this like rapidly evolving a world of algorithms and AI and social media and it just feels very scary. And I think we hear a lot that the answer is education. And I know that that is the answer. But are you able to give us something more tangible of like what that education actually looks like? What can parents actually do

to teach, you know, both their, you know, their children, whether they're boys or girls? Yeah, absolutely. So so much of this thrives in silence and so much of it lives in shame, whether you're talking about the manosphere stuff, whether you're talking about people who don't feel able to explain to a parent that they've been victimized through deep fake pornography, like all of this stuff, it thrives in silence. So communication is the most important thing. But when people hear that, they think,

oh my God, I've got to sit down my teenager and have this huge, uncomfortable, like horrifying, huge summit. And that is actually the opposite of what you want. What you want is just little and often from as early as possible. It's not too late if you've got a teenager, but if you are listening to this and you have a, a child who is, you know, under the eight of six is the perfect time to start. And I don't mean that in a scary way. I just mean it in a way that it is okay to point out how weird it is that when

you're in the toy shop, the chemistry set is on the shelf that's marked boys toys. It's all right to stop in the supermarket and look at the magazines and say, why does it say women's over there? And it's got diet and gossip and cookery magazines. And under the sign that says men's interest, we've got the economist and National Geographic and the new scientist. Just having those calls. Just having those conversations gives them, it opens up a whole world to them of possibility for disrupting what the world tells them that it doesn't necessarily have to be true. And I know that sounds really simple, but if you do it just little by little every day, then you're raising a kid who says, sometimes the world gets it wrong and sometimes it's not going to be right about

me. And as they get a bit older, starting to talk about consent is really important, starting to talk about modeling bodily integrity, having the right to choose everything that happens to their body, whether that might be role-modelled through seeing a parent or seeing a family member and deciding whether they want to greet them with a hug or a high-five or a wave or a smile is telling them you get to choose. Somebody else doesn't get to define a physical interaction. You get to choose what's comfortable for you. And then as they get a little bit older, it is starting to talk about what online pornography is and how it might be really, really different from what sex looks like offline. And that actually a lot of what might happen in those online spaces is

showing things which are actually abusive and which they are not expected to have to do. Because we are seeing so many kids who are in their early teens, if that, you know, saying, but it's normal for girls to cry join sex. Like it's not rape. It's a compliment, really. It's not rape if she enjoys it. I have to choke her. That's what girls want.

And I know that sounds so scary. Like I know people will listen and think that you're cherry picking the most extreme. But just have a look at the 2023 Children's Commission. report on pornography because it found that three quarters of kids by the time they get to 18 have seen sexually violent porn and that this corresponded with 57% of them thinking that girls enjoy being choked and hurt and abused and it's what they want and those things are connected but the important thing is that parents have got power here we used to think for a long time that like turning off all the porn stopping kids from accessing it was the only solution but really the

solution is about giving them the tools to understand and recognize and know that when they see it or if they come across it doesn't define them doesn't define their sexual relationships it doesn't reflect anything close to a reality of what healthy relationships and consensual sex looks like there was a game that came out recently which basically encouraged players to become women's worst nightmare and it was called no mercy um and it encouraged your incest like you've got extra points for like raping your own mom and stuff I know and it took a while it was banned in the UK but I guess that's one part of this conversation we haven't had is gaming.

Yeah. Because still, and I need to check, I was reading the statistics about this yesterday for a video I was making, and I've forgotten all of them, obviously. But I remember growing up playing Grand Theft daughter with my brother, I say playing, he'd let me watch. And that seems to have got more and more prevalent. And in that, you can pick up prostitutes, you can run them over with your car. You can do the most deplorable, despicable things.

This one game has been banned, but there are still, so many out there and we haven't really talked about gaming. Are kids gaming a lot? Is it just one part of the same thing or is it in and of itself a beast that we need to be worrying about as well? So I don't think again like so many of these things

that the gaming itself is inherently the problem. There are obviously elements of some games which are really deeply misogynistic and that's a big problem and there are some elements of gaming culture. So for example when kids are like talking over their headsets that we often see being very misogynistic or kind of being, sometimes gaming,

particularly when it goes into kind of gaming chat rooms and forums can be a conduit to either the manosphere or also the far right to white supremacy. There was one mum I interviewed who said that she heard her 14-year-old was playing a video game. She heard someone shout, feminism is cancer over the headset. So I would say it's kind of a version

of what we're seeing more widely on social media, but perhaps more deeply concentrated. But what is really worrying is that we are seeing a kind of gamification of, of sexual violence being taken to whole new levels that we've never imagined through these emerging forms of technology that I explore in the book. So, for example, a virtual reality game that you can engage in whilst using a sex robot. So the sex robot is in front of you. You've got your VR headset on. It looks like there's a moving, breathing, real woman who you're

interacting with, but it feels incredibly real because you are also at the same time interacting with this silicon robot woman in front of you. And the gamification there where you can score in the game as you score and similar kind of gaming elements of things like AI girlfriends and chatbots, which are a hugely widespread issue that no one is talking to, talking about. It kind of gamifies women in relationships in a way that is reminiscent of pickup artistry, reminiscent of the ideas of incels and so on. So it's like a sex doll, VR sex doll?

Yes, there's a cyber brothel in Berlin that I traveled to for the book where you can go and you can use sex robots. You can order a sex robot to be prepared for you when you arrive. You can order one that's covered in blood. You can ask for custom things, particulars, and I asked them to slash and cut and tear her closing before I arrived just to see if they would and they did. No questions asked. And then you go into a room where there is like an undercreated kind of gynecological chair that you can use. you have this thing to use to do whatever you want to. And when I walked in, it looked like there was a naked young woman lying with her back

to me on the bed. It looked so, so terrifyingly real. And no one's going to come into that room. No one's going to stop you doing whatever you want to do. And when I walked over to her, she was incredibly realistic. Her fingers were kind of trembling. And then I looked down and realized that one of her labia had been torn off. No.

And these are not just available in cyber brothels. You can pay thousands of dollars to get your own sex robots. Some of them will warm to the touch. They will talk to you. They have a memory. They can be customized to look like a real person, real woman, who you might want to have at home to rape whenever you choose, or perhaps your ex-partner, or perhaps a woman that you're stalking.

