Woman's Hour - Paulina Porizkova - former supermodel, Vivienne Westwood, Sally Wainwright, Servicewomen & sexual assault, Annus horribilis

Episode Date: December 30, 2022

Dame Vivienne Westwood died yesterday at the age of 81 but she has been called the ‘undisputed Queen of British Fashion’. She made her name with her controversial punk and new wave styles in the 1970s and went on to dress some of the biggest stars in fashion. She was well known for her androgynous designs, slogan T-shirts and irreverent attitude towards the establishment and would use her platform later to bring the causes she cared about like climate change to the forefront. Barjis Chohan is a fashion designer in London who got her first break fresh out of college working with Dame Vivienne WestwoodThe multi Bafta-winning BBC drama Happy Valley returns to our screens on New Year’s Day. It’s a long awaited third series – the first came out in 2014, and the second in 2016. It centres on police Sergeant Catherine Cawood (pron. Kay-ward) - played by Sarah Lancashire - and her family in West Yorkshire and is the brainchild of writer and director Sally Wainwright, whose other TV credits include Last Tango in Halifax, Scott and Bailey and Gentleman Jack. Krupa speaks to Sally, who is considered to be one of our greatest television dramatists.Hundreds of servicewomen have experienced sexual abuse during their training at The Royal Military Academy Sandhurst, according to Salute Her UK. Their figures show that 177 women have sought help for cases spanning more than 20 years. Paula Edwards, CEO of Salute Her UK discusses the ‘toxic culture’ of sexual assault in the military. Salute Her UK is the sister charity of Forward Assist - which supports military veterans struggling to adjust to civilian life. It is the only UK gender-specific support service to offer therapy and interventions for survivors of in-service sexual abuse.Even if you don’t know her name, you will almost certainly recognise her face. A former supermodel Czechoslovak-born Paulina Porizkova appeared on the covers of numerous top magazines around the world during the 1980s and 1990s, including Vogue, Elle, Harper's Bazaar, Glamour and Cosmopolitan. In 1988 she became one of the highest-paid models in the world as the face of Estee Lauder. She also acted in many movies and TV shows and was on the judging panel on cycle 10 of America’s Next Top Model. Her novel, A model Summer, was published in 2007. She has now written a memoir, No Filter: The Good, the Bad, and The beautiful.2022 marks thirty years since Queen Elizabeth II used the term annus horribilis (worst year) in her Ruby Jubilee speech to describe a personal low point. As we approach the New Year, some of us may, instead of celebrating, be looking back at our own personal annus horribilis. But how do we cope when all the bad news seems to come at once? And after a worst year, how do we feel hopeful for a better one? Emily Dean is a radio host and author of Everybody Died So I Got A Dog. Ella Risbridger is a food writer whose books describe how she found solace from grief and mental illness through the comfort of cooking. They both join Krupa Padhy to discuss how we can cope with the lowest points in life.Presenter: Krupa Padhy Producer: Kirsty StarkeyInterviewed Guest: Barjis Chohan Interviewed Guest: Sally Wainwright Interviewed Guest: Paula Edwards Interviewed Guest: Paulina Porizkova Photographer: Jill Greenberg Interviewed Guest: Ella Risbridger Interviewed Guest: Emily Dean

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BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello, this is Krupa Bharti and you're listening to the Woman's Hour podcast. Good morning and thank you for joining us. The undisputed queen of British fashion, a very British kind of genius, the mother of punk. Just some of what has been written about Vivienne Westwood in the media and by fans since hearing about her death yesterday. We're going to look back on her life with a designer who worked with her and we do want to hear from you about how the work of Vivienne Westwood impacted your life. Maybe you wore or wanted to wear her fashion, Maybe you have thoughts on her activism. Do get in touch as we together

look back at her five-decade career. Also, if you are a fan of the drama Happy Valley, the long wait is over. A new series starts on New Year's Day. I've been speaking to the writer and director behind it, Sally Wainwright. A conversation with the former supermodel, Polina Poliskova,

one of the highest paid models of the 1980s, is also coming up. And as we close 2022, some of you may be looking back on the past 12 months. It's been 30 years since Queen Elizabeth II used the term annus horribilis in her Ruby Jubilee speech when talking about a personal low point. How have you tackled your own difficult year? You can text the programme. That number is 84844. It's at BBC Woman's Hour over on Twitter and Instagram. You can, of course, email us through our website and you can now send us a WhatsApp message or an audio note using the number 03700 100 444. Let us begin with that news about Dame Vivienne Westwood, who died yesterday at the age of 81.

She's being called, as I said there, the undisputed queen of British fashion. And she made her name with her controversial punk and new wave styles in the 1970s and went on to dress some of the biggest stars in fashion. Here is Dame Vivian talking to Jenny Murray on Woman's Hour back in 2014. At one point, I did really feel that punk clothes were a kind of crusade. And later on, I changed my idea about that and I gave a title to one of my fashion shows called Civilised Aid. And I do think that they are artistic and they are about culture and it is about choice and about getting a life,

making the best of you, expressing yourself. But at the time of punk, definitely it was a kind of uniform of revolt. I know that recently you've become very interested in sustainable fashion. And I wonder when I hear that, how easily do those two words actually sit together? Because it seems to everybody that fashion is about ever-changing trends. So to create something sustainable seems odd. I've got this Maxim, and we're doing a new shop in Paris, and definitely carved on the door will be, buy less, choose well, make it last.

