Woman's Hour - Weekend Woman's Hour: ADHD and hormones, 'Leaning out' at work, Sarah Hadland

Episode Date: July 18, 2026

What impact do hormones have on women with ADHD? A pioneering study by Kings College and Queen Mary University in London is putting the link to the test, by asking 50 women who are medicated for their ADHD to track their menstrual cycle. Report academic Dr Jessica Agnew-Blais and Laura Mears-Reynolds from the charity ADHDAF+ join presenter Nuala McGovern to discuss why the research matters.This weekend Dalia Stasevska conducted the first night of the BBC Proms. The Finnish-Ukrainian Principal Guest Conductor of the BBC Symphony Orchestra also has a new album, Ukrainian Mixtape, recorded with the BBC Symphony Orchestra, showcasing rarely heard works. Dalia joins presenter Anita Rani to discuss her route into conducting and her passion for Ukrainian music.New analysis in The Economist suggests that, after years of progress, fewer women are reaching executive positions and there may also be signs that younger women are becoming less interested in promotion. Nuala speaks to the author of that report, Vinjeru Mkandawire, and Sanchia Neilson who left an executive role to rebalance her life.Australian surf and fashion photographer Cait Miers is photographing 1,000 women globally, bare-faced, for a project she has called Laugh Lines. Anita talks to Cait about her mission to challenge beauty standards and also Alexis Zahner, one of the first women to be photographed for the project.Actor Sarah Hadland will be a familiar face to many, having played numerous roles over the years, but is probably best known as Stevie in the BAFTA-nominated sitcom Miranda. Currently on stage in London’s West End, she joins Nuala to discuss her latest role as Alice in The Truth, a fast-paced comedy of infidelity and duplicity.Presenter: Anita Rani Producer: Kirsty McQuire

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Hello, I'm Anita Rani and welcome to Woman's Hour from BBC Radio 4. Just to say that for rights reasons, the music in the original radio broadcast has been removed for this podcast. Hello and welcome to the programme. Coming up, the Finnish Ukrainian conductor who just opened the BBC proms, tells us about the women who showed her the way. And new analysis finds that the most highly qualified working women in human history are leaning out rather than leaning in. Also, unfiltered beauty. Could you go makeup free and filter free in a photo? We meet the photographer asking women to embrace their real faces. Plus, truth and lies in relationships. Actor Sarah Hadland joins us to tell us about her new

comedy of adultery, the truth. But first, could hormones and periods make ADHD symptoms worse in women? A new study, the first of its kind by King's College and Queen Mary University of London, is tracking the way that women with medicated ADHD say they're affected by their menstrual cycle. Well, to learn more, Nula was joined by the lead academic on this project, Dr Jessica Agnew Blaze, and Laura Mears Reynolds, the founder and CEO of the child. charity ADHD AF Plus, which is as females plus. Neula began by asking Jessica how the study came about. This is something that I really started because of what women with ADHD were saying.

And at the time, I remember looking at what was at the time Twitter. And I saw women with ADHD talking about their symptoms in their cycle and saying, oh, does anybody else notice their symptoms get so much worse before they get their period or their medication just doesn't seem to be working? And I thought, oh, that's interesting. I wonder what the research is about that. And when I looked it up, it was nothing. So that was kind of the genesis of this.

And I thought this is something that women are saying is really important. And there's really no scientific evidence to back any of this up at this point. And, you know, I feel like I was saying ADHD as if everybody is familiar with the term. It does get bandied about. It is attention deficit of hyperactivity disorder. But how would you describe it, Jessica? Well, I would say, you know, these are women who have a diagnosis of ADHD in our study. And in general, ADHD is characterized by as you mentioned,

mentioned symptoms of inattention, so being distractible, kind of daydreamy, or symptoms of hyperactivity or impulsivity. In Adulis, usually manifests as maybe a feeling of internal restlessness, making decisions quickly, things like that. So this study, new research, it is a small study. Can you specify exactly who it covers? Yes, absolutely. So includes 56 women. They all have a clinical diagnosis of ADHD and they are taking medication for their ADHD. In this particular study, we include women who aren't taking a hormonal contraceptive. So we sort of see how their symptoms change with a quote unquote natural cycle. And we've followed them for three months, so across three menstrual cycles.

And each day they, on their smartphone, have an app that asks them about their ADHD symptoms, how their symptoms interfered where they're functioning that day, as well as some other things that might change across the menstrual cycle. So things like depressed mood or irritability. So this is underway. at the moment. So you won't have any findings just yet. But what is it you're hoping to pinpoint? I think we want to understand how women's ADHD symptoms might change across their menstrual cycle or there are certain cycle phases during which symptoms tend to get worse. It's possible this is true

for a subgroup of women and not everybody. So who are the women who this might affect the most? And then I think taking that forward, we can think about how this might change clinical care. So for example, if it seems like medication might not be quite as effective, for example, in the premenstrual phase, it is possible to change medication dose for a certain part of a woman's cycle. If this is something that she and her clinician notice might be helpful. And just for some of the figures, two and a half million people, not specifically women in the UK are thought to have ADHD, hundreds of thousands waiting effort and diagnosis still. Laura, let me bring you in here. You run a charity, you host a podcast to support women with ADHD. What do women tell you anecdotally about their menstrual cycle and their symptoms?

