The Netmums Podcast - S13 Ep10: Dame Kelly Holmes - from Olympic gold, to ‘not getting old’!

Episode Date: June 18, 2024

In this week's episode of The Netmums Podcast, Wendy and Alison are joined by double Olympic champion and winner of BBC Sports Personality of the Year, Dame Kelly Holmes.  Dame Kelly opens up about her early years, growing up as a mixed-race child in Kent, and the pivotal moments that shaped her. From being inspired by her PE teacher to joining the army and eventually conquering the world of athletics, she also discusses the impact of the military's ban on homosexuality and her eventual coming out in 2022. Dame Kelly also shares her strategies for maintaining her wellbeing, the importance of balance, and the newfound freedom she feels in being her true self. She offers invaluable advice to parents on encouraging their children, especially girls, to stay active and engaged in sports. Stay connected with Netmums for more parenting tips, community support, engaging content: Website: netmums.com / Instagram: @netmums 

You're listening to the Netmums podcast with me, Wendy Gollich. And me, Alison Perry. Coming up on this week's show... It was my PE teacher, Debbie Page, that told me I could be good. And just having one person believe in me just felt, you know, came alive. And so my talent here pointed out was running and that's what happened. Now, I will never forget her. And she was actually the first person that I called when I came back to the UK from Athens to say thank you, because I do believe about her, maybe I would have lost who I was. But before all of that, this episode of the Netmums podcast is brought to

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On the one hand, I'm still recovering from the coldest, wettest half term ever in Cornwall and trying and failing to do that juggle of work and mum and kids. Do you find that as overwhelming as I do? I just can't stand it. Oh my goodness, especially just just after either before or after the school holidays it's just a bit overwhelming you're just trying to get everything done and then catching up and it's just all a bit yeah a bit hectic it's it's hard but on the other hand I'm celebrating because my 15 my 15 I've elevated her my 13 year old is for the first time ever cooking dinner for her and her sister because I'm recording this podcast. I love it.

That's so good. Do you know what? The same thing happened to us about two weeks ago, my 13-year-old. Now, to be fair, it was because we said we'll pay her three pounds to cook us dinner. But she did a really good job. And it was like, actually, this is worth three quid. If we can just sit on our bums on the sofa and she'll like make us dinner. So, yeah, it was good.

Well, I'm trying to get my daughter to come and say hello to our guest today, but she won't because she's too starstruck. So tell us who we have got on the podcast, please. I am not surprised she's starstruck because I think today's guest has official national treasure status um dame kelly holmes is joining us today and she's a double olympic champion winner of bbc sports personality of the year european athlete of the year and she was honored with a damehood from the queen um her yeah we're bowing down we're bowing down um her memoir unique is out in paperback now and it sees her sharing her experiences of being gay but having to hide it as a young soldier in the military it is an inspiring tale of self-discovery overcoming struggles and learning to be your true

self dame kelly a huge welcome to the netmums podcast. Thank you very much. This is nice to come on here. Thanks for the advice. It's very lovely to have you. So it's 20 years since your double win in the 800 and 1500s at the 2004 Games in Athens, which I bet feels like yesterday and a million years ago all at the same time do you still remember it as if it was like last week yeah I mean 20 where has 20 years gone first let's face it I don't know how time goes but um when I get the chance to show a montage of my wins pretty much every day because I go around the world speaking um to lots of corporate organization but people effectively and um so I get to do it and the funny thing is is if people don't know me because you know like I say I go around the world

I put that on um it paints the picture very much with my facial expressions and if they do know me or they're from Britain they're still cheering and they know the outcome so it's a you know it's a it's one of those 20 years I can't believe but you know when you get to 20 it's something like a celebration thing isn't it and it's yeah yeah it's amazing I mean you've achieved so much there's no no denying it but you know reading your book it's amazing. I mean, you've achieved so much, there's no denying it. But, you know, reading your book, it's clear that your life didn't start well. You haven't had some, you know, fairy tale childhood and existence leading up to this moment. And the way you describe it in your book is really heartbreaking.

