Woman's Hour - Weekend Woman's Hour: Author Alex O'Brien on what playing poker can teach you, Maternity care & Sprinter Bianca Williams

Episode Date: November 4, 2023

This week, the Maternity Safety Alliance group has called for a full statutory public inquiry into maternity safety in England. They joined Jess to explain why they’re calling for this inquiry as did Presenter Krupa Padhy, who has produced a documentary on Radio 4 which investigates this issue. Writer and comedian Alison Larkin avoided love most of her adult life but in her 50s, she found true love for the first time with an Indian climate scientist. Then he died. Alison joins Krupa to tell her all about her new show based on this experience, Grief…Comedy at the Soho Theatre.British sprinter Bianca Williams has had lots of success in Athletics competitions for almost a decade but in recent weeks it has been an investigation into an incident which happened three years ago that has put her back into the news. She joins Krupa to discuss her stop and search ordeal.Singer-songwriter and cellist Ayanna Witter-Johnson has collaborated with a prestigious range of artists from Andrea Bocelli to Anoushka Shankar. She has now joined forces with London Symphony Orchestra Percussion Ensemble to create a new album, Ocean Floor. She joins Anita to discuss it.Have you ever played poker? Did you think about how playing it could influence your life decisions? Science writer and poker player Alex O’Brien has written a new book, The Truth Detective, which explores how the game's rules and strategies help us to better navigate the world and make better choices. She spoke to Jess about the life lessons she’s learned from playing – and why she’s teaching her daughter.Presenter: Anita Rani Producer: Claire Fox

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.

Hello and welcome to Weekend Woman's Hour, where we treat you to the highlights of the past week. Coming up, have you ever thought about the life lessons you might learn from playing poker? It exposes you to failing. You know, the thing about poker is you can hold the best hand, a pocket pair of aces, and still lose. Because you have to make the best hand with the cards that fall on the board. Author and poker player Alex O'Brien tells us how the famous card game has helped her navigate real life situations. Plus we hear from comedian Alison Larkin about what it's like to find true love in your 50s. But first, this week a group of families who've been affected by failures in NHS maternity care, including bereaved parents and grandparents, called for a full statutory public inquiry into maternity safety in England.

The Maternity Safety Alliance group argues that despite several reviews into maternity services, too much avoidable harm continues to devastate lives. They say fundamental reform is needed. Presenter Krupa Padi has produced a documentary on Radio 4 which investigates this issue. She's brought her own personal story to the investigation, How Safe is Maternity Care? Her baby died 10 years ago in April 2013 after mistakes were made during her childbirth. She stepped over to the other side of the mic and spoke to Jess alongside Emily Barley, one of the parents from the Maternity Safety Alliance and whose baby Beatrice died during labour last year in May 2022. Emily began by explaining why they're calling for this public inquiry. This is about stopping what happened to us and our babies

from happening to other families. We've got this dire situation now in NHS maternity where more mums and babies are dying. We've got babies suffering life-changing brain injuries, loads of other kinds of harms to mums, birth injuries, psychological injuries that aren't even counted. And then the cost of all of this is just eye-watering. Last year alone, there was 2.6 billion, that's billion, paid out in compensation to families because of this harm and because of

the effect that it's had on their lives. Well, definitely come to those figures because that is an eye-wateringly high number isn't it? I wonder how this inquiry that you're calling for will be different to the others as I mentioned just a couple of weeks ago on this program on Women's Hour we discussed the Care Quality Commission's report into maternity units and of course there was that massive review the Ockenden review back in 2020, they all made recommendations of what should happen. Why will this inquiry be different, do you think? So they were local investigations into what happened in particular in HS Trusts. And while they were really useful and came up with findings

that were so important, they were quite limited in scope. They only looked at part of the problem. And at the same time, they haven't had the impact that we would all have hoped for and instead what they found is the same failings over and over again so these investigations have taken place years apart and found the same things um so and and i think part of the reason for that is that it's not just what's happening in hospitals that's the problem there's a much wider systemic problem. We've got regulators that are failing so badly that families who are living through hell are having to raise the alarm. We've got failing governance.

The way adverse events are learned from, just it's not real learning, it's not making any change. And then I think there's also this attitude at all levels through the NHS that kind of treats this kind of avoidable harm, including deaths, as though it's inevitable. But it's not inevitable. And we should have a system that treats every baby as precious and every baby that can and should live does live. And that's why we're calling for this national public inquiry we think that it's all just so broken that we need a whole system analysis yeah of course and I'm sure the NHS would push back on some of what you said there because they aren't here right now but I do appreciate what you're

saying in that we need you feel that we need a broader scope in looking at this issue but I do remember the Ockendon review although local did widen its findings to make sure that it was nationwide recommendations. Now, Emily, you mentioned the figures. I want to just focus on that for the moment, because as you've said in many of the interviews that are involved, because so much is being spent by the NHS on payouts to families whose babies have died or been injured. So talk me through the numbers that you found and where you've got those figures from. So they come from NHS Resolution, which is an organisation that is set up specifically to deal with clinical injury that's through negligence, which, I mean, that on its own just seems insane to me that we have to have a whole separate branch of the NHS just to deal with litigation because of all the harm that's been caused.