Hello, thank you so much for having me. I have been hearing and have been experiencing how much worse our symptoms for ADHD get completely cyclically. So as that estrogen is dropping in the luteal phase, our symptoms are exacerbated. I've had women tell me that they have feared that they have dementia. we are you know for me the emotional side of ADHD is something that I really really struggle with emotional dysregulation so it's a feeling everything times a thousand the knock-on effect that has not just on our mental health and well-being causing us to be anxious and depressed but outwardly into our lives making it impossible to do adulting do life our jobs become incredibly difficult are from family relationships

everything, the wheels just fall off. For me personally, I know, and like many women that I've worked with, that going into perimenopause, when the estrogen is declining, is when all of those symptoms are really, really wrapped up. For me, that's what led to me finally getting an ADHD diagnosis is because there was no amount of masking that could be done. There were no coping strategies that could make life work. And how did it impact you on a day-to-day level?

say when your symptoms were severe? I think it impacts on the most basic level of trying to do daily tasks, but then it impacts on a much deeper level because you are feeling so worthless, so useless, your self-worth. I ended up so incredibly depressed. I couldn't understand why everyone around me was able to hold down a job, was able to manage a bank account, wasn't getting upset with people all the time and feeling wounded all the time. It literally spans out into all areas of your life. There are some very, very bleak statistics, which I don't know if I'm allowed to say,

but we're in danger of self-harm and of taking our own lives because of, yeah, the knock-on effect that all of this has on our mental health and lives. And indeed, I don't have those statistics. I will say if people are affected by some of the issues that you mentioned there, there are links to help and support on the BBC action line. But, you know, you are speaking to lots of women as well. Interesting, you mentioned perimenopause. Let me come back to you, Jessica.

Because when I've heard work or research done, it has often been with women moving into perimenopause or menopause, maybe they get a diagnosis at that point. But not so much younger women that are having, going through their menstrual cycles, you know, at an age perhaps, I don't know, in their 20s, 30s, maybe early 40s. Why do you think that hasn't been looked at so far? I mean, I think in general with ADHD, we're kind of coming where there was this historical bias towards thinking of it as both kind of a male disorder and a childhood disorder.

So things that affect adult women, so things like across the lifespan. So the menstrual cycle, hormonal change during pregnancy, as you mentioned, the menopausal transition, all of these things tend to be under-researched. So I think we can think across a woman's lifespan during these times of hormonal change and that we need to consider how ADHD changes across all these different transitions. Have hormones being thought about with ADHD previous to this, if not in a large research? I'm just thinking about when somebody goes for an assessment. So there are some research that shows that ADHD tends to be associated with higher risk for what we think of as maybe hormonal sensitivity. So there's some work showing that women with

ADHD are more likely to have PMDD or premenstrual dysphoric disorder, as well as some research showing they're more likely to have postpartum depression or anxiety, and also some showing that they might have a higher risk of sort of a poor outcome associated with hormonal contraceptives. So we're starting to see some of this work that considers ADHD. in the context of these hormonal changes. But all the studies I mentioned just came out within the last, basically, a couple of years. So we're really just at the beginning of this research.

You know, and as Laura described some of the symptoms that she has, and when I was talking about symptoms, we were talking about ADHD specifically. But as you talk about that, Jessica, I'm thinking, you know, I've often spoken to women with PMDD, for example, on this program or other severe menstrual cycle symptoms. That could mimic some of those. that are for ADHD. How do you differentiate of what is causing what? That's a great question. I think in general, you have to disentangle between PMDD and something that

people call premenstrual exacerbation of an existing condition. So this is true for, you know, something like depression or anxiety. And the big difference is with PMDD, you see these symptoms really resolve when you're not in the premenstrual phase. So when we're looking at ADHD, this is something that people have symptoms all the time. And then there may be an exacerbation premenstrual. But you're right, there is some overlap between what we might see from PMDD and what we would see from ADHD symptoms. And this is one reason that we're also collecting information on depression, for example, to see if maybe some of the increases are amongst this group that might also be at higher risk for changes in depressed mood during certain cycle phases. And this is just women that are medicated for ADHD.

Yes, we wanted to understand many women anecdotally report that they feel their medication doesn't work as well in certain cycles. faces and this is something that we wanted to investigate. A message coming in. Autism and ADHD. Please can you remind the world that these are lifelong disabilities, not just a bit of anxiety that can be cured with some talking therapy, visit from a retired Sengkhouse with special educational needs coordinator, special needs teacher, disability charity trustee and family carers of somebody who has been through it. Back to you, Laura, before we finish.

Did having an explanation for your experience and perhaps hearing Dr. Jessica speak this morning change your understanding of what you've been going through? Oh gosh, 100%. And I just have to say, Jessica, thank goodness you are doing this. It's really, really fantastic. For years now, having got my diagnosis, I started talking about my experiences and experiences of people like me going through this later in life. And time and time again, the same issues were coming up, you know, exactly as you said with the medication to now find out that potentially that is because as eustrogen is dropping, the medication isn't able to work at its peak performance. To have it all makes sense is completely life-changing.

And the validation of speaking to others is what has been all that's been available for so many of us because, as we know, the services are overstretched, the research isn't there. For me, like starting the podcast, having others on and then having an online community to witness that peer support, the difference that it has made to be validated. So many of us have felt like aliens that we are completely alone in this experience when actually there are so many of us. And coming together has not been life-changing. It's genuinely been life-saving.

And that's why I've founded the charity is to bridge that gap, to have free support and to have people come together in their local communities with others that are experiencing the same. So yeah, it really is so, so fantastic that you're doing this. Jessica, when might you have full findings? So we've just had our final participants finish their three months of follow-up at the end of June. So now we're in our kind of data analysis phase. So hopefully we'll have some findings shortly.

Dr. Jessica Agnew Blaze and Laura Mears Reynolds speaking to Nula earlier this week. And if you have any concerns about your own health, we advise you to speak to your GP. Listener Week is fast approaching. All of the content you hear on the program that week in August will have been suggested by you. Yes, that's every single item. And we still need ideas. So please do keep them coming in.

We read all of them. To give you some inspiration, last year we featured topics as varied as women who were living on narrow boats, the role of stepmothers, the joys of pickleball. We'd love to hear from you. So get in touch with a conversation topic or just say who you think we should interview and why.