You can send them photographs, and they will customize everything. They'll customize skin-toin, face shape, freckles, eye color. There's hundreds of different nipple types and sizes that you can choose from. These dolls have everything except the ability to say no. They can talk to you. They can ask you how your day was. Some of them will be self-warming. Some of them will be self-lubricating.

They're making the skin more and more realistic. Some of them have settings called one of them, for example, was designed with a setting called Frid Farrer. When you turn that setting on, she would essentially allow you to rape her because she'd be saying, no, no, that she didn't want you to. Oh, my God. I mean, it's huge.

And it's normalizing all of these four. of abuse and the idea that women are objects that men should be able to own, which are straight out of all of the problems that we claim to really care at the moment about trying to tackle. I'm blown away. I'm blown away. Literally. I can't believe that exists.

I cannot believe it. But here's the really scary thing. Sorry. The thing is that is the sex tech market is a 30 billion dollar global market. So that's, it's big and lots and lots of people are accessing and using those robots. and these dolls. One of the Kardashians' ex-partners recently spoke about having one made to look like her. But what no one is talking about, we do occasionally talk about and worry about sex robots, but what no one is talking about is that you can download a version of this. So the same

exact thing that lives in your pocket. And it's called an AI girlfriend or an AI chatbot. And you can create her again to look exactly how you want her to look. You can customize everything. You get to pick her name. She will be there. moving on the screen, she's an avatar, or she can look very realistic, she can be like someone who essentially kind of looks like your FaceTiming with her, but she is available to you 24 hours a day. If you're a teenage boy, you can have her, you can have as many as you like, you can access them for free, you can jump into rape scenarios with them, you can abuse them. In fact, many, many men abuse them and then share the screenshots of abusing them with each other online to see who can do

the most awful and depraved thing to them. And when people worry about sex robots, I think, yeah, But these apps, if you look at last year alone and you just look at the Google Android Play Store, the top 11 apps chatbot AI apps have a combined 100 million downloads. This is huge. This is a bigger problem. And again, it's something that no one is talking about. I hadn't heard. I honestly hadn't heard of it. I never heard of it.

But it's, I mean, it's so widespread. Like there's one company that has 25 million active users alone. And the thing that really gets me about these companies is that they market themselves as like sexual wellness. They market themselves as like, we're here to help anybody to, you know, form stronger relationships and to sometimes help their mental health, to feel more confident, to have a virtual relationship with someone that can really help you in your life. And if you're a lonely man, like this alleviates loneliness and it can help you to learn how to form relationships. And then you look at these things on the app store and every single one of them, is a very, very young avatar on the advert of a very large breasted woman. You download it and it's like, would you like to choose necrophia to be one of my hobbies?

Like it's not about that. They're marketing it as something that's about wellness and mental health. And the reality is that it's about misogyny. It's really insidious. And they're attracting funding by doing that. But it goes back to exactly what you were saying earlier about Donald Trump saying it's a really hard time to be a young man in America. Oh, yeah.

So, I mean, we've literally come full circle because it's so hard to download this app because the women aren't going to talk to you. I mean, I saw a financial time story not long ago. It was all over the, I think it was a reel. It was on Instagram and it was saying like how women are leaving men behind. And it was like, because women are earning money now. And it's like, you don't notice it, but it's like language like that that's just like, it is, there's poor men rhetoric, isn't it?

Oh, yeah. Or even when there was a horrendous murder case of a head teacher at a very prestigious school who was shot dead and they said that maybe living in the shadow of his overachieving wife in one of the headlines was what caused him to snap. I mean, it is mind-blowing. And again, it's really important to say that again, this isn't doing men any favours. It's not like we're punching down on something that could be a really good tool for men. If men are suffering from an epidemic of loneliness, they deserve so much better than an app that presents them with. apparently breathing, fuckable, submissive woman to do what they want with, because that's not going to help them form real-life relationships.

That's just going to ingrain all the behaviours and beliefs that are probably the existing barriers to why they don't have healthy relationships in the first place. That's a real societal problem we need to tackle, but this isn't the answer. When you get met with these questions and this confusion from people, whether it's in real life or on the internet, how does it manifest? Is it generally curiosity and kindness? or is it sharting and judgment?

Both. Yeah? Yeah. And how do they feel coming? Like, which, what? Do you, have you got the patience for either? Do you want to talk to people? You know what?

I mean, I prefer people to talk to me in a respectful way. But like, and so, yeah, I much prefer people just to come with their curious questions, like in a nice fan of us. Yeah. Yeah, and you've done a lot of interviews, you know, podcasts, TV, newspaper. have you ever been in a situation where you feel like this is someone, you're trying to push me, where you feel uncomfortable? And I think as well, sometimes people fire these questions,

but they don't want the answers. They don't want to listen or actually take anything in. They just kind of want to say their truth. And there's no change in what they think or feel. That's what I found, like doing a lot of research around this. I found that people are asking you questions, you're giving answers and they don't believe your answers. When you say this is my fantasy, this is what I like doing, I enjoy this, I enjoy sex,

I'm doing something that I want to do and I'm monetising something that I enjoy. We don't really believe it and we're projecting our own stuff onto it. Yeah. And that must be frustrating. And it's kind of the same thing as you're crying at the end of that documentary. Everyone said it's because this has taken a toll on her and we're not actually listening to what you're saying. Yeah. And I could go blue in the face explaining it.

but some people just won't listen. That's fine. Like I respect other people's opinions on it and that's fine. But it's just like annoying if you're going to ask the questions at least try and like listen and maybe understand my point of view. Yeah. But the constant dialogue around it like she's lying, she's not being true to herself, she's not being, all this stuff.

Does it ever make you question yourself? Yeah, I think sometimes, because sometimes you just do think like, is, you know, because I am such an anomaly, is this truly what I think? And yeah, definitely. But I mean, it always just comes down to like, I just try and, like, really ground myself

and, like, speak to my friends and my family and stay true to myself rather than kind of listening to other people. It's a lot of noise, though. Yeah. Like, creating, and I think it's really cool that your family can be that safe space for you. But it must be an... You must have very good boundaries to be able to not be swayed by what everybody else has to say.

Because often I find the things that hurt the most are the things that I'm insecure about, right? So, like, I know if I want to talk about something on the internet, I need to be hell sure of it. Because if people start poking holes, I'm literally like, oh, God, I'll crumble. Like, there I go. My backbone's just gone. So I imagine you have to be very sure of yourself, just because of the size of the audience. Yeah. Like, when there's that much noise, you have to be sure of who you are within that.

