Spinning Plates with Sophie Ellis-Bextor - Episode 138: Sara Pascoe

Episode Date: November 10, 2024

Sara Pascoe is a stand up comedian who I particularly love. She now has two little boys after a long period of trying for a baby, including IVF. She spoke honestly to me about how she can remember being in a liminal head space for a long time while trying for a baby, and acknowledges she was 'horribly spiky' about parenthood before she had her boys, realising now that it was self-protection and a coping mechanism.  She shared that she recently had a phone call from Robbie Williams who she idolised as a teenager, and how that made her feel like god, manifesting her teenage desires in her 40s!She also told me that if she was Prime Minister she would limit everyone to 2 hours screen time per day and that she reckoned we'd all secretly like her for it!Spinning Plates is presented by Sophie Ellis-Bextor, produced by Claire Jones and post-production by Richard Jones. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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Listen to Uncover Bad Results everywhere you get your podcasts. Acast helps creators launch, grow and monetize their podcasts everywhere. Acast.com. Hello, I'm Sophie Ellis-Bexta and welcome to Spinning Plates, the podcast where I speak to busy working women who also happen to be mothers about how they make it work. I'm a singer and I've released seven albums in between having my five sons aged 16 months to 16 years so I spin a few plates myself. Being a mother can be the most amazing thing but can also be hard to find time for yourself and your own ambitions. I want to be a bit nosy and see how other people balance everything. Welcome to Spinning Plates.

Greetings from Hunter Valley. I'm in a place that's about two hours from Sydney and apparently it's where Australian wine began its journey. It's the oldest region of Australian wines in Australia and my eyes have just seen a very beautiful looking actually trike I'm trying to describe it so it's like a three-wheeled obviously trike sorry silver motorbicy type thing but in a minute I'm gonna be getting on with Gary Barlow oh and I can see a carved kangaroo basically today I'm doing a gig I take that it's a beautiful kangaroo. Basically today I'm doing a gig, I'll take that. It's a beautiful gig,

because it's in the middle of a vineyard. Lucky flipping me. And during the day I'm filming with Gary for a show that he's doing all about wine. So we're going to be trying some Chardonnay today, which is actually completely okay by me. And it's very beautiful here and it's hot and it's sunny and there's a gorgeous tree here with purple flowers like lilac all over it.

Wow, that is stunning. So yeah, trike, carved kangaroo, lilac flowered tree, chardonnay, garibarlo gig. That's my day, guys. That's my day. How are you? It's been so cool this trip actually so not gonna lie I'm starting to feel a little bit homesickness creeping in mainly because I've still got another 10 11 days before I'm back but I've done over two weeks since I've seen the Smalls and we've been all over Australia I've been to Perth, Adelaide, Melbourne, Sydney, I go to Brisbane tomorrow. The shows have been great. The Take That crowds have been gorgeous.

I've managed to swim in Bondi. I had a lovely time in Melbourne which is such a great city. I went to see Confidence Man in Melbourne on Monday night, that was wicked. I went to see Coldplay there as well. Really good gigs. So you know, it has been a really quite jammy equation where there's been probably more play than work, which is, to be honest with you, a tour I like to be on. It's not going to feel quite the same for the next week. We're flying to America on Monday.

It's going to be very intense to have travel. Three flights, one of them's 13 hours to get there and then we've got three headline shows back to back. But there should be really good fun and I came here to sing so all good. Anyway, I hope it all is well with you. I got a lovely guest for you this week. I had a fantastic chat with Sarah Pascoe not long before I flew away to America and sorry to where'd I start Marrakesh and I got on with her so well. We had met before we did a book show together Sarah Cox's book show I think it's called Between the Covers so that's when I met Sarah and I really liked her and you know when you just think oh I would be very happy to be friends with that person she's smart interesting funny she

has written lots of books which are excellent and she's about to go on tour actually she's doing a UK tour and it has just been announced so if you're in the UK and you fancy checking that out go to her Instagram or type it into search or whatever and you'll find it but we had a a really interesting conversation. She'd kind of got to the point at 40 where she thought I'm not gonna have any kids. She really had wanted to and her partner had really tried very hard to have a baby. It wasn't happening. And then through IVF she's had two little boys and so I think she had them aged 42 and 43. They're still only little now I think. I didn't from it because I got it a little bit wrong they are two and just one

and talked about how life-changing is really but also and I know this is a conversation I had with Emma Barnett as well when you've had years of dealing with, you know, trouble and desire to conceive, you have built up your emotional palette to deal with what's happening to you. And then you suddenly find yourself with a foot in the camp of having become a parent, but you still remember so much of how it felt when you weren't in that camp and all the things that would upset you and all the ways that things could be framed to you that made you feel better or worse. So yeah, sort of a foot in both camps really.

So it was lovely to explore all of that and talk about Sarah's upbringing and how she's found raising her babies and how she's found going to work with kids. And Sarah was just, you know, very open, very honest, really interesting person. I just thought, yeah, we had a lovely conversation. So yes, I'll leave you with that while I'm off drinking Chardonnay with Gary Barlow. And I will speak to you on the other side. But thanks, Sarah, for joining me. And thanks to you on the other side. But thanks, as ever, for joining me,

and thanks to Sarah for sharing so much. Really. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Really nice to see you again, Sarah. Lovely to see you. How are you? Yeah, I'm really well, thank you. I had a terrible night with my two-year-old. I've been working away,

and he's started to get quite emotional about it, sort of, you know, understandably. But last night I was there, so he couldn't get upset about me not being there. So he decided he wanted a pink dummy. He just picked a color we don't have. Okay, great. To have absolute meltdowns about. I see.

It can be quite tricky when they start getting old enough to work out when you're there and when you're not there. Yeah. And it sounds like he's entering into the bit as well of being quite clever about how to elongate bedtimes and things like that. Yeah, and just to have all of the attention. And also you realise the emotion is real, but they don't have any of the communication skills to actually know, you know, I'm just unsettled. I'm not feeling great. I just want to keep reminding myself you're there. Yes. Instead it's like, no, I want a pink dummy. Great. Yeah. But you've also just had the celebration in your house because your little one is just turned one. Yeah, he's just one. And it's really strange,

but he's so cute. And with him, I'm a little bit sad about him leaving the baby stage now that he's sort of walking around like this little man. Is he walking already? Oh yeah, walking at 10 months, they both were. My husband's family are really sporty, and I think my children are athletic, unfortunately. LAUGHS I like that, the idea of they're walking quick

because they've got this, like, athleticism. Yeah, they're rehearsing for the Olympics, the walking Olympics, the climbing stairs Olympics, and I wanted readers. Yeah. Perfect. I know, this is what happens. You just get this little kernel of a person and there they are. And I suppose, I mean, looking at everything, does it kind of blow your mind how much can change within the space of like what, three or four years? Well, time has become a different thing. Before I had children, I guess there was sort of like monthly time in terms of like, you know, you have periods

and then however long a job lasted or looking forward to a job that might be 18 months away, tours are usually a year, Edinburgh was 12 months in time and now I feel like time, I don't trust it. It's sort of super fast while also not moving at all. And yeah, my entire life has turned inside out from before having children to now having them. I'm trying to navigate what existed before with what exists now. And that's a big thing. And that navigation continues for a long time, I think.

And then it changes because we're in, Theodore goes to nursery twice a week, but we are only a year and a half away from him starting school. And then Albie will start a year after that. And that's such a massive change for people, because then suddenly you don't see your kids from Monday to Friday. Yeah. In the daytime. We're so used to just all being in the house. Yeah, it's true. All that noise and busyness and activities and stuff.

And what might last 20 minutes and what might get us through to bath time. Yeah. But that is crazy as well to have two small people, two under three. It's a constant energy in house, isn't it? Yeah. It's a very specific energy and it's lovely, but it's quite intense. And I suppose through it, from the outside looking in, you haven't seemed to have really stopped being productive as well.

