Woman's Hour - Mel Shilling, Meera Narandan, Ella Saltmarshe, Lina Prestwood, Chi-chi Nwanoku, Nadia Gilani

Episode Date: September 30, 2022

A woman posted a thread on Mumsnet about wanting to take time off work while going through a break up with father or her child, the responses she got were mixed. We want to know whether you would ever consider this but also would you be open about taking time off to help deal with a break up? We speak to relationship expert Mel Schilling and blogger Meera Narandan.We talk to Chi-chi Nwanoku from Chineke! Orchestra – Europe’s first professional majority Black and ethnically diverse orchestra – and hear music from their new albumThe Yoga Manifesto – a new book by Nadia Gilani and we’ll be joined by one of the winners from last night’s International Women’s Podcast AwardsPresenter: Anita Rani Producer: Lisa Jenkinson Studio Manager: Michael Millham.

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. I'm Natalia Melman-Petrozzella, and from the BBC, this is Extreme Peak Danger. The most beautiful mountain in the world. If you die on the mountain, you stay on the mountain. This is the story of what happened when 11 climbers died on one of the world's deadliest mountains, K2, and of the risks we'll take to feel truly alive. If I tell all the details, you won't believe it anymore. Extreme, peak danger. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.

BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello, I'm Anita Rani and welcome to Woman's Hour from BBC Radio 4. It's in the headlines. We know that more than 40,000 nurses have left their jobs in the NHS in England in the last year. But what the figures don't tell us is why they're choosing to leave or why nurses are choosing to stay for that matter. We know that a lot of you who listen to the programme are nurses or work for the NHS and we would really like to hear from you this morning. We want to give you the opportunity to tell us how you see it. What's happening where you are? Have you quit your job as a nurse? Why? What's the reason? Get in touch with us.

And conversely, if you are one of the around three quarters of a million nurses in the UK who are still working, why are you staying put? You can text the programme. The number is 84844. You can contact us via social media. It's at BBC Woman's Hour. You can email us through the website and you can also WhatsApp me with a message

or a voice note. The number is 03700 100 444. Data charges may apply depending on your provider. So you might want to check the terms and conditions. That number once again, if you do want to leave me a voice note, it's 03700 100 444. Also this morning, how does time feel today? How are you feeling about time? Do you, like me, already feel like there's not enough hours in the day? Well, by the end of the programme, we'll all be thinking about time in a very different way, hopefully elongating it, as we talk to two women who've just won an International Women's Podcast Award, all about their podcast to do with time. Then from thinking about time

to yoga. Yep, we are breathing and stretching and talking about posture and poses and how yoga saved Nadia Gilani's life. But she also realised she was often the only brown face in her yoga classes, both as a student and a teacher. Well, she's written a memoir and will be here to talk to me about it. We're then going to discuss heartbreak and whether you should be given, you'll like this, time off from work if you're going through it. Definitely want your opinions on this one. Have you had to take time off from work because of heartbreak? Was your employer understanding or did you have to pull a sickie or did you just pull your socks up and get on with it?

84844 is the number to text. And if that wasn't enough, it's Friday, so we're having music. How lovely is that? That's a piece of music from a new album of works by Samuel Coleridge-Taylor performed by the Chineke Orchestra, who are Europe's first ever professional

ethnically diverse orchestra and the absolute game changer. Chichi Wanoku will be telling me all about them. So grab your cuppa and settle in for the hour. First, though, record numbers of nurses are quitting the NHS in England, according to new data analysis by the Nuffield Trust for the BBC. More than 40,000 have left the health service in the past year, in the year to June, one in nine of the workforce.

Also published today, a report from NHS providers said the squeeze on pay amid rising inflation is forcing nurses and other staff out of the health service or into making desperate decisions, including stopping contributions to their pension, skipping meals and taking on second jobs. Miriam Deacon, Director of Policy and Strategy at NHS Providers, spoke to Justin Webb on this morning's Today programme.

NHS staff are facing some really difficult choices. So, for example, we've heard of a nurse skipping meals on shifts so that they can pay for school uniforms back at home. We hear stories about staff being worried about whether they can cover the costs of their commute, whether they can cover the cost of petrol if they're a mobile worker. And trusts tell us that the cost of living crisis is having a real chilling effect, both on recruitment into the service and also on retention. So although it's anecdotal at the moment, they do tell us it's having a cooling effect on new joiners. And they're particularly worried about retaining those staff who are on modest and lower

incomes in the service so people who can move to hospitality and retail and get better terms. I mean it's partly about money it's absolutely no question about that but it but it's also more widely isn't it the kind of the way in which you're asked to work now as a nurse in many situations in England. Absolutely and I think it's a bit of a self-fulfilling prophecy in some ways. And at the moment, we're operating with vacancies of over 130,000 across the NHS. And I think your piece this morning showed that one in 10 nursing roles are vacant. So for every post that's vacant obviously puts more pressure on those teams who are working in the service, making their working conditions more difficult. So we really

need to work with government to get a political commitment and a financial commitment so the NHS can plan much further ahead for the workforce numbers that it needs so that we can train, recruit, retain the right numbers of doctors and nurses to meet the rising demand that we're seeing. That was Miriam Deacon, Director of Policy and Strategy at NHS Providers, speaking to Justin Webb on this morning's Today programme. Well, I'm joined by Molly Case, who's a clinical specialist nurse working in the community in South London. Molly, welcome to Woman's Hour. Hi, good morning.

