Woman's Hour - Ruth Birch and Julia Curry, Liza Mundy, Lyse Doucet and Tal Hochman, Cindy Thomas and Laura Barton

Episode Date: October 24, 2023

Liza Mundy is the bestselling author of Code Girls, a book about the American women who broke codes during the Second World War. Her new book details the lives of spies and intelligence agents behind some of the biggest operations in postwar history including locating Osama bin Laden, and rescuing the schoolgirls kidnapped by Boko Haram.Around 80 Israeli rights groups have signed a letter calling on the organisation UN Women to condemn acts of violence against women by Hamas. The letter was addressing a statement issued by UN Women, a United Nations entity which aims to be a global champion of women and girls – which they said ‘ignored the atrocities that took place on Oct 7th’. Emma Barnett speaks to Tal Hochman from the Israeli Women’s Network who are one of the organisations involved and also by Lyse Doucet the BBC’s Chief International Correspondent.According to a new trial published in the journal of Clinical Psychiatry involving 80 people from Massachusetts General Hospital - heated yoga sessions could lead to reduced depressive symptoms in adults with moderate-to-severe depression. The trial findings suggest that the combination of yoga and heat should be considered as a potential treatment for individuals experiencing depression. Hot yoga instructor Cindy Thomas and writer and broadcaster Laura Barton talk about the survey.Ruth Birch and Julia Curry are a couple from South Wales. They met as young women in the British army, but had to leave because of the pressure they were under to lie about their sexuality and conceal their relationship. You were not allowed to be gay or lesbian in the UK military until the year 2000. The stress led to them breaking up, but twenty years later they reunited, and now campaign on behalf of fellow LGBT veterans. Ruth and Ju feature on You Had Me at Hello, a podcast where ordinary people tell their love stories. Presenter: Emma Barnett Producer: Lisa Jenkinson Studio Manager: Giles Aspen

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 Emma Barnett and welcome to Woman's Hour from BBC Radio 4. Good morning and welcome to today's programme. As two Israeli female hostages in their 70s and 80s are released by Hamas and the airstrikes and missiles continue, the United Nations Women Division is being called out by a group convened by the Israeli Women's Network for the failure to detail and condemn what atrocities Hamas carried out on women and children in Israel.

We have asked a representative of UN Women to come on Women's Hour and we are waiting to hear back. Lise Doucette will also be here, the BBC's chief international correspondent, who's in southern Israel, close to the Gaza Strip, to give us a picture of the region and the brutal reality of what is happening to women and children on the ground in Gaza. Also on today's programme, the fascinating history of the women working for the Central Intelligence Agency in America, or as we know it, the CIA, right up to the present day. And I'll be joined by two women who fell in love in the British military,

but broke up and left their jobs as they weren't allowed to be gay and have their jobs. And there's a bit of a theme in the second half of today's programme of not easily being allowed to be your full self at work, whether because of your sex in terms of the CIA in a very male environment and how you were taken seriously or weren't because you were a woman working in that field, or your sexuality, as I just discussed in that story we'll come to.

It is a huge thing to have to act differently or hide a fundamental part of yourself at work. If you can relate, do get in touch. Text me here at 84844. That's the number you need to text. Messages are charged at your standard rate on social media at BBC Women's Hour is where you'll find us. You can email me through the Women's Hour website

or send a WhatsApp message or voice note on the number 03700 100 444. Data charges may apply depending on your provider, so do check. But first, UN Women, a division of the United Nations which aims to be a global champion of all women and girls, is being strongly criticised for failing to condemn acts of violence against Israeli women by Hamas, which the Israeli government says includes young women being raped and slaughtered. A new letter signed by 80 different human rights groups, both inside and outside of Israel,

has been convened by the Israeli Women's Network. Shortly, I'll just be talking to the former social worker Tal Hochman, who helped put the letter together for the Israeli Women's Network. And after that, I'll be talking to Lise Doucette, the BBC's chief international correspondent, who, as I said, is in southern Israel, close to the Gaza Strip. We'll cover, of course, the actions of Hamas, the freeing of those two female hostages, and life this morning in Gaza. But I also should say at this point, and I'm very mindful that it's half term here in the UK. I know we have listeners from around the world, but some may find the details of what we're going to discuss very upsetting indeed. Tal Hochman for the Israeli Women's Network. Good morning. Welcome to Women's Hour.

Thank you for having me. Why have you put this letter together? So on the 13th of October, we were pretty surprised to read the statement that the UN women issued. And they didn't condemn and didn't talk about the horrific attack on the 7th of October Israelis and non-Israelis that are being held in Gaza. More than 220 people are still there. So I'm looking at this statement now that you're talking about from the United Nations Women's Division. At the beginning, it does talk about being deeply alarmed that the UN women condemns

the attacks on civilians in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories and is deeply alarmed by the devastating impact on civilians, including women and girls. And there's a reiteration of the UN Secretary General's call to all parties to ensure the safety of civilians and civilian infrastructure and that humanitarian law and human rights law must be respected and upheld. And so it continues. But that's the statement that you're talking about. The rest of that statement is factually accurate to say it focuses on the situation in Gaza. So is your issue that no detail has been shared about what Hamas did? Yes, we see the consequences now. We see that people are asking if it really happened on social media. I would expect the UN branch that promotes and protects women's rights everywhere and in every place in the world to care about both Israeli women and other women.

