Woman's Hour - Listener Week: Aftermath of domestic abuse, women's dialects, losing parents in your 30s, knickers

Episode Date: August 7, 2026

Listener Week on Woman's Hour is where we bring your stories, ideas and the issues you want to hear about to air.A father has written to us about his daughter's experience of domestic abuse. He says that while she suffered physical and emotional abuse at the hands of her partner in a small town, the harm didn't end when the relationship did. He says that despite knowing the circumstances, many of her friends and those in their community have encouraged her to 'let it go' and they now maintain happy relationships with him. We'll speak with psychologist Dr Jessica Taylor, about our listener's daughter's experience. Do you ever use dialect when you speak? Do you think of yourself as having an accent? How do you feel about the way you sound? A listener in Yorkshire, Christina Longden, has got in touch with a request to hear from women like herself who are actively keeping regional dialect alive, an endeavour which she says has traditionally been the preserve of men. Christina would also like to discuss accent and dialect bias and why, she says, men have always been more permitted to speak in dialect than women. To discuss why what you say and how you say it still matters and how it’s influenced by gender, presenter Chloe Tilly is joined down the line from Yorkshire by Christina Longden, a council member of the Yorkshire Dialect Society; by Diana Rackham, chair of Friends of Norfolk Dialect; and by Professor Rob Drummond, professor of sociolinguistics at Manchester Metropolitan University.'Most people expect to lose their parents much later in life, often when they're middle-aged or older. But what happens when it happens in your thirties instead?’ Those are the words of Becky Tanswell, who contacted us wanting to share her experience of losing both of her parents before the age of 40. Becky says it changed not only her experience of grief, but also motherhood and her sense of identity. She also wants to explore an aspect of bereavement that's rarely talked about: how grief can coexist with unexpected feelings of freedom, resilience and hope.Granny pants, thongs, shorts, high-legs, bikini briefs. We wear them every single day, but do we spend enough time and money choosing our gussets? And what do you do when your go-to knicker is decommissioned? This is what listener Christine Stainer wanted us to get into, so she joins Chloe along with Kim Hawley, chief wellness tester at Good Housekeeping.Presenter: Chloe Tilly Producer: Simon Richardson

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. Growing businesses deal with the same problem. Too many tools, too much back and forth and not enough time. Odu helps bring it all together. It's an all-in-one business management platform, fully integrated from sales and accounting to inventory and marketing, so your team can spend less time chasing information and focus on growth. Whether you're in retail, manufacturing or service, Odu gives you one place. to manage your business. Visit Odu.com to book a demo. It's O'Dbolo.com. Hello, this is Chloe Tilly and you're listening to The Woman's Our Podcast. Good morning and welcome to the program. It is our final day of listener week. Every single item we've discussed since Monday has come from you. And you've sent in so many brilliant suggestions of what we should be talking about.

So today we're going to be joined by a proud Yorkshire listener who is trying to keep regional dialects alive. Something she says has often been the preserve of men. So what does your dialect say about you? Do you dial it up and dial it down, depending on the company you keep? You can text us 84844 on social media. We're at BBC Woman's Hour. And of course, you can email us through our website. Now, I wonder have you ever felt stigmatised for having a regional accent or a dialect? Or do you say, actually, no, this is a badge of honour that I wear. And interestingly, do you encourage it in your kids, or do you find yourself telling them to do? tone it down. Now one woman's our listener got in touch about the impact of losing both of her parents

in her 30s. She will tell us how it has shaped her as a mother and affected her sense of an identity, but also something that we rarely discuss. She also has feelings she didn't expect of freedom, both financially and from being a carer. And we're talking knickers, whether they're high leg, hipster, thongs or quite frankly anything in between. It's prompted by a listener getting in saying her favourite pants are no longer available and she's struggling to find a comfy alternative. We're going to get some advice from a knicker tester. Your thoughts, of course, very welcome via WhatsApp.

0-3700-100-444. But first, a father has written to us about his daughter's experience of domestic abuse. He says she suffered abuse at the hands of her partner in a small town and the harm didn't end when the relationship did. He goes on to say there was, physical and emotional abuse in the relationship, and she left her partner after a violent incident, which she reported to the police, although later decided not to take the case further.

Now, many friends and her women's group have encouraged her to, quote, let it go, now that the relationship has ended. Others have maintained happy relationships with him, and he now wants to attend social and community events that she was once part of. The father says that despite knowing the circumstances, organisers have allowed this to happen, leaving his daughter feeling excluded from spaces where she once felt safe and welcome. Now, we often talk about the impact of abuse within a relationship. How much attention is paid to what happens when a survivor feels unsupported or isolated by the wider community afterwards? Well, the father suggested we speak to psychologist Dr Jessica Taylor about what some people call the social gaslighting of women who've experienced abuse.