Are you surprised at the large numbers of nurses leaving your profession, 40,000 in the last year? I'm not surprised. I've been working within the NHS for nearly a decade now. And whilst it's certainly a record level, it's been going this way for a very long time for different reasons, in particular under the government that we've been under for almost a decade. I'm not surprised. I think there's different factors at play now. But I'm very sad about it oh I'm in an NHS place so excuse the fire alarm the fire alarm's going off there we go why are you not surprised what's happening what are you seeing around you?

So I now work in the community and that was a deliberate move after experiencing kind of working through Covid in an intensive care and an acute trust. I've worked through terrible short-staffedness, which only ever impacts on the patient care. The nurses and midwives only ever go into this profession to help people, to make people feel better, to do the best job that they can do for people. And if we're not able to do that, I can understand why people are leaving. Obviously, the cost of living crisis at the moment is affecting everybody, whether that's nurses or people in other professions. But certainly the strain and the kind of the toll on nurses working in a profession where you have to give such empathy to other people when you're kind of your reserves are very low yourself. It takes a toll.

Well, Molly, unsurprisingly, lots of our listeners are already starting to get in touch. And I just want to read a couple of these out to you, see what you think. Someone said, I was a midwife, but recently retired after 47 years of service. She says, I have two nieces currently working as nurses. Both are thinking of leaving.

One because she saw a cleaning job at McDonald's that paid more money than she's getting at present and it's much less stressful. She says, I'm appalled that a service I was proud of has come to this. And someone else here has said, and this is from Milita who's emailed in to say, no one is mentioning the real reason why nurses are leaving. There is no work-life balance when working 12-hour shifts whoever introduced this is to blame an aging workforce an elderly trainee can't sustain this lifestyle when you're you're so tired yourself all you want to do is sleep it's that simple i think i think that um certainly the the 12-hour shift thing different shifts work differently for different people it depends on on on the life that you've got in your kind of family balance and things like that but certainly the work-life balance in general if people are

being absolutely work their rotas are not being kind of fair to them then and there's no joy coming from from work and they're not able to experience kind of any rest in their own lives then of course it's it's going to be detrimental to their own health. I think that this has been going on for a little while. And I think that the pandemic and working through COVID has been a real catalyst for people. I think a huge thing for nurses, yes, absolutely, we want to be paid more. Of course we do. But most of my colleagues simply want to feel valued and respected in their role we do the most incredible job we are absolutely most of us love our jobs when we're able to do the job that we signed up to do but we don't feel valued um it's one of the reasons that i have moved in the last year

and i'm a big believer in feeling that you can't chip away at the monolithic kind of being that is the government and all these things that don't feel fair and you have to chip away at your own little world which is why I moved. Yeah you mentioned there you've moved because you only moved to community nursing a year ago out of a hospital environment and that's because of what you had to go through which we can only begin to imagine those of us who don't work within the NHS what you had to go through with Covid? I think for me there was a lot of reasons why I moved into the community and I'm very passionate about helping people to die well and die with dignity and die what we're kind of calling a good death and obviously experiencing people dying through Covid in

the intensive care which was sometimes a very necessary way to die, I was really passionate about kind of experiencing another way to die and helping families to not be frightened of death and dying. But certainly my experience of working in hospitals, one of the most terrifying things is walking onto a shift and there not being enough staff and you're either moved to another place within the hospital that you have no speciality in or you're left to work and plug the gaps on a ward where you're looking after patients that require organ support. They require the fundamentals of care and you cannot provide it. There is nothing more frightening. So, Molly, I've got to ask them, why are you staying? I love my job. I love being a nurse. It's part of my identity. I'm not necessarily a religious person, but I believe that my calling very much is to make people feel a little bit better.

And in making people feel a little bit better, it makes me feel better. It's very simple for me. Like I said, I'm a big believer in, I'm very kind of passionate about impacting change, but sometimes for your own mental health and your own well-being, that change has to come in little small chips away. So I thought for myself, I would follow what I love to do, which is demystifying death. Molly, thank you very much for speaking to me this morning. Molly Case is a clinical specialist nurse. 84844 is the number to text if you want to tell me what you think and lots of you are a message here from someone saying I've worked as a nurse for 30 years as a band six nurse I retired at 55 I wanted to return the management

is so awful which is the reason I and my colleagues left they bring in changes without discussion they stress staff out and bullying is rife the freedom to speak up is a joke and run in-house. Also, community staff are paid 22 pence per mile once they exceed 3,500 miles, which we clock up in our service in three to four months in full time. Someone else has said, I work in A&E in a major London hospital. The work is relentless and we regularly face abuse in the hospital.

Staff are physically assaulted and have been punched, spat at or racially abused by patients. After this, we must continue to work under strenuous conditions to try and provide safe care for patients. Please do keep your thoughts coming in on that or anything else you hear about this morning. Molly just mentioned that she's staying with the profession because it's her calling. And I think maybe our next guest yoga is her calling um well today the world health organization has suggested that yoga classes should be offered at work to reduce mental illness in offices and factories maybe you do yoga maybe you can understand this maybe you want to get in touch and tell me what you think about yoga well someone who knows the benefits and pitfalls of yoga is writer and yoga teacher Nadia Gilani, who went to her first yoga class when she was only 16.

She was worried. She was battling an eating disorder. Her mum took her in a baggy tracksuit, trousers and a T-shirt to a local YMCA class. For a few minutes, it stopped her brain from its constant calorie counting and gave her a new way to think about her body. Since then, yoga has been her constant companion through addiction, bulimia, breakups and loss. But it hasn't been easy. She's been delusioned with the commercialization and cultural appropriation, and she decided to write a book all about her experience called The Yoga Manifesto. And I'm delighted to say that Nadia is in the studio to talk to me all about it. I really enjoyed it. So congratulations

on the book. Welcome to Woman's Hour. I want to take you back to the age of 16 and your mum taking you to that very first yoga class. Why did she want you to do it? Well, firstly, thank you for this is all very exciting. Thank you for having me on. Well, she took me, like you said, I had problems with food. I don't really know what, I mean, looking back now, I suppose it was, you know, as a teenager, there were lots of changes going on in my body. I think looking back, I was struggling with the way that I felt. It wasn't really about my body and the food.