Writing books, doing what you do. Yeah, I changed how I was productive, but I also had a lot of panic. My friend's just had her first at 40, and I don't know if it's because it's late. It feels like you've worked so, so hard against all odds to get a measure of success or a career that you feel, that you want and that you enjoy, and then feeling it slip away, not through choice, but because you physically couldn't go somewhere or physically do a job. The panic, and watching my friend go through it it I feel so sorry for me three years ago And it's what everyone says to use her children's like it will come back. They will still be there you can do that in a year's time Why don't you just enjoy your pregnancy? Ha ha ha

Yeah, or enjoy your baby mmm, but then I do feel like It took me a little while to sort this out in my head I think but we put so much emphasis on that beginning bit and what kind of a parent you are at that bit and what kind of baby you have. But actually, that's just the very beginning of the story, isn't it? So it's okay to not really know. Yes, and also I think even if you're there a lot of the time to actually be present for it, you still go back and go, oh, I can't remember. I worked a lot less in the first year of Albie's life than I did in the first year of Theodore's life. I didn't write a book immediately, which is what I did with Theodore's book. So I thought, right, okay, if I'm at home and I can't go

out to gigs, then I'll write all the time. With Albie, I did it. I still can't remember it. It was still sort of like sleepwalking. Yeah. Definitely. Sleepwalking is a good term for it. But writing a book when you tell your family what what can you remember about that time? Being manic. Being manic. So Theodore, both of the both of my babies woke up a lot in the night and with Theodore he had that nipple confusion thing where I was pumping but he was drinking a lot of milk and so I was sitting up for hours in the night because I'd read and been told that you produce more milk at night and he was just such a hungry boy, like just guzzling it and that's why

he wouldn't breastfeed because my boobs were too slow for him. He was just so impatient and so I would be up all night reading and then I would write in the day sort of holding him And obviously not all day But and I do remember thinking like after 10 days. It's amazing I don't need to sleep and I didn't realize that I was sort of really manic Yes, I can really relate that feeling you think you think oh I'm actually this exception to that I can actually just do this

I've had two hours of broken sleep and look at me. I'm saying to exception to that. I can actually just do this. I've had two hours of broken sleep. Look at me. And saying to people with that voice. It actually just feels a bit like I'm on MDMA actually. Like I'm just so happy. I finally got everything I wanted and people's caution of thinking this will crash. And of course it did. But I enjoyed writing and I enjoyed it felt like rigging the system. I can have my child and be creative and my brain was existing somewhere completely differently sort of influenced by very much earlier point in my life. I was writing a book about a sort of 30-something woman who doesn't know what she wants who works in a pub

and it was and you know she's dating and things and that was quite nice to think about when I was wearing those big net pants that you wear after a C-section leaking. It was actually quite a nice escapism. Mm, well, because I was thinking that when I've looked over your work and the topics you cover, it feels like you've got a real self-awareness and also sort of like a perspective on your life. It's quite philosophical actually about all the strands and what's led you to being the

person you are and how you approach things, how you deal with things. And I think if you are lucky enough to have a creative job, that's a muscle you're able to flex quite a lot, isn't it? Yeah. And it's so, I feel like that can size me the difference between being OK and not OK, being able to have that catharsis of that space. Yes, the outlet and stand-up comedy as a job, especially the way that I do it, which is, you know, I talk about myself, being able, the big duvet, like,

that just sort of comes over your life, which is, I need to give 100%, I need to meet 100% of this small person's needs. They cannot meet a single one of them. I have to do it for them. Or you and your partner, if you've got a partner. I've got a husband, so we have to meet all their needs. Getting to escape after bedtime to do a standup gig. And people would say to me,

oh, is your baby's only five weeks old? Why aren't you here? And I would think, because this is the bit. But for 20 minutes, I remember who I am. And then I would go home feeling exhilarated. I'd go home feeling like I'd drunk a bottle of champagne because I'd had 20 minutes going, oh, there I am, there I am, there I am, when I'm not holding a baby.

And it was, it was such an escape valve. I don't know why, but that actually makes me feel really emotional, that idea. I think it's because, I think no matter what your path to parenthood, I can relate to that feeling of losing yourself and then having that bit that's really like, ah, I need this. But also knowing the backdrop of how those babies came to be. And being able to find that little bit of yourself, I think must have been really vital. Yeah. Because I've spoken to a few people who've had much wanted babies after a really long journey leading to that place.

And sometimes it can be tricky to know how to feel about yourself when you've actually the other side of that coin. Because the wanting a baby, I would imagine, a very very familiar place you're in like a brain going through the same loop of thinking all the time and suddenly you're not in you're in a different you've got a foot in another camp. Luckily when I think even before we did IVF so when we were just trying I don't say just trying we were trying very hard, but we were very focused. But someone said that it's often harder for people who have longed for children and go for a long journey

when it's really hard at the beginning because you think you're going to be really happy. And it feels like ingratitude and you're not prepared at all for suddenly going, oh God, have we made a terrible mistake? If you get pregnant by accident, then of course that's something that you think about a lot at the beginning, the pros and cons. Whereas if you're just thinking pros, pros, pros, pros, let's get there, then suddenly if you're not enjoying it six days in, where do you put that? We were forewarned about that and that was very useful. When we were in Edinburgh recently, my husband was at the Edinburgh Festival and I took my

kids to this soft play and it was a really wonderful soft play and they had like a Peppa Pig theme and they had a Peppa Pig car. This is going somewhere. So it's a car, you put a pound in and it moves and you're sitting. So the child is sitting with Daddy Pig, Mummy Pig, Pepper and George. And my son, I didn't have a pound. My son's been watching Pepper Pig. He talks about this car then for the next four days.

Red car, pound car, coins car, you know, Pepper George, and he kept telling me, Pepper George in the back, and he was so obsessed with this car. And so, you know, it's odd you don't have cash, but anyway, I went to a cash machine, went to Tesco's to a self-service, got the pound coins. He looked after them. When we had the time to go to the soft play, we went back, we put a pound in, it started moving.

He burst into tears. He just burst into tears, wanted to get off. And then he wanted to stand near it with it moving, but not be inside it. It was so overwhelming. And I thought, this is such a perfect analogy analogy because like getting what you want is very overwhelming and the more you want it and the more you build it up you have created it in your head and reality won't be the same. He didn't know what it felt like to be in the car with it moving and the minute it moved he was like this is not what I've imagined. And so that is what it's like if

you've longed for children. You're just trying to get across that line, that finishing line and you haven't thought anything about the life afterwards, so you are having to build it. The really, really amazing thing, I think the very positive thing isn't just that I had given up on having children. I honestly thought once I was past 40, that was my line of, okay, now I didn't have children. It's amazing that my mom calls me a medical miracle that I did have children in my 40s through IVF. But the other side of it is I loved my job so much

that it really, really made me reflect on, oh my God, I'm so lucky, because I'm a failed actor. I was trying to be an actor and I found standup and I stand up as my such, I will do it for free and I will, on no sleep I will leave my house and go across London to a pub

to speak to 30 people because I love it so much. And that's such a big pat on the back of like, oh, aren't I fortunate that I have a job that I love that much. Yeah, and also you've just found it. Yeah. And I do kind of believe that by and large people and creative things tend to find the career they're kind of after after a while, if you know what I mean?

I'd hope so, yeah. Because there's so many little decisions you have to make all the time. It ends up being quite bespoke. Yeah. That works for me, that doesn't work for me. Yeah, not that path, that will take me over there. Exactly.