All ideas are. good ideas. Serious, fun, we want to hear all of them. You can text Woman's Hour on 84844. You can contact us on social media. It's at BBC Woman's Hour or you can email us through our website. Last night, Dalia Stazewska took the helm at the first night of the BBC proms at the Royal Albert Hall, kicking it off one of the world's biggest classical music festivals. Dalia is the Finnish Ukrainian principal guest conductor of the BBC Symphony Orchestra. Away from the podium, she's become a fierce champion of Ukrainian composers and her new album Ukrainian mixtape recorded with the BBC Symphony Orchestra showcases rarely heard works. When she joined me in the Woman's Hour

studio ahead of the big night, I asked her what was in store for the audience. Great music and a lot of emotions. Coming from you, how will you feel? I feel really good and it's such a special festival to be part of. It's each time really emotional because I think it's one of the highlights of my season each year. The venue is such a special and the audience is absolutely amazing and it's a great honour to open this

one of the greatest festivals on earth. Yeah, absolutely. It's electric. I want to go back a little bit and hear your story because you started out studying violin. So tell me about your route into music. My grandmother was a big, classical music fan and there was no musicians

in our family but I suppose that she kind of planted this love for music and my father wasn't so keen on playing the piano when he was little so when we were born me and my two brothers then there came

this suggestion from her that why don't we try with these kids if they would like the music so she didn't give up your grandmother no not at all the next generation Somebody will learn. Yes. So this is how we actually started playing classical music.

And I indeed picked up the violin. And she was actually very present during those my early years. She came to every single concert. She sat in the corridors waiting for my violin lessons to finish. So she was much involved. What was her name? Irina. Irina.

And I believe Madam Butterfly made a bigger impression on you. Yes. So I already played maybe violin for three, four years. by that time and after school we usually hang out in the conservatory library, music library. It was just a tiny two-room library. And those library ladies were fantastic. They were kind of babysitting as kids there. And I remember going to her and asking that I've listened so much violin music.

Like I know all the CDs here already that can you give me something interesting to listen that I've never heard before? And she gave me Madame Butterfly recording and she gave me also libretto translated into Finnish language and said that read the story at the same time while you listen to it and it was like a flashlight

I've never heard symphony orchestra before that and of course being in my early teens this tragic story of butterfly it really touched me but something what was even more how do you say transformative was that for the first time I felt that the music understood me in such a, if you can put it in such a funny way, but it somehow touched me

on the levels that I never experienced before. And somehow from that moment, I came obsessed with orchestral music and opera. And I somehow, in my mind, I changed from forced to practice into that I want to practice because my dream became to play in a symphony orchestra. Wonderful. So then when did it go from wanting to play in a symphony orchestra to then becoming a conductor? Well, that happened again. some years later, I was already at the Music University, studying at the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki. I was in my early 20s. And I saw for the first time female conductor. Yeah, she was a student at the Sibelius Academy, a really lovely conductor. Her name is Eva Ollikainen. And it is funny that I went almost every

week to symphony concerts, and that was my first time I saw a female. on the podium. And she became like a role model to me. And I suddenly like realized that, wait a minute, can women do that as well? Yeah. You know? And I, to this day, I also like, I celebrate how the world has changed because back then and it's not that long time ago. It's 20 years only. Like all my teachers knew how obsessed I was with the scores, with the, with the orchestral music, but nobody like suggested. Suggested it even. So I had to see it for myself. And that was a huge, huge moment in my life. And I think like in just a couple months,

I already was holding the baton in my hands. And the rest is history. I started by mentioning that you're a Finnish Ukrainian and we're going to talk about your Ukrainian mix up, your new album. And you're a fierce champion of Ukrainian composers. So I'm just want to kind of understand being brought up in the Ukrainian culture and how, you know, that kind of, I suppose, like me, I was brought up in two cultures and at home you're spoon-fed this other world and how that

played out for you. Indeed, my mom is Finnish and I grew up most of my life in Finland. But through my father, my grandmother, the presence of Ukrainian heritage was really present and it was taken care of and something that they were so proud of. and I became proud of it always. It was fascinating. And we didn't travel to Ukraine until 2001 for the first time. So it was kind of like this almost surreal dream country where everything was better and bigger.

But culture was, of course, really appreciated. We learned history, folk songs and everything, food traditions. But one thing that was absent was knowledge of classical music Ukrainian. So my grandmother maybe name dropped a few names, but there was nothing that we could listen to. There was no CDs with Ukrainian composers available. That just didn't exist. And then, of course, later in my career, I started to realize it that actually it's true, the absence of Ukrainian classical music being performed and also the digital memory of recorded music.

It was just missing. There were some. But you had to really know and do. dig a lot around to get your hands on something. And this was for me one of the big motivations that I really wanted to explore myself Ukrainian classical music, but also to share it with broader audiences. And another thing that sparked was this current situation, of course, this really tragic events.

And Ukraine is fighting for its existence, like, literally. and I wanted to show them support and I wanted to celebrate their culture and this seemed to be the right moment to put this album. Yeah, celebrate the culture but also, as you were saying, record the culture. Exactly. So it's there digitally for people to hear and know.

I think we should hear a clip. This is from your new album, which is out tomorrow, Ukrainian mixtape. Here's a clip of the solemn overture. I'm thinking about your grandma and the sort of pride that she must feel, you know, that... Upstairs, I know. that she feels pride of this. And she is great force also for me still here and being proud of

being part of two cultures. And of course, being brought up in Finland, it gives me a really nice perspective towards the Ukraine, not coming from inside but from outside. But many people also, and I hope that this will be the reaction, that why haven't we heard this music before? It's so glorious. It's clearly part of the Western European classical music tradition. Why haven't we heard about this? And it is due to the horrific history of Ukraine, 350 years of systematic erasure of culture,

because they know that when you erase the culture, people don't know where they are from and you can remake the history, you know, without their existence. But Ukrainians have existed. They have fought for 350 years. and they will fight, and I know that they will win this war. And all the composers, like on this album, they exist, and this glorious music exist. And it's something really to celebrate that now, finally, Ukraine, despite this tragedy, has a star moment to determine and to show who they are on their own tournaments and celebrate their own culture.