I think that what we do gives people a real choice It's not a choice of quantity, it's a choice of quality One other thing I have to ask you about You have a history of loving to shop Why do you love to do that kind of thing? I don't think I do love to shop I think that fashion designers, what they do They design for an ideal world

It's a parallel world to this one, but it's kind of better. And so I expect that this heroic feeling of all these straps and everything, it reminded me of cloaks and knights and, you know, it was like a hero outfit. And not wearing your pants to meet the Queen. I don't wear knickers. I've got trousers on at the moment. I've got some knickers on underneath them. But under a skirt, I don't usually wear them.

I don't have any need to. And I didn't realise why the photographers were all on the floor. I didn't know why. Quite the personality there. Dame Vivian Westwood talking about how she designs fashion for an ideal world well let's talk about this a bit more at length with Barajas Chauhan who is a fashion designer in London who got her first break fresh out of college working with Dame Vivian Westwood welcome to the program. Hi there thank you very much for inviting me. So you were fresh out of college and then you contacted Vivian. Yes I did I mean I was at that phase in my life

that I just came out of college and I didn't have a job I was doing a sales assistant job but I didn't have a design kind of creative job and I thought let me just be brave and contact Vivian Westwood. Because I just thought, okay, name Vivian Westwood is like an icon. And if I want to work anywhere, I would like to work with Vivian Westwood. But I didn't do that kind of sending an email and then waiting for a response. I just picked up the phone and called the manager. And then she said, okay, why don't you come in tomorrow with your portfolio? So that's what I did. I went to see that's where her studio is. And I didn't meet her at the interview, but the manager was very nice and warm. And she said, okay, you studied at St. Martin's, do you know pattern cutting? And I said, yes, I do. And she said, can you start from next week?

And that's how my journey into fashion started. It was an eye opener, to be honest. It was amazing, amazing experience for me because coming from a conservative Muslim family and then going into my first break to Vivian Westwood was like kind of the complete opposite to where I came from and my background and living kind of a sheltered life and being exposed to someone who was utter shock to your system practically speaking what was it like working with her then it it was it was like it was eclectic because she would come um on her bicycle with her little poodle dog and multi-colored socks um she would just barge in and then she would just disappear.

Then her son would come in and he would drive his car right into the studio and start fixing the car while we're doing the cutting, cutting. So every day was colorful, vibrant, different. But one thing that stood out for me is the work ethic of the studio, the energy. It's like this was like not just a creative studio but it's like it was on a mission we were working on this collection called storm in a teacup this was in 1995 and she was showcasing it in paris in in march 1996

during paris fashion week and we were all working towards that. But I remember her asking me even to come on a Sunday to work because that's how dedicated they were. They just, I feel that they live, breathe, eat fashion and they enjoyed it and it didn't feel like it was work. You paint quite the picture for us, Barjus. Sadie in Allawash has gotten in touch with us and says, my friend borrowed my Vivienne Westwood Seditionary's cowboy t-shirt. Her strict

Catholic mum discovered it doing the laundry and ripped it to shreds. Would be worth so much money now. Still fuming. Well, let's talk about the fashion specifically, the rips, the safety pins, the latex. Just a few quotes from this morning's media coverage that she developed the idea of underwear as outerwear. And she also transformed the corset, for example, from a symbol of female repression to one of power and sexual freedom. Her clothes really sent out a message to the world. They did. With with her it was all about empowerment like for me modesty covering up is empowerment but hers was the opposite is like revelation revealing your body was about liberation and freedom and i respect that totally because we're just coming from the other side of the

spectrum but both of us are arguing about empowerment because you know it's just seen from a different perspective. But I think what I loved about it is that she really brought history into her work. It's like there were a lot of cultural references and her classic tailoring was just phenomenal. You know, I've got a jacket and I just feel her pattern cutting skills, considering she didn't come from formal education, like, you know, from a fashion background. She was self-taught. But the way she used to use the little miniature dummy in her studio and carve out all these designs and experiment was just mind-blowing. I was totally inspired whilst I was there. And it's something that I really, really take on and still am inspired by her work to this day.

What about her activism? I mean, to what extent did she bring that to her work? And what did you make of her, you know, leaving behind fashion to some extent in the final decade of her life and moving more towards those political causes that were so close to her heart? I think from day one, politics and fashion were, for her, they were together. It wasn't a part. It wasn't that you just become a fashion designer and not a politician. She had a voice and she used her platform to really express that and express her individuality and also transform people's lives. And, you know, she really changed people's mindsets about climate

change and what she believed in. And her latter life, I mean, I remember even when we were working, she always found a way of saying something political through her work, whether it was through her T-shirts or even her wording. There was something she really was passionate about and she just went out there and educated the market because I think we learned a lot through her. Barjes Chohan an absolute pleasure to speak to you about your memories of working with Vivienne Westwood. Sabine in York on email has her memories of wearing a lace body designed by Vivienne Westwood in the 1980s. She bought it from the sock shop.