The daughter has told us she is happy for her experience to be. discussed. Well, Dr Jessica Taylor is a chartered psychologist, Sunday Times bestselling author, and the founder of Victim Focus, an organisation which specialises in trauma-informed research, training and support. I spoke to her and began by asking what her reaction was to hearing this father's account of what his daughter had experienced. Unfortunately, I actually was not surprised at all. And when women talk to me about these kinds of experiences, again, really sadly, one of the things I end up saying to them is that this is probably the most common response that women will get from their friends, from their family, from their social networks is going to be this sort of disbelief or minimisation or, you know, telling you to move on or sort of framing you as if you're overreacting or that you're completely lying about it. I think the expectation, and I totally understand it, but the expectation that most of us have when we go through a situation like this is that our support network is going to be there for us.

but very often they are not. And instead, I suppose, the reactions that we get from them further compound that trauma because we were expecting them to hold us up and listen and be there, protect us, and also to not then have any more contact with the perpetrator, but that very often does not happen. And do we know why that is? There's multiple reasons for that, I think. If we think about the psychological motivations of those people around the victim,

some of it unfortunately is going to be apathy they just don't care like you think they're going to care about what happened to you and they don't some of it is going to be a struggle to see the perpetrator for who they really are so maybe that perpetrator is very friendly or charming or successful or nice or you know however they perceive that perpetrator to be and it just doesn't line up in their head like that perpetrator doesn't fit the stereotype of what they think so therefore it is easier to believe that woman is lying or exaggerating than it is to have to cut that perpetrator off, for example, and see them for who they are. I think some of it is also to do with like an embedded belief in the sort of innocent until proven guilty. So it's like, well, you said he did that,

but the police haven't arrested him. And he's got no conviction. So like, what, what are you expecting from us? You want us to just cut him off on your word? You know, so sometimes it'll come back to something like that. But there's so many motivations. I mean, one of the more controversial ones is going to be that there are certain people in our friendship networks that are perpetrators themselves.

So they're definitely not going to take the word of a victim. I mean, we tell women, don't we? And men, that if they're in an abusive relationship to get out and things will get better, but this is different trauma that's ongoing. And what is that like for the man or the woman who's going through that. Howard, the best way to explain this is I think that we're almost

misleading victims to believe that if they leave an abusive relationship, the abuse will end, because you ended the relationship and therefore this will end for you. And in most cases, post-separation abuse will start when you try to leave that relationship. So we already have a lot of research that is saying, for the man or the woman in that situation, predominantly women, that the most dangerous time is your point of exit. So when you try to exit an abusive relationship, that's where your risk level for violence, even things like homicide, go up at that point. But it's not as if there's this big peak of risk and then it just disappears and that perpetrator is just like, oh, well, that's over now and it's over, I'll just move on. In a lot of cases, the control and the power

that that perpetrator exerted and wanted over that victim, it doesn't go anywhere just because the victim says, I don't want to be in this relationship anymore and it's over. So it then evolves into post-separation abuse, stalking, harassment, smear campaigns, and that's that trauma that you're talking about. It's that we've told these victims, if you just come forward, if you just report it, if you just leave, your life is going to get better. But what if it doesn't? What if actually makes it much, much worse?

And in the letter from the father, he says that his daughter feels increasingly excluded, from social spaces and spaces in her community, which were once a really important part of her life. Is that often the case? Yes. I've actually come across multiple cases like this over the last few years where the women end up fully withdrawing from those. You know, maybe it's a club, maybe it's a bar that they go to,

maybe it's a gym that they go to, maybe it's the workplace, they end up quitting their job, you know, because there isn't really a way, for that woman to have a sense of safety where she's now in spaces where that abusive X is not only just in them, but is sort of successfully and happily in them and people are welcoming them and supporting them, listening to them, believing them. She is going to get isolated. And I think that it's important that we recognise that that isolation is not in her head. She is being isolated in that situation. And how is she supposed to feel safe? So eventually most women just

withdraw. The father says he actually uses the term social gaslighting. I mean, first of all, just explain what that is. And do you think that's a useful term? Do you think that's a realistic term? I use the term gaslighting quite specifically, because I do think that it can be overused. I'm not suggesting that he is doing it because I don't think he is. But I think I use it specifically to mean the way that we will frame a victim as being mentally ill or having mental health issues or having gone crazy or not understanding or, you know, exaggerating something that they're talking about. Gaslighting is a deliberate thing. It's a way of making that person look like they're going crazy or look like they're exaggerating

so that nobody actually has to take them seriously. Does that happen in social environments? Absolutely. Does it also happen in a collective? So could your whole family gaslight you when you're saying, actually, this person abused me? They're like, no, we think it's your mental health. We think you should go get help. you're the one with the problem here.

Does that happen in a family? Yes. Does that happen in an entire friendship network? Absolutely. Does it happen within a community? Absolutely. It even happens in global communities, which is what we've seen with celebrities that have been gaslit,

for example, and framed as mentally ill when they've come out as victims of abuse. So the way that he's talking about this is likely accurate. It is quite common, for example, that when women are trying to get their friends and family to see what their abuser did, it is quite common, unfortunately, for that friendship network to start being like, I think she needs help. Like, she's obsessed with this. Why does she keep going on about it?

Like, she needs help. Like, she needs therapy. She should speak to her doctor. So it does move into gaslighting quite quickly, actually. And ultimately, what they're looking for is human connection and support, right? So they're talking to people and trying to get them to understand. Now, in other, and further than that, for some women, what they're trying to do is get other women to understand that their abuser is dangerous

and that they're not a good person, that they're lying to everybody, that they've manipulated everybody. And so they're trying to get that across. But of course, the more they try to get that across, the more that they can be framed as Matt and that they have mental health issues and that they're obsessed with their ex. So they're accidentally, completely accidentally,

falling into this trap, you know, and it's not their fault at all, but people are much more comfortable suggesting that a woman has something wrong with her mental health than that potentially there is a perpetrator in their community. And is there a difference when it involves a female survivor opposed to a male survivor? Do male survivors face different barriers or do women face different barriers within their community? Yes, I think that they do.