Dahlia Stashevska, speaking to me on Thursday and her album Ukrainian mixtape is out now. And BBC Proms runs until the 12th of September with every prom broadcast on BBC Radio 3 and 27 on BBC TV and IPlayer. For more information, go to BBC.co.com.uk slash proms. Still to come on the programme. Is honesty always the best policy in relationships? A new play, The Truth,

grapples with that question, and we'll hear from one of its stars, Sarah Hadland. And remember, you can enjoy Woman's Hour any hour of the day. If you can't join us live at 10 a.m. during the week, all you need to do is subscribe to the podcast. It's free via BBC Sounds. Now, for some time, it seemed as though the only way was up for women in the workforce. More of us than ever were narrowing the pay gap and climbing the corporate ladder.

But new analysis suggests that progress may have stalled. A recent article in The Economist points to fewer women reaching executive positions and signs that younger women might be becoming less interested in promotion. So are women now choosing? to lean out instead of lean in to coin the former Facebook executive Cheryl Sandberg's phrase. Well, earlier this week, Nula was joined by the author of that article, Vingeru Mukanda Weary, who's the news editor at The Economist, along with Sancia Nielsen, a data insights specialist, who left a senior corporate role after deciding that the cost to her family life was too high.

She now runs her own business, data every day. Nula started by asking Vingero to share some of her top findings. So for years, the narrative related to women at work was one of steady progress. You have women now outnumber men at university in virtually every wealthy country. Last year, for the first time in the UK, there were more female doctors than men. But now the data appears to be telling a radically different story. So for the first time in perhaps a generation, the gender pay gap is. opening up again. It's widened for two years in a row in the US. That hasn't happened in 60 years.

It's widening in Canada. It's widening in France. And it's widening in the UK for mothers, for women in their 40s. And it's not just women. It's not just sort of women at the top. You mentioned the stat about women executives. We had fewer lower number of women in senior positions for the first time in 20 years, the share of women in executive positions. But it's also across the OECD, the share of women in full-time work is lower than it was for the first time in 15 years. So those countries that have reached developmental milestones. But with that, is there one reason or is this also a myriad? I think there are lots of different factors behind this. We know that access to childcare and the cost of childcare is an issue. There's the economic

uncertainty that AI brings. There's, you know, changing expectations around parenting. But it also appears that women's aspirations in professional aspirations are shifting. That's what's really interesting, I think, in this, because it's not just about parents. And that's very much why I threw it out to my listeners in that way. Exactly. So I found, I came across a survey by McKinsey and Leanin. That's the nonprofit founded by Charles Sandberg. They run a survey, an annual survey, which asks people how interested they are in promotions. And for years, men and women wanted promotions at the exact same rates. For the first time last year, in a decade, that flipped,

that we saw a really big gap between men and women. And what was most... So it's not happening to men. No, no. This is the bit. If it was just a societal change in general. No, men's interest in promotions has continued to increase, whereas women's interests are stalled.

And what was most striking about that data, actually, was that for the youngest women, so, you know, women who aren't necessarily mothers, the youngest women in entry-level jobs, they were the least interest in promotions. And I think that actually serves as a wake-up call for employers, because here you have the most qualified female workforce in history. And what they're saying is that, you know, they're doing the mats on promotions. They're looking, they're weighing up the costs of progressing at work, but they're looking at the cost, they're looking at the longer hours, the lack of flexibility, and they simply don't want it. And with younger women,

Is there anything we can pinpoint there? It's harder to say with younger women. There's so many different factors behind this. But I do think that we look at the need for flexibility in the workplace. COVID introduced such big shifts in the workplace. So interesting. We had Emma Greed, the businesswoman behind. She co-founded Good American and Skims, among other businesses.

And she talked about working from home as affecting career advancement for women. They're not seen. They're back in the home. They're doing more housework. of flexibility, but what's good for one individual, she said, isn't necessarily good for women as a whole in the workplace, which I thought was interesting. If you want to listen to that interview, just pop in Emma Greed and Woman's Hour and that interview will pop up. Let me come to you, Sanchez. So you had spent 20 years building your career. One rung away on that ladder from the C-suite

or the executive leadership. The rung broke. You decided to go down and give up status and salary in a very clear career path. Why? So I'd been working in the same place for about eight years. I'd risen up the ranks, but actually what I realised was the further up that ladder I got, the further away I was getting from the work that I really enjoyed, like the data work, the technical work. And it became much more about managing client accounts, managing a team, to run a team of 80 and a lot of HR stuff that wasn't admin, HR issues, people issues.

Personal. Exactly. It was really, really difficult. And what I found was outside of my professional life, I was kind of obsessed with being this good girl, good mother, good wife, good friend, good daughter, all of it. And actually, I was just full to the brim with guilt because I wasn't doing anything in the way that I wanted to do it. It didn't feel like I was ever doing enough. I wasn't doing it properly. And all of my patients was used up in the office. And by the time I got home, I didn't

really have anything left. And I kind of hate to admit it, but I'd become pretty unbearable to the people that I love the most. Was it a hard decision to make? Was it gradual? Was it sudden? It was, it was quite a hard decision. And we had planned it quite meticulously. So my husband's a teacher. He used to work in finance and had made the decision to become a teacher. And so we really thought about balance. We had spent ages doing multiple spreadsheets, figuring out what was important to us and how long we could go and all of these backup plans. It was, I definitely had a tipping point when there was just too much for me. And I realized that actually I was completely burnt out. but I am really, really pleased with making that decision, fully understand that it comes from a position of privilege and not everybody is able to make that decision.