She says, I've long outgrown it and have recently passed it on to my son, who loves wearing dresses. I think she would approve. The multi-Bafta winning BBC drama, Happy Valley, returns to our screens on New Year's Day. It's a long-awaited third series. The first came out in 2014 and the second in 2016. It centres on police Sergeant Catherine Kaywood,

played with humour and grit by Sarah Lancashire, and it's about the reality of law enforcement and the complexities of her own family in West Yorkshire. It's the brainchild of writer and director Sally Wainwright, whose other TV credits include The Last Tango in Halifax, Scott and Bailey, and Gentleman Jack. I've been speaking to Sally and I asked her how she came up with the now iconic character of Catherine Kaywood. I think when you create a character like that, there's so many things at work. You know, there's a big part of yourself in any character that that you create there's um the influence of other people around you

I knew that Sarah was going to play her before we before I wrote it or at least I hoped she would and so that really helped to have her in mind so you know you can really visualize this character you know what the character is going to sound like um I often, I think with characters like that, I often create people who I kind of wish I was. They're kind of superheroes to me. But I don't have a superhero kind of mentality. So for me, superheroes have to be very real as well. They have to be very down to earth. They have to be people to whom things have happened. You know, I mean, the thing with Catherine, I always say is that she's kind of quite a funny person to whom something very tragic has happened and that really gives i think gives her that that depth of character that she has got um you know she's very warm and

she's very funny and she understands people and she understands people's foibles but she's also pretty tough because of this very unusual and tragic thing that's happened to her in the past and also the nature of the job which does make people you know it does make people tough you know the the police women I've worked with as advisors they're all that well I say all I've worked closely with three uh four police women and they're all really really fabulous women but they're also you know worldly they're tough They've seen things that most of us don't ever have to see. That idea of Catherine as a superhero, I think you're absolutely spot on there. Early on in the new series, she talks about her retirement.

I mean, she is a woman in her 50s. Are women, in your opinion, at the height of their powers at that age? I think they are in many ways. I'm going to write about this next in a new series I'm developing at the moment which is about women of a certain age and the idea that you you kind of you know you kind of become the person you've always imagined you might be one day but at the same time you've got an awful lot to deal with and so your confidence is probably at its best and you know you're confident about who you are. You don't kind of take nonsense off people anymore much.

But you've also got a lot to deal with by this age. You've got, you know, in my case, an elderly parent who needs, you know, help. And sons who are, you know, they're on the way now, but, you know, they've had their ups and downs. You know, partners who are having midlife crises and all that kind of thing. So you have, as well as the menopauseopause of course you have that to deal with too so i think women at the age katherine's that are very complex well let's take a listen to katherine in action coming to respond to a 999 call where have you been i rang over five hours ago been a very busy night sir if you ring 999 you expect someone to turn up you don't expect to be kept waiting.

We've had a major incident to deal with in Littleborough so I've had to send most of my team off over the border to assist our colleagues. And then would you believe we've had a fatal collision up Pell and Main two dead. Now the operator you spoke to ascertained that there was no one unconscious, no one not breathing, no one in need of an ambulance and no one's life in danger, is that correct? Yeah. So, strictly speaking, that's not a 999 call, just FYI, that's a one-on-one call. But on the plus side, you've got a sergeant,

you've got a very experienced sergeant, you've sorted it all out, so... Don't tell me what's happened. She is such a brilliant character. So she's a sergeant committed to defending her community, equally a grieving mother, a fierce grandmother, a concerned sister. I mean, what have you given Catherine to chew on for this final series? It's really difficult to talk about it without giving away spoilers.

So she does have a rift with her sister, a big rift. And there is a kind of, there's a big showdown with them, hopefully. Oh, I can't, it's difficult to say. A big showdown. We can work with that. There's a big showdown and it will keep our listeners intrigued. I certainly am, having had a taste of the first couple of episodes. I can't wait to watch the rest. Let's talk about Sarah Lancashire, who plays Catherine.

I mean, with each of your characters, there is such depth to each and every one of them. But in particular for Sarah, it feels like a career-defining performance. Talk us through how you met her and how important that working relationship has been to you. Well, I first met Sarah years ago when I wrote Coronation Street, but not in any... It was kind of only to say hi. But it was when she played Caroline in Last Tango that I just really enjoyed her performance. I just thought there was a real, you know, she really thinks about things to the nth degree. She puts so much into it.

She's got that fabulous combination of being able to do really, really serious drama and then being hilariously funny. And that really, really appeals to me. So, you know, it kind of was a no-brainer to want to write something else for her afterwards. As a writer, you don't often work with actors. You kind of get to meet them and you have conversations with them but I think really it's the director they listen to um and it was only when I did Happy Valley that I actually started directing I directed the fourth episode of season one and then I directed the first block in the last block of season two and I have by default

ended up directing the first block of this which hadn of season two and I have by default ended up directing the first block of this which hadn't been the plan but I had to take over so she's fantastic to work with as you know she's a perfectionist which I am so we kind of get that about each other that you know sometimes it can be painful being a perfectionist and annoying to other people but it's I wouldn't I wouldn't not work with perfectionists because I think if you're going to make a tv show you might as well do it to the absolute best of your ability so i think i think it's that painstaking care about detail is is that kind of what makes the show what it is you know that it's it's it's and that's why i really enjoy working with sarah so that she really

deeply cares about it she cares about it um you know, to the point of making herself ill sometimes. So I kind of really respect where she comes from and hope it's mutual. I don't know, I think she is. Well, you've certainly got a recipe that's working out very well, working between the two of you. There are themes of domestic violence and coercive control in this series, and we do witness Catherine's frustrations, really, at how little she can do as a police officer to intervene. Was that a tough storyline for you to write? Yeah, I mean, like all the stories in Happy Valley, I work very closely with Lisa Farrant, and this time with Janet Hudson,

who, you know, makes sure that everything is accurate so that when Catherine, she has to arrest the girl and identifies her separately as somebody who's suffering from coercive control. And Lisa gave very clear advice about how she would deal with that and what she can and can't do. You know, as she says later to Claire, you can only lead a horse to water.