Yeah, 100%. But how do you generate that certainty? Or do you just kind of hope? I don't know. You know what? I just truly believe in what I do. Like I truly believe it. And that's what it comes down to.

But for me, I do also think like the noise is part of the reason why it's so big and it does so well and stuff like that. So I just have to take that on the chin and realize that's what comes with that. With the rise of like the sort of trend, I suppose like looking obviously your work and then. Bonnie Blue made a lot of headlines this year. And I am loathed to ask you how you feel about other creators because it's a really annoying thing that we do with women where it's like, oh, there's another woman in your industry. I'm going to ask how you feel about her.

Because it's actually, it's not hugely relevant. We don't need to talk about that at all. But it's more just as you're watching other creators come up and the industry change, it kind of does it feel competitive or gamified in any way where it's sort of like, and I imagine that makes it quite. fun in a way because the competitiveness is quite a good thing within an industry and if you've got the monopoly I imagine it's quite boring um but is that kind of an odd thing that you're shaping the industry

i don't know it's like you're running a race yeah you're kind of aware of that as it's happening yeah i think it's hard because i think in a lot of industries people in the media tends like pit to women against each other all the time like you just see it so much like you know whether it's the music industry or, you know, I don't know, actors or anything like that. But, you know, I do just try and, like, stay in my own race and stay true to myself and, like, just try and, like, reassess and talk to my friends, my family and, you know, really get to the bottom, like, what I want to do and what it is for me that I enjoy. So I try, I try not to, but I can, yeah, I, I, I resonate with that, that, you know, it can become quite, you know, not competitive, because at the end of the day,

there's enough users on the app for everyone and, you know, it's, it's, it shouldn't be like that at all. And like, I love the community of this work and the fact that they're like, I've made some my best friends through it and it's, it's so lovely that like you can talk to someone. They can really relate to what, what it is you're going through. And so I think that that's a really nice thing about it. It's just the community. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. I know, yeah. I know what you mean about the competitive. It's not the right word. I can't think of what the word I mean is. It's like you feel like you have to keep up. Keep up. Yeah.

I mean, but that's maybe just, I think that's the interesting thing about where sex, it's like the dichotomy where sex meets the internet. Because it's like it's, you've just got two races running. Or I don't know. It's like it just becomes sort of like another commodity in a way. It's like, well, you know, the internet kind of levels everything. And sex just gets part of that. And humans get part of that.

And we're all swept up in it all the time. So it's quite an interesting thing just to what to, to, goodness, where we go, do you know where we go, have you got any idea? Literally non. No. No.

But you just go on it. Non, yeah. I tell you guys I'm excited to do some like different, different things I haven't done before, like in social media. Like I'm trying to as well, like focus a little bit on more on my YouTube and like now I've seen the community

I've gained from like I do TikTok blogs and where I vlog my day and the community on there is just so, so lovely. Like I've had so many girls reach out and like, I recently went on holiday show. be through and like never before if I had so many girls come up to me and say such a lovely things and it's it's so nice to have that that I was just like I want to focus more on like maybe like YouTube or some you know maybe like gaining more like female audience just because like

that would be super fun what would you want to do with a female audience like do you want the community just like the is that it would there be any like I don't know like is it like an educational thing that you'd want to be part of or is it just like just be here for the vibes Honestly, it's just like a friend thing. I mean, I don't gain any money from my TikTok vlogs. It's not a monetary thing at all. It's just like a fun thing I enjoy doing. And like it's like a little like diary basically I have of all my day is. But there, I mean, there are definitely like different like revenue things I want to go down in the future. Like I'd love my own lingerie line. Like I'd love to do more TV. Like there's just so many stuff that like outside of just being a porn star that I would love to explore. Yeah. Do you have anything like? in the pipeline, have you got any more stunts planned? I don't have any more stunts planned for the time being. I don't know if like the numbers thing is like a little bit overdone now or like, I don't know.

I don't know if I've just, I just feel a bit bored with it. You know what I mean? Like there's only so many men you can book in a day. So maybe like just something a bit more like to go out my creative juices flow in. Like just something fun. Like a sex guy die. Yeah, exactly.

Exactly. Thinking about... That sounds logistically horrible. Every level I feel like. If I could have pictured like my pussy will not be dry out, honestly. Like slapping in the wind. Oh my God. Your worst day out.

Like if I could write Alex's worst day out. It would be like, so you've got to be naked. You've got to be sky tip. Yeah, like tips up here. You've got to be having sex and everyone's going to be filming it. It would be dribble. It would be dreadful. The thing that most people really want to hear about it, well, most people really want to ask you is if you're all right, because you do the weirdest stuff with your free time.

You've done 10 Iron Man's to date. Thankfully, you've retired now. And if you tell me otherwise you're out, I'm not hearing it. But you've done 10 Iron Man's countless half, cycled across America, across Europe, a bunch of times. You've gone to Everest Base Camp, Snowden, anything else, probably? Well, strictly speaking, I've started 10 Iron Man's, but I only finished nine. I had a back problem which meant I couldn't run. A bulging disc in her back.

And she still did the swim and the cycle and just decided to sit the marathon out. Actually, the annoying thing is by the time I'd finished the cycle, I was feeling so pumped that I couldn't believe I wasn't going to do the run. Unfortunately, I hadn't packed my trainers otherwise I'd have probably done it just because, you know, the adrenaline gets to you a bit. Can you tell it, for anyone who doesn't know, can you tell us exactly what an Iron Man entails? Yeah, so an Iron Man is, it's basically a long distance triathlon. The distances are 2.4 mile swim, open water, so that will be in a lake or sea or reservoir or whatever.

So 2.4 mile swim, 112 mile cycle ride, and then you run the marathon at the end. Which is 26.2 miles. It is 26.2 miles, yeah. Bloody hell. I just couldn't. Well, it's weird, actually. It's one of those things that you, if I said to you, I've done a half Iron Man and I give you half of those statistics, people go, oh, God, I couldn't do that. So there's at some point where somebody might think, oh, I could do that. But Iron Man is so extreme that, yeah, very few people go, oh, yeah, I'll give that a go.