The research around, for example, things like pathologisation, so the framing of you as being mentally ill when you're trying to talk about abuse and abuses is much more common in women and girls, for example. It's not that it doesn't happen to men and boys, when they've been subjected to abuse, it's not as likely because the way that gender-roll stereotyping works is that when women express their emotions, they are generally seen as hysterical, over-emotional,

exaggerating and lying. So that lends itself to that psychiatric approach more. Like, well, she's got a personality disorder. She's got something wrong with her. She needs to go to a doctor. I think with men, I think there's a slightly different experience that they go through when they've been abused, which is like silencing.

Like they just don't tell anyone at all. In fact, actually, that's such an interesting way of looking at it because maybe in that case, the reason that women are so much more likely to experience this form of exclusion and gaslighting is because they're more likely to try and talk to their female friends and to their contacts and their networks and say, look, this is what happened to me and I need your help,

whereas maybe it's that the male survivors are just not really saying anything. The father in his message to us is suggesting a practical solution. calling for a safe, facilitated space where the community can, will essentially explore attitudes which he describes as misogynistic and patriarchal. Is that possible? What would that look like? Is it realistic? Oof, that is interesting because attitudes are much harder to change than we originally thought,

and what we've got to remember is that all of us are groomed and socialised into what we think and believe since birth. Like, there's no way around that. Similarly, for example, like if we take the conversation around misogyny, at the moment, especially in the UK, the conversation around misogyny, in policing, in government, in society,

in the so-called manosphere and all that sort of thing, it's focused on men's misogyny and that men are misogynistic and the impact on women. But what that has completely ignored is that women are also misogynistic. And women, we are all brought up to hate women because we live in a misogynistic society. So in a way, all of the interventions that we've done

and all of the narratives we've created in order to try and deal with these attitudes, we've actually ignored 51% of the population when we're actually contributing to it as well because women victim blame at the same rate as men and women holds misogynistic views at the same rate as men and the research has backed that up for a good 15 years now. So even when I go into spaces,

because I do a lot of attitudinal change work, let's say we have 50 people in a room, you might have 20 people that react really well to that. And they sat there like, oh my gosh, I've always thought this, but you're always going to have a resistant proportion that are just sitting there listening to you thinking, I don't care what you say, I know what I believe, you know. It's hard.

That kind of attitudeal change is hard. So if people are listening to our conversation now and think actually someone has come to me and spoken to me and said that they have got out of an abusive relationship or in an abusive relationship, And maybe on reflection, they're thinking maybe I brought into this idea that actually, well, this person is nice to me and they seem kind and they've got a good job and I can't really believe that they would do this. If people are reassessing that as they listen to our conversation, what could they do in their own community to support somebody who has said, actually, I'm a survivor of abuse and this person is still in our community? The first thing I would say is if you're listening to this and those are the conclusions you're coming to, please don't feel like guilty.

Because you have been groomed in society to believe that these kinds of perpetrators are like weirdos, monsters and that you can spot them and that, you know, you can tell the difference. And you absolutely cannot. Abuse of all kinds occurs at every level of society and every background of person. Everybody is capable of abuse. So that's the first thing. The second thing is, if it's like what you could do differently, honestly, the best thing you can, could do if somebody came to you and disclosed abuse and I was talking to you about these types of things that they're perpetrators, still in the community, still at large, everybody

loves them, whatever, is ask them what they want. Like, you don't need to jump to a conclusion. You could be speaking to that victim and say to them, thank you for telling me. Is there something in particular that you need or want from me? And you know, a lot of victims will say, well, no, not really. I just wanted to tell you. I just wanted somebody to listen to me. You don't always have to be the person that jumps in and takes action. Well, that was chartered, Dr Jessica Taylor. And if you've been affected by anything that you have heard, the BBC Action Line has links for support.

Now, do you ever use dialect when you speak? Do you think of yourself as having an accent? And how do you feel about the way you sound? Well, a listener from Yorkshire, Christina Longdon, has got in touch with us with her request to hear from women like herself who are actively keeping regional dialects alive, an endeavour which she says has traditionally been the preserve of men. Now, following a recent Westminster Hall debate by MPs, which referred to mocking regional accents as the last form of exceptional discrimination in this country, Christina also raised the related issue of accent and dialect bias.

Men, she says, have always been more permitted to speak in dialect than women. Well, to discuss why what we say and how we say it, or indeed how our ancestors did, still matters and also how it's influenced by gender, we can speak to Christina Longdon, who's suggesting. did this, a council member of the Yorkshire Dialect Society. Morning to you, Christina. Good morning. Hello. Lovely to have you with us. Also joining us is Diana Rackham, Chair of Friends of Norfolk dialect. Hi, Diana. Hello, good morning. Good to have you with us. And also Professor Rob Drummond, Professor of Sociolinguistics at Manchester Metropolitan University. Welcome to you as well, Rob. Good morning, thanks. First of all, Rob, can you just explain to us? Let's take this right back to basics. What's the difference between dialects? and accent and how closely related are they? Yeah, that's a good question.

So they are obviously, they are related and people use the terms interchangeably sometimes. But really, if we're being quite precise about it, dialect is the bigger term. Dialect includes words and grammar and pronunciation, how you sound. But when we talk about accent, we're only talking about pronunciation.

So it's just the sounds of your language is accent, and everything else is dialect when you think about words and grammar. Now, Christina, we're having this discussion because you suggested it. Just explain to us where your passion came from for dialect and indeed, I suppose, by extension accent. I think it came from my parents. My dad in particular has always been a very broad accent. I must admit as well, I feel like a bit of a thought because I'm a Lancashire last.