The figures are huge. I think the bulk of them are made up of babies who suffer a brain injury at birth and then have lifelong care needs. But then it also does cover um the psychological injury and other other losses that families suffer when their baby dies and as well other kinds of avoidable harm mums who suffer physical injuries there's just so much um and it makes up the end so the entire nhs NHS bill for negligence and compensation. Almost two thirds of it comes from maternity. So we've got this specific area of the NHS that is doing particularly badly.

Yeah. Krupa, I'd like to bring you in now because you decided to make this documentary and you brought in your own experience of maternity failures. It must have been very difficult going back to such a traumatic time in your life. It was. And well, first of all, Emily, it's great to hear from you. I commend what you're doing and I'm so sorry for what you and your family are about to go through. I wish 10 years on we weren't hearing stories like this and that's in part one of the reasons why I wanted to make this I knew it was going to be challenging from the outset um together with uh producer Caitlin Smith we'd been discussing whether or not it's the right time but I realized there's never a right time to do a documentary like this, because

something like this doesn't leave you. It changes, how you feel about it changes. And I also knew one thing, as a journalist, I'm in a privileged position, I always ask people to be vulnerable with me, I ask people to be authentic, to share the most fragile parts of their experiences. And sometimes, even though we don't want to be the story, we as journalists become the story. And I just hope that someone listening to the documentary, which goes out this evening, might feel a bit more empowered as a result of what they've heard.

Because there is so much that I wish I had known about my rights, about questions I can ask that I didn't know about and that I wish I had known about my rights, about questions I can ask that I didn't know about and that I wish I had known about. What were those things? My rights, my rights to a C-section, my rights to access to my records. I mean, it fundamentally comes down to being heard, as you were saying in your introduction. I mean, it goes back to the multiple flaws that were made during my labour, and there were countless errors made in my labour. And in all of those, I felt disempowered. I didn't have the knowledge. I mean, I'll go right back to the beginning. I was induced at 41 weeks because my amniotic fluid was low. And I was by

default told I was going to have an induction. I was 29 when I fell pregnant with Elora, I was healthy, she was healthy. And I naively just accepted what I was told. And I was told by the doctor, you're going to have an induction, not knowing that actually I could have asked whether I could have a C-section. And I think that was a fundamental flaw. I mean, I didn't realize, you know, I'm a petite lady. Elora was a big baby. All these factors didn't come into it. I blindly just said, OK, doctor knows best. I'm going to have an induction. Thereafter, it just went downhill, really. I was induced. I hypercontracted, which is when you have too many contractions during a short period of time. I wasn't listened to on multiple occasions. I was told I was being dramatic. And then

multiple failings, the CTG, the heart rate readings were incorrectly read at multiple times i developed a fever which subsequently turned into sepsis again that wasn't recognized and this went on for 36 hours um until i um delivered her there was a full sex delivery which went wrong which left a bleed to laura's brain and then a very delayed C-section. Fundamentally, it all came down to not being listened to, not knowing that it is my right to ask for a C-section at any stage. I was granted a C-section about 24 hours in by the consultant who was on call. But the doctor who I was seeing never came back to tell me that. Why not?

She didn't hand over that information. She clocked off. She clocked off her shift. And she did not hand over that information to the night team. I was seen by so many members of staff that evening. I've lost count. I can remember a few faces, but the rest is just a blur. 36 hours of labor, a countless number of team members trying to help me, but no communication, not listening to me and not listening to one another.

Now, I just want to read this statement, Krupa, from Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust. We asked them for a statement and they've said this. Words cannot express the sadness we feel about the loss of Krupa's baby Allura in 2013. We are so sorry we did not provide the care that Krupa and her family should have received. We recognise how difficult it must be for her to share her story and feel privileged to have the opportunity to discuss improvements in maternity care with her. Over the past 10 years we have transformed our team working and culture, one of the key issues that Krupa identified. We've also put much better training and safety

processes in place, increased staffing levels and increased our focus on continuity of care, enabling more women to have the same small team throughout their pregnancy, delivery and postnatal care. The views and voices of our family have been key to these developments and continue to drive improvement and now emily if you would like to share could you tell us about beatrice and your experience from may 2022 yeah so beatrice was a healthy full-term baby she's absolutely perfect when she was born she was just beautiful um Beatrice died during labor because of another series of very very basic failings and I think what people need to understand is that for a baby to die a lot has to happen a lot has to go wrong

a lot of really basic things um so in our case, I also hypercontracted. That's one of the similarities with Krupa's story. I raised concerns and then I begged for help. And I was just met with kind of shrugs and literal eye rolls. I wasn't listened to. I felt as though I was judged for being a bit of a drama queen. You know, I was a first time mum who didn't know what was going on. And yeah, I was ignored. When we finally did have monitoring of Beatrice's heart, it showed that she was struggling and then

that she was dying. And at the point where we should have been rushed into theatre for an emergency cesarean it just didn't happen and there was a lot of delay and faffing around and and kind of it's hard to understand I had in our case I had sort of three midwives and two doctors in the room just standing around not really doing anything not recognising the emergency. And then she was dead. And she was born a couple of hours later. I gave birth to her in the pool, in the birthing pool. And it's so difficult to describe because it was the best moment of my life, meeting my baby.