It's not only Israeli women that were attacked. There were Muslim women, Bedouin women, women with hijab that you can see that are Muslims and were shot. And the horrific attack is just indescribable. I don't want to be too graphic and I won't, but The stories that are now uncovering as the days go by, we see, we hear horrific, horrific stories. And even the terrorists, they had body cameras on them. So after the attack, they shared them online and people could see their own loved ones being raped and attacked and killed. And some of them even livestreamed on the Facebook wall of the victim while killing them. So this is the brutality is indescribable.

And we need an organization like UN Women to be on our side saying that these attacks are terrible because human morality is not just like gray. It's there are things that are right and there are things that are wrong. And we need to come in people saying that this is wrong. We aren't going to go into all of those details. And I should say, you know, a lot of those are written up and people can follow the address from, for instance, Israel's leader, Benjamin Netanyahu, who's been quoted, if I was just to give one line, which said, we saw boys and girls bound who were shot in the head, men and women burned alive,

young women who were raped and slaughtered, soldiers who were beheaded. For those who are thinking what is being talked about here. We are Women's Hour. We're focusing on what's happened specifically, if we can, to women and also to children. And it is that lack of condemnation you feel which has motivated you to put this letter together. As I say, we've asked the United Nations Women, the UN Women Group, to put someone forward to come on Women's Hour. Maybe they will take us up on that. As of yet, they have not.

And we don't yet have a statement in response to your concern and your protest against what you see as a lack of condemnation. Have you had any response from UN Women? No, we didn't receive any response. Since we spread the letter, there are more, more organizations have signed on. So now we have more than 100 organizations from Israel and also the rest of the world. We have Canada, Australia, the States, Brazil, all over. And it's not just, I just want to be sure that I'm clear. It's not just to condemn the situation, what happened, the attack of the 7th of October. It's the fact that now, as we speak, there are hostages in Gaza that we don't know

if they're being taken care of. We know that Hamas don't treat women well, to say the least. We don't know what's happening to these women, to these children. We have terrible evidence saying what happened to the bodies that were discovered and what happened to the people that were taken out of the situation. But we have no idea what's happening to the people in Gaza now. There is, as of the 20th, four days ago, October, on the United Nations website, an update about the impact of the crisis in Gaza on women and girls. There is no update or any detail around the hostages and anything that has happened to Israeli women and women who were targeted, women and children, by Hamas and are still the more than 200,

as we understand, hostages who are being kept. Why do you think there is, as you would see it, this blind spot from the United Nations? I have to be completely... I don't know, I'm just, I have no explanation. What do you think it is, though? Because there's something you feel that has been missed, and you're not alone, and more than 100 organisations have felt compelled to sign.

Why do you think it has been missed, as you would put it? First of all, the attack was extremely brutal. And even the media here in Israel, but also internationally, they're not showing everything. Israeli families have to go through the videos to see and to find if their loved ones are kidnapped or dead. So we've been exposed to more terrible photos and videos. But I think that it's really hard to grasp what happened. It's more of an ISIS tactics that happened on October 7. I'm so sorry to interrupt you. I'm just going to say least you set is on the line and we have some interruption on that particular

line just um if you're hip to our listeners if you're hearing any sound i will go to least you set in a moment but if we could sort that out i'm sorry if people are struggling to hear it they will still hear you tal i'm just saying in case they're wondering why there's that background noise least you set is out in the field and I'll go to her in a moment. But please carry on. Your point is not everything's being shown and people are searching for their relatives in the footage that is being shown. Yes, and maybe the international... Sorry.

I tell you what, I'm going to have to... I tell you what, Tal, could you just hold that thought? I will come back to you in a moment. I think we're just trying to clear the line. There we go. We've managed to do it. Tal, please carry on. I'm so sorry to interrupt it. No worries. I just think that people are finding it difficult to grasp the whole situation and the international community maybe in particular, because these are not, we were surprised as well, these are not tactics that we've seen before. These are ISIS tactics of beheading people, of targeting specifically women and children. These are things that never happened in Israel. And to think of the

fact that people woke up at 6.30 in the morning on Shabbat morning, just out of the blue in a Jewish holiday. So I would try to be naive and say that maybe the international community doesn't grasp the whole situation. And I would strongly ask for them to wake up and to be on our side and to help the hostages because we need help and we will need to recover from this. So you believe that the reason why you think this has been missed and not detailed and not condemned is because the United Nations women, which is meant to represent all women and girls, has failed to grasp what Hamas did um I don't know more than that I don't want to be presumptuous and

and say things that I'm not sure because they they really didn't talk about it um no it's not it's not for you to answer i just think it's important to give you the opportunity to to say what you think and what is underpinning this letter yes i just want to say that with the feminists in israel we we've been working my organization specifically has been working in israel for the past 40 years to promote women's rights. And we promote women, whoever they are. Right. We promote Palestinians rights and also Jewish women's rights. And we were pretty surprised by the fact that the organization that we thought that would represent us and would be on our side and would protect us and would want

to protect the hostages, the women hostages, was just nowhere to be found. So this is the result that we wrote the letter. This is what we're asking for. And it's not too late. They can still talk about it. They can still issue posts on social media. They can do it. It's not too late. And that's what you're looking for, which is what I was going to ask. Again, apologies for the interruption on the line there. I know we're going to Lise Doucette now, and I think that's what it was.