I was born in Lancashire. And I've been in West Yorkshire for nearly 20 years now. So I went to university, first generation, university educated to a Russell group, university, and I felt like a fish out of water for many reasons, but primarily because the minute I opened my gob, I sounded so different. And I was very, very fortunate in that my professor at university, Carl Chin, who's a very well-known brummy, he instantly zoned in on what was my nervousness at speaking. and I think it probably is Carl and reading Mother in Heights

that made me realise actually there's a certain way of speaking which isn't just your accent it's the words and it's your mother tongue it's the words that you learned from very small when you were small from your grandparents and then I became curious as to why these words are being lost

partly because of globalisation, Americanisation and I just thought as a historian and I kind of a wick to myself and to my children to reclaim that really. And for you, Diana, why were you engaged in celebrating dialect? I think it's a sort of very similar story, really. When I was growing up, I didn't really realise I was using dialect words. I would say to my mum, oh, the cat's caught a ranny. And I would be confused because if somebody else would identify that as a shrew.

and it wasn't until years later did I think, oh, that was a dialect word. And again, that university experience getting out and meeting people from other parts of the world and hearing other words. I remember opening the fridge and going, oh, the carrots have gone fozy and nobody else knew what the word foezy meant.

So suddenly I was like, oh, this is really interesting that I have words that I use to describe things and other people don't know what they are. And then the idea of it being of Norfolk dialect origin. We've got a treat for our listeners because you're both going to read some traditional speech, if you like, some traditional dialect for us.

I know Christina, you've got an extract from a poem. Do you want to briefly introduce it for us and then go ahead and deliver it for us? This was interestingly written in the 1860s by a man called Samuel Laycock, who is claimed by Lancashire as the Lancashire poet, although like me, he was cross-border, across Sutherworthmore, born and bred in Marsden in West Yorkshire. So he hopped over the hill, like many of us do, blending the Yorkshire with the Lancashire. This is primarily written in

Lancashire dialect. It's a very well-known one, and it's called Bowton's Yard. So it's the name of a yard in Staler Bridge, which is where Samuel lived. At number one, in Bouton's Yard, migroni keeps a scoo. It was in a me. many scholars yet, who's no but one or two. They send found women's ray the cross. Well, well, it may be so. I know who boxed me rarely once and poohed me ears, I know. At number two, lives Widow Burns, who washes clothes for folk.

They're Billy, that's the son. Wheeling cork. They send new courts with salmon heads that lives at number three. It may be so. I cannot tell. It matters now to me. Lovely. Now, for people who maybe aren't familiar with that dialect,

is there a line particularly you want to pick out for us, explain its meaning? This is a great one. And it illustrates how in Lancashire, as opposed to Yorkshire, they drop the L off things. So it says, I know who boxed me. She thumped me, boxed me, rarely once and pooed my ears, I know.

So she pulled my ears. And scoo, I grew up saying, we're going to school. So it's school. whereas in Yorkshire we say it quite differently. That's really interesting. Diana, I know you're going to give us a taste of traditional Norfolk speech. Now this is something you wrote yourself, I understand. So take it away. Yeah, so I wrote it myself because I was having to look through things and trying to find a way of getting lots of dialect words in there for you.

And it goes like this. That tooty little old mother, she never hung up in a way. but one day she had a thigh out. That's a rum and ball, Billy, say. They had a good old marble about how that was all a loader old truck, and they went off to the charity. She used a dweil to get rid of the muck. Time went by, and then one day,

bore Billy turned up at her door, with a gift to trickle out her new tidy home. She was sure she'd sent that before. That's lovely. Thank you so much. and I really appreciate you writing something, especially for women's out. We feel very honoured. Do you want to pick out a line for us particularly and explain its meaning?

Yeah, so I'd just thought I'd pick out a few of my favourite words in there. So to triculate means to decorate. And I think, you know, you can hear it in the word a bit there. Dwyle is of Dutch origin. So some of the Norfolk dialect is influenced by the Flemish weavers coming over. And so Dwight is a floorcloth. And of course a famous phrase We might say if something's a bit strange, bit odd

Or we find that a bit funny We would go, that's a rumman Thank you. Thank you for explaining that. It's a really interesting insight. And I know one thing I want to pick up on, Christina, I know when you got in touch with us, you said that the work of recording,

reading, speaking dialect words Has long been the preserve of men. And I'm just interested why you think that and indeed why that is. Yeah, I mean, if you speak to any of the fellas who were involved in the Yorkshire Dialect Society, you know, I'm sure they're in agreement with me, which is just at that point, really in the late end of the Victorian era, this is when the dialect societies in Britain boomed. So in the 1890s, academics, actually, but many of them from, you know, more working class backgrounds who love the dialect, decided to preserve the language in dictionaries. And obviously at this point, women were not engaged in those kind of professions. So it has been, you know, very male dominated in terms of the actual recording and the preservation.

Women have always spoken in dialect. We've always gotten on with stuff. We've not had time to be sitting down writing dictionaries and thinking about the way that we speak. We just do it. And I think that's the interesting bit is so you can speak to women now who speak dialect, but they would not perhaps even know about a society of preserving it. Having spoken to a lot of women the last couple of weeks about this, unanimously I get told your accent is bad enough.

You have to water that down anyway in order to get on in life, but to speak these words that somebody will have to ask you what they mean is an absolute no-no. And this is why we're losing it is because as women, we have this pressure of deference, of hierarchy, the fear, especially if you're from a more working class background of speaking the way that you would in the home, everything that your family do to sacrifice and to hope that you do well in the world. It's like you're betraying that. So there's this prestige that goes with standard English.