But at the time, I was very obsessed with body and food and disappearing, really, hiding my you know it was the 90s hiding my body in between combat trousers and baggy jumpers and it was my mum's latest attempt I think to she tried lots of things to help me and I didn't want to go I was very reluctant um I said I didn't want to go all day and then in the end she just took me anyway at the end of that that night and um yeah it's it's something magical happened in there um and yeah i think that's what kind of has been the constant in my life when i've fallen out with yoga because i have at times as well what what happens you explain it so beautifully in the book and i i love yoga and i've been doing it back your

experience is exactly what mine was and i I'm just being, just know what, you're not in your head, you're in your body, aren't you? Just, I mean, I think lots of our listeners will do it, but some will have no idea about yoga whatsoever. Yeah, I think it's interesting, isn't it? Because it's kind of trying to describe something that's almost beyond words. But I think what happened in that first class,

and I definitely get it now, and this is what keeps me going, is, you know, I had a discombobulated, my head and body seemed like they were floating around in space separate to each other. And something, and I spent a lot of time in my head, body I didn't have a particularly good relationship with, I didn't really understand what was happening to my body, I didn't like it. And then something kind of like all the planets were aligned something happened in the practice I mean it took the hour like towards the end it's when the things clicked into place you know in the beginning I was very awkward I felt like everybody's looking at me I was very uncomfortable um I don't feel like that now but I mean obviously I've everything was okay it was like a deep kind of firm feeling of just okay and I think that was the best feeling I'd had in a long time and I think you know that's what I

thought gosh my mum said you know you've got to keep practicing and I thought yeah maybe I this is what I've got to do we are going to talk about your relationship with yoga because the whole book is about your relationship with falling in and out of love with it and the various points in your life where it's helped you but I just because you're on woman's I just want to take a minute to um ask about your mum because she's like she's a superhero in this book she is uh she was your she's from Pakistan single mum brought you up on her own in a council flat, went back to school, trained to be a primary school teacher, took you to your first yoga class. You also get her to come to classes at various points.

She's incredible. She is. She's going to love you for saying this. She is my hero, really. My life, when people read the book mean you've said such kind things I mean and and so you know having read it that I've had quite chaotic quite crazy and dysfunctional at times life and my mum's had her own you know she hasn't had the easiest time and it was I had a single mum and she had one child and um so it was kind of we're a team and she took me everywhere you know she took me um to yoga she took me to she wanted me to have a really rich life and so as

best as she could she did all these things I mean she came here when she was five so she was born in Pakistan but in some way she kind of grew up here like I did so um yeah and and um we've we've got a lot of stories and it was really important to me. It's really lovely that you picked that up because I really wanted to put her in the book. Yeah. But with that in a kind of sensitive way so that because obviously in revealing my own life, I was going to be revealing her life. And I, you know, I made sure that she was happy with it because there are some tender moments where, you know, I just didn't want to kind of upset her or reveal too much. Of course. And you've got to be mindful of that, I suppose, when you're writing your memoir. But you have revealed a lot about yourself. So you talk very openly and honestly about your struggles with body image and bulimia. But you also, and I think this is really revelatory in

a book, Nadia, as a South Asian woman to talk about your problems with addiction and and drink because it's not spoken about and how you know how yoga helped you or the your how you fell in and out of love with yoga through that yeah i think it's the the story that i've tried to tell is a story i mean i haven't really sort of read it anywhere else which is that you know often um you see the sort of triumph over tragedy type stories which are which are wonderful read. They're kind of like, you know, life is difficult. And then, you know, I found yoga or whatever it might be. And then things are better. And for me, I suppose I kept coming in and out.

Like after that first class, I got really into it, but it didn't cure me. The eating, the food problems were still there. The body was still there. And then in my 20s, I I mean I had a Muslim upbringing and um I didn't drink until really late in the day and then I started so I didn't have come from an alcoholic background um but you know cross addiction is a thing and I suppose you know the bulimia got really out of control and then I just alcohol kind of started um I started using alcohol in that kind of way as well to desensitize. It's all about numbing, really. It's all about destroying the feelings that we can't contain.

This is what I think. I can't speak for anybody else's experience of these illnesses. But I think why did I keep coming back to yoga? That was a question I had in the book because obviously I left it. Why was I coming back? And I suppose for me um because I'd had that magical first experience um I think a part of me was perhaps looking for a cure um and I don't think I've actually found it I just think somewhere along the line um I've got better and I mean I still actually I mean if I'm going to be really honest and I write about this in the book I still I mean I don't drink anymore but I still have you know probably quite a dysfunctional relation in my body at times and you know that's quite a vulnerable thing to say as somebody who you know was teaching yoga but I think it's real and honest and

hopefully relatable. Relatable. Absolutely relatable. You then go on to eventually become a yoga teacher after having practiced it for 20 odd years. And all of a sudden you start seeing something that you've experienced and observed, which is who is it that is doing yoga? Who is it that's running the classes? And you'd often find yourself as the only non-white face in these spaces. Yeah, I mean, that was the case in the early days in the 90s when i was practicing and i think it didn't really bother me because i was too busy you know having this chaotic life i was too busy getting on with whatever i needed to do i fully i properly noticed it when i was teaching and i think that's when it

became a bit of a trouble for me because I was teaching so the power dynamic was very strange um and that it was very white not very diverse um in terms of gender even and shape and body size you know everybody kind of was a similar kind of physiology as well it was all very strange and I was at the bottom of the kind of food chain because I just started teaching and also the processes around hiring teachers was very strange as well. It didn't seem to be a lot of teachers around who did not really practice for very long, which seemed like to me like the way that one would. Because it's like we need to do these practices and then integrate them, find out what they mean to us and then start sharing them. But it's become a very factory line conveyor belt. I mean, there's just too many teachers. And commercialized.