You can't actually make people do things against their will, even though Parts of Coercive Control is about people being in positions where they are doing things against their will. So yeah, it's tough to write things like that. It does take you into dark places and it makes for very interesting drama. But it's that idea of making entertainment out of difficult things, which I have a bit of an odd relationship with. I do find it difficult sometimes. It's a fine balance, isn't it? You also seem to be drawn in this series to portraying, let's say, weak men,

those who lie, who deceive, who can't see their way through when things get out of control. And it's up to the strong women in this series to kind of clear up the mess. Why? I suppose it has been a bit of a theme in Happy Valley. Well, I don't know if they're weak men. I think they're men who find themselves out of their depth through...

It's kind of about... The story with Faisal, I think, is about somebody who is in a family where he feels he's not as important as some of his relations. And so he finds a way to make extra money to make himself more relevant, I suppose. So I hope it's not about weakness. It's about complexity, I hope. Let's go back to your own journey in this industry. You talked about your time on Coronation Street. I mean, what did soaps teach you about writing and also the wider industry? I think discipline. What you learn on a soap is discipline.

You learn that, you know, you have to hit your deadlines. And the other big thing I learned on Coronation Street was how important story is, how important it is to be able to come up with huge amounts of story and quite quickly which is the hardest thing in the world so I'm hearing speed speed speed deadlines that's what I'm hearing from you and then how does that translate into you working on a series like this I mean you've talked about um Happy Valley being your kind of entry into the world of directing. Could you ever see yourself going back to being a wordsmith only now

or is this second hat one you intend to keep? Yeah, I mean, my next project I am going to just write, but I hope I will also continue to direct it's such a big commitment directing you know it it it makes the process so much longer when I write and direct um it's finding a balance and it's finding other directors who can translate what I do into something that I can better watch you've touched on it what you're working on next but could you expand on that a bit more I mean is there for example another series of Last Tango in Halifax on its way? That's not planned. I mean, Last Tango in Halifax never actually, I would never say no to doing more.

But there's nothing in the pipeline at the moment. I've got a couple of things that haven't been announced yet, so I can't talk about them. I know in recent days you've lost your dear mum. Yeah. And I know that's naturally had a big impact on you. Can you give us a sense of what she meant to you and your career journey in many ways? She meant everything.

I wouldn't have had my career without my mum. She loved Coronation Street and she was really, she had a real passionate engagement with stories and whether it was reading or watching TV or radio drama, she had a real passionate engagement with story. So right from a young age, I would write stories for school and homework, and she always read them in great depth and offered great... She was my greatest script editor ever, and she was my greatest critic and greatest fan, and she was so proud of what I did, and I really couldn't have done it without her.

And that came to... She often appeared in my work. When I wrote At Home With The Braithwaites, Alison Braithwaite was based on her. And when I wrote The Amazing Mrs Pritchard, the foreign secretary was called Dorothy Crowther, which was her name. And then, of course, Last Tango In Halifax was completely based on her.

When she... My dad died in 2001. She remarried Alec, this guy she'd been to school with 60 years earlier. And yeah, so her life became a TV series. So it's boundless what I owe my mum. Thank you for asking about that. No, thank you for sharing that with us. I'm fascinated that your mum played such a big role

in your character creation. What did she make of that? I think she'd be thrilled. I think she was a frustrated writer. She did write plays herself. And, you know, she was one of those women who grew up in, you know, her working class background in that period. She was not encouraged to stay at school.

And, you know, she was very clever and she was very creative and she definitely had a creative mind. She definitely thought outside the box. And knowing her as I came to, you know, in different circumstances, I'm sure she could have done what I've done. You know, it's just, as I say, the different way women were not encouraged in those days in the way that men were. A pleasure speaking to Sally Wainwright.

And Happy Valley starts again on Sunday at 9pm on BBC One. Now, hundreds of service women have experienced sexual abuse during their training at the Royal Military Academy Santa as according to charity Salute Her UK. Their figures show that 177 women have sought help for cases spanning more than 20 years. Paula Edwards is the CEO of Salute Her UK and she says a lack of action by those at the top has resulted in a toxic culture at Sandhurst and in the military in general. And she joins us now. Thank you for your time, Paula. Thank you for having me. Thank you for letting me be a voice for the women as well. That's incredibly important. These women, they've been turning to your charity sharing their experiences what have they been telling you that they don't feel safe serving in the military that the military justice system is corrupt by

design and that the investigation process is skewed and to protect the military rather than to protect the victim or to enable the victim to get any sense of real justice. So the seeking of justice has been central to so much of what they have shared with you and I want to expand on that. I mean we've spoken about the concerns for example regarding the lack of independence in the complaint system at length with both the victim of assault in the forces and the MP Sarah Atherton only in November when the army's zero tolerance to unacceptable sexual behaviour went live. This is a significant part of how it differs compared to when a civilian is assaulted, isn't it? Yeah, it's completely different. And if we just look at the culture at Sandhurst for a moment,

the culture is toxic and the offences definitely impact on women more than men. But the bias investigating seems linked to the wider cultural discipline concerns. So what often happens is women don't get the wraparound care and support and treatment that they deserve and that they need. In the civilian world, did you get that package of care? Yeah, we haven't been able to get a statement from Sandhurst. It is closed for Christmas until the 8th of January and their phone line is switched off.