Tal Hoffman, thank you very much indeed. When we hear back from the United Nations, women will bring it to you. I very much hope I can interview someone from the organisation about this and about the situation as well in Gaza, of which there are several statements on the United Nations website. Lise Doucette, where are you at the moment?

I know you can describe a bit where you are. And just on this particular point, the release of two female hostages, of course, is dominating the news headlines this morning. But we were also talking there about the uh the abuse of women by hamas yes and welcome hello emma and all apologies to women's hour listeners and also to tal that um we were asked to keep our our audio open and unfortunately there's a we're about a less than now less than a mile from the gaza strip you might be able to see it behind me. And there's been a lot of bombardment and artillery fire over the last 10, 15 minutes.

So it seemed to have caused, of course, some interruption to your audio. This is very much a war zone now, the 18th day of the Israel-Gaza war. And it's still no sign of letting up. But there was that very good news last night, a glimmer of hope, when two more hostages, 79-year-old Nurit and also 85-year-old Jokovic, who are now in hospitals.

They've been given medical treatment. We have heard Jokovic's daughter, Sharon, who came from Britain, was able to see her mother and to say she's, well, she's frail. Some of our listeners may have seen those videos, chilling and comforting in equal measure to frail women, dazed after the trauma of being held hostage for more than two weeks. And in that last moment where Jokov Veta, she's about to be handed over to the International Committee of the Red Cross, turns to her captor wearing balaclava covering his face

and his body armor and the green bandana of Hamas. She turns to him and shakes his hand and says, shalom, which means peace in Hebrew. And as we've been on air, Emma, they are giving details from a press conference about the conditions in which they were held in tunnels underground in Gaza, how they were given medical treatment, how they were told not to discuss politics, how they all were given, each person was given medical attention. And we're going to get more details in the hours to come

about how these hostages were treated. So two more, that's four in all, who've been released in the past few days. But there are more than 200 still being held hostage, including Israelis and some 30 other nationalities, also believed to include Britons, including everything from 80-year-old Holocaust survivors to nine-month-old babies who were seized at gunpoint as they were being cradled in their mother's arms. And it is, I suppose, striking as well, four women have been released. And in the cases of the two most recent women, not with their husbands, they have not been released. So some will have noticed perhaps that that detail if i could just bring you to what is going on in gaza is some incredibly

moving images on the fronts of some of the newspapers today of of a woman in particular an image on the front of the guardian holding her baby walking with a backdrop which is just completely gray um and and smoke filled. And there's also some details coming out, Lise, of hospitals struggling with power in Gaza and details of baby incubators and critical need as the fuel runs low. Yes, you heard from Tal the profound anger and trauma, collective trauma, as it's being described here in Israel after the horrific events of October the 7th. And the world is just really beginning to find out the enormity of what has happened on October the 7th. Yesterday, the Israeli Defense Forces held a briefing for

journalists where the journalists were not allowed to film the images, but it was 43 minutes of raw footage from Hamas gunmen while they were on a rampage across southern Israel. Absolutely chilling details, their treatment of women and children. And so, too, on the other side of the Gaza border, you know, Emma, there used to be this phrase in wars gone by, women and children first, women and children first on the other side of the Gaza border. You know, Emma, there used to be this phrase in wars gone by, women and children first, women and children first on the boat, first on the train, first on the bus, protect the women and children, the innocents in these wars.

But now women and children first seems to mean first hit the women and children. In wars of our time, which are fought street to street and house to house, it is the women and children who are paying the heaviest of prices. Just take one of the statistics, which is on that UN Women website that you mentioned. 50,000 women in Gaza are now pregnant. More than 5,000 are giving birth in these desperately dangerous conditions where there's no clean water. The hospitals are warning that they only have enough fuel to run the generators for a few more days.

Israel is not allowing fuel into Gaza, saying this is something that can be diverted by Hamas. This is an extraordinarily painful time. Painful for girls, since we're on Women's Hour, women and girls in Gaza. Painful for women and girls on this side of the border. War does not discriminate between religions, between ages, between genders. This is a war where so many, so many are suffering. And sadly, this is a war the Israeli Defence Forces keep telling us is just beginning. It could still last for many more months. international correspondent in southern Israel there. Now, did you know it was a group of women analysts who found and tracked down the location of the Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden?