Would, could your employer have done anything to make you stay? I think there are a few things. The flexibility obviously is key, affordable childcare. You know, we literally made our last nursery payment ever last week, so hooray. but the flexibility and the support structures. So I didn't have, like whilst I had a very, very supportive boss, there wasn't that support structure of helping me kind of with my diary, for instance, you know, the ability to say no to things was really hard. And I think we often, I'm really glad that you asked it that way

because I think often women are framed as the problem. And it's like, we have to change, you know, we need to be more assertive. need to be more confident in saying no. And I think that the values that a lot of employers have around what is important and what's necessary for that career progression, there are all these slippery words like confidence, you know, gravitas, my most hated word, presence, being in the office, all of that. I think changing those values of what's important for progression and implementing those support structures. But the workplace has not changed, perhaps. at the speed that some would like.

I know after Emma Greed was on some of our listeners, were really irked by the fact that visibility can be equivalent to value in certain workplaces. Okay, some messages, it's quite a few that I come in. Let's read some of them. I find I can no longer manage to be a manager or senior employee, a menopausal on Hort, Lake Dignose, ADHD. I have burned out in multiple jobs. My income went from 35K as a manager to 3K as a waitress.

I have a degree in waitressing, although it was called a different name in the old days, drama. All that matters to me now is family and volunteering in my community. It's profoundly meaningful in a way. My jobs have never been. Sarah and Bradford, of course, you have to be able to afford to do that. Fran in Scotland, as a woman approaching 40, I'm finally accepting my ambition and have stopped trying to care less about work. Embracing my ambition and going for opportunities has led me to a new role in a new country. and I feel more energized, excited and fulfilled

than when I was just trying to accept roles that bored me. But sometimes I do feel it's shameful to enjoy work and to prioritize professional success. Interesting, okay, so she feels she can't kind of fly that flag. Here's another. I've been a social worker for 20 years. I enjoy my job and never wanted to progress, in inverted commas, up to management.

There is a societal pressure to progress, and I think it's fine to stay where you are. If you want to, I've witnessed several people, progress to management just because it was viewed as the natural thing to do. Several of them don't do it very well. There should be more focus and positivity about remaining where you want to be in work and doing a good job there. Interesting stuff in Jira. Yes, exactly.

You know, you asked about what some of the drivers were. I think it's a mix of both. All of the data that I presented that I found in my research is that, you know, it's a mix of personal choice as well as structural barriers. But when I think about, you know, what are the sectors that rely hugely on women that hire the most women, where the effects of this retreat are most likely to show up? It's, you know, it means we're losing teachers and doctors and nurses and care workers. The list goes on. And I think that's the real tragedy here, that what a society makes it undesirable for women to work,

it's our communities and our schools and hospitals that pay too. We do have a teacher. I began my teaching career age 21 with the highest ambition. hoping to be a head teacher one day. I secured various middle leadership positions over the 10 years I was in the classroom. But the more time I spent with those in senior positions, the more I realized how stressed and overworked they were.

I'm now in my 30s hoping to build a family and have stepped away from teaching altogether as I don't feel as compatible with being a present parent. My career is no longer the most important thing in my life. Interesting because many, of course, are in teaching, hoping to have hours that will help them when they have children. I mean, there's a couple of things here.

One, that if we have less women in the workplace, you don't have the same role models or able to aspire to that person that might have gone before you. And the other I'm wondering, is success being framed differently for women now? That's what I think I'm hearing from these women that have got in touch. Sancho, what does success look like to you?

I totally agree. I think what I've seen with a lot of my peers and for myself is that people are developing these portfolio careers. it's not, there's not only one way to work and it doesn't have to be corporate. And I think we have to remember as well that this system was never historically designed for women. Right. And it still doesn't work for women. So to me, you know, in the time and money equation, I've chosen time.

And I'm fortunate to be able to do that. But I've chosen time. I've chosen purpose. And it means that I'm in control of my time, broadly speaking. I'm able to be present with my kids. but I'm also able to use my brain. I think since I left corporate, I really feel like a layer of sludge has just been removed from my brain

and I've been able to focus on things that I care about and helping other people, you know, be it at my housing association role or my generation success role or my role at my daughter's primary school. It doesn't sound like you've actually retreated, shall we say. Here's another. I'm in a different direction.

I was a successful. Well, Barrister, after having my two children, it became impossible for me to continue. I was told by my female head of chambers to do more work and get a nanny. I wasn't prepared to do that. I left the bar. But it took a diagnosis of breast cancer to give me the courage to do so. I didn't want two full-time jobs, and motherhood had to be my priority. No regrets, but society is still set up to put pressure on the mother.

My husband's career as a surgeon has gone from strength to strength. Where are the men that are leaning out? Well, it seems like they're not, according to Vindjj. But I suppose is there a way just before I let you go to tackle this? Is this a problem? It's clearly something that employers, that policymakers are still grappling with. It's a big problem. Finjero, Makanda Weiray and Sancia Nelson.

How did a boycott Jimmy become a billionaire from posting videos? On good, bad billionaire, we're going to find out how the world's most popular YouTuber Mr Beast made his fortune. He's buried himself in a coffin for days. counted to 100,000 on camera and even recreated squid games all in an attempt to go viral on the internet. But it all started when he gave a homeless man $10,000.

So is he a philanthropist reshaping capitalism? Or is he just the king of the attention economy? Find out on good bad billionaire. Listen on BBC.com or wherever you get your podcasts. Nula there. Now, as soon as someone takes out a camera, do you feel the pressure to pose in a certain way? Maybe make sure your makeup is on point

or change your posture to look picture perfect. Well, if so, you're not the only one. According to my next guest, Kate Myers, many women feel this pressure. Kate is an Australian surf and fashion photographer, and she says all too often on shoots, women will criticise and apologise for their looks before a single photo is even taken.