But we did get a response from the Ministry of Defence. They were able to give a statement. And in that, I want to share this with you. They write, young recruits deserve to be treated with respect, not taken advantage of. That is why the armed forces has a zero tolerance approach to sexual assault and any allegations reported will be investigated with immediate action taken.

This part in particular, Paula, the new independent serious crime unit set up to investigate serious crimes across our tri-services, independent of the chain of command, will ensure anyone found guilty will face the full weight of the law and immediate dismissal. In further recognition of how serious allegations of this nature are taken, the Defence Secretary has already introduced a policy on zero tolerance to sexual offences and sexual relationships between instructors and trainees, making them dismissable offences. And finally, they share a new commandant arrived at RMA Sandhurst in August and has been charged with making improvements at the academy. He has already made three key improvements, the introduction of a new RMAS code of conduct,

the creation of a new sexual harassment task force under the cadet government and the introduction of a new alcohol policy. So a lot there. A new independent serious crime unit, a zero tolerance policy, a new creation of crime unit a zero tolerance zero tolerance policy a new creation of a sexual harassment task force paula does any of this reassure you considering what you've heard from these people coming to your charity not yet um if the military are going to be genuine

and they genuinely want to improve the armed forces and create a safe working environment for women, they have to look at the victim's journey through the service justice system. And I don't see any evidence for that. The evidence, in my eyes, couldn't be any clearer that rape, sexual assault, sexual assault by penetration, other sexual crimes should be dealt with by the civil justice system

um having a system within the military isn't what a lot of the victims have asked for victims have to come forward in the first place and trust the system before the report into it and for the women who access the leader they don't trust the system in fact many of the women face career suicide if they do report what's happened to them well let's expand on that a bit more because that journey through the system that is so traumatic i mean you've got the sexual trauma on one hand trauma in itself and then further trauma that these women have been sharing with you give us a few more details and what they've said about how they've been treated when they have had the courage to report these

issues um so many of the women that i work with are medically discharged um so they have reported a sexual assault from the sexual assault they've struggled with the mental health then have um issues relating to suicidal thoughts and depression and anxiety low mood etc they get sent to in-service mental health unit that supports them within their psychological health and well-being often what happens or what women tell me tell me is what happened is happening is that the women are then downgraded um and then they're medically discharged so a lot of the women feel like they've done the right thing they've reported to the right people they are hopeful that they're going to be protected and supported throughout their journey

however they rise they're punished and be protected and supported throughout their journey. However, in their eyes, they're punished and they'll lose their entire career. And then, you know, that's the professional impact, the impact on their mental and physical well-being. And then add to that this kind of social aspect, because in the military you're often working and living in the same bases with the same circles. Are precautions made when women report these crimes to ensure that they remain safe not for the women who access salute uk and the women certainly don't tell me

that in fact a lot of the women tell me that they are often with the perpetrator day in and day out or they are moved and that they are seen as the problem so what support the woman might have had for my unit disappears and she becomes very lonely and isolated what do you think paula has created this toxic culture has come from a lack of being able to investigate serious crimes independently so i think the military's sole purpose for a lot of these women and what the women think um is the purpose is to protect the reputation of the military at all costs and to get rid of the problem which is often the victim so i think that's at the core of the military at all costs and to get rid of the problem which is often the victim so i think that's at the core of the problem um and it's just still feeling like an old boys club

an old boys network there isn't many women who are there who are of higher rank um that can protect any of the women that come through the military. Specifically on some of your concerns, the Defence Secretary Ben Wallace has said military instructors who start sexual relationships with young recruits could face jail within a year under his new plans. And this is following those claims of a toxic culture of sexual assault at Sandhurst. How do you feel about that again going back to the reassurance will it move us in the right direction i think that it's a right step in the right direction i think it's going to protect um victims a lot more but the victims have to report it in

the first place um and they have to trust the system to report it so there's some steps that have to come before that act. Paula Edwards CEO of Salute Her UK we appreciate you coming on to the programme. Now even if you don't know her name there is a high chance you will recognise her face the former supermodel Polina Poliskova appeared on the covers of numerous top magazines around the world during the 1980s and the 1990s, including Vogue, Elle, Harper's Bazaar, Glamour and Cosmopolitan. In 1988, she then became one of the highest paid models in the world as the face of Estée Lauder.

The first part of Polina's life was spent very happily with her grandmother in communist Czechoslovakia. Age nine, she was reunited with parents she hardly knew in Sweden and Polina found her new life very tough. She was bullied at school for being different and too tall. Her parents split up almost immediately and whilst her mother worked night and day to make ends meet, Polina found herself responsible for herself and her three-year-old brother. At 15, she was then whisked to Paris to become a supermodel and then at 19, she became a rock star's wife when she met Rick Okazek of The Cars. He was 21 years her senior. They were married for many decades. They had two sons. But whilst they were in the process of getting a divorce, Rick died unexpectedly just before the pandemic.

All this and more is in her memoir, No Filter, The Good, The Bad and The Beautiful. I started by asking her about coping with living and working in Paris as a teenager. By the time I moved to Paris at 15 and I moved in to an apartment by myself by the time I was 15 and a half, I already knew how to take care of myself and a three-year-old child. So actually taking care of just myself was easier in comparison. And then of course came the pitfalls of being a 15-year-old fashion model, which, you know, in 1980 was sexual harassment we thought of as compliments. So it's definitely growing up in a world where you risk not seeing things as other people do. Let's put it that way.