She was incredible. But it was the worst moment as well because she was dead. I'm so sorry that happened to you Emily. Thank you for sharing. Thank you. We do have a statement as well from Barnsley Hospital in regards to your case Emily and they said we are deeply sorry for the loss of Beatrice and we have met with Emily to apologise. We immediately recognised that this tragic event should not have happened and we reported it to Healthcare Safety Investigation Branch. We have fully cooperated with their independent investigation

and we entirely accept the findings and the recommendations which we are now implementing. Like other maternity units, we are constantly striving to make our services better and safer. All NHS trusts are required to report certain cases to the HSIB, who provide an independent review and recommendations which we implement. Each case is unique and provides specific and distinct learning points that allow the service to make progressive improvements. Emily, there'll be many women listening to this that might be horrified at what they're hearing and the terrible experiences that some women have had. What

advice would you give to women to empower them, to make them feel confident in giving birth it's really difficult because the system isn't safe and in an unsafe system there isn't anything sadly if i'm honest with you isn't anything that an individual woman can do you're in such a vulnerable position it is not in your power to do that i know that if i have another baby I will have an elective cesarean for me that seems like the only way to avoid the lottery of going into spontaneous birth but the the only other advice I could give really is to trust your instincts and question everything I regret and will regret to the end of my days ever trusting the people who were there to look after me because they didn't yeah oh i think that's something that we would all do in that vulnerable

state is trust the expert what would you like to see happen next emily so obviously we want this um full statutory national public inquiry so that we can have a whole system analysis um and and figure out what's broken how to fix it and why it hasn't, why all of the other attempts to fix it haven't worked before. But fundamentally what that needs to translate into is listening to women and implementing the clinical best practice that we already understand. We know how to deliver babies safely. And for some reason, it's not happening. That's what we need to find out. baby is going to be just perfect. If you are pregnant or expecting or hoping to get pregnant, trust that your baby will be perfect, but be empowered with the information you need to ask the right questions. Presenter Krupa Padi speaking to Jess alongside Emily Barley from the Maternity Safety Alliance. A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said,

every parent deserves to feel confident in the care they and their baby receive. And we welcome the CQC's commitment to monitoring those trusts that are not providing an adequate standard to ensure improvements are made. Nationally, we've invested £165 million a year since 2021 to grow the maternity workforce and improve neonatal services. And we're promoting careers in midwifery by increasing training places by up to 3,650 over the past four years. And you can listen back to Krupa's File on 4 documentary How Safe is Maternity Care? on BBC Radio 4 tomorrow at 5pm

and can catch up with it on BBC Sounds. Next, known on both sides of the Atlantic as the English-American, the writer and comedian Alison Larkin is also the award-winning narrator of more than 250 audiobooks, including the complete novels of Jane Austen. Alison had avoided love for most of her adult life. However, in her 50s, she found true love for the first time with an Indian climate scientist who had also immigrated to the US. Then he died. After 30 years living in the United States, Alison is currently in the UK to perform her one-woman show, Grief, a comedy, which opens at the Soho Theatre in London

on Monday. She began by telling Krupa about her love story. I had avoided love all my life, I think, because I was adopted. And a lot of people who are adopted do what I did, which is to, well, the key to dealing with the fear of abandonment is to date people you don't like. So if they do leave you, it doesn't matter. So I had thought, OK, love is not really going to be for me. I had early childhood abandonment and twin loss, which, according to adoption psychology, meant that I was doomed. So I sort of gave up on it. I married a very nice man who didn't speak for 20 years. I lost all our money. I found myself on my own in the middle of the countryside with two children. I raised them, but supporting them by narrating Jane Austen and Charlotte Bronte. And then when they went to college, a chap who talked about himself for three hours straight and then told me what a great conversationalist I am. And then I met another guy who literally had scrambled egg in his beard. And I thought, this isn't for me either.

And then I met Bima, who was the same age as me a little bit younger and for the first time in my life I fell truly in love and I'd always wondered what it was like yeah and I found out you know I used to say we can't be in love because there's no friction and we don't have to negotiate and he's too easy I know it's his macro and it was it was an amazing gift and I had a year and a half with him and I had quit comedy I'd quit writing he and I were off to India and America and England and then he died very suddenly after a perfect, perfect day. And I found myself in the pandemic on my own with the cat and the dog. And I remember that I had processed finding my all-American birth mother with my novel, The English American. And I had been friends with Archbishop Desmond Tutu years before and when I

met him years before we cracked each other up because I did a Margaret Thatcher impression and the two of us were the master of impressions as we are learning in this very short segment sorry sorry yeah no I love it so we'll keep it going so what happened was he had said to me, I want you to remember something. I can't control what happens to me, but I can control how I respond to it. Flip forward 15 years and my beloved Beamer died. And I remembered what he said. And our mutual friend said, you've got to tell him what happened. And I did.