Tell us a little bit about the first few years of your life and the impact that it's had on you into adulthood. So, yeah, I mean, I think the first few years of my life were based really around the fact that I was born to a white mother. It's a mixed race child going back down into Kent, being taken into Kent. And, you know, I still live in Kent. I'm still from the same village, but as I describe it in the books, the whiter than white can't do it again. And my mum was only 17 when she had me. So if you think about that in the 70s, very taboo,

one, to be having a, being young and having a child at a young age, and two, to being a mixed race child to a white predominantly family. So she was told by my granddad, you know, she can't look after me until she can look after herself, basically. And so I went into a children's home for the first five years in and out. I mean, I wouldn't say that's affected me as a person as much as the fact that I know it's my upbringing and it's my grounding, you know, because at the same time, my mother, you know, had adoption services come numerous times and she just refused to sign the papers. So I always think that what life might have been if my mum hadn't been so strong as a young person to refuse to kind of give up on me. So that's probably the main thing that I'll take from that side of my mum

and her relationship. But then, of course, growing up in that environment, I was the only mixed-race girl at schools, primary school, secondary school. And at the time, I don't think I really felt any different as such until it's pointed out because you know like children are taught difference yeah you know when they grow up they just find a friend that friend is whoever they connect with and it doesn't matter what they look like who they are what their family background is so it's only when somebody points it out and I was eight when um bony m brown girl in the ring came on and guess who's the brown girl in the ring but instead

of it intimidating me which i find is maybe my unique self is that um i was just the yeah sugar in the plum plum plum i'm drinking yeah this is great i'm obviously the best you know and so i think having that attitude helped so when I went to my secondary school became friends with let's say the misfits um who are still my friends to this day you know Kerry who's short freckly ginger hair and and Kim who was very very short and then the really tall Debbie and it's just so weird so um I did find out early on that I felt, where do I fit with everything? You know, I wasn't academic at school whatsoever.

I was the one that liked sport. Nobody else did. Everything was very different in my world. And I've decided very early on, and I don't even know where the word came to, that, okay, then I'm unique because I don't want to be the same as everyone else. So I think that was almost a strength for me at a young age. And do you think those experiences, maybe not the brown girl in the ring bit,

but the rest of it, what led you to starting the Kelly Holmes Trust? Absolutely. Mentoring young people who are facing challenges. Yeah, it was actually my PE teacher so my PE teacher is the one that sort of got a grip of me and told me I could be good now when you're the child that sits outside the classroom most of the time and now we're calling the word neurodiversity it wasn't a thing we all know that and you know people getting diagnosed with dyslexia etc etc well I probably had a lot of those and my mum you know, people getting diagnosed with dyslexia, et cetera, et cetera. Well, I probably had a lot of those. And my mum, you know, blatantly told me I probably did. And it was her.

It was my PE teacher, Debbie Page, that told me I could be good. And just having one person believe in me just felt, you know, came alive. And so my talent here pointed out was running. And that's what happened. Now, I will never forget her. And she was actually the first person that I called when I came back to the UK from Athens to say thank you, because I do believe about her maybe I would have lost who I was. And so I started the charity purely because I believe one person

can make a lifelong change to somebody. They give them the opportunity or the right words or the support. And that's why the trust started in 2008. It does feel like that PE teacher and her encouraging you did set your life off on that trajectory because it's not only got you into the athletics, but then that's why you joined the army, wasn't it? Because you wanted to become a PT in the army army what do you think your life would have been like if that PE teacher hadn't taken you

under her wing I really don't know what I would have been or who I would have been I think I just would have been the kid that got in trouble all the time and you know didn't really have any purpose because in one sense then if I think about it because sometimes you only can reflect on past can't you know you can never reflect and you can dismiss a lot of things but I also think that maybe there was something in me I had a lot of empathy anyway I've always done charity work I've always helped the old people in our council state when they couldn't go up and get shopping and it was snowing and i'll be shoveling the you know covering the path and going up and running back because they dropped chocolate out the windows so i think i would have been somebody that would have wanted to do good anyway but i think from a

what am i going to do as a person I didn't really have any skills I left school with no qualifications whatsoever the army was something that gave me the sense of oh I can have a career I can learn a lot about myself I can meet other people I might be able to travel and it will be surrounding discipline and support, which at a young age, even though no one likes discipline, I felt it would teach me a lot, you know, and I'd grow up a lot. And hence why when I was 14, again, I decided I wanted to be in the army after we had the kind of military organizations come into our school. And it was just something that I just thought I can be something if I follow that pathway because I didn't really know what else I was going to do. So you say you talk about going into the military in the book and then you talk about wanting to win an Olympic medal were there moments where you thought nah this isn't going to happen