For sure. Yeah, I mean, it's just too many teachers. And commercialised. For sure. Yeah, I mean, it's all commercialised. It's become quite elitist. I mean, I've worked with, you know, I've been underpaid and I've worked with, but it's close to my heart with, you know, groups that, you know, you could say are marginalised or vulnerable groups like refugees.

I write about, one of my favourite stories in the book is about some teenage boys who I met and taught. It was quite a difficult time, but it ended well and it was a really lovely experience. But the business of yoga, the that surrounds yoga, the brand, if you like, of yoga isn't really including them. And I started to get quite upset and angry about that. Which is kind of the opposite of what it should be. It should be for everybody, right? Absolutely anyone. And I mean, it's not going to be for everyone not everybody's going to want to but i think we need to give people the choice to make up their own minds but actually it's being taken away from

those groups um like like the refugee boys like um other women's groups that i've taught and um you know and we're always stuck in the back of a community center we're always kind of like we've got mats that have seen better days. And I started to feel quite political about it all. I just felt like this is meant to be for anyone. And also we're being told how we need to do it. It's like we need to wear all this kind of sexy active wear. We need to buy these hundred quid mats.

And, you know, we don't even realise it. We just get caught up in it and we start feeling like we need all this stuff. And it's just capitalism, isn't it? So what would you like to see happen? I mean, you've written this brilliant book. Yeah. So, I mean, the book is obviously, as you know, it's a memoir. So it's about my relationship with yoga and then looking outward and looking at yoga's relationship with the world. And by the time you get to the last chapter, I'm really not big on telling people what to do. So I didn't it's not a manifesto that sort of tells people the commandments

of this is what we need to do because who am I to even know what we need to do but I'm very quite a thinky person and I like thinking about sort of there's always things going on in my mind so I suppose I was sort of playing around with things areas that people could look at so businesses and brands can look at what they can do

putting their money where the yoga is if you like students we can think about what we can do, putting their money where the yoga is, if you like. Students, we can think about what we can do. And it's just lots of ideas. And then, you know, readers can decide what they might do. Well, it is a very good read, Nadia. Thank you very much for coming on to talk to me. And it's out now, The Yoga Manifesto by Nadia Gilani.

84844 is the number to text if you'd like to get involved with any of the things we're talking about. Lots of you getting in touch with various things particularly the nursing story uh julia says i'm a health visitor with an inner london nhs trust i'm off sick today from a flu-y cold made worse by exhaustion my team is short-staffed missing one health visitor the team lead and neighborhood lead the health visitors who are left are overstretched and exhausted attempting to meet kpis without the staffing and management to make this possible she says i love my job i love working with my clients improving the lives of children and their parents but i worry that i'm being broken by the nhs will have to leave to preserve my health now on to the next story last night saw the coming together

of the best in podcast talent with the international women's podcast awards celebrating the work of those who identify as women and non-binary both in front of and behind the mic there were winners across 10 categories which include the best moments of comedy gold and moment of raw emotion well i'm delighted to say we're joined by the winners of the moment of visionary leadership how impressive category the host of the long time academy Ella Saltmarsh and the producer Lena Preston congratulations was it a big party yes there were a lot of sequins what does it mean for you to have won this award I mean it means so much for us to have won but also

to all of the visionary women who we hear from in the podcast um so we won the award for a particular moment um uh which was uh the story about when i first realized uh how important it was to be a good ancestor which is which is the premise of the whole show yes let's talk about what the long time academy is about then so if we're going to go because we i think we need to get into this don't we because it's quite i've listened to bits and it's brilliant but yes for the listeners what is the Longtime Academy? So the Longtime Academy is a show that explores how we can be good ancestors and perhaps I'll start with like with that story that we we won the award for which was it happened about seven years ago I was looking after my little nephew at the time,

he was two. And he was like a kid who was really obsessed by doors, like any doors, bathroom doors, car doors, sliding doors. And I was looking after him. And he was playing with a really big cupboard door. But I didn't think about it because it was like on brand him and his doors and as he was doing that I was reading an article about climate change and it was one of those articles that I'm sure many of your listeners would have read where it talks about these kind of terrifying scenarios for the end of the century and I heard a noise and I looked up and my little nephew was about to pull this massive cupboard down on him. So like I jumped up, threw the article down, pushed the cupboard back up, grabbed him.

He started screaming at the injustice of being taken away from the best game in the world. And I guess to both of our surprise, I started to cry too. Because in that moment, I realised that the future I was reading about was a future he'd probably be alive in and that I was not going to be there to scoop him up from danger. And I think for the first time in my life, I suddenly understood myself to be an ancestor. And I didn't have kids and it was never a thing I'd thought about before, about descendants and my descendants.

And so that began the journey which has become the podcast. And in the podcast, we talk to people all over the world who are showing us what it means to be a good ancestor. Incredibly incredible voices like Julia Olson, the American lawyer who is supporting children and young people to sue their governments because they're destroying their future. Incredible indigenous voices, Diana Michelle Shenandoah, who talked to us how their indigenous form of government actually takes the long term into account.