And he then started writing me emails. And he said, Alison, you've got to do another what happened. And I did. And he then started writing me emails. And he said, Alison, you've got to do another show. You've got to do a comedy, write songs, write a book, tell the story. Because I found after he died, that instead of wanting to hide under the bed and never come out again. I wanted to live life and love more fully than ever before. So I had avoided love for 50 years because I was afraid of the worst happening. And then when the worst did happen, I found I had this deep sense of joy, and I still do.

So I wrote a show, and I'm doing it at the Soho Theatre on Monday and Wednesday you are so invigorated you're you're you're beaming and I can see just how much love you have for Beamer well when somebody you love dies the body dies but the love doesn't and so it's still there and I also think that when people die there's a shift in energy but I think if you're open to it you can remain connected and so it's been an extraordinary journey and but there's a lot of humor because he was so funny and I just wanted to share with people that you know don't be frightened of love because even if the worst happens and if it can happen to me and I can be okay then you can too and I think we get to choose how we spend every day and and the other thing was just the message I got from it was don't waste your time on anything that doesn't

matter because it could all be gone tomorrow so there's been this extraordinary journey for me and I'm really excited to be sharing it with audiences and it's wonderful for you to be sharing with us here on Women's Hour Jackie has said I have in the last five months reconnected with my first love we are 65 and 66 respectively we met at 17 and we were in love but circumstances and indecision separated us at 21 we are now both widowed with five grown-up children we reconnected by email and met two months later it's been amazing the feelings are still there and our awareness of the fragility of life has made it all the more wonderful and we are planning to marry as soon as we logistically

can so with mature spectacles on it can can still be rose-tinted. That's beautiful. You know what? I loved, I was listening to what Jill and Hilary. Yeah. And I thought, yes, I know. And when you're older and you have raised your children, you want different things.

And you're actually able as a woman to say, well, who am I now? And often you're very different from how you were as a young woman. And also as an older woman, at least in my case, I can say no. So with the online dating, there's a lot of no, thank you very much. No, no, no, no, no. Which I think, by the way, that online dating is a really good thing because you can be intentional about it. And I'm absolutely thrilled to hear this about these two women and it gives me hope that maybe again one day I was going to say the hope of finding love again may I I'm sure I will but I feel like I have to complete this show and there's also a book coming out next year first yeah and once that's done perhaps he'll show up you know

we've been talking about love for the past seven, eight minutes. I need to talk about the actual show. Grief and comedy. You don't associate the two with one another. But you've said that when it comes to a serious subject matter, you say people need to be laughing 65% of the time. How do you make that happen? Well, it's true that if you want to tell people the truth, you make them laugh first or they'll kill you. And I just, I have a great sense of humor and Bima did as well. And he was so funny. And so I've remembered a lot of our conversations and there's just a lot of humor in it. And I think there's something ironically funny about spending a lifetime avoiding love because

you're afraid of it, then the worst happening and then finding that you want to live more fully than ever before. That is, it's joyful. And one thing I can say is that people who come will feel a lot better when they leave from when they came in. It's not a downer. Yeah. I don't think loss has to be. That doesn't mean you're in denial. I think I got very lucky during the pandemic. I had no choice but to grieve him solo for a long time. But once that period was over, there was this extraordinary energy and it's still there and it was oh my goodness this life is so precious don't waste it and so if you meet a guy online and you don't really like him nope next that's what I would say yeah and I want to rewind Desmond Tutu how on earth did you meet

Desmond Tutu I believe you've done many impersonations for him. I would never do him. Not of him for me. No. But he, you know, I met him because I was, a friend of mine called Karen Hayes was making a documentary about him. And she invited me to dinner, to a lunch in New York. And he was sitting at the end of the table. And there were these two very impressive young men talking about themselves.

And I'm right at the end of the table. And suddenly Tutu stops the conversation. And he says, I did not win the Nobel Peace Prize to listen to you two talking about yourselves because you think I might be good for your career while you completely ignore the young woman at the end of the table. Alison, tell us about you. And I said, well, I was adopted.

I found my birth parents in America and now I'm a stand-up comic and he said did you have a good adoption and and I said well yes I got very lucky but then again if I'd been married to uh but then again if I'd been adopted by Mia Farrow today I could be married to Woody Allen and he cracked up and then asked me to join him for two days and he would make me sit opposite him because I would become Margaret Thatcher and he of course was Desmond Tutu because he was Desmond Tutu. And we'd have these political discussions

and we just were on the same... Role play. He was role play. He needed a little help. But we had a blast and we got on, same sense of humour and then that was how I met him. And that's how the seeds of this grief for comedy were planted. Yes.