I can't do this or we did you have quite strong self-belief from the beginning I think with anything when you have a glimmer of hope you can kind of either see it front on or dismiss it because it's too hard and I think I was quite I was a very talented junior athlete and I went through the ranks and the athletics and I became mini youth Olympic champion when I was 17. So for me, it was almost like, well, I can, I can do this. I'm good enough. So I did have an element of self-belief from my running, but it was also about setting goals and dreams. You know, without those, where are you going in life? And I think the fact that I had them very early on, even though they could be a big fluffy cloud,

it set me on a sense of, well, if I want to get there, this is what I've got to do. Sometimes that's what you have to have. That's the outcome. And then how am I going to get there is the journey, right? So that side of it. And then the military side of it was about career and, you know, how well I could do. And can I become a PTI after being a heavy goods vehicle driver driving around in big trucks you know it's like right no but I want to be a PTI so what have I got to do to go there and of course when

people put you down things in sport is very um objective and in life generally it's very subjective some people are telling you if you're good and giving you the chance and opening the doors in sport you have to make those happen you know you win you lose you get a good time you don't get qualified you don't so those two journeys along the side were very different in my mindset you know I knew that I had to put in the work and commitment determination as an athlete to get anywhere as high as I could. And in my military career, some of it was dictated by what other people wanted me to do, but I could do a really good job.

And as long as I did the job well, I know I was fulfilling my own pathway. And you've talked about how much you learned in the army and how rewarding it was, but it was illegal to be gay in the army until the year 2000, which, you know, that sounds incredible when you think about it now. What was that like for you as a young person in the army? Well, when I joined, I didn't know I was gay. I mean, I was just a teenager. You know, I had the boyfriends like we did.

And I was going on one with teenagers. I was just a teenager doing my thing I was very much into my sport so I didn't really go out with my mates that much anyway it was just life I joined the military this girl kissed me in the taunts and basic training

and it just felt like oh okay I don't know it was so weird I didn't put myself under a label or that gays didn't really know what that meant you know because growing up sex education was all one way of thinking like we were the same person you know and it's only when you then get older you realize maybe not but because the law was in place so there was a ban against homosexuality in the military which didn't really know much about other than the fact these really weird rules that you know think i joined the 17 year old

can't sit on the bed with a mate unless you've got a foot on the floor you know it's all like things imagine like your teenage girls i heard that mates over and they're playing on the bed or they're doing things or they're sitting up with their phones and you've got you tell them make sure you've got a foot on the floor on the floor that's so weird because how does that help so when those things came we were like what's all that and then of course we realized there was this law but i suppose at the time you just do you you it's not like everyone's rampantly having sex or anything it's just that you get used you get to like someone or something you know just a normal process of love like um and then i suppose it became more prevalent as you get older because you always everyone that is maybe

gay you get to know it's like a code you know you'll all sneak out in the same car go to a club then come back in all dispersed you know or you won't ever talk about anything in barracks or you'll watch your back and the funny thing is I mean when I joined the women's royal army corps I swear half of them were gay anyway I mean so the thing is the difference was is that when I was 22 basically what happened to me is there was a raid and the raid is that the difference was, is that when I was 22, basically what happened to me is there was a raid. And the raid is that there was like a witch hunt in the early 90s where the higher rank and the services were trying to kick out anybody that might be gay, were known to be gay, assumed to be gay,

or we just don't like and we pretend they're gay. And so they used to send in the military police who would come and ransack your room, your belongings, everything, rip it up, looking for things. It's like somebody saying, well, you can't have children, but you've got children. You think, well, I must hide them. And then somebody comes in trying, looking for the children

and trying to rip you through. And you're like, it's just children. It's the same thing so what happened I was 22 and it left me with fear like because I loved my job like I made sure I was I wanted to be the best PTI ever you know I didn't want to be kicked out I didn't want to be potentially court-martialed which means going in front of court could be jailed people and this happens people were jailed sexual abuse verbally abused lost long service medals after serving for 15 years they could have been on the front line it could be all these things yet they were trying to get

these people out and as a 22 year old when you want your career and the risk of the career going just because somebody finds out about you is really terrifying and so I have a love hate love relationship with the military because I love being a PTI yeah I mean I got my MBE for services to the military that wasn't for just walking around that was because I was a good PTI yet on the other sense of it that sliding doors moment could have been I could have lost my career if they'd find out about me that's not right really is it yeah so when you came out in 2022 was it absolutely terrifying set against the backdrop of what you've just told us yeah oh my gosh it's the hardest thing you know

I've done I've achieved so much and gone through quite a lot of highs and lows of different parts of life and to actually do a documentary which I did Kelly Holmes being me hardest thing was just to sort of say publicly I'm a gay woman and it was never because I was ashamed or whatever it's just that when you have fear instilled in you whatever that is becomes almost like debilitating. It's like you are so panicked about every single outcome post that part of trying to free yourself that you just build up the worst things that can happen. In my head, it would be that everyone belittles my achievement, that no one would want me to do anything anymore. People would look at me weird.