Yeah, you talk to people, women particularly around the world about this. Yeah, absolutely. And I think in the show, we're exploring exploring like how do the systems that we live in come to be so short term? But then also like how do we build new ones? And we look and hear from the people who are doing that today. Who are some of the women, Lena, that you've spoken to that really stand out for you? Well, actually, we opened the show with Celeste Headley, the broadcaster, opera singer. And she wrote a really interesting book about how we experience time and about our relationship with work. And I think the episode we start started with her because I think

we wanted to start in a place that met our listeners. And that was in this sense that time just feels against us. It feels like we're packing everything into every kind of square minute beyond its capacity we're all looking down we're all firefighting the present yet the meantime there's this incredible existential threat coming down the road so it feels like we don't have any time i wonder how many i wonder how many other people are nodding along whilst you're saying this yeah absolutely i think it's a sort of existential crisis in every sense of the word. And that's really where we meet our listeners. And then across the series, Ella mentioned Diane and Michelle Shenandoah.

They really spoke to me personally. Kate Raworth, The Economist, was fantastic. Her thoughts on growth has changed the model of my podcast business. I mean, I am fundamentally changed after making this series in what way in the sense that I approach everything like I've suddenly realized what does success look like for my business and for so long you're taught that to grow an independent podcast business it looks like being acquired in five years time um and being able to sell and making money um and actually I realised that's not what it

is for me. For me, success and kind of getting listeners is more about the impact that the shows can make. It makes me think about what I can tell my kids, you know, 20 years time, what I was doing and what essentially is an incredibly pivotal moment for all of us. But I think what's crucial about the show is that rather than kind of just labor how pivotal and how uh overwhelming this moment is we kind of give a toolkit to try and manage those very big feelings i would recommend people listen to it and it is like a toolkit and there's various things that you can do to help you it's just fascinating to do lots of meditation and if we had more, we would do it right now.

But sadly, time is not on our side. But I do want to know how important it was to have the awards and for you as women in this space to have been recognised last night. Yeah, I mean, it was so important. And I think these awards are really important, like the International Podcast Awards for Women, because all over the world right now, as you hear on this show, a really important like you know international podcast awards for women because you know all over the world right now as you hear on this show um women's rights are under threat you know Iran

America like wherever we look um and it's so important that we support each other's voices that we amplify the stories that need to be heard that we use our privilege to make sure that as women we are supporting and sharing the stories of other women especially in industries that are so male dominated so you know a huge big up to the organizers of the awards they have created such an amazing community of women and is the podcast space somewhere you can be more nuanced you can really oh 100 my background is in tv and like, you know, throwing no shade at TV. But I absolutely love how much space there is to be niche and nuanced and spacious and take your time with ideas. And that's not being undisciplined with the medium. That's just taking the time it tells

to tell a story. We're so used to cramming things into slots. I'm sure you're familiar, Anita. She says looking at the clock. She says looking at the clock, exactly. So, yeah, I think, yeah, absolutely. But I think as well that the space last night, it was really humming with a very special energy. And less than a third of the most successful podcasts worldwide

are hosted by women. Why do you think there's so little representation, even fewer women of colour? Oh, I mean, I think there's a legacy of a media that hasn't given, made space for those voices. And also, I think, you know, again, time. You know, I think it takes time to produce these things. And so the more we platform the producers who are maybe not in the top 20 of the podcast charts, but who are there in the charts, who are really working incredibly hard to make incredibly high quality shows, is incredibly important because they don't have the marketing. And they are out there making the most incredible shows.

And it's really important awards like this exist to showcase them. Absolutely. And go and find them. You can start with the Longtime Academy. Thank you very much. Both of you winners. Congratulations again, Ella Saltmarsh and Lena Prestwood. Now, would you ever take time off to get over a breakup? Well, the number of applications for divorce is the highest it's ever been in the last 10 years. Over 33,000 people applied under the new no-fault application from April to June. But should people be given time off from work to deal with the fallout? It was a question one woman put up on Mumsnet.

She posted about going through a breakup with the father of her child and she wanted to know if it would be unreasonable to take sick leave. Well, the responses were mixed. She was met with some sympathy, but also some hostility. And some women did not understand why she would even consider it. Well, what do you think? Maybe you're going through it right now. One of the 33,000 I just mentioned.

What are your thoughts on this? How have you managed the breakup? Did you talk to work? Did you get time off? Did you have to pull a sickie or did you just pull your socks up and get on with it 84844 if you fancy dropping me a text well here to discuss it is Mel Schilling relationship coach and confidence expert and Meera Narandon. Meera and Mel welcome to Woman's Hour I'm going to come to you first Meera because because you went through a breakup, didn't you? Did you go, did you get time off? What happened? So this was, there's been two, unfortunately,

but the most recent one was like end of last year. And it was not necessarily a breakup where we were in a relationship, but it was obviously a very, it was almost a relationship, but I was in it for three years and it got cut off very randomly. And it was something that actually really affected me mentally like I didn't realize how much it impacted me until the day it happened you know I was upset I didn't eat I didn't sleep

I was crying I'd go to work I'd get triggered by anything and um it got to the point I was going to the office and they were like Mira just go home they didn't want me to come into the office because I couldn't even work like I was not that I was not working but it was just I was so distracted or I was very upset or something would just make me start crying in the office because I felt very upset or I would just like I'm not doing the best of my abilities of what I was doing like a week ago and um I didn't go to work for a good couple days a lot of the time they asked me to just work from home until I got better, but then I felt like I had to come into the office

because it actually distracted me. So that's something I'm very grateful for. And even the first time, it was about four years ago, I was actually on the way to work where it happened, but basically I had broken up with that person, but something had happened and triggered me, and it resulted in me stopping my car in the middle, like on the way to work and having to sort of get my head together because it was very like a distressing

situation and luckily that manager is someone who I'm very good friends with and he was just like just take time off because how can you be expected to work when you're mentally not there you know when you're feeling upset you know it's a different level of experience and it's not something that I'd wish on anyone to experience. I'm going to bring Mel in here. Mel, Mira has obviously got very understanding colleagues and an employer, hasn't she? What do you make of the request to get leave if you've gone through a heartbreak?