You can't just give it a go. it's one of those things you do have to train for a bit. And you gave it a go for the first time. I think this is what makes, because Iron Man is really impressive. And Alex, my husband, does Iron Man, not to be confused with my co-host. I do not do Iron Man.

Iron Man? Iron Man. Iron men. Anyway, Boy Al does them. And it's impressive when he does them as a 30-year-old man. But it's like next level crazy, impressive that you did your first one age 50. And you did one a year basically for the next 10 years. Yeah. Which is bonkers. Most people don't start it in their 50s. And whenever I put anything about any of

your mad endeavours on my Instagram, the question that I always get is from women maybe a little bit older than are being advertised these events saying, yeah, but how? Like what made you, what possessed you aged 49 to be like? Well, if I can just answer that, I did. know what it was when I said yes. Okay. So I'd been fundraising for the charity Help for Heroes by doing a cycle event. And after having got fit to cycle, I thought, well, maybe I could do the London Marathon. You know, anything's possible.

So I started trying to train a bit for a marathon and had all sorts of problems with my ankles. I went to see a doctor who said, really, you've got this. odd condition. I can't remember what he said. But he said, you know, we could try surgery, but usually it occurs in people who are older and overweight, so I usually suggest they don't do anything. But really running is the worst thing you can do. He said, physio and stick to the bike, but no running. So I had to say to the charity, really sorry, I won't be running the London Marathon for you. And they completely understood. But then I had a contact from somebody else at the charity who maybe didn't understand what I'd just said,

who said, how about doing an Ironman for us or with us? And I was out in a dog walk at the time, and I thought, oh yeah, that's a good idea. I'll do that. It was only when I got home, I googled that the end part of the Iron Man is actually running a marathon. But then the guy who was coordinating the team rang me up and said, hey, I hear you're going to come and do an Iron Man with us.

And I said, oh, there's been a bit of a miscommunication, and I'm afraid I can't. And he said, why not? And I said, well, I got this problem with my ankles. And he said, ankles? You've got ankles? What are you worried about? Turns out two of the team didn't even have legs.

You know, they were wheelchair. They'd both lost legs in Afghanistan. So really, it didn't, you know, I had nothing to complain about. As you said, I've got ankles. What am I worried about? So with that can-do attitude, that's how I started it. It's stupidity, firstly, by not just. checking and then just shamed into it.

And then within those two years, basically at some point, my sister, who was also married Benaz, me and her lived together with our husbands. So we were in this flat, in this two-bedroom flat, me, my husband, and her and her husband. And I think it was at this point that we really saw, okay, both of our relationships are really abusive and this is not right. And we started really confining in each other and telling each other and hearing also because we were living in the same house, what was going on. And then my sister just started saying to my parents, she's leaving him, she doesn't want to be with him. But my parents were against it. They weren't supportive of that decision. But then one summer, in 2005, she just left. She went back

to my parents. And she said she's not going back. And at that point, she met somebody new. And once again, our community had found out that she was still married, but having, you know, dating somebody, which they really looked down on and saw that as a big, you know, shame on our family. And at this point, both her and the boyfriend, who was also Kurdish, started receiving a lot of backlash and threats, harassment, people following them. And so she started going to the police, reporting these, you know, these talking incidents and people following her, calling her, harassing her. but the police didn't really take it seriously.

And within about a few months in 2006, things really escalated. One day in January, she went missing. This was just after she turned 21. She went missing and I was still married at this point. Her boyfriend contacted the police and said she's missing. And they opened this huge investigation, missing person and realized, actually, we've got all these reports from her. She has been in genuine danger.

So let's start looking at the people that she's reported. And their investigation basically led them a few months to discover that my sister was in fact murdered by the same people that she was reporting to the police for leaving her marriage, basically. And in some, I guess, bitter, twisted way, that's actually what enabled me to get out of my marriage because after that happened,

I just knew there's no way I can stay in this marriage and I went against my family. It was really hard. I did everything I could. Just really put my foot down and said, I'm not going back to my husband. That is so brave. Yeah.

I mean, I think my sister, she gave me a lot of strength because just her even leaving her husband was really brave and then saying she wants to be with someone else. The community I come from, girls don't really make decisions like that themselves. They don't really, you know, stand up to the patriarchal norms that are kind of set out for them. And they're raised in a certain way and they live their lives in a certain way. They don't really have much say in these big decisions. So, you know, she was really brave.

And I think it makes me really sad that something like that had to happen for me to actually be able to get out of my marriage. But it's really thanks to her that I'm able to be here. today and not not lead a completely different life gosh i'm so sorry for what you've been through it's that's just awful with your sisters killers would they ever convicted were they found charged yeah they were actually yeah um so five people in total um were tried and sentenced to life imprisonment wow yeah was her husband among those he wasn't um even though personally uh i feel he contributed to the abuse that she was receiving because he was essentially forcing her to stay married, even though she didn't want to be married to him anymore.

He was never seen as someone that contributed to any of this. So he continued on with his life and lived happily ever after. Wow. Yeah. Who were the killers then? So actually my dad, my uncle, and three of the men from the Kurdish community are all in prison and were all found guilty of my sister's matter. Okay.

Yeah. And that is, it's an honour killing, am I right? Yes, yeah. So it's called an honour killing because really the foundation for why girls are punished in this way, most of the time girls, because it happens to men too. It doesn't really make sense because if you think about it, it's really a very dishonourable thing to do. But the intent is that by doing this kind of evil act, this really, you know, inhumane, violent act, they're saving the family honour. So it's done in the name of honour That's really the motivation behind this kind of crime

You know how sometimes we hear passion crime And you know, this is the motivation for it It's to save the family honour in some really strange way We need to have such a look at the language that we use I've never even thought about the passion Some of the headlines that you'll read In relation to violence against women Yeah

The language is really shocking Really shocking. Because it kind of removes also a bit of, I guess, responsibility because there's kind of accountability, very little accountability for the perpetrator. And there's almost a reason for why women have to die. Yeah, for the second, an inevitability that has had to happen. Yeah, because of this as opposed to. Yeah. Wow, I'm so sorry.

Thank you. Give us an insight into that in any way. Obviously, you know, you've not experienced it yourself, but as you have seen it in your patience and you understand the science. of gender dysphoria. You say that, but I still occasionally think, what? Yeah. You know, it still sometimes absolutely amazes me that anybody would do this. I have these moments.