And it was him really pushing me. I said, I don't really want to write again. He said, no, you have to. Because most people would condemn themselves to a life of despair after this happening. But you have found a way to find the joy in the midst of the suffering. And this is something the world needs right now and you can't say no to Archbishop Desmond Tutu so I didn't. Alison Larkin there Carrie from Lancashire got in touch with us about this and said my husband and I

met five years ago at the ages of 50 and 54 respectively we married after two years and I have never felt so loved. We're having the time of our lives. I've been in relationships in the past and have children, but I've never felt like this. He is just perfect for me and I am perfect for him. Still to come on the programme, would you teach your daughter how to play poker? We hear from author Alex O'Brien on why she has and composer and cellist Ayanna Witter-Johnson tells us about her brand new album. 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 daily podcast for free via the Woman's Hour website. Now, Bianca Williams is the British sprinter who's had success in the World Athletics Championships this year, the European Championships in 2018 and 2016, and more recently a gold medal at the Commonwealth Games held in Birmingham. But in recent weeks, it's been an investigation into an incident which happened three years ago that has put her back into the news. Bianca and her partner, fellow athlete Ricardo dos Santos, were stopped outside their home in London in July 2020. They had their three-month-old baby with them in the car. Both were handcuffed and searched on suspicion of having drugs and weapons. Nothing was found and there were no arrests made. A video of the incident was shared widely online. A police

misconduct hearing was held involving the five officers present. Just over a week ago, that hearing found that two Met officers must be sacked as the stop and search was found to have amounted to gross misconduct. Allegations against three other officers were not proven. The Metropolitan Police said the family had deserved better and apologised to them for their distress. Bianca spoke to Krupa, who began by giving her reaction to the outcome of the hearing.

It's still very much like a bittersweet feeling. It's just, yeah, I'm happy that it was gross misconduct, but there's still more that needs to be done. It was a very traumatic event and still is a traumatic event to me yeah I'm just still trying to like comprehend it all and just yeah it's a lot to take in it's a lot it is a lot can you take us back to what happened yeah we were just on our way home from training um so Zuri was three months old at the time but yeah we'd finished training gone like made our way home and I remember going past Holland Park station and seeing a TSG van there and I said to Ricardo like what's what's that van I've not not seen that one

before or maybe even if I had I just hadn't paid attention to it and um and he said that was a that was the van that stopped me last night, like not long ago. And I was like, oh, wow, that's so unnecessary. And, you know, continued making our way home and we saw another one and I thought, oh, what a coincidence. And, yeah, we made a turn and literally as soon as we made that turn, Ricardo said, yeah, they're going to follow us. So I then looked back and then within seconds they then made that turn

and that's just how it was until we made our stop at home. And I don't know, within seconds they all came out of the car with batons and ready to smash the glass. And it was, yeah, it was really scary. You mentioned the TSG van there. That is the Territorial Support Group and that's a met operations unit which specializes in public orders policing this isn't the first time that your partner had been stopped no not the first time can you expand on that um yeah so he'd been stopped numerous times i i can't remember the number but it's numerous times and he would always call me when he's been stopped and just let me

know just in case um something happened but i never really knew, like, what it, like, maybe I was just a bit, like, naive to the whole situation. Like, he would call me and I'd be like, OK, that's fine. This was your first experience of it? Yeah, my first experience. I hadn't been, you know, pulled over before. Yeah. And then for when it happened and I was with him,

I just thought, oh, my God, like, this is madness. To then be put in handcuffs, to have my son in the car. Yeah, it was... You were shaking. Yeah, yeah. Like yeah like i don't like i don't really like watching the video back i can't watch the video back because it really just brings tears to my eyes because it was like the trauma like hasn't left i feel like i'm always on edge um my anxiety when when i'm in the car with ricardo or just if ricardo's in the car with zuri like he's always through the roof i'm always wondering like are they going to be okay are we going to be okay whenever we've got like a police

car driven past I'm always having to look back and I never had to do that before I was never I never cared enough to do that before but now like it's it's like second nature to me it's second nature but do you think with time that feeling might ever leave you? I doubt it. I don't think so. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The hearing found that the two sacked officers lied about smelling cannabis in the car and said that they had breached their professional standards of police behaviour in relation to honesty and integrity. And you've spoken about the police using the same old excuse about smelling cannabis.

What makes you say that? We had messages from so many people back in 2020 and saying that, yeah, that's what they said to me or the police have always said that. Yeah, it's something that you've heard time and time again. Yeah. Earlier this year, Baroness Dame Louise Casey published a report in the force and said that there was rotten treatment of black people

and the protection of women had been, I quote, thrown out of the window. Women people and the protection of women had been, I quote, thrown out of the window. Women specifically and the treatment of women specifically. What is your assessment of the Metropolitan Police there? That there is like institutional racism and misogyny within the police system. And it's quite scary that we live in a world where people that are supposed to protect us, we actually don't know if they are going to protect us.