Back to this one. I think my friends who are very talented but quite confused are the ones who've got too many paths. Like do I want to be a Hollywood movie star? Or do I want to have a live tour? It's very hard to have both. I know a couple of people have managed it but you do have to sort of put yourself back on the path of we say yes to that and no to that then. And so it sounds, I mean I've sort of already answered it really, but I think your relationship

with stand-up hasn't shifted massively? I still feel like I'm in a honeymoon period. That's so nice. Yeah, and I also think it's because the thing that's really addictive about creative work is when, I guess, the novelty. So I'm still sort of working my way up, really. There are people who get very, very successful

very quickly, and the rooms, once you're at a certain size, they don't get bigger. So I guess whatever the thrill you get the first time you play, I don't play the O2, but I imagine if you're someone who plays the O2, like Russell Howard or someone like that, the thrill you get the first time,

when the next time you're there or the next time you're there for five days, it's just the O2, you know, that's where you gig. Whereas for me, it's like, oh, it's a thousand seats at this tour, oh, we're doing some three thousand seats at this tour. And so the fact that it's growing is really addictive as well. Well, also momentum is such a good bed for later. Yeah.

To do that kind of thing, isn't it? Yeah, to want to be better. Yeah. And to feel like you're going in a direction. Yeah, to feel like the path is still unfolding. Yeah. and to feel like you're going in a direction. Yeah, to feel like the path is still unfolding. I do feel like, I don't know, being in your 40s, feeling like it's like an unexpected bonus.

I'm a bit older, I'm 45, and I feel like, oh, it's way better than I was expecting for that feeling. And it feels doubly lucky, because my husband's young, he's 36, and he's about to have this massive TV show come out. And we're talking a lot to him, and I'm probably lucky because my husband's young, right, he's 36, and he's about to have this massive TV show come out and we're talking a lot to him and I'm thinking, oh, it's so much nicer to have these things in your 40s. Because even though 30 years old, you know, it's established, you're an adult, you're still a baby in some ways, there's just a different energy about, I think there's a different enjoyment of those things in your 40s.

Maybe it's because you just have to go, yeah, yep, I don't have collagen in my skin anymore. You just have to go, yeah, I'm this person. Yeah, kind of fearlessness that kind of comes with that. Yeah, a bit more resilience. So with your tour, are you sort of, I mean, is this you by yourself? So I will be touring with my band, and when I have taken, when I had had my last baby who's now five, I did take

him with me for a tour on the tour bus which was lovely. But I can't really do that practically and I find my head gets very split if I try and do too, I can bring them to some shows but it will be time away. Which is a mixed thing for me. I like the, I mean it's a real indulgence to have a bit of space, a bit of head space. But when I go away for chunks of time, I do find that tricky. I suppose you wouldn't have had to do that yet. I think it's really an unwinnable choice

because either you go, which means that you're lonely, you miss them, and there's a part of your heart going, is this selfish? Mm. Or... And then you're putting maybe much more pressure on the partner that stays at home, who then, you know, they just have to... They have to do much more and be much more supportive. And then you have the flip side where you take them with you,

and then what I find is I'm not really at all in... I hate working in that mode because I think I'm not... There sort of does need to be a selfish click that goes off when you're on stage where it's about what's happening right in front of you and you don't have that if there's, you know, your baby's gone down late for their nap and you're thinking, did they wake up again? Yeah. And I just need... Yeah. All of those things. Yeah. But you did have a time, didn't you, where your partner was working away for quite a

while? Yeah, in Australia, yeah. So he went to film a show that's about to come out now. So it's a really odd cycle because he auditioned for the show the day after our first son was born and then had to go away to Australia. We'd done IVF, obviously. I hadn't known, you know, don't know if it's going to work. And we were so lucky with it.

I was then pregnant with my second son. My first son was 10 months old and started walking, which is when the trouble really started. And I was sort of waddling around after him, and my husband went away for two and a half months. And yeah, I really, really struggled, really, really struggled. And actually, the baby was so sad without his dad.

If one of your primary carers just disappears from your life and he then was just so, so clingy and so sad. And yeah, it was really hard. And I say that as someone who knows how lucky I am. These aren't major problems in terms of, it's just, it's the, it's just. These aren't major problems in terms of, it's just... Well, I think it's good to talk about that, because I think sometimes having those moments of absence,

especially when you have jobs where it's now or never kind of thing with these opportunities, isn't it? I think at the time, you feel like you are the only person in that situation and everybody else has got a much more regular thing or they just got their shit together a bit better or whatever. So I think hearing about it, I find it reassuring. Yeah. Yeah. I think a lot about women who do nine to five jobs or nine to six or even longer hours because, and I know it's not just women, I guess it's just because I'm a woman that I think about women. I know men also have to work and leave their families,

but I struggle so much with really flexible hours. And the fact that my job gives me an income where I do have choices. I can afford childcare. I can afford a nursery, even though it's galling how expensive it is. But I think a lot about women who have to go back to work when the economics of it dictate that, and they don't get a choice about when they see their children. So actually now I'm in a position of such privilege,

yet I really struggle. And my partner and I are really struggling with the time because we're cannibalizing it. I'm doing a job at the moment in Leeds, which means I go back and forth to Leeds, which means that he can't really work. And then his work is quite often in Australia because he's Australian.

And when he does that, I can't look at the same time. Why do you have to pick someone who lives with his family so far away? I know, I know. Australia. I think his family are more furious because he came to England and I've sort of stolen him and the grandchildren, yeah. That is tricky. It is tricky, yeah.

It could have been further away. Yeah, so far. It's stupid. Except the kids even, they've been, you've done that? Oh yes, we took Theodore there a couple of times. But now that there's two, I just, I actually can't face the plane. We're supposed to be going for Christmas and we haven't booked it and I'm kind of hoping he forgets. My husband, he's got ADHD, so it could just fall off the list.

But I'm thinking about the two of you, when you get to 40 and you've got this invisible line of like, right, that's that. Yeah. you and you get to 40 and you've got this invisible line of like, right, that's that. Yeah. So how does it feel to then embark on something like IVF when you've kind of made that decision? I can't quite imagine how that must felt. It feels like two things. It feels like working really hard towards something. So with IVF, you know, because usually they'd have told you why you can't conceive or you'll have some idea. And so IVF is an absolute gamble. And there's some numbers, you know, you get people really, really research that kind of thing.

So you'll have read lots of stuff online. You'll know your chances are there. So if you do three rounds, it's this or you know things about, you know, amounts of eggs you might get or. But what it felt like to me and how my husband was the person who was really keen to try, because I sort of said I'm done, and he said can we now just try this next? Can we try even harder? And I thought there's two ways to look back. And his argument, which was correct I think for us, was if it doesn't work,

then we get to look back and go, we really did try everything. We won't get to 45 and and go, we really did try everything. We won't get to 45 and then go, oh hang on, should we have tried a little bit harder? I think he was worried about a space, a sadness in our life later on, whereas I was very convinced that we could adopt and foster and have a life. I desperately wanted to be generative, help other people, be part of my community, society. I wanted to have a stage of my life now which was less focused on myself because it has been so focused on me.

And I felt I could fit it with those things. I love my dog so much and I didn't give birth to him. And he doesn't look like me and he's nothing like me. And I was so convinced that love just you know it just grows and I was really and I think we still would like to adopt later on. It's really important to me. And I think also we'd like to have more children actually I know you've got five. Yeah and I totally agree with that love. I totally agree with that love, Grace. I totally agree with that. And there's so many ways to have a family.

And if I really scour my brain, I can only think of maybe one friend that's got what I would call the sort of traditional storybook version of what I was shown when I was little. And then no one else has actually. So I think there's so many ways to be involved in raising small people, if that's something you want to do. And also, I also, having been by side, having been an auntie first, although I don't live very near my sisters,

they both had children before I had children, even though they're much younger than me. I do think that some people need to not have children so they can help with the children. And I believe that before I had them is that we do need some people who are available to. Yeah, the village. Yeah, the village to be the extra ones.