15 and a half to be in your own apartment in Paris working and then to take on as you say this sexual harassment you talk about this openly in your in your book as well at one point you talk about the onus being on you to inspire sexual desire and you write specifically the sexual tension at a shoot wasn't a side effect it was something you wanted because it would make for better photos. Yes, and I have no idea what sex is yet. But it's interesting how we women learn so early on about, I guess, is it flirting? Putting yourself out as charming and delightful and pretty, of course, so that you will be liked. You know, all of what we've touched on here has come out a great deal when we've talked about the Me Too movement, the impact of which has been so significant in the modelling industry. And this

idea that you felt that it was sudden and you were surprised by that, but surely wasn't it about time that such behaviour was called out? Well, it was about time probably a thousand years ago. It's always been about time. You are someone who has gone through this firsthand. You've had photographers behave with you in particularly unacceptable ways. Yeah, but because I was so conditioned in believing that this was a good thing. I know it's striking and it's scary, really, because I think a lot of

women in my generation might feel a little similarly about it. And thank God that the young ones don't, that the young ones just put their foot down and go, no more of this crap. But I was brought up in an environment in which this was okay. And so it's sort of like muscle memory. You have to regrow a new set of muscles. That is so interesting, almost retraining your mind. Yeah, absolutely. Retraining my mind in order to be able to see this for what it really is, the power of men over women.

And it's all about power play. This is not about compliments. And I wonder, Paulina, how that power play translated into your marriage, because at the age of 19, you married your future husband, Rick Okazic, the lead singer for the cast. He was 21 years older than you. I mean, first of all, the age difference. How did you navigate that? Well, I didn't think of the age difference when I was 19. To me, he was older and sophisticated and just smarter and knew it all because of his age. I think I found him in part attracted because of his age. But of course, I mean, you know, realistically, yet was I looking for a parental

figure as a lover? Yes, of course I was. And he also had this way of loving me, this, you know, passionate, obsessive, I want to have all of you all the time. That was very much like my grandmother. So he fit the bill for my soulmate at the time perfectly. I struggled a little bit in the beginning with some of his control, but then I thought he knows better than I. He knows about relationships. He's failed already at a couple of them, so he knows what it takes to maintain. And we you know, we were together for 33 years. So it was a really long and happy marriage because I got what I needed from him and he got what he needed from me.

I don't know to what extent your modelling career was impacted during your marriage, but really when you came out of that, was getting that financial independence back a big part of your healing? I would say it was a part of my healing for sure, because yes, of course, financial independence is. It lets it allows you to do all the rest of the healing, you know, because for the first year when I didn't really have enough cash to buy groceries, you know, that was just one more thing on my plate that was keeping me down. So yes, let's not underrate financial independence here. It's really, really amazingly helpful. But, you know, like I say in my book, I have gone gone I've been through parts of my life where I was

really poor and parts of my life where I was really rich so the one thing I've learned from that is that that the money didn't necessarily make me happier I was possibly at my happiest in my life when I was a child and you know when we had very little money and I never had any new clothes and I got, you know, a banana for Christmas because that was seen as luxury. And, you know, and then years of financial freedom and having all the money that one could possibly use that were really lonely and depressing. So as wonderful as money is, it's not all. Yeah, that's very powerful. Financial power aside, being financially independent aside, there was that dimension of emotional healing that you had to do.

And interestingly, as you have taken those steps to make your life your own once again, you turned to Instagram. And I'm interested to learn what you did with this and why you chose that platform. Well, it's called desperation. um literally um i took to instagram because i was drowning and because the world was sunk in a worldwide pandemic and there was no way for me to um have any comfort of friends There was nobody there to hold my hand or to distract me or any of that. So I was literally, my Instagram posts were little messages in bottles that I was throwing off of my isolated little island into the waves, just hoping somebody would find a bottle and reach out to me. And the remarkable thing was,

was I wasn't the only person stranded on an island in COVID. A lot of us were. And so we kind of found each other. And this, I would say, community that found me and that I found on Instagram was incredibly helpful. It was people that heard me and I heard them. We were all sort of metaphorically holding each other's hands, you know, across the ethernet. Paulina, there is one chapter in your book that struck me.

It's called Nude Not Naked. And you talk about being happy to wear nearly nothing, or in some cases, nothing at all. You talk about, throughout your book, there is this theme of being exposed, about being vulnerable, being fragile. I mean, I just wonder how much this approach you have ties in to those emotions? Oh, to me being naked. See, and this is why I write about it in the book. To a lot of women, being naked is being vulnerable.

And because I grew up in Scandinavia in the 1970s, I never felt that way. Again, I was shaped in a different way. I grew up with a different set of muscles. To us, nudity was perfectly normal and perfectly healthy, and there was nothing vulnerable about it. On the contrary, it was almost like projecting strength. It's like showing emotional vulnerability is now seen as a sign of strength. If you dare to do that, then obviously you're strong enough to take it.

It was the same idea about the body. And so I never felt vulnerable when I was naked, and I still don't. I still feel like in power, like this is me. This is fully me, and I'm making no pretense of anything else but this being me. And it's like emotionally I was, I'm trying to find my way to feel equally as fearless about my, about myself emotionally as I am physically. So here's the thing, Polina, you look amazing. You are utterly striking. And anyone just needs to go through your Instagram feed to note that. I mean, going through your account, you recently posted a picture of yourself in a bikini on a beach from four years ago.