The Central Intelligence Agency in America, or as we know it, the CIA, has employed women since it was established shortly after the Second World War. They started off as secretaries, but it took until 2018 for the first female director of the CIA to be appointed, Gina Haspel. Like women's careers in many other sectors, it was a battle for the first women in the CIA to be listened to, to be respected, to be accorded that understanding that what they were bringing was important. But unlike other sectors, their lives were also depending on their work. I should say many other sectors, of course. Liza Mundy is the author of the bestselling book Code Girls about the women who broke codes in World War II. And now she's written another book called The Sisterhood,

The Secret History of Women at the CIA. Liza, welcome to the programme. Thank you so much for having me. It's a fascinating look through, but it does take us up to the present day. And I mentioned a very modern, a very recent experience of women analysts, those working to try and make the world a safer place. That is meant to be the M.O. of the CIA. And do you think that we are, if I could start where we are now, do you think we are in the right place for women being trusted and accorded that equal

respect in the intelligence agency? Well, we're in a lot better place than we were even 20 years ago, 25 years ago. It was a group of women analysts at the CIA who were tracking al-Qaeda and Osama bin Laden as early as the 1990s and trying to warn about the threat posed by this sort of disparate network of terrorists in different parts of the world who were communicating with each other. And they were trying to call attention to this threat that people in Washington, people at the CIA, but then people in Washington had trouble taking seriously because they weren't backed by a state. They didn't have uniforms. They didn't have an army. And people thought, well, you know, how dangerous could they really be?

But at the CIA, as in the UK, there's a long tradition of women working in what was called the vaults at the CIA, the so-called vault women. And during the Cold War, these were women like sort of like Connie Sachs, the character of Connie Sachs in the Le Carre novels, who had this capacious knowledge, this bottomless knowledge of during the Cold War of Soviets, KGB officers and communist adversaries and could provide often the male officers with the clues that they needed to make linkages and to identify traitors. And this tradition of women with this just incredibly relentless, deep knowledge of the adversary certainly carried forward into these women warning about 9-11 and then into the female targeters. This became a discipline at the CIA called targeting, which was tracking and finding terrorists around the world. And it is certainly the case that Osama bin Laden would not have been

located without the presence of a very large group of the targeting core was predominantly female. To go back in time then, what I found fascinating as well was the idea of CIA wives, the role that wasn't necessarily known about, but also pretty crucial. Tell us about that. Absolutely. And this is one of my favorite parts of the book. There's a chapter called Housewife Cover. And this shows how, you know, during many decades of the Cold War, the men of the spy corps at the CIA held, you know, that women weren't really capable of spycraft on the streets, that the quintessential job of finding foreign nationals who will pass secrets to the CIA, that very difficult ask that you have to make of someone to betray their own country and pass secrets, was something that women weren't really capable of doing. And so that was

how the spy corps of operatives out on the street remained predominantly male for many years. But these men were getting substantial help from their own wives who were expected to travel around the world, who were often trained and received close to the same level of training as the men, and who were with them out on the streets, helping, first of all, moving inconspicuously. This was one of the ways in which women were at an advantage because women were considered unimportant and more able to move around without being surveilled. It gave women an advantage, both women who were actual employed spies of the CIA, but also wives,

and particularly in places like Moscow, where CIA officers were being surveilled by the KGB around the clock and, you know, followed in cars. The KGB generally knew who the CIA officers were, who were there undercover. And so wives were incredibly instrumental with driving the car so that her husband could make what was called a car toss, tossing a message out a window to be retrieved by a Soviet asset or helping with a dead drop when an asset would leave a message or the CIA officer would leave a message for the asset. The wife could be one of the wives in the book. Her name is Shirley Sulik. She would carry a huge purse and she would drop her lipstick, you know, drop all this, oh, look, all my stuff is on

the ground and sweep up her lipstick and her pens and everything that was in her big bag. And she would sweep up the message as well. That's pretty good. I mean, you can put a lot in a handbag, can't you? And if you're being underestimated as a woman, I often think it's quite a good place to be. Because you could go below the radar quite literally in this sense. It's striking, though, as well, the same level of training, but I bet no pay or recognition. Right, right. And there was a long period of time where women who were trained CIA officers, if they married a colleague, as one of the women in my book did, and that was very common, married a fellow CIA officer, the woman had to resign. She was expected to resign so that she, and this was true at our U.S. State Department as well. We forget that.

It was expected that the woman would then resign her career, the training dollars that had been put into her training, but then she would follow her husband around the world and she would help them. But she would be unpaid and there would be no advancement to her career. Yeah. I mean, my next discussion is actually about in the British military, two people meeting and not being able to be to be gay, to be lesbian and be together. Well, that too. Which I know is also another feature. Is that right? For decades and decades. For decades and decades. Yes. And that was grounds for expulsion.

And, you know, the amount of good women and men lost in that situation would have been very notable. I do love the part of the book where you also talk about because it does seem like there's a sisterhood and there is camaraderie there. That's not always the case. But you call them the original sisterhood. They did get together to potentially plan a joint memoir of their experiences, but perhaps had a look at the memoirs of their male counterparts with a few wry smiles. Yes, well, this was a group of women who were among the foremost voices warning about 9-11 and warning about the danger posed by al-Qaeda and Osama bin Laden, writing warnings, trying to gather attention. And that's when it's not a good thing to be underestimated and

inconspicuous when you're trying to make your voice heard in a workplace, in a bureaucracy that, as you said, was created to protect our national security. And so these women were in the building on 9-11. They were experiencing 9-11 from within the CIA building. They stayed at their posts, even though it was expected that the CIA itself might be a target for the fourth airplane. And so they were, you know, sitting with their backs to the wall, expecting that at any moment an airplane could plow through the wall. The rest of the CIA evacuated during 9-11. And so then, you know, immediately... Sorry, if I may, these women stayed in the building?