And they are just so vitally important. And those relationships and the fact that children will want to talk to those people, not to their parents about certain things. And we need other adults in our lives, I think. Yes, definitely. That's the way society works. I was actually explaining, not the same thing, but I was talking to my eight year old this morning, because he was saying, I want some of the kids in his class are quite shy, and he wants to invite them over because you feel sad about this. And I was trying to explain, well, actually having like, you need all types of

people in society to form it. So whilst you might feel more confident and you like what you thought was important, if someone's introverted but actually quite happy, they might be actually okay in that space. They don't feel you have to always fix things to what your version of okay looks like. I suppose it's the same thing of looking across the board and you can project your desires on other people. But actually... Well, that's what happens a lot to women who choose not to have children, is the next question is all, and then what's wrong with you, rather than how amazing you know what you want.

I've got lots of girlfriends. And some of them are some of the most maternal people I know don't have their own children. And some of the most people I've seen not be that maternal are mothers. The two are not always hand in hand. And you can nurture and be supportive and be loving and all of those things without it being a sad story or I really hope that we're sort of getting better as a society not to instantly go, oh Jennifer Aniston hasn't had kids, she must be this, that and the other. Yeah, it's tedious. It's really reductive, yeah it is tedious. It's so reductive. I think we have got a bit better about it, but maybe, I don't know, I suppose conversations like this still go away to go about how it's okay not to be defined by that choice.

Either way, actually. I think it is getting better. The other day, what was I reading? I was reading David Nicholls' new book, which I don't know if you've read. It's lovely, it's really fun, it's really charming, and the central character is probably, I'm trying to remember, early 40s, doesn't have children, it just doesn't come up in the book and it's like, it's so, you go, we are getting better. Someone's able to talk about a woman's life and her dating and her needs and her wants and her loneliness without also having to go, but the reader

will be wondering, how does she feel about having children? It's like, you know, that's one of the things that's interesting about people but it shouldn't be the repetitive thing. That's true. We get it. Life gets busy. Luckily with Peloton Tread, you can still get the challenging workouts you crave. Only have 10 minutes? Take a quick Peloton workout. Want to go all out? Chase down your goals with 20 to 45 minute tread

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Acast.com. But when you're someone that is trying to have a baby, there's that whole sub-code. I think that you can hold on to, you mentioned about researching before, Ivif, but I think there's so much you can do now on the internet and apps that can become so obsessive about yourself. Would people have known that you had all that in you? Because I feel like there's been times in my life where that's been me as well, checking things. There can be a whole world going on in your head

of tracking yourself, thinking about things. I had to think even the normal half month, even if you just have sex, right? Even if you just have sex without a condom, you spend half of the month thinking you might be pregnant, which means you are in this like, what do they call it? Liminal space, you're in a liminal space where you're both yes and no, and you don't know,

and you're two things existing at once. The headspace of that for the years while we were trying made me furious. The headspace that it took up, and it was more for me than my husband, but the emotional thing. And then feeling due on feels a lot like being pregnant. And I was like, nature, you're so out of order for doing this to me. It's like, bit queasy, bit moody. I'm clumsy. What does clumsy mean? I could be in the early pregnancy or I could

be about to have my period. It's the same hormones and it's so frustrating. So what would people have known? I, when we actually did IVF, I had, it was, it was the end of those COVID lockdowns periods and so I had some privacy there, but in public and, and because my job is public, I mean, literally as in sort of talking about it, I was so defensive. I was so didn't want to be thought of as sad, because what I was going through was quite sad.

I was horribly spiky, doing stand-up about not wanting kids, doing stand-up about... What was this? Routines about how... You couldn't plan the children that you were going to have. I remember being spiky, and there's this horrible memory I've got because one of my friends wrote a book called The Hangover Games and it's so, it was about how she got pregnant. Was that Sophie?

Yes, yes, Sophie. And it's such a funny, brilliant book. And then they asked me for a quote, like the publishers, and the quote I gave is on the back of the book. And this is, it screams to me, you know, a 39 year old infertile woman. And I said, this is my quote, Sophie, I'm sorry, it said, this is the first book about motherhood that doesn't bore me. And that is someone who's so defensive because the reason I was

bored, I didn't, I avoided things about motherhood because I felt like I was being, there was a club I wasn't allowed to be part of and I didn't want to be seen looking through the window and that to be quite sad. So I did the opposite of like, ugh, aprons, aprons, and breastfeeding, God, boring, and that spiky defensiveness, which I now sort of feel a bit, I just couldn't be vulnerable about it. That makes total sense.

Yeah. You're just protecting yourself. Yeah. And also there's all these, we have, socially... we have... socially we have small talk that is perfectly acceptable that's actually about really big stuff that a lot of people don't want to talk about. Yeah, yeah. And that you expected socially to have a quick answer to.

Absolutely. Like a quick neat answer, rather than like, oh I always just think, I could be having a miscarriage right now How dare you ask exactly and I think about all of it I think about the you're gonna have a second I think about it and then when you have a second the fact that people still ask is this the last one you go You were asking something so huge so huge my husband and I would have to sit down and talk about this Yeah, and I just met you exactly. Yeah, I've just met you and if you want me to answer that honestly, like trust me, you actually don't. Yeah, I'm going to have a bit of a cry.

Searching for the words. Exactly. Yeah. Now that's so true. And I think that's something that maybe people are a bit better about understanding the sort of what can be going on on the inside. But that instinct to protect yourself and to brush it off so it's not awkward for you, not awkward for them, It just moves on.

Yeah, and also I just felt really insistent that if I didn't have children, that wasn't going to make my life any sadder because my life is really varied and enriching and hugely pleasurable in that I enjoy reading in the bath. And so which means that I was really happy. And I think that was my defensiveness. Just because me and my husband

can't have a family in this way, that doesn't mean that my life will be any sadder. That's what I thought. Well, I agree, that is true. I do believe that's true. And I think whenever you, it's like your boy with the pepper pig car, when you want something,

you have an idea of what it is in your head. Yeah. And then that's all an idea but the reality might be something vastly different to that, that changes everything and it's all unknown. So that is all true. Yeah, it is all true. Yeah. And I mean, I guess if someone spent a lot of time around children, they might have an idea of what it's like, but we didn't have any idea. Even then it's only their experience of it.

From the external. It's the whole idea of the projection that you put around other people's lives as well, of joining the dots and go, well that must be wonderful for them. But you never, it's only one person's experience of it really. But it is complicated because it's such a big instinct when it's there and it takes over your brain cells. And I know that you, I've heard about you talk about how difficult it was when you actually were pregnant to just be in that and not be constantly worrying about what would happen.

Yeah, the anxiety. Yeah, I really, when I know people who are pregnant now, that's all I want for them. I just wish, because it is a very transient sort of part of your life, and to be able to be just curious about it and take it for granted, that's what I want for people, that's safety. And unfortunately, if you've lost a pregnancy, or maybe some people can, I just, it was awful,

because I kept thinking. And I've had a friend who's just recently had a baby and he went through what I went through, which is until you're holding them, death is everywhere, their death is everywhere and living another life in your imagination, which is the one where they die. Da da da da.

But luckily actually, since they've been born, I think about it a lot less. I was then worried I was going to spend the rest of my life thinking about death. I did think a lot about it when Theodore was a small baby. But actually I now feel like I take it for granted. Which I think is good, you have to survive don't you? You have to... I think your brain is quite good at not being able to obsess if you think about one thing

forever. It does come to a point where it just maxes out. But your experience of being a new mum must be so different. So am I right, your mum had you when she was only a teenager? Yeah, she was 19 and so young. She hadn't lived at home since she was 14, so she was without, I'd say, a good support network. She her example, she hadn't had a good home life, so she didn't have a good example of mothering. So it's so different.

I had another lifetime, like, you know, another 20 years on her before I had children. So it's so the other end. Mm, crazy, isn't it? It's so crazy. And all of the things, I miss all the things I used to be able to do because I did them. My mum missed them because she never got an opportunity to do them until we were grown up or never.