I shouldn't say that really, should I. I all by patients, I'll think, oh, my God, he's terrible. No, I still get these moments when I'm thinking, what the hell am I actually doing here? Mm. But the, you see people change overnight. when I remember a patient who was almost mute when she came into hospital, quiet as a church mouse. And the day after the operation, I went to do my ward drowned and she was sitting on the edge of her bed holding court with about five or six other people.

You think, how did that all get suddenly unblocked? but just the presence of a penis and the lack of female genitalia was just stopping her doing. Yeah. So she became who she was supposed to be. As she saw it, yeah. And that's actually what matters, isn't it? Yeah.

If you've got something genuine in your head, I mean, I think the majority of trans people, if someone came up with a tablet that said that, you know, there's this trans woman in her 20s, life's pretty miserable. If someone came up with a tablet that said, actually, I'm very happy being a bloke now. They take it.

Yeah. They don't do this because they want to. No. In the end, they've got no option. They have to. You know, they come into hospital and I show them a really scary consent form. You know, this can happen, this can happen, this can happen. And they say, well, I've got to do it.

Yeah. I don't want to do it, but I know I have to. Yeah. They're driven. That makes gender dysphoria as serious a condition as anything. Well, yeah, I mean, it's somewhere in, it's not a mental illness. That's the thing people think of these, they're all mad. It's not really a mental illness.

The brain's just wired up differently. What is it classed as? It's moved, I think, the Americans, I think, have moved it into intersex. Okay. They've moved it out of mental disorders and into intersex. And I think that's probably where it belongs. You've got, I mean, you've got the sort of standard intersex

with a child that's born, you know, comes out and the midwife says, it's, hmm, not sure. Yeah. Yeah, that's. Which in itself can be, can be, that, they're in. interesting group actually. But this is a group where they come out and the midlife says it's a boy or it's a girl. But the brain isn't there. The brain doesn't agree. That's a very strong organ the brain. It'll override everything else. A hundred percent. If gender dysphoria is left untreated,

what do you see? Or if... We think from the studies that are done, unfortunately there's not that many of them, that if you don't offer any treatment or support for patients with gender dysphoria, about one in five commit suicide. Okay. That's a very high mortality rate. It is. That's as high as... It's the same as anorexia and ovosa if left untreated. Okay. If you allow the patient to starve themselves to death, they will. Okay. And we had a, we know we had a significant number of suicides during COVID because the whole thing just stopped. Okay. So the evidence is there.

Yeah. The debate, I suppose, is around appropriate management of this condition or appropriate treatment. To your mind, what is that? To start off with sessions with an appropriately trained person who can unpick the whole thing and to support them and to help them that way. And then you go on to physical treatments initially hormones. and then if still required surgery. The hormones done after puberty, taken after puberty, did they reverse, how do they work?

Well, they don't reverse anything that's happened. So if you are a trans man who's developed breasts, you're not going to shrink them. They're going to stay. You can't undevelop them. Hair growth, I mean, you don't start growing hair on your beard and all the rest of it. It alters the follicles. So that, I mean, you might find this surprising, but you've probably got the same number of hair follicles on your face as I have.

That is surprising. But they all produce tiny, fine, downy hair, but those hair follicles then change, to produce the coarser hair that gives me a beard if I don't shave. Okay. So taking hormones would shrink? It won't change the follicles back again. Okay.

Your voice breaks if you get testosterone, and it breaks for women, trans men, who take testosterone, their voice will also break. The changes in the shape of the larynx and the vocal folds aren't reversible. Okay. So what do they do? What can they? I mean, for a trans woman who has their hair follicles with thick hair,

does it stop the hair growth? No, hormones don't change yet. They need permanent hair removal, electrolysis. Laser. See, that's what I think people don't realize. When you said, you know, if they could take a pill to not have to do all of this, like that's what people are having. There's so much more to it even than...

I'm sure that the majority of my patients would rather have grown up without having to do any of this. Yeah. Because never mind the huge expanse of things you need to do, the cost that's associated. It's cost neutral. Can you explain the cost neutrality on this? I can't quote the paper, but I should be able to, but I have seen it.

Somebody did a study looking at trans patients undergoing surgery, and they move dramatically up the socioeconomic scale after they've had their operations. So they pay more tax. So they're paying for themselves? And they actually end up paying, as a group, they end up paying for their operations. Wow, okay. So actually, this is cost-neutral. I mean, you know, Rachel Reeves doesn't need to worry about the cost of doing this

because actually it pays for itself. Okay. She's going to get more income tax in. Yeah. So it's proven to actually be an investment. Yeah, I mean, it's a strange argument, but it's one that does stack up. Yeah. You have to stress that getting a photo of a woman looking bad in any kind of way was a huge

win for the paparazzi, which goes a long way to explaining how big that industry got. Here's Charles to explain. I mean, certainly in the British press, in our tabloids, photos of women were very, very often, you know, there would be photos of women depicted in unflattering ways. And they seemed really, you know, really popular. There'd be like women falling out of taxis or women showing their cellulite and things like this. Did you feel like you had to go out of your way to get photos like that because you knew that there was an appetite for that? No. The problem is I think people have a common misperception of what actually goes on. I mean, when you're taking the picture, you're just taking the picture and what happens, happens. It's usually up to the editors of the particular outlets, how those pictures end up getting spun. So, you know, when you take a picture, yeah, if you see an unflatery one, yeah, you might include it in the set because you know the appetite of, say, the British tabloids. So you know, okay, if I get somebody really glamorous looking bad, that's going to sell.

But you're not, at least from my standpoint, you're not actively seeking to get that shot. You know, I mean, sometimes one of the most popular shots that we used to take would be celebrities eating because, yeah, there's nothing more in flattering than, you know, shoveling food in your mouth. And having somebody shoot you. So those you would tend to take, be it man, woman, whatever. It's just, that was always a good shot. But, you know, the, for lack of a better phrase, you know, the Britney Spears upskirt shot and things like that. It's, those aren't things that I'm particularly setting out to get.