And yeah, so it's very much we have to check ourselves. Just a quick example, when you introduced me then, I didn't say a-up, or now then, because I had to check that. I thought, well, that alienate people. And it's a nice side of that, which means that you've been inclusive, but also this is what we've been doing to ourselves as women for a long time. That's really interesting. Rob, I want to bring you back in on that,

because studies show women use fewer dialect features than men. Is it for those reasons that Christina's just outlined? Yeah, exactly that. There is a greater kind of societal pressure on women to follow the norms of sort of standard English. English and standard behavior and politeness and all of these things because we live in a very unequal society and historically it's been even more so. And so women have needed that that prestige that comes with with standard language, as Christine has just said, they need that in

order to kind of elevate their position in a similar situation. A man wouldn't necessarily have to do that. And she'll also write in that in the kind of historically, it has been men who have been recording these things. And interesting, the survey of English dialect was a very big survey in the 1950s and 60s, which really aimed to preserve dialect across England. And they specifically targeted norms, they were called, they were non-mobile, older, rural men, because those were the people who were kind of deemed to have the most authentic, be the most authentic dialect speakers. And so that just reinforces this all the time. And so that just reinforces this all the time. And so you get this constant idea that if you want true kind of dialect, you know, you go to these older men.

And of course, that's just nonsensical because it has just been pointed out. Women have always used these different ways of speaking. It's just that in sort of in society, in areas where people are being judged and where people need to get on, then there is this real inequality and different expectations of men and women. and we see that, you know, even today. Well, when you mention that, it made me think about, if we're talking about dialect, but also accent, the way Andy Burnham, when he speaks, can be treated

versus, say, for example, Angela Rainer as a woman. Yeah, absolutely. And this is something we're looking into at the moment, actually. So with my colleague Amanda Cole at Cambridge, we're looking at the voices of people in Westminster. So we've got a project on the go called Westminster Voices, and we're interviewing MPs and members of the House of Lords and we're asking for their experiences of their ways of speaking.

And you're absolutely right. There are, again, different expectations and different judgments. And this just reinforces other studies and other things that have happened in the past where we see this real kind of unequal judgment about how people speak. So you can get a man and a woman with seemingly identical other social factors, same class, same background, same ethnicity, same job. Yet it will be the woman who is picked out as speaking in, you know, her speech will be viewed negatively, more negatively than a man.

And this happens kind of anecdotally with, I don't know, I've seen it with kind of in presenters in broadcasting. There are some very clear examples. As you say, in politics, people like Andy Burnham, Angela Rainer, Jess Phillips. And there are plenty of men with much stronger or equally strong regional access. since there's Jess Phillips and Angela Raina, but they don't get the same kind of judgment. And this is also backed up in research

that women's voices are judged more harshly, more negatively. Christine, you said that you, I mean, even before we came on here today, you thought about what words to use and whether that might alienate people. Do you feel pressure from, say, family when you were growing up to talk a certain way? Or indeed, you passed that on to your children,

and say, no, don't talk like that. Tone it down. I definitely do feel like, because if I've ever on the radio, my parents always comment how broad I sound. And I have to explain that when I'm nervous, I go really broad. Job interviews, it's been commented. And it's just a nervous thing. And I'm going right back to being small because I'm feeling vulnerable because I'm on air.

With my kids, it's interesting because they have less of an accent than me, and that's possible because of my husband who doesn't have. have, he was a brummy. He's a brummy in denial. He'll kill me for saying that. So he, he kind of watered down that. But I have encouraged both my children to, to play with dialects and to play with words and, you know, just saying casual stuff like, Fram this end. You know, they're useless, like a wooden duck and put wooden dial. And, you know, just the words that we have in West Yorkshire like braying, or if you're not from around the area, we call somebody an off-cumder.

these are words that my kids will know and they'll be familiar with from school. But I think that's just probably because I make quite a lot of effort to instill that in them. Would you worry if they used it they would be judged? I think it would depend. I mean, my son, for example, I believe that he's an apprentice and I believe that in the workplace, you know, quite a lot of these dialect words I used. my daughter again, it's really difficult because depending on what job you're going to, you almost feel that you have to just say to your kids now, just remember,

you speak differently outside the house as you would, you know, in the workplace and in a job interview and, you know, they'll roll my eyes, they'll roll their eyes at me and say, yeah, shut up, mum. But it is that thing of just saying you have got more disadvantage because of the region that you come from and the types of family that you're born into. than other people. So I just have to warn you to, one, be careful and to also, you know, make sure that other people can understand you. There is a lovely element of just being considerate to other people, but there is a definite deference element to it all as well.

Thank you so much for coming on discussing this. Really, really interesting conversation. Christina, thank you for suggesting it. Christina Longdon there. Take care of yourself. We also heard from Diana Rackman and from Professor Rob Drummond. His new book, Manchester Voices, accents, dialects and identities is out now. Thank you for your messages coming in on this. This message is coming in saying, when I was at school in North Yorkshire back in the late 70s, the school newspaper was called Now Then,

a commonly used greeting in that region, often shortened simply to now. I was just explained to my husband last night, says this message, the meaning of the word keek, I hope I've pronounced that properly, to look furtively because it was used on Benedorme's murder. He asked me why I know,

I never used it. I said because no one would understand it. I never use these words like Lopfully and Loppy Dog. And this message says it makes me sad. Also, I've toned down my accent to work in professional services because it would sound really odd. But this is a nice positive message about dialect. I have a Brummy accent, not a black country accent. Both apparently indicate that the speaker is rather common or stupid and advantage as they don't see us coming. Do keep your thoughts coming. You can get in touch. this, you can text us 84844. We're at BBC Woman's Hour. Eating well shouldn't be complicated, but somehow it turns into recipes, prep, clean up, and half your Sunday gone. Factors solves all

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Clean. That's up to $90 off and free shipping, but only with the code clean at factormeals.ca. Factor, Canada's number one meal delivery service. Now, on Tuesday, Kylie discussed a topic that lots of our listeners requested for Listener Week. 52-year-old Stacey Doogood was unemployed, has been unemployed, for 16 months, actively applying for jobs to no avail. She estimates she sent over 150 job applications and received very few replies. She explained her situation. We are facing a crisis, midlife women, and there's a reason for it.