They would judge me. They would cause me hell. They would be bullying and whatever. I just believed it all and also I just thought that if I had admitted that I was going to in the army I still thought maybe I could be jailed because I'd never had the conversation post the ban being lifted in 2000 with anyone in the military that would tell me otherwise. So again, I created this whole thing in my head that by saying I was going to be in the army, doing the band,

I might be jailed. I didn't know. And so it doesn't matter what age you are, you know, I'm not young. So to live with that was not that nice, to be honest. But what was the reaction from the LGBTQ community, which wasn't even called that back then. So what was the reaction from that documentary? It was amazing, you know, because I'd never, ever been associated with the LGBTQIA alphabet.

Sorry. It's one of my biggest fears is always getting stuff like that wrong because I'm terrible at keeping up with what it should be i'm really bad i'm so sorry to anybody i offended for getting it wrong yeah well it's a good conversation to have actually which maybe we have but um the i i grew up in the era of lgb originally and the 80s and lgbt and LGBT and LGB you know the connotations behind it the AIDS epidemic the real awful things that were happening back in the 80s and then obviously during the 90s it started to expand and then as I've not been involved I've seen from afar this kind of creation

of this community that's got bigger and bigger but it's not got bigger because people have just finally joined it the reason it's got bigger is people are now got a safe place to feel they're part of something they've always been we've always been around i mean you know look at our history of how many really fantastic famous people were gay or whatever or the first transfers look about years ago we're just now creating this mountain like it's all changed and new now what's new is the fact that people from as I've worked and had to learn a lot and educate myself is that you want to feel validated you want to feel seen you want to feel like you're not the only one you want to feel like you can just relax and other people are like you and by making all of these sort of labels

as such it means that not everyone fits in and conforms in the same way as you or her or him or whatever and that's when you expand it right out to intersectionality meaning that you know people look at me i did a talk just early before i've come on with you and i stand there and if you didn't know who i was you were just and you didn't know me and i hadn't achieved everything i've done you go there's a short mixed race or black woman standing in front of me but if i go to you well my mum was white my stepdad was white and my siblings were white. I only know that from my culture. Just because the colour of my skin doesn't mean I now know something to do with, I don't know, Jamaica or something.

You know what I mean? And also, how do you know whether I was straight, bi, gay, you know, what my religion is? You wouldn't know by me just standing there. So let's start communicating more and the main thing is to allow people to be happy because I never was even though I've achieved a lot I was never happy it caused me a lifelong problem with mental health problems and I believe that I have a right just to live and be and you know you do you get me but you know sometimes we might actually get along if we talk yeah just a reminder that Duracell is partnering with the

European Academy of Pediatrics to educate medical experts and parents about the dangers of swallowing lithium coin batteries and how to prevent it yes Yes, with its baby secure technology and tamper proof packaging, Duracell really is the safest battery brand for families. And you mentioned mental health, you've spoken so much about mental health and, you know, the struggles that you've had over the years, which is brilliant. It's so good that you, because you shouldn't have to, As someone who struggles with these things, you shouldn't have to put yourself out there. But it obviously helps so many people.

But what do you do today to look after your mental well-being? I think a lot has alleviated because of the freedom I now feel to be myself, my true authentic self. It's helped me to find my own happiness and to thinking I'm as valid as anyone else and actually do you know what I'm going to now live my life you know to live with 34 years of fear and know that I may not have 34 years of happiness I'm determined every day to be happy but the other thing is I suppose I you know balance I have balance in life more now you know I like to keep fit but I like a good party you know a good gin tea and then

you know I don't eat the best of the time but then I'll go to the gym or go to a court I just find that I'm finding a balance of happiness now rather than it's all about this one thing and I've got to prove I like the gin balance let's let's keep the gin balance you know um so yeah I find that I go out walking uh a lot now more than I used to hate walking because I used to think god if I get there twice as quick, if I can get there twice as quick, why am I going to walk? Whereas now, I love the fresh air. I love listening to the birds and sometimes just a little bit of mindfulness. Sometimes I'm not a great reader, but I've taken up to,