You know, there were lots and lots of things my mum never had the choice of doing because she had, and then she had, because she had my sister 18 months after me, so she had then three of us at 25 as a single mother. So I'm so fortunate actually and I got pregnant at 16 when I was at college and I absolutely knew I didn't want to have a child then, but a lot of that was because I'd seen what had happened to my mum. My mum was offering to look after this child for me. Really? Yeah, oh she'd have loved it. My mum loves babies. Actually my mum would have loved it as well.

Yeah, and I think maybe there's something romantic about, okay now you go off to university and I'll be this young nana. Wow. That would have flipped everything, wouldn't it? If that person was here. Well that's what happens if you have a termination, which I did, you have this ghost you have this ghost who's, and you's going, oh my God, I remember when it would have been, when I was 36 going, oh wow, I'd have a nearly 20-year-old now. Because also I had the termination on my birthday, so they get old, on my 17th birthday, so they get older with me.

You've got a proper anniversary. Yeah, proper anniversary. And you go, and so now, gosh. Did you have good support at that time? I think I was absolutely adamant that that's what I wanted to do. So I didn't have like, you know, that the TV version where someone's

in floods and floods of tears. And I mean, it wasn't necessarily an easy experience, but it was, and it was a very simple decision. I wanted to be famous when I was 16. And I absolutely didn't think that, and I'd just seen what my mum had had to sacrifice. And a 16-year-old me was like, ah, not sacrificing anything.

No, and I think you have to have... You have to remember that the person you were... The instinct you had then, you were the same kernel of you. So you made the decision that was completely the right one for yourself. Yeah. And actually when I was infertile, you know, going through that process of infertility, I questioned a lot, was I right, if that was my chance to be a mum? And the answer was always, yes, that was the right decision. It wasn't like, oh God, I've made a wrong choice here. Well, that is really good because I think it can haunt people a bit.

Absolutely. And I think living with that kind of emotion, you just have to find a way to be at peace with it because you can't tie that into a book anyway. It is what happened. And I think that's people who don't make the choice for them but make the choice because they have restricted options. That's a very good point. That's the one where it's sad when you think, you know, they think, I can't do this or

we can't afford another one or this or that. That is heartbreaking. Absolutely. Or just feel like someone's pressuring them into, you know, they think, I can't do this or we can't afford another one or this or that. That is heartbreaking. Absolutely. Or just feel like someone's pressuring them into, yeah, this isn't going to work. Yeah. Just to move it slightly to under. I've always got a bit of a fascination with stand-up because I think, hear me out, I think there's a small part of me that thinks that could have been my life. Yes, yes, yes.

If I can make people laugh, it makes me feel absolutely brilliant. It's a wonderful feeling. When you're on stage, you must sort of tell stories. Well, it's become part of it. It used to be that I used to talk hardly at all. I was very shy. Now there's like whole, I started to find myself walking up and down. Yeah. I can get a bit into that. It's a nice feeling, isn't it? I love it. Yeah.

It feels great. And so I feel like I've always got this feeling when I watch people do stand up that I have to have a joke prepared in case I accidentally catch eyes with a comic in quantum leap and then I have to finish their routine. Oh, Sophie, I'm obsessed with this. Don't, because when I'm in the moment, I can never remember what joke I should tell. I haven't got the material ready, but in my mind, it's a real possibility. Yes, but I feel like we could do a game show where I show you the first halves of routines

and you have to finish them. Yes. There used to be this thing called setlist, which you would have loved, and I wish it still existed because you could do it, where you went on stage with a microphone, you said hello and then on the screen behind you, a prompt would come up and you would have loved and I wish it still existed because you could do it where you went on stage with a microphone you said hello and then on the screen behind you a sort of a prompt would come up and you would have to start doing stand-up so it might say dogs are better than cats and then you would start going so I was in the park the other day and you start it was great

and so the audience loved it because obviously the audience can see what you see yeah and you would have to pretend it's your material and it would come through and then you and then it would your material. And it would come through. And then it would say, so after five, it would then go, my big closer. And it would be something like Nazi aliens. And you would just have to do it. But we could do that. But it would be other people's jokes.

It would be like, Michael McIntyre's Mandrake. And then you'd have to finish it off. But then I feel like if I've had a slight miscalling with comedy, which my family might disagree with, you know, do you feel you had a similar thing with singing? Because wasn't that why you... Yeah, well, this is so... I want to go back to stand-up first and then I will answer that question because I'm going down a Robbie Williams wormhole at the moment. And so...

What does that look like? I just listened to him on a podcast. The truth is he rang me this week and I have always been a fan of him since I was 14. And it's very, very weird for the person you loved as a teenager to ring you in your 40s. Do you know why he rang me? I don't. To tell me that he listened to me on a podcast and he thought the male comedian was a bit mean to me. Literally defending me and being nice and inviting me to his film premiere. Like I honestly thought I was...

This is like beamed out of the... 14 year old me manifested it and then it happened. My friend Katie, my best friend, because she was like, I can't believe it, she went, how do you feel? I feel like I'm God. I feel like I wished a thing. That's amazing. So what kind of thing? Kindness. Because I've spoken about him before, being being a fan of him and a fan take that anyway I digress so I'm now going back to Robbie Williams Wormhole I think this is kind of amazing because I'm listening to him thinking yeah he could have been a comic he has a comic personality as in he's really insecure he hates criticism

and he needs to be seen and understood it's so frustrating so that's that's that's why comedians comedians not. Some of them are very good actors, but it's because they want their self to be seen. And I thought pop star or musical performer is such an interesting between the two, because you, Robbie Williams, these people, you're amazing performers. You're on stage and something electric happens

that not everyone can do and that you can't take your eyes off, and the charisma and the electricity of it. But yeah, the chat between songs, it's you, you want to be there. You have the liveness of it. You don't want anyone thinking I could have put on that CD. You talk to show this is happening right now. You are in the room with me. Totally in the moment.

And it's also a bit of chemistry with the crowd. They create it and then you reflect it back at them. And you always, the reason you say that, tell them they're an amazing audience. And people think, oh, they say that every night. You know, you're going, you made this. I was yawning 10 minutes ago. My body was like, oh God, what will happen? It's a conductive two way street.

They give it to you and you suddenly go, I'm better than I was a second ago. With comedy, the funnier they think you are, the funnier you are. It's so hard to be funny when no one thinks you're funny. Yeah, that would be really tricky. You come out there, and then, and you can't sort of combust it by yourself. It's always stand up. It's a double act, right?

So true, the energy just gets bigger and bigger, doesn't it? Yeah, bigger, bigger, bigger. And then you're in on the joke together. Yes, and then something crazy happens that wasn't supposed to happen. And all of us are like, oh my God, that we were here for this. Yes. So you are a comedian, I guess is what I'm trying to say. There's an element of it, of a first person former.

For me, the singing, I find singing too vulnerable. Even karaoke, which I very rarely do, and I can't remember the last time I did, actually I can remember, it was with Tim Vine, who loves karaoke, and it's in Melbourne, so this is talking eight years ago, the last time I did karaoke. I get too nervous. I get too nervous about being good. My knee starts to go, go and flooded with too much adrenaline and my throat sort of closes all of the things

that would sound lovely in your own bathroom. Oh my God. And I choose over ambitious songs. You have to say the key with karaoke is to pick a crowd, please, so that other people sing along. Yeah, which I would never do. I would sing Don't Rain on my Parade. But I would sing something where I know

it's incredibly difficult. And I've just, I did, I've done a couple of things singing. I actually did, I did stand up about it because it was such a horrific experience. Because again, it felt like I'd manifested it from teenage me. But there was a show called All Together Now, which had a hundred people, a hundred judges on BBC and Jerry Halliwell from the Spice Girls was the central, like the celebrity judge. Okay.