We are being filtered out by AI. In April 2025, I started applying for jobs. End of April, nothing. No auto replies, nothing. May, the same. June, July, August. I started running out of money. Christmas, disaster.

I was on my niece. Sent my CV to a girlfriend of mine who works for a big law firm in London. She said, Stacey, this is an old lady's CV. You need to Botox it. And by Botox it, she meant reduce my entire identity, my entire work experience, my work life down to seven years. Remove my age. Remove all semblance of who I am.

And then I got mad. I posted to my Instagram stories how I, felt how frustrated it was, is it just me, no auto replies and being ghosted, there were hundreds of messages. I'm arguing it's the system that's broken, not us. I'm arguing that this is reductive and that the government needs to have better governance over the recruitment industry. And that is what I'm calling for. Well, that is the experience of Stacey Doogood. The discussion has prompted a phenomenal response over 1,500 comments and counting. This is important, but it's not just the AI recruiting process that needs fixing. It's the deeply

entrenched asism. That's the contribution from one listener. You can keep your thoughts coming in on that. And you can hear that discussion in full. All you have to do is go to BBC Sounds and search for Woman's Hour for Tuesday the 4th of August. Now, most people expect to lose their parents much later in life, often when they're middle aged or older. But what if this happens in your 30s instead. Those are the words of Rebecca Tanswell, who contacted us wanting to share her experience of losing both of her parents before the age of 40. Rebecca says it changed not only her experience of grief, but also motherhood and her sense of identity. She also wants to explore an aspect of bereavement that's rarely talked about how grief can coexist with unexpected feelings of freedom,

of resilience and indeed hope. And I'm delighted to say that Rebecca is with us now. Good morning to you, Rebecca. Good morning. Thank you for having me. Well, thank you. And I mean, this is such a deeply personal story. Why is it that you wanted to share it with us and get us talking about it? Well, being an adult orphan, that's what I call it, in my 30s whilst navigating those early years of motherhood. It's been really lonely. And so I wanted to reach out to share my story in the hope that there are other listeners who might resonate with what I'm going through,

and we can start a discussion about it. You were very close to your mum, weren't you? Describe that relationship for us. Yeah, my mum, Gina, we were so close. I say I never grew out of holding her hand. We would say, I love you several times a day, lots of hugs and kisses. We loved going for walks with her Bedlington Terriers,

visiting old churches and going to open gardens. and mum got very poorly toward the end of her life with cancer and she was in hospice care. And I remember holding her hand and having my son Luca, my first son, Luca, who was seven months at the time on my lap. And I was looking at Luca who was at the start of his life. And I was looking at mum who was at the end of her life. and I lay my head on her chest and she stroked my hair and said, I'm not going to hear Luca say his first words, am I? And that was true.

And I, every night now when I stroke my children's hair, you know, as they go to sleep, I think of her and how proud she was to see me become a mum and what an amazing granny she was to Luca. And is that why you say navigating motherhood without your mum has been one of the hardest parts? Yeah, I mean, when you become a mum for the first time, you want your mum by your side. You know, not just practically helping you, but being at the end of the phone saying, you've got this, you're doing great, or I'm coming right over to help you. and she's not there for those moments.

And there are so many questions I have for her that I'll never get the answers to. Like, did you breastfeed me? And what kind of sleeper was I? And what did you feed me when you started weaning? And just those insights that I never thought to ask because I wasn't a mum yet. I'm now at the forefront of my mind. I know that it was around 18 months later that you were, you discovered that you were pregnant again, which must have been a wonderful moment for you. But it was also

the day that you found out that your dad had died. Yeah, the night before dad died, I took a pregnancy test and found out I was pregnant. So there was this kind of 12-hour period of elation. And the following afternoon, I got a call from my dad's very good neighbor to say that my dad had taken his own life. And so then the absolute joy I was feeling just evaporated and I was left with feelings of absolute horror and overwhelming, just grief. Yeah. And how did the grief differ in mourning for your mum and your dad? Because it must have been different. Yeah, and that's something I want to share with you is that grief doesn't necessarily feel the same between parents. So with a dad who's taken his own life unexpectedly, there is a lot of anger there

as well as the sadness. And then moving through that anger, you know, towards the end of my dad's life. His mental health was very poor and I was supporting him through that. And there were many calls we had with Dad on the end of the line saying he was thinking about taking his own life, which was incredibly distressing. I'd get concerned calls from neighbours, you know, concerned about his welfare and I'd have to rush to the house and be dialing 999 and navigating getting dad sectioned. It was a very chaotic existence between us in those final few years. And in his death, there has been peace. I'm no longer worrying about the phone call from him. And there's calm in my life and a space in my life has opened up that didn't exist when he was alive because so much

of my time was taken up being a dutiful daughter, being a good daughter to him. And so I'm now left with this space that I get to fill and think, who, who am I now? I'm not his daughter, you know, and what do I spend my time with? And there's freedom and there's hopefulness in that that I'd like to share as well. And so does that mean you've almost rediscovered who you are? I'm on that journey. I'm on that journey of discovery and thinking, yeah, who is Becky now? And I think I'd like to spend time, the time that I have, being a really present mother, being a really supportive friend and present in my community.