if I can read one chapter, that means I'm switching off from my phone. It might take me ages to read that chapter, but I'm switching off from my phone and I'm just doing me or go in my bath and have bubble bath and you know candles on and the music and I just go that's non-negotiable because that's 15 minutes just for me so I've created this space now where if I need time out I'll take it and it's I don't care what other people think about that because you, you know, like I say, when you've conformed to society or you've worried about society for so long, and then a lot of the way that you think and feel when you're second guessing and whatever, it's so exhausting.

And now I'm not worried about what anyone else thinks. I don't care. That takes a lot of freedom to just breathe. You know, now I don't have to worry about you worry about myself so as a mum of a young teenage girl I wanted who's banging doors in the background my apologies you know as well as I do how hard it can be to encourage these girls to get into sport at school yeah what advice do you have to me and all the parents out there who are thinking that the kids don't want to do PE, the girls don't want to be active? What do we do?

I know it is really difficult. It's funny because when I first retired, I created a post called National School Sport Champion under Gordon Brown government and I got him to basically or the government to basically try and get me around the country to try and inspire sort of people into sport and I created a program called Girls Active and Girls Active was basically about looking at the barriers to doing sport and how young girls felt at that time so it was about PE kit which has completely changed from my era I mean

to accessible sports that actually were fun and not just the netball cross country and you know the things that they didn't want to do and it was just trying to find how do you create a space where it's about your well-being and it's about positivity And when you do sport and activity, it is about you being more in tune with your body and your attitudes to success because life is challenging. And so sport has that same thing about, you know, sometimes you're going to get setbacks. Sometimes things aren't always going to go as well. Sometimes you're going to have to communicate with a group of people

and they might not all be great at communicating, if you don't communicate we don't go any further so it was almost looking at what are the benefits outside of just the physical thing and then for you know what I do believe in now because obviously I'm not a teenager so I can't go jump into their heads but I do have a lot of teen nieces and nephews. And they're all very different. What has been very apparent is a lot of them are very inspired by this new generation of talented sports people. So if you take something like the Lionesses,

it's no longer gone to being just looking slim and you know wearing these fancy clothes and that's your role model you've now got role models who are fit they are got purpose they've got dreams ambition and work hard and strong is the new glamour so for me the era is fantastic and i sort of encourage some of my lot to just look at these new sports. The Olympics is coming up in Paris this year. You know, if young girls in particular just watch a bit of sport, they'll see all the raft of sports that these young girls from, you know, right up to adults and how that's made them as individuals become someone with purpose, become someone with determination, strong-minded, individual, not being sheep led by their mates who are all going off partying, because you can still do that. So there's a couple of things, really. I mean, it's quite a lot.

I mean, let's face it, I do know that I'm you know I'm better this side being um having nieces and nephews than my own children put it that way I wanted to ask you about the Olympics though actually because it's still prohibitively expensive to go and watch and I know you can watch it on TV But it's not something that everyone can take their teenage daughters' sons to because for some families it's just way out of the ballpark. And I think that's really sad because it is so inspiring and you get the goosebumps when you're watching it. And, oh, to have been there, but loads of people can't.

What can we do about it? No, I mean, it is really difficult. So many people are priced out, but it because not just you guys as it's our family and that soon adds up and it's the travel and the accommodation and i just don't think it ever is going to change in that sense i mean i know when you host the games like we did in 2012 there was an element of free tickets to schools and etc so there was a lot of free tickets to schools and et cetera. So there was a lot of people that went to the Olympics and the Paralympics because of the fact that they were given tickets or charity tickets or whatever. So there was the ability to do it in the home nation.

When it's a ball, of course, it's the home nation that get those benefits, unfortunately, everyone do. But I do think sometimes watching it on telly, you get to see more because you hear the history of the athlete. They show the close-ups, the emotion. They can articulate it far better than just seeing what's happening there. You go to a stadium, an electrical stadium with 80,000 to 100,000 people, and you might see a dot.