I think I vaguely remember that. And they did a celebrity one at Christmas and when I got the call my agent said, don't do it. Because she basically she said, you know, it's all reality TV people. Gemma Collins was doing it and someone from Love Island and a sports player and she used like the term low rent. And I had to say to her- You didn't hear that, you just heard?

No, I said to her to her... You didn't hear that, you just heard? No, I said to her, this is my dream. When I was 14, I auditioned for Barrymore's My Kind of People in a shopping centre, forgot the words of my song, regretted it forever, this is my do-over. I can get that to be a bit right this time. All I want to do, I said, you know, I won't forget my words, I get to sing on TV to a fucking Spice Girl. Like you know, and that was 14 to 40, All of it felt really like this is the magic.

This is the full cycle, the end of the narrative. Duh duh duh duh. Roll credits afterwards. And then of course what happened was that my throat closed. And I sang a song that they chose, because they choose the song, they don't know. I wanted to sing Anastasia, I'm out of love. And they wanted me to just, oh God.

It was a song that starts off really, really simple and becomes powerful at the end. God, why can't I remember it? My heart will go on. Not quite that. Do you know what's awful is my mind has obviously blanked it out. That's probably true. Because occasionally I'll hear it on the radio and go, oh this song. Anyway, and then I got that Jerry Halliwell just ripped me a new one. Like, oh she called me pitchy. She was using like proper, then they said to us, you know, in inverted commas, it's the celebrity special, it's not going to be, they're not going to judge

it like the show. It'll be lovely. That is not what happened. No one's, because how you get points on that show is people stand up and dance and no one stood up and danced. So I knew I'd done really badly. Oh I'm so sorry. And I was trying not to cry. Well, so TV's TV. It's got its own agenda. Of course. It'll be nothing to do with your singing. Yeah. Oh, no, I think I did, you know, it just was bad singing.

But the problem was that hurt me too much. If you said, Sarah, I did a gig on TV and it wasn't very funny, I'd go, well, I'm just trying to be better. You know, I have this little yoga mantra of like, you know, nothing to prove, everything to share. And that's my job, you know, nothing to prove, everything to share. And that's my job, you know. I packed my sandwiches, you didn't enjoy them. Sorry, that's how I feel about comedy. I did my best, I can't force you. Singing feels like I've got no skin on. Well also you haven't, like that's very raw, like big, big, people when they sing normally

they've gone through loads of other gigs and been crap and been you know. And that's how I feel if you did stand up on TV and then they were horrible to me. You'd go, well they shouldn't have been there. Exactly. My mum did a singing competition thing once on television. It was called Just the Two of Us where people were partnered with professional singers and my mum was partnered with, what's his name, Alexander O'Neil. He did Arlea, where about do? Oh yes, oh wow. They got through the first round and then they did another round and then she got knocked out and there was a guy from the police, Stuart Copeland I think, very mean to him, I hate

that was not cool. I was sat in, it was a live thing, I think I was the most nervous I've ever been in my life because I couldn't funnel it anywhere. If I get nervous for my own show, I've ever been in my life because I couldn't funnel it anywhere. If I get nervous for my own show, I can use it in what I do. This was just like my mom. And she sang a Maroon 5 song that one, you know, this love has taken... So all I could hear before they went live was her just going,

I was so high, I couldn't... I was so high, like practicing the first line over and over. Like, we're practicing the first line over and over. Oh, if that comes on the radio. Oh, yeah. That was tough. That's very hard. I think the moral is don't do singing competitions. I'm telling you. Well, competitions of anything creative is idiotic.

I mean, the creativity isn't competitive. We're not in the Olympics. So true. We're not racing each other. We're making things and trying to make each other feel better. Music is supposed to be fun. But I think singing in general, I mean one day I do sometimes fantasize, or maybe, or maybe I'll just,

actually having the children, I'm thinking maybe I'll start learning piano, you know, because my kids have music lessons, but maybe I'll do it first. Wouldn't it be lovely to have something? So my mind is open to it, but also because my dad is a musician. Yeah, I was going to ask you about that. I think how it rebelled so much from it. Yeah, that's interesting because I was hearing you talk about how your relationship with jazz is... Oh, God, yeah. And I was thinking...

I haven't spoken to many people who are the offspring of someone who does a similar thing to me and your dad must have been touring and doing what he did. Well, my dad didn't want to be famous, so my dad's quite unique in that. So when he was 17 and he was in a pop band and they did a couple of things on TV and then he quit, he didn't want it. They went to Japan. He hated fans and being screamed at. And I think being told people loved him

and they didn't know him actually made him feel mentally distraught. Didn't work. Yeah. And so then he spent all of his life, or is spending his life, getting amazing at something with almost like in outsider art, I think, with no awareness of audience. It's not for other people. The recent thing that he's made

is like a 24-hour musical version of Ulysses. Like, that's what my dad's doing. Like all musicians, for money, he plays weddings and he can do Van Morrison and the sax solo from Baker Street, but but he does jazz improvisation. Oh, that's...

Sounds like bees. That's what I say. Sounds like bees, dad. Have you listened to the 24-hour? No, but I will do. I don't actually, I mean it's on CD. I don't have a CD player, not even on my computer. I don't actually, I mean it's on CD, I don't have a CD player, not even on my computer. I will, I will, I'll be very interested in it. So his last thing that he made was about Dylan Thomas. It's fascinating and also my dad teaches, so he actually, he's, I think you'd find it interesting because teaching musicians what people want from music is very, very

different to what he wanted from music. And reality TV has changed lots of things, the competitions has changed things, people teaching musicians what people want from music is very very different to what he wanted from music and Reality TV has changed lots of things the competitions has changed things people think There is such a thing as having huge natural talent and it being spotted and it being overnight and whereas my dad is all about the You you practice for 10 hours a day. Yeah, whatever whatever is happening, whether that's your wedding day, whether you haven't been to sleep the night before, that's the only way that you're going to be good enough that the people you know are good will also nod at you and go, yeah, you're good. And that's the thing that matters. The craft.

Yeah. Well, he's right. I mean, that is the side of it that needs the nuts and bolts. And there are, that is basically how you get good at stuff. What is it, that number of hours you're supposed to fit in? Yes, for 10,000 hours. Yes, exactly. That whole theory is really helpful because, and also I think it's helpful for people who think they're not talented at things. I was talking to my husband about this last night.

There's a couple of people in comedy who if you had seen them 10, 15 years ago, you'd have said, they just don't have it, probably myself included in a way. And you watch people claw their way to a point, and then one of them's won an Emmy, another one of them is sort of a Saturday night comic now, they're so massive. And actually it's incredibly heartening that you can decide what you want and get it even if you are the worst in your class at it.

Yes, but that is the thing, that's actually probably the thing that you need is that determination, that no plan B feeling. Yeah, no plan B and actually I think it can be harder to be told you're really good at something and the world doesn't reflect it. Being told you're the worst at it and going, right, well, I'm going to prove you wrong or I'm going to get slightly better and just keep coring. That momentum, like we talked about earlier, it makes you feel like you're going somewhere because you started probably a bit lower down. Also, my dad, there's a lot of pleasure in working hard is the other thing. People think the pleasure will come from the

thousands of people clapping you or the money, but actually there's this really deep-seated flow concentrating on something creative, you know, the work is the work is the work, that actually is its own thing. Definitely. Yeah, yeah, and it's so satisfying. I feel like that's like nourishing for your soul, isn't it, those bits? And producing things and creating stuff. Yeah. And that's a bit we're in control of.