And it's difficult for people not to compare. And you have addressed this in your book when you talk about the responsibility of beauty. And you even share a quote from a comment on Instagram where someone says your hypocrisy on this matter is incredible. I'm keen to get your thoughts on this. Well, look, I was given this body. I'm trying to use what I was given. I wasn't given a different body. I wasn't given a different face. This is what I have. And I haven't, you know, and I haven't done anything to alter my body. I haven't gotten bigger boobs or liposuction, which quite frankly, some days I look at my thighs and I think, oh God, you know, this could use a lift. Do you have cellulite? And obviously I'm not, you know, I don't post pictures of myself in which I feel like I look bad.

I obviously post ones in which I think I look good. This is what I got. This is all I got. This is why I started my career out as being seen because of this body and face that I was given. Now it's in part of why I'm being heard. So what else should I do? What do you say, though, to those who are struggling with a degree of self-acceptance when it comes to their bodies? I mean, you talk openly in your book about battling two walls, either the war against invisibility or the war for self-acceptance.

How do you work through that? Well, I'm still working through that one. And if I had an answer for you, I would write a brand new book about how to come to perfect self-acceptance and embrace yourself and love yourself the way you are and then we'd all be really happy, right? I guess it doesn't, it doesn't really work like that. I'm still battling with it. I have days in which I feel really shitty about myself. You know, I'm a woman of a certain age.

When I speak of being invisible, what I'm really talking about is, in my case now, because I have regained some visibility as a famous person, not as a woman, mind you, but what's taken away is our pretty privilege when we get older. And so, and you know, and the pretty privilege, you can regain it by making yourself look younger again. And so I struggle with that all the time because I could regain my pretty privilege. And instead of fighting this, no, I'm going to go with it. I'm going to age. I'm going to embrace exactly what I was given. And because what I was given is now, it's in a different stage. I'm in a different stage. And to regain this pretty privilege that you talk about, I mean, have you ever been tempted to get Botox, to get fillers, as so many women do?

All the time. Of course. I'm always tempted. What stops you? What stops you? Because you can do it, even though you look great as you are. What stops you? What stops you? Because you can do it, I've strived for the idea of being worthy of love. And that means me as I am, naked, with wrinkles, with everything that comes with who I am now.

And to change that, that would be, to me, feels a bit like selling false wear, you know? It's, I would be misrepresenting the person that I really am and what I'm really looking for ultimately is connection and love. And I don't think I'm going to get those by conforming to what society wants from women, which is that they remain young forever. Polina Poliskova there talking to me about her new memoir, No Filter, The Good, The Bad and The Beautiful. And on the subject of fashion,

we've also been looking back at the life of Vivienne Westwood and what she meant to you. This message from Debbie writes, Vivienne Westwood, what a legend meant to you. This message from Debbie writes, Vivienne Westwood, what a legend. I will be wearing my pirate boots today and feeling like a true fashionista. What a very sad day. She will live on in all the people

who love to make a statement in what they wear and love to shock. Thank you very much, Debbie, for being in touch. Now, 2022 marks 30 years since Queen Elizabeth II used the term annus Horribilis in her Ruby Jubilee speech to describe a personal low point. It's a Latin term which can be translated as horrible year or worst year. And we wanted to talk about what happens when we hit our own Annus Horribilis. As we approach New Year's Eve, for lots of us it's a time of celebration,

but there are equally many who might be looking back on 2022 as their worst year. I'm joined by the broadcaster and author of Everybody Died So I Got a Dog, Emily Dean, and the writer Ella Rysbridger, whose book The Year of Miracles, Recipes About Love, Grief and Growing Things, was published earlier this year. Welcome to you both. Hi. Ella, let's start with you. In your work, you've written about some very difficult times in your life. Is Anus Horribilis, or Worst Year, is it a term that you would turn to? Do you find it a helpful label at all? I think when I wrote, so I've written two books now about bad years two different

cookbook memoirs about years that certainly when I wrote the first one I was 21 and I thought this is going to be the worst year of my whole life and I think maybe that's and I thought this this is the you know anna cerebellis for want of a better word and you, life just keeps going and different things happen. And I think with every year that passes, I feel more and more that I myself am better to think in the small terms, to think about today, to think about this week, to think even about sort of the hour, the minute. Then I am kind of trying to fit things into a larger structure. Every time I think I know, oh, this is the worst year or this is the best year something changes and I think it it kind of frightens me as a term because you know you don't know what's around the corner you don't know it kind of flattens all of your experience into one easy story and I don't know if you find that Emily but certainly the queen's part of a story

right the monarchy is kind of a story that we tell ourselves it fits into these patterns of big big terrible things and big good things and jubilees and you know other complicated things I'm not going to get into but I can see why it worked for the queen to say it but maybe she had great days in that terrible year and maybe she also had worse personal moments. So I don't know. I'm kind of uneasy with it as a term. I think because grief never feels linear like that.