You'll get involved in the cheering and the energy and that, but you might not actually see involved with hearing and the energy and that but you might actually see the faces of the people I did watch 2012 on the telly because I had a tiny baby so I just sat there watching the Olympics you know I was inspired by watching the Olympics when I was 14 you know I watched it in summer holidays and I watched Sebastian Cohen win a gold medal and he stood on the rostrum you know national anthem british flag fly and the gold medal around his neck and as a young girl who had athletics was the only thing feeling i was good at that was enough inspiration for me to create my dream so sometimes you know it is that and for

parents to you know parents just to maybe i think the world's changing anyway, but parents to maybe say the benefits of physical activity, not about just sport, just about well-being and how the correlation between your mental health and your physical health is very important. So by doing activities, it will help you alleviate anxiety and stress and worries and also to not be conformed by your then friendship group because as we know some of us are very lucky like myself to have really close friends in school but we always create friends during our journey don't we as adults and actually you don't you want to be the one that stands apart and the one that you know doesn't get conformed and stay down here

like I didn't I went in the army and my mates stayed at home. But I've had a richer, I wouldn't say better life, but a different life because I pushed myself away from just the norm. Yeah. Now, I've got the opposite problem to you, Wendy, in that I've got a 13-year-old who is very sporty and she's on the cricket team, she's on the Rangers team, she dances competitively.

And she's always saying to me, Mum, can we go for a run this evening? Especially now that the weather, it's brighter in the evenings. And I'm just like, I'm too tired. Something that she's trying to get me to do is go along to park run with her. Oh, I love it. I know that is something that you are a big fan of. So why should I go along to parkrun with my 13 year old tell me you firstly should go because she's asking you to go and to have as we've just discovered

with wendy a teenage girl that is very much into keeping active which will have all the benefits of the mental health and the physical health absolutely you should go because it's about encouraging her and continuing that second thing is for Run, what's brilliant about it is we all just show up at 9 o'clock. Everybody there has just shown up. They've made a commitment to be there. It doesn't matter whether you're the young whippersnapper that's going for, you know, 5K time because they've got a championship coming up or the last person who's never last because you have a tail walker,

you all just do 5K. And the only challenge is your own challenge, really, because some people go, oh, I want to get a faster time here or, you know, or I'm trying to go for the alphabet so I travel around the country and try and get one with an A and one with a B.

Oh, I didn't know people did that. That's so cool. I've only got one more to get. I've got one more to A and one with a B. Oh, I didn't know people did that. That's so cool. I've only got one more to get. I've got one more to get. Where's the Z? I've got to find me, what was it, my W, I think. I've got one more to get.

Zed, where did you go to be a Zed? In South Africa. Wow. I go to South Africa a lot. And I've been going for years, and it just happened to be there as I said. I was like, yes. But no, what's great about it, people go, oh, yeah, but you're an international runner.

Yeah, but I'm not anymore. You know, I'm 19 years retired and 39 plus 15. I go because I want to go. I'm still capable of running. Sometimes I'm very competitive if I see a woman or two in front of me and I'm thinking I'm gonna help you especially if they're anywhere looking at you can't even tell how old people are these days but if I think like hold on a minute no then I'll try another time there's the competitive streak it's still there sometimes um but no in answer that question part

one is really good because it's about the social element there's no barriers to entry you can walk run jog take your buggy at some places take a dog at some places only some and you've gone out nine o'clock show commitment and i'll tell you everyone's buzzing after they've done it it's really cool and I just rock up with my my hat on trying not to be seen the moment I open my mouth and the men always get competitive with me but you know um I've got to ask you just you just mentioned your age but you said it in a really strange way. You said 39 plus, what was it? 15. 15. Tell us what that's all about.

Oh, see, I... So I remember hearing something. I think it was on these women. I didn't tell them that I'd heard this, but they were talking to somebody, interviewing, and someone who said it was a privilege to age. And I said, no, it's a privilege to get older. It's not a privilege to age. And I said, no, it's a privilege to get older. It's not a privilege to age. Because when you age, you start sagging, you get wrinkles,

you get grey hair, you get whatever. I don't want to age. I don't want to age. I'm privileged to get older because my mum passed away at 64. I don't know how long I've got left. So every day is now a happy day, like I said. But I don't want to age. I don't want to get all the saggy bits and the hormonal problems

and the perimenopause and all that lot. So I always used to say I don't want to be the big 4-0. So it stuck at 39 and I kept going plus 1, plus 2. Now the pluses are far too many. I have to even calculate it in my head. That, I'm stealing that from this day onwards. I love it. Yeah.