Stayed, yes. And everyone else left? Yes, the counterterrorism center at the CIA, which was very small at that time, all those officers stayed in the building. It was not a large group of officers, but they were not allowed to evacuate and did not want to evacuate. And then, of course, there was this terror reports coming in of a second wave of attack. And so the women had to spend months and then ultimately years trying to prevent more attacks, even as they were being blamed for a failure to warn. So inconspicuousness or being underestimated was a great problem. And then gradually within the building, it did become acknowledged that they should have

been listened to and that this group of largely women who were trained to track individuals wherever they were around the world, whoever they were communicating with, were what was needed to fight terrorism, the terrorism that proliferated. They're talking about ISIS and al-Shabaab in Africa and Boko Haram. These groups that had splintered off, many of which were franchises of al-Qaeda, had to be, you know, had to be located one by one by one. Well, it's fascinating. And what you sort of come to as well is that they don't end up doing

it. But you've put their stories together in terms of their memoir. They don't. Yes, they don't put it together. Right. Sorry, it's a really important point that you're making, which is if you don't listen to women, although we can make jest about it, you know, in other lines of work where it is about security. In this in this case, it's incredibly frightening to hear that detail. Yes. And as you said, there was a gathering. The women got together in 2016. Many of them, several of them retired at that point. And they had resolved, because a lot of memoirs have been written since 9-11. And in many cases, male officers trying to sort of get their word in about history. And the women were going to try to write a collective memoir, but they just became so frustrated and were still so traumatized by, again, by the atrocities that they had witnessed

online when they're tracking ISIS and in the Iraq war is going on. Anyway, they ended up reading aloud the men's memoirs in sort of very pompous voices and drinking a fair amount that night. And they are very much a sisterhood, both the women who are still there, still in the counterterrorism fight, and the women who have retired but are still very much in touch with each other. Just finally, I mean, it's a mighty tome. There's a lot of stories, there's some good pictures as well, which we appreciated. Thank you for appreciating that. What did you want and what do you want people who perhaps got no connection to this, and especially, you know, on this side of the pond as well,

what do you want women to take away from this? What do you want your readers to learn? Well, on your side of the pond, I mean, we modeled the CIA after MI6. So I think they're very much, you know, parallel stories. And there were during World War Two, both of the spy services had a lot of women serving as well. But I think the ultimate message, I hope that readers, believe it or not, enjoy sections of the book, particularly the first half of the book, which is World War II and the Cold War. I mean, there are some thrilling tales of successful espionage and operations carried out by female officers. We do love our spy stories, it's safe to say. Yes, yes. But particularly in the part of the book that does make the pivot into the counterterrorism era and women who are

witnessing these sorts of atrocities online. I do hope that readers understand and appreciate the importance of what we call inclusion. And I know inclusion is, on our side of the pond, it's like a corporate word these days, and corporations making the case for inclusive teams and diversity. And so people can roll their eyes sometimes when they hear that word. But there is absolutely no question that Osama bin Laden would still be out there, would not have been found if it were not for this predominantly female group of targeters who just stuck with the work for a decade to find him. that terrorists, you know, the use of civilians as human shields, traveling with women and children, doing so deliberately because they knew that the West would have a great deal of trouble bringing themselves to act when there are human shields

surrounding the terrorists. Knowing those tactics uh it was important it was important to know those tactics you know the women to uncover them as well yeah which you which you you put together um but it's always interesting for me to ask when someone spent a long time on a project and researched it you know what what you when you sit when you sit back what you hope people might be able to take from it so i'm happy to be able to ask you that question liza monday thank you very much. The book is called The Sisterhood, The Secret History of Women at the CIA. As I say, I'm hoping to talk to two women who have quite a remarkable,

it's a love story really, but some things to relate to very much in what we were just talking about there about not being able to be yourself. this instance we hope to have a conversation with those who were in the british military now hot yoga do you do it do you need to sweat do you feel better afterwards can you think of nothing worse i'm asking not just because i'm being nosy although that's definitely a big part of who i am because of a new trial published in the journal of Psychiatry involving 80 people from Massachusetts General Hospital. They found that heated yoga sessions could lead to reduced depressive symptoms in adults with moderate to severe depression.

The trial findings suggest that the combination of yoga and heat should be considered as a potential treatment for individuals experiencing that level of depression. Hot yoga instructor Cindy Thomas, I'm told, is on the line, and the writer and broadcaster Laura Barton, who is a convert, it's safe to say, to all of this. Welcome to you both, a very hot welcome. I used to say a warm welcome. Let's go hot. Cindy, good morning. What is it about the hot version of yoga? I've done the regular version, the room temperature, but what is it about hot for you? So hot for me is,

it's that combination of a room that's heated to about 38 degrees Celsius. The humidity level is kept at about 50 to 60%. And from just walking in, you are suddenly in a challenging environment and the mind tends to switch off from your daily stress and the kind of just those voices that happen in the mind and all you worry about is getting through the next 60 or 90 minutes because you've got to cope in the heat is that part of it you've got to cope in the heat and it you cannot think of anything else other than what a teacher is instructing you to do for that 60 to 90 minutes. And at the end, when you come to Shavasana, where you're just lying there, sweaty, warm, the mind is completely switched off. It doesn't worry about anything. It's just got this euphoria that you have gone through a very challenging 60 or 90 minutes.