So she's on a mission to challenge beauty standards by photographing a thousand women bare-faced for a project called laugh lines. The third woman to be photographed by Kate for this project was Alexis Zana, a self-described millennial tech addict. Well, I spoke to both of them yesterday down the line from Australia and I began by asking Kate why she started laugh lines. I have been a photographer for the past 12 years and over that time I've just observed so many women in front of my lens kind of self-doubt and all these negative things. They don't like the way they look and they apologising. And I'm like, I just think, I thought there was something wrong with that.

So, yeah, Laugh L'Lines was born a couple of years ago in my head. And now it's finally, we've finally started. We've shot 125 women so far. So, yeah, it's a really, really fun and exciting project. Before we find out what kind of what their reaction is to those photographs and how you convince them to do it. What kind of negative talk are they saying? What do we want to say to themselves?

Yeah, there's a lot of, like, apologising, like, sorry, I'm not photogenic. There's a lot of, like, oh, I didn't put makeup on today, like, sorry. There's, yeah, just, it's kind of this whole apologising piece. And I just, like, I just believe that beauty is not skin deep. It's, it's all inside. And yeah, as a photographer, I guess it's just been really interesting to observe. And I thought, there's something, yeah, there's something here that I think that we need to change. We need to change as women. So, yeah. Okay, well, we've got an audience. and the audience are getting in touch with us, Kate.

So I'm going to bring the audience into this conversation. Alexis, you'll be coming in in a minute. One message here saying, I have really tried to like my face, but still at the age of 44, I'm so critical. I even find myself boring, and it's genuinely not fishing for compliments, as my family would say,

I really wish I looked less like me. Another one here saying, I'm 52. Photos without makeup are out of the question. Even with makeup, I cringe internally. When a photo of me is taken, I brace myself before, I look at it and usually delete 29 out of 30 photographs. Another one here, I'm 61 years old, an artist and an art teacher,

and I wear makeup because I genuinely enjoy the aesthetic process. For me, it isn't about hiding floors looking younger or meeting other people's expectations. It's simply another form of creative expression. I happily go out without makeup, so I don't feel dependent on it, but when I choose to wear it, I enjoy deciding on colors, textures and overall effect as much as I do when I'm painting on a canvas. Okay, but that is definitely, you know, owning the way you want to look. But the first two comments made me feel a bit sad.

Okay, and I guess this is where what you're trying to counteract. Where's this pressure coming from, do you think? I think it's like, it's everywhere. It's so deep, and this topic is so, so deeply ingrained. And I'm just, you know, still at the start of understanding it myself. But it's everywhere. It's in the magazines we look at. It's in social media.

It's, you know, you walk past all the big makeup stores. And, you know, there's fix this and fix this. and fix that and we don't need fixing. Like there's nothing wrong with us. So, yeah, it's just like I've had so many women. I've had over 2,000 women even apply and tell me why they want to be part of laugh lines. And it's crazy like what's happening. So, yeah.

I'm going to bring Alexis into this chat. Alexis, you describe yourself as a millennial tech addict. Tell me about your experience of social media and how that's influenced, how you present yourself. Yeah, I guess. many of us who have grown up tech native, we've grown up with a phone in our hands. For the most part, we're seeing ourselves back all the time through a phone screen. And oftentimes we've got a filter on that or we feel the need to put makeup on to feel like we're enough so that we can take those

photos for social media. And I think when we're constantly bombarded with influence from a screen, people's idealic lifestyles, people dressing, looking perfectly, that we begin to internalize. And we begin to internalize that to mean something about us, and that is that we are less than if we're not looking perfect ourselves. So this is something that I've certainly experienced through my lifetime as a social media user. And then when I started to research this for my book, Real as well, I realized that this was a really common issue for so many women around the world. So when I came across Kate and her project, I immediately fell in love because I felt personally that this was something that I needed to hear for myself.

How hard was it for you to have the photo taken? Tell us about the process. It was harder than I thought it was going to be. I always consider myself to be a pretty confident, extroverted person, but I got really quite emotional when I saw the image back that Kate had shared with me. And I think it's because, again,

we are so used to seeing ourselves in a filtered way. And having the ability to curate and control what we look like in the public domain, It felt really exposing and vulnerable to suddenly not just have no makeup on, but then to have that photograph for everyone to see. So when Kate showed me the image, yeah, I felt really, really vulnerable, but beautiful at the same time because it was the first time I'd been able to see myself in that unfiltered way. And that was quite a special moment for me.

It's so interesting, isn't it, Kate? Because you've tapped into something. Because even whilst we're having this conversation, I'm very aware all of a sudden that I've got no. makeup on and that this is going to probably go on the woman's hour at Instagram. And my job is public facing. And I would never go on telly without makeup, you know, it just wouldn't do that. So as we're having the conversation, I'm like, oh, I feel a bit.

Why have I done this? Why did I just lean into it? So what happens when you suggest to these women? Let's take a picture of you with no makeup on. How hard is it to convince them? And then what do they see when you show them that photo? Yeah, it's been interesting, like a mix of people and emotions, like when they sit in the chair. And I guess that's all I'm asking. Like I love makeup. I think it's got a beautiful

place. Like it's not, this project isn't about that. It's like it's just give me five minutes of your time. Sit in front of the chair without makeup on. Get your photo taken. See if things are coming up for you. And yeah, if they are, then maybe there's, that's a place to start for change if that's what you want. But yeah, I've, I've had lots of women say like all sorts of things. Okay, here's an interesting one that's come in from one of our listeners. I don't, says someone, since my hair fell out during menopause 15 years ago, I have actively avoided the camera even at my son's wedding. Why do some people think photos are a necessary part of life? Kate, what are you trying to do with the photos? What do you want to reveal?