You don't feel protected? I don't know. If you asked me this three years ago, I would have said, yeah. Now, I don't know. I don't think so. And you've got a little boy. And in that video, it's clear just how worried you are about him. It's the first thing that comes to your mind. My baby baby you're screaming you must worry for him oh yeah definitely as a black boy growing up in London like bless him he has no idea what how the world is and how scary the world is and I fear for him growing up with him and his friends and you know him like going to school on his own or going out to a party and, I don't know,

I feel like I'm just going to have to be his taxi driver until I feel safe. I feel like he's safe, but I just worry about how it's going to be, how the world's going to be when he grows up. Speaking after the panel's verdict, the Met's Deputy Assistant Commissioner, Matt Ward, said he was confident that the Met can and will learn from the experiences that you went through and that they'll work alongside communities to deliver fair and effective stop and search for all Londoners. That's their statement. Do you believe this will be a learning experience for them?

I'd hope so. I'd really hope so. It's going to take a lot for the public to trust the police anyway. And especially after this, it's going to be you know a massive question mark to see if the police are really gonna you know learn from this i'd hope so i hope they learn from it i want to um talk about the crowdfunding page that's been set up in support of the two officers who were dismissed following that hearing and the page reads every penny will go to support the officers and their families. And it mentions their mortgage payments and bills. And as of this morning, it's exceeded its target of 50,000. It's now at around 130,000 pounds.

What's your reaction to that? What I will say is that everyone has a right to do a crowdfund. But in the circumstances, it's quite shocking, really and truly. The amount of money that's been raised and look like I've seen some of the comments and saying that you know they shouldn't have just like shouldn't have lost their jobs but they lied like the officers lied at the end of the day and there has to be a punishment towards that like we can't accept that in the police force like that shouldn't be allowed so therefore they lost their jobs for that but it just I don't know I'm still shocked by it like I understand people want to help that's that that is fine but the circumstances

and that's been the reaction that these officers have had What reaction have you had since that outcome? I don't know. It's a tough one because I'm glad people can see that they were lying. But it's one where we've gotten so much hate from the officers now losing their jobs. Like we're getting blamed for them losing their jobs when they lied. They were dishonest. In what what way people are saying that I had so many comments saying that like it

wasn't a racist situation why did they lose their jobs because it was clear that it wasn't like racist attack the comments that the trolling has been crazy that That's horrific. Yeah, we were trolled in 2020. Now it's like 10 times worse. Do you regret almost kind of raising what happened in light of all the hate that you're receiving? No. No, because I feel like we have a voice and we're going to use it. And there are so many people

that have been stopped by the police or have been in situations where the police have been unlawful to them and haven't been able to speak up or don't have a voice or just don't have a background of where people can support them or just the financials where you can get a lawyer and take it further. We are doing this to help the next person and to help the people behind us because it's going to happen again, sadly. You had what happened to you back in 2020, clearly traumatic.

And now you've had what happened on Wednesday with the ruling and it's clearly impacted you. You're clearly getting the negativity once again. I want to ask about the mental toll this has taken on you because you are an incredibly successful athlete. How has this impacted you being at the top of your game? When I get to the track, I've really just got to block it out and focus on what I've got to do. And when I get to a competition, I want to be successful. So I've really got to block it out. But it's just when you have your downtime, when you're home, when you're going on Twitter or Instagram or Facebook

and you just see the messages, it's like, oh my gosh, again. I've just really got to block it out because I want to be the best athlete there is out there. And I can't do that with having just keep focusing on the negativity, the negative comments. I can't progress if I keep focusing on that. So I the negative comments I can't I can't progress if I keep focused on that so I really try and block it out as much as I can what is next for you you've got Paris in 2024 is that the ultimate goal it is definitely the ultimate goal um I went

to Rio but I didn't get to run as a part of the the relay and then I missed out on Tokyo due to pregnancy or and having my son so this this time I really want to be in Paris and I think it'll be fun a lot of people talk about how having a baby has impacted their careers it sounds like you're you're smashing it you're smashing your personal best having had your baby which is which is brilliant yeah I couldn't believe it has he been in a massive motivating factor I imagine yeah he's like the best cheerleader. He is amazing. You know, we bring him to the track and he's cheering for everyone. This year, I felt so much stronger, like mentally and physically, that my confidence in athletics has just like gone to the sky.

I just feel incredible. I don't know where I'd be if it wasn't without Zuri. Like, I really don't know where I'd be because, like, he is just showing me that you are able to continue to have a baby and still progress. Bianca Williams there. Singer, songwriter and cellist Ayanna Witter-Johnson graduated with a first class degree in classical composition at the Trinity Laban Silver Award in 2008 and has collaborated with a prestigious range of artists from Andrea Bocelli and Anushka Shankar, Tanitha Nsoni and Akala.