There are all of these arbitrary things in everyone's lives that you just don't get to decide. But you can decide how you spend your hours today or whether you write a bit more or think a bit more about something or practice. Yeah. I feel like it's a really, I was thinking about what you might want to pass down to your boys. I think that's a lovely thing to pass down. I hope I feel that's a really I was thinking about what you might want to pass down to your

Your boys, I think that's a lovely thing to pass down. I hope I get that I'm really worried because I grew up in a family that didn't have money and now my husband and I Really? I mean we're safely middle-class And and do have money and it's even things like I had to get life insurance the other day And I haven't put it in my husband's or my kids' names because I think the worst thing that could happen would be they just get hundreds of thousands of pounds. I don't know how to like... How to navigate actually having... Yes, in real life they're going to have to have part-time jobs because at the moment obviously

I just want to give them everything. I'm really bad with sweeties and stuff because I just want to make them happy. And I think, oh that will just carry on and then I'll have screwed them up that way. I think I find that quite tricky as well because I think my relationship with money part of it was definitely crystallizing the fact that from the time I was 18 I never had that was responsible for myself yeah but that wasn't because my parents said right you, you're 18 and we're done. It was because that was literally just where we were at. And how do I instill that if it's actually something I'll have to choose?

I want them to know the value and I want them to work for stuff. And it also feels good when you've worked for things. And also the bits where it's all gone a bit wonky, it's so sobering and you don't make those mistakes again Yeah, and you know that you want them to have that sense of ambition for themselves. Yeah I think that is something I'm not very good at either navigating that it's really hard I moved out 18 as well and Was independent I lived in a really horrible shared house with lots of mice. I was very happy

but I Can't imagine letting my son stay in those circumstances. When I remember the way I used to live, it's genetic, isn't it? Or it's hardwired. I mean, like you just don't want your children to suffer, but actually suffering is part of life. Low-level safe suffering, I mean. Not starving, but thinking, how will I earn the money to feed myself?

They do have to go through that. Definitely. not starving, but thinking how will I earn the money to feed myself? They do have to go through that. Definitely. And I suppose, I might be wrong, but I feel like if it's something that matters to you, then it becomes part of the conversation. And it's not necessarily about the literal thing of like how much pocket money they get, but more the more the conversation around it. Yes.

Hopefully. Gives you a sort some moral compass about it. But definitely sort of practicing it, but then having really hard lines of, oh, yeah, just so you know, I'm not going to buy you a car. Yeah. And how similar do you think their childhood, what bits of your childhood do you want to incorporate, do you think? Well, we were a bit feral, actually. Here's the thing about having a mum who's young and has to work full-time,

is that she didn't really know what we were doing, but also a lot of things we were doing. I've got a friend who's similar, and he was taking drugs in a shed, whereas we were sort of playing outside, not in a countrysidey way, because we were in Dagenham, but just sort of like playing British Bulldog and running around a lot. And so it wasn't quite this pastoral climbing trees, but it wasn't a screen based life. We barely watched television. I've got so many cultural holes because I don't think I remember, I don't remember either of my parents watching TV.

They also didn't listen to the radio. We just sort of ran amok and read. And that's sort of accidental. That wasn't because, and so I would like, I'd be devastated if my kids didn't read. One of my sisters doesn't read. And you know, she just doesn't enjoy it. Yeah. Like maybe she'll pick up Harry Potter on holiday, but she's never actually finished

it. That kind of thing. Yes. And that would make me so sad for them because it's such a pleasure. And it's a hidden world, isn't it? You can enter into all those different worlds through books. And it feels like, you know, exercising empathy and your learning. And it's like watching Netflix.

If you've been told a great story, you're being... It's not because it's better than other kind of things, but yeah, if they end up like gaming, gaming on comfy chairs. That's the thing where I'd walk up and go, boy, should we go to the seaside? Yeah. I mean, I have not managed to avoid that. Well, I don't know, I don't think it's your choice, really.

I think that's the world, it's what their friends are into. I think it's really hard at the moment, because obviously he's two and a half. He likes puddles, he likes Wellington boots, he likes speaking to the bin men. he likes waving at buses and trains, it's such a magical existence. Fast forward 10 years if he then wants to just play a shooting game, I'll be the parent and go, but where did it go wrong? But then that's how they socialise as well.

Of course, and it's fun in a different way and I guess you'd have to not be snobby about it and go, they're enjoying themselves. It's fun in a different way and I guess you have to not be snobby about it. They're enjoying themselves. And it all kind of unfolds. It's not like you suddenly find yourself there. It's one day to another day to another day, isn't it? And things can change. Sometimes I think I've got things a little bit wonky and then you can kind of go, we're

not actually going to do it like that anymore. Well, I'm hoping that's what will happen. I think it's so amazing that they're considering there should be phones for teenagers that are different and for children so they don't have the internet access. And I think maybe the government, if I was prime minister, I'll just go, right, everyone's allowed two hours of screen time a day. That's the law. You can't unelect me now. Everyone gets two hours of screen time. Use it up how you want. When it's gone, everything turns off. Sorry. Yes.

And then we'd be like, oh god, don't nanny state, but secretly we'd all be really pleased. Yeah, because I think you always worry what other people are doing about it anyway. And if we're all in it together. Yeah, and also most people would just say, I was just on my phone too much, I just hate my phone. Yes. But again, day to day, yeah.

Well, the thing about the phone I've always found quite exhausting is just that you're expected to be, and you expect everyone else to be, constantly accessible. And I think sometimes that's the bad thing. Oh yeah, why didn't you reply to me 15 minutes ago? Exactly, it's been an hour what's happened to them. But then when you wrote your book when you'd had your first baby, did you do it on your phone?

No, on a laptop. I'm actually quite good on my phone. Years and years I didn't get an iPhone or a smartphone. I had a Nokia up until, well, eight years ago. I only got a smartphone eight years ago. And I recently downgraded my phone so I've got the oldest smartphone you can have. And I think eventually I will just get a camera. And then that will be my eccentric personality that I don't have a smartphone.

That'll be it. I'll be like, Sarah without the smartphone, yeah, that's her. Okay, well if you cling onto that I'll be really impressed.'ll be like, Sarah without the smartphone. Yeah, that's her. Okay. If you cling on to that, I'll be really impressed. There's nothing that good on there. Sometimes I do do this thing where you just check stuff for no reason. At the moment, I check my steps. I'm like, why am I checking my steps?

And I'll be literally looking at it and then move a bit and go, yeah, it's gone up too. But then you can take all the photos and all that. Yes I look at my kids photos. And when you're a new mum I think having that community of being able to talk to people is so good. Absolutely I wouldn't want to shut anyone off and then occasionally there's a brilliant joke and people make loads of jokes and memes and I do love it when that happens. I liked it when Gwyneth Paltrow skied into that guy and everyone just had fun for a while. Like, I love those moments. Yes, that's really good.

Across the world, yeah. And since you've had your babies, have you noticed you've had people come up to you and say that you've given them a little bit of hope about what could be? I've had, well what worried me actually, when women who were in their late 20s or early 30s saying, I love it when someone in their 40s has children because it makes me think I can do it that long. And I just think it's so shit they have to think about it then. It's so shit that for some women there are clouds over working towards what they want

in their career or enjoying being single, or traveling. They always have to have this pin of, but when am I going to have a family if that's something else that I want? And the relief, I spent such a long time Googling celebrity ages when they had their children, because I found it so great, even though lots of those people will have had doughnut eggs, or they will have had to go through IVF procedures, but something about going, and she was 46, it does give you this little breathing space of, I remember doing a gig with Jo Brand when I was about 10 weeks pregnant with Theodore, and she had her children

at I think at 42 and 44, and I loved that so much because I was so worried about being too old, she's got grown up, like teenage children now, and I thought, well, she's still young, she's not an old lady in a chair in a home. So I'll be there in my kid's life, hopefully. Yeah, I think that kind of thing is, I do exactly the same.

And I wonder as well, when you do a job like ours, it's quite hard to know when to, you can safely, well, anytime is just what might be of like giving yourself over to having a kid if you need to be doing work. And that's why sometimes you can use work as a way to protect yourself about what else is happening. Because if you get pregnant, there are things you can do and you can't do and vice versa.