And if you get them and they sell, then you get them and they sell. That's actually really interesting. And I, that was a misconception I had as well. I thought that you, you set out to get, not you, but like the, you know, the paparazzi set out to get unfattering photos because they know that that is what they would sell. Some do, obviously, right? Because once you realize,

oh, I got that shot, it's sold. Okay, let me go out and get more of that. But that's not journalism to me, you know. And I think one of the core things you do want to get, and one of the core things that magazines and newspapers do want to see is that celebrities are just like us. So that's why some of it sells, right? So, i.e., you know, they get up in the morning

and they don't have makeup on and they go to the grocery store and they grab their Starbucks with their hair messed up. that's type of thing you know at a grocery shop and push their shopping cart just the same as everybody else in their slippers you know there's two types of photography paparazzi photographers there's the ones that come in it from a journalistic aspect

and you get what you get and there's the ones that are actively trying to create controversy and trying to get the shots and that's not the way I try to operate but you know people do but I imagine you witnessed a lot of that oh yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah I think there was a shot once of Britney Spears

getting out of her car, you know, exceedingly short skirt and a photographer caught it. And you could see that she had no underwear on. And then the next thing, you know, every photographer and their mother is trying to get, trying to get that shot. And I'm like, why? You know what I mean? One, it's rude. Two, it's unflattering.

And two, it's just, it's crass. I know. Why do we want to see it? And the thing is, it's like, the fact that anybody runs with that story anyway in the first place is even a bit bizarre. but especially when it comes to British tabloids, we're talking about a country where page three girls were a popular thing. So it's not outside of the realm of possibility that that's what they're focusing on.

Did you ever do things that you didn't really want to do or didn't necessarily feel ethical to you? But you kind of had to stay relevant, to make a living, to be in the world of the paparazzi? Well, it depends on what you consider unethical. I mean, I would argue that a lot of celebrities would argue that taking somebody's picture surreptitiously when they don't necessarily want it done would be unethical. Or taking a picture of a celebrity when you're not asking would be unethical. It depends.

You know, have I ever broken into somebody's house? No. Have I ever gone through somebody's trash? No. Have I long lens somebody, you know, from a hilltop? Yes. Yeah. Have I flown a drone over a celebrity?

wedding? Yes. Have I been in a helicopter over a celebrity wedding? Yes. Have I taken pictures of celebrities, you know, picking and dropping their kids off from school? Yes. Tend not to do that anymore. Yeah. Only because I'm older. I have a kid. I have a kid in private school. So private school in LA means sometimes your kid goes to school with high profile people. And you just try to, you just, There's no point in it. I see no, you know, story value in taking pictures of children. You know, if they're out with a celebrity, that's a different story. But, you know, if they're doing other things, it's kind of off movements.

It was very common for perhaps to hide in bushes and outside houses, taking photos on really long lenses. And it was always the pictures of women, normally in their bikinis, that sparked the most intrigue and therefore generated the most money. Even in 2011, do you remember those photos of Kate Middleton, Topless on her honeymoon were taken? She was on a private island at the time. She was Topless on a private island,

and photographs were released with her. I don't think it gets more invasive than that. But this actually leads us on to another subset of celebrity photography, which is getting photos of them in their swimwear, which was, unfortunately, the biggest are most profitable. Would you always get more for a woman who was in a bikini, who's wearing a bikini on the beach?

Always. Right. Always. Always, always, always, always, always, always, always, always, always, always, always, always. That's why there's photographers that just hang out on the beach in Hawaii, Miami, the Caribbean. A celebrity in a bikini? Yeah, gold. I mean, that makes sense, because it always makes headlines, right?

Yeah, exactly. Well, and also it's the fashion thing. It's the, you know, fetidization of women. Yeah. Because people are like, oh, look, she looks gorgeous or, you know, some. Unfortunately, it's, you know, it's to take down, you know, oh, you know, they're wearing a bikini and they don't look great. It's, it's, it's around that. Once again, it's around the sensationalism of that.

Was it bigger in the, in the noughties? like we need beach pictures and now it's there's less of an appetite for it or is it just as where people just as hungry? I think it's just the same. I don't think I don't think anything about that's changed. Yeah. Okay. Okay. I don't and I don't and I don't think it will. What role do you think that kind of photography and you know photograph, you know, photographs of women looking unflattering or less than flattering? What effect do you think that that had on women's body image in general. Oh, I think it would be awful.

I mean, here's the thing. I have a daughter. She's seven years old. The last thing I want is her growing up, you know, whether she's, you know, overweight or underweight or underweight, the skinny. The last thing I want is her being concerned about her body image based on some bullshit she's seen in a magazine. I mean, at the end of the day, you know,

you know, tabloid pictures and stuff, you know, it's bullshit, right? It's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's a lot more problems going on in the world than, than that. And I think the reason, um, you know, celebrity, celebrity photography and celebrity content is so interesting to people because, you know, sometimes it gives them an escape, you know, it's, it's, it's, that's what the entertainment value is from it. So so so and that's why you know, there are sections of tabloids and magazines where it's like celebs are just like us because people want to think what want to be able to escape from their mundane lives.

And I think it it is awful that you know, those things are capitalized upon. And yeah, photographers don't help it. You know, the picture, you know, a picture's worth a thousand words, right? So if you get, if you get the picture, there's, you know, 20,000 words that's going to be written about it. And it's not and it's not good. And I think, you know, I've had the benefit of being this a long time.

And like I said, once you get into the reality of the world, i.e. family, i.e. kids and things like that, you do realize, yeah, it's kind of awful. People like to blame the paparazzi. And I do think still at the end of the day, it's kind of the public's fault. Because if they weren't clicking on it, if they weren't buying it, if back in the days before the Internet was around, if circulation didn't go up, because Kim Kardashian, you know, it's supply and demand. You know, that's, you know, newspapers are there to simply give people what they want. I was on the cover for Cosmo. And that, as you know, was a very controversial magazine cover. And it was like one of, was supposed to be one of the best things to happen my career,

but was actually one of the most difficult. And I was left the other side of it, a different person, I think, yeah. People were just being cruel and it was like, it was, I think it was interesting to see, horrible to see how they were so quick to jump on it. Yeah. So quick to jump on it. Yeah. It was hard.

There were like a few girls involved in that but like no one was, no one was mentioned. It was just myself and Jessamine Stanley of the group. There was like, I think 12. I mean, I was on the actual cover. And there was also like a series inside and there was digital covers. so and there was so many incredible variations of people inside. The thing which was so frustrating for me was I think what was so hard was because I was really advocating to look at health as a spectrum and include mental health in it.