She's now joined forces with the London Symphony Orchestra Percussion Ensemble. Their new album, Ocean Floor, explores stories relating to Ayana's ancestral heritage, culture and identity and blurs the boundaries between chamber music, jazz and soul. I spoke to Ayana and she began by telling me about her new record. Really, it's a celebration of music across the African diaspora. There's elements of classical, gospel, soul, reggae. There are all these flavours that are ultimately music that I adore. I think

it's been a real breath of fresh air because I've been able to throw out them rhythms from West Africa. I used to be in a dance troupe as a three, four year old with my mum, a Ghanaian dance troupe. And there are all these rhythms that I grew up with that I've been able to bring to the ensemble and expand and explore, as well as my songwriting. It's been a real joyous opportunity to write for not only non-pitch percussion but pitched as well for marimba and vibraphone, udu, djembes, piano like a real range of instruments there. Joyous but also what did it do for you personally to be able to explore your identity in this way? Well it gave me the breadth to dig into narratives that I don't ordinarily get to tune into and in particular I was in Jamaica a few years ago

and tragically a young man lost his life at the beach the day I was there. And it got me thinking about what happened in that moment but what also has happened to many of my ancestors during the transatlantic slave trade where lives were thrown overboard, live slaves were thrown overboard into the sea and there's a history of black bodies in the ocean essentially. So the album does explore stories of that nature

and personally in my own family I lost a great grandparent to the sea and as well as this young man so it kind of got me thinking about the value of black life. Yeah, one of the songs where you explain that story Yes, that's the opening, the prologue of the Ocean Floor Suite. So in 1781, there was a slave ship called the Zong, which is a British slave ship that set out from Ghana to Jamaica.

And 130 slaves were thrown overboard. And they said there wasn't enough water on the ship, but actually there was heavy rainfall. And what happened was they claimed compensation when they came back to England. So there was a lot of, I guess, financial gain in the loss of black life at that moment in time. It's a really poignant piece in the album and it makes you just stop in your tracks. I did stop. I was walking and I had to stop and just listen to you telling me this account. And what I then found was the day the young man lost his life at the beach, at that time, there were also children playing and there was someone being baptised in the sea. And it kind of reminded me that there's always a cycle of life.

There is darkness, but at the same time, there's joy. And you just sort of have to open your perspective to see all those things simultaneously, which is why the ensemble was perfect to explore that. I was able to sort of really shift moods. And that's because there's so much to play with, with a percussion ensemble, textures, timbres. And they're phenomenal musicians. How difficult is it, Ayanna? Because you do so much. You combine playing, singing and even percussion at your feet.

Yeah, my foot, my right foot. Yes, tell us. Tell us what, because you people, it's radio, so we'll have to describe it. I have to describe. So I'm standing, I'm holding my cello to the left of me and then I'm singing. And then in my right foot, I am tapping. Imagine like a kick drum pedal that would be in a drum kit. It's attached to a jam block and that gives it a donk, donk kind of sound.

Well, I love it because I've seen you on stage performing with Nathan Sawney. I've seen you on your own. You've name checked all the people that you've worked with because obviously you're in high demand. And you've just produced this exquisite album. I was going to say, who's the album for? But it's for everybody. Yeah. And dedicated to your mum yeah the both pieces that bookend the album are both um to her because she's the one who encouraged me

to learn an instrument and to pursue my creativity and so we must know mum's name hillary cellist ayanna witter johnson there with neil percy on percussion from the lso now have you ever played poker did you think about how playing it could influence your life decisions science writer and poker player alex o'brien has written a new book the truth detective which explores how the game's rules and strategies help us to better navigate the world and make better choices she began by telling jess how she went from science writing to poker playing. Well, actually through another friend who was a poker player and I asked her to show me how to play and it literally blew my mind because, you know, contrary to popular culture,

the game of poker is actually really, really cerebral. It's this multi-dimensional puzzle game. That's how I'd like to explain it. And I absolutely love it. And any strategic game I like to play. And poker has always been this game that boys and men played. And now I'm sitting here learning how to play it and thinking, well, this isn't that difficult. Yeah, that's how I got into it. And then just studied it further and further. And turns out I'm pretty good at it.

Yes, you are. Now, were you attracted at all by the money, the financial sums available that you can win when playing poker? Because you hear about these people winning hundreds of thousands, if not millions of pounds sometimes. There's big money in poker that's true but that wasn't my initial impetus it was more about winning or competing because I'm highly competitive but also what was really attractive to me was that this was a very heavily male dominated game. And as a woman going into this field, proving not with words, with anything, just through skill that I deserve to sit at that table was very, very attractive to me. So it felt like an accomplishment.

Absolutely. And still does every single time. Whilst you're coming at it from an angle of it teaching you about life and teaching you new skills, there are a lot of people who I suppose get caught up in the darker side of playing a game like poker. Someone that might have a gambling addiction, for example. How do you see that issue as a poker player um so of course anything can be addictive and can be taken to an extreme what i'd like to say is um poker has a lot of good benefits that come through playing the game what it does teach you to for you to succeed in the game, it requires you to be self-disciplined and focused. Like in any, I mean, it's not very different to trading.