That's the hope. I mean, it must be a good thing to look around and see the state of people at the end of it. It's already part of you. I'm sure never, because you're a very good teacher. I can tell that you have a smile as you look round as the state of the room. But we'll cut to that. Laura, you came to hot yoga yourself for a specific reason at a specific time in your life. Tell us more. I did. This is about 11 years ago and I was going through a divorce

and I was as sort of mentally strung out as that could possibly make you. And so, yes, I started going to hot yoga and I went every day for three months and then continued to go pretty much every day. But that was, I just had to get through it for that first three months. And it really changed my life. It's still a huge part of my life now. What time of day was your routine?

I would go at any time to fit around. I'm freelance, so I can fit it around whatever so yeah it's just quite intense to go every day I suppose as well which um which part you know because some people say we might be questioning is it the hot yoga although this is the study that's been done or is it the ritual of having something you know that you can go to and people talk about their mat kind of becoming a place for them? I think it's both. I think it gave me structure at a time in my life when I needed structure. And also the form of hot yoga I do is the same. It's the Bikram method or 26 plus two. So you do the same 26 postures twice.

So there's a lot of ritual within this practice. So that definitely helped me and it stilled my mind and that's how you describe it stilling stilling your mind yeah and and actually as Cindy's just said I think um I think the heat helps with that too because you have no choice but to focus on your body and not not your racing thoughts really I mean how hot do you get how sweaty are you I just like to picture things. You know, got to describe it. There are lots of variables. I mean, it depends sort of if you've drunk the night before, if you hydrated enough before class, if you, you know, where you are in your cycle, all those things will affect how much you sweat, whether you're a man or a woman, whether you've eaten spicy foods. I'm sure Cindy will correct me on any of this.

But where are you, never asked anyone this, but where are you on the sweat spectrum typically? I'm quite low on that. I'm going to boast. I'm going to put it out there. I'm quite low on that. That's a boast. Only because I've done it for so long. And so your body gets used to it.

It's fascinating. Laura, I'll come back to you. But Cindy, I also have a friend who swears by this. You know, she's been having quite a difficult time. And this takes her out of herself. And actually, unlike some things where maybe if you watch a film and you're having a hard time and you go away for that time, and then you come straight back to where you were before, she finds she doesn't come straight back. What would you think of that, Cindy? So that's all to do with this. In hot yoga, you have multiple releases of endorphins, which take quite a while to, the endorphin levels in the body take quite a while to reduce.

And it's all about the 26 plus 2 postures that Laura was describing. They are, you know, there's a couple of peaks in the sequence. So you bring your endorphin levels right up, then you release them, then you bring them up again and release them. And the endorphin levels stay high for quite a long time afterwards. And that's why you feel this sort of euphoria for quite a while after a hot yoga class. And you don't get that in normal yoga. Yeah, well, fascinating. I mean, as I say, I've never done it, but I am, Cindy, completely guilty of going to a regular yoga class, making my to-do list, not doing the breathing

properly and not going into the... I mean, you know, that's my fault, not the teacher's fault. But I wonder if the heat is the extra part of this. Laura, what for you do you think was it in the end with the heat side of it that changed how you were feeling because you talked a bit about the practice of it I think I'm an actually cold person and so it sort of it it gave me a sort of safe warm space to go into every single day so I think there's that I felt you know at a very vulnerable time in my life I felt safe but also it was that focus and that you have to, in my form of hot yoga, there's a mirror and you have to look at yourself in the mirror

and you're sweating and you are a mess and half dressed. But it gave me a new relationship with my body and also with being in the present moment in the heat because you can't think about anything else. Are there any dangers, Cindy, would you say, for people who are now listening to this thinking, OK, well, maybe I should give it a go? You know, this isn't just us randomly deciding to have this conversation. There's a new trial that's been published in a journal that's trying to put this out there in the world to help people.

So, I mean, there's a couple of groups of people who would need to consult a doctor before doing hot yoga. So people with low blood pressure, it's not a great idea because their blood pressure doesn't, they struggle to get their blood pressure up in a hot yoga class. People with heart conditions will need to consult a doctor first. Women going through the menopause, although hot yoga is amazing for menopause, they do struggle with the extra heat. So they will take a bit longer to get used to hot yoga than someone who is maybe a bit younger or men. Men go to hot yoga very quickly. But the menopause, certainly the extra heat, some women find amazing, some women just

can't cope with it. Okay, so it's not for everyone. We just got a question. What about blood pressure and other risk factors? What is it for you? You know, you're the teacher, I know you've described, you know, how it works and what you think it is. But how do you feel when you are doing it? Because you obviously love it because you do it. I imagine that, you know, there's a connection for you. Yeah, it's a, you know, I come out of doing it. It's the challenge of getting through it because you're hot and you're sweaty and you're trying to do postures.

And when you get to the end of the 90 minutes, you feel amazing that you've got through the challenge. And it is a physical challenge to get through a class. And then afterwards, it's the fact that the mind is just completely blank. You just can't have any thoughts. You just, you lie there, your endorphins are racing, and the mind is blank.