That's interesting. Yeah, I guess at the end of the day, I think having, you know, 1,000 images blown up, like, and you're walking through a gallery and you're staring at them from all walks of life, like women from everywhere, that will be powerful in itself. I think those images will just speak for themselves. But yeah, it's going to be fun. So tell me more about what the ambition is from this project. Where do you want to take it? I guess everywhere we're starting in Oz, then, yeah, I would love to, you know, reach people like Kim Kardashian. I'd love to reach ladies in the Amazon. I would love to, like, just, I want this to be a household thing, and I want to go way beyond a thousand. I think I can get to 10,000. I reckon we could shoot for the

stars, go to a million. And yeah, I just want women to know that, you know, the way that they look in a photo or, like, it doesn't change your value. Your value comes from within, your, you're beauty comes from your passions, your energy, the way you live your life. Also, who's setting the beauty standards? Like, what are we trying to, what are we aiming for? You take pictures of surfers. I see women who surfers being incredibly powerful. You know, generally women in sport, it's about their power and their skills.

And it's so wonderful to see women in sport. So, I mean, you'd imagine that there's not much makeup involved in surfer. women or is there, am I mistaken? Like sometimes, like I've had, I've shot a lot of campaigns and yeah, we will have makeup artists like on beaches, which was something that I didn't sit well with me, actually, to be honest. But, yeah, like shooting women in their natural environments has always been something that I've been hugely passionate about.

And I guess now I'm finally stepping into like what I think I'm here to do. And yeah, it's like this has come from. you know, me being a photographer in the serp industry. But yeah, I think from that world, I've seen a lot and I've learned a lot. And I'm like, we need to do something about this. So I'm giving it a crack. Keep doing it. How do you get women to relax? Because I think that being a photographer capturing the essence of somebody is such as super skill. But it is about the relationship with the person taking the photo, isn't that? Yes. And I guess like I'm pretty happy, go lucky. I'm pretty relaxed person myself. So yeah, I just get them to.

to chill out, have a smile, maybe crack a joke or something. And yeah, that's kind of when I get the best photos. And, you know, I've done that in the campaigns. It was always like when the model would fall out of the pose. I'm like, that's the moment, you know. It's not the pose. Like, why are we posing? We don't need a pose.

Just be yourself. Yeah. Alexis, has going through this experience in having this photograph taken, changed how you now present yourself on social media. It's certainly illuminated. for me how uncomfortable I was with being unfiltered and how uncomfortable I felt feeling or showing up as my real self, particularly on social media platforms where we're always staring back at ourselves, but it's always got a filter. So for me, it's just been an opportunity to kind of reconnect with

what I value as well. And for me, that's really about feeling myself in all different contexts and online for me is certainly one of them. So it's really inspired me and encouraged me to keep showing up as my full self, unfiltered and real, and hopefully building this momentum of Kate's incredible project for encouraging other women to do the same. Thanks to both Kate Myers and Alexis Zana. And if you want to take part, you can check out Kate's Laugh-Liflines project online. We also discussed this topic in even greater depth

in our spin-off series, The Woman's Hour Guide to Life. So check out our episode, Love Your Face, whatever your age, you can find it online. Next, Sarah Hadland will be a familiar face to many of us having played numerous roles over the years, but she's best known for her role as Stevie in the BAFTA-nominated sitcom Miranda. Sarah is currently starring in the West End production of The Truth, a fast-paced comedy of spiraling infidelity and deception. She plays Alice, a married woman embroiled in an affair with her husband's best friend, setting off a chain of increasingly complicated lies and duplicity.

Sarah joined Noola in the Woman's Hour studio and they started by discussing the opening scene which finds Alice and her lover, played by Stephen Mangan, in bed together. And that's where we begin. That's where we begin. And I think that it appears that it's quite straightforward. This is a farce about infidelity.

But as the play unraveled over the course of seven scenes, you start to realise that nothing is as it seems. Everything is much more complicated. Who is lying? Who is telling the truth? Right until hopefully the very last second of the play, the audience are wrong-footed. And it's really lovely listening to that backstage because you can hear...

It's fascinating, actually. Women and men react at different points to different things. It's generally the women that catch on faster to the end of the play, which is so fascinating. You can hear a sort of, ooh. Oh, yeah, I should have asked my husband exactly. Then now I was sitting between two men. Oh, okay.

And did you find that the men and women reacted to different things? I think I was so gripped by it. If I'm completely honest, that definitely we were laughing so heartily. Well, you know, I threw it out to my listeners. One of the messages that came in there recently divorced a serial cheater as a husband and is furious about this, you know,

this thought that could ever withholding the truth be a kinder way of behaving. Well, I mean, this is what the play is all about. What does each individual person think is the truth? For them, for their partner, within a relationship. And certainly I know people who have been in relationships where they know a person is cheating and they are kind of okay with it. But it's, and equally, you know, people that are like, well, I would want to know.

But it also, the bigger question is just about truth in general. What do we consider, oh, well, that's a little white lie. I mean, I have a small child and there is obviously the conversations about lying and what is a little white lie. Like you don't want your child if somebody says, do I look nice in this? And your child say, no, that looks horrible. You look awful. I mean, they might say that to you.

you don't, you want, so what are you saying there when you say, oh, well, that's not a very nice thing to say. And so that already begins that. And in fact, I've often had my, I'm a single working mum and I bring my child into the theatre sometimes with me. And, you know, they ask about the play. And I say, well, it's a grown up play. It's not for children. And what is it about? And I say, well, it's about people telling fibs. And it's really interesting that, you know, then your child might say, oh, but you said, I mean, I famously said you couldn't get you YouTube on our TV. And then they found out you could, Mommy, you've told a massive lie. You're a liar and you're like, well, yeah, I did. So it's complicated. And then that grows,

doesn't it, as you become an adult as to the lies become more impactful. And yeah, I suppose it's the boundaries and the lines. I mean, I mentioned this line by Michelle, played by Stephen Mangon, which is if everyone started telling the truth tomorrow, there would hardly be a couple left. It will be the end of civilization. Yeah, I mean, it's, it's, yeah, what human being walking this earth can say that they've never lied and that they've never lied to their partner, even on some, on some small. The honesty within a relationship.