I would love to write more. I used to write poetry all the time when before my parents were poorly. And I'd love to pick up the pen again. I know mum would have loved that. And go on adventures travelling because I was always anxious about leaving the country because what if my parents were. parents needed me. And so how do you navigate that grief? Because you're essentially dealing with a double grief, but griefs which are so very different. I have really navigated that through my children. So I have two cheeky boys, Luca who's three and a half, and Sonny, who's nine months.

And Sunny, in particular, of course I found out I was. pregnant with him just the day before dad died. And when we got the 20 weeks scan and found out he was a boy, we quickly decided to name him Sonny because he has been the sunshine in the darkness. And I like to think that he was a gift from mum to pull me through that horrendous grief from losing dad and her. And through. my boys, through loving my boys, it's like it brings back memories of my parents. Like as I say, in stroking their hair, it's like mum's giving me a stroking my hair and playing with them and teaching Luca how to ride a bike. It's like my dad's alongside me and we're

going through those memories. We recently got back from a trip to the seaside to Nuky and Cardigan Bay and we did the crab fishing I used to do with dad. And it's just, reliving those memory. Very healing for me. I want to ask you a little bit about, you touched on it, about this almost feeling of relief from some of the anxiety, the worry, responsibility you carried for your parents. Was it difficult for you to acknowledge those feelings? Absolutely, because we don't talk about them, do we?

I think in our society, The way we talk about grief is it's so sad and we're kind of comfortable talking about the sadness, but what we're not comfortable is talking about the other things. And with my mum, she passed away from cancer, but in the final years of her life, she had vascular dementia. And I used to joke with her, I'm going to build you a granny shed in the garden. But there was a, there was truth in that sentiment in that I was going to look after her, whatever. because she looked after my nan. My nan had looked after her mum.

That's what the women did in our family. We took care of each other. So I was going to become a full-time carer for my mum. But that didn't mean the thought of that didn't, well, it felt, I felt full of dread. If I'm honest, I felt full of dread. I was really scared. I was really anxious.

It kept me up at night because I knew that in becoming a full-time carer for mine, it would mean that I'd have to step up. away from my career, which was important to me. I'd have to step away from my young family. And so the future looked quite bleak. And to be doing that in your 30s is a really tough thing, I think, at any age caring, but when you've got a young family and you know that you're going to have to miss all those special moments because you're going to be looking after your mum with dementia, that's hard. People don't like talking about that, do they? And so you have freedoms now that you didn't have. Yeah, so I was looking at my life as being a full-time carer to mum and increasingly

to my dad because of his mental health. That's not on the cards anymore. So there is a freedom in that, but there was also another thing we don't talk about, financial freedom. So I was envisaging a lot of my parents' inheritance was going to be gobbled up with their home fees, you know. But we were left with, you know, their family home and their savings. And that has given me some financial freedom. You know, I'm on my mat leave at the moment. I was worrying about how I'm navigating that and I've been able to navigate it comfortably. I have financial independence in my 30s.

My niece, all the grandchildren inherited some money. niece who was 19, she's going to put a deposit down on her first house. You know, what 19 year old gets to do that? So the financial freedom has filtered not just to myself, but to the grandchildren as well. And again, we kind of feel icky talking about money, don't me? But, you know, I can go and do some higher education if I want to. I can go back to education. I can do a career change. What a gift my parents have given me. How happy they would be to know that. that. And you say it's made you more resilient. In what way? Absolutely. I used to think the day that my mum died would be the worst day ever and it was and also the day that dad died because I'd lost

my people, the people that I love so much in the world. I held my hand as my mom took her last I was there and I endured that and I come out of the other side. I've gone on to carry a child and bring life, bring him into the world, you know, through the death of my dad. And so if I can get through that, I can get through the ups and downs of my wonderful marriage. I can get through career stresses. I can get through anything. And I don't sweat the small stuff anymore.

The toddler tantrums, the sleepless nights. Yeah, it's tough. But I can get through it. So it's made me incredibly resilient. Rebecca, it's been really lovely to speak to you today. And thank you so much for talking to us because it must be incredibly difficult for you. But important to discuss these things,

which you rightly say are not often discussed. So thank you so much. Thank you. Take care. That's Rebecca Tanswell there, who wanted us to talk about that. And if you want to get in touch with your experience as well, do share your thoughts with us,

84844, or you can WhatsApp us 0-3-700-100-444. Right, we've got seven minutes of the program left, and we're going to talk about knickers. Granny pants, thongs, shorts, high legs, bikini briefs, anything you like. We wear them every single day. But do we spend enough? time and enough money choosing them.

And what do you do when you'll go to knickers are decommissioned? Find the nearest alternative, hope for the best, or take a leap of faith and try something completely different. Well, this is what listener Christine Stainer wanted us to discuss. So we've asked Kim Hawley, chief wellness tester at Good Housekeeping to join Christine and myself to discuss this. So welcome to you both. Thank you.

Thanks for being with us. So, Christine, you wanted to come on women's out to talk. about knickers. Tell us your problem you've got at the moment. Well, I like the ones that I've got. And when I went back to the famous department store on the high street to buy some more, I discovered they're no longer available. So you look at what you were used to and what style they were. And there are umpteen styles out there, as you mentioned in your introduction. And so you try and find the nearest. And then you look at the same. And then you look at the same. size and they were size 10 or 12. But no, now they're size small, medium and large. So you think,

well, which one do I buy? So you plump for a size and you plump for a style. You take them home, you wear them, and you discover they're uncomfortable. So what do you do then? You have to throw them away because nobody wants secondhand knickers. Secondhand, almost anything else you can get rid of, but not those. So that's a waste of money. It's going into landfill. It's a waste of resources. So then you go back and buy some more. And that could happen two or three times. You end up spending money resorted. And I've spoken to other various friends.