Look, I think Mira's story really illustrates what this is about. It's a mental health event that she experienced. You know, this is not just a little, you know, a couple of teenagers having a breakup, you know, at school. This is a serious relationship and it has serious impact. You know, this is no different from if a person in the workplace experienced the death of a family member or a miscarriage or, you know, another milestone life event that has the flow and effect for somebody's mental health. So I think really what we're talking about here. Some people listening might think it is very different though. You know, a breakup is different to losing a member of the family.

Well, I think that's an unfair statement. You know, I think what we have to do here is accept that everybody's mental health is based on their subjective experience and their lived experience. So, you know, in the UK, of course, employees are equally entitled to take a sick day, whether that's a physical illness or a mental illness. And I think what we're describing here is a mental illness episode. And, you know, the context of that, to be blunt, is actually none of your employer's business. You know, as an employee, you're not obliged to say to your employer, I need a day off because I had a breakup.

You don't need to open yourself up to potentially being ridiculed or having that minimized or invalidated. You know, if you're having an experience where, you know, in Mira's example, you were being triggered, there was clearly some post-traumatic stress going on there. It actually doesn't matter what caused that, whether it was a death or a breakup, it was significant for you and it's had the impact, which means you can't do your job. I can see some people making notes in my mind, None of your business. What do you make of, I mean, this started on Mumsnet and this woman put this question out there, but the response was mixed. Some people saying she was being unreasonable for even suggesting it and actually

taking time off work would then be leaving her colleagues in the lurch to have to pick up her mess or the work that she wasn't able to do. Go on, Mira. No, I think with stuff like that, it's really unfair to say, as I was saying earlier, people experience different things. For example, I don't deal with funerals how other people do. I don't really get emotional, but at this particular time, going through a heartbreak was very emotional. And and I think isn't it better someone works on themselves

and make sure they're much better and better mindset for them to be able to achieve the best when they're at work because the reality is when I was going into work I was not able to do anything on my best of abilities and I'm a very good I'm a very good employee so I think when it comes to like that it's very unfair to say especially because they might deal with situations differently and mental health is important and I think in the last three years after COVID it's even more there's even more stress on how important it is okay cool maybe taking two weeks or two weeks plus might be sort of you know okay it's not like you don't need two weeks but definitely there should be mental

health days where we should just be able to just stay home, relax, get stuff together, start back on a Monday and you'll feel a bit better and hopefully distracted and get your mind more, you know, more driving stuff. Mel, do you think women feel supported when it comes to asking for time off in general in the workplace when it is for personal issues? I think it's really tough. I think it's very tough because often, you know, the umbrella term of women's issues are often not taken seriously in the workplace, whether that is a breakup or, you know, issues with a menstrual cycle, you know, or if it's about menopause. But I think organisations are starting to wake up, you know, you're starting to hear about, for example, menopause policies in place. And I think organisations are also starting to become aware that absenteeism is not the worst problem.

You know, presenteeism is also a problem. That is, if someone was to come to work, you know, with a mental health hangover, if you like, that's actually very contagious in a workplace. If there is negative mood, it is very contagious. And many times organisations find that it's actually better for that person to be at home recovering and then to return when they're actually in a stronger position. Can being in the workplace though, Mel, sometimes help people because it distracts you from the trauma.

Distraction or avoidance. Yeah. Oh, distraction or avoidance. Interesting. Yeah. Well, people do say it, don't they? Actually, I'm not thinking about it because I'm at work, so I've just buried my head in work.

I have to laugh, and this is me as an Australian being very judgmental about the Brits and the stereotype of stiff upper lip, you know. Is that the answer or is that avoidance? My concern is that that is a barrier head in work as opposed to actually dealing with the issue, and it's really just a Band-Aid or a plaster, as you say. It's so interesting, isn't it, because some people listening might think, well, what happened to resilience?

You know, a breakup is something that lots of people will experience and it is life. And, you know, absolutely, you're right, it impacts the people differently. But historically, people have just had to go to work and get on with it. And was that necessarily for the best?

It's something that's just been normalised really. You know, I'm sure if this was a conversation that was brought up 10, 15 years ago, it would sort of be normal to be able to just take time off when you're feeling very down. But because it's never been a thing, it's sort of just get over it, man up and be resilient and go to work. It's not, I think that's one of the reasons why it's being questioned and i think the heartbreak is nothing you know when someone dies or someone goes through a miscarriage or someone is extremely ill they feel like that is because it affects you physically literally that's something that you can't compare to a heartbreak

and just because you can't visually see a heartbreak you know a lot of people you know it hurts people more people die from heartbreak you know that's true grandparents well you know I know people whose granddads have died and then their grand grandmas died shortly after just from heartbreak and it's just yeah seriously because it's a scene but I'm sure if it was a scene they'd take it more seriously. So in your experience, Mel, what impact does heartbreak have on self-confidence? What can it do? Well, ultimately it's a rejection and rejection and humiliation, we know erode self-esteem.