And in such a funny way because I didn't realize I was actually going through like really bad mental health and in the end like physical problems because of my health because of my mental health. I didn't think it was going to be as bad as it was. I think what was so hard was, first of all, being in lockdown, I couldn't go out. I couldn't really, like, talk, like, really see friends and, like, deal with what was going on. But, like, it wasn't just the usual, you know, horrible men on the internet, the right stuff. It was, like, GPs and nutritionists and doctors making YouTube videos, PTs.

You know, someone reformulated the cover of the Cosopoulata magazines with three skeleton dead people image it. Like, it was, like, images of, like, dead people. as a form of like how bad it was. And I just was like, I was just, I don't know, I think I really did lose a sense of myself. Like I think I, I think it broke me from everything else. I think it just finally to like put the pun into the bloody image that used, but like it was the nail on the coffin.

It just was so hard on my mental and physical wellbeing that I just was like, why am I doing this? Like, and it's saying silly because I think part of that, you know, I felt like I deserved it. because why did you, like, you know, the idea of like, if you put yourself out there, you deserve that. But I think there's so, that's, I think there's so much of that to unpick and like what we do and specifically what you do.

But I think that's like, it's such a, and you say, I mean, you use the word victim blaming. And if you think of like a traditional victim in the context of like that word, well, that's that phrase. And it came from rape and sexual assault and sexual harassment. And it's always that it puts the onus on the women. Yeah. And I think it was a very easy little.

step for people to take because the online space was dominated by women that when things started going wrong or when we started to be attacked or when you started to be hurt by it it was just it's such an easy thing it's something we already do to women all the time force them to take responsibility for things that are literally not their fault yeah by simply existing by being public by being anything you're blamed for it and that's in and of your in yourself to unlearned that is such a hard thing. I don't think people understand it. It was even hard because I remember that particular PT made that post.

And I also saw people that followed me like it, which was really, really painful. That's horrendous, yeah. Because I was just like, then it makes you feel like everyone doesn't see you the way you think they see you and that they secretly all think something else. And it was just so hard. But what was most of treating about it was that no one actually read the article.

Like obviously, I was invited on to Good Morning in Britain with Piers Morgan. I rejected every, every press opportunity I rejected. I couldn't, I couldn't do it. I mean, I was, I think, yeah, like, you'd think that you'd want to do that if you were, you'd be lucky enough to be chosen to be on a cover of a major magazine. I just couldn't bring myself to do it. I really struggled.

And I think it was, it felt like I was, like, in the room of everyone's tea. Like, everyone was home. I felt like I was in the room with, like, millions of people. And I actually started coming online and like feeling like 250,000 people were looking at me. It became like the problem I think really kind of span from there. I realized that, you know, I had to do something because I wasn't, I was worried for myself like really deeply. Like I was worried about what I was going to be. God, why?

Sorry, I'm so sorry. Don't say. I was worried about what was going to be left of me if I continued to allow myself to, um, absorb the things that people said about me and how people viewed me. And I think that is actually a problem for women on the internet in general. And it's a very hard thing to navigate. And I think, you know, I respect so many people for their bravery and like, but I think at some point, you have to know all your limits. And yeah, I think I'm, I'm really grateful. I'm not grateful that I had to deal with it, but I'm grateful that it gave me an opportunity to reflect on, you know,

how much I was just like so passively accepting it. And also how I think I, I also did get, I think to an extent addicted to reading the hateful comments. It actually became a form of self-harm. A hundred. I've been there. Yeah. I was, I, I, I, and like, you get to this point where you think, everybody hates me. Everybody hates me.

And I'm this. I, you know, you say the worst things about yourself. And I, like, remember telling Dan about it. And I just felt like I didn't deserve help. I didn't know where to even begin. I couldn't really, I felt even like I couldn't. like talk about it with like I remember having a phone call of my sister my sister's young she's 25 and like honestly she's so that generation they're like a better than last day yeah they are so

fucking boundaries and she was like so sweet to me and I think it was like I have to get past this because I am an adult and I cannot you know like let this rule me but it took some like serious inspection, I took some time offline and I had like chats it down and I was like I knew that you know people kept saying like if you it's not, if you don't like it then you should just come offline but I knew that this would this would follow me offline if I didn't deal with that it was gonna.

That I take a real issue when people say that because for a few reasons first of all I mean I get it in principle but it's like first of all it's really not an option in this day and age but also and it's not your responsibility to fix a systemic issue. But if we do as we always have, which is push women back and make victims be quiet and run away, then this continues. And it's like,

I genuinely think what you have done has been the most powerful response to this by such a way because you've so gracefully, like, reclaimed your power and just gone on to be happy. And it, there's, there is, you can feel it like even as a follower and I really believe this you can feel when somebody

wants validation and when they don't and it's not in it's in no or when they need validation and it's in no way knocking anybody that does need validation because of course we all need fucking validated because look at the world and look at what we've been taught our worth is and all of that but like when you see someone like make that switch on the self-love journey and really start validating themselves and believing that it's the coolest thing to watch Did you know the twins are twins? Oh no, so I didn't know. So got pregnant.

So Catherine would have been, I don't know, 15 months old. Got pregnant. Terribly sick and not just sick but exhausted. And I said, I'm sure I'm having twins. So I went to see my GP and I said, I've got a feeling I'm having twins. So she said, oh, we'll send you along for a scan. I think it was probably about 10 weeks then. went along, this radiographer did it, you know, he'd seen to me previous times, and he said,

oh, you know, did the scan, oh, perfectly normal. I can remember him saying, oh yeah, nine weeks size, perfectly normal, one baby, you know, your fourth baby, not a problem, away you go. Then I just got bigger and bigger and bigger and sicker and sicker and sicker. And my sister who was a midwife, I went to her and I said, do you know, I'm 13 weeks pregnant And I looked like, she said, let me have a little feel of you. She went, oh my God, you're a 20 week's eyes. She said, you beg her back to the doctor.

She said, it's either a multiple pregnancy or there's something wrong. Yeah. So I went to see my GP. She said, go back for another scan. And he was so offhand. He didn't even put a gown on me. He said, this is ridiculous. A woman with a fourth baby, you know, do, da-da-da.

And Dave had hold of Catherine while he was doing the scan. And I just remember him going over. and over and over. And I said, there is only one there, isn't there? He went, and he just put his two fingers up too. I said, I told you. I told you. I knew it.