A lot of traders become poker players, poker traders. So because there's a lot of overlaps there and similarities. But when you look at the new breed of poker players that come into the game, they treat it as a business. They have spreadsheets when they prepare to play online. They have bankroll management, capital allocation. They diversify their exposure. So they will swap percentages of each other. So there'll be a group of players that know each other's skill sets and they'll just take 10% of each other. So there'll be a group of players that know each other's skill sets and they'll just take 10% of each other.

So if they lose, but the other one wins, then they get 10% of their winnings. So they sort of minimize their risk. And it's all about understanding risk. And I'd like to say that to that question. Yeah, I mean, understanding risk is definitely an important skill to learn for life in general, not just in a game. So you speak about poker having helped you in life. How? Tell us, what are the skills you need for poker that have helped you in real life situations?

You know, I'd like to answer that question as a woman. I'm a science writer and sort of analytical thinking and question skills are sort of embedded into my job description. But as a woman, you know, I didn't grow up climbing trees and roughing it out or taking or being encouraged to take risks. I was sort of cocooned a little bit. So what it taught me was, again, self-discipline and focus, but also self-confidence, or my fairly self-confident, but the confidence level as I have now got around money, around finance, around risk is a lot higher. Also, fearlessness. I feel that I have learned how to deal with this idea of uncertainty because as a society we've been conditioned to fear that what we do not know and

and with playing poker you learn how to quantify the uncertainty, the unknown. It has a number and then you allocate a risk number to it. And you do that repeatedly. And I think one of your listeners was writing in about the repetition of this. And that is what poker does. It repeatedly exposes you to taking risks, making decisions around money. And also what it also does, it exposes you to failing. You know, the thing about poker is you can hold the best hand, a pocket pair of aces, and still lose because you have to make the best hand with the cards that fall on the

board. So it teaches you that although you can make the right decisions, sometimes it won't work out and you have to make peace with the fact. And how have you applied that to real life then? Give us a real life example. I mean, when it comes to money, when it comes to trying to make decisions, the right decision in the moment, how have you applied that to real life example I mean when it comes to money when it comes to trying to make decisions the right decision in the moment how have you applied that to real life um I think I'm a lot more zen about things um it's it's calmed you out a bit more yeah you get because I'm not result orientated anymore um and you learn that you must um consider keep in mind that it's a process, that the road to success,

success isn't a single point in time or an event. It's a process. And that is not a straight trajectory upwards. So, yeah. It's more about the journey than the destination. Now, I wonder if I'm the only one that thinks this, but when I think poker immediately, I think of mostly men in quite a low lit room, cigar smoke everywhere, male banterception exists. And it's when you go and play tournaments, particularly, these are highly focused, highly determined players, especially at the higher end, high stakes players. So now it's a sport. It's a mind sport. It really challenges you in ways, in so many ways, in terms of emotional resilience, you know, strategic thinking. Yeah, it's that in the movies, but not in real life.

And has being a woman in that male dominated space been a detriment to your poker game or is it a benefit or is it somewhere in between maybe um somewhere in between i'm not going to lie misogyny and sexism still exists really is it is it quite in your face even though i'm fairly known known now in the poker world there's still the odd player that uh feels entitled to that space and does not like me at the table. Simply because you're a woman? Simply because of my gender, yes. And then what they will do, though, is they will play really badly because they're so keen to beat me. And I'll, again, poker also teaches you to be patient

and I'll bide my time and then take every single chip they have. That is the best way to beat these men. And that must be such a satisfying feeling. It is. And okay, so you've mentioned the negatives there of being quite male dominated, but still you have a daughter. Yes. Teaching her to play poker. Would you be okay with her going into that setting and becoming a player? Yes, absolutely. She's also a chess player and at home we play a lot of board games, strategic games. Really? Do you have a TV? We do. We don't watch TVs.

Really? So your main form of, I suppose, entertainment is... Friday nights at the O'Brien household is get the board games out and then we get a takeaway and then we'll watch a movie together. Okay. But yes, I have taught her how to play purely because she's a girl. She's a little girl. And as any parent will tell you, our fear is, you know, we will never worry, stop worrying about them when they grow up. So I want to give her the tools, the skill sets she needs to battle it out in real life. And I want her to be fearless when it comes to, you know, decision-taking,

when she doesn't know what to do, when I'm not there to guide her. I want her to be absolutely confident pulling up any chair at any table, forget the poker table, but boardroom, you know, the negotiation table, and sit down and know she needs to be there. She has a right to be there. Poker player Alex O'Brien there. That's all for today's Woman's Hour. Join us again next time.

I'm Sarah Trelevan, and for over a year, I've been working on one of the most complex stories I've ever covered. There was somebody out there who was faking pregnancies. I started like heard of.