So for me, looking at confidence, it's essentially made up of two things. One is self-esteem and the other is self-efficacy. So self-esteem is that voice inside you that says when I look in the mirror I actually like what I see I deserve happiness I deserve love I deserve success so when you go through a breakup a breakup particularly if it involves a level of rejection and you know an attack on your ego self-esteem is. So that's one part of confidence that starts to fall away. And then self-efficacy is that, you know, belief and understanding that you've had successes in

the past, therefore you can do it again. And when you have a failed relationship, if that's how you're characterizing it, then that can actually undermine that voice inside you that says, I can do it. So it can have some very real consequences in terms of your, not only your confidence, but the flow on from that is your potential to perform to your optimal levels of work. Lots of people getting in touch about this, lots of our listeners. I went through a breakup in the 1980s. I had two kids and was homeless. It was a dreadful time for us. In those days, having time off for heartbreak would have been scoffed at i just had to pull up my socks and get on with it the kids and i got through it but it was hell at the time no one gave me time off work um someone else saying i'm a primary school teacher

and have recently been through a very challenging divorce from the father of my children i didn't even consider time off work and was actually grateful for the distraction everyone's situation is different but with a job like mine the impact of being off work is huge, and there would have been no capacity for it. That's from Charlotte and East Anglia. Like you say, you just have to judge your own experience, don't you, and what's going on in your own world. Navigate it.

Yeah. So, Mira, what... Yes, go on, Mel. I was just thinking, aren't we lucky that things have moved on from the 80s? You know, in those days, sexual harassment was compulsory in workplaces too. Someone else said here, I'm a retired HR director of 30 years standing. I always gave time off to those dealing with a breakup of any gender.

The basis was that in each case they were not fit to work. And I suppose that's what it's all about. Mira, did you feel better then? Tell me about you. You were given, you've got very understanding colleagues. They you home they said take some time out how long did you take off and was it was it better for you? Yeah I mean I took okay it wasn't like I took a whole week off but I did take a good couple of days off because it was very fresh in the mind and like I said I wasn't eating and I wasn't sleeping so I was physically getting more ill um so physically after having the rest day and you know being around my family my mum forcing me to eat and stuff I felt automatically much better and

then I felt kind of recharged and I felt like um you know I definitely felt much better and then what I ended up doing was I ended up working home quite a bit just because I felt like going into work was where I was in my head quite a lot and that I felt like I would go into work already upset whereas if I was at home I'm distracted I'm working already as soon as I wake up um but yeah it's something I'm very grateful for because I feel much better like within two weeks two three weeks you know I felt better than I was ever before and I'm very grateful I feel like if I was forced to go into work that would have really affected my job performance and affected my career quite significantly but because I was able to relax get better I'm even I'm in I'm in an even better position that I'm in now was before so yeah well Mira and Mel thank you both for talking to me

loads of you have been in touch about this. Janet says, read Time Off for emotional problems. Will someone think of the employer? Why should, how can employers fund all this time off? Take some of your annual leave. And someone else says, if history is anything to go by, dismissing the need for attention paid to mental health issues in order to be resilient is a fool's errand. And someone else says, all this discussion on time off for breakups is based on being paid while sick.

I'm on zero hours. If I don't work, I don't get paid. However upset I may be. Interesting conversation. Keep your thoughts coming in. Now, Chineke Orchestra, Europe's first professional majority black and ethnically diverse orchestra, has today released a new album of works by the celebrated African-British composer Samuel Coleridge-Taylor. It commemorates the 110th anniversary of Coleridge-Taylor's death and is the first album to be released on Chineke Records as part of a newly created partnership with Decca. The album features an appearance by award-winning US violinist Elena Uristo, plus a world premiere recording of a work by Coleridge-Taylor's daughter,

Avril Coleridge-Taylor, daughter, Avril Coleridge-Taylor, of which I will play you a bit shortly. Double bassist Chichi Wanoku, CBE, is executive producer of Chineke Rockwoods and supports, inspires and encourages black and ethnically diverse classical musicians working in the UK and Europe by providing a platform on which to excel. She's a game changer and we are delighted that she's on Woman's Hour. Welcome. What an exciting project to be on. You believe that black and ethnically

diverse composers like Coleridge Taylor deserve greater attention. Why? I certainly do. Why? Because it's incredible music that we've been denied most of our lives, really. I never learned about Coleridge-Taylor or anyone else of his ilk. Tell us a bit about him. There might be listeners who've never heard of him. Yes. So, Coleridge-Taylor was born in London to a Sierra Leonean father and English mother. He never actually met his father because

his father, who was a medical doctor, traveled back to Sierra Leone not even knowing that he was expecting a baby. So, but, but he, his mother then married an English man and raised him in Croydon and he was fortunate enough to get some music lessons. He played the violin and he sang in choirs and things like that and ended up winning a violin scholarship at the age of 15 to the Royal College of Music. And in those days, it was it was Stanford who was the principal of the Royal College of Music. Stanford was a composer and he believed that every single student at the college should learn composition regardless of their instrument or their voice.

And this is where Carwish Taylor began his, what was to be his legacy really as a composer. The day he started at the Royal College of Music was the same day as Ralph Vaughan Williams and Gustav Holst all of whom we learned about during our studies and school days and college days um and and how much of an inspiration for you you know as often the only non-white face in the orchestras that you've played in well I mean it it was, this was a game changer for me because I didn't, A, didn't know, I didn't even know women composers existed until halfway through my career.

We were taught very little at the institution where I studied. And therefore, and so when, when I was creating Chinake eight years ago was when I started the process. Our first concert was seven years ago. I thought, right, okay, we have to find a piece of music that's going to represent what part of our mission is about. And when I discovered this composer and this wonderful piece, the Ballade in A minor that he wrote when he was in his early 20s. This is what we played, this is what we opened our first concert with and that the week of rehearsals it was every in everybody's ears it was our earworm and we were all sort of very moved by it because not only was this wonderful music but it was sad because we all of us said well but why didn't we know about it before this fantastic music that

we could all feel very very proud of and and what it does it reasserts black people into the classical music arena we've always been there but we've never really been included and now you have supercharged it by creating the chineke orchestra Tell us about why you've done this. Well, that was one of the reasons because I truly felt, well, I was being asked questions by Ed Vasey, actually the previous culture minister, about why he only ever saw me regularly on the international concert platform.

And wind the clocks forward a few months, I saw the Kinshasa Orchestra from the Congo playing at the Royal Festival Hall and realised, you know, well, why? Why should it be a novelty that there's more than one black face on the stage playing Beethoven and Berlioz, which is what they were playing at the South Bank? And I vowed that I was going to aim to try and do something about it. And I rang, you know, I called every single musical institution in the country, all the conservatoires, the concert halls. And I said, this is what I'm going to I'm planning to do. Everyone agreed something needed to be done.

And they were all relieved that I was going to do something about it. then had the next task was finding the musicians because I literally could count on the fingers of one hand how many black musicians I'd ever worked with in my career and the more I looked I mean and it's often said in various places when people need to try and diversify the workforce or whatever it is whether it's an orchestra or whatever that we just can't find people how did you find the people that's the first thing that people say always or they either say that or oh but the standard's not high enough or I mean one of the things that was said to me is oh classical music's not really your music is it and so and so I had to sort of juggle all of these questions and say to myself well you, you know what, you might be saying that, but I'm just going to go and look anyway. And so I started by writing to a few soloist friends of mine because they play in orchestras all over the place.

And, you know, on the off chance that they've come across other black musicians and that they might put me in touch with them. And so one name led to another name and Conservatoire Principles gave me some of their alumni names. And I did, I researched, I followed people's, I looked at them on YouTube. I tracked people down because I didn't have, we didn't have auditions to start with. So I tracked people down and they were there, you know. And what was the experience like when you all came together for the first time? Well, that was an extraordinary feeling. If you can imagine 62 people walking into a room, a rehearsal room in London, no two people knew each other, apart from three of the Canemasons were in the orchestra.

Of course they were. Five of them were in the junior orchestra, which launched on the same day. That's the family of Sheku Canemason, the cellist, the incredible cellist who played at Meghan and Harry's wedding, just in case. Yes, Sheku was 16 at that time. And if you can imagine walking into a room where people were just, you know,

with their bassoon cases, their violin cases, their flute cases, unpacking their cases. And where I'd never seen that amount of people of colour doing that. And then... And as it is Women's Hour though, very quickly, how many of those 62 people were women? About 31 of them. Very good. Which has been a fantastic record. You know, it's been about 50-50 all the way through, all the way through our career. And so when we sat down to eventually start our first rehearsal, for the first time in most of our careers,

all we had to think about was the music. Amazing. And I think we should listen to some of that music. Let's play a piece of music from The Other. Oh, it's so good. So rousing. But that has a female connection, because that's by the daughter of Sam Coleridge-Taylor, Avril. Exactly. That's his daughter. She was nine when he died at the age of 37. But that piece is called Sussex Landscape. When she retired, she went to live in an old people's home in Sussex.

And she was near the sea. And when you listen to the rest of that piece of music you hear whenever you hear the cymbals crashing you can hear the ocean waves crashing against the you know the sea wall this this clearly even that short clip you can tell the huge orchestral landscape that she had in mind a huge voice. And there's a lot more of her music yet to be revealed. Oh, we cannot wait. What more can be done? It's a big question to get rid of this elitist stereotype often associated with classical music, that it's dominated by white musicians. I know you're doing as much as you can, but there's more to be done. There's more to be done. I mean, I think everybody can, everyone has a responsibility

to pick up a little bit of their own mantle. Go and find a musician. Go and find a piece of music. Celebrate it. Celebrate them. Play it. Let's listen to it. Let's play it and share it.

Well, they can start by the album that you've just worked on by the Chineke Orchestra. Chi-Chi, thank you so much. It's been an absolute joy speaking to you this morning um and go and find the album track it down listen to it this weekend absolutely incredible so many of you have been getting in touch with everything all the topics we've been discussing this morning about whether you should be given time off from work so margaret said um when my husband was dying of cancer i had three children i was given time

off to be with him and to care for the children. However, after he died, going back to work was an enormous support and boost for me because all my colleagues at university where I worked were so caring and kind and spent a long time listening. The work environment varies depending on the job. Someone else says, as a manager of a team of other women, I had the policy of supporting one of my absolute best employees who struggled with depression of getting her to ring in well on her really good days. It was important for me as her manager that she enjoyed those good days and benefited from them as much as possible by having choice over how she spent it. Hello, I'm John Wilson, and I'm here to tell you about my podcast series, This Cultural Life. In each episode, I ask leading artistic figures to reveal the most important people, events,

and cultural works that have had a profound impact on their own creativity. It was just so different. It was so away from everyone. It just blew my mind. I didn't know about this. I just was confronted by it. And to me, this was art. You know, I felt art. We didn't know we were going to be there for years.

But I mean, I honestly would have shot that thing for five years. I didn't care. People like Nicole Kidman, Goldie, Armando Iannucci, Jarvis Cocker, Hannah Gadsby, Tracey Emin, Paul McCartney and It means a great deal to me, that show. You realise how extraordinarily uplifting it can be to share an experience with 1,500 people. The people whose work we love talking about the work that they love. Search for This Cultural Life on BBC Sounds. I'm very emotional now, thank you. That's all for today's Woman's Hour. Join us again next time.

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What does she have to gain from this? From CBC and the BBC World Service, The Con, Caitlin's Baby. It's a long story, settle in. Available now.