I remember I had a miscarriage one time. My mum was like, well, there'll now be things that you can do that you wouldn't have and vice versa. I remember I had a miscarriage one time, my mum was like, well, there'll now be things that you can do that you wouldn't have been able to do. And that gave me a bit of comfort. It's also why I didn't take anything out of my diary with Theodore because it had come straight after a miscarriage. I thought I am not having a space in my diary where I was supposed to have a baby, which meant I had no space. And actually, that's the other thing that makes me sad is that, and then when I was pregnant with Albie,

I thought I am not going to look at a job and go, oh, at least I can do that because I lost my baby. So it's so hard, that inversion. I've got a friend who's pregnant now after having a miscarriage. It's her second child. And she was like, we're moving house, we're doing this, we're doing that. It's like, it's the anxiety where you go, I can't allow myself to relax in case

something happens again. So hard, isn't it? Yeah. I don't know if that ever 100% goes because there's so much unknown and once they hear your heart's on the outside and every once in a while I'll feel like, why am I, I just want to go run to the schools and just scoop them all up and just bring them here and have them all in front of me and for all so I just know everybody's okay. Yeah. Also, that's the thing with the working away.

I mean, you're like me, you love your job, but it makes me feel like I'm unplugged. And it's like that whole thing where you get home late, you need to go into their room and like touch their skin and go, okay, now I'm plugged in. Yes. My body needs, yeah, we all need each other now. Yeah, that plugged in is a really my body needs, yeah, we all need each other now. Yeah, that plugged in is a really nice term for it. I like that.

Well, I think it sounds like everything, I mean, I really like the way that you've spoken about everything, and I think that I'm actually just really happy for you. I do think it's absolutely wonderful that you have your babas here. And it's always lovely when there's much wanted babies in the world. It's a good thing. Yeah, yes.

It's a very, very, very exciting thing to be an established adult and then going, and now here I am, learning everything over completely from the beginning. And I also think it's really great to feel very alive, like, you know, very present, you know, so many things happening, and a lot of them are really sort of quotidian things. But it's a really great feeling because you can go onto autopilot.

Definitely. And, yeah. And what a privilege to have new adventures now. It's wonderful. And I think, however the cards fall, the family you have is the one you have, and at any other point in time it wouldn't have been the same. So this is just where that's like the destiny of it. And that's the odd thing about a miscarriage is that, often for me, for people that miscarriage, if you then manage to have a child afterwards,

you're looking at them going, well you had to exist. And if that other person had existed, if another person had existed, you wouldn't exist. And that then becomes so unfathomable. It's not that it makes you glad, but it just, narratively, it really helps. Definitely. Which is very sad for people who don't get that. I'm not saying that, because there is this other kind of peace you have to find if you don't have it.

But if you are lucky enough to have a child, you do then go, oh, of course, it was you. Of course it was you. Yeah, we were waiting for you. Exactly. Yeah, you had to exist. Oh, well, I really want to come and see you when you're in turn. I want to come and see you. Let's do that. But don't catch eyes with me, because remember we're... No, no, I really want to come and see you when you're in turn. I want to come and see you. Let's do that.

Come and see you, yeah. But don't catch eyes with me, because remember we'll swap. No, no, no, I'm going to do it on purpose. I'm going to have a spotlight ready. I'm going to know your seat number, and I'm going to set you up, and it's going to be great.

Also, I love quantum leaps. Also, I don't know if you know this, but someone messaged me ages ago, because when your book came out, you said that if you ever had a sitcom, you would start it on the tube, and you would like music, and you'd get up and dance, then someone sent it to me because I did a sitcom and that was the start of my sitcom. Oh wow. It was on the tube and it was a

mariachi band and each episode I did more dancing until in the last one I'm standing up and I'm sort of going round the pole. That's what, yeah that was brilliant. Yes, yes so it was exactly what you envisioned. Of course, it sounds like we really shouldn't. Yes, no we can. Now that's how I can, I know I can trust you to finish my joke. Okay, yeah, it's that panic. I don't know why, but whenever I think of it, I think it's something to do with a hamster, but I can't think of anything funny

that's happened with a hamster. But you will have to, the electricity. Free me from the hamster thing. If ever anyone says to you, like, oh, I don't know how you can do what you do, all of these people, and you're, it's exactly the same as standup, where it's like, I don't know how you can do what you do, all of these people, and you're... it's exactly the same as stand-up, where it's like, I can't tell you how you do what you do. But when you're there, your mouth opens and your brain just does it.

Really? Yes. What about... because with a song though, I know that even if you forget a line in the verse, you're still going to have to get to the chorus. Yeah. But what about with jokes? If you... You just keep talking.

Just keep talking. Keep talking. And it's your natural instinct. If you watch people doing new material, they will do what they've written down as their punchline and people don't laugh. And then they will dissect or comment on the fact that people didn't laugh. And then that becomes funny. And do you find you learn when you're watching other people do it as well?

Do you notice the way someone enters or their rhythm? It's more just it's so uncomfortable to be scared for someone. Do you notice the way someone enters or their rhythm? It's more just it's so uncomfortable to be scared for someone. So if you're not scared for you, it's so much more comfortable for someone else. They're not scared. You've got to go somewhere. So you almost have to care less. Yeah, I would agree with that. I think so much of it is about the confidence trick of saying to the audience,

look, don't worry about me. I'm going to be fine. There's nothing that could happen here. Yeah, so just relax. Don't make this terrible for me. Enjoy it, don't enjoy it. I'm still going to be okay. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, which is why watching your mum sing a song on a TV show, that can't happen.

Excruciating. Okay. So much to think about. Thank you so much. Thank you. about. Thank you so much. See, what a wonderful woman. I realized as well in my conversation with her, I didn't get an opportunity, obviously we spoke a lot about being in comedy, but I didn't get a chance to talk to her about Sewing Bee. I thought she was brilliant when she was hosting

UK Sewing Bee and also Great British Sewing Bee,, it's called by its true name, and also I just wanted to talk about it because I love the program. But maybe next time, hey, we did talk about some really cool stuff, really interesting and yeah, just really appreciated having time with her like that really. Meanwhile, I haven't got too long now, I'm actually waiting for Gary to finish and he's having like, I don't know, glam hair and makeup done before we get on the trike and go and try some wine. Sometimes your life is just quite an unexpected place,

isn't it? I do think it's gonna be nice now. Now I've got a question for you. So I'm the wine tasting, right? I've also got a gig later. Do I A, have very small sips of wine and just not think about it? B, have small sips of wine and just not think about it. B. Have small sips of wine and spit them out.

C. Have big sips of wine and swallow that or have big sips and spit it out. I'm thinking it's either A or D. So it would be a bigger mouthful, but don't swallow it because I don't want to be drunk on stage or very small sips and just take the punt. Yep, I agree with you. Option A is the best one. Thanks. I knew you'd feel the same. Anyway, I bet you're inside. I can see my tour manager looking

for me, but it's so nice out here. Thanks so much for lending me your ears. Thank you to Sarah for such a great conversation. Thank you to Claire James for producing the podcast, to Richard for editing, Ella May for the artwork, mostly you for your time, your ears, your wisdom. I've had a few brilliant suggestions coming from some of you out there about who to speak to, because we're nearing the end of this series and I've got a couple more for you,

but I am starting the next series, so please keep them coming to me. It's so good because you really challenge and interest me when you think of people I would never have thought of and that is some of them my favorite favorite favorite conversations. So keep it coming in the meantime hope you're having a lovely day or evening night wherever you are. All right lots of love to you, bye bye. Acast powers the world's best podcasts. Here's a show that we recommend. Who is the dad? For years, a Canadian lab promised people the answer.

It's obviously legit, it's a DNA company. But one by one, its prenatal paternity tests gave people the wrong answer. You're the company that's supposed to provide me with results, I was pissed. This is the story of our investigation into how it all happened. wrong answer.