You're just in a really happy, safe bubble. You must be doing a lot of washes in the week, though. I don't know how many days a week that you're in this space. Every day. The washing machine goes a lot it's quite a bit i mean can you actually go out after this just on a much lighter note or do you have to go home and have a shower um are you meant to let the sweat stay what you've done the night before so if you if you have been well hydrated with water you can probably go out if you've been drinking night before, you'll need to have a good shower and wash your hair. And finally, just because I do love detail, Cindy,

how does the room smell? The room, it depends on the studio. So our studio has an airflow system that changes the air 10 times an hour. That's nice. But they can be, there is definitely a hot yoga smell. You always know when you walk into a yoga studio, whether they've got a hot room.

Yeah, Laura, I feel like you'll nod to that. The funny thing is you grow to love it. That's a funny thing. Well, a teacher and a convert, a very dedicated pupil, Laura Barton there and Cindy Thomas. Thank you for bringing us your experiences of hot yoga after that. Very interesting. It's a small trial, but it's a very interesting trial. There's headlines across all the papers today with people talking about perhaps it's a way forward.

But I did promise you to talk to and to hear from Ruth Birch and Julia Curry, a married couple from South Wales. They met as young women in the British Army, but both felt they had to leave because of the pressure they were under to lie about their sexuality and conceal their relationship at the time. You were not allowed to be gay or lesbian in the UK military until the year 2000. The stress led to them breaking up, but 20 years later, they were reunited, and they now campaign on behalf of fellow LGBT veterans.

Ruth and Jew, as Julie is known, have just recorded an episode of you had me at hello which is a new podcast where ordinary people tell their extraordinary love stories and it's lovely to have you both on woman's hour ruth and jew good morning for a dog good morning emma thank you very much for having us lovely good morning emma hello good morning to all the listeners as well for listening in. Thank you dearly. It's a pleasure to talk to you. There's a very lovely ending to this story, but if I can just take you back, Ruth, I'll come to you first.

You were doing different jobs, both of you, in the British Army and a secret relationship. Yes, definitely. It was a relationship that neither of us expected. Our eyes met across hockey sticks and that was it. It was like love at first sight and we knew that our relationship was wrong according to the army and we kept it a complete secret as best we could. We didn't even acknowledge each other where we were in Northern Ireland and it was so difficult because you have to be two people all the time. It's mentally exhausting.

Ju, what was it like for you conducting a secret relationship? Like Ruth said, it's like living a double life, being a professional soldier, and we loved our jobs. But the love I had, you know, which I do still now for Ruth, I wanted to share. Like when you first fall in love with somebody, you want to, you know, tell the world. And we had to keep it secret because of our careers. And, you know, this is also for people who aren't familiar with this, but I've interviewed a few people on this and I still find it very shocking. But when there's suspicion, when there were suspicions about people and their sexuality,

you know, there's different there's treatment that was that was meted out by the people in charge. And I know you both fell under suspicion at different times. Gee, what kind of treatment did you experience as a result? Well, actually, I had a new staff sergeant came into the garrison because I was a driver. And the corporal who was in his office at the time said, Jew, he wants you out. He thinks you're gay. No proof there wasn't Emma. So he made my life hell.

He put me on the worst driving details like early night, early morning. He stopped me from doing all the sports i i was at high standard they used to fly me back to mainland england that was all stopped and i felt so alone so i isolated i couldn't speak to nobody saying i'm getting victimized because my staff sergeant thinks I'm gay and I couldn't tell nobody I was gay because I would have been thrown out the career I love so much so I was under pressure to do my job professionally especially Northern Ireland the pressure we had there let alone the pressure to hide my identity well it, it was all my identity, really, because I left Ruth.

So I had to keep that closed doors. So I put so much mental pressure on myself. A huge amount. And then being, you know, your job being made more difficult. And Ruth, also, you know, people had raids, didn't they, on their stuff? You know, people were suddenly, their belongings were searched. There'd be all sorts of of if there was suspicion there'd be all sorts of actions wouldn't there yeah that's absolutely what happened to me i came back to my accommodation to my room i opened the door and everything was everywhere all my documents uh things had been

taken they'd taken cuddly toys. They'd taken written documentation. They'd taken some of my CDs, Erasure, The Communards. I think they thought that was a thing then. That was if you listen to those, you must be gay. And everything was taken. I turned around and there were two Royal Military Police there and they and they marched me away. And I was taken for interrogation. And I say interrogation, not an interview. And I had light shone in my face. I had no legal representation. And that was on and off for about three weeks, solid.

Was leaving, to keep with you, Ruth, for a moment, was leaving the military and your splitting up, your relationship, was that all mixed up together? They actually posted you out because they couldn't find any evidence on both of us as such that they could get to stick to dishonorably discharge us or just throw us out. They sent you to Cyprus for six months to split us up. And we used to write to each other every day on the blueys. And we used to have to write in code because we knew that these were being

intercepted. The Blueys are the messaging system in the military. Yes, they are. Yes. Sorry. I only know that because I've written to my brother-in-law and sister-in-law that way. So there you go.

That's why I know. But for those who don't. Fantastic. Yeah. And they're free. So we made a point then of, you know, still being in touch. But it just got too much because when Jew came back, she was still hounded. I was still being hounded all the time. And Jew rang me up one day and said, I just can't cope anymore.