I spoke to my book group. And they all with one voice said, no, we have the same problem. And I thought, this is happening across the country. We're all throwing away various pairs of knickers because they're uncomfortable. And you really don't want to wear uncomfortable knickers. Well, at least I don't. And I'm sure many other women don't.

So I just wondered how other people cope with it. Well, it's interesting because we've got this message which has come in saying knickers, where have the guss it's gone? They're definitely narrowed. I'm spilling out. It's uncomfortable and unsightly. Before I bring Kim in to talk about this. So your main driver is what, Christine, is it, it's comfort rather than say cost or look or whatever? It's comfort, yes. Okay. So Kim, you have done some knicker testing. Talk us through. How do you do it, first of all? So at Good Housekeeping Institute, what we do is we'll test everything as much as we possibly can.

So we send out like dozens of pairs of pants in different styles. So that was the first issue. Obviously, as you just said, there are, I mean, I didn't even realize how many different styles of pants there are. There is everything from full length briefs to low-rise brief, hipsters, cheeky briefs. And then coming up the rear, you've got thongs and high-wasted thongs quite literally. there are just so many so it's finding a style that you like in a fabric that you like

and as Christine says in a size that actually fits you because there's not an awful lot of clarity there so what we do is we I will like for instance if I'm testing the pants we will measure them so they get measured across the top from top to bottom

and more importantly we measure the gusset no one wants an uncomfortable gusset in their pants They have got smaller. There are some key brands of really, you know, cottoned onto that. And they're like, okay, well, we're going to make sure that that stays. Because I think it's a little bit like trimming the edges off your chocolate.

You know, when they start taking that little square into a sort of rectangle, they've sort of narrowed it down in all sorts of ways, just cutting costs, I'm going to say. But yeah, that is uncomfortable because obviously, you know, we are designed by a logically in a certain shape. And so to have those sort of parts of your underwear being trimmed off without a buy or leave. And there's also difficulty, isn't it? Because washing sometimes, the elastics going, it changes shape. You can put them on one week, put them on the next week.

They don't feel like they fit. They're uncomfortable. They're saggy, whatever. Well, that's the testing that we do. So we will measure them. We then put them through like a digital imaging. So it checks the colour. And then we will put them through multiple wash and dry cycles.

So they go through five wash-dry cycles and then we repeat the process. So we measure them again. We put them back through the digital imaging. So we can see if they've shrunk in any way, see if the colour changes. So that way at least you know you've got something of good quality. So that's the first thing. And then we send lots of pairs out to our readers. And then they give us their feedback after about four weeks.

So they've had actual in-situ pant testing. So what's your advice to Christine, who's a favourite pants that they're always. a go-to pants, suddenly aren't being made anymore. And it can be a bit overwhelming, because I don't even feel like as you go to different shops, they have the same description for the same pants. They don't have the same descriptions. There are hundreds of different... So when we were trying to decide which

ones to test, that was a whole... That was a day of my life I'm not going to get back. Because I'm sitting there with this big list of pants thinking, well, I don't know which ones. So we went with the most popular, which according to, you know, Rita, the... I think it was 2016, UGov Pole,

was that's the last time they asked women what pants they wear. And so it was like a full brief or I think the next one was a boy short and the next one was a thong. So those are the most popular ones and those are the ones that we tested. So I think probably the best thing to do is when you find a pair that you like, yes, note down the size. Obviously the retailer you got it from but also the fabric because the fabrics can be different. If you've got a cotton pants or you've got something that's a little bit more man-made, but now they do these fabrics like a tent cell and modal, which are natural fabrics, but they've been sort of chemically engineered.

So they're very soft. And so to have the fabric you like, the size you like, the shape you like. And if I was, Christine, I would definitely, if it was that pair of pants, and they've changed the design without some kind of consultation, I would complain. I mean, I'm not suggesting you go to, service is with the pants. But you can email the brand and say, you know, this has changed and you've spent your money

on something. And as you're quite right, you can't do anything with that then. So at least you would get, hopefully you'd get refunded. But I definitely think there's a case for some sort of, you know, standardisation. When you go to a shop and you buy a pair of size five shoes, you're not expecting to, oh, maybe I can get away with a four or sometimes I'm a size seven. it's the size it is so there should definitely be

I think some sort of standardisation men have small, medium, large, extra large and it goes up like that whereas women's as Christine says it's size six size small there's so many so to find something that you like and that fits you really important

Christine I hope that's helped you best of luck in your quest to try and find your replacement bans good to speak to you both this morning Christine Stainer there and also Kim Hawley Chief Wellness tester at Good Housekeeping. Thank you for your messages today. And also if you have been impacted by anything that we have discussed today, do remember you can get help and support at the BBC

Action Line website. That's all for today's Women's Hour. Do join us again next time. I'm David Dimbleby and from the History Podcast and BBC Radio 4, this is Invisible Hands, the American Century. It's the story of how in the ashes of World War II, Flash, Washington. The White House announces Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. America rose to become a global superpower. The United States, whatever our force may be, is the hope of the world. And the invisible hands who made it happen.

He's probably the most important person nobody ever heard of. Listen to Invisible Hands, the American Century. First on BBC Science. Thanks.