I knew it. And I said, Dave, how are we going to cope? He said, don't worry, Norm. We'll talk about it later. Did you ever talk about it? I will never forget them coming home and telling me. Never forget. You excited?

No. Was I? Oh, flip. I was not excited. She ruined my life. She wanted to be an only child. No, no, okay. Look, I

found it difficult with Jen. I found it a little bit more difficult. I knew you put her in the washing machine, didn't you? I did a lot to Jen that I now regret. She did, I'm a awful lot. I'm still terribly sorry. And I found it even harder when Katten came along. And then suddenly I'm being told

that there is two more to add to the bunch. I just remember I went, I was sat on the sofa and I called her over. I said, Alex, I've got something to tell you. I was terrified of that. I don't remember it like that. And you went, yes, what?

She was, you know, she was proper, yeah. Yes, right, okay, what? You know, where all those horrible children? Ooh. And I said, Mommy's going to have another baby. You went, another baby? You've already got one. I went, well, actually, actually, it's not one.

It's two. And she just looked at me, she went, you're having two babies? I said, yeah. And she just marched out. That's still done. I think that went down well. And when I say it was like a comedy, everybody we told, howled with laughter. I can't believe you had twins.

And that they were both girls. Yeah. And I just remember we had this scan and she went, oh, look, there she is. And I knew they're identical. Oh my gosh. So I said, it's two more girls. It's two more girls. Two more girls.

Two more girls. I said, but she could have made a mistake. She might, you know, she might have made a mistake. You know, the imaging wasn't that great then. So I was really expected. I mean, like that, what are we going to call them? We've run out of names. Yeah.

What are we going to call them? Yeah, because I always think it's funny that Catherine's name is Alex's middle name. I know. Yeah. They're my two favourite names. Yeah, of course. If you didn't expect to have that many.

No. Did she have any idea of how many kids you wanted? Four. Well, we've got one extra. That's not too bad. Exactly, exactly. Wow. And then the twins were born.

Sorry twins, if you're listening, but they were horrible. They were horrors. They were fantastic baby babies. You know, they slept. They were wonderful. They were great feeders. No problem. But then they stopped.

They were hungry. We got thrown out the nursery. I used to, I put them in the nursery one day a week. So I could go and do my Tesco shop. Right. So we went, so, you know, and it lasted for about three weeks. weeks and then the lady called me in and she said look we have a problem she said you know there are so many babies in this room and your babies um they just need feeding all the time and they start to cry

and when they start crying they don't stop and they get all the other babies crying she said so we have to feed them first and then all the other babies is in there like that's starving so they try and give the babies the main meal and then the twins would be screaming because they wanted the pudding. So she said, I think you're best looking for someone to come to the house to look after them. But it was lovely meeting you and everything and good luck. Goodbye. So I remember just walking out with them. I said, Dave, we've been thrown out of the nursery. They told us not to come back. Oh, my God. It's not the first time the twins have, well, it was the first time the twins have been thrown out of something, but not the last.

No, they're oh, no, no, no, no. The twins, yeah. Piano, they try to do piano and then the piano teacher said that they were the worst students that she'd ever had and she threw them out the house. Yeah. Get out. Get out. Remember we're all the walk of shame? Because they wouldn't practice. And it's funny, you know, because, you know, with one, two, and possibly three,

you know, you'd do everything. You know, you'd go to wherever, you know, swimming, piano, you, tennis. We went everywhere. But by the time we came to the twins, they're all right. They don't need to. They don't need to. They don't need to. to be extraordinary.

I think like your family should have been a sitcom throughout you're growing up. You tell the story of me going shopping. Oh my goodness. So we were, you know, getting ready one morning and she had a little basket. I was upstairs in the bathroom, just got out the shower and I'm chatting away to her. How old was that? You were about 18, no, 18 months too. You know, she had this basket.

She had all a little bits and. bobs you know and she said i said okay when you go it can you get me some bread and six eggs and a pint of milk please she said okay thank you so i'm there you know drying myself off you know the next thing i had the door go i thought what what she'd open the door managed to open front door and she's out i went shopping and i'm running behind a towel around me you are such a people please i know one wanted to get eggs and bread i better go now i was like okay Mom. Alex, come back.

I didn't mean it. I didn't mean it. Where are the shops? There are no shops around. Oh my God. How was I going? There were no shops anywhere near. No, I know.

I know. Right. We really have to go. Yeah. I'm going to go get so drunk. I don't want to feel all my feelings anymore. I want to do it. drink. Let's get black out guys.

You'll see me like on the old's photos flashing my nickers to people on the platform at Waterloo Station later. I'm not going to say thank you again. No. Don't stop. I don't want to cry anymore. I just wish I could give like everyone a hug. Oh no. This is giving mean girls.

This is giving that middle school. Guys, I've lost it. I'm actually lost it. Rain it in now. I can go home. Shall we all go? She's pushed me past feeling sad. I'm just laughing at you.

Honestly, fair enough. Yeah, it's true. My own feelings inside. I wasn't crying. I'd laugh at myself. Oh, I can't acknowledge this severity. I can't acknowledge that we're not coming back. I can't do it.

Okay, this is, goodbye. This is see you later. I love you. We love you so much. Thank you for everything. And I really hope we see you again in this capacity. I'm embarrassed. at some in some capacity

on a microphone again I don't know these people have been listening like guys we didn't even really care that much they'd be like this is like way too intense like it was just a fucking podcast

Jesus Christ I listened to you but I had nothing else you just like won in a big roster my therapist ghosted me Jesus and then I listened to yours if I had time but okay

we're fine with you going like we're fine. Yeah, I just want to hug everyone. They're like, please stop hugging me, stop crying at me, just leave me alone. Okay, I need to go. I'm actually embarrassed for us. I'm emotionally drained. Whatever, whatever swag and coolness we had leaving on a seven mil down and see you later.

We've ruined it with this. This has been horribly ugly. This is horrible. Horrible. Let us end it. Let us go. Goodbye. I love you.

Don't be fired. Bye. Say. Jesus. Can I just remind everyone, this is a woman that got a woman that got her sister to write her wedding thank you card. There is no emotional regularity here at all. We are getting tears or we're getting goodbye.

It's because I can't regulate my emotions. It's always been a problem. And on that. Okay, on that, we love you guys. Thank you so much. Thank you for everything. We love you. We will miss you more than words can say.

Thank you.