We're just going to have to finish. And was such a brave thing that that she did but it absolutely broke me and um both of us then decided on our separate ways that we would leave the military we felt we had to before we would dishonor be discharged and and that was it until over 25 years later when by some miracle we got back in touch again well I mean let's come to that just a moment if we can because do you did leave the forces but you also returned I understand yes yeah that's correct Emma um when they got their way they posted me out to Cyprus they left me alone no mental abuse I did my job, which I love. The day I came back to England,

I was posted in Colchester. They went through all my MFO box, which was all my belongings. They went through all that. So I thought, oh, here we go again. I went to work. I was changing the wheel on the lorry because I was a driver. And two men came in suits and took me away in front of my bosses, all my colleagues, and took me in a room and interrogated me for hours

with all those blueys that Ruth sent me. And they highlighted certain sentences and said, what does that mean? Why did Corporal Birch say that? And I said, we were just, you know, friends and waffled on. So when I got back, everything was, people looked at me. So I knew I had to sign out because I was witch hunted. My career was over. But the crazy thing is, Emma Emma because I signed myself out within then a couple years I was still on the

reserves service I was sent to Bosnia I didn't have to go but I left the British army and the country and our queen I went I went yeah I'm going so I did seven months in Bosnia and they left me alone and that's all I wanted to do is serve my country but unfortunately the tour finished and very humbling experience and back to civilian street and I thought what a waste all that money they spent on me and Ruth, professional soldiers years ago. And we were good soldiers because we loved our jobs. We loved it. So, yeah, that's what happened to me.

I was sent to Bosnian then. But if I was thrown out, they wouldn't have called me up. No. And I'm still the same person. Yeah. It sounds like a time very long ago and it's not um but there is a happy ending if i could put it like that because obviously things things have changed there we go there we go you sound like women i need to go for a drink with um i finished at 11 i finished at 11

so we'll we'll talk but um but you you you do if I can fast forward slightly because of your relationship you aren't together for many many years and then you are uh tell us how this happened Ruth okay um it was over it was over 25 years and I'd still been thinking about you there was something you know that that was still in my heart and I was lucky enough to go on a channel four program called coach trip yeah with the wonderful Brendan and I was on there from the start to finish with a fantastic work colleague called called Andy and he's he's a veteran as well and we we got on like a house on fire and um I wasn't very good with IT I'm still not very good with IT because I couldn't get the camera to work on this either. And I had a message on Facebook and I didn't know you could get messages on Facebook.

So I didn't read it for three months, but it was actually from Jew. She got her mate to send a message to me. She just wondered how I was. So when I got it, I said, oh, I'm on the TV. Have a look at Coach Fit. And we started texting. We text for a couple of times a week.

And then we started to ring each other. And after about six months, we actually finally met up. We met up in Porthcawl and we met up in August when the fireworks were on. They have fantastic firework displays down here and um when I saw her walking towards me it was her particular walk and her smile and it was so incredible it was like all of a sudden oh hello all those all those um all those years had suddenly disappeared and we were back together again. And it was absolutely fantastic. But were you both single?

Sort of. Yes. That's another story. But yes, initially, yes. Yes, we were. Yeah. You were available. Yeah, I was available.

The other relationships had actually broken down. No, no, because, you know, life is all about timing a lot of the time. Your dog's obviously got a good sense of timing, wanting to get in on the act. Yeah, I'm sorry about that. It's all right. The whole family's involved. It's nice.

Oh, totally, yeah. All love. All love. But you are together now, finally. Yes. I suppose it must be weird, Drew, because you could have had all those years in between. But a way of being, I suppose, together now and what you've been through must make you all the stronger for it. we say when we listened to the podcast the other day and we went who are those two young ladies we're listening about did that really happen and we just count our blessings and my wish was I know it might sound a bit corny to all the listeners but to meet back up with Ruth and to be live with her to an old lady and what's happened in the past was so wrong and for the veterans

but love and light to everybody because there is hope and me and Ruth still love the British Army to this day unfortunately just so sad but we lost oh sorry we lost what you can look at is you could say that we lost like over 25 years the army took that away from us but if you start to get consumed by that

then it isn't any good you need to move forward and it's very easy to say that sometimes but we just look at each other sometimes and say we can't believe that we're actually back together again yeah it's an absolute miracle and how it happened you know is just absolutely incredible well I've absolutely loved talking to you today no thank you thank you very much for coming on Ruth Birch and Julia Curry there and and a story you know it's lovely to there. And a story, you know,

it's lovely to hear how things conclude as well. You know, not just how things were, but how things are in the present day. And it's wonderful to be in your reality with you, even if you couldn't work the camera and I can't see you on the screen here.

But that's radio. I don't need to see you. None of our listeners can either. So thank you so much for talking to us this morning. We'll be going for that drink in about 90 seconds time, but that's my time. And thank you for your company today. I'll be back with you tomorrow at 10. That's all for today's Woman's Hour. Thank you so much for your time. Join us again for the next one. Hi, I'm Christy Young, and this is Young

Again, my podcast for BBC Radio 4, where I get the chance to meet some of the world's most noteworthy and intriguing people and ask them the question, if you knew then what you know now, what would you tell yourself? I don't regret anything in my life. You don't? No.

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