If you could go back and tell non-aging young Kelly something, what would you tell her? Oh, wow. I think, I mean, it might be a bit cliche, but see, I've always said not to live with regret, because I feel that, you know, like an if-only sort of thing, let's face it. If you say, if only I had, well, that is too late, isn't it? So you're going to live with if-only forever. Whereas if you just go go I'm going to give it everything I can and I'll try my best and I'll do whatever and if it doesn't work out well at least I'll try I don't live with only so I would have continued that thing in my life is just keep

going keep going keep going because one day you know you never know what's going to happen because at the time when things have been tough it's very easy I think you mentioned to give up it's so easy when things get really hard and tough to revert back to your safe safe zone and your comfort zone and to feel like I'm not threatened by failure or worried about what people might think if I don't achieve whereas I always think that you know if I just give it something sometimes I don't tell people what I'm going for. I just have it as a personal goal. I want to know then whether I've got that perceived failure or not.

But other things I've articulated, it's because I want other people to come along with me and to help me get there. And if I say this is what I want to do and this is how I'm going to do it, I have to find people to support that. But at least I give it a go. And I will never give up until it's so evident that it's not going to happen. Because at the end of the day, things change at different times of life. People come into your life that can give you the next step forward. And sometimes that aspiration just gets held back here for a little bit. And then along the line, you remember what you really wanted to do and you keep going but if i've

always said that's no point i wouldn't have done half the things i've done um so i think for me going back to my younger self it would be to be like the road road is gonna be a rocky road um and maybe the only thing that i probably could say is don't worry as much as I did. I wish I could have been happier a lot longer. I wish I could have been happier a lot longer, but it's life, so. So with that in mind, then, what is next for you to achieve? Is there anything that you really want to do still? Or do you think you might want to have a little rest now?

Not quite yet. So this year we're going for my charity. As I say, 16 years old now, we're going to Machu Picchu. And it's always been like one of those aspirations because I like the sort of spiritual side of it. But also they have wild llamas and alpacas and I have five alpacas of my own they're 15 now I've had them 14 and a half years they just munch grass in the field and the hedges yeah they all have afros and things like that but they're like out there like

the mountains I just want to see them like in real so you're doing it for the alpacas just so we're clear and the ancient civilization or any of that business so doing that and then one of the things i started a couple of months ago was a thing called Athena Effect and it was about women empowerment one of the real big focuses for me next year after this 20th anniversary is like how do I as an individual keep evolving because I think it's important for us sometimes people are settled with what they are that's fine but other people still feel there's something else to give or something else they want to do or they're not dead yet so that's why i keep striving i'm one of those people so um i decide one of the things i feel is really important because i go around the world globally as a motivational speaker and i go to lots of

corporates big thing that's evident for me is a lot of women really just do not believe in themselves enough or women not supporting women women who go higher ranks in businesses who then want to bring other women down it does my head it's like you've had to struggle for the journey and get there just because you're at the top and you think oh I can't be seen support women because the men won't like it it's not the men they've had enough chances to be at the top it's like you know if you're a woman you've got up there tell others how to get up so the more women at the top we're going to make the you know world a better place and we'll get the quality that we've been fighting for so some of the things i've been doing is that putting on

events on talking about different subjects that matter and And the last one I did, I mean, it was like, I only had three weeks to organize it because I'm sort of lastminute.com, and I was going to get 150. I'd done it in 75, but I put a DJ on at 8.30 in the morning. By 11.30, we were already on a nightclub thing, having had conversations on healthy menopause, women empowerment in terms of your mindset and also diversity and inclusion

and understanding the role that women might fit into all that conversation. And it was brilliant. So next year, I'm hoping to do one on the day before International Women's Day, which is a Friday, I think like the 7th of March, and make it 1,000 people. That's 1,000 women coming together.

That's my mission. So I might have to get you lot to come. We could do a live podcast or something. Yeah, do it. Live podcast with a DJ. Boom. It. Kelly, thank you so much.

It's been so lovely to have you on the podcast. Thank you for joining us. Thank you. No, I really appreciate it. And you lovely to have you on the podcast thank you for joining us thank you no i really appreciate it and we've got you know i've heard how well it does and how well you ladies are doing bringing conversation to the floor so thank you for the chance kelly don't forget you can get in touch with us on all social channels instagram facebook tiktok just type in netmoms and you'll find us and if you liked what you've heard today we'd love for you to give us a five-star rating press the follow button and share the podcast on all your socials