Yeah. I mean, it's like sometimes if you've sort of, you know, said, or do you think they're attractive? It's almost like a test question, isn't it? Either way, to a man or a woman or whoever your partner is, it is a bit of a test, you know, what's the right answer if you say, oh, yeah, they're gorgeous. Oh, right. So you think they're gorgeous. What do you say?

It can start with little things like that where you might say, oh, no, no, you're the most. And then it can become much bigger things. But I think that's an interesting aspect that you bring up there because within this play as well, there is so much of testing the couple to see what they know or what they don't know instead of just coming straight out and saying it.

It's kind of a form of passive aggression. Yeah, absolutely. And the way that also, I think, I think when you're, there are so many elements involved in a relationship. And I think when lust is involved, you can kind of, certainly for my character, Alice, there are moments when she's so wrapped up in Michelle that he's talking absolute nonsense. But in the moment, she's so kind of confused and is in love with him and having this physical relationship that she can't, she's kind of thinking, is that right?

I don't know. She's also not being truthful to her partner. So she's in this quagmire of she doesn't know which way is up anymore. So when he's talking nonsense to her, she's thinking maybe it's right. And then later in the play, she just definitely, in the words of Love Island, I've definitely got the ick. I look at him and I think, what was I doing with you? The scales fall away. Yeah, and you kind of think you're an absolute shambles of a human being.

What was I doing? And, you know, what goes on behind closed doors, I suppose, nobody knows. Oh, I think that is also the appeal of the play. And it's part of, like I say, I was drawn to this couple arguing. I love saying people argue because we don't. We so rarely, rarely see what really goes on in relationships. We're all guilty of it and social media has made it ten times worse that we post these pictures going, going for dinner with this one, a heart emoji.

And then you might know that couple in real life and think, well, I know that he's having an affair. She hates him. But they're still putting out this having a dinner with this one. And you think, oh, what a load of... But we all do it. And there is, of course, great comedy in that as well. Yes. You have played, as I mentioned, a wide variety of Alice here.

but people know you as Stevie in Miranda. That was 2009 to 2015, so a long time to be playing a character. I was thinking as well, you need to take up space on stage as you do. And with comedy, some people might say that humor is a shield, that you can kind of hide behind it. But in another way playing comedy, you're really putting all your vulnerabilities out there. Like in a physical way, I know Miranda was like six foot one. I think you're about...

Five foot one. Five quarter. Although I might be shrinking, so maybe I have five foot. I stick out of here, you'll be grand. But you know the importance of visual comedy there. But I'm just wondering about you, the thought of taking up space or how you take up space as a woman. I think that it's really interesting that I never, ever have thought of myself as being small. And I think certainly when I was little, even littler, I think my parents raised two.

I have an older sister who is three years older than me. We were certainly raised that we could sort of do anything and we were raised to be very confident young women. And I think that makes you kind of feel like, well, I have a voice and I'm going to, you know, go out to the world and do my thing. And I think that I've never considered myself to sort of be little. And I think I've probably got quite a big personality. So I think, yeah, it's not something that ever really crosses my mind.

I saw a piece by Emma Beddington today in the garage and we said, are middle-aged women really invisible? I see them everywhere. Do you know what's really interesting is after doing Strictly, I went into Strictly Come Dancing thinking, not really thinking I was the flag bearer for older women. Again, not really thinking I was 53 when I did it. But as Shirley Ballas reminded everybody every week,

ladies and gentlemen, this young lady is 53 years old. That's five and a three, 53, seven years she'll be 60. I mean, I got told that every week. And I became constantly middle-aged women coming up to me and saying, you're really making us think we can do things. And that was a really big moment when I thought, God, yeah, I am. I'm middle-aged now. And that made me feel even more like, right, I want to do everything and be really out there.

Because, yeah, you know, why shouldn't we be? And if anything, as you get older, you have a lot more to say. You've got life experience. You care a lot less. You think, well, you know, I think there was definitely a time as a young, woman where I remember people say, you mustn't do this. You know, in having a career in show business, you must be very careful what you do and you mustn't do this and you mustn't take this job.

And you get old, do you think it doesn't matter. You know, just do what you want. Do what you want to do. Sarah Hadland talking to Nula there. And the truth is on at the Apollo Theatre in London's West End until the 12th of September. That's it from me on Monday's program, Summer Stargazing. Physicist Dr Emma Chapman will be here to tell us about meteor. showers and a partial solar eclipse. And as English heritage warns that sending postcards could

become a distant memory, what are the innovative ways women are using to communicate via snail mail? Join Nula at 10am on Monday and enjoy the rest of your weekend. That's all for today's Woman's Hour. Join us again next time. This cultural life from BBC Radio 4. I will never go into anything so deep like that again. The world's leading artistic figures reveal their creative influences. Disobey, disagree, disavow. I'm John Wilson. And my recent guests have included the scopter Anish Kapoor, photographer Annie Leibovitz, the actor, Kristen Scott Thomas. It has made me good at telling stories about people have a secret suffering. And former children's laureate Frank Cottrell-Boyce.

If art's got one function, it's to point to what's wonderful and say, look, this is your world. It's insane. Listen to this cultural life on BBC Sounds. How did a boycott Jimmy become a billionaire from posting videos? On good, bad billionaire. We're going to be a bit. find out how the world's most popular YouTuber, Mr. Beast, made his fortune. He's buried himself in a coffin for days. Counted to 100,000 on camera. And even recreated squid games, all in an attempt to go viral on the internet. But it all started when he gave a homeless man $10,000. So is he a philanthropist reshaping capitalism? Or is he just the king of the attention economy? Find out on good, bad

billionaire. Listen on BBC.com or wherever you get your podcasts.