Pain never feels linear like that to me. Emily? Yeah, I really relate to what you were saying, Ella, because I felt I lost my sister and it was, you know, it was a life interrupted. She died of cancer and it was diagnosed very late and she had two children. So it was, you know, it's really tragic. And then my parents died pretty shortly afterwards. So it was kind of this condensed box set of trauma, essentially. And all these things, what I went through wasn't unusual. You know, we'll all end up losing up losing our family you know horrible spoiler alert at this time of year I'm sorry that's not

very seasonal but the fact is I think we all kind of operate under the assumption that there's a rational showrunner in charge of your life and they're spacing out events equally so we'll give you a bit of trauma there then we'll give you two years to recover. And when that doesn't happen and you get this truckload of stuff at once, you're reeling a bit, you're thinking, but actually this isn't how it's meant to happen. I'm meant to have a sort of rational gap in between these things happening.

So I certainly related to that idea of, I suppose I felt like a bit like I was a talisman for bad luck, that every time I entered the room, I was like the raven or the skull in the Renaissance painting. Oh, here she comes, grief face again. So I think that was interesting what you were saying about trying not to make it my identity, I suppose, and respecting certainly at this time of year, it is difficult for some people. It will always be difficult for me. And so it's about having a new year

and looking forward to the new year, I suppose, on my terms. For me, that means escaping to the country with my best friend and her husband and my godchildren and six dogs. That is my bliss. That's my happy place. Yes, and you need to find that yourselves in many ways.

We've had this message from E who writes, 2022 was the year I left my husband at 25 years because I didn't love him. I loved someone else. I then lost that love because as it turns out, he not only did love me, but was controlling and manipulative. I'm now alone, but in my lovely, peaceful flat, and I don't know how I'm still standing, but I am. And 2023 can only get better. I mean, Ella, on that, there is a lot of pressure, as we've touched on around this period. If you've had a bad year, is there that unfair pressure almost for the next year to be a good one? I think there is, yeah. And I think that's one reason why I'd really perhaps urge people not to think in these big narrative terms. Life isn't story shaped. And I, you know, I've written two memoirs now and I've had to try quite hard to fit my life into the shapes of the book.

I expect the same is true for Emily. But because life isn't story shaped, you can't try and say I am the character and this is what's happening. You need to focus for me anyway. I find if you focus on the small on the practical on the everyday you know Emily got a dog I cooked obsessively and still do I think if you focus on what can I do to make today better what can I do to make today feel good rather than thinking the next year must be better I I spent a lot of time you you know, my partner died of cancer five years ago now. And it was an incredibly complex and difficult time. But I think I had spent a lot of time before that when he was ill. And before that, when I was ill, it was a difficult decade, thinking next year is going to be different, something else is going to happen,

I'm going to feel better. And then I think you kind of wind up in these terrible cycles of why don't I feel better why aren't things going better I'm putting this extra pressure which is so then difficult to negotiate your way out of whereas if you think okay I'm going to walk the dog there's going to be fresh air I'm going to look at the sky or I'm going to go and make some lunch or some dinner and I'm going to sit and I'm going to carefully think about what I really want to eat right now. Yeah, it's almost about going moment by moment by what you're saying there. And that's what Sue in Kent has attempted to do. She's got in touch to say, to recover from my annus horribilis loss of both my parents falling out with four brothers and the betrayal of a close friend.

I have moved with my partner out of London to the countryside and taken on an acre of brambles and started the planting out of an orchid with heritage fruit and nut tree. She elaborates on that and then she goes on to say, Mother Nature is a wonderful and generous healer and although we are both exhausted at the end of the day, it is a happy and fulfilled exhaustion. Emily, on that, I mean, you found your dogs, but I mean, what if you can't find your thing? What advice would you give to people?

I think for me, what the dog, I mean, obviously I've got a dog and he is absolutely adorable. I know that's boastful, but, you know, he really is. He's looking pretty dapper on there as well on the screen. I'm never separated from him. It's codependent, but that's a whole other program what I would say is that um I think for me what he actually represented was routine and structure and I'm child free so it was also having someone I was responsible for it gave me even if I didn't want to get up in the morning he had to be fed you know he had to uh go for his comfort break um So for me, that's what it represented. And I think some sort of routine and structure is utterly vital when you're going through a difficult period like that. And that joy that you get from being outside, which sounds trite, but it's true. I took my dog on the beach

yesterday. He'd never seen sand. I am still, I've been happy for 24 hours just looking at him running up and down. I mean, what I'm hearing from you is that discipline and routine are paramount. Thank you so much, Emily and Ella there. And my thanks to all of you for your many messages and for spending some of your morning with us here. Thanks for listening. There's plenty more from Woman's Hour over at BBC Sounds. Hi, I'm Andy Oliver and I'd like to tell you all about my Radio 4 series, One Dish. over at BBC Sounds. their favourite food to my table and we'll be unpacking the history of it. And food psychologist

Kimberley Wilson is on hand to talk us through the science bit. What food reminds you of your child? What's your favourite place to go for dinner? What do you have for Sunday lunch? What's your favourite dessert? Do you say plantain or plantain? What food would you take with you to a desert island? What's your favourite type of chilli oil? What do you have for breakfast? What's the best pasta? So if you're the sort of person who's already planning what you're having for lunch while you're eating breakfast, then this podcast is going to be right up your street. That's One Dish with me, Andy Oliver. Listen now on BBC Sounds.

I'm Sarah Trelevan, and for over a year, I've been working on one of the most complex stories I've ever covered. There was somebody out there who was faking pregnancies. I started, like, warning everybody. Every doula that I know. It was fake. No pregnancy. And the deeper I dig, the more questions I unearth.

How long has she